157	----	DADDY-LONG-LEGS by JEAN WEBSTER Copyright 1912 by The Century Company TO YOU Blue Wednesday The first Wednesday in every month was a Perfectly Awful Day--a day to be awaited with dread, endured with courage and forgotten with haste. Every floor must be spotless, every chair dustless, and every bed without a wrinkle. Ninety-seven squirming little orphans must be scrubbed and combed and buttoned into freshly starched ginghams; and all ninety-seven reminded of their manners, and told to say, 'Yes, sir,' 'No, sir,' whenever a Trustee spoke. It was a distressing time; and poor Jerusha Abbott, being the oldest orphan, had to bear the brunt of it. But this particular first Wednesday, like its predecessors, finally dragged itself to a close. Jerusha escaped from the pantry where she had been making sandwiches for the asylum's guests, and turned upstairs to accomplish her regular work. Her special care was room F, where eleven little tots, from four to seven, occupied eleven little cots set in a row. Jerusha assembled her charges, straightened their rumpled frocks, wiped their noses, and started them in an orderly and willing line towards the dining-room to engage themselves for a blessed half hour with bread and milk and prune pudding. Then she dropped down on the window seat and leaned throbbing temples against the cool glass. She had been on her feet since five that morning, doing everybody's bidding, scolded and hurried by a nervous matron. Mrs. Lippett, behind the scenes, did not always maintain that calm and pompous dignity with which she faced an audience of Trustees and lady visitors. Jerusha gazed out across a broad stretch of frozen lawn, beyond the tall iron paling that marked the confines of the asylum, down undulating ridges sprinkled with country estates, to the spires of the village rising from the midst of bare trees. The day was ended--quite successfully, so far as she knew. The Trustees and the visiting committee had made their rounds, and read their reports, and drunk their tea, and now were hurrying home to their own cheerful firesides, to forget their bothersome little charges for another month. Jerusha leaned forward watching with curiosity--and a touch of wistfulness--the stream of carriages and automobiles that rolled out of the asylum gates. In imagination she followed first one equipage, then another, to the big houses dotted along the hillside. She pictured herself in a fur coat and a velvet hat trimmed with feathers leaning back in the seat and nonchalantly murmuring 'Home' to the driver. But on the door-sill of her home the picture grew blurred. Jerusha had an imagination--an imagination, Mrs. Lippett told her, that would get her into trouble if she didn't take care--but keen as it was, it could not carry her beyond the front porch of the houses she would enter. Poor, eager, adventurous little Jerusha, in all her seventeen years, had never stepped inside an ordinary house; she could not picture the daily routine of those other human beings who carried on their lives undiscommoded by orphans. Je-ru-sha Ab-bott You are wan-ted In the of-fice, And I think you'd Better hurry up! Tommy Dillon, who had joined the choir, came singing up the stairs and down the corridor, his chant growing louder as he approached room F. Jerusha wrenched herself from the window and refaced the troubles of life. 'Who wants me?' she cut into Tommy's chant with a note of sharp anxiety. Mrs. Lippett in the office, And I think she's mad. Ah-a-men! Tommy piously intoned, but his accent was not entirely malicious. Even the most hardened little orphan felt sympathy for an erring sister who was summoned to the office to face an annoyed matron; and Tommy liked Jerusha even if she did sometimes jerk him by the arm and nearly scrub his nose off. Jerusha went without comment, but with two parallel lines on her brow. What could have gone wrong, she wondered. Were the sandwiches not thin enough? Were there shells in the nut cakes? Had a lady visitor seen the hole in Susie Hawthorn's stocking? Had--O horrors!--one of the cherubic little babes in her own room F 'sauced' a Trustee? The long lower hall had not been lighted, and as she came downstairs, a last Trustee stood, on the point of departure, in the open door that led to the porte-cochere. Jerusha caught only a fleeting impression of the man--and the impression consisted entirely of tallness. He was waving his arm towards an automobile waiting in the curved drive. As it sprang into motion and approached, head on for an instant, the glaring headlights threw his shadow sharply against the wall inside. The shadow pictured grotesquely elongated legs and arms that ran along the floor and up the wall of the corridor. It looked, for all the world, like a huge, wavering daddy-long-legs. Jerusha's anxious frown gave place to quick laughter. She was by nature a sunny soul, and had always snatched the tiniest excuse to be amused. If one could derive any sort of entertainment out of the oppressive fact of a Trustee, it was something unexpected to the good. She advanced to the office quite cheered by the tiny episode, and presented a smiling face to Mrs. Lippett. To her surprise the matron was also, if not exactly smiling, at least appreciably affable; she wore an expression almost as pleasant as the one she donned for visitors. 'Sit down, Jerusha, I have something to say to you.' Jerusha dropped into the nearest chair and waited with a touch of breathlessness. An automobile flashed past the window; Mrs. Lippett glanced after it. 'Did you notice the gentleman who has just gone?' 'I saw his back.' 'He is one of our most affluential Trustees, and has given large sums of money towards the asylum's support. I am not at liberty to mention his name; he expressly stipulated that he was to remain unknown.' Jerusha's eyes widened slightly; she was not accustomed to being summoned to the office to discuss the eccentricities of Trustees with the matron. 'This gentleman has taken an interest in several of our boys. You remember Charles Benton and Henry Freize? They were both sent through college by Mr.--er--this Trustee, and both have repaid with hard work and success the money that was so generously expended. Other payment the gentleman does not wish. Heretofore his philanthropies have been directed solely towards the boys; I have never been able to interest him in the slightest degree in any of the girls in the institution, no matter how deserving. He does not, I may tell you, care for girls.' 'No, ma'am,' Jerusha murmured, since some reply seemed to be expected at this point. 'To-day at the regular meeting, the question of your future was brought up.' Mrs. Lippett allowed a moment of silence to fall, then resumed in a slow, placid manner extremely trying to her hearer's suddenly tightened nerves. 'Usually, as you know, the children are not kept after they are sixteen, but an exception was made in your case. You had finished our school at fourteen, and having done so well in your studies--not always, I must say, in your conduct--it was determined to let you go on in the village high school. Now you are finishing that, and of course the asylum cannot be responsible any longer for your support. As it is, you have had two years more than most.' Mrs. Lippett overlooked the fact that Jerusha had worked hard for her board during those two years, that the convenience of the asylum had come first and her education second; that on days like the present she was kept at home to scrub. 'As I say, the question of your future was brought up and your record was discussed--thoroughly discussed.' Mrs. Lippett brought accusing eyes to bear upon the prisoner in the dock, and the prisoner looked guilty because it seemed to be expected--not because she could remember any strikingly black pages in her record. 'Of course the usual disposition of one in your place would be to put you in a position where you could begin to work, but you have done well in school in certain branches; it seems that your work in English has even been brilliant. Miss Pritchard, who is on our visiting committee, is also on the school board; she has been talking with your rhetoric teacher, and made a speech in your favour. She also read aloud an essay that you had written entitled, "Blue Wednesday".' Jerusha's guilty expression this time was not assumed. 'It seemed to me that you showed little gratitude in holding up to ridicule the institution that has done so much for you. Had you not managed to be funny I doubt if you would have been forgiven. But fortunately for you, Mr.--, that is, the gentleman who has just gone--appears to have an immoderate sense of humour. On the strength of that impertinent paper, he has offered to send you to college.' 'To college?' Jerusha's eyes grew big. Mrs. Lippett nodded. 'He waited to discuss the terms with me. They are unusual. The gentleman, I may say, is erratic. He believes that you have originality, and he is planning to educate you to become a writer.' 'A writer?' Jerusha's mind was numbed. She could only repeat Mrs. Lippett's words. 'That is his wish. Whether anything will come of it, the future will show. He is giving you a very liberal allowance, almost, for a girl who has never had any experience in taking care of money, too liberal. But he planned the matter in detail, and I did not feel free to make any suggestions. You are to remain here through the summer, and Miss Pritchard has kindly offered to superintend your outfit. Your board and tuition will be paid directly to the college, and you will receive in addition during the four years you are there, an allowance of thirty-five dollars a month. This will enable you to enter on the same standing as the other students. The money will be sent to you by the gentleman's private secretary once a month, and in return, you will write a letter of acknowledgment once a month. That is--you are not to thank him for the money; he doesn't care to have that mentioned, but you are to write a letter telling of the progress in your studies and the details of your daily life. Just such a letter as you would write to your parents if they were living. 'These letters will be addressed to Mr. John Smith and will be sent in care of the secretary. The gentleman's name is not John Smith, but he prefers to remain unknown. To you he will never be anything but John Smith. His reason in requiring the letters is that he thinks nothing so fosters facility in literary expression as letter-writing. Since you have no family with whom to correspond, he desires you to write in this way; also, he wishes to keep track of your progress. He will never answer your letters, nor in the slightest particular take any notice of them. He detests letter-writing and does not wish you to become a burden. If any point should ever arise where an answer would seem to be imperative--such as in the event of your being expelled, which I trust will not occur--you may correspond with Mr. Griggs, his secretary. These monthly letters are absolutely obligatory on your part; they are the only payment that Mr. Smith requires, so you must be as punctilious in sending them as though it were a bill that you were paying. I hope that they will always be respectful in tone and will reflect credit on your training. You must remember that you are writing to a Trustee of the John Grier Home.' Jerusha's eyes longingly sought the door. Her head was in a whirl of excitement, and she wished only to escape from Mrs. Lippett's platitudes and think. She rose and took a tentative step backwards. Mrs. Lippett detained her with a gesture; it was an oratorical opportunity not to be slighted. 'I trust that you are properly grateful for this very rare good fortune that has befallen you? Not many girls in your position ever have such an opportunity to rise in the world. You must always remember--' 'I--yes, ma'am, thank you. I think, if that's all, I must go and sew a patch on Freddie Perkins's trousers.' The door closed behind her, and Mrs. Lippett watched it with dropped jaw, her peroration in mid-air. The Letters of Miss Jerusha Abbott to Mr. Daddy-Long-Legs Smith 215 FERGUSSEN HALL 24th September Dear Kind-Trustee-Who-Sends-Orphans-to-College, Here I am! I travelled yesterday for four hours in a train. It's a funny sensation, isn't it? I never rode in one before. College is the biggest, most bewildering place--I get lost whenever I leave my room. I will write you a description later when I'm feeling less muddled; also I will tell you about my lessons. Classes don't begin until Monday morning, and this is Saturday night. But I wanted to write a letter first just to get acquainted. It seems queer to be writing letters to somebody you don't know. It seems queer for me to be writing letters at all--I've never written more than three or four in my life, so please overlook it if these are not a model kind. Before leaving yesterday morning, Mrs. Lippett and I had a very serious talk. She told me how to behave all the rest of my life, and especially how to behave towards the kind gentleman who is doing so much for me. I must take care to be Very Respectful. But how can one be very respectful to a person who wishes to be called John Smith? Why couldn't you have picked out a name with a little personality? I might as well write letters to Dear Hitching-Post or Dear Clothes-Prop. I have been thinking about you a great deal this summer; having somebody take an interest in me after all these years makes me feel as though I had found a sort of family. It seems as though I belonged to somebody now, and it's a very comfortable sensation. I must say, however, that when I think about you, my imagination has very little to work upon. There are just three things that I know: I. You are tall. II. You are rich. III. You hate girls. I suppose I might call you Dear Mr. Girl-Hater. Only that's rather insulting to me. Or Dear Mr. Rich-Man, but that's insulting to you, as though money were the only important thing about you. Besides, being rich is such a very external quality. Maybe you won't stay rich all your life; lots of very clever men get smashed up in Wall Street. But at least you will stay tall all your life! So I've decided to call you Dear Daddy-Long-Legs. I hope you won't mind. It's just a private pet name we won't tell Mrs. Lippett. The ten o'clock bell is going to ring in two minutes. Our day is divided into sections by bells. We eat and sleep and study by bells. It's very enlivening; I feel like a fire horse all of the time. There it goes! Lights out. Good night. Observe with what precision I obey rules--due to my training in the John Grier Home. Yours most respectfully, Jerusha Abbott To Mr. Daddy-Long-Legs Smith 1st October Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I love college and I love you for sending me--I'm very, very happy, and so excited every moment of the time that I can scarcely sleep. You can't imagine how different it is from the John Grier Home. I never dreamed there was such a place in the world. I'm feeling sorry for everybody who isn't a girl and who can't come here; I am sure the college you attended when you were a boy couldn't have been so nice. My room is up in a tower that used to be the contagious ward before they built the new infirmary. There are three other girls on the same floor of the tower--a Senior who wears spectacles and is always asking us please to be a little more quiet, and two Freshmen named Sallie McBride and Julia Rutledge Pendleton. Sallie has red hair and a turn-up nose and is quite friendly; Julia comes from one of the first families in New York and hasn't noticed me yet. They room together and the Senior and I have singles. Usually Freshmen can't get singles; they are very scarce, but I got one without even asking. I suppose the registrar didn't think it would be right to ask a properly brought-up girl to room with a foundling. You see there are advantages! My room is on the north-west corner with two windows and a view. After you've lived in a ward for eighteen years with twenty room-mates, it is restful to be alone. This is the first chance I've ever had to get acquainted with Jerusha Abbott. I think I'm going to like her. Do you think you are? Tuesday They are organizing the Freshman basket-ball team and there's just a chance that I shall get in it. I'm little of course, but terribly quick and wiry and tough. While the others are hopping about in the air, I can dodge under their feet and grab the ball. It's loads of fun practising--out in the athletic field in the afternoon with the trees all red and yellow and the air full of the smell of burning leaves, and everybody laughing and shouting. These are the happiest girls I ever saw--and I am the happiest of all! I meant to write a long letter and tell you all the things I'm learning (Mrs. Lippett said you wanted to know), but 7th hour has just rung, and in ten minutes I'm due at the athletic field in gymnasium clothes. Don't you hope I'll get in the team? Yours always, Jerusha Abbott PS. (9 o'clock.) Sallie McBride just poked her head in at my door. This is what she said: 'I'm so homesick that I simply can't stand it. Do you feel that way?' I smiled a little and said no; I thought I could pull through. At least homesickness is one disease that I've escaped! I never heard of anybody being asylum-sick, did you? 10th October Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Did you ever hear of Michael Angelo? He was a famous artist who lived in Italy in the Middle Ages. Everybody in English Literature seemed to know about him, and the whole class laughed because I thought he was an archangel. He sounds like an archangel, doesn't he? The trouble with college is that you are expected to know such a lot of things you've never learned. It's very embarrassing at times. But now, when the girls talk about things that I never heard of, I just keep still and look them up in the encyclopedia. I made an awful mistake the first day. Somebody mentioned Maurice Maeterlinck, and I asked if she was a Freshman. That joke has gone all over college. But anyway, I'm just as bright in class as any of the others--and brighter than some of them! Do you care to know how I've furnished my room? It's a symphony in brown and yellow. The wall was tinted buff, and I've bought yellow denim curtains and cushions and a mahogany desk (second hand for three dollars) and a rattan chair and a brown rug with an ink spot in the middle. I stand the chair over the spot. The windows are up high; you can't look out from an ordinary seat. But I unscrewed the looking-glass from the back of the bureau, upholstered the top and moved it up against the window. It's just the right height for a window seat. You pull out the drawers like steps and walk up. Very comfortable! Sallie McBride helped me choose the things at the Senior auction. She has lived in a house all her life and knows about furnishing. You can't imagine what fun it is to shop and pay with a real five-dollar bill and get some change--when you've never had more than a few cents in your life. I assure you, Daddy dear, I do appreciate that allowance. Sallie is the most entertaining person in the world--and Julia Rutledge Pendleton the least so. It's queer what a mixture the registrar can make in the matter of room-mates. Sallie thinks everything is funny--even flunking--and Julia is bored at everything. She never makes the slightest effort to be amiable. She believes that if you are a Pendleton, that fact alone admits you to heaven without any further examination. Julia and I were born to be enemies. And now I suppose you've been waiting very impatiently to hear what I am learning? I. Latin: Second Punic war. Hannibal and his forces pitched camp at Lake Trasimenus last night. They prepared an ambuscade for the Romans, and a battle took place at the fourth watch this morning. Romans in retreat. II. French: 24 pages of the Three Musketeers and third conjugation, irregular verbs. III. Geometry: Finished cylinders; now doing cones. IV. English: Studying exposition. My style improves daily in clearness and brevity. V. Physiology: Reached the digestive system. Bile and the pancreas next time. Yours, on the way to being educated, Jerusha Abbott PS. I hope you never touch alcohol, Daddy? It does dreadful things to your liver. Wednesday Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I've changed my name. I'm still 'Jerusha' in the catalogue, but I'm 'Judy' everywhere else. It's really too bad, isn't it, to have to give yourself the only pet name you ever had? I didn't quite make up the Judy though. That's what Freddy Perkins used to call me before he could talk plainly. I wish Mrs. Lippett would use a little more ingenuity about choosing babies' names. She gets the last names out of the telephone book--you'll find Abbott on the first page--and she picks the Christian names up anywhere; she got Jerusha from a tombstone. I've always hated it; but I rather like Judy. It's such a silly name. It belongs to the kind of girl I'm not--a sweet little blue-eyed thing, petted and spoiled by all the family, who romps her way through life without any cares. Wouldn't it be nice to be like that? Whatever faults I may have, no one can ever accuse me of having been spoiled by my family! But it's great fun to pretend I've been. In the future please always address me as Judy. Do you want to know something? I have three pairs of kid gloves. I've had kid mittens before from the Christmas tree, but never real kid gloves with five fingers. I take them out and try them on every little while. It's all I can do not to wear them to classes. (Dinner bell. Goodbye.) Friday What do you think, Daddy? The English instructor said that my last paper shows an unusual amount of originality. She did, truly. Those were her words. It doesn't seem possible, does it, considering the eighteen years of training that I've had? The aim of the John Grier Home (as you doubtless know and heartily approve of) is to turn the ninety-seven orphans into ninety-seven twins. The unusual artistic ability which I exhibit was developed at an early age through drawing chalk pictures of Mrs. Lippett on the woodshed door. I hope that I don't hurt your feelings when I criticize the home of my youth? But you have the upper hand, you know, for if I become too impertinent, you can always stop payment of your cheques. That isn't a very polite thing to say--but you can't expect me to have any manners; a foundling asylum isn't a young ladies' finishing school. You know, Daddy, it isn't the work that is going to be hard in college. It's the play. Half the time I don't know what the girls are talking about; their jokes seem to relate to a past that every one but me has shared. I'm a foreigner in the world and I don't understand the language. It's a miserable feeling. I've had it all my life. At the high school the girls would stand in groups and just look at me. I was queer and different and everybody knew it. I could FEEL 'John Grier Home' written on my face. And then a few charitable ones would make a point of coming up and saying something polite. I HATED EVERY ONE OF THEM--the charitable ones most of all. Nobody here knows that I was brought up in an asylum. I told Sallie McBride that my mother and father were dead, and that a kind old gentleman was sending me to college which is entirely true so far as it goes. I don't want you to think I am a coward, but I do want to be like the other girls, and that Dreadful Home looming over my childhood is the one great big difference. If I can turn my back on that and shut out the remembrance, I think, I might be just as desirable as any other girl. I don't believe there's any real, underneath difference, do you? Anyway, Sallie McBride likes me! Yours ever, Judy Abbott (Nee Jerusha.) Saturday morning I've just been reading this letter over and it sounds pretty un-cheerful. But can't you guess that I have a special topic due Monday morning and a review in geometry and a very sneezy cold? Sunday I forgot to post this yesterday, so I will add an indignant postscript. We had a bishop this morning, and WHAT DO YOU THINK HE SAID? 'The most beneficent promise made us in the Bible is this, "The poor ye have always with you." They were put here in order to keep us charitable.' The poor, please observe, being a sort of useful domestic animal. If I hadn't grown into such a perfect lady, I should have gone up after service and told him what I thought. 25th October Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I'm in the basket-ball team and you ought to see the bruise on my left shoulder. It's blue and mahogany with little streaks of orange. Julia Pendleton tried for the team, but she didn't get in. Hooray! You see what a mean disposition I have. College gets nicer and nicer. I like the girls and the teachers and the classes and the campus and the things to eat. We have ice-cream twice a week and we never have corn-meal mush. You only wanted to hear from me once a month, didn't you? And I've been peppering you with letters every few days! But I've been so excited about all these new adventures that I MUST talk to somebody; and you're the only one I know. Please excuse my exuberance; I'll settle pretty soon. If my letters bore you, you can always toss them into the wastebasket. I promise not to write another till the middle of November. Yours most loquaciously, Judy Abbott 15th November Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Listen to what I've learned to-day. The area of the convex surface of the frustum of a regular pyramid is half the product of the sum of the perimeters of its bases by the altitude of either of its trapezoids. It doesn't sound true, but it is--I can prove it! You've never heard about my clothes, have you, Daddy? Six dresses, all new and beautiful and bought for me--not handed down from somebody bigger. Perhaps you don't realize what a climax that marks in the career of an orphan? You gave them to me, and I am very, very, VERY much obliged. It's a fine thing to be educated--but nothing compared to the dizzying experience of owning six new dresses. Miss Pritchard, who is on the visiting committee, picked them out--not Mrs. Lippett, thank goodness. I have an evening dress, pink mull over silk (I'm perfectly beautiful in that), and a blue church dress, and a dinner dress of red veiling with Oriental trimming (makes me look like a Gipsy), and another of rose-coloured challis, and a grey street suit, and an every-day dress for classes. That wouldn't be an awfully big wardrobe for Julia Rutledge Pendleton, perhaps, but for Jerusha Abbott--Oh, my! I suppose you're thinking now what a frivolous, shallow little beast she is, and what a waste of money to educate a girl? But, Daddy, if you'd been dressed in checked ginghams all your life, you'd appreciate how I feel. And when I started to the high school, I entered upon another period even worse than the checked ginghams. The poor box. You can't know how I dreaded appearing in school in those miserable poor-box dresses. I was perfectly sure to be put down in class next to the girl who first owned my dress, and she would whisper and giggle and point it out to the others. The bitterness of wearing your enemies' cast-off clothes eats into your soul. If I wore silk stockings for the rest of my life, I don't believe I could obliterate the scar. LATEST WAR BULLETIN! News from the Scene of Action. At the fourth watch on Thursday the 13th of November, Hannibal routed the advance guard of the Romans and led the Carthaginian forces over the mountains into the plains of Casilinum. A cohort of light armed Numidians engaged the infantry of Quintus Fabius Maximus. Two battles and light skirmishing. Romans repulsed with heavy losses. I have the honour of being, Your special correspondent from the front, J. Abbott PS. I know I'm not to expect any letters in return, and I've been warned not to bother you with questions, but tell me, Daddy, just this once--are you awfully old or just a little old? And are you perfectly bald or just a little bald? It is very difficult thinking about you in the abstract like a theorem in geometry. Given a tall rich man who hates girls, but is very generous to one quite impertinent girl, what does he look like? R.S.V.P. 19th December Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, You never answered my question and it was very important. ARE YOU BALD? I have it planned exactly what you look like--very satisfactorily--until I reach the top of your head, and then I AM stuck. I can't decide whether you have white hair or black hair or sort of sprinkly grey hair or maybe none at all. Here is your portrait: But the problem is, shall I add some hair? Would you like to know what colour your eyes are? They're grey, and your eyebrows stick out like a porch roof (beetling, they're called in novels), and your mouth is a straight line with a tendency to turn down at the corners. Oh, you see, I know! You're a snappy old thing with a temper. (Chapel bell.) 9.45 p.m. I have a new unbreakable rule: never, never to study at night no matter how many written reviews are coming in the morning. Instead, I read just plain books--I have to, you know, because there are eighteen blank years behind me. You wouldn't believe, Daddy, what an abyss of ignorance my mind is; I am just realizing the depths myself. The things that most girls with a properly assorted family and a home and friends and a library know by absorption, I have never heard of. For example: I never read Mother Goose or David Copperfield or Ivanhoe or Cinderella or Blue Beard or Robinson Crusoe or Jane Eyre or Alice in Wonderland or a word of Rudyard Kipling. I didn't know that Henry the Eighth was married more than once or that Shelley was a poet. I didn't know that people used to be monkeys and that the Garden of Eden was a beautiful myth. I didn't know that R. L. S. stood for Robert Louis Stevenson or that George Eliot was a lady. I had never seen a picture of the 'Mona Lisa' and (it's true but you won't believe it) I had never heard of Sherlock Holmes. Now, I know all of these things and a lot of others besides, but you can see how much I need to catch up. And oh, but it's fun! I look forward all day to evening, and then I put an 'engaged' on the door and get into my nice red bath robe and furry slippers and pile all the cushions behind me on the couch, and light the brass student lamp at my elbow, and read and read and read one book isn't enough. I have four going at once. Just now, they're Tennyson's poems and Vanity Fair and Kipling's Plain Tales and--don't laugh--Little Women. I find that I am the only girl in college who wasn't brought up on Little Women. I haven't told anybody though (that WOULD stamp me as queer). I just quietly went and bought it with $1.12 of my last month's allowance; and the next time somebody mentions pickled limes, I'll know what she is talking about! (Ten o'clock bell. This is a very interrupted letter.) Saturday Sir, I have the honour to report fresh explorations in the field of geometry. On Friday last we abandoned our former works in parallelopipeds and proceeded to truncated prisms. We are finding the road rough and very uphill. Sunday The Christmas holidays begin next week and the trunks are up. The corridors are so filled up that you can hardly get through, and everybody is so bubbling over with excitement that studying is getting left out. I'm going to have a beautiful time in vacation; there's another Freshman who lives in Texas staying behind, and we are planning to take long walks and if there's any ice--learn to skate. Then there is still the whole library to be read--and three empty weeks to do it in! Goodbye, Daddy, I hope that you are feeling as happy as I am. Yours ever, Judy PS. Don't forget to answer my question. If you don't want the trouble of writing, have your secretary telegraph. He can just say: Mr. Smith is quite bald, or Mr. Smith is not bald, or Mr. Smith has white hair. And you can deduct the twenty-five cents out of my allowance. Goodbye till January--and a merry Christmas! Towards the end of the Christmas vacation. Exact date unknown Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Is it snowing where you are? All the world that I see from my tower is draped in white and the flakes are coming down as big as pop-corns. It's late afternoon--the sun is just setting (a cold yellow colour) behind some colder violet hills, and I am up in my window seat using the last light to write to you. Your five gold pieces were a surprise! I'm not used to receiving Christmas presents. You have already given me such lots of things--everything I have, you know--that I don't quite feel that I deserve extras. But I like them just the same. Do you want to know what I bought with my money? I. A silver watch in a leather case to wear on my wrist and get me to recitations in time. II. Matthew Arnold's poems. III. A hot water bottle. IV. A steamer rug. (My tower is cold.) V. Five hundred sheets of yellow manuscript paper. (I'm going to commence being an author pretty soon.) VI. A dictionary of synonyms. (To enlarge the author's vocabulary.) VII. (I don't much like to confess this last item, but I will.) A pair of silk stockings. And now, Daddy, never say I don't tell all! It was a very low motive, if you must know it, that prompted the silk stockings. Julia Pendleton comes into my room to do geometry, and she sits cross-legged on the couch and wears silk stockings every night. But just wait--as soon as she gets back from vacation I shall go in and sit on her couch in my silk stockings. You see, Daddy, the miserable creature that I am but at least I'm honest; and you knew already, from my asylum record, that I wasn't perfect, didn't you? To recapitulate (that's the way the English instructor begins every other sentence), I am very much obliged for my seven presents. I'm pretending to myself that they came in a box from my family in California. The watch is from father, the rug from mother, the hot water bottle from grandmother who is always worrying for fear I shall catch cold in this climate--and the yellow paper from my little brother Harry. My sister Isabel gave me the silk stockings, and Aunt Susan the Matthew Arnold poems; Uncle Harry (little Harry is named after him) gave me the dictionary. He wanted to send chocolates, but I insisted on synonyms. You don't object, do you, to playing the part of a composite family? And now, shall I tell you about my vacation, or are you only interested in my education as such? I hope you appreciate the delicate shade of meaning in 'as such'. It is the latest addition to my vocabulary. The girl from Texas is named Leonora Fenton. (Almost as funny as Jerusha, isn't it?) I like her, but not so much as Sallie McBride; I shall never like any one so much as Sallie--except you. I must always like you the best of all, because you're my whole family rolled into one. Leonora and I and two Sophomores have walked 'cross country every pleasant day and explored the whole neighbourhood, dressed in short skirts and knit jackets and caps, and carrying shiny sticks to whack things with. Once we walked into town--four miles--and stopped at a restaurant where the college girls go for dinner. Broiled lobster (35 cents), and for dessert, buckwheat cakes and maple syrup (15 cents). Nourishing and cheap. It was such a lark! Especially for me, because it was so awfully different from the asylum--I feel like an escaped convict every time I leave the campus. Before I thought, I started to tell the others what an experience I was having. The cat was almost out of the bag when I grabbed it by its tail and pulled it back. It's awfully hard for me not to tell everything I know. I'm a very confiding soul by nature; if I didn't have you to tell things to, I'd burst. We had a molasses candy pull last Friday evening, given by the house matron of Fergussen to the left-behinds in the other halls. There were twenty-two of us altogether, Freshmen and Sophomores and juniors and Seniors all united in amicable accord. The kitchen is huge, with copper pots and kettles hanging in rows on the stone wall--the littlest casserole among them about the size of a wash boiler. Four hundred girls live in Fergussen. The chef, in a white cap and apron, fetched out twenty-two other white caps and aprons--I can't imagine where he got so many--and we all turned ourselves into cooks. It was great fun, though I have seen better candy. When it was finally finished, and ourselves and the kitchen and the door-knobs all thoroughly sticky, we organized a procession and still in our caps and aprons, each carrying a big fork or spoon or frying pan, we marched through the empty corridors to the officers' parlour, where half-a-dozen professors and instructors were passing a tranquil evening. We serenaded them with college songs and offered refreshments. They accepted politely but dubiously. We left them sucking chunks of molasses candy, sticky and speechless. So you see, Daddy, my education progresses! Don't you really think that I ought to be an artist instead of an author? Vacation will be over in two days and I shall be glad to see the girls again. My tower is just a trifle lonely; when nine people occupy a house that was built for four hundred, they do rattle around a bit. Eleven pages--poor Daddy, you must be tired! I meant this to be just a short little thank-you note--but when I get started I seem to have a ready pen. Goodbye, and thank you for thinking of me--I should be perfectly happy except for one little threatening cloud on the horizon. Examinations come in February. Yours with love, Judy PS. Maybe it isn't proper to send love? If it isn't, please excuse. But I must love somebody and there's only you and Mrs. Lippett to choose between, so you see--you'll HAVE to put up with it, Daddy dear, because I can't love her. On the Eve Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, You should see the way this college is studying! We've forgotten we ever had a vacation. Fifty-seven irregular verbs have I introduced to my brain in the past four days--I'm only hoping they'll stay till after examinations. Some of the girls sell their text-books when they're through with them, but I intend to keep mine. Then after I've graduated I shall have my whole education in a row in the bookcase, and when I need to use any detail, I can turn to it without the slightest hesitation. So much easier and more accurate than trying to keep it in your head. Julia Pendleton dropped in this evening to pay a social call, and stayed a solid hour. She got started on the subject of family, and I COULDN'T switch her off. She wanted to know what my mother's maiden name was--did you ever hear such an impertinent question to ask of a person from a foundling asylum? I didn't have the courage to say I didn't know, so I just miserably plumped on the first name I could think of, and that was Montgomery. Then she wanted to know whether I belonged to the Massachusetts Montgomerys or the Virginia Montgomerys. Her mother was a Rutherford. The family came over in the ark, and were connected by marriage with Henry the VIII. On her father's side they date back further than Adam. On the topmost branches of her family tree there's a superior breed of monkeys with very fine silky hair and extra long tails. I meant to write you a nice, cheerful, entertaining letter tonight, but I'm too sleepy--and scared. The Freshman's lot is not a happy one. Yours, about to be examined, Judy Abbott Sunday Dearest Daddy-Long-Legs, I have some awful, awful, awful news to tell you, but I won't begin with it; I'll try to get you in a good humour first. Jerusha Abbott has commenced to be an author. A poem entitled, 'From my Tower', appears in the February Monthly--on the first page, which is a very great honour for a Freshman. My English instructor stopped me on the way out from chapel last night, and said it was a charming piece of work except for the sixth line, which had too many feet. I will send you a copy in case you care to read it. Let me see if I can't think of something else pleasant-- Oh, yes! I'm learning to skate, and can glide about quite respectably all by myself. Also I've learned how to slide down a rope from the roof of the gymnasium, and I can vault a bar three feet and six inches high--I hope shortly to pull up to four feet. We had a very inspiring sermon this morning preached by the Bishop of Alabama. His text was: 'Judge not that ye be not judged.' It was about the necessity of overlooking mistakes in others, and not discouraging people by harsh judgments. I wish you might have heard it. This is the sunniest, most blinding winter afternoon, with icicles dripping from the fir trees and all the world bending under a weight of snow--except me, and I'm bending under a weight of sorrow. Now for the news--courage, Judy!--you must tell. Are you SURELY in a good humour? I failed in mathematics and Latin prose. I am tutoring in them, and will take another examination next month. I'm sorry if you're disappointed, but otherwise I don't care a bit because I've learned such a lot of things not mentioned in the catalogue. I've read seventeen novels and bushels of poetry--really necessary novels like Vanity Fair and Richard Feverel and Alice in Wonderland. Also Emerson's Essays and Lockhart's Life of Scott and the first volume of Gibbon's Roman Empire and half of Benvenuto Cellini's Life--wasn't he entertaining? He used to saunter out and casually kill a man before breakfast. So you see, Daddy, I'm much more intelligent than if I'd just stuck to Latin. Will you forgive me this once if I promise never to fail again? Yours in sackcloth, Judy Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, This is an extra letter in the middle of the month because I'm rather lonely tonight. It's awfully stormy. All the lights are out on the campus, but I drank black coffee and I can't go to sleep. I had a supper party this evening consisting of Sallie and Julia and Leonora Fenton--and sardines and toasted muffins and salad and fudge and coffee. Julia said she'd had a good time, but Sallie stayed to help wash the dishes. I might, very usefully, put some time on Latin tonight but, there's no doubt about it, I'm a very languid Latin scholar. We've finished Livy and De Senectute and are now engaged with De Amicitia (pronounced Damn Icitia). Should you mind, just for a little while, pretending you are my grandmother? Sallie has one and Julia and Leonora each two, and they were all comparing them tonight. I can't think of anything I'd rather have; it's such a respectable relationship. So, if you really don't object--When I went into town yesterday, I saw the sweetest cap of Cluny lace trimmed with lavender ribbon. I am going to make you a present of it on your eighty-third birthday. ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! That's the clock in the chapel tower striking twelve. I believe I am sleepy after all. Good night, Granny. I love you dearly. Judy The Ides of March Dear D.-L.-L., I am studying Latin prose composition. I have been studying it. I shall be studying it. I shall be about to have been studying it. My re-examination comes the 7th hour next Tuesday, and I am going to pass or BUST. So you may expect to hear from me next, whole and happy and free from conditions, or in fragments. I will write a respectable letter when it's over. Tonight I have a pressing engagement with the Ablative Absolute. Yours--in evident haste J. A. 26th March Mr. D.-L.-L. Smith, SIR: You never answer any questions; you never show the slightest interest in anything I do. You are probably the horridest one of all those horrid Trustees, and the reason you are educating me is, not because you care a bit about me, but from a sense of Duty. I don't know a single thing about you. I don't even know your name. It is very uninspiring writing to a Thing. I haven't a doubt but that you throw my letters into the waste-basket without reading them. Hereafter I shall write only about work. My re-examinations in Latin and geometry came last week. I passed them both and am now free from conditions. Yours truly, Jerusha Abbott 2nd April Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I am a BEAST. Please forget about that dreadful letter I sent you last week--I was feeling terribly lonely and miserable and sore-throaty the night I wrote. I didn't know it, but I was just sickening for tonsillitis and grippe and lots of things mixed. I'm in the infirmary now, and have been here for six days; this is the first time they would let me sit up and have a pen and paper. The head nurse is very bossy. But I've been thinking about it all the time and I shan't get well until you forgive me. Here is a picture of the way I look, with a bandage tied around my head in rabbit's ears. Doesn't that arouse your sympathy? I am having sublingual gland swelling. And I've been studying physiology all the year without ever hearing of sublingual glands. How futile a thing is education! I can't write any more; I get rather shaky when I sit up too long. Please forgive me for being impertinent and ungrateful. I was badly brought up. Yours with love, Judy Abbott THE INFIRMARY 4th April Dearest Daddy-Long-Legs, Yesterday evening just towards dark, when I was sitting up in bed looking out at the rain and feeling awfully bored with life in a great institution, the nurse appeared with a long white box addressed to me, and filled with the LOVELIEST pink rosebuds. And much nicer still, it contained a card with a very polite message written in a funny little uphill back hand (but one which shows a great deal of character). Thank you, Daddy, a thousand times. Your flowers make the first real, true present I ever received in my life. If you want to know what a baby I am I lay down and cried because I was so happy. Now that I am sure you read my letters, I'll make them much more interesting, so they'll be worth keeping in a safe with red tape around them--only please take out that dreadful one and burn it up. I'd hate to think that you ever read it over. Thank you for making a very sick, cross, miserable Freshman cheerful. Probably you have lots of loving family and friends, and you don't know what it feels like to be alone. But I do. Goodbye--I'll promise never to be horrid again, because now I know you're a real person; also I'll promise never to bother you with any more questions. Do you still hate girls? Yours for ever, Judy 8th hour, Monday Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I hope you aren't the Trustee who sat on the toad? It went off--I was told--with quite a pop, so probably he was a fatter Trustee. Do you remember the little dugout places with gratings over them by the laundry windows in the John Grier Home? Every spring when the hoptoad season opened we used to form a collection of toads and keep them in those window holes; and occasionally they would spill over into the laundry, causing a very pleasurable commotion on wash days. We were severely punished for our activities in this direction, but in spite of all discouragement the toads would collect. And one day--well, I won't bore you with particulars--but somehow, one of the fattest, biggest, JUCIEST toads got into one of those big leather arm chairs in the Trustees' room, and that afternoon at the Trustees' meeting--But I dare say you were there and recall the rest? Looking back dispassionately after a period of time, I will say that punishment was merited, and--if I remember rightly--adequate. I don't know why I am in such a reminiscent mood except that spring and the reappearance of toads always awakens the old acquisitive instinct. The only thing that keeps me from starting a collection is the fact that no rule exists against it. After chapel, Thursday What do you think is my favourite book? Just now, I mean; I change every three days. Wuthering Heights. Emily Bronte was quite young when she wrote it, and had never been outside of Haworth churchyard. She had never known any men in her life; how COULD she imagine a man like Heathcliffe? I couldn't do it, and I'm quite young and never outside the John Grier Asylum--I've had every chance in the world. Sometimes a dreadful fear comes over me that I'm not a genius. Will you be awfully disappointed, Daddy, if I don't turn out to be a great author? In the spring when everything is so beautiful and green and budding, I feel like turning my back on lessons, and running away to play with the weather. There are such lots of adventures out in the fields! It's much more entertaining to live books than to write them. Ow ! ! ! ! ! ! That was a shriek which brought Sallie and Julia and (for a disgusted moment) the Senior from across the hall. It was caused by a centipede like this: only worse. Just as I had finished the last sentence and was thinking what to say next--plump!--it fell off the ceiling and landed at my side. I tipped two cups off the tea table in trying to get away. Sallie whacked it with the back of my hair brush--which I shall never be able to use again--and killed the front end, but the rear fifty feet ran under the bureau and escaped. This dormitory, owing to its age and ivy-covered walls, is full of centipedes. They are dreadful creatures. I'd rather find a tiger under the bed. Friday, 9.30 p.m. Such a lot of troubles! I didn't hear the rising bell this morning, then I broke my shoestring while I was hurrying to dress and dropped my collar button down my neck. I was late for breakfast and also for first-hour recitation. I forgot to take any blotting paper and my fountain pen leaked. In trigonometry the Professor and I had a disagreement touching a little matter of logarithms. On looking it up, I find that she was right. We had mutton stew and pie-plant for lunch--hate 'em both; they taste like the asylum. The post brought me nothing but bills (though I must say that I never do get anything else; my family are not the kind that write). In English class this afternoon we had an unexpected written lesson. This was it: I asked no other thing, No other was denied. I offered Being for it; The mighty merchant smiled. Brazil? He twirled a button Without a glance my way: But, madam, is there nothing else That we can show today? That is a poem. I don't know who wrote it or what it means. It was simply printed out on the blackboard when we arrived and we were ordered to comment upon it. When I read the first verse I thought I had an idea--The Mighty Merchant was a divinity who distributes blessings in return for virtuous deeds--but when I got to the second verse and found him twirling a button, it seemed a blasphemous supposition, and I hastily changed my mind. The rest of the class was in the same predicament; and there we sat for three-quarters of an hour with blank paper and equally blank minds. Getting an education is an awfully wearing process! But this didn't end the day. There's worse to come. It rained so we couldn't play golf, but had to go to gymnasium instead. The girl next to me banged my elbow with an Indian club. I got home to find that the box with my new blue spring dress had come, and the skirt was so tight that I couldn't sit down. Friday is sweeping day, and the maid had mixed all the papers on my desk. We had tombstone for dessert (milk and gelatin flavoured with vanilla). We were kept in chapel twenty minutes later than usual to listen to a speech about womanly women. And then--just as I was settling down with a sigh of well-earned relief to The Portrait of a Lady, a girl named Ackerly, a dough-faced, deadly, unintermittently stupid girl, who sits next to me in Latin because her name begins with A (I wish Mrs. Lippett had named me Zabriski), came to ask if Monday's lesson commenced at paragraph 69 or 70, and stayed ONE HOUR. She has just gone. Did you ever hear of such a discouraging series of events? It isn't the big troubles in life that require character. Anybody can rise to a crisis and face a crushing tragedy with courage, but to meet the petty hazards of the day with a laugh--I really think that requires SPIRIT. It's the kind of character that I am going to develop. I am going to pretend that all life is just a game which I must play as skilfully and fairly as I can. If I lose, I am going to shrug my shoulders and laugh--also if I win. Anyway, I am going to be a sport. You will never hear me complain again, Daddy dear, because Julia wears silk stockings and centipedes drop off the wall. Yours ever, Judy Answer soon. 27th May Daddy-Long-Legs, Esq. DEAR SIR: I am in receipt of a letter from Mrs. Lippett. She hopes that I am doing well in deportment and studies. Since I probably have no place to go this summer, she will let me come back to the asylum and work for my board until college opens. I HATE THE JOHN GRIER HOME. I'd rather die than go back. Yours most truthfully, Jerusha Abbott Cher Daddy-Jambes-Longes, Vous etes un brick! Je suis tres heureuse about the farm, parceque je n'ai jamais been on a farm dans ma vie and I'd hate to retourner chez John Grier, et wash dishes tout l'ete. There would be danger of quelque chose affreuse happening, parceque j'ai perdue ma humilite d'autre fois et j'ai peur that I would just break out quelque jour et smash every cup and saucer dans la maison. Pardon brievete et paper. Je ne peux pas send des mes nouvelles parceque je suis dans French class et j'ai peur que Monsieur le Professeur is going to call on me tout de suite. He did! Au revoir, je vous aime beaucoup. Judy 30th May Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Did you ever see this campus? (That is merely a rhetorical question. Don't let it annoy you.) It is a heavenly spot in May. All the shrubs are in blossom and the trees are the loveliest young green--even the old pines look fresh and new. The grass is dotted with yellow dandelions and hundreds of girls in blue and white and pink dresses. Everybody is joyous and carefree, for vacation's coming, and with that to look forward to, examinations don't count. Isn't that a happy frame of mind to be in? And oh, Daddy! I'm the happiest of all! Because I'm not in the asylum any more; and I'm not anybody's nursemaid or typewriter or bookkeeper (I should have been, you know, except for you). I'm sorry now for all my past badnesses. I'm sorry I was ever impertinent to Mrs. Lippett. I'm sorry I ever slapped Freddie Perkins. I'm sorry I ever filled the sugar bowl with salt. I'm sorry I ever made faces behind the Trustees' backs. I'm going to be good and sweet and kind to everybody because I'm so happy. And this summer I'm going to write and write and write and begin to be a great author. Isn't that an exalted stand to take? Oh, I'm developing a beautiful character! It droops a bit under cold and frost, but it does grow fast when the sun shines. That's the way with everybody. I don't agree with the theory that adversity and sorrow and disappointment develop moral strength. The happy people are the ones who are bubbling over with kindliness. I have no faith in misanthropes. (Fine word! Just learned it.) You are not a misanthrope are you, Daddy? I started to tell you about the campus. I wish you'd come for a little visit and let me walk you about and say: 'That is the library. This is the gas plant, Daddy dear. The Gothic building on your left is the gymnasium, and the Tudor Romanesque beside it is the new infirmary.' Oh, I'm fine at showing people about. I've done it all my life at the asylum, and I've been doing it all day here. I have honestly. And a Man, too! That's a great experience. I never talked to a man before (except occasional Trustees, and they don't count). Pardon, Daddy, I don't mean to hurt your feelings when I abuse Trustees. I don't consider that you really belong among them. You just tumbled on to the Board by chance. The Trustee, as such, is fat and pompous and benevolent. He pats one on the head and wears a gold watch chain. That looks like a June bug, but is meant to be a portrait of any Trustee except you. However--to resume: I have been walking and talking and having tea with a man. And with a very superior man--with Mr. Jervis Pendleton of the House of Julia; her uncle, in short (in long, perhaps I ought to say; he's as tall as you.) Being in town on business, he decided to run out to the college and call on his niece. He's her father's youngest brother, but she doesn't know him very intimately. It seems he glanced at her when she was a baby, decided he didn't like her, and has never noticed her since. Anyway, there he was, sitting in the reception room very proper with his hat and stick and gloves beside him; and Julia and Sallie with seventh-hour recitations that they couldn't cut. So Julia dashed into my room and begged me to walk him about the campus and then deliver him to her when the seventh hour was over. I said I would, obligingly but unenthusiastically, because I don't care much for Pendletons. But he turned out to be a sweet lamb. He's a real human being--not a Pendleton at all. We had a beautiful time; I've longed for an uncle ever since. Do you mind pretending you're my uncle? I believe they're superior to grandmothers. Mr. Pendleton reminded me a little of you, Daddy, as you were twenty years ago. You see I know you intimately, even if we haven't ever met! He's tall and thinnish with a dark face all over lines, and the funniest underneath smile that never quite comes through but just wrinkles up the corners of his mouth. And he has a way of making you feel right off as though you'd known him a long time. He's very companionable. We walked all over the campus from the quadrangle to the athletic grounds; then he said he felt weak and must have some tea. He proposed that we go to College Inn--it's just off the campus by the pine walk. I said we ought to go back for Julia and Sallie, but he said he didn't like to have his nieces drink too much tea; it made them nervous. So we just ran away and had tea and muffins and marmalade and ice-cream and cake at a nice little table out on the balcony. The inn was quite conveniently empty, this being the end of the month and allowances low. We had the jolliest time! But he had to run for his train the minute he got back and he barely saw Julia at all. She was furious with me for taking him off; it seems he's an unusually rich and desirable uncle. It relieved my mind to find he was rich, for the tea and things cost sixty cents apiece. This morning (it's Monday now) three boxes of chocolates came by express for Julia and Sallie and me. What do you think of that? To be getting candy from a man! I begin to feel like a girl instead of a foundling. I wish you'd come and have tea some day and let me see if I like you. But wouldn't it be dreadful if I didn't? However, I know I should. Bien! I make you my compliments. 'Jamais je ne t'oublierai.' Judy PS. I looked in the glass this morning and found a perfectly new dimple that I'd never seen before. It's very curious. Where do you suppose it came from? 9th June Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Happy day! I've just finished my last examination Physiology. And now: Three months on a farm! I don't know what kind of a thing a farm is. I've never been on one in my life. I've never even looked at one (except from the car window), but I know I'm going to love it, and I'm going to love being FREE. I am not used even yet to being outside the John Grier Home. Whenever I think of it excited little thrills chase up and down my back. I feel as though I must run faster and faster and keep looking over my shoulder to make sure that Mrs. Lippett isn't after me with her arm stretched out to grab me back. I don't have to mind any one this summer, do I? Your nominal authority doesn't annoy me in the least; you are too far away to do any harm. Mrs. Lippett is dead for ever, so far as I am concerned, and the Semples aren't expected to overlook my moral welfare, are they? No, I am sure not. I am entirely grown up. Hooray! I leave you now to pack a trunk, and three boxes of teakettles and dishes and sofa cushions and books. Yours ever, Judy PS. Here is my physiology exam. Do you think you could have passed? LOCK WILLOW FARM, Saturday night Dearest Daddy-Long-Legs, I've only just come and I'm not unpacked, but I can't wait to tell you how much I like farms. This is a heavenly, heavenly, HEAVENLY spot! The house is square like this: And OLD. A hundred years or so. It has a veranda on the side which I can't draw and a sweet porch in front. The picture really doesn't do it justice--those things that look like feather dusters are maple trees, and the prickly ones that border the drive are murmuring pines and hemlocks. It stands on the top of a hill and looks way off over miles of green meadows to another line of hills. That is the way Connecticut goes, in a series of Marcelle waves; and Lock Willow Farm is just on the crest of one wave. The barns used to be across the road where they obstructed the view, but a kind flash of lightning came from heaven and burnt them down. The people are Mr. and Mrs. Semple and a hired girl and two hired men. The hired people eat in the kitchen, and the Semples and Judy in the dining-room. We had ham and eggs and biscuits and honey and jelly-cake and pie and pickles and cheese and tea for supper--and a great deal of conversation. I have never been so entertaining in my life; everything I say appears to be funny. I suppose it is, because I've never been in the country before, and my questions are backed by an all-inclusive ignorance. The room marked with a cross is not where the murder was committed, but the one that I occupy. It's big and square and empty, with adorable old-fashioned furniture and windows that have to be propped up on sticks and green shades trimmed with gold that fall down if you touch them. And a big square mahogany table--I'm going to spend the summer with my elbows spread out on it, writing a novel. Oh, Daddy, I'm so excited! I can't wait till daylight to explore. It's 8.30 now, and I am about to blow out my candle and try to go to sleep. We rise at five. Did you ever know such fun? I can't believe this is really Judy. You and the Good Lord give me more than I deserve. I must be a very, very, VERY good person to pay. I'm going to be. You'll see. Good night, Judy PS. You should hear the frogs sing and the little pigs squeal and you should see the new moon! I saw it over my right shoulder. LOCK WILLOW, 12th July Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, How did your secretary come to know about Lock Willow? (That isn't a rhetorical question. I am awfully curious to know.) For listen to this: Mr. Jervis Pendleton used to own this farm, but now he has given it to Mrs. Semple who was his old nurse. Did you ever hear of such a funny coincidence? She still calls him 'Master Jervie' and talks about what a sweet little boy he used to be. She has one of his baby curls put away in a box, and it is red--or at least reddish! Since she discovered that I know him, I have risen very much in her opinion. Knowing a member of the Pendleton family is the best introduction one can have at Lock Willow. And the cream of the whole family is Master Jervis--I am pleased to say that Julia belongs to an inferior branch. The farm gets more and more entertaining. I rode on a hay wagon yesterday. We have three big pigs and nine little piglets, and you should see them eat. They are pigs! We've oceans of little baby chickens and ducks and turkeys and guinea fowls. You must be mad to live in a city when you might live on a farm. It is my daily business to hunt the eggs. I fell off a beam in the barn loft yesterday, while I was trying to crawl over to a nest that the black hen has stolen. And when I came in with a scratched knee, Mrs. Semple bound it up with witch-hazel, murmuring all the time, 'Dear! Dear! It seems only yesterday that Master Jervie fell off that very same beam and scratched this very same knee.' The scenery around here is perfectly beautiful. There's a valley and a river and a lot of wooded hills, and way in the distance a tall blue mountain that simply melts in your mouth. We churn twice a week; and we keep the cream in the spring house which is made of stone with the brook running underneath. Some of the farmers around here have a separator, but we don't care for these new-fashioned ideas. It may be a little harder to separate the cream in pans, but it's sufficiently better to pay. We have six calves; and I've chosen the names for all of them. 1. Sylvia, because she was born in the woods. 2. Lesbia, after the Lesbia in Catullus. 3. Sallie. 4. Julia--a spotted, nondescript animal. 5. Judy, after me. 6. Daddy-Long-Legs. You don't mind, do you, Daddy? He's pure Jersey and has a sweet disposition. He looks like this--you can see how appropriate the name is. I haven't had time yet to begin my immortal novel; the farm keeps me too busy. Yours always, Judy PS. I've learned to make doughnuts. PS. (2) If you are thinking of raising chickens, let me recommend Buff Orpingtons. They haven't any pin feathers. PS. (3) I wish I could send you a pat of the nice, fresh butter I churned yesterday. I'm a fine dairy-maid! PS. (4) This is a picture of Miss Jerusha Abbott, the future great author, driving home the cows. Sunday Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Isn't it funny? I started to write to you yesterday afternoon, but as far as I got was the heading, 'Dear Daddy-Long-Legs', and then I remembered I'd promised to pick some blackberries for supper, so I went off and left the sheet lying on the table, and when I came back today, what do you think I found sitting in the middle of the page? A real true Daddy-Long-Legs! I picked him up very gently by one leg, and dropped him out of the window. I wouldn't hurt one of them for the world. They always remind me of you. We hitched up the spring wagon this morning and drove to the Centre to church. It's a sweet little white frame church with a spire and three Doric columns in front (or maybe Ionic--I always get them mixed). A nice sleepy sermon with everybody drowsily waving palm-leaf fans, and the only sound, aside from the minister, the buzzing of locusts in the trees outside. I didn't wake up till I found myself on my feet singing the hymn, and then I was awfully sorry I hadn't listened to the sermon; I should like to know more of the psychology of a man who would pick out such a hymn. This was it: Come, leave your sports and earthly toys And join me in celestial joys. Or else, dear friend, a long farewell. I leave you now to sink to hell. I find that it isn't safe to discuss religion with the Semples. Their God (whom they have inherited intact from their remote Puritan ancestors) is a narrow, irrational, unjust, mean, revengeful, bigoted Person. Thank heaven I don't inherit God from anybody! I am free to make mine up as I wish Him. He's kind and sympathetic and imaginative and forgiving and understanding--and He has a sense of humour. I like the Semples immensely; their practice is so superior to their theory. They are better than their own God. I told them so--and they are horribly troubled. They think I am blasphemous--and I think they are! We've dropped theology from our conversation. This is Sunday afternoon. Amasai (hired man) in a purple tie and some bright yellow buckskin gloves, very red and shaved, has just driven off with Carrie (hired girl) in a big hat trimmed with red roses and a blue muslin dress and her hair curled as tight as it will curl. Amasai spent all the morning washing the buggy; and Carrie stayed home from church ostensibly to cook the dinner, but really to iron the muslin dress. In two minutes more when this letter is finished I am going to settle down to a book which I found in the attic. It's entitled, On the Trail, and sprawled across the front page in a funny little-boy hand: Jervis Pendleton if this book should ever roam, Box its ears and send it home. He spent the summer here once after he had been ill, when he was about eleven years old; and he left On the Trail behind. It looks well read--the marks of his grimy little hands are frequent! Also in a corner of the attic there is a water wheel and a windmill and some bows and arrows. Mrs. Semple talks so constantly about him that I begin to believe he really lives--not a grown man with a silk hat and walking stick, but a nice, dirty, tousle-headed boy who clatters up the stairs with an awful racket, and leaves the screen doors open, and is always asking for cookies. (And getting them, too, if I know Mrs. Semple!) He seems to have been an adventurous little soul--and brave and truthful. I'm sorry to think he is a Pendleton; he was meant for something better. We're going to begin threshing oats tomorrow; a steam engine is coming and three extra men. It grieves me to tell you that Buttercup (the spotted cow with one horn, Mother of Lesbia) has done a disgraceful thing. She got into the orchard Friday evening and ate apples under the trees, and ate and ate until they went to her head. For two days she has been perfectly dead drunk! That is the truth I am telling. Did you ever hear anything so scandalous? Sir, I remain, Your affectionate orphan, Judy Abbott PS. Indians in the first chapter and highwaymen in the second. I hold my breath. What can the third contain? 'Red Hawk leapt twenty feet in the air and bit the dust.' That is the subject of the frontispiece. Aren't Judy and Jervie having fun? 15th September Dear Daddy, I was weighed yesterday on the flour scales in the general store at the Comers. I've gained nine pounds! Let me recommend Lock Willow as a health resort. Yours ever, Judy Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Behold me--a Sophomore! I came up last Friday, sorry to leave Lock Willow, but glad to see the campus again. It is a pleasant sensation to come back to something familiar. I am beginning to feel at home in college, and in command of the situation; I am beginning, in fact, to feel at home in the world--as though I really belonged to it and had not just crept in on sufferance. I don't suppose you understand in the least what I am trying to say. A person important enough to be a Trustee can't appreciate the feelings of a person unimportant enough to be a foundling. And now, Daddy, listen to this. Whom do you think I am rooming with? Sallie McBride and Julia Rutledge Pendleton. It's the truth. We have a study and three little bedrooms--VOILA! Sallie and I decided last spring that we should like to room together, and Julia made up her mind to stay with Sallie--why, I can't imagine, for they are not a bit alike; but the Pendletons are naturally conservative and inimical (fine word!) to change. Anyway, here we are. Think of Jerusha Abbott, late of the John Grier Home for Orphans, rooming with a Pendleton. This is a democratic country. Sallie is running for class president, and unless all signs fail, she is going to be elected. Such an atmosphere of intrigue you should see what politicians we are! Oh, I tell you, Daddy, when we women get our rights, you men will have to look alive in order to keep yours. Election comes next Saturday, and we're going to have a torchlight procession in the evening, no matter who wins. I am beginning chemistry, a most unusual study. I've never seen anything like it before. Molecules and Atoms are the material employed, but I'll be in a position to discuss them more definitely next month. I am also taking argumentation and logic. Also history of the whole world. Also plays of William Shakespeare. Also French. If this keeps up many years longer, I shall become quite intelligent. I should rather have elected economics than French, but I didn't dare, because I was afraid that unless I re-elected French, the Professor would not let me pass--as it was, I just managed to squeeze through the June examination. But I will say that my high-school preparation was not very adequate. There's one girl in the class who chatters away in French as fast as she does in English. She went abroad with her parents when she was a child, and spent three years in a convent school. You can imagine how bright she is compared with the rest of us--irregular verbs are mere playthings. I wish my parents had chucked me into a French convent when I was little instead of a foundling asylum. Oh no, I don't either! Because then maybe I should never have known you. I'd rather know you than French. Goodbye, Daddy. I must call on Harriet Martin now, and, having discussed the chemical situation, casually drop a few thoughts on the subject of our next president. Yours in politics, J. Abbott 17th October Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Supposing the swimming tank in the gymnasium were filled full of lemon jelly, could a person trying to swim manage to keep on top or would he sink? We were having lemon jelly for dessert when the question came up. We discussed it heatedly for half an hour and it's still unsettled. Sallie thinks that she could swim in it, but I am perfectly sure that the best swimmer in the world would sink. Wouldn't it be funny to be drowned in lemon jelly? Two other problems are engaging the attention of our table. 1st. What shape are the rooms in an octagon house? Some of the girls insist that they're square; but I think they'd have to be shaped like a piece of pie. Don't you? 2nd. Suppose there were a great big hollow sphere made of looking-glass and you were sitting inside. Where would it stop reflecting your face and begin reflecting your back? The more one thinks about this problem, the more puzzling it becomes. You can see with what deep philosophical reflection we engage our leisure! Did I ever tell you about the election? It happened three weeks ago, but so fast do we live, that three weeks is ancient history. Sallie was elected, and we had a torchlight parade with transparencies saying, 'McBride for Ever,' and a band consisting of fourteen pieces (three mouth organs and eleven combs). We're very important persons now in '258.' Julia and I come in for a great deal of reflected glory. It's quite a social strain to be living in the same house with a president. Bonne nuit, cher Daddy. Acceptez mez compliments, Tres respectueux, je suis, Votre Judy 12th November Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, We beat the Freshmen at basket ball yesterday. Of course we're pleased--but oh, if we could only beat the juniors! I'd be willing to be black and blue all over and stay in bed a week in a witch-hazel compress. Sallie has invited me to spend the Christmas vacation with her. She lives in Worcester, Massachusetts. Wasn't it nice of her? I shall love to go. I've never been in a private family in my life, except at Lock Willow, and the Semples were grown-up and old and don't count. But the McBrides have a houseful of children (anyway two or three) and a mother and father and grandmother, and an Angora cat. It's a perfectly complete family! Packing your trunk and going away is more fun than staying behind. I am terribly excited at the prospect. Seventh hour--I must run to rehearsal. I'm to be in the Thanksgiving theatricals. A prince in a tower with a velvet tunic and yellow curls. Isn't that a lark? Yours, J. A. Saturday Do you want to know what I look like? Here's a photograph of all three that Leonora Fenton took. The light one who is laughing is Sallie, and the tall one with her nose in the air is Julia, and the little one with the hair blowing across her face is Judy--she is really more beautiful than that, but the sun was in her eyes. 'STONE GATE', WORCESTER, MASS., 31st December Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I meant to write to you before and thank you for your Christmas cheque, but life in the McBride household is very absorbing, and I don't seem able to find two consecutive minutes to spend at a desk. I bought a new gown--one that I didn't need, but just wanted. My Christmas present this year is from Daddy-Long-Legs; my family just sent love. I've been having the most beautiful vacation visiting Sallie. She lives in a big old-fashioned brick house with white trimmings set back from the street--exactly the kind of house that I used to look at so curiously when I was in the John Grier Home, and wonder what it could be like inside. I never expected to see with my own eyes--but here I am! Everything is so comfortable and restful and homelike; I walk from room to room and drink in the furnishings. It is the most perfect house for children to be brought up in; with shadowy nooks for hide and seek, and open fire places for pop-corn, and an attic to romp in on rainy days and slippery banisters with a comfortable flat knob at the bottom, and a great big sunny kitchen, and a nice, fat, sunny cook who has lived in the family thirteen years and always saves out a piece of dough for the children to bake. Just the sight of such a house makes you want to be a child all over again. And as for families! I never dreamed they could be so nice. Sallie has a father and mother and grandmother, and the sweetest three-year-old baby sister all over curls, and a medium-sized brother who always forgets to wipe his feet, and a big, good-looking brother named Jimmie, who is a junior at Princeton. We have the jolliest times at the table--everybody laughs and jokes and talks at once, and we don't have to say grace beforehand. It's a relief not having to thank Somebody for every mouthful you eat. (I dare say I'm blasphemous; but you'd be, too, if you'd offered as much obligatory thanks as I have.) Such a lot of things we've done--I can't begin to tell you about them. Mr. McBride owns a factory and Christmas eve he had a tree for the employees' children. It was in the long packing-room which was decorated with evergreens and holly. Jimmie McBride was dressed as Santa Claus and Sallie and I helped him distribute the presents. Dear me, Daddy, but it was a funny sensation! I felt as benevolent as a Trustee of the John Grier home. I kissed one sweet, sticky little boy--but I don't think I patted any of them on the head! And two days after Christmas, they gave a dance at their own house for ME. It was the first really true ball I ever attended--college doesn't count where we dance with girls. I had a new white evening gown (your Christmas present--many thanks) and long white gloves and white satin slippers. The only drawback to my perfect, utter, absolute happiness was the fact that Mrs. Lippett couldn't see me leading the cotillion with Jimmie McBride. Tell her about it, please, the next time you visit the J. G. H. Yours ever, Judy Abbott PS. Would you be terribly displeased, Daddy, if I didn't turn out to be a Great Author after all, but just a Plain Girl? 6.30, Saturday Dear Daddy, We started to walk to town today, but mercy! how it poured. I like winter to be winter with snow instead of rain. Julia's desirable uncle called again this afternoon--and brought a five-pound box of chocolates. There are advantages, you see, about rooming with Julia. Our innocent prattle appeared to amuse him and he waited for a later train in order to take tea in the study. We had an awful lot of trouble getting permission. It's hard enough entertaining fathers and grandfathers, but uncles are a step worse; and as for brothers and cousins, they are next to impossible. Julia had to swear that he was her uncle before a notary public and then have the county clerk's certificate attached. (Don't I know a lot of law?) And even then I doubt if we could have had our tea if the Dean had chanced to see how youngish and good-looking Uncle Jervis is. Anyway, we had it, with brown bread Swiss cheese sandwiches. He helped make them and then ate four. I told him that I had spent last summer at Lock Willow, and we had a beautiful gossipy time about the Semples, and the horses and cows and chickens. All the horses that he used to know are dead, except Grover, who was a baby colt at the time of his last visit--and poor Grove now is so old he can just limp about the pasture. He asked if they still kept doughnuts in a yellow crock with a blue plate over it on the bottom shelf of the pantry--and they do! He wanted to know if there was still a woodchuck's hole under the pile of rocks in the night pasture--and there is! Amasai caught a big, fat, grey one there this summer, the twenty-fifth great-grandson of the one Master Jervis caught when he was a little boy. I called him 'Master Jervie' to his face, but he didn't appear to be insulted. Julia says she has never seen him so amiable; he's usually pretty unapproachable. But Julia hasn't a bit of tact; and men, I find, require a great deal. They purr if you rub them the right way and spit if you don't. (That isn't a very elegant metaphor. I mean it figuratively.) We're reading Marie Bashkirtseff's journal. Isn't it amazing? Listen to this: 'Last night I was seized by a fit of despair that found utterance in moans, and that finally drove me to throw the dining-room clock into the sea.' It makes me almost hope I'm not a genius; they must be very wearing to have about--and awfully destructive to the furniture. Mercy! how it keeps Pouring. We shall have to swim to chapel tonight. Yours ever, Judy 20th Jan. Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Did you ever have a sweet baby girl who was stolen from the cradle in infancy? Maybe I am she! If we were in a novel, that would be the denouement, wouldn't it? It's really awfully queer not to know what one is--sort of exciting and romantic. There are such a lot of possibilities. Maybe I'm not American; lots of people aren't. I may be straight descended from the ancient Romans, or I may be a Viking's daughter, or I may be the child of a Russian exile and belong by rights in a Siberian prison, or maybe I'm a Gipsy--I think perhaps I am. I have a very WANDERING spirit, though I haven't as yet had much chance to develop it. Do you know about that one scandalous blot in my career the time I ran away from the asylum because they punished me for stealing cookies? It's down in the books free for any Trustee to read. But really, Daddy, what could you expect? When you put a hungry little nine-year girl in the pantry scouring knives, with the cookie jar at her elbow, and go off and leave her alone; and then suddenly pop in again, wouldn't you expect to find her a bit crumby? And then when you jerk her by the elbow and box her ears, and make her leave the table when the pudding comes, and tell all the other children that it's because she's a thief, wouldn't you expect her to run away? I only ran four miles. They caught me and brought me back; and every day for a week I was tied, like a naughty puppy, to a stake in the back yard while the other children were out at recess. Oh, dear! There's the chapel bell, and after chapel I have a committee meeting. I'm sorry because I meant to write you a very entertaining letter this time. Auf wiedersehen Cher Daddy, Pax tibi! Judy PS. There's one thing I'm perfectly sure of I'm not a Chinaman. 4th February Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Jimmie McBride has sent me a Princeton banner as big as one end of the room; I am very grateful to him for remembering me, but I don't know what on earth to do with it. Sallie and Julia won't let me hang it up; our room this year is furnished in red, and you can imagine what an effect we'd have if I added orange and black. But it's such nice, warm, thick felt, I hate to waste it. Would it be very improper to have it made into a bath robe? My old one shrank when it was washed. I've entirely omitted of late telling you what I am learning, but though you might not imagine it from my letters, my time is exclusively occupied with study. It's a very bewildering matter to get educated in five branches at once. 'The test of true scholarship,' says Chemistry Professor, 'is a painstaking passion for detail.' 'Be careful not to keep your eyes glued to detail,' says History Professor. 'Stand far enough away to get a perspective of the whole.' You can see with what nicety we have to trim our sails between chemistry and history. I like the historical method best. If I say that William the Conqueror came over in 1492, and Columbus discovered America in 1100 or 1066 or whenever it was, that's a mere detail that the Professor overlooks. It gives a feeling of security and restfulness to the history recitation, that is entirely lacking in chemistry. Sixth-hour bell--I must go to the laboratory and look into a little matter of acids and salts and alkalis. I've burned a hole as big as a plate in the front of my chemistry apron, with hydrochloric acid. If the theory worked, I ought to be able to neutralize that hole with good strong ammonia, oughtn't I? Examinations next week, but who's afraid? Yours ever, Judy 5th March Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, There is a March wind blowing, and the sky is filled with heavy, black moving clouds. The crows in the pine trees are making such a clamour! It's an intoxicating, exhilarating, CALLING noise. You want to close your books and be off over the hills to race with the wind. We had a paper chase last Saturday over five miles of squashy 'cross country. The fox (composed of three girls and a bushel or so of confetti) started half an hour before the twenty-seven hunters. I was one of the twenty-seven; eight dropped by the wayside; we ended nineteen. The trail led over a hill, through a cornfield, and into a swamp where we had to leap lightly from hummock to hummock. of course half of us went in ankle deep. We kept losing the trail, and we wasted twenty-five minutes over that swamp. Then up a hill through some woods and in at a barn window! The barn doors were all locked and the window was up high and pretty small. I don't call that fair, do you? But we didn't go through; we circumnavigated the barn and picked up the trail where it issued by way of a low shed roof on to the top of a fence. The fox thought he had us there, but we fooled him. Then straight away over two miles of rolling meadow, and awfully hard to follow, for the confetti was getting sparse. The rule is that it must be at the most six feet apart, but they were the longest six feet I ever saw. Finally, after two hours of steady trotting, we tracked Monsieur Fox into the kitchen of Crystal Spring (that's a farm where the girls go in bob sleighs and hay wagons for chicken and waffle suppers) and we found the three foxes placidly eating milk and honey and biscuits. They hadn't thought we would get that far; they were expecting us to stick in the barn window. Both sides insist that they won. I think we did, don't you? Because we caught them before they got back to the campus. Anyway, all nineteen of us settled like locusts over the furniture and clamoured for honey. There wasn't enough to go round, but Mrs. Crystal Spring (that's our pet name for her; she's by rights a Johnson) brought up a jar of strawberry jam and a can of maple syrup--just made last week--and three loaves of brown bread. We didn't get back to college till half-past six--half an hour late for dinner--and we went straight in without dressing, and with perfectly unimpaired appetites! Then we all cut evening chapel, the state of our boots being enough of an excuse. I never told you about examinations. I passed everything with the utmost ease--I know the secret now, and am never going to fail again. I shan't be able to graduate with honours though, because of that beastly Latin prose and geometry Freshman year. But I don't care. Wot's the hodds so long as you're 'appy? (That's a quotation. I've been reading the English classics.) Speaking of classics, have you ever read Hamlet? If you haven't, do it right off. It's PERFECTLY CORKING. I've been hearing about Shakespeare all my life, but I had no idea he really wrote so well; I always suspected him of going largely on his reputation. I have a beautiful play that I invented a long time ago when I first learned to read. I put myself to sleep every night by pretending I'm the person (the most important person) in the book I'm reading at the moment. At present I'm Ophelia--and such a sensible Ophelia! I keep Hamlet amused all the time, and pet him and scold him and make him wrap up his throat when he has a cold. I've entirely cured him of being melancholy. The King and Queen are both dead--an accident at sea; no funeral necessary--so Hamlet and I are ruling in Denmark without any bother. We have the kingdom working beautifully. He takes care of the governing, and I look after the charities. I have just founded some first-class orphan asylums. If you or any of the other Trustees would like to visit them, I shall be pleased to show you through. I think you might find a great many helpful suggestions. I remain, sir, Yours most graciously, OPHELIA, Queen of Denmark. 24th March, maybe the 25th Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I don't believe I can be going to Heaven--I am getting such a lot of good things here; it wouldn't be fair to get them hereafter too. Listen to what has happened. Jerusha Abbott has won the short-story contest (a twenty-five dollar prize) that the Monthly holds every year. And she's a Sophomore! The contestants are mostly Seniors. When I saw my name posted, I couldn't quite believe it was true. Maybe I am going to be an author after all. I wish Mrs. Lippett hadn't given me such a silly name--it sounds like an author-ess, doesn't it? Also I have been chosen for the spring dramatics--As You Like It out of doors. I am going to be Celia, own cousin to Rosalind. And lastly: Julia and Sallie and I are going to New York next Friday to do some spring shopping and stay all night and go to the theatre the next day with 'Master Jervie.' He invited us. Julia is going to stay at home with her family, but Sallie and I are going to stop at the Martha Washington Hotel. Did you ever hear of anything so exciting? I've never been in a hotel in my life, nor in a theatre; except once when the Catholic Church had a festival and invited the orphans, but that wasn't a real play and it doesn't count. And what do you think we're going to see? Hamlet. Think of that! We studied it for four weeks in Shakespeare class and I know it by heart. I am so excited over all these prospects that I can scarcely sleep. Goodbye, Daddy. This is a very entertaining world. Yours ever, Judy PS. I've just looked at the calendar. It's the 28th. Another postscript. I saw a street car conductor today with one brown eye and one blue. Wouldn't he make a nice villain for a detective story? 7th April Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Mercy! Isn't New York big? Worcester is nothing to it. Do you mean to tell me that you actually live in all that confusion? I don't believe that I shall recover for months from the bewildering effect of two days of it. I can't begin to tell you all the amazing things I've seen; I suppose you know, though, since you live there yourself. But aren't the streets entertaining? And the people? And the shops? I never saw such lovely things as there are in the windows. It makes you want to devote your life to wearing clothes. Sallie and Julia and I went shopping together Saturday morning. Julia went into the very most gorgeous place I ever saw, white and gold walls and blue carpets and blue silk curtains and gilt chairs. A perfectly beautiful lady with yellow hair and a long black silk trailing gown came to meet us with a welcoming smile. I thought we were paying a social call, and started to shake hands, but it seems we were only buying hats--at least Julia was. She sat down in front of a mirror and tried on a dozen, each lovelier than the last, and bought the two loveliest of all. I can't imagine any joy in life greater than sitting down in front of a mirror and buying any hat you choose without having first to consider the price! There's no doubt about it, Daddy; New York would rapidly undermine this fine stoical character which the John Grier Home so patiently built up. And after we'd finished our shopping, we met Master Jervie at Sherry's. I suppose you've been in Sherry's? Picture that, then picture the dining-room of the John Grier Home with its oilcloth-covered tables, and white crockery that you CAN'T break, and wooden-handled knives and forks; and fancy the way I felt! I ate my fish with the wrong fork, but the waiter very kindly gave me another so that nobody noticed. And after luncheon we went to the theatre--it was dazzling, marvellous, unbelievable--I dream about it every night. Isn't Shakespeare wonderful? Hamlet is so much better on the stage than when we analyze it in class; I appreciated it before, but now, dear me! I think, if you don't mind, that I'd rather be an actress than a writer. Wouldn't you like me to leave college and go into a dramatic school? And then I'll send you a box for all my performances, and smile at you across the footlights. Only wear a red rose in your buttonhole, please, so I'll surely smile at the right man. It would be an awfully embarrassing mistake if I picked out the wrong one. We came back Saturday night and had our dinner in the train, at little tables with pink lamps and negro waiters. I never heard of meals being served in trains before, and I inadvertently said so. 'Where on earth were you brought up?' said Julia to me. 'In a village,' said I meekly, to Julia. 'But didn't you ever travel?' said she to me. 'Not till I came to college, and then it was only a hundred and sixty miles and we didn't eat,' said I to her. She's getting quite interested in me, because I say such funny things. I try hard not to, but they do pop out when I'm surprised--and I'm surprised most of the time. It's a dizzying experience, Daddy, to pass eighteen years in the John Grier Home, and then suddenly to be plunged into the WORLD. But I'm getting acclimated. I don't make such awful mistakes as I did; and I don't feel uncomfortable any more with the other girls. I used to squirm whenever people looked at me. I felt as though they saw right through my sham new clothes to the checked ginghams underneath. But I'm not letting the ginghams bother me any more. Sufficient unto yesterday is the evil thereof. I forgot to tell you about our flowers. Master Jervie gave us each a big bunch of violets and lilies-of-the-valley. Wasn't that sweet of him? I never used to care much for men--judging by Trustees--but I'm changing my mind. Eleven pages--this is a letter! Have courage. I'm going to stop. Yours always, Judy 10th April Dear Mr. Rich-Man, Here's your cheque for fifty dollars. Thank you very much, but I do not feel that I can keep it. My allowance is sufficient to afford all of the hats that I need. I am sorry that I wrote all that silly stuff about the millinery shop; it's just that I had never seen anything like it before. However, I wasn't begging! And I would rather not accept any more charity than I have to. Sincerely yours, Jerusha Abbott 11th April Dearest Daddy, Will you please forgive me for the letter I wrote you yesterday? After I posted it I was sorry, and tried to get it back, but that beastly mail clerk wouldn't give it back to me. It's the middle of the night now; I've been awake for hours thinking what a Worm I am--what a Thousand-legged Worm--and that's the worst I can say! I've closed the door very softly into the study so as not to wake Julia and Sallie, and am sitting up in bed writing to you on paper torn out of my history note-book. I just wanted to tell you that I am sorry I was so impolite about your cheque. I know you meant it kindly, and I think you're an old dear to take so much trouble for such a silly thing as a hat. I ought to have returned it very much more graciously. But in any case, I had to return it. It's different with me than with other girls. They can take things naturally from people. They have fathers and brothers and aunts and uncles; but I can't be on any such relations with any one. I like to pretend that you belong to me, just to play with the idea, but of course I know you don't. I'm alone, really--with my back to the wall fighting the world--and I get sort of gaspy when I think about it. I put it out of my mind, and keep on pretending; but don't you see, Daddy? I can't accept any more money than I have to, because some day I shall be wanting to pay it back, and even as great an author as I intend to be won't be able to face a PERFECTLY TREMENDOUS debt. I'd love pretty hats and things, but I mustn't mortgage the future to pay for them. You'll forgive me, won't you, for being so rude? I have an awful habit of writing impulsively when I first think things, and then posting the letter beyond recall. But if I sometimes seem thoughtless and ungrateful, I never mean it. In my heart I thank you always for the life and freedom and independence that you have given me. My childhood was just a long, sullen stretch of revolt, and now I am so happy every moment of the day that I can't believe it's true. I feel like a made-up heroine in a story-book. It's a quarter past two. I'm going to tiptoe out to post this off now. You'll receive it in the next mail after the other; so you won't have a very long time to think bad of me. Good night, Daddy, I love you always, Judy 4th May Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Field Day last Saturday. It was a very spectacular occasion. First we had a parade of all the classes, with everybody dressed in white linen, the Seniors carrying blue and gold Japanese umbrellas, and the juniors white and yellow banners. Our class had crimson balloons--very fetching, especially as they were always getting loose and floating off--and the Freshmen wore green tissue-paper hats with long streamers. Also we had a band in blue uniforms hired from town. Also about a dozen funny people, like clowns in a circus, to keep the spectators entertained between events. Julia was dressed as a fat country man with a linen duster and whiskers and baggy umbrella. Patsy Moriarty (Patrici really. Did you ever hear such a name? Mrs. Lippett couldn't have done better) who is tall and thin was Julia's wife in a absurd green bonnet over one ear. Waves of laughter followed them the whole length of the course. Julia played the part extremely well. I never dreamed that a Pendleton could display so much comedy spirit--begging Master Jervie's pardon; I don't consider him a true Pendleton though, any more than I consider you a true Trustee. Sallie and I weren't in the parade because we were entered for the events. And what do you think? We both won! At least in something. We tried for the running broad jump and lost; but Sallie won the pole-vaulting (seven feet three inches) and I won the fifty-yard sprint (eight seconds). I was pretty panting at the end, but it was great fun, with the whole class waving balloons and cheering and yelling: What's the matter with Judy Abbott? She's all right. Who's all right? Judy Ab-bott! That, Daddy, is true fame. Then trotting back to the dressing tent and being rubbed down with alcohol and having a lemon to suck. You see we're very professional. It's a fine thing to win an event for your class, because the class that wins the most gets the athletic cup for the year. The Seniors won it this year, with seven events to their credit. The athletic association gave a dinner in the gymnasium to all of the winners. We had fried soft-shell crabs, and chocolate ice-cream moulded in the shape of basket balls. I sat up half of last night reading Jane Eyre. Are you old enough, Daddy, to remember sixty years ago? And, if so, did people talk that way? The haughty Lady Blanche says to the footman, 'Stop your chattering, knave, and do my bidding.' Mr. Rochester talks about the metal welkin when he means the sky; and as for the mad woman who laughs like a hyena and sets fire to bed curtains and tears up wedding veils and BITES--it's melodrama of the purest, but just the same, you read and read and read. I can't see how any girl could have written such a book, especially any girl who was brought up in a churchyard. There's something about those Brontes that fascinates me. Their books, their lives, their spirit. Where did they get it? When I was reading about little Jane's troubles in the charity school, I got so angry that I had to go out and take a walk. I understood exactly how she felt. Having known Mrs. Lippett, I could see Mr. Brocklehurst. Don't be outraged, Daddy. I am not intimating that the John Grier Home was like the Lowood Institute. We had plenty to eat and plenty to wear, sufficient water to wash in, and a furnace in the cellar. But there was one deadly likeness. Our lives were absolutely monotonous and uneventful. Nothing nice ever happened, except ice-cream on Sundays, and even that was regular. In all the eighteen years I was there I only had one adventure--when the woodshed burned. We had to get up in the night and dress so as to be ready in case the house should catch. But it didn't catch and we went back to bed. Everybody likes a few surprises; it's a perfectly natural human craving. But I never had one until Mrs. Lippett called me to the office to tell me that Mr. John Smith was going to send me to college. And then she broke the news so gradually that it just barely shocked me. You know, Daddy, I think that the most necessary quality for any person to have is imagination. It makes people able to put themselves in other people's places. It makes them kind and sympathetic and understanding. It ought to be cultivated in children. But the John Grier Home instantly stamped out the slightest flicker that appeared. Duty was the one quality that was encouraged. I don't think children ought to know the meaning of the word; it's odious, detestable. They ought to do everything from love. Wait until you see the orphan asylum that I am going to be the head of! It's my favourite play at night before I go to sleep. I plan it out to the littlest detail--the meals and clothes and study and amusements and punishments; for even my superior orphans are sometimes bad. But anyway, they are going to be happy. I think that every one, no matter how many troubles he may have when he grows up, ought to have a happy childhood to look back upon. And if I ever have any children of my own, no matter how unhappy I may be, I am not going to let them have any cares until they grow up. (There goes the chapel bell--I'll finish this letter sometime). Thursday When I came in from laboratory this afternoon, I found a squirrel sitting on the tea table helping himself to almonds. These are the kind of callers we entertain now that warm weather has come and the windows stay open-- Saturday morning Perhaps you think, last night being Friday, with no classes today, that I passed a nice quiet, readable evening with the set of Stevenson that I bought with my prize money? But if so, you've never attended a girls' college, Daddy dear. Six friends dropped in to make fudge, and one of them dropped the fudge--while it was still liquid--right in the middle of our best rug. We shall never be able to clean up the mess. I haven't mentioned any lessons of late; but we are still having them every day. It's sort of a relief though, to get away from them and discuss life in the large--rather one-sided discussions that you and I hold, but that's your own fault. You are welcome to answer back any time you choose. I've been writing this letter off and on for three days, and I fear by now vous etes bien bored! Goodbye, nice Mr. Man, Judy Mr. Daddy-Long-Legs Smith, SIR: Having completed the study of argumentation and the science of dividing a thesis into heads, I have decided to adopt the following form for letter-writing. It contains all necessary facts, but no unnecessary verbiage. I. We had written examinations this week in: A. Chemistry. B. History. II. A new dormitory is being built. A. Its material is: (a) red brick. (b) grey stone. B. Its capacity will be: (a) one dean, five instructors. (b) two hundred girls. (c) one housekeeper, three cooks, twenty waitresses, twenty chambermaids. III. We had junket for dessert tonight. IV. I am writing a special topic upon the Sources of Shakespeare's Plays. V. Lou McMahon slipped and fell this afternoon at basket ball, and she: A. Dislocated her shoulder. B. Bruised her knee. VI. I have a new hat trimmed with: A. Blue velvet ribbon. B. Two blue quills. C. Three red pompoms. VII. It is half past nine. VIII. Good night. Judy 2nd June Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, You will never guess the nice thing that has happened. The McBrides have asked me to spend the summer at their camp in the Adirondacks! They belong to a sort of club on a lovely little lake in the middle of the woods. The different members have houses made of logs dotted about among the trees, and they go canoeing on the lake, and take long walks through trails to other camps, and have dances once a week in the club house--Jimmie McBride is going to have a college friend visiting him part of the summer, so you see we shall have plenty of men to dance with. Wasn't it sweet of Mrs. McBride to ask me? It appears that she liked me when I was there for Christmas. Please excuse this being short. It isn't a real letter; it's just to let you know that I'm disposed of for the summer. Yours, In a VERY contented frame of mind, Judy 5th June Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Your secretary man has just written to me saying that Mr. Smith prefers that I should not accept Mrs. McBride's invitation, but should return to Lock Willow the same as last summer. Why, why, WHY, Daddy? You don't understand about it. Mrs. McBride does want me, really and truly. I'm not the least bit of trouble in the house. I'm a help. They don't take up many servants, and Sallie an I can do lots of useful things. It's a fine chance for me to learn housekeeping. Every woman ought to understand it, and I only know asylum-keeping. There aren't any girls our age at the camp, and Mrs. McBride wants me for a companion for Sallie. We are planning to do a lot of reading together. We are going to read all of the books for next year's English and sociology. The Professor said it would be a great help if we would get our reading finished in the summer; and it's so much easier to remember it if we read together and talk it over. Just to live in the same house with Sallie's mother is an education. She's the most interesting, entertaining, companionable, charming woman in the world; she knows everything. Think how many summers I've spent with Mrs. Lippett and how I'll appreciate the contrast. You needn't be afraid that I'll be crowding them, for their house is made of rubber. When they have a lot of company, they just sprinkle tents about in the woods and turn the boys outside. It's going to be such a nice, healthy summer exercising out of doors every minute. Jimmie McBride is going to teach me how to ride horseback and paddle a canoe, and how to shoot and--oh, lots of things I ought to know. It's the kind of nice, jolly, care-free time that I've never had; and I think every girl deserves it once in her life. Of course I'll do exactly as you say, but please, PLEASE let me go, Daddy. I've never wanted anything so much. This isn't Jerusha Abbott, the future great author, writing to you. It's just Judy--a girl. 9th June Mr. John Smith, SIR: Yours of the 7th inst. at hand. In compliance with the instructions received through your secretary, I leave on Friday next to spend the summer at Lock Willow Farm. I hope always to remain, (Miss) Jerusha Abbott LOCK WILLOW FARM, 3rd August Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, It has been nearly two months since I wrote, which wasn't nice of me, I know, but I haven't loved you much this summer--you see I'm being frank! You can't imagine how disappointed I was at having to give up the McBrides' camp. Of course I know that you're my guardian, and that I have to regard your wishes in all matters, but I couldn't see any REASON. It was so distinctly the best thing that could have happened to me. If I had been Daddy, and you had been Judy, I should have said, 'Bless you my child, run along and have a good time; see lots of new people and learn lots of new things; live out of doors, and get strong and well and rested for a year of hard work.' But not at all! Just a curt line from your secretary ordering me to Lock Willow. It's the impersonality of your commands that hurts my feelings. It seems as though, if you felt the tiniest little bit for me the way I feel for you, you'd sometimes send me a message that you'd written with your own hand, instead of those beastly typewritten secretary's notes. If there were the slightest hint that you cared, I'd do anything on earth to please you. I know that I was to write nice, long, detailed letters without ever expecting any answer. You're living up to your side of the bargain--I'm being educated--and I suppose you're thinking I'm not living up to mine! But, Daddy, it is a hard bargain. It is, really. I'm so awfully lonely. You are the only person I have to care for, and you are so shadowy. You're just an imaginary man that I've made up--and probably the real YOU isn't a bit like my imaginary YOU. But you did once, when I was ill in the infirmary, send me a message, and now, when I am feeling awfully forgotten, I get out your card and read it over. I don't think I am telling you at all what I started to say, which was this: Although my feelings are still hurt, for it is very humiliating to be picked up and moved about by an arbitrary, peremptory, unreasonable, omnipotent, invisible Providence, still, when a man has been as kind and generous and thoughtful as you have heretofore been towards me, I suppose he has a right to be an arbitrary, peremptory, unreasonable, invisible Providence if he chooses, and so--I'll forgive you and be cheerful again. But I still don't enjoy getting Sallie's letters about the good times they are having in camp! However--we will draw a veil over that and begin again. I've been writing and writing this summer; four short stories finished and sent to four different magazines. So you see I'm trying to be an author. I have a workroom fixed in a corner of the attic where Master Jervie used to have his rainy-day playroom. It's in a cool, breezy corner with two dormer windows, and shaded by a maple tree with a family of red squirrels living in a hole. I'll write a nicer letter in a few days and tell you all the farm news. We need rain. Yours as ever, Judy 10th August Mr. Daddy-Long-Legs, SIR: I address you from the second crotch in the willow tree by the pool in the pasture. There's a frog croaking underneath, a locust singing overhead and two little 'devil downheads' darting up and down the trunk. I've been here for an hour; it's a very comfortable crotch, especially after being upholstered with two sofa cushions. I came up with a pen and tablet hoping to write an immortal short story, but I've been having a dreadful time with my heroine--I CAN'T make her behave as I want her to behave; so I've abandoned her for the moment, and am writing to you. (Not much relief though, for I can't make you behave as I want you to, either.) If you are in that dreadful New York, I wish I could send you some of this lovely, breezy, sunshiny outlook. The country is Heaven after a week of rain. Speaking of Heaven--do you remember Mr. Kellogg that I told you about last summer?--the minister of the little white church at the Corners. Well, the poor old soul is dead--last winter of pneumonia. I went half a dozen times to hear him preach and got very well acquainted with his theology. He believed to the end exactly the same things he started with. It seems to me that a man who can think straight along for forty-seven years without changing a single idea ought to be kept in a cabinet as a curiosity. I hope he is enjoying his harp and golden crown; he was so perfectly sure of finding them! There's a new young man, very consequential, in his place. The congregation is pretty dubious, especially the faction led by Deacon Cummings. It looks as though there was going to be an awful split in the church. We don't care for innovations in religion in this neighbourhood. During our week of rain I sat up in the attic and had an orgy of reading--Stevenson, mostly. He himself is more entertaining than any of the characters in his books; I dare say he made himself into the kind of hero that would look well in print. Don't you think it was perfect of him to spend all the ten thousand dollars his father left, for a yacht, and go sailing off to the South Seas? He lived up to his adventurous creed. If my father had left me ten thousand dollars, I'd do it, too. The thought of Vailima makes me wild. I want to see the tropics. I want to see the whole world. I am going to be a great author, or artist, or actress, or playwright--or whatever sort of a great person I turn out to be. I have a terrible wanderthirst; the very sight of a map makes me want to put on my hat and take an umbrella and start. 'I shall see before I die the palms and temples of the South.' Thursday evening at twilight, sitting on the doorstep. Very hard to get any news into this letter! Judy is becoming so philosophical of late, that she wishes to discourse largely of the world in general, instead of descending to the trivial details of daily life. But if you MUST have news, here it is: Our nine young pigs waded across the brook and ran away last Tuesday, and only eight came back. We don't want to accuse anyone unjustly, but we suspect that Widow Dowd has one more than she ought to have. Mr. Weaver has painted his barn and his two silos a bright pumpkin yellow--a very ugly colour, but he says it will wear. The Brewers have company this week; Mrs. Brewer's sister and two nieces from Ohio. One of our Rhode Island Reds only brought off three chicks out of fifteen eggs. We can't imagine what was the trouble. Rhode island Reds, in my opinion, are a very inferior breed. I prefer Buff Orpingtons. The new clerk in the post office at Bonnyrigg Four Corners drank every drop of Jamaica ginger they had in stock--seven dollars' worth--before he was discovered. Old Ira Hatch has rheumatism and can't work any more; he never saved his money when he was earning good wages, so now he has to live on the town. There's to be an ice-cream social at the schoolhouse next Saturday evening. Come and bring your families. I have a new hat that I bought for twenty-five cents at the post office. This is my latest portrait, on my way to rake the hay. It's getting too dark to see; anyway, the news is all used up. Good night, Judy Friday Good morning! Here is some news! What do you think? You'd never, never, never guess who's coming to Lock Willow. A letter to Mrs. Semple from Mr. Pendleton. He's motoring through the Berkshires, and is tired and wants to rest on a nice quiet farm--if he climbs out at her doorstep some night will she have a room ready for him? Maybe he'll stay one week, or maybe two, or maybe three; he'll see how restful it is when he gets here. Such a flutter as we are in! The whole house is being cleaned and all the curtains washed. I am driving to the Corners this morning to get some new oilcloth for the entry, and two cans of brown floor paint for the hall and back stairs. Mrs. Dowd is engaged to come tomorrow to wash the windows (in the exigency of the moment, we waive our suspicions in regard to the piglet). You might think, from this account of our activities, that the house was not already immaculate; but I assure you it was! Whatever Mrs. Semple's limitations, she is a HOUSEKEEPER. But isn't it just like a man, Daddy? He doesn't give the remotest hint as to whether he will land on the doorstep today, or two weeks from today. We shall live in a perpetual breathlessness until he comes--and if he doesn't hurry, the cleaning may all have to be done over again. There's Amasai waiting below with the buckboard and Grover. I drive alone--but if you could see old Grove, you wouldn't be worried as to my safety. With my hand on my heart--farewell. Judy PS. Isn't that a nice ending? I got it out of Stevenson's letters. Saturday Good morning again! I didn't get this ENVELOPED yesterday before the postman came, so I'll add some more. We have one mail a day at twelve o'clock. Rural delivery is a blessing to the farmers! Our postman not only delivers letters, but he runs errands for us in town, at five cents an errand. Yesterday he brought me some shoe-strings and a jar of cold cream (I sunburned all the skin off my nose before I got my new hat) and a blue Windsor tie and a bottle of blacking all for ten cents. That was an unusual bargain, owing to the largeness of my order. Also he tells us what is happening in the Great World. Several people on the route take daily papers, and he reads them as he jogs along, and repeats the news to the ones who don't subscribe. So in case a war breaks out between the United States and Japan, or the president is assassinated, or Mr. Rockefeller leaves a million dollars to the John Grier Home, you needn't bother to write; I'll hear it anyway. No sign yet of Master Jervie. But you should see how clean our house is--and with what anxiety we wipe our feet before we step in! I hope he'll come soon; I am longing for someone to talk to. Mrs. Semple, to tell you the truth, gets rather monotonous. She never lets ideas interrupt the easy flow of her conversation. It's a funny thing about the people here. Their world is just this single hilltop. They are not a bit universal, if you know what I mean. It's exactly the same as at the John Grier Home. Our ideas there were bounded by the four sides of the iron fence, only I didn't mind it so much because I was younger, and was so awfully busy. By the time I'd got all my beds made and my babies' faces washed and had gone to school and come home and had washed their faces again and darned their stockings and mended Freddie Perkins's trousers (he tore them every day of his life) and learned my lessons in between--I was ready to go to bed, and I didn't notice any lack of social intercourse. But after two years in a conversational college, I do miss it; and I shall be glad to see somebody who speaks my language. I really believe I've finished, Daddy. Nothing else occurs to me at the moment--I'll try to write a longer letter next time. Yours always, Judy PS. The lettuce hasn't done at all well this year. It was so dry early in the season. 25th August Well, Daddy, Master Jervie's here. And such a nice time as we're having! At least I am, and I think he is, too--he has been here ten days and he doesn't show any signs of going. The way Mrs. Semple pampers that man is scandalous. If she indulged him as much when he was a baby, I don't know how he ever turned out so well. He and I eat at a little table set on the side porch, or sometimes under the trees, or--when it rains or is cold--in the best parlour. He just picks out the spot he wants to eat in and Carrie trots after him with the table. Then if it has been an awful nuisance, and she has had to carry the dishes very far, she finds a dollar under the sugar bowl. He is an awfully companionable sort of man, though you would never believe it to see him casually; he looks at first glance like a true Pendleton, but he isn't in the least. He is just as simple and unaffected and sweet as he can be--that seems a funny way to describe a man, but it's true. He's extremely nice with the farmers around here; he meets them in a sort of man-to-man fashion that disarms them immediately. They were very suspicious at first. They didn't care for his clothes! And I will say that his clothes are rather amazing. He wears knickerbockers and pleated jackets and white flannels and riding clothes with puffed trousers. Whenever he comes down in anything new, Mrs. Semple, beaming with pride, walks around and views him from every angle, and urges him to be careful where he sits down; she is so afraid he will pick up some dust. It bores him dreadfully. He's always saying to her: 'Run along, Lizzie, and tend to your work. You can't boss me any longer. I've grown up.' It's awfully funny to think of that great big, long-legged man (he's nearly as long-legged as you, Daddy) ever sitting in Mrs. Semple's lap and having his face washed. Particularly funny when you see her lap! She has two laps now, and three chins. But he says that once she was thin and wiry and spry and could run faster than he. Such a lot of adventures we're having! We've explored the country for miles, and I've learned to fish with funny little flies made of feathers. Also to shoot with a rifle and a revolver. Also to ride horseback--there's an astonishing amount of life in old Grove. We fed him on oats for three days, and he shied at a calf and almost ran away with me. Wednesday We climbed Sky Hill Monday afternoon. That's a mountain near here; not an awfully high mountain, perhaps--no snow on the summit--but at least you are pretty breathless when you reach the top. The lower slopes are covered with woods, but the top is just piled rocks and open moor. We stayed up for the sunset and built a fire and cooked our supper. Master Jervie did the cooking; he said he knew how better than me and he did, too, because he's used to camping. Then we came down by moonlight, and, when we reached the wood trail where it was dark, by the light of an electric bulb that he had in his pocket. It was such fun! He laughed and joked all the way and talked about interesting things. He's read all the books I've ever read, and a lot of others besides. It's astonishing how many different things he knows. We went for a long tramp this morning and got caught in a storm. Our clothes were drenched before we reached home but our spirits not even damp. You should have seen Mrs. Semple's face when we dripped into her kitchen. 'Oh, Master Jervie--Miss Judy! You are soaked through. Dear! Dear! What shall I do? That nice new coat is perfectly ruined.' She was awfully funny; you would have thought that we were ten years old, and she a distracted mother. I was afraid for a while that we weren't going to get any jam for tea. Saturday I started this letter ages ago, but I haven't had a second to finish it. Isn't this a nice thought from Stevenson? The world is so full of a number of things, I am sure we should all be as happy as kings. It's true, you know. The world is full of happiness, and plenty to go round, if you are only willing to take the kind that comes your way. The whole secret is in being PLIABLE. In the country, especially, there are such a lot of entertaining things. I can walk over everybody's land, and look at everybody's view, and dabble in everybody's brook; and enjoy it just as much as though I owned the land--and with no taxes to pay! It's Sunday night now, about eleven o'clock, and I am supposed to be getting some beauty sleep, but I had black coffee for dinner, so--no beauty sleep for me! This morning, said Mrs. Semple to Mr. Pendleton, with a very determined accent: 'We have to leave here at a quarter past ten in order to get to church by eleven.' 'Very well, Lizzie,' said Master Jervie, 'you have the buggy ready, and if I'm not dressed, just go on without waiting.' 'We'll wait,' said she. 'As you please,' said he, 'only don't keep the horses standing too long.' Then while she was dressing, he told Carrie to pack up a lunch, and he told me to scramble into my walking clothes; and we slipped out the back way and went fishing. It discommoded the household dreadfully, because Lock Willow of a Sunday dines at two. But he ordered dinner at seven--he orders meals whenever he chooses; you would think the place were a restaurant--and that kept Carrie and Amasai from going driving. But he said it was all the better because it wasn't proper for them to go driving without a chaperon; and anyway, he wanted the horses himself to take me driving. Did you ever hear anything so funny? And poor Mrs. Semple believes that people who go fishing on Sundays go afterwards to a sizzling hot hell! She is awfully troubled to think that she didn't train him better when he was small and helpless and she had the chance. Besides--she wished to show him off in church. Anyway, we had our fishing (he caught four little ones) and we cooked them on a camp-fire for lunch. They kept falling off our spiked sticks into the fire, so they tasted a little ashy, but we ate them. We got home at four and went driving at five and had dinner at seven, and at ten I was sent to bed and here I am, writing to you. I am getting a little sleepy, though. Good night. Here is a picture of the one fish I caught. Ship Ahoy, Cap'n Long-Legs! Avast! Belay! Yo, ho, ho, and a bottle of rum. Guess what I'm reading? Our conversation these past two days has been nautical and piratical. Isn't Treasure Island fun? Did you ever read it, or wasn't it written when you were a boy? Stevenson only got thirty pounds for the serial rights--I don't believe it pays to be a great author. Maybe I'll be a school-teacher. Excuse me for filling my letters so full of Stevenson; my mind is very much engaged with him at present. He comprises Lock Willow's library. I've been writing this letter for two weeks, and I think it's about long enough. Never say, Daddy, that I don't give details. I wish you were here, too; we'd all have such a jolly time together. I like my different friends to know each other. I wanted to ask Mr. Pendleton if he knew you in New York--I should think he might; you must move in about the same exalted social circles, and you are both interested in reforms and things--but I couldn't, for I don't know your real name. It's the silliest thing I ever heard of, not to know your name. Mrs. Lippett warned me that you were eccentric. I should think so! Affectionately, Judy PS. On reading this over, I find that it isn't all Stevenson. There are one or two glancing references to Master Jervie. 10th September Dear Daddy, He has gone, and we are missing him! When you get accustomed to people or places or ways of living, and then have them snatched away, it does leave an awfully empty, gnawing sort of sensation. I'm finding Mrs. Semple's conversation pretty unseasoned food. College opens in two weeks and I shall be glad to begin work again. I have worked quite a lot this summer though--six short stories and seven poems. Those I sent to the magazines all came back with the most courteous promptitude. But I don't mind. It's good practice. Master Jervie read them--he brought in the post, so I couldn't help his knowing--and he said they were DREADFUL. They showed that I didn't have the slightest idea of what I was talking about. (Master Jervie doesn't let politeness interfere with truth.) But the last one I did--just a little sketch laid in college--he said wasn't bad; and he had it typewritten, and I sent it to a magazine. They've had it two weeks; maybe they're thinking it over. You should see the sky! There's the queerest orange-coloured light over everything. We're going to have a storm. It commenced just that moment with tremendously big drops and all the shutters banging. I had to run to close the windows, while Carrie flew to the attic with an armful of milk pans to put under the places where the roof leaks and then, just as I was resuming my pen, I remembered that I'd left a cushion and rug and hat and Matthew Arnold's poems under a tree in the orchard, so I dashed out to get them, all quite soaked. The red cover of the poems had run into the inside; Dover Beach in the future will be washed by pink waves. A storm is awfully disturbing in the country. You are always having to think of so many things that are out of doors and getting spoiled. Thursday Daddy! Daddy! What do you think? The postman has just come with two letters. 1st. My story is accepted. $50. ALORS! I'm an AUTHOR. 2nd. A letter from the college secretary. I'm to have a scholarship for two years that will cover board and tuition. It was founded for 'marked proficiency in English with general excellency in other lines.' And I've won it! I applied for it before I left, but I didn't have an idea I'd get it, on account of my Freshman bad work in maths and Latin. But it seems I've made it up. I am awfully glad, Daddy, because now I won't be such a burden to you. The monthly allowance will be all I'll need, and maybe I can earn that with writing or tutoring or something. I'm LONGING to go back and begin work. Yours ever, Jerusha Abbott, Author of When the Sophomores Won the Game. For sale at all news stands, price ten cents. 26th September Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Back at college again and an upper classman. Our study is better than ever this year--faces the South with two huge windows and oh! so furnished. Julia, with an unlimited allowance, arrived two days early and was attacked with a fever for settling. We have new wall paper and oriental rugs and mahogany chairs--not painted mahogany which made us sufficiently happy last year, but real. It's very gorgeous, but I don't feel as though I belonged in it; I'm nervous all the time for fear I'll get an ink spot in the wrong place. And, Daddy, I found your letter waiting for me--pardon--I mean your secretary's. Will you kindly convey to me a comprehensible reason why I should not accept that scholarship? I don't understand your objection in the least. But anyway, it won't do the slightest good for you to object, for I've already accepted it and I am not going to change! That sounds a little impertinent, but I don't mean it so. I suppose you feel that when you set out to educate me, you'd like to finish the work, and put a neat period, in the shape of a diploma, at the end. But look at it just a second from my point of view. I shall owe my education to you just as much as though I let you pay for the whole of it, but I won't be quite so much indebted. I know that you don't want me to return the money, but nevertheless, I am going to want to do it, if I possibly can; and winning this scholarship makes it so much easier. I was expecting to spend the rest of my life in paying my debts, but now I shall only have to spend one-half of the rest of it. I hope you understand my position and won't be cross. The allowance I shall still most gratefully accept. It requires an allowance to live up to Julia and her furniture! I wish that she had been reared to simpler tastes, or else that she were not my room-mate. This isn't much of a letter; I meant to have written a lot--but I've been hemming four window curtains and three portieres (I'm glad you can't see the length of the stitches), and polishing a brass desk set with tooth powder (very uphill work), and sawing off picture wire with manicure scissors, and unpacking four boxes of books, and putting away two trunkfuls of clothes (it doesn't seem believable that Jerusha Abbott owns two trunks full of clothes, but she does!) and welcoming back fifty dear friends in between. Opening day is a joyous occasion! Good night, Daddy dear, and don't be annoyed because your chick is wanting to scratch for herself. She's growing up into an awfully energetic little hen--with a very determined cluck and lots of beautiful feathers (all due to you). Affectionately, Judy 30th September Dear Daddy, Are you still harping on that scholarship? I never knew a man so obstinate, and stubborn and unreasonable, and tenacious, and bull-doggish, and unable-to-see-other-people's-point-of-view, as you. You prefer that I should not be accepting favours from strangers. Strangers!--And what are you, pray? Is there anyone in the world that I know less? I shouldn't recognize you if I met you in the street. Now, you see, if you had been a sane, sensible person and had written nice, cheering fatherly letters to your little Judy, and had come occasionally and patted her on the head, and had said you were glad she was such a good girl--Then, perhaps, she wouldn't have flouted you in your old age, but would have obeyed your slightest wish like the dutiful daughter she was meant to be. Strangers indeed! You live in a glass house, Mr. Smith. And besides, this isn't a favour; it's like a prize--I earned it by hard work. If nobody had been good enough in English, the committee wouldn't have awarded the scholarship; some years they don't. Also-- But what's the use of arguing with a man? You belong, Mr. Smith, to a sex devoid of a sense of logic. To bring a man into line, there are just two methods: one must either coax or be disagreeable. I scorn to coax men for what I wish. Therefore, I must be disagreeable. I refuse, sir, to give up the scholarship; and if you make any more fuss, I won't accept the monthly allowance either, but will wear myself into a nervous wreck tutoring stupid Freshmen. That is my ultimatum! And listen--I have a further thought. Since you are so afraid that by taking this scholarship I am depriving someone else of an education, I know a way out. You can apply the money that you would have spent for me towards educating some other little girl from the John Grier Home. Don't you think that's a nice idea? Only, Daddy, EDUCATE the new girl as much as you choose, but please don't LIKE her any better than me. I trust that your secretary won't be hurt because I pay so little attention to the suggestions offered in his letter, but I can't help it if he is. He's a spoiled child, Daddy. I've meekly given in to his whims heretofore, but this time I intend to be FIRM. Yours, With a mind, Completely and Irrevocably and World-without-End Made-up, Jerusha Abbott 9th November Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I started down town today to buy a bottle of shoe blacking and some collars and the material for a new blouse and a jar of violet cream and a cake of Castile soap--all very necessary; I couldn't be happy another day without them--and when I tried to pay the car fare, I found that I had left my purse in the pocket of my other coat. So I had to get out and take the next car, and was late for gymnasium. It's a dreadful thing to have no memory and two coats! Julia Pendleton has invited me to visit her for the Christmas holidays. How does that strike you, Mr. Smith? Fancy Jerusha Abbott, of the John Grier Home, sitting at the tables of the rich. I don't know why Julia wants me--she seems to be getting quite attached to me of late. I should, to tell the truth, very much prefer going to Sallie's, but Julia asked me first, so if I go anywhere it must be to New York instead of to Worcester. I'm rather awed at the prospect of meeting Pendletons EN MASSE, and also I'd have to get a lot of new clothes--so, Daddy dear, if you write that you would prefer having me remain quietly at college, I will bow to your wishes with my usual sweet docility. I'm engaged at odd moments with the Life and Letters of Thomas Huxley--it makes nice, light reading to pick up between times. Do you know what an archaeopteryx is? It's a bird. And a stereognathus? I'm not sure myself, but I think it's a missing link, like a bird with teeth or a lizard with wings. No, it isn't either; I've just looked in the book. It's a mesozoic mammal. I've elected economics this year--very illuminating subject. When I finish that I'm going to take Charity and Reform; then, Mr. Trustee, I'll know just how an orphan asylum ought to be run. Don't you think I'd make an admirable voter if I had my rights? I was twenty-one last week. This is an awfully wasteful country to throw away such an honest, educated, conscientious, intelligent citizen as I would be. Yours always, Judy 7th December Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Thank you for permission to visit Julia--I take it that silence means consent. Such a social whirl as we've been having! The Founder's dance came last week--this was the first year that any of us could attend; only upper classmen being allowed. I invited Jimmie McBride, and Sallie invited his room-mate at Princeton, who visited them last summer at their camp--an awfully nice man with red hair--and Julia invited a man from New York, not very exciting, but socially irreproachable. He is connected with the De la Mater Chichesters. Perhaps that means something to you? It doesn't illuminate me to any extent. However--our guests came Friday afternoon in time for tea in the senior corridor, and then dashed down to the hotel for dinner. The hotel was so full that they slept in rows on the billiard tables, they say. Jimmie McBride says that the next time he is bidden to a social event in this college, he is going to bring one of their Adirondack tents and pitch it on the campus. At seven-thirty they came back for the President's reception and dance. Our functions commence early! We had the men's cards all made out ahead of time, and after every dance, we'd leave them in groups, under the letter that stood for their names, so that they could be readily found by their next partners. Jimmie McBride, for example, would stand patiently under 'M' until he was claimed. (At least, he ought to have stood patiently, but he kept wandering off and getting mixed with 'R's' and 'S's' and all sorts of letters.) I found him a very difficult guest; he was sulky because he had only three dances with me. He said he was bashful about dancing with girls he didn't know! The next morning we had a glee club concert--and who do you think wrote the funny new song composed for the occasion? It's the truth. She did. Oh, I tell you, Daddy, your little foundling is getting to be quite a prominent person! Anyway, our gay two days were great fun, and I think the men enjoyed it. Some of them were awfully perturbed at first at the prospect of facing one thousand girls; but they got acclimated very quickly. Our two Princeton men had a beautiful time--at least they politely said they had, and they've invited us to their dance next spring. We've accepted, so please don't object, Daddy dear. Julia and Sallie and I all had new dresses. Do you want to hear about them? Julia's was cream satin and gold embroidery and she wore purple orchids. It was a DREAM and came from Paris, and cost a million dollars. Sallie's was pale blue trimmed with Persian embroidery, and went beautifully with red hair. It didn't cost quite a million, but was just as effective as Julia's. Mine was pale pink crepe de chine trimmed with ecru lace and rose satin. And I carried crimson roses which J. McB. sent (Sallie having told him what colour to get). And we all had satin slippers and silk stockings and chiffon scarfs to match. You must be deeply impressed by these millinery details. One can't help thinking, Daddy, what a colourless life a man is forced to lead, when one reflects that chiffon and Venetian point and hand embroidery and Irish crochet are to him mere empty words. Whereas a woman--whether she is interested in babies or microbes or husbands or poetry or servants or parallelograms or gardens or Plato or bridge--is fundamentally and always interested in clothes. It's the one touch of nature that makes the whole world kin. (That isn't original. I got it out of one of Shakespeare's plays). However, to resume. Do you want me to tell you a secret that I've lately discovered? And will you promise not to think me vain? Then listen: I'm pretty. I am, really. I'd be an awful idiot not to know it with three looking-glasses in the room. A Friend PS. This is one of those wicked anonymous letters you read about in novels. 20th December Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I've just a moment, because I must attend two classes, pack a trunk and a suit-case, and catch the four-o'clock train--but I couldn't go without sending a word to let you know how much I appreciate my Christmas box. I love the furs and the necklace and the Liberty scarf and the gloves and handkerchiefs and books and purse--and most of all I love you! But Daddy, you have no business to spoil me this way. I'm only human--and a girl at that. How can I keep my mind sternly fixed on a studious career, when you deflect me with such worldly frivolities? I have strong suspicions now as to which one of the John Grier Trustees used to give the Christmas tree and the Sunday ice-cream. He was nameless, but by his works I know him! You deserve to be happy for all the good things you do. Goodbye, and a very merry Christmas. Yours always, Judy PS. I am sending a slight token, too. Do you think you would like her if you knew her? 11th January I meant to write to you from the city, Daddy, but New York is an engrossing place. I had an interesting--and illuminating--time, but I'm glad I don't belong to such a family! I should truly rather have the John Grier Home for a background. Whatever the drawbacks of my bringing up, there was at least no pretence about it. I know now what people mean when they say they are weighed down by Things. The material atmosphere of that house was crushing; I didn't draw a deep breath until I was on an express train coming back. All the furniture was carved and upholstered and gorgeous; the people I met were beautifully dressed and low-voiced and well-bred, but it's the truth, Daddy, I never heard one word of real talk from the time we arrived until we left. I don't think an idea ever entered the front door. Mrs. Pendleton never thinks of anything but jewels and dressmakers and social engagements. She did seem a different kind of mother from Mrs. McBride! If I ever marry and have a family, I'm going to make them as exactly like the McBrides as I can. Not for all the money in the world would I ever let any children of mine develop into Pendletons. Maybe it isn't polite to criticize people you've been visiting? If it isn't, please excuse. This is very confidential, between you and me. I only saw Master Jervie once when he called at tea time, and then I didn't have a chance to speak to him alone. It was really disappointing after our nice time last summer. I don't think he cares much for his relatives--and I am sure they don't care much for him! Julia's mother says he's unbalanced. He's a Socialist--except, thank Heaven, he doesn't let his hair grow and wear red ties. She can't imagine where he picked up his queer ideas; the family have been Church of England for generations. He throws away his money on every sort of crazy reform, instead of spending it on such sensible things as yachts and automobiles and polo ponies. He does buy candy with it though! He sent Julia and me each a box for Christmas. You know, I think I'll be a Socialist, too. You wouldn't mind, would you, Daddy? They're quite different from Anarchists; they don't believe in blowing people up. Probably I am one by rights; I belong to the proletariat. I haven't determined yet just which kind I am going to be. I will look into the subject over Sunday, and declare my principles in my next. I've seen loads of theatres and hotels and beautiful houses. My mind is a confused jumble of onyx and gilding and mosaic floors and palms. I'm still pretty breathless but I am glad to get back to college and my books--I believe that I really am a student; this atmosphere of academic calm I find more bracing than New York. College is a very satisfying sort of life; the books and study and regular classes keep you alive mentally, and then when your mind gets tired, you have the gymnasium and outdoor athletics, and always plenty of congenial friends who are thinking about the same things you are. We spend a whole evening in nothing but talk--talk--talk--and go to bed with a very uplifted feeling, as though we had settled permanently some pressing world problems. And filling in every crevice, there is always such a lot of nonsense--just silly jokes about the little things that come up but very satisfying. We do appreciate our own witticisms! It isn't the great big pleasures that count the most; it's making a great deal out of the little ones--I've discovered the true secret of happiness, Daddy, and that is to live in the now. Not to be for ever regretting the past, or anticipating the future; but to get the most that you can out of this very instant. It's like farming. You can have extensive farming and intensive farming; well, I am going to have intensive living after this. I'm going to enjoy every second, and I'm going to KNOW I'm enjoying it while I'm enjoying it. Most people don't live; they just race. They are trying to reach some goal far away on the horizon, and in the heat of the going they get so breathless and panting that they lose all sight of the beautiful, tranquil country they are passing through; and then the first thing they know, they are old and worn out, and it doesn't make any difference whether they've reached the goal or not. I've decided to sit down by the way and pile up a lot of little happinesses, even if I never become a Great Author. Did you ever know such a philosopheress as I am developing into? Yours ever, Judy PS. It's raining cats and dogs tonight. Two puppies and a kitten have just landed on the window-sill. Dear Comrade, Hooray! I'm a Fabian. That's a Socialist who's willing to wait. We don't want the social revolution to come tomorrow morning; it would be too upsetting. We want it to come very gradually in the distant future, when we shall all be prepared and able to sustain the shock. In the meantime, we must be getting ready, by instituting industrial, educational and orphan asylum reforms. Yours, with fraternal love, Judy Monday, 3rd hour 11th February Dear D.-L.-L., Don't be insulted because this is so short. It isn't a letter; it's just a LINE to say that I'm going to write a letter pretty soon when examinations are over. It is not only necessary that I pass, but pass WELL. I have a scholarship to live up to. Yours, studying hard, J. A. 5th March Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, President Cuyler made a speech this evening about the modern generation being flippant and superficial. He says that we are losing the old ideals of earnest endeavour and true scholarship; and particularly is this falling-off noticeable in our disrespectful attitude towards organized authority. We no longer pay a seemly deference to our superiors. I came away from chapel very sober. Am I too familiar, Daddy? Ought I to treat you with more dignity and aloofness?--Yes, I'm sure I ought. I'll begin again. My Dear Mr. Smith, You will be pleased to hear that I passed successfully my mid-year examinations, and am now commencing work in the new semester. I am leaving chemistry--having completed the course in qualitative analysis--and am entering upon the study of biology. I approach this subject with some hesitation, as I understand that we dissect angleworms and frogs. An extremely interesting and valuable lecture was given in the chapel last week upon Roman Remains in Southern France. I have never listened to a more illuminating exposition of the subject. We are reading Wordsworth's Tintern Abbey in connection with our course in English Literature. What an exquisite work it is, and how adequately it embodies his conceptions of Pantheism! The Romantic movement of the early part of the last century, exemplified in the works of such poets as Shelley, Byron, Keats, and Wordsworth, appeals to me very much more than the Classical period that preceded it. Speaking of poetry, have you ever read that charming little thing of Tennyson's called Locksley Hall? I am attending gymnasium very regularly of late. A proctor system has been devised, and failure to comply with the rules causes a great deal of inconvenience. The gymnasium is equipped with a very beautiful swimming tank of cement and marble, the gift of a former graduate. My room-mate, Miss McBride, has given me her bathing-suit (it shrank so that she can no longer wear it) and I am about to begin swimming lessons. We had delicious pink ice-cream for dessert last night. Only vegetable dyes are used in colouring the food. The college is very much opposed, both from aesthetic and hygienic motives, to the use of aniline dyes. The weather of late has been ideal--bright sunshine and clouds interspersed with a few welcome snow-storms. I and my companions have enjoyed our walks to and from classes--particularly from. Trusting, my dear Mr. Smith, that this will find you in your usual good health, I remain, Most cordially yours, Jerusha Abbott 24th April Dear Daddy, Spring has come again! You should see how lovely the campus is. I think you might come and look at it for yourself. Master Jervie dropped in again last Friday--but he chose a most unpropitious time, for Sallie and Julia and I were just running to catch a train. And where do you think we were going? To Princeton, to attend a dance and a ball game, if you please! I didn't ask you if I might go, because I had a feeling that your secretary would say no. But it was entirely regular; we had leave-of-absence from college, and Mrs. McBride chaperoned us. We had a charming time--but I shall have to omit details; they are too many and complicated. Saturday Up before dawn! The night watchman called us--six of us--and we made coffee in a chafing dish (you never saw so many grounds!) and walked two miles to the top of One Tree Hill to see the sun rise. We had to scramble up the last slope! The sun almost beat us! And perhaps you think we didn't bring back appetites to breakfast! Dear me, Daddy, I seem to have a very ejaculatory style today; this page is peppered with exclamations. I meant to have written a lot about the budding trees and the new cinder path in the athletic field, and the awful lesson we have in biology for tomorrow, and the new canoes on the lake, and Catherine Prentiss who has pneumonia, and Prexy's Angora kitten that strayed from home and has been boarding in Fergussen Hall for two weeks until a chambermaid reported it, and about my three new dresses--white and pink and blue polka dots with a hat to match--but I am too sleepy. I am always making this an excuse, am I not? But a girls' college is a busy place and we do get tired by the end of the day! Particularly when the day begins at dawn. Affectionately, Judy 15th May Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Is it good manners when you get into a car just to stare straight ahead and not see anybody else? A very beautiful lady in a very beautiful velvet dress got into the car today, and without the slightest expression sat for fifteen minutes and looked at a sign advertising suspenders. It doesn't seem polite to ignore everybody else as though you were the only important person present. Anyway, you miss a lot. While she was absorbing that silly sign, I was studying a whole car full of interesting human beings. The accompanying illustration is hereby reproduced for the first time. It looks like a spider on the end of a string, but it isn't at all; it's a picture of me learning to swim in the tank in the gymnasium. The instructor hooks a rope into a ring in the back of my belt, and runs it through a pulley in the ceiling. It would be a beautiful system if one had perfect confidence in the probity of one's instructor. I'm always afraid, though, that she will let the rope get slack, so I keep one anxious eye on her and swim with the other, and with this divided interest I do not make the progress that I otherwise might. Very miscellaneous weather we're having of late. It was raining when I commenced and now the sun is shining. Sallie and I are going out to play tennis--thereby gaining exemption from Gym. A week later I should have finished this letter long ago, but I didn't. You don't mind, do you, Daddy, if I'm not very regular? I really do love to write to you; it gives me such a respectable feeling of having some family. Would you like me to tell you something? You are not the only man to whom I write letters. There are two others! I have been receiving beautiful long letters this winter from Master Jervie (with typewritten envelopes so Julia won't recognize the writing). Did you ever hear anything so shocking? And every week or so a very scrawly epistle, usually on yellow tablet paper, arrives from Princeton. All of which I answer with business-like promptness. So you see--I am not so different from other girls--I get letters, too. Did I tell you that I have been elected a member of the Senior Dramatic Club? Very recherche organization. Only seventy-five members out of one thousand. Do you think as a consistent Socialist that I ought to belong? What do you suppose is at present engaging my attention in sociology? I am writing (figurez vous!) a paper on the Care of Dependent Children. The Professor shuffled up his subjects and dealt them out promiscuously, and that fell to me. C'est drole ca n'est pas? There goes the gong for dinner. I'll post this as I pass the box. Affectionately, J. 4th June Dear Daddy, Very busy time--commencement in ten days, examinations tomorrow; lots of studying, lots of packing, and the outdoor world so lovely that it hurts you to stay inside. But never mind, vacation's coming. Julia is going abroad this summer--it makes the fourth time. No doubt about it, Daddy, goods are not distributed evenly. Sallie, as usual, goes to the Adirondacks. And what do you think I am going to do? You may have three guesses. Lock Willow? Wrong. The Adirondacks with Sallie? Wrong. (I'll never attempt that again; I was discouraged last year.) Can't you guess anything else? You're not very inventive. I'll tell you, Daddy, if you'll promise not to make a lot of objections. I warn your secretary in advance that my mind is made up. I am going to spend the summer at the seaside with a Mrs. Charles Paterson and tutor her daughter who is to enter college in the autumn. I met her through the McBrides, and she is a very charming woman. I am to give lessons in English and Latin to the younger daughter, too, but I shall have a little time to myself, and I shall be earning fifty dollars a month! Doesn't that impress you as a perfectly exorbitant amount? She offered it; I should have blushed to ask for more than twenty-five. I finish at Magnolia (that's where she lives) the first of September, and shall probably spend the remaining three weeks at Lock Willow--I should like to see the Semples again and all the friendly animals. How does my programme strike you, Daddy? I am getting quite independent, you see. You have put me on my feet and I think I can almost walk alone by now. Princeton commencement and our examinations exactly coincide--which is an awful blow. Sallie and I did so want to get away in time for it, but of course that is utterly impossible. Goodbye, Daddy. Have a nice summer and come back in the autumn rested and ready for another year of work. (That's what you ought to be writing to me!) I haven't any idea what you do in the summer, or how you amuse yourself. I can't visualize your surroundings. Do you play golf or hunt or ride horseback or just sit in the sun and meditate? Anyway, whatever it is, have a good time and don't forget Judy. 10th June Dear Daddy, This is the hardest letter I ever wrote, but I have decided what I must do, and there isn't going to be any turning back. It is very sweet and generous and dear of you to wish to send me to Europe this summer--for the moment I was intoxicated by the idea; but sober second thoughts said no. It would be rather illogical of me to refuse to take your money for college, and then use it instead just for amusement! You mustn't get me used to too many luxuries. One doesn't miss what one has never had; but it's awfully hard going without things after one has commenced thinking they are his--hers (English language needs another pronoun) by natural right. Living with Sallie and Julia is an awful strain on my stoical philosophy. They have both had things from the time they were babies; they accept happiness as a matter of course. The World, they think, owes them everything they want. Maybe the World does--in any case, it seems to acknowledge the debt and pay up. But as for me, it owes me nothing, and distinctly told me so in the beginning. I have no right to borrow on credit, for there will come a time when the World will repudiate my claim. I seem to be floundering in a sea of metaphor--but I hope you grasp my meaning? Anyway, I have a very strong feeling that the only honest thing for me to do is to teach this summer and begin to support myself. MAGNOLIA, Four days later I'd got just that much written, when--what do you think happened? The maid arrived with Master Jervie's card. He is going abroad too this summer; not with Julia and her family, but entirely by himself I told him that you had invited me to go with a lady who is chaperoning a party of girls. He knows about you, Daddy. That is, he knows that my father and mother are dead, and that a kind gentleman is sending me to college; I simply didn't have the courage to tell him about the John Grier Home and all the rest. He thinks that you are my guardian and a perfectly legitimate old family friend. I have never told him that I didn't know you--that would seem too queer! Anyway, he insisted on my going to Europe. He said that it was a necessary part of my education and that I mustn't think of refusing. Also, that he would be in Paris at the same time, and that we would run away from the chaperon occasionally and have dinner together at nice, funny, foreign restaurants. Well, Daddy, it did appeal to me! I almost weakened; if he hadn't been so dictatorial, maybe I should have entirely weakened. I can be enticed step by step, but I WON'T be forced. He said I was a silly, foolish, irrational, quixotic, idiotic, stubborn child (those are a few of his abusive adjectives; the rest escape me), and that I didn't know what was good for me; I ought to let older people judge. We almost quarrelled--I am not sure but that we entirely did! In any case, I packed my trunk fast and came up here. I thought I'd better see my bridges in flames behind me before I finished writing to you. They are entirely reduced to ashes now. Here I am at Cliff Top (the name of Mrs. Paterson's cottage) with my trunk unpacked and Florence (the little one) already struggling with first declension nouns. And it bids fair to be a struggle! She is a most uncommonly spoiled child; I shall have to teach her first how to study--she has never in her life concentrated on anything more difficult than ice-cream soda water. We use a quiet corner of the cliffs for a schoolroom--Mrs. Paterson wishes me to keep them out of doors--and I will say that I find it difficult to concentrate with the blue sea before me and ships a-sailing by! And when I think I might be on one, sailing off to foreign lands--but I WON'T let myself think of anything but Latin Grammar. The prepositions a or ab, absque, coram, cum, de e or ex, prae, pro, sine, tenus, in, subter, sub and super govern the ablative. So you see, Daddy, I am already plunged into work with my eyes persistently set against temptation. Don't be cross with me, please, and don't think that I do not appreciate your kindness, for I do--always--always. The only way I can ever repay you is by turning out a Very Useful Citizen (Are women citizens? I don't suppose they are.) Anyway, a Very Useful Person. And when you look at me you can say, 'I gave that Very Useful Person to the world.' That sounds well, doesn't it, Daddy? But I don't wish to mislead you. The feeling often comes over me that I am not at all remarkable; it is fun to plan a career, but in all probability I shan't turn out a bit different from any other ordinary person. I may end by marrying an undertaker and being an inspiration to him in his work. Yours ever, Judy 19th August Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, My window looks out on the loveliest landscape--ocean-scape, rather--nothing but water and rocks. The summer goes. I spend the morning with Latin and English and algebra and my two stupid girls. I don't know how Marion is ever going to get into college, or stay in after she gets there. And as for Florence, she is hopeless--but oh! such a little beauty. I don't suppose it matters in the least whether they are stupid or not so long as they are pretty? One can't help thinking, though, how their conversation will bore their husbands, unless they are fortunate enough to obtain stupid husbands. I suppose that's quite possible; the world seems to be filled with stupid men; I've met a number this summer. In the afternoon we take a walk on the cliffs, or swim, if the tide is right. I can swim in salt water with the utmost ease you see my education is already being put to use! A letter comes from Mr. Jervis Pendleton in Paris, rather a short concise letter; I'm not quite forgiven yet for refusing to follow his advice. However, if he gets back in time, he will see me for a few days at Lock Willow before college opens, and if I am very nice and sweet and docile, I shall (I am led to infer) be received into favour again. Also a letter from Sallie. She wants me to come to their camp for two weeks in September. Must I ask your permission, or haven't I yet arrived at the place where I can do as I please? Yes, I am sure I have--I'm a Senior, you know. Having worked all summer, I feel like taking a little healthful recreation; I want to see the Adirondacks; I want to see Sallie; I want to see Sallie's brother--he's going to teach me to canoe--and (we come to my chief motive, which is mean) I want Master Jervie to arrive at Lock Willow and find me not there. I MUST show him that he can't dictate to me. No one can dictate to me but you, Daddy--and you can't always! I'm off for the woods. Judy CAMP MCBRIDE, 6th September Dear Daddy, Your letter didn't come in time (I am pleased to say). If you wish your instructions to be obeyed, you must have your secretary transmit them in less than two weeks. As you observe, I am here, and have been for five days. The woods are fine, and so is the camp, and so is the weather, and so are the McBrides, and so is the whole world. I'm very happy! There's Jimmie calling for me to come canoeing. Goodbye--sorry to have disobeyed, but why are you so persistent about not wanting me to play a little? When I've worked all the summer I deserve two weeks. You are awfully dog-in-the-mangerish. However--I love you still, Daddy, in spite of all your faults. Judy 3rd October Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Back at college and a Senior--also editor of the Monthly. It doesn't seem possible, does it, that so sophisticated a person, just four years ago, was an inmate of the John Grier Home? We do arrive fast in America! What do you think of this? A note from Master Jervie directed to Lock Willow and forwarded here. He's sorry, but he finds that he can't get up there this autumn; he has accepted an invitation to go yachting with some friends. Hopes I've had a nice summer and am enjoying the country. And he knew all the time that I was with the McBrides, for Julia told him so! You men ought to leave intrigue to women; you haven't a light enough touch. Julia has a trunkful of the most ravishing new clothes--an evening gown of rainbow Liberty crepe that would be fitting raiment for the angels in Paradise. And I thought that my own clothes this year were unprecedentedly (is there such a word?) beautiful. I copied Mrs. Paterson's wardrobe with the aid of a cheap dressmaker, and though the gowns didn't turn out quite twins of the originals, I was entirely happy until Julia unpacked. But now--I live to see Paris! Dear Daddy, aren't you glad you're not a girl? I suppose you think that the fuss we make over clothes is too absolutely silly? It is. No doubt about it. But it's entirely your fault. Did you ever hear about the learned Herr Professor who regarded unnecessary adornment with contempt and favoured sensible, utilitarian clothes for women? His wife, who was an obliging creature, adopted 'dress reform.' And what do you think he did? He eloped with a chorus girl. Yours ever, Judy PS. The chamber-maid in our corridor wears blue checked gingham aprons. I am going to get her some brown ones instead, and sink the blue ones in the bottom of the lake. I have a reminiscent chill every time I look at them. 17th November Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Such a blight has fallen over my literary career. I don't know whether to tell you or not, but I would like some sympathy--silent sympathy, please; don't re-open the wound by referring to it in your next letter. I've been writing a book, all last winter in the evenings, and all the summer when I wasn't teaching Latin to my two stupid children. I just finished it before college opened and sent it to a publisher. He kept it two months, and I was certain he was going to take it; but yesterday morning an express parcel came (thirty cents due) and there it was back again with a letter from the publisher, a very nice, fatherly letter--but frank! He said he saw from the address that I was still at college, and if I would accept some advice, he would suggest that I put all of my energy into my lessons and wait until I graduated before beginning to write. He enclosed his reader's opinion. Here it is: 'Plot highly improbable. Characterization exaggerated. Conversation unnatural. A good deal of humour but not always in the best of taste. Tell her to keep on trying, and in time she may produce a real book.' Not on the whole flattering, is it, Daddy? And I thought I was making a notable addition to American literature. I did truly. I was planning to surprise you by writing a great novel before I graduated. I collected the material for it while I was at Julia's last Christmas. But I dare say the editor is right. Probably two weeks was not enough in which to observe the manners and customs of a great city. I took it walking with me yesterday afternoon, and when I came to the gas house, I went in and asked the engineer if I might borrow his furnace. He politely opened the door, and with my own hands I chucked it in. I felt as though I had cremated my only child! I went to bed last night utterly dejected; I thought I was never going to amount to anything, and that you had thrown away your money for nothing. But what do you think? I woke up this morning with a beautiful new plot in my head, and I've been going about all day planning my characters, just as happy as I could be. No one can ever accuse me of being a pessimist! If I had a husband and twelve children swallowed by an earthquake one day, I'd bob up smilingly the next morning and commence to look for another set. Affectionately, Judy 14th December Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I dreamed the funniest dream last night. I thought I went into a book store and the clerk brought me a new book named The Life and Letters of Judy Abbott. I could see it perfectly plainly--red cloth binding with a picture of the John Grier Home on the cover, and my portrait for a frontispiece with, 'Very truly yours, Judy Abbott,' written below. But just as I was turning to the end to read the inscription on my tombstone, I woke up. It was very annoying! I almost found out whom I'm going to marry and when I'm going to die. Don't you think it would be interesting if you really could read the story of your life--written perfectly truthfully by an omniscient author? And suppose you could only read it on this condition: that you would never forget it, but would have to go through life knowing ahead of time exactly how everything you did would turn out, and foreseeing to the exact hour the time when you would die. How many people do you suppose would have the courage to read it then? or how many could suppress their curiosity sufficiently to escape from reading it, even at the price of having to live without hope and without surprises? Life is monotonous enough at best; you have to eat and sleep about so often. But imagine how DEADLY monotonous it would be if nothing unexpected could happen between meals. Mercy! Daddy, there's a blot, but I'm on the third page and I can't begin a new sheet. I'm going on with biology again this year--very interesting subject; we're studying the alimentary system at present. You should see how sweet a cross-section of the duodenum of a cat is under the microscope. Also we've arrived at philosophy--interesting but evanescent. I prefer biology where you can pin the subject under discussion to a board. There's another! And another! This pen is weeping copiously. Please excuse its tears. Do you believe in free will? I do--unreservedly. I don't agree at all with the philosophers who think that every action is the absolutely inevitable and automatic resultant of an aggregation of remote causes. That's the most immoral doctrine I ever heard--nobody would be to blame for anything. If a man believed in fatalism, he would naturally just sit down and say, 'The Lord's will be done,' and continue to sit until he fell over dead. I believe absolutely in my own free will and my own power to accomplish--and that is the belief that moves mountains. You watch me become a great author! I have four chapters of my new book finished and five more drafted. This is a very abstruse letter--does your head ache, Daddy? I think we'll stop now and make some fudge. I'm sorry I can't send you a piece; it will be unusually good, for we're going to make it with real cream and three butter balls. Yours affectionately, Judy PS. We're having fancy dancing in gymnasium class. You can see by the accompanying picture how much we look like a real ballet. The one at the end accomplishing a graceful pirouette is me--I mean I. 26th December My Dear, Dear, Daddy, Haven't you any sense? Don't you KNOW that you mustn't give one girl seventeen Christmas presents? I'm a Socialist, please remember; do you wish to turn me into a Plutocrat? Think how embarrassing it would be if we should ever quarrel! I should have to engage a moving-van to return your gifts. I am sorry that the necktie I sent was so wobbly; I knit it with my own hands (as you doubtless discovered from internal evidence). You will have to wear it on cold days and keep your coat buttoned up tight. Thank you, Daddy, a thousand times. I think you're the sweetest man that ever lived--and the foolishest! Judy Here's a four-leaf clover from Camp McBride to bring you good luck for the New Year. 9th January Do you wish to do something, Daddy, that will ensure your eternal salvation? There is a family here who are in awfully desperate straits. A mother and father and four visible children--the two older boys have disappeared into the world to make their fortune and have not sent any of it back. The father worked in a glass factory and got consumption--it's awfully unhealthy work--and now has been sent away to a hospital. That took all their savings, and the support of the family falls upon the oldest daughter, who is twenty-four. She dressmakes for $1.50 a day (when she can get it) and embroiders centrepieces in the evening. The mother isn't very strong and is extremely ineffectual and pious. She sits with her hands folded, a picture of patient resignation, while the daughter kills herself with overwork and responsibility and worry; she doesn't see how they are going to get through the rest of the winter--and I don't either. One hundred dollars would buy some coal and some shoes for three children so that they could go to school, and give a little margin so that she needn't worry herself to death when a few days pass and she doesn't get work. You are the richest man I know. Don't you suppose you could spare one hundred dollars? That girl deserves help a lot more than I ever did. I wouldn't ask it except for the girl; I don't care much what happens to the mother--she is such a jelly-fish. The way people are for ever rolling their eyes to heaven and saying, 'Perhaps it's all for the best,' when they are perfectly dead sure it's not, makes me enraged. Humility or resignation or whatever you choose to call it, is simply impotent inertia. I'm for a more militant religion! We are getting the most dreadful lessons in philosophy--all of Schopenhauer for tomorrow. The professor doesn't seem to realize that we are taking any other subject. He's a queer old duck; he goes about with his head in the clouds and blinks dazedly when occasionally he strikes solid earth. He tries to lighten his lectures with an occasional witticism--and we do our best to smile, but I assure you his jokes are no laughing matter. He spends his entire time between classes in trying to figure out whether matter really exists or whether he only thinks it exists. I'm sure my sewing girl hasn't any doubt but that it exists! Where do you think my new novel is? In the waste-basket. I can see myself that it's no good on earth, and when a loving author realizes that, what WOULD be the judgment of a critical public? Later I address you, Daddy, from a bed of pain. For two days I've been laid up with swollen tonsils; I can just swallow hot milk, and that is all. 'What were your parents thinking of not to have those tonsils out when you were a baby?' the doctor wished to know. I'm sure I haven't an idea, but I doubt if they were thinking much about me. Yours, J. A. Next morning I just read this over before sealing it. I don't know WHY I cast such a misty atmosphere over life. I hasten to assure you that I am young and happy and exuberant; and I trust you are the same. Youth has nothing to do with birthdays, only with ALIVEDNESS of spirit, so even if your hair is grey, Daddy, you can still be a boy. Affectionately, Judy 12th Jan. Dear Mr. Philanthropist, Your cheque for my family came yesterday. Thank you so much! I cut gymnasium and took it down to them right after luncheon, and you should have seen the girl's face! She was so surprised and happy and relieved that she looked almost young; and she's only twenty-four. Isn't it pitiful? Anyway, she feels now as though all the good things were coming together. She has steady work ahead for two months--someone's getting married, and there's a trousseau to make. 'Thank the good Lord!' cried the mother, when she grasped the fact that that small piece of paper was one hundred dollars. 'It wasn't the good Lord at all,' said I, 'it was Daddy-Long-Legs.' (Mr. Smith, I called you.) 'But it was the good Lord who put it in his mind,' said she. 'Not at all! I put it in his mind myself,' said I. But anyway, Daddy, I trust the good Lord will reward you suitably. You deserve ten thousand years out of purgatory. Yours most gratefully, Judy Abbott 15th Feb. May it please Your Most Excellent Majesty: This morning I did eat my breakfast upon a cold turkey pie and a goose, and I did send for a cup of tee (a china drink) of which I had never drank before. Don't be nervous, Daddy--I haven't lost my mind; I'm merely quoting Sam'l Pepys. We're reading him in connection with English History, original sources. Sallie and Julia and I converse now in the language of 1660. Listen to this: 'I went to Charing Cross to see Major Harrison hanged, drawn and quartered: he looking as cheerful as any man could do in that condition.' And this: 'Dined with my lady who is in handsome mourning for her brother who died yesterday of spotted fever.' Seems a little early to commence entertaining, doesn't it? A friend of Pepys devised a very cunning manner whereby the king might pay his debts out of the sale to poor people of old decayed provisions. What do you, a reformer, think of that? I don't believe we're so bad today as the newspapers make out. Samuel was as excited about his clothes as any girl; he spent five times as much on dress as his wife--that appears to have been the Golden Age of husbands. Isn't this a touching entry? You see he really was honest. 'Today came home my fine Camlett cloak with gold buttons, which cost me much money, and I pray God to make me able to pay for it.' Excuse me for being so full of Pepys; I'm writing a special topic on him. What do you think, Daddy? The Self-Government Association has abolished the ten o'clock rule. We can keep our lights all night if we choose, the only requirement being that we do not disturb others--we are not supposed to entertain on a large scale. The result is a beautiful commentary on human nature. Now that we may stay up as long as we choose, we no longer choose. Our heads begin to nod at nine o'clock, and by nine-thirty the pen drops from our nerveless grasp. It's nine-thirty now. Good night. Sunday Just back from church--preacher from Georgia. We must take care, he says, not to develop our intellects at the expense of our emotional natures--but methought it was a poor, dry sermon (Pepys again). It doesn't matter what part of the United States or Canada they come from, or what denomination they are, we always get the same sermon. Why on earth don't they go to men's colleges and urge the students not to allow their manly natures to be crushed out by too much mental application? It's a beautiful day--frozen and icy and clear. As soon as dinner is over, Sallie and Julia and Marty Keene and Eleanor Pratt (friends of mine, but you don't know them) and I are going to put on short skirts and walk 'cross country to Crystal Spring Farm and have a fried chicken and waffle supper, and then have Mr. Crystal Spring drive us home in his buckboard. We are supposed to be inside the campus at seven, but we are going to stretch a point tonight and make it eight. Farewell, kind Sir. I have the honour of subscribing myself, Your most loyall, dutifull, faithfull and obedient servant, J. Abbott March Fifth Dear Mr. Trustee, Tomorrow is the first Wednesday in the month--a weary day for the John Grier Home. How relieved they'll be when five o'clock comes and you pat them on the head and take yourselves off! Did you (individually) ever pat me on the head, Daddy? I don't believe so--my memory seems to be concerned only with fat Trustees. Give the Home my love, please--my TRULY love. I have quite a feeling of tenderness for it as I look back through a haze of four years. When I first came to college I felt quite resentful because I'd been robbed of the normal kind of childhood that the other girls had had; but now, I don't feel that way in the least. I regard it as a very unusual adventure. It gives me a sort of vantage point from which to stand aside and look at life. Emerging full grown, I get a perspective on the world, that other people who have been brought up in the thick of things entirely lack. I know lots of girls (Julia, for instance) who never know that they are happy. They are so accustomed to the feeling that their senses are deadened to it; but as for me--I am perfectly sure every moment of my life that I am happy. And I'm going to keep on being, no matter what unpleasant things turn up. I'm going to regard them (even toothaches) as interesting experiences, and be glad to know what they feel like. 'Whatever sky's above me, I've a heart for any fate.' However, Daddy, don't take this new affection for the J.G.H. too literally. If I have five children, like Rousseau, I shan't leave them on the steps of a foundling asylum in order to insure their being brought up simply. Give my kindest regards to Mrs. Lippett (that, I think, is truthful; love would be a little strong) and don't forget to tell her what a beautiful nature I've developed. Affectionately, Judy LOCK WILLOW, 4th April Dear Daddy, Do you observe the postmark? Sallie and I are embellishing Lock Willow with our presence during the Easter Vacation. We decided that the best thing we could do with our ten days was to come where it is quiet. Our nerves had got to the point where they wouldn't stand another meal in Fergussen. Dining in a room with four hundred girls is an ordeal when you are tired. There is so much noise that you can't hear the girls across the table speak unless they make their hands into a megaphone and shout. That is the truth. We are tramping over the hills and reading and writing, and having a nice, restful time. We climbed to the top of 'Sky Hill' this morning where Master Jervie and I once cooked supper--it doesn't seem possible that it was nearly two years ago. I could still see the place where the smoke of our fire blackened the rock. It is funny how certain places get connected with certain people, and you never go back without thinking of them. I was quite lonely without him--for two minutes. What do you think is my latest activity, Daddy? You will begin to believe that I am incorrigible--I am writing a book. I started it three weeks ago and am eating it up in chunks. I've caught the secret. Master Jervie and that editor man were right; you are most convincing when you write about the things you know. And this time it is about something that I do know--exhaustively. Guess where it's laid? In the John Grier Home! And it's good, Daddy, I actually believe it is--just about the tiny little things that happened every day. I'm a realist now. I've abandoned romanticism; I shall go back to it later though, when my own adventurous future begins. This new book is going to get itself finished--and published! You see if it doesn't. If you just want a thing hard enough and keep on trying, you do get it in the end. I've been trying for four years to get a letter from you--and I haven't given up hope yet. Goodbye, Daddy dear, (I like to call you Daddy dear; it's so alliterative.) Affectionately, Judy PS. I forgot to tell you the farm news, but it's very distressing. Skip this postscript if you don't want your sensibilities all wrought up. Poor old Grove is dead. He got so that he couldn't chew and they had to shoot him. Nine chickens were killed by a weasel or a skunk or a rat last week. One of the cows is sick, and we had to have the veterinary surgeon out from Bonnyrigg Four Corners. Amasai stayed up all night to give her linseed oil and whisky. But we have an awful suspicion that the poor sick cow got nothing but linseed oil. Sentimental Tommy (the tortoise-shell cat) has disappeared; we are afraid he has been caught in a trap. There are lots of troubles in the world! 17th May Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, This is going to be extremely short because my shoulder aches at the sight of a pen. Lecture notes all day, immortal novel all evening, make too much writing. Commencement three weeks from next Wednesday. I think you might come and make my acquaintance--I shall hate you if you don't! Julia's inviting Master Jervie, he being her family, and Sallie's inviting Jimmie McB., he being her family, but who is there for me to invite? Just you and Lippett, and I don't want her. Please come. Yours, with love and writer's cramp. Judy LOCK WILLOW, 19th June Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, I'm educated! My diploma is in the bottom bureau drawer with my two best dresses. Commencement was as usual, with a few showers at vital moments. Thank you for your rosebuds. They were lovely. Master Jervie and Master Jimmie both gave me roses, too, but I left theirs in the bath tub and carried yours in the class procession. Here I am at Lock Willow for the summer--for ever maybe. The board is cheap; the surroundings quiet and conducive to a literary life. What more does a struggling author wish? I am mad about my book. I think of it every waking moment, and dream of it at night. All I want is peace and quiet and lots of time to work (interspersed with nourishing meals). Master Jervie is coming up for a week or so in August, and Jimmie McBride is going to drop in sometime through the summer. He's connected with a bond house now, and goes about the country selling bonds to banks. He's going to combine the 'Farmers' National' at the Corners and me on the same trip. You see that Lock Willow isn't entirely lacking in society. I'd be expecting to have you come motoring through--only I know now that that is hopeless. When you wouldn't come to my commencement, I tore you from my heart and buried you for ever. Judy Abbott, A.B. 24th July Dearest Daddy-Long-Legs, Isn't it fun to work--or don't you ever do it? It's especially fun when your kind of work is the thing you'd rather do more than anything else in the world. I've been writing as fast as my pen would go every day this summer, and my only quarrel with life is that the days aren't long enough to write all the beautiful and valuable and entertaining thoughts I'm thinking. I've finished the second draft of my book and am going to begin the third tomorrow morning at half-past seven. It's the sweetest book you ever saw--it is, truly. I think of nothing else. I can barely wait in the morning to dress and eat before beginning; then I write and write and write till suddenly I'm so tired that I'm limp all over. Then I go out with Colin (the new sheep dog) and romp through the fields and get a fresh supply of ideas for the next day. It's the most beautiful book you ever saw--Oh, pardon--I said that before. You don't think me conceited, do you, Daddy dear? I'm not, really, only just now I'm in the enthusiastic stage. Maybe later on I'll get cold and critical and sniffy. No, I'm sure I won't! This time I've written a real book. Just wait till you see it. I'll try for a minute to talk about something else. I never told you, did I, that Amasai and Carrie got married last May? They are still working here, but so far as I can see it has spoiled them both. She used to laugh when he tramped in mud or dropped ashes on the floor, but now--you should hear her scold! And she doesn't curl her hair any longer. Amasai, who used to be so obliging about beating rugs and carrying wood, grumbles if you suggest such a thing. Also his neckties are quite dingy--black and brown, where they used to be scarlet and purple. I've determined never to marry. It's a deteriorating process, evidently. There isn't much of any farm news. The animals are all in the best of health. The pigs are unusually fat, the cows seem contented and the hens are laying well. Are you interested in poultry? If so, let me recommend that invaluable little work, 200 Eggs per Hen per Year. I am thinking of starting an incubator next spring and raising broilers. You see I'm settled at Lock Willow permanently. I have decided to stay until I've written 114 novels like Anthony Trollope's mother. Then I shall have completed my life work and can retire and travel. Mr. James McBride spent last Sunday with us. Fried chicken and ice-cream for dinner, both of which he appeared to appreciate. I was awfully glad to see him; he brought a momentary reminder that the world at large exists. Poor Jimmie is having a hard time peddling his bonds. The 'Farmers' National' at the Corners wouldn't have anything to do with them in spite of the fact that they pay six per cent. interest and sometimes seven. I think he'll end up by going home to Worcester and taking a job in his father's factory. He's too open and confiding and kind-hearted ever to make a successful financier. But to be the manager of a flourishing overall factory is a very desirable position, don't you think? Just now he turns up his nose at overalls, but he'll come to them. I hope you appreciate the fact that this is a long letter from a person with writer's cramp. But I still love you, Daddy dear, and I'm very happy. With beautiful scenery all about, and lots to eat and a comfortable four-post bed and a ream of blank paper and a pint of ink--what more does one want in the world? Yours as always, Judy PS. The postman arrives with some more news. We are to expect Master Jervie on Friday next to spend a week. That's a very pleasant prospect--only I am afraid my poor book will suffer. Master Jervie is very demanding. 27th August Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Where are you, I wonder? I never know what part of the world you are in, but I hope you're not in New York during this awful weather. I hope you're on a mountain peak (but not in Switzerland; somewhere nearer) looking at the snow and thinking about me. Please be thinking about me. I'm quite lonely and I want to be thought about. Oh, Daddy, I wish I knew you! Then when we were unhappy we could cheer each other up. I don't think I can stand much more of Lock Willow. I'm thinking of moving. Sallie is going to do settlement work in Boston next winter. Don't you think it would be nice for me to go with her, then we could have a studio together? I would write while she SETTLED and we could be together in the evenings. Evenings are very long when there's no one but the Semples and Carrie and Amasai to talk to. I know in advance that you won't like my studio idea. I can read your secretary's letter now: 'Miss Jerusha Abbott. 'DEAR MADAM, 'Mr. Smith prefers that you remain at Lock Willow. 'Yours truly, 'ELMER H. GRIGGS.' I hate your secretary. I am certain that a man named Elmer H. Griggs must be horrid. But truly, Daddy, I think I shall have to go to Boston. I can't stay here. If something doesn't happen soon, I shall throw myself into the silo pit out of sheer desperation. Mercy! but it's hot. All the grass is burnt up and the brooks are dry and the roads are dusty. It hasn't rained for weeks and weeks. This letter sounds as though I had hydrophobia, but I haven't. I just want some family. Goodbye, my dearest Daddy. I wish I knew you. Judy LOCK WILLOW, 19th September Dear Daddy, Something has happened and I need advice. I need it from you, and from nobody else in the world. Wouldn't it be possible for me to see you? It's so much easier to talk than to write; and I'm afraid your secretary might open the letter. Judy PS. I'm very unhappy. LOCK WILLOW, 3rd October Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, Your note written in your own hand--and a pretty wobbly hand!--came this morning. I am so sorry that you have been ill; I wouldn't have bothered you with my affairs if I had known. Yes, I will tell you the trouble, but it's sort of complicated to write, and VERY PRIVATE. Please don't keep this letter, but burn it. Before I begin--here's a cheque for one thousand dollars. It seems funny, doesn't it, for me to be sending a cheque to you? Where do you think I got it? I've sold my story, Daddy. It's going to be published serially in seven parts, and then in a book! You might think I'd be wild with joy, but I'm not. I'm entirely apathetic. Of course I'm glad to begin paying you--I owe you over two thousand more. It's coming in instalments. Now don't be horrid, please, about taking it, because it makes me happy to return it. I owe you a great deal more than the mere money, and the rest I will continue to pay all my life in gratitude and affection. And now, Daddy, about the other thing; please give me your most worldly advice, whether you think I'll like it or not. You know that I've always had a very special feeling towards you; you sort of represented my whole family; but you won't mind, will you, if I tell you that I have a very much more special feeling for another man? You can probably guess without much trouble who he is. I suspect that my letters have been very full of Master Jervie for a very long time. I wish I could make you understand what he is like and how entirely companionable we are. We think the same about everything--I am afraid I have a tendency to make over my ideas to match his! But he is almost always right; he ought to be, you know, for he has fourteen years' start of me. In other ways, though, he's just an overgrown boy, and he does need looking after--he hasn't any sense about wearing rubbers when it rains. He and I always think the same things are funny, and that is such a lot; it's dreadful when two people's senses of humour are antagonistic. I don't believe there's any bridging that gulf! And he is--Oh, well! He is just himself, and I miss him, and miss him, and miss him. The whole world seems empty and aching. I hate the moonlight because it's beautiful and he isn't here to see it with me. But maybe you've loved somebody, too, and you know? If you have, I don't need to explain; if you haven't, I can't explain. Anyway, that's the way I feel--and I've refused to marry him. I didn't tell him why; I was just dumb and miserable. I couldn't think of anything to say. And now he has gone away imagining that I want to marry Jimmie McBride--I don't in the least, I wouldn't think of marrying Jimmie; he isn't grown up enough. But Master Jervie and I got into a dreadful muddle of misunderstanding and we both hurt each other's feelings. The reason I sent him away was not because I didn't care for him, but because I cared for him so much. I was afraid he would regret it in the future--and I couldn't stand that! It didn't seem right for a person of my lack of antecedents to marry into any such family as his. I never told him about the orphan asylum, and I hated to explain that I didn't know who I was. I may be DREADFUL, you know. And his family are proud--and I'm proud, too! Also, I felt sort of bound to you. After having been educated to be a writer, I must at least try to be one; it would scarcely be fair to accept your education and then go off and not use it. But now that I am going to be able to pay back the money, I feel that I have partially discharged that debt--besides, I suppose I could keep on being a writer even if I did marry. The two professions are not necessarily exclusive. I've been thinking very hard about it. Of course he is a Socialist, and he has unconventional ideas; maybe he wouldn't mind marrying into the proletariat so much as some men might. Perhaps when two people are exactly in accord, and always happy when together and lonely when apart, they ought not to let anything in the world stand between them. Of course I WANT to believe that! But I'd like to get your unemotional opinion. You probably belong to a Family also, and will look at it from a worldly point of view and not just a sympathetic, human point of view--so you see how brave I am to lay it before you. Suppose I go to him and explain that the trouble isn't Jimmie, but is the John Grier Home--would that be a dreadful thing for me to do? It would take a great deal of courage. I'd almost rather be miserable for the rest of my life. This happened nearly two months ago; I haven't heard a word from him since he was here. I was just getting sort of acclimated to the feeling of a broken heart, when a letter came from Julia that stirred me all up again. She said--very casually--that 'Uncle Jervis' had been caught out all night in a storm when he was hunting in Canada, and had been ill ever since with pneumonia. And I never knew it. I was feeling hurt because he had just disappeared into blankness without a word. I think he's pretty unhappy, and I know I am! What seems to you the right thing for me to do? Judy 6th October Dearest Daddy-Long-Legs, Yes, certainly I'll come--at half-past four next Wednesday afternoon. Of COURSE I can find the way. I've been in New York three times and am not quite a baby. I can't believe that I am really going to see you--I've been just THINKING you so long that it hardly seems as though you are a tangible flesh-and-blood person. You are awfully good, Daddy, to bother yourself with me, when you're not strong. Take care and don't catch cold. These fall rains are very damp. Affectionately, Judy PS. I've just had an awful thought. Have you a butler? I'm afraid of butlers, and if one opens the door I shall faint upon the step. What can I say to him? You didn't tell me your name. Shall I ask for Mr. Smith? Thursday Morning My Very Dearest Master-Jervie-Daddy-Long-Legs Pendleton-Smith, Did you sleep last night? I didn't. Not a single wink. I was too amazed and excited and bewildered and happy. I don't believe I ever shall sleep again--or eat either. But I hope you slept; you must, you know, because then you will get well faster and can come to me. Dear Man, I can't bear to think how ill you've been--and all the time I never knew it. When the doctor came down yesterday to put me in the cab, he told me that for three days they gave you up. Oh, dearest, if that had happened, the light would have gone out of the world for me. I suppose that some day in the far future--one of us must leave the other; but at least we shall have had our happiness and there will be memories to live with. I meant to cheer you up--and instead I have to cheer myself. For in spite of being happier than I ever dreamed I could be, I'm also soberer. The fear that something may happen rests like a shadow on my heart. Always before I could be frivolous and care-free and unconcerned, because I had nothing precious to lose. But now--I shall have a Great Big Worry all the rest of my life. Whenever you are away from me I shall be thinking of all the automobiles that can run over you, or the sign-boards that can fall on your head, or the dreadful, squirmy germs that you may be swallowing. My peace of mind is gone for ever--but anyway, I never cared much for just plain peace. Please get well--fast--fast--fast. I want to have you close by where I can touch you and make sure you are tangible. Such a little half hour we had together! I'm afraid maybe I dreamed it. If I were only a member of your family (a very distant fourth cousin) then I could come and visit you every day, and read aloud and plump up your pillow and smooth out those two little wrinkles in your forehead and make the corners of your mouth turn up in a nice cheerful smile. But you are cheerful again, aren't you? You were yesterday before I left. The doctor said I must be a good nurse, that you looked ten years younger. I hope that being in love doesn't make every one ten years younger. Will you still care for me, darling, if I turn out to be only eleven? Yesterday was the most wonderful day that could ever happen. If I live to be ninety-nine I shall never forget the tiniest detail. The girl that left Lock Willow at dawn was a very different person from the one who came back at night. Mrs. Semple called me at half-past four. I started wide awake in the darkness and the first thought that popped into my head was, 'I am going to see Daddy-Long-Legs!' I ate breakfast in the kitchen by candle-light, and then drove the five miles to the station through the most glorious October colouring. The sun came up on the way, and the swamp maples and dogwood glowed crimson and orange and the stone walls and cornfields sparkled with hoar frost; the air was keen and clear and full of promise. I knew something was going to happen. All the way in the train the rails kept singing, 'You're going to see Daddy-Long-Legs.' It made me feel secure. I had such faith in Daddy's ability to set things right. And I knew that somewhere another man--dearer than Daddy--was wanting to see me, and somehow I had a feeling that before the journey ended I should meet him, too. And you see! When I came to the house on Madison Avenue it looked so big and brown and forbidding that I didn't dare go in, so I walked around the block to get up my courage. But I needn't have been a bit afraid; your butler is such a nice, fatherly old man that he made me feel at home at once. 'Is this Miss Abbott?' he said to me, and I said, 'Yes,' so I didn't have to ask for Mr. Smith after all. He told me to wait in the drawing-room. It was a very sombre, magnificent, man's sort of room. I sat down on the edge of a big upholstered chair and kept saying to myself: 'I'm going to see Daddy-Long-Legs! I'm going to see Daddy-Long-Legs!' Then presently the man came back and asked me please to step up to the library. I was so excited that really and truly my feet would hardly take me up. Outside the door he turned and whispered, 'He's been very ill, Miss. This is the first day he's been allowed to sit up. You'll not stay long enough to excite him?' I knew from the way he said it that he loved you--and I think he's an old dear! Then he knocked and said, 'Miss Abbott,' and I went in and the door closed behind me. It was so dim coming in from the brightly lighted hall that for a moment I could scarcely make out anything; then I saw a big easy chair before the fire and a shining tea table with a smaller chair beside it. And I realized that a man was sitting in the big chair propped up by pillows with a rug over his knees. Before I could stop him he rose--rather shakily--and steadied himself by the back of the chair and just looked at me without a word. And then--and then--I saw it was you! But even with that I didn't understand. I thought Daddy had had you come there to meet me or a surprise. Then you laughed and held out your hand and said, 'Dear little Judy, couldn't you guess that I was Daddy-Long-Legs?' In an instant it flashed over me. Oh, but I have been stupid! A hundred little things might have told me, if I had had any wits. I wouldn't make a very good detective, would I, Daddy? Jervie? What must I call you? Just plain Jervie sounds disrespectful, and I can't be disrespectful to you! It was a very sweet half hour before your doctor came and sent me away. I was so dazed when I got to the station that I almost took a train for St Louis. And you were pretty dazed, too. You forgot to give me any tea. But we're both very, very happy, aren't we? I drove back to Lock Willow in the dark but oh, how the stars were shining! And this morning I've been out with Colin visiting all the places that you and I went to together, and remembering what you said and how you looked. The woods today are burnished bronze and the air is full of frost. It's CLIMBING weather. I wish you were here to climb the hills with me. I am missing you dreadfully, Jervie dear, but it's a happy kind of missing; we'll be together soon. We belong to each other now really and truly, no make-believe. Doesn't it seem queer for me to belong to someone at last? It seems very, very sweet. And I shall never let you be sorry for a single instant. Yours, for ever and ever, Judy PS. This is the first love-letter I ever wrote. Isn't it funny that I know how? 
19015	----	[Illustration: As Right Guard, Jane proved herself worthy of the position.] ----------------------------------------------------------------------- JANE ALLEN: RIGHT GUARD By Edith Bancroft Author of Jane Allen of the Sub-Team THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY Akron, Ohio New York ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright MCMXVIII THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY Jane Allen, Right Guard Made in the United States of America ----------------------------------------------------------------------- TABLE OF CONTENTS I DAY DREAMS 1 II A COUNCIL OF WAR 11 III BAD NEWS 17 IV THE REASON WHY 27 V THE UNKNOWN MISCHIEF MAKER 34 VI THE PLOT THICKENS 42 VII AN UNPLEASANT TABLEMATE 51 VIII A HAPPY THOUGHT 63 IX SEEKERS OF DISCORD 72 X A VAGUE REGRET 82 XI REJECTED CAVALIERS 91 XII NORMA'S "FIND" 101 XIII THE EXPLANATION 111 XIV OPENLY AND ABOVEBOARD 122 XV THE RECKONING 132 XVI PLAYING CAVALIER 140 XVII THE EAVESDROPPER 151 XVIII DIVIDING THE HONORS 157 XIX RANK INJUSTICE 167 XX THE RISE OF THE FRESHMAN TEAM 182 XXI REINSTATEMENT 197 XXII MAKING OTHER PEOPLE HAPPY 210 XXIII A NEW FRIEND 224 XXIV THE LISTENER 241 XXV THE ACCUSATION 258 XXVI THE STAR WITNESS 273 XXVII CONCLUSION 299 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- JANE ALLEN: RIGHT GUARD CHAPTER I DAY DREAMS "Come out of your day dream, Janie, and guess what I have for you." Hands behind him, Henry Allen stood looking amusedly down at his daughter. Stretched full length in a gaily striped hammock swung between two great trees, her gray eyes dreamily turned toward the distant mountain peaks, Jane Allen had not heard her father's noiseless approach over the closely clipped green lawn. At sound of his voice, she bobbed up from the hammock with an alacrity that left it swaying wildly. "Of course I was dreaming, Dad," she declared gaily, making an ineffectual grab at the hands he held behind him. "No fair using force," he warned, dexterously eluding her. "This is a guessing contest. Now which hand will you choose?" "Both hands, you mean thing!" laughed Jane. "I know what you have in one of them. It's a letter. Maybe two. Now stand and deliver." "Here you are." Obligingly obeying the imperative command, Mr. Allen handed Jane two letters. "Oh, joy! Here _you_ are!" Jane enveloped her father in a bear-like hug, planting a resounding kiss on his sun-burnt cheek. "Having played postman, I suppose my next duty is to take myself off and leave my girl to her letters," was his affectionately smiling comment. "Not a bit of it, Dad. I'm dying to read these letters. They're from Judith Stearns and Adrienne Dupree. But even they must wait a little. I want to talk to _you_, my ownest Dad. Come and sit beside me on that bench." Slipping her arm within her father's, Jane gently towed him to a quaint rustic seat under a magnificent, wide-spreading oak. "Be seated," she playfully ordered. Next instant she was beside him on the bench, her russet head against his broad shoulder. "Well, girl of mine, what is it? You're not going to tell me, I hope, that you don't want to go back to college." Henry Allen humorously referred to another sunlit morning over a year ago when Jane had corralled him for a private talk that had been in the nature of a burst of passionate protest against going to college. "It's just a year ago yesterday, Dad," Jane returned soberly. "What a horrid person I was to make a fuss and spoil my birthday. But I was only sixteen, then. I'm seventeen years and one day old now. I'm ever so much wiser. It's funny but that is really what I wanted to talk to you about. Going back to Wellington, I mean. I want to go this time. Truly, I do." "I know it, Janie. I was only teasing you." Henry Allen smiled down very tenderly at his pretty daughter. "Of course you were," nodded Jane. "I knew, though, that you were thinking about last year, when I behaved like a savage. I was thinking of it, too, as I lay in the hammock looking off toward the mountains. Dear old Capitan never seemed so wonderful as it does to-day. Yet somehow, it doesn't hurt me to think of leaving it for a while. "Last year I felt as though I was being torn up by the roots. This year I feel all comfy and contented and only a little bit sad. The sad part is leaving you and Aunt Mary. Still I'm glad to go back to Wellington. It's as though I had two homes. I wanted to tell you about it, Dad. To let you know that this year I'm going to try harder than ever to be a good pioneer." Raising her head, Jane suddenly sat very straight on the bench, her gray eyes alive with resolution. "You don't need to tell me that, Janie." Her father took one of Jane's slender white hands between his own strong brown ones. "You showed yourself a real pioneer freshman. They say the freshman year's always the hardest. I know mine was at Atherton. I was a poor boy, you know, and had to fight my way. Things were rather different then, though. There is more comradeship and less snobbishness in college than there used to be. That is, in colleges for boys. You're better posted than your old Dad about what they do and are in girls' colleges," he finished humorously. "Oh, there are a few snobs at Wellington." An unbidden frown rose to Jane's smooth forehead. Reference to snobbery brought up a vision of Marian Seaton's arrogant, self-satisfied features. "Most of the girls are splendid, though," she added, brightening. "You know how much I care for Judy, my roommate, and, oh, lots of others at Wellington. There's Dorothy Martin, in particular. She stands for all that is finest and best. You remember I've told you that she looks like Dearest." Jane's voice dropped on the last word. Silence fell upon the two as each thought of the beloved dead. "Dad, you don't know how much it helped me last year in college to have Dearest's picture with me," Jane finally said. "It was almost as if she were right there with me, her own self, and understood everything. I've never told you before, but there were a good many times when things went all wrong for me. There were some days when it seemed to me that I didn't want to try to be a pioneer. I wanted to pull up stakes and run away. I sha'n't feel that way this year. It will be so different. I'll walk into Madison Hall and be at home there from the start. I'll have friends there to welcome----" Jane's confidences were suddenly interrupted by the appearance of Pedro, the groom, leading Donabar, Mr. Allen's horse, along the drive. "I've got to leave you, girl." Mr. Allen rose. "I've an appointment with Gleason, to look at some cattle he wants to sell me. I'll see you at dinner to-night. Probably not before then." With a hasty kiss, dropped on the top of Jane's curly head, her father strode across the lawn to his horse. Swinging into the saddle, he was off down the drive, turning only to wave farewell to the white-clad girl on the beach. Left alone, Jane turned her attention to her letters. Those who have read "JANE ALLEN OF THE SUB-TEAM" will remember how bitterly Jane Allen resented leaving her beautiful Western home to go East to Wellington College. Brought up on a ranch, Jane had known few girls of her own age. To be thus sent away from all she loved best and forced to endure the restrictions of a girls' college was a cross which proud Jane carried during the early part of her freshman year at Wellington. Gradually growing to like the girls she had formerly despised, Jane found friends, tried and true. Being a person of strong character she also made enemies, among them arrogant, snobbish Marian Seaton, a freshman of narrow soul and small honor. Due to her interest in basket-ball, Jane soon found herself fighting hard to win a position on the freshman team. She also found herself engaged in a desperate struggle to rule her own rebellious spirit. How she won the right to play in the deciding game of the year, because of her high resolve to be true to herself, has already been recorded in her doings as a freshman at Wellington College. "You first, Judy," murmured Jane, as she tore open the envelope containing Judith's letter and eagerly drew it forth. She smiled as she unfolded the one closely written sheet of thin, gray paper. Judith never wrote at length. The smile deepened as she read: "DEAR OLD JANE: "It's about time I answered your last letter. I hope to goodness this reaches you before you start East. Then you'll know I love you even if I am not a lightning correspondent. I just came home from the beach yesterday. I had a wonderful summer, but I'm tanned a beautiful brown. I am preparing you beforehand so that you will not mistake me for a noble red man, red woman, I mean, when you see me. "I'm dying to see my faithful roommate and talk my head off. I shall bring a whole bunch of eats along with me to Wellington and we'll have a grand celebration. Any small contributions which you may feel it your duty to drag along will be thankfully received. I'm going to start for college a week from next Tuesday. I suppose I'll be there ahead of you, so I'll have everything fixed up comfy when you poke your distinguished head in the door of our room. "I've loads of things to tell you, but I can't write them. You know how I love (not) to write letters, themes, etc. You'll just have to wait until we get together. If this letter shouldn't reach you before you leave El Capitan, you will probably get it some day after it has traveled around the country for a while. Won't that be nice? "With much love, hoping to see you soony soon, "Your affectionate roommate, "JUDY." Jane laughed outright as she re-read the letter. It was so exactly like good-humored Judy Stearns. She did not doubt that she was destined presently to hear at least one funny tale from Judith's lips concerning the latter's pet failing, absent-mindedness. Picking up Adrienne's letter from the bench, Jane found equal amusement in the little French girl's quaint phraseology. "WICKED ONE:" it began. "Why have you not answered the fond letter of your small Imp? But perhaps you have answered, and I have not received. _Ma mère_ and I have had the great annoyance since we came to this most stupid studio, because much of our mail has gone astray. "We have finished the posing for the picture 'The Spirit of the Dawn.' It was most beautiful. _Ma mère_ was, of course, the Dawn Spirit, allowed for one day to become the mortal. She had many dances to perform, and was superb in all. I, too, had the dance to do in several scenes. When we meet in college I will tell you all. "We shall not pose again in these motion pictures for the directors are, of a truth, most queer. They talk much, but have the small idea of art. It became necessary to quarrel with them frequently, otherwise the picture would have contained many ridiculous things. It is now past, and, of a certainty, I am glad. I am longing to make the return to Wellington. It will be the grand happiness to see again all my dear friends, you in particular, beloved Jeanne. "_La petite_ Norma will soon finish the engagement with the stock company. We have the hope to meet her in New York, so that she and your small Imp may make the return together to Wellington. Take the good care of yourself, dear Jeanne. With the regards of _ma mère_ and my most ardent affection, "Ever thy IMP." Jane gave the letter an affectionate little pat. It was almost as though she had heard lively little Adrienne's voice. How good it was, she reflected happily, to know that this time she would go East, not as a lonely outlander, but as one whose place awaited her. There would be smiling faces and welcoming hands to greet her when she climbed the steps of Madison Hall. Yes, Wellington was truly her Alma Mater and Madison Hall her second home. CHAPTER II A COUNCIL OF WAR "What does it all mean? That's the one thing I'd like to know." Judith Stearns plumped herself down on Ethel Lacey's couch bed with an energy that bespoke her feelings. "It is as yet beyond the understanding," gloomily conceded Adrienne Dupree. "You'd better go downstairs and see Mrs. Weatherbee at once, Judy," advised Ethel. It was a most amazed and indignant trio which had gathered for a council of war in the room belonging to Ethel and Adrienne. "I'm going to," nodded Judith with some asperity. "I have Jane's telegram here with me. I just stopped for a minute to tell you girls. Why, Jane will be in on that four o'clock train! A nice tale we'll have to tell her!" "Oh, there's surely been a misunderstanding," repeated Ethel Lacey. Judith shrugged her shoulders. "It looks queer to me," she said. "You know Mrs. Weatherbee never liked Jane. It would be just like her----" Judith paused. A significant stare conveyed untold meaning. "She couldn't do anything so unfair and get away with it," reasoned Ethel. "Jane could take up the matter with Miss Howard and make a big fuss about it." "She could, but would she?" demanded Judith savagely. "You know how proud Jane is. She'd die before she'd give Mrs. Weatherbee the satisfaction of seeing she was hurt over it. She----" "Oh, what's the use in speculating?" interrupted Ethel. "Go and find out, Judy. We're probably making much ado about nothing." "It is I who will go with you," announced Adrienne decidedly. "I am also the dear friend of Jane." "Let's all go," proposed Judith. "There's strength in numbers. If Mrs. Weatherbee hasn't been fair to Jane it will bother her a whole lot to have three of us take it up." Adrienne and Ethel concurring in this opinion, the three girls promptly marched themselves downstairs to the matron's office to inquire into the matter which had aroused them to take action in Jane Allen's behalf. Ten minutes later they retired from an interview with Mrs. Weatherbee, more amazed than when they had entered the matron's office. They were also proportionately incensed at the reception with which they had met. "I think she's too hateful for words!" sputtered Judith, the moment the committee of inquiry had again shut themselves in Ethel's room. "She might have explained," was Ethel's indignant cry. "I don't believe that Jane's not coming back to Madison Hall." "Jane _is_ coming back to Madison Hall," asserted Judith positively. "She said so in her last letter to me. That is, she spoke of our room and all. If she hadn't intended coming back, she'd have said something about it." "Of a truth she intended to return to this Hall," coincided Adrienne. "This most hateful Mrs. Weatherbee has perhaps decided thus for herself. Would it not be the humiliating thing for our _pauvre Jeanne_ to return and be refused the admittance?" "That won't happen," decreed Judith grimly. "We're going to the train to meet her, you know. We'll have to tell her the minute she sets foot on the station platform." "But suppose we find that it's true?" propounded Ethel. "That she doesn't intend to live at the Hall this year? Something might have happened after she wrote you girls to make her change her mind." "There's only one thing that I know of and I'd hate to think it was that," returned Judith soberly. "You know what I mean, that Jane mightn't care to room with me." "That is the nonsense," disagreed Adrienne sturdily. "We, who know Jane, know that it could never be thus. But wait, only wait. We shall, no doubt, prove this Mrs. Weatherbee to be the g-r-rand villain." Adrienne's roll of r's, coupled with her surmise as to the disagreeable matron's villainy, provoked instant mirth. Downhearted as she was, Judith could not refrain from giggling a little as her quick imagination visualized in stately, white-haired Mrs. Weatherbee the approved stage villain. "We'll just have to wait and see," declared placid Ethel. "It's after two now. Let's take a bus into Chesterford and see the sights until train time. We'll be on pins and needles every minute if we sit around here." "I'm going without a hat. I just can't bear to go back to my room for one. I guess you know why," shrugged Judith. "It is the great shame," sympathized Adrienne. "I am indeed sad that our Dorothy has not returned. She could perhaps learn from Mrs. Weatherbee what we cannot." "I wish Dorothy _were_ here," sighed Judith. "A lot of the girls haven't come back yet. I thought I'd be late, but I'm here early after all. Too bad Norma couldn't come on from New York with you." "It was most sad." Adrienne rolled her big black eyes. "She has yet one more week with the stock company. _La petite_ has done well. She has received many excellent notices. Next summer she will no doubt be the leading woman. She has the heaven-sent talent, even as _ma mère_." "Alicia Reynolds is back," announced Judith. "I met her coming in with her luggage about an hour ago. She was awfully cordial to me. That means she's still of the same mind as when she left Wellington last June. She's really a very nice girl. I only hope she stays away from Marian Seaton." "Neither Marian nor Maizie Gilbert have come back yet. I wish they'd stay away," came vengefully from Ethel. "With Alicia and Edith Hammond both on their good behavior Madison Hall would get along swimmingly without those two disturbers." "They'll probably keep to themselves this year," commented Judith grimly. "It's pretty well known here how badly they treated Jane last year and how splendidly she carried herself through it all." "Oh, the old girls at the Hall won't bother with them, but some of the new girls may," Ethel remarked. "We're to have several new ones." "There'll be one less new girl if I have anything to say about it," vowed Judith. "If there's been any unfairness done, little Judy will take a prompt hike over to see Miss Rutledge." "Jane wouldn't like that," demurred Ethel. "Can't help it. I'd just have to do it," Judith made obstinate reply. "As Jane's roommate I think I've a case of my own. If Jane has chosen to room somewhere else--then, all right. But if she hasn't--if she's been treated shabbily,--as I believe she has been--then I'll go wherever she goes, even if I have to live in a house away off the campus." CHAPTER III BAD NEWS "Oh, girls, it's good to be back!" Surrounded by a welcoming trio of white-gowned girls, Jane Allen clung affectionately to them. All along the station platform, bevies of merry-faced, daintily dressed young women were engaged in the joyful occupation of greeting classmates who had arrived on the four o'clock train. Here and there, committees of upper class girls were extending friendly hands to timid freshmen just set down in the outskirts of the land of college. Stepping down from the train Jane had been instantly seized by her energetic chums and smothered in a triangular embrace. A mist had risen to her gray eyes at the warmth of the welcome. She was, indeed, no longer the lonely outlander. It was all so different from last year and so delightful. "It's good to have you back, perfectly dear old Jane!" emphasized Judith, giving Jane an extra hug to measure her joy at sight of the girl she adored. "What happiness!" gurgled Adrienne. "We had the g-r-r-r-eat anxiety for fear that you would perhaps not come on this train." "Oh, I telegraphed Judy from St. Louis on a venture," laughed Jane. "I knew she'd be here ahead of me." "Then you did receive my letter," Judith said with satisfaction. "I was afraid you mightn't." "I didn't answer it because I was coming East so soon," apologized Jane. "I took your advice, though, about the eats. There was a stop over at St. Louis, so I went out and bought a suitcase full of boxed stuff. Maybe it isn't heavy! We'll have a great spread in our room to-night. Who's back, Judy? Have you seen Christine Ellis or Barbara Temple yet? Is Mary Ashton here? I know Dorothy isn't or she'd be here with you." As Jane rattled off these lively remarks, her three friends exchanged significant eye messages. "Then--why--you----" stammered Judith, a swift flush rising to her cheeks. "What's the matter, Judy?" Jane regarded her roommate in puzzled fashion. She wondered at Judith's evident confusion. "Nothing much. I mean something rather queer." Judith contradicted herself. "Let's take a taxi, girls, and stop at Rutherford Inn for tea. We can talk there." "But why not go straight to Madison Hall?" queried Jane, in growing perplexity. "I'm anxious to get rid of some of the smoke and dust I've collected on my face and hands. We can have tea and talk in our own room and be all by ourselves." "I wish we could, Jane, but we must have a talk with you before you go to the Hall," returned Judith, her merry features now grown grave. "What is it, Judy?" All the brightness had faded from Jane's face. Her famous scowl now darkened her brow. She cast a quick glance from Adrienne to Ethel. Both girls looked unduly solemn. "Girls, you're keeping something from me; something unpleasant, of course," Jane accused. "I must know what it is. Please tell me. Don't be afraid of hurting my feelings." "We're going to tell you, Jane," Judith said reassuringly. "Only we didn't want to say a word until--until we found out something. But this isn't the place to talk. Let's hail the taxi, anyway. Then he can stop at the Inn or not, just as you please. We'll tell you on the way there." "All right." Almost mechanically Jane reached down to pick up the suitcase she had placed on the station platform in the first moment of reunion. All the pleasure of coming back to Wellington had been replaced by a sense of deep depression. In spite of the presence of her chums she felt now as she had formerly felt when just a year before she had stood on that same platform, hating with all her sore heart its group of laughing, chatting girls. "Do not look so cross, _cherie_." Adrienne had slipped a soft hand into Jane's arm. "All will yet be well. Come, I, your Imp, will lead you to the taxicab." "And I'll help do the leading," declared Judith gaily, taking hold of Jane's free arm. "Ethel, you can walk behind and carry Jane's traveling bag. That will be some little honor." Knowing precisely how Jane felt, Judith affected a cheeriness she was far from feeling. She heartily wished that she had not been obliged to say a word to rob her roommate of the first joy of meeting. While traversing the few yards that lay between the station and the point behind it where several taxicabs waited, both she and Adrienne chattered lively commonplaces. Jane, however, had little to say. She was experiencing the dazed sensation of one who has received an unexpected slap in the face. What had happened? Why had Judy insisted that they must have a talk before going on to the Hall? Surely some very unpleasant news lay in wait for her ears. But what? Jane had not the remotest idea. "Now, Judy," she began with brusque directness the instant the quartette were seated in the taxicab, "don't keep me in the dark any longer. You must know how--what a queer feeling all this has given me." Seated in the tonneau of the automobile, between Adrienne and Judith, Jane turned hurt eyes on the latter. "Jane," began Judith impressively, "before you went home last year did you arrange with Mrs. Weatherbee about your room for this year?" "Why, yes." A flash of amazement crossed Jane's face. "Of course I did," she went on. "Mrs. Weatherbee understood that I was coming back to Madison Hall." "Humph!" ejaculated Judith. "Well, there's just this much about it, Jane. About nine o'clock this morning a little, black-eyed scrap of a freshman marched into my room and said Mrs. Weatherbee had assigned her to the other half of my room. I told her she had made a mistake and come to the wrong room. She said 'no,' that Mrs. Weatherbee had sent the maid to the door with her to show her the way." "Why, Judy, I don't see how----" began Jane, then suddenly broke off with, "Go on and tell me the rest." "I didn't like this girl for a cent. Her name is Noble, but it doesn't fit her. She has one of those prying, detestable faces, thin, with a sharp chin, and she hates to look one straight in the face," continued Judith disgustedly. "I went over to see Adrienne and Ethel and told them. Then we all went downstairs to interview Mrs. Weatherbee. She said you weren't coming back to Madison Hall this year." "Not coming back to Madison Hall!" exclaimed Jane, her scowl now in fierce evidence. "Did _she_ say it in just those words?" "She certainly did," responded Judith. "I told her that I was sure that you were and she simply froze up and gave me one of those Arctic-circle stares. All she said was, 'I am surprised at you, Miss Stearns. I am not in the habit of making incorrect statements.' Adrienne started to ask her when you had given up your room and she cut her off with: 'Young ladies, the subject is closed.' So that's all we know about it, and I guess you don't know any more of it than we do." "So _that_ was why you didn't want me to go on to the Hall until I knew," Jane said slowly. "Well, I know now, and I'm going straight there. Mrs. Weatherbee has never liked me. Still it's a rather high-handed proceeding on her part, I think." "If she did it of her own accord, I don't see how she dared. I'm not going to stand for it. That's all," burst out Judith hotly. "Miss Howard won't either. As registrar she'll have something to say, I guess. If she doesn't, then on to Miss Rutledge. That's going to be my motto. I won't have that girl in your place, Jane. I _won't_." "I won't let her stay there if I can help it," was Jane's decided answer. "I'd rather the affair would be between Mrs. Weatherbee and me, though. If she has done this from prejudice, I'll fight for my rights. It won't be the first time she and I have had words. It seems hard to believe that a woman of her age and position could be so contemptible." "That's what I thought," agreed Judith. "Well, we'll soon know. Here we are at the edge of the campus. Doesn't old Wellington look fine, though, Jane?" Jane merely nodded. She could not trust herself to speak. The gently rolling green of the wide campus had suddenly burst upon her view. Back among the trees, Wellington Hall lifted its massive gray pile, lording it in splendid grandeur over the buildings of lesser magnitude that dotted the living green. She had longed for a sight of it all. It was as though she had suddenly come upon a dear friend. For a moment the perplexities of the situation confronting her faded away as her gray eyes wandered from one familiar point on the campus to another. "It's wonderful, Judy," she said softly, her tones quite steady. "Even with this horrid tangle staring me in the face I can't help being glad to see Wellington again. Somehow, I can't help feeling that there's been a mistake made. I don't want to pass through the gates of Wellington with my heart full of distrust of anyone." "You're a dear, Jane!" was Judith's impulsive tribute. "Adrienne says Mrs. Weatherbee may turn out to be 'the grand villain.' Let's hope she won't. Anyway, if things can't be adjusted, wherever you go to live I'll go, too. I won't stay at the Hall without you." "Thank you, Judy." Jane found Judith's hand and squeezed it hard. She had inwardly determined, however, that her roommate should not make any such sacrifice. It would be hard to find a room anywhere on the campus to take the place of the one the two had occupied at Madison Hall during their freshman year. "I'm glad there's no one on the veranda," presently commented Jane. Having dismissed the taxicab, the three girls were now ascending the steps of the Hall. "Better wait here for me, girls, I'd rather have it out with Mrs. Weatherbee alone," she counseled. "I hope I sha'n't lose my temper," she added ruefully. Mentally bracing herself for the interview, Jane crossed the threshold of the Hall and walked serenely past the living-room to the matron's office just behind it. She was keeping a tight grip on herself and intended to keep it, if possible. She knew from past experience how greatly Mrs. Weatherbee's calm superiority of manner had been wont to irritate her. Jane loathed the idea of having a dispute with the matron the moment she entered Madison Hall. She had begun the first day of her freshman year in such fashion. Afterward it had seemed to her that most of the others had been stormy, as a consequence of a wrong start. She reflected as she walked slowly down the hall that this new trouble, was, at least, not of her making. She had the comforting knowledge that this time she was not at fault. CHAPTER IV THE REASON WHY Primed for the momentous interview, Jane was doomed to disappointment. The matron's office was empty of its usual occupant. "Oh, bother!" was her impatient exclamation. "I'll either have to wait for her or go and find her. I'll go back to the veranda and tell the girls," she decided. "Then I'll come here again. Mrs. Weatherbee may not be in the Hall for all I know." "Back so soon. What did she say?" Judith sprang eagerly from the wicker chair in which she had been lounging. "She is not there," returned Jane with a shadow of a frown. "I'm sorry. I wanted to see her and get it over with. Where's Ethel?" "Oh, she forgot that she had an appointment with Miss Howard. She rushed off in a hurry." "Mrs. Weatherbee has perhaps gone to make the call," suggested Adrienne. "Why do you not ring the bell and thus summon the maid?" "A good idea." Standing near the door, Jane's fingers found the electric bell and pressed it. "Where is Mrs. Weatherbee?" she inquired of the maid who presently came to answer the door. "Isn't Millie here any more?" she added, noting that a stranger occupied the place of the good-natured girl who had been at the Hall during Jane's freshman year. "No, miss. She's gone and got married. Did you want Mrs. Weatherbee? She's upstairs. I'll go and find her for you." "Thank you. If you will be so kind. Please tell her Miss Allen wishes to see her." Disturbed in mind, though she was, Jane replied with a graciousness she never forgot to employ in speaking to those in more humble circumstances than herself. It was a part of the creed her democratic father had taught her and she tried to live up to it. "Wish me luck, girls, I'm going to my fate. Wait for me," she said lightly and vanished into the house. "She's taking it like a brick," Judith admiringly commented. "Ah, yes. Jane is what _mon père_ would call 'the good sport,'" agreed Adrienne. "She is the strange girl; sometimes fierce like the lion over the small troubles. When come the great misfortunes she has calm courage." Re-entering Mrs. Weatherbee's office, Jane seated herself resignedly to wait for the appearance of the matron. When fifteen minutes had passed and she was still waiting, the stock of "calm courage" attributed to her by Adrienne, began to dwindle into nettled impatience. She now wished that she had not given her name to the maid. It looked as if Mrs. Weatherbee were purposely keeping her waiting. This thought stirred afresh in Jane the old antagonism that the matron had always aroused. After half an hour had dragged by Jane heard footsteps descending the stairs to the accompaniment of the faint rustle of silken skirts. She sat suddenly very straight in her chair, her mood anything but lamb-like. "Good afternoon, Miss Allen," greeted a cool voice. Mrs. Weatherbee rustled into the little office, injured dignity written on every feature of her austere face. "Good afternoon, Mrs. Weatherbee." Courtesy to an older woman prompted Jane to rise. Her tone, however, was one of strained politeness. There was no move made toward handshaking by either. "I was greatly surprised to learn that _you_ wished to see me, Miss Allen," was the matron's first remark after seating herself in the chair before her writing desk. Mrs. Weatherbee's intonations were decidedly accusing. Jane colored at the emphasis placed on the "you." "Why should you be surprised?" she flashed back, an angry glint in her gray eyes. Already her good resolutions were poised for flight. "I am even more surprised at the boldness of your question. I consider it as being in extremely bad taste." "And I am surprised at the way I have been treated!" Jane cried out passionately, her last remnant of patience exhausted. "I understand that you have seen fit to ignore the arrangement I made with you last June about my room. Miss Stearns has informed me that you have given it to an entering freshman. It's the most unfair proceeding I've ever known, and I shall not submit to such injustice." This was not in the least what Jane had purposed to say. She had intended to broach the subject on the diplomatic basis of a mistake having been made. She realized that she had thrown down the gauntlet with a vengeance, but she was now too angry to care. "_Miss Allen!_" The older woman's expression was one of intense severity. "Such insolence on your part is not only unbecoming but entirely uncalled for. You appear to have forgotten that you gave up your room of your own accord. I reserved it for you until I received your letter of last week." "Of my _own accord_!" gasped Jane, unable to believe she had heard aright. "My letter of last week! I don't understand." "I am at a loss to understand _you_," acidly retorted the matron. "I know of only one possible explanation for your call upon me this afternoon. I should prefer not to make it. It would hardly reflect to your credit." "I must ask you to explain," insisted Jane haughtily. "We have evidently been talking at cross purposes. You say that I gave up my room of my own accord. You mention a letter I wrote you. I have _not_ given up my room. I have _never_ written you a letter. You owe me an explanation. No matter how unpleasant it may be, I am not afraid to listen to it." "Very well," was the icy response. "Since you insist I will say plainly that it appears, even after writing me a most discourteous letter, you must have decided, for reasons of your own, to ignore this fact and return to Madison Hall. Not reckoning that your room would naturally be assigned to another girl so soon, you were bold enough to come here and attempt to carry your point with a high hand. I am quite sure you now understand me." "I do not," came the vehement denial. "I repeat that I never wrote you a letter. If you received one signed by me, it was certainly not I who wrote it. I am not surprised at your unfair opinion of me. You have never liked me. Naturally you could not understand me. I will ask you to let me see the letter." Mrs. Weatherbee's reply was not made in words. Reaching into a pigeon-hole of her desk she took from it a folded letter minus its envelope and handed it to Jane. Her head in a whirl, Jane unfolded it and read: "MRS. ELLEN WEATHERBEE, "Madison Hall, "Wellington Campus. "Dear Madam: "Although I regret leaving Madison Hall, it would be highly disagreeable to me to spend my sophomore year in it with you as matron. Your treatment of me last year was such that I should not like to court a second repetition of it. Therefore I am writing to inform you that I shall not return to the Hall. "Yours truly, "JANE ALLEN." CHAPTER V THE UNKNOWN MISCHIEF MAKER "This is too dreadful!" Springing to her feet, Jane dashed the offending letter to the floor, her cheeks scarlet with outraged innocence. "That was precisely my opinion when I read it," Mrs. Weatherbee sarcastically agreed. "But I never wrote it," stormed Jane. "That's not my signature. Besides the letter is typed. I would never have sent you a typed letter. Have you the envelope? What postmark was stamped upon it?" "It was postmarked 'New York.' No, I did not keep the envelope." "New York? Why, I came straight from Montana!" cried Jane. "I haven't been in New York since last Christmas." "I could not possibly know that. A letter could be forwarded even from Montana to New York for mailing," reminded the matron with satirical significance. "Then you still believe that I wrote _this_?" Jane's voice was freighted with hurt pride. Something in the girl's scornful, fearless, gray eyes, looking her through and through, brought a faint flush to the matron's set face. The possibility that Jane's protest was honest had reluctantly forced itself upon her. She was not specially anxious to admit Jane's innocence, though she was now half convinced of it. "I hardly know what to believe," she said curtly. "Your denial of the authorship of this letter seems sincere. I should naturally prefer to believe that you did not write it." "I give you my word of honor as a Wellington girl that I did _not_," Jane answered impressively. "I cannot blame you for resenting it. It is most discourteous. I should be sorry to believe myself capable of such rudeness." "I will accept your statement," Mrs. Weatherbee stiffly conceded. "However, the fact remains that _someone_ wrote and mailed this letter to me. There is but one inference to be drawn from it." She paused and stared hard at Jane. Without replying, Jane again perused the fateful letter. As she finished a second reading of it, a bitter smile dawned upon her mobile lips. "Yes," she said heavily. "There is just one inference to be drawn from it--spite work. I had no idea that it would be carried to this length, though." "Then you suspect a particular person as having written it?" sharply inquired the matron. "I do," came the steady response. "I know of but one, perhaps two persons, who might have done so. I am fairly sure that it lies between the two." "It naturally follows then that the person or persons you suspect are students at Wellington," commented the matron. "This is a matter that would scarcely concern outsiders. More, we may go further and narrow the circle down to Madison Hall." Jane received this pointed surmise in absolute silence. "There is this much about it, Miss Allen," the older woman continued after a brief pause, "I will not have under my charge a girl who would stoop to such a contemptible act against a sister student. I must ask you to tell me frankly if your suspicions point to anyone under this roof." "I can't answer that question, Mrs. Weatherbee. I mean I don't wish to answer it. Even if I knew positively who had done this, I'd be silent about it. It's my way of looking at it and I can't change. I'd rather drop the whole matter. It's hard, of course, to give up my room here and go somewhere else. I love Madison Hall and----" Jane came to an abrupt stop. She was determined not to break down, yet she was very near to it. "My dear child, you need not leave Madison Hall unless you wish to do so." Mrs. Weatherbee's frigidity had miraculously vanished. A gleam of kindly purpose had appeared in her eyes. For the first time since her acquaintance with Jane Allen she found something to admire. For the sake of a principle, this complex, self-willed girl, of whom she had ever disapproved, was willing to suffer injury in silence. The fact that Jane had refused to answer her question lost significance when compared with the motive which had prompted refusal. "You might easily accuse me of unfairness if I allowed matters to remain as they are," pursued the matron energetically. "As the injured party you have first right to your old room. Miss Noble, the young woman now occupying it with Miss Stearns, applied for a room here by letter on the very next day after I received this letter, supposedly from you. "I wrote her that I had a vacancy here and asked for references. These she forwarded immediately. As it happens I have another unexpected vacancy here due to the failure of a new girl to pass her entrance examinations. Miss Noble will no doubt be quite willing to take the other room. At all events, you shall have your own again." "I can't begin to tell you how much I thank you, Mrs. Weatherbee." Jane's somber face had lightened into radiant gratitude. "But I _can_ tell you that I'm sorry for my part in any misunderstandings we've had in the past. I don't feel about college now as I did last year." Carried away by her warm appreciation of the matron's unlooked-for stand in her behalf, Jane found herself telling Mrs. Weatherbee of her pre-conceived hatred of college and of her gradual awakening to a genuine love for Wellington. Of the personal injuries done her by others she said nothing. Her little outpouring had to do only with her own struggle for spiritual growth. "It was Dorothy Martin who first showed me the way," she explained. "She made me see myself as a pioneer, and college as a new country. She told me that it depended entirely on me whether or not my freshman claim turned out well. It took me a long time to see that. This year I want to be a better pioneer than I was last. That's why I'd rather not start out by getting someone else into trouble, no matter how much that person is at fault." During the earnest recital, the matron's stern features had perceptibly softened. She was reflecting that, after all, one person was never free to judge another. That human nature was in itself far too complex to be lightly judged by outward appearances. "You know the old saying, 'Out of evil some good is sure to come,'" she said, when Jane ceased speaking. "This affair of the letter has already produced one good result. I feel that I am beginning to know the real Jane Allen. You were right in saying that I never understood you. Perhaps I did not try. I don't know. You were rather different from any other girl whom I ever had before under my charge here." "I kept up the bars," confessed Jane ruefully. "I didn't wish to see things from any standpoint except my own. I'm trying to break myself of that. I can't honestly say that I have, as yet. I shall probably have a good many fights with myself about it this year. It's not easy to make one's self over in a day or a month or a year. It takes time. That's why I like college so much now. It's helping me to find myself. "But that's enough about myself." Jane made a little conclusive gesture. "I hope there won't be any--well--any unpleasantness about my room, Mrs. Weatherbee. I'd almost rather take that other vacancy than make trouble for you." "There will be no trouble," was the decisive assurance. "If Miss Noble objects to the change there are other campus houses open to her. I see no reason why she should. She only arrived this morning. She will not be kept waiting for the room. The girl who failed in her examinations left here at noon. I will see about it now." Mrs. Weatherbee rose to put her promise into immediate effect. "If you don't mind, I'll join Judith and Adrienne on the veranda. I am anxious to tell them the good news," eagerly declared Jane, now on her feet. Glancing at the disturbing letter which she held she handed it to Mrs. Weatherbee with: "What shall you do about this letter?" "Since the star witness in the case refuses to give testimony, it is hard to decide what to do," smiled the matron. "I might hand the letter to Miss Rutledge, yet I prefer not to do so. It is purely a personal matter. Suppose I were to prosecute an inquiry here at the Hall regarding it. It would yield nothing but indignant protests of innocence. If the writer were one of my girls she would perhaps be loudest in her protests." Though Jane did not say so, she was of the private opinion that the person she suspected would undoubtedly do that very thing. "A girl who would write such a letter would be the last to own to writing it," she said dryly. "Very true. Still things sometimes work out unexpectedly. If we have a mischief maker here, we may eventually discover her. Girls of this type often overreach themselves and thus establish their guilt. I shall not forget this affair." The matron's voice grew stern. "If ever I do discover the writer, she will not be allowed to remain at Madison Hall." CHAPTER VI THE PLOT THICKENS "And Mrs. Weatherbee's gone to oust the disturber of our peace! Oh, joy!" To emphasize further her satisfaction Judith gave Jane an ecstatic hug. "You can't be any gladder than I am." Jane returned the hug with interest. "But how did it thus happen so beautifully?" questioned Adrienne eagerly. "It was a mistake----No, it wasn't either. It was----" Jane paused. She wondered if she had the right to put her friends in possession of what she had so lately learned. Mrs. Weatherbee had not enjoined silence. Adrienne and Judith were absolutely trustworthy. They had forewarned her of the situation. It was only fair that they should be taken into her confidence. "I've something to tell you girls," she went on slowly. "You must wait to hear it until we are in our room. I'd rather not go into it out here on the veranda." "All right. We'll be good. I hope the noble Miss Noble will hurry up and move out," wished Judith. "I can imagine how delighted she'll be." "She may care but little," shrugged Adrienne. "Of a truth, she has not been here so long. But a few hours! It is not much!" "I don't believe she'll relish it a bit," prophesied Judith. "She looks to me like one of those persons who get peeved over nothing. Isn't it funny, though? Mrs. Weatherbee made a mistake last year about your room, Jane. Do you remember how haughty you were when you found out you were to room with little Judy?" "Yes. I was a big goose, wasn't I?" Jane smiled reminiscently. "It wasn't Mrs. Weatherbee's fault this time. That's all I'll say until we three go upstairs." "Wish she'd hurry," grumbled Judith, referring to the usurping freshman. "This evacuation business isn't going along very speedily. I wonder if she's unpacked. She hadn't touched her suitcase when I left her. Her trunk hadn't come yet. Maybe it came while we were out. I hope not. Then there'll be that much less to move." "Had this Miss Noble examinations to take?" asked Jane. "No, she told me she was graduated from a prep school last June. Burleigh, I think she said. I really didn't listen much to her. I was so upset over having her thrust upon me, I didn't want to talk to her." "Poor Judy." Jane bestowed a sympathizing pat upon Judith's arm. "All the time I was thinking 'poor Jane,'" laughed Judith. "Oh, dear! Why doesn't Mrs. Weatherbee come back. I'm crazy to hear the weird story of your wrongs, Janie." It was at least fifteen minutes afterward before the matron descended the stairs, looking far from pleased. Watching for her, Jane stepped inside the house and met her at the foot of the stairs. "You may move in as soon as you please, Miss Allen," she informed Jane, her annoyed expression vanishing in a friendly smile. "Thank you. I sha'n't lose any time in doing it." Jane returned the smile, thinking in the same moment that it seemed rather odd but decidedly nice to be on such pleasant terms with the woman she had once thoroughly disliked. "Did you notice how vexed Mrs. Weatherbee looked when she came downstairs?" was Judith's remark as the door of her room closed behind them. "I'll bet she had her own troubles with the usurper." "First the disturber, then the usurper. You have, indeed, many names for this one poor girl," giggled Adrienne. "Oh, I can think of a lot more," grinned Judith. "But what's the use. She has departed bag and baggage. To quote your own self, 'It is sufficient.' Now go ahead, Jane, and spin your yarn." "It's no yarn. It's sober truth. You understand. I'm speaking in strict confidence." With this foreword, Jane acquainted the two girls with what had taken place in the matron's office. "Hm!" sniffed Judith as Jane finished. "She's begun rather early in the year, hasn't she?" "I see we're of the same mind, Judy," Jane said quietly. "I, too, am of that same mind," broke in Adrienne. "I will say to you now most plainly that it was Marian Seaton who wrote the letter." "Of course she wrote it," emphasized Judith fiercely. "It's the most outrageous thing I ever heard of. You ought to have told Mrs. Weatherbee, Jane. Why should you shield a girl who is trying to injure you?" "I could only have said that I _suspected_ her of writing the letter," Jane pointed out. "I have no proof that she wrote it. Besides, I didn't care to start my sophomore year that way. When I have anything to say about Marian Seaton, I'll say it to her. I'm going to steer clear of her if I can. If I can't, then she and I will have to come to an understanding one of these days. I'd rather ignore her, unless I find that I can't." "You're a queer girl," was Judith's half-vexed opinion. "I think, if I were in your place, I'd begin at the beginning and tell Mrs. Weatherbee every single thing about last year. I'd tell her I was _positive_ Marian Seaton wrote that letter. She'd be angry enough to tax Marian with it, even though she made quite a lot of Marian and Maizie Gilbert last year. If Marian got scared and confessed--good night! She'd have to leave Madison Hall. We'd all be better off on account of it." "No, _ma chere_ Judy, you are in that quite wrong," disagreed Adrienne. "This Marian would never make the confession. Instead she would make the great fuss. She would, of a truth, say that Jane had made the plot to injure her. She is most clever in such matters." "I'm not afraid of anything she might say," frowned Jane. "I simply don't care to bother any more about it. I have my half of this room back and that's all that really matters. If Marian Seaton thinks----" The sudden opening of the door cut Jane's speech in two. Three surprised pairs of eyes rested on a sharp-chinned, black-eyed girl who had unceremoniously marched into their midst. Face and bearing both indicated signs of active hostility. "Did I hear you mention Marian Seaton's name?" she sharply inquired of Jane. "You did." Jane gazed levelly at the angry newcomer. "Which of these two girls is Miss Allen?" This question was rudely addressed to Judith, whose good-natured face showed evident disgust of the interrogator. "I am Jane Allen. Why do you ask?" Jane spoke with curt directness. "I supposed that you were." The girl smiled scornfully. "I only wished to make sure before telling you my opinion of you. It did not surprise me to learn that it was _you_ who turned me out of my room. I had already been warned against you by my cousin, Marian Seaton. No doubt you've been saying spiteful things about her. I know just how shabbily you treated her last year. If she had been here to-day, you wouldn't have been allowed to take my room away from me. She has more influence at Wellington than you have. She will be here soon and then we'll see what will happen. That's all except that you are a selfish, hateful troublemaker." With every word she uttered the black-eyed girl's voice had risen. Overmastered by anger she fairly screamed the final sentence of her arraignment. Then she turned and bolted from the room, leaving behind her a dumbfounded trio of young women. "Brr!" ejaculated Judith. "What do you think of that? I'm sure I could have heard that last shriek, if I'd been away over on the campus. Marian Seaton's cousin! Think what Judy escaped!" "You are very funny, Judy," giggled Adrienne. "And that girl! How little repose; what noise!" "Yes, 'what noise,'" Judith echoed the giggle. "Really, girls, am I awake or do I dream? First a strange and awful girl comes walking in on me. Then I learn the pleasant news that Jane's deserted me. Along comes Jane, who doesn't know she's lost her home. Enter Marian Seaton as a letter writer. Result Jane and Mrs. Weatherbee become bosom friends. Jane is vindicated and her rights restored. Right in the middle of a happy reunion in bounces the tempestuous Miss Noble. Quite a little like a nightmare, isn't it?" "It has the likeness to the movie plot," asserted Adrienne mirthfully. "Very thrilling and much mixed." "I never dreamed coming back to Wellington would be like this." Jane smiled. Nevertheless the words came with a touch of sadness. "Don't let it worry you, Jane," counseled Judith. "I was only fooling when I said this afternoon had been like a nightmare. You may not have another like this the whole year. Things always happen in bunches, you know. I move that we re-beautify our charming selves and go down to the veranda. We'll be on hand if any of the girls arrive. There's a train from the east at five-thirty. Dorothy may be on that." "I hope she is," sighed Jane. Mention of Dorothy Martin made Jane long for a sight of the gentle, whole-souled girl whom she so greatly loved and admired. "Go ahead, Jane, and change your gown. I'll unpack your bag for you," offered Judith. "Beloved Imp here may help, if she's very good." "Thank you, Judy." Jane began an absent unfastening of her pongee traveling gown, preparatory to bathing her throat, face and hands, dusty from the journey. While her two friends laughed and chattered as they unpacked her bag, she gave herself up to somber reflection. The events of the afternoon had left her with a feeling of heavy depression. Why, when she desired so earnestly to do well and be happy, must the ancient enmity of Marian Seaton be dragged into her very first day at Wellington. Was this a forerunner of what the rest of her sophomore days were destined to be? CHAPTER VII AN UNPLEASANT TABLEMATE Despite the unpropitious events of the afternoon, evening saw a merry little party in full swing in Judith's and Jane's room. Barbara Temple and Christine Ellis came over from Argyle Hall. The five-thirty train had brought not only Dorothy Martin but Mary Ashton as well. Eight o'clock saw them calling on Judith and Jane, along with Adrienne and Ethel. Of the old clan, Norma Bennett alone was absent, a loss which was loudly lamented by all. So swiftly did time fly that the party ended in a mad scurry to comply with the inexorable half-past ten o'clock rule. Jane went to bed that night considerably lighter of heart. Reunion with the girls who were nearest to her had driven the afternoon's unpleasantness from her thoughts, for the time being at least. The friendly presence of those she loved had proved a powerful antidote. A night's sound sleep served to separate her further from the disagreeable incidents of the previous day. She had two things, at least, to be glad of, she reflected, as she dressed next morning. She was back in her own room. More, she now stood on an entirely different footing with Mrs. Weatherbee than heretofore. This last was brought home to her more strongly than ever when, in going down to breakfast, she passed the matron on her way to the dining-room and received a smiling "Good morning, Miss Allen." It was at decided variance with the reserved manner in which Mrs. Weatherbee had formerly been wont to greet her. "Well, we are once again at the same table," remarked Adrienne as Jane slipped into the place at table she had occupied during her freshman year. "Until last night I ate the meals alone. It was _triste_." Adrienne's profound air of melancholy made both Jane and Dorothy laugh. "What made you come back to college so early, dear Imp?" questioned Dorothy, smiling indulgently at the little girl. "I had the longing to see the girls," Adrienne replied simply. "This past summer I have greatly missed all of you." "We've all missed one another, I guess," Jane said soberly. "Often out on the ranch I've wished you could all be with me. Next summer you must come. I'm going to give a house party." "What rapture!" Adrienne clasped her small hands. "I, for one, will accept the invitation, and now." Somewhat to Jane's surprise Dorothy said not a word. She merely stared at Jane, a curiously wistful expression in her gray eyes. "Don't you want to come to my house party, Dorothy?" Though the question was playfully asked it held a hint of pained surprise. "Of course I'd like to come. I will--if I can." This last was added with a little sigh. "Did you bring Firefly East with you, this year, Jane?" she inquired with abrupt irrelevance. "Yes. Pedro started East ahead of me with Firefly. They haven't arrived yet. Are you going to ride this year, Dorothy?" Jane was wondering what had occasioned in Dorothy this new, wistful mood. It was entirely unlike her usual blithe, care-free self. "I'm afraid not." The shadow on Dorothy's fine face had deepened. "Frankly, I can't afford to keep a riding horse here. I don't mind telling just you two that it was a question with me as to whether I ought to come back to college. We were never rich, you know, just in comfortable circumstances. This summer Father met with financial losses and we're almost poor. Both Father and Mother were determined that I should come back to Wellington on account of it being my last year. So I'm here. I've not brought any new clothes with me, though, and I shall have to be very economical." Dorothy smiled bravely as she made this frank confession. "Who cares whether your clothes are new of old, Dorothy?" came impulsively from Jane. "It's having you here that counts. Nothing else matters. I'm ever so sorry that your father has met with such misfortune." "Ah, yes! I too, have the sorrow that such bad luck has come to your father. _We_ are the lucky ones, because you have come back to us," Adrienne agreed impressively. "You're dears, both of you. Shake hands." Her eyes eloquent with affection, Dorothy's hand went out to Jane, then to Adrienne. "We try to be like you, _ma chere_," was Adrienne's graceful response. "That's very pretty, Imp," acknowledged Dorothy, flushing. "I'll have to watch my step to merit that compliment. Now that you've heard the sad story of the poverty-stricken senior, I call for a change of subject. Did you know that Edith Hammond isn't coming back?" "She isn't!" Jane looked her surprise at this unexpected bit of news. "No. Edith is going to be married," Dorothy informed. "She was heart-whole and fancy-free when she left here last June. Then she went with her family to the Catskills for the summer. She met her fate there; a young civil engineer. They're to be married in November. She wrote me a long letter right after she became betrothed. Later I received a card announcing her engagement." "I hope she'll be very happy," Jane spoke with evident sincerity. "I'm so glad we grew to be friendly before college closed last June. It was awfully awkward and embarrassing for us when we had to sit opposite each other at this table three times a day without speaking." Tardy recollection of the fact that there had also been a time when the wires of communication were down between herself and Dorothy, caused a tide of red to mount upward to Jane's forehead. The eyes of the two girls meeting, both smiled. Each read the other's thoughts. Such a catastrophe would not occur again. "I wonder how many new girls there will be at the Hall," Dorothy glanced curiously about the partially filled dining-room. "Let me see. We had four graduates from Madison. Edith isn't coming back. That makes five vacancies to be filled. Do you know of any others?" The approach of a maid with a heavily laden breakfast tray, left the question unanswered for the moment. "You forget, _la petite_," reminded Adrienne as she liberally sugared her sliced peaches. "She will no longer live at the top of the house. She has already made the arrangements to room with Mary Ashton. So there are but four vacancies. I would greatly adore to be with my Norma, but Ethel is the good little roommate. I am satisfied." Adrienne dismissed the subject with a wave of her hand. "Norma can have Edith's place at our table," suggested Dorothy. "That will be nice. I'll speak to Mrs. Weatherbee about it right after breakfast." "Perhaps we should not wait until then." Adrienne half rose from her chair. Noting that the matron's place at another table was vacant she sat down again. "Here she comes now!" Jane followed her announcement with a muffled "Oh!" Mrs. Weatherbee was advancing toward their table and not alone. Behind her walked the aggressive Miss Noble. "Miss Noble, this is Miss Martin." The matron placidly proceeded with the introductions and rustled off, unconscious that she had precipitated a difficult situation. Her mind occupied with other matters, she had failed to note the stiff little bows exchanged by three of the quartette. It had not been lost upon Dorothy, however. Greeting the newcomer in her usual gracious fashion, she wondered what ailed Jane and Adrienne. "Have you examinations to try, Miss Noble?" she asked pleasantly, by way of shattering the frigid silence that had settled down on three of the group. "No, indeed." The girl tossed her black head. "_I_ am from Burleigh." "Oh! A prep school, I suppose?" Dorothy inquired politely. The name was unfamiliar to her. "One of the most exclusive in the Middle West," was the prompt answer, given with a touch of arrogance. "I must say, Wellington doesn't compare very favorably with it in _my_ opinion." A faint sparkle of resentment lit the wide gray eyes Dorothy turned squarely on the freshman. "That's rather hard on Wellington," she said evenly. "I hope you will change your mind after you've been with us a while." "I hardly expect that I shall, judging from what I've already seen of it. That is, if Madison Hall furnishes a sample of the rest of the college." Turning petulantly to the maid who had come up to attend to her wants she ordered sharply: "Bring me my breakfast at once. I am in a hurry." A dead silence ensued as the maid walked away. Signally vexed at the stranger's disparaging remarks, Dorothy had no inclination to court a fresh volley. Jane and Adrienne were equally attacked by dumbness. They were devoting themselves to breakfast as if in a hurry to be through with it. "I didn't intend to speak to you ever again," the disgruntled freshman suddenly addressed herself to Jane. "I suppose you think it's queer in me to sit down at the same table with you after what I told you yesterday. I was going to refuse, then I decided I had a perfect right to sit here if I chose. If you don't like it you can sit somewhere else." "Thank you. I am quite satisfied with this table." Jane's reply quivered with sarcasm. "I sat here at meals last year. I have no intention of making a change." "It is, of a truth, most sad, that we cannot oblige you," Adrienne cut into the conversation, her elfish black eyes snapping. "It is not necessary, however, that we should say more about it. We are here. We shall continue to be here. It is sufficient." She made a sweeping gesture as if to brush the offensive Miss Noble off the face of the earth. The latter simply stared at the angry little girl for a moment, too much amazed to make ready reply. Adrienne's calm ultimatum rather staggered her. Too courteous to show open amusement of the situation, Dorothy resorted to flight. With a hasty "Excuse me" she rose and left the table. Jane and Adrienne instantly followed suit, leaving the quarrelsome freshman alone in her glory. Straight toward the living-room Dorothy headed, her friends at her heels. Dropping down on the davenport she broke into subdued laughter. "You naughty Imp," she gasped. "I know I oughtn't laugh, but you were so funny. Wasn't she, Jane?" "Yes." Jane was now smiling in sympathy with Dorothy's mirth. A moment earlier she had been scowling fiercely. "What's the answer, Jane?" Dorothy's laughter had merged into sudden seriousness. "Marian Seaton's cousin," returned Jane briefly. "I didn't intend to mention it," she continued, "but under the circumstances I think you ought to know the truth." Briefly Jane acquainted Dorothy with the situation. "The whole affair is contemptible," Dorothy's intonation indicated strong disapproval of the cowardly attempt to deprive Jane of her room. "It looks as though Marian were guilty," she continued speculatively. "She's the only one at Wellington, I believe, who would do you a bad turn." "You forget Maizie Gilbert," shrugged Jane. "Oh, Maizie, left to herself, would never be dangerous. She's too lazy to be vengeful. She only follows Marian's lead." "This Marian well knew that with Mrs. Weatherbee Jane could not agree," asserted Adrienne. "She had the opinion that when Jane arrived here Mrs. Weatherbee would listen to nothing she might say. So she had the mistaken opinion." "Mrs. Weatherbee always means to be just," defended Dorothy. "She has rather prim ideas about things, but she's a stickler for principle. I am glad she's over her prejudice against you, Jane." "So am I," nodded Jane. "About this whole affair, Dorothy, I don't intend to worry any more. I'm going to be too busy trying to be a good sophomore pioneer to trouble myself with either Marian Seaton or her cousin. Nothing that she did last year to try to injure me succeeded. As long as I plod straight ahead and keep right with myself I've nothing to fear from her." CHAPTER VIII A HAPPY THOUGHT During the week that followed Jane became too fully occupied with settling down in college to trouble herself further about Marian Seaton. Neither the latter nor Maizie Gilbert had as yet returned to Wellington, a fact which caused Jane no regret. She did not doubt that as soon as Marian put in an appearance she would hear a garbled tale of woe from her belligerent cousin. Whether Marian would take up the cudgels in her cousin's defense was another matter. Firm in her belief that Marian had written the disquieting letter, Jane was fairly sure that the former's guilty conscience would warn her against making a protest to Mrs. Weatherbee that her cousin had been shabbily treated. As it happened she was quite correct in her surmise. When, late one afternoon at the end of the week, Marian and Maizie Gilbert arrived at Madison Hall they were treated to a sight that disturbed them considerably. To a casual observer there was nothing strange in the sight of two white-gowned girls seated in the big porch swing, apparently well pleased with each other's society. To Marian Seaton, however, it represented the defeat of a carefully laid scheme. Sight of Jane Allen, calmly ensconced in the swing and actually laughing at something Adrienne Dupree was relating with many gestures, filled Marian Seaton with sullen rage, not unmixed with craven fear. "_What_ do you think of that?" she muttered to Maizie as the driver of the taxicab brought the machine to a slow stop on the drive. "I never expected to see _her_ here." "Maybe Mrs. Weatherbee didn't receive it," returned Maizie in equally guarded tones. "Something's gone wrong," was the cross surmise. "Watch yourself, Maiz, when you talk, to Mrs. Weatherbee." "Oh, she couldn't possibly know," assured Maizie. "This Allen snip has just managed to have her own way. You know what a hurricane she is when she gets started." "Just the same you'd better be on your guard," warned Marian. "Madison Hall, miss." The driver was impatiently addressing Marian. Deep in considering the unwelcome state of affairs revealed by Jane's presence on the veranda, neither girl had made any move to alight. "Oh, keep quiet!" exclaimed Marian rudely. "We'll get out when we are ready." "Charge you more if you keep me waiting," retorted the man. "Time's money to me." This threat resulted in the hasty exit of both girls from the machine. Provided with plenty of spending money, Marian thriftily endeavored always to obtain the greatest possible return for the least expenditure. As the luggage-laden pair ascended the steps, some hidden force drew Marian's unwilling gaze to the porch swing. A quick, guilty flush dyed her cheeks as her pale blue eyes met the steady, inscrutable stare of Jane's gray ones. Immediately she looked away. She could not fathom the meaning of that calm, penetrating glance. In consequence Marian could not know that Jane had been seeking confirmation of a certain private belief, which the former's guilty confusion had supplied. "Do you think she's found out anything?" Marian asked nervously of Maizie, the instant they had entered the house. "Mercy, no. If she had she'd have glowered at you," reassured Maizie. "She just looked at you as though you were a stranger. You needn't be afraid of _her_. She's too stupid to put two and two together." "She must know about the letter, though. What I can't see is how she managed to stick here in spite of it. Every room here was spoken for last June. Mrs. Weatherbee told me so. I'll bet Elsie's had to go to another campus house. It's a shame! That letter was meant to do two things. Get Jane Allen out of the Hall and Elsie in. Don't stop to talk with old Weatherbee, Maizie," was Marian's injunction. "We'll just say 'How do you do. We're back,' and hustle upstairs. Be sure to notice if she seems as cordial as ever. If she is, it will be a good sign that we're safe." Meanwhile, out on the veranda, Adrienne was remarking under her breath to Jane: "Did you observe the face of Marian Seaton? Ah, but she is the guilty one!" "I noticed," replied Jane dryly. "I was determined to make her look at me, and she did. It upset her to see me here. She wasn't expecting it." "It is the annoyance that she has returned," sighed Adrienne. "All has been so delightful without her." "I'm going to forget that she's here," avowed Jane sturdily. "Come on, Imp. Let's go over to the stable and see Firefly. I promised him an apple and three lumps of sugar yesterday. I must keep my word to him." Rising, Jane held out an inviting hand to Adrienne. The little girl promptly linked her fingers within Jane's and the two started down the steps, making a pretty picture as they strolled bare-headed across the campus to the western gate. "Hello, children! Whither away?" Almost to the wide gateway they encountered Dorothy Martin coming from an opposite direction. "We're going to call on Firefly. Want to come along?" invited Jane. "Of course I do. Firefly is a very dear friend of mine." "I must stop at that little fruit stand below the campus and buy Firefly's apple," Jane said as the trio emerged from the campus onto the public highway. "I have the sugar in my blouse pocket." She patted a tiny bulging pocket of her white silk blouse. "Marian Seaton and Maizie Gilbert have returned," Adrienne informed Dorothy, with a droll air of resignation. "But a few moments past and we saw them arrive. We made no effort to embrace them." "Miss Howard isn't pleased over their staying away so long," confided Dorothy. "She told me yesterday that every student had reported except those two. She asked me if I knew why they were so late. She hadn't received a word of excuse from either of them. Too bad, isn't it, that they should so deliberately set their faces against right?" "They walk with the eyes open, yet are blind," mused Adrienne. "I have known many such persons. Seldom is there the remedy. I cannot imagine the reform of Marian Seaton. It would be the miracle." "You may laugh if you like, but I've wondered whether there mightn't be some way to find the good in her. Dad says there's some good in even the worst person, if one can only find it." Silent from the moment Adrienne had mentioned Marian's name, Jane broke into the conversation. "After I read that miserable letter, I felt as though I hated Marian Seaton harder than ever," she went on. "When I saw her to-day I despised her for being what she was. All of a sudden it came to me that I was sorry for her instead. It's a kind of queer mix-up of feelings." Jane gave a short laugh. "You have the right spirit, Jane. I'm proud of you for it. You make me feel ashamed. While I've been merely saying that it's too bad about Marian, you've gone to the root of the matter," assured Dorothy earnestly. "Yet what could one do thus to bring about the reform?" Adrienne's shrug was eloquent of the dubiety of such an enterprise. "Begin as Jane has, by being sorry for her," replied Dorothy thoughtfully. "I am French," returned Adrienne simply. "The Latin never forgets nor forgives." Having now reached the fruit stand where Jane had stopped to purchase a large red apple for her horse, the subject of Marian Seaton was dropped. Arrived at the stable the three girls spent a merry session with Firefly, who demanded much petting from them. "He's the dearest little horse I ever saw, Jane!" glowed Dorothy when they finally left him finishing the apple which Jane had saved as a good-bye solace. "If ever I owned a horse like Firefly I'd be the happiest girl in the whole world." "There aren't many like him." Jane turned for a last look over her shoulder at her beautiful pet. Pursing her lips she whistled to him. Instantly he neighed an answer. "Is he not cunning?" cried Adrienne. Dorothy admiringly agreed that he was. Jane smiled in an absent manner. An idea had taken shape in her mind, the pleasure of which brought a warm flush to her cheeks. In consequence she suddenly quickened her pace. "What's the matter, Jane? Training for a walking match?" asked Dorothy humorously. "I beg your pardon," apologized Jane, slowing down. "I just happened to think of a letter I wanted to write and send by the first mail." "Run on ahead, then," proposed Dorothy. "We'll excuse you this once." "Oh, it's not so urgent as all that. I just let my thoughts run away with me for a minute." Nevertheless there was a preoccupied light in Jane's eyes as the three returned across the campus to the Hall. The instant she gained her room she went hastily to work on a letter, a pleased smile curving her lips as she wrote. When it was finished she prepared it for mailing and ran lightly down the stairs and across the campus to the nearest mail box. She gave a happy little sigh as it disappeared through the receiving slot. How glad she was that the idea had come to her. She wondered only why she had never thought of it before. CHAPTER IX SEEKERS OF DISCORD Fifteen minutes after the arrival of Marian and Maizie a disgruntled trio of girls sat closeted in the room belonging to Marian and Maizie. "It's all your fault," stormed Elsie Noble, her sharp black eyes full of rancor. "If you'd come here as you promised instead of being a week late you could have used the wonderful influence you _say_ you have with Mrs. Weatherbee to let me keep that room. It's forty times nicer than the one I have." "I couldn't get here any sooner. Howard Armstead gave a dinner dance specially in honor of _me_ and we had to stay for it." Marian crested her blonde head as she flung forth this triumphant excuse. "Of course you did. You're so boy-struck you can't see straight. I might have known it was because of one of your silly old beaux. I'm glad I have more sense." "You don't show any signs of it," sneered Marian. "Stop quarreling, both of you," drawled Maizie. "Go go ahead, Elsie, and tell us what happened about the room. That's the thing we want to know. For goodness' sake keep your voice down though. You don't talk. You shout." "I'd rather shout than drawl my words as if I were too lazy to say them," retaliated Elsie wrathfully. "All right, shout then and let everybody in the Hall know your business," was Maizie's tranquil response. "If you came here to fuss, Elsie, then we can get along very well without you. If you expect to go around with us, you'll have to behave like a human being." Marian's cool insolence had an instantly subduing effect on her belligerent relative. She knew that Marian was quite capable of dropping her, then and there. "I don't know what happened about the room," she said sulkily, but in a decidedly lower key. "I came here at nine o'clock in the morning. Mrs. Weatherbee sent the maid with me to the room. That Stearns girl said I must have made a mistake. I knew that she wasn't exactly pleased. She said hardly a word to me. She went out and stayed out until just before luncheon. Then she came in for about ten minutes and went downstairs. I didn't see her again." "She was probably running around the campus telling her friends about it," lazily surmised Maizie. "I'll bet she was all at sea. Wonder if she went to Weatherbee with a string of complaints." "What happened after that?" queried Marian impatiently. "What happened?" Elsie pitched the question in a shrill angry key. "Enough, I should say. I unpacked part of my things, then finished reading a dandy mystery story I'd begun on the train. About four o'clock Mrs. Weatherbee sailed in here and made me give up the room." "What did she say?" was the concerted question. "She said there'd been a misunderstanding about Miss Allen's coming back to the Hall. That Miss Allen was not to blame and so must have her own room. I said I wouldn't give it up and she said it was not for me, but her, to decide that. She said I could have the other room if I wanted it. If I didn't then she had nothing else to offer me. I said I'd go to the registrar about it. She just looked superior and said, 'As you please.' I knew I was beaten. If I went to the registrar, then Mrs. Weatherbee would have a chance to show her that letter. If I gave in, very likely she'd let the whole thing drop. As long as she'd offered me another room here, I thought it was best to take it." "I didn't think it would turn out like that," frowned Marian. "Weatherbee couldn't bear Jane Allen last year. I was sure she'd be only too glad to get rid of her. That letter was meant to make her furious, enough so that she wouldn't let this Allen girl into the Hall again. Something remarkable must have happened." "Weatherbee didn't suspect you, anyway," chimed in Maizie. "She was all smiles when we went into her office." "Yes, she was sweet as cream. She could never trace it to me anyway. I took good care of that." "Who wrote it for you?" asked Elsie curiously. "That's my affair," rudely returned Marian. "If I told you all my business you'd know as much as I do. I'm sorry the scheme didn't work, but, at least, you got into the Hall. I'm certainly glad that girl failed in her exams. As for Jane Allen--well, I'm not through with her yet. Who is your roommate?" "A Miss Reynolds. She's a soph----" "_Alicia Reynolds!_" chorused two interrupting voices. "Well of all things!" Marian's pale eyes widened with surprise. "What do you think of that, Maiz?" "You're in luck, Marian," Maizie averred with a slow smile. "You stand a better chance of getting in with Alicia again. Elsie can help you if she doesn't go to work and fuss with Alicia the first thing." "What are you talking about? Who is this Alicia Reynolds?" inquired Elsie curiously. "Oh, we chummed with her last year. She didn't like this Jane Allen any better than we did. Then last spring she went riding and fell off her horse and our dear Miss Allen picked her up and brought her home on her own horse. Alicia wasn't hurt. She thought she was and that the Allen girl was a heroine," glibly related Marian. "She listened to a lot of lies Jane Allen told her about us and now she won't speak to either of us. It's too bad, because we are really her friends and this Allen person isn't. Some day we hope to prove it to her." "This Jane Allen must be a terrible mischief-maker," was Elsie's opinion. "I told her what I thought of her the afternoon she came." "You did?" exclaimed Marian. "Yes, sirree. I went straight to her room and spoke my mind. I was so furious with her. The very next morning Mrs. Weatherbee put me at the same table with her. It was my first meal at the Hall. I went to Rutherford Inn for luncheon and dinner. I was hungry and thought maybe the meals wouldn't suit me. They're all right, though. When I saw her at the table I was going to balk about sitting there, then I changed my mind. I had as much right to be there as she. I told her that, too." "Some little scrapper," murmured Maizie. There was cunning significance, however, in the slow glance she cast at Marian. "What did she say to you?" Marian had returned Maizie's glance with one of equal meaning. "Not much of anything. I didn't give her a chance," boasted Elsie. "That little French girl snapped me up in a hurry. She's awfully pretty, isn't she?" "She's a little cat," retorted Marian. "Look out for her. She's too clever for you. Her mother's Eloise Dupree, the dancer. She dances too. They're friends of President Blakesly's. She's awfully popular here and afraid of nobody. She's devoted to Jane Allen, though, so that settles her with me." "Is Dorothy Martin at your table?" asked Maizie. "Yes. I don't like her." "She's a prig," shrugged Maizie. "Edith Hammond used to sit there. Do you know her?" queried Marian of Elsie. "She's not here any more. She's going to be married. I heard this Dorothy talking about her yesterday to Miss Dupree." "Glad's she's gone. She was another turncoat. Hated Jane Allen and then started to be nice to her all of a sudden." "This Jane Allen seems to have a lot of friends for all you girls say about her," Elsie asserted almost defiantly. "I detest her, but I notice she's never alone. The first night she came there was a crowd of girls in her room. I heard them laughing and singing." "They didn't come to _see her_," informed Marian scornfully. "It's Judith Stearns that draws them. She's very popular at Wellington. Can't see why, I'm sure. Anyway Jane Allen has pulled the wool over her eyes until she thinks she has a wonderful roommate." "Jane Allen hasn't so many friends," broke in Maizie. "Dorothy Martin, Judith, Adrienne Dupree, Ethel Lacey, she's Adrienne's roommate, and Norma Bennett. That's all. Lots of girls in the sophomore class don't like her." "Yes, and who's Norma Bennett," sneered Marian. "She used to be a kitchen maid; now she's a third-rate actress. She's a pet of Adrienne's and Jane Allen's. I think we ought to make a fuss about having her here at the Hall. If we could get most of the girls to sign a petition asking Mrs. Weatherbee to take it up it would be a good thing." "But would she do it?" was Maizie's skeptical query. "She might if we worked it cleverly," answered Marian. "Adrienne and her crowd would probably go to President Blakesly. We'd have to work it in such a way that Norma wouldn't let her. This Bennett girl is one of the sensitive sort. False pride, you know. Beggars are usually like that. Of course, I don't say positively that we can do it. We'll have to wait and see. Some good chance may come." "It would be a splendid way to get even with Jane Allen and Adrienne Dupree, too," approved Maizie. "They would have spasms if their darling Norma had to leave Madison Hall and they couldn't help themselves." "I think it would be rather hard on this Norma," declared Elsie bluntly. She had pricked up her ears at the word "actress." Unbeknown to anyone save herself she was desperately stage struck. The idea of having a real actress at the Hall was decidedly alluring. "You don't know what you're talking about," angrily rebuked Marian. "It's hard on the girls of really good families to have to countenance such a person. I've lived at Madison Hall a year longer than you have. Just remember that." "What we ought to do is to get as many girls as we can on our side," suggested crafty Maizie. "There are forty-eight girls at the Hall, most of them sophs. Last year we let them alone, because they weren't of our class. This year we'll have to make a fuss over them. Lunch them and take them to ride in our cars and all that. It will be a bore, but it will pay in the end. Once we get a stand-in with them, we can run things here to suit ourselves." "That's a good idea," lauded Marian. "We'll begin this very day." So it was that while Jane Allen and her little coterie of loyal friends entered upon their college year with high aspirations to do well, under the same roof with them, three girls sat and plotted to overthrow Wellington's most sacred tradition: "And this is my command unto you that ye love one another." CHAPTER X A VAGUE REGRET "WELL, Jane, it's our turn to do the inviting this year," announced Judith Stearns, as she pranced jubilantly into the room where Jane sat hard at work on her Horace for next day's recitation. "When is it to be?" Jane looked up eagerly from her book. "A week from to-night. The notice just appeared on the bulletin board. You know my fond affection for the bulletin board." Judith boyishly tossed up her soft blue walking hat and caught it on one finger, loudly expressing her opinion of her own dexterity. "Sit down, oh, vainglorious hat-thrower, and tell me about it," commanded Jane, laughing. "That's all I know. It's to be next Wednesday night. I suppose our august soph committee has met and decided the great question. It's the usual getting-acquainted-with-our-freshman-sisters affair. After that comes class meeting, and after that----" Judith plumped down on her couch bed and beamed knowingly at Jane. "Guess what comes after that," she finished. "Basket-ball." Jane gave a long sigh of pure satisfaction. There was a pleasant light in her eyes as she made the guess. She was anxiously looking forward to making the sophomore team. "Yes, _basket-ball_." Judith echoed the sigh. She also hoped to make the team. "We'll have to get busy and invite our freshmen to the dance," she said wagging her brown head. "The freshman class is large this year; about a third larger than last year's class. That means some of the juniors and seniors will have to help out. I'm glad of it. It will give Norma a chance to go too." "There are only four freshmen in this house," stated Jane. "One of them is out of the question for us." "I get you," returned Judith slangily. "Undoubtedly you refer to the ignoble Miss Noble. Noble by name but not by nature," she added with a chuckle. Jane smiled, then frowned. "Honestly, Judy, I'd give almost anything if she weren't at our table. I don't mind her not speaking to any of us. But she always listens to every word we say and acts as if she was storing it up for future reference. Even Dorothy feels the strain." "It's too bad," sympathized Judith. "There's only one consolation. When it gets too much on your nerves you can always fall back on Rutherford Inn." "I'm going to fall back on it to-night," decided Jane suddenly. "Let's have a dinner party." "Can't go. I am the proud possessor of one dollar and two cents," Judith ruefully admitted. "This is to be _my_ party," emphasized Jane. "I haven't touched my last check yet. I've been too busy studying to partify. Now don't be a quitter, Judy. I want to do this." Jane had observed signs of objection on Judith's good-humored face. "All right," yielded Judith. "Go ahead. I'll give a blow-out when my check comes. It'll be here next week." "We'll invite Norma, Dorothy, Adrienne, Ethel, Mary, Christine Ellis, Barbara Temple, and oh, yes--Alicia Reynolds. We mustn't forget Alicia." "Yes, she needs a little recreation," grinned Judith. "Chained to the ignoble Noble! What a fate for a good little soph! Some roommate!" "You'd better be careful about the pet name you're so fond of giving that girl," warned Jane, laughing a little in spite of her admonition. "You know your failing. You'll say it some time to someone without thinking. Then little Judy will be sorry." "Oh, I only say it to you and Imp," averred Judith cheerfully. "You're both to be trusted." "If we're going to have the party to-night we'll have to hurry up about it. How are we going to get word to Alicia? I hate to go to her room on account of Miss Noble. And what about Christine and Barbara?" Jane laid down her book and rose from her chair. "I'll go over to Argyle Hall and invite them. Tell Ethel to go in and invite Alicia," suggested Judith. "She's almost as obliging as I am. She rooms next to Alicia and our noble friend. It will be only a step for her. She won't mind doing it." "I guess I'd better. Tell Christine and Barbara to be at the Inn by six-thirty." Jane turned and left the room. Walking down the long hall she passed Alicia's door. It was open a trifle. She was tempted to peep in and see if Alicia might perhaps be within and alone. Second thought prompted her to go on without investigating. Rapping smartly on Ethel's door, her knock was followed by the sound of approaching footfalls from within. Nor was she aware that through the slight opening in Alicia's door a pair of sharp black eyes peered out at her. "Why, hello, Jane!" greeted Ethel. "Come in." "Can't stop but a minute." Jane stepped into the room, careful to close the door behind her. "I'm giving a dinner party at Rutherford Inn to-night," she briskly began. "All of our crowd are going, I hope. I'm just starting out to invite them. Where's Imp?" "Downstairs on the trail of her laundry," laughed Ethel. "It went out white linen skirts and silk blouses. It came back sheets and pillow cases. You should have seen her face when she opened the package. She threw up her hands and said: 'What stupidity! Must I then appear in my classes draped like the ghost?'" Jane joined in Ethel's merry laughter. She had a vision of petite Adrienne trailing into classes thus spectrally attired. "I want you to do something for me, Ethel." Jane had grown suddenly serious. "Will you go to Alicia and invite her to the party? I'd rather not go myself. You understand why. But it's really necessary to invite her. She might feel hurt if she were left out. I wouldn't have that happen for worlds. Not after what she did for me about basket-ball. She was dining out the night we had the spread so I couldn't invite her to that. I told her so afterward for fear she might have been offended." "Surely I'll tell her," nodded Ethel. "I don't think she's in now, though. I met her going down the walk as I came up it. She said she had to go to the library for a book she needed. I imagine she'll be back soon." "Be sure to tell her," Jane impressed upon Ethel. "Thank you ever so much. Tell Adrienne, too. Don't dress up. It's a strictly informal party. Meet me in the living-room at six." With this Jane departed to go on to Dorothy's room. Passing the door of Alicia's room she noted that it was now closed. As Alicia was out she guessed that Elsie Noble was in. She was now not sorry that she had refrained from approaching it. Undoubtedly she would have met with an unpleasant reception. Finding her other friends at home, Jane quickly made the rounds and hurried back to her own room. Judith appeared soon afterward with the information that Christine and Barbara had joyfully accepted and would be on hand at the Inn. When at six o'clock the party from the Hall gathered in the living-room, first glance about showed her that Alicia was missing. Going over to where Ethel stood, Jane anxiously asked: "Did you see Alicia, Ethel?" "Yes. She isn't coming. She said to tell you it was impossible for her to accept. I went to her room a few minutes after you left. I knocked until I was tired but no one answered. So I went back to my room. After a while I tried again and while I was standing at her door she came down the hall with Miss Noble. I asked her to come into my room a minute and told her." "Funny she didn't give you any reason why she couldn't come," pondered Jane with drawn brows. "She looked as though she'd been crying," returned Ethel. "I thought maybe she'd had bad news or something so I didn't urge her. She wasn't a bit snippy. She just looked white and a little bit sad." "I wonder if I ought to run up and see her." Jane stared at Ethel, her eyes fall of active concern. "Better wait until to-morrow," advised Ethel. "Whatever's the matter with her, she may feel like being alone. You know how it is sometimes with one." "Yes, I know." Jane knew only too well how it felt to be sought out by even her friends when occasional black moods descended upon her. "We may as well start," she said slowly. "As hostess I mustn't neglect my guests. I'll surely make it a point to see Alicia in the morning." Nevertheless as the bevy of light-hearted diners left Madison Hall and strolled bare-headed in the sunset toward Rutherford Inn, a vague uneasiness took hold of Jane. She regretted that she had not gone upstairs to see Alicia. Nor did it leave her until after she had reached the Inn, where for the time being the lively chatter of her companions served to drive it from her mind. CHAPTER XI REJECTED CAVALIERS One glaring result of Jane's dinner party was the ignoring of the ten-thirty rule that night. It was eight o'clock when the congenial diners finished an elaborate dessert and strolled gaily out of the Inn. The beauty of the night induced the will to loiter. Some one proposed a walk into Chesterford and a visit to a moving-picture theatre. When they emerged from it it was half-past nine, thus necessitating a quick hike to the campus. Jane and Judith made port in their room at exactly twenty-five minutes past ten. Visions of unprepared lessons looming up large, they decided that for once "lights out" should not be the order of things. As a consequence of retiring at eleven-thirty, both overslept the next morning and dashed wildly off to chapel without breakfast. Occupied from then on with classes, it was not until she had finished her last recitation of the morning and was on her way to Madison Hall that Jane remembered her resolve to see Alicia. Determined to lose no more time in putting it into execution, she quickened her pace. Coming to the stone walk leading up to the steps of the Hall, Jane uttered a little cluck of satisfaction. She had spied Alicia seated in a rocker on the veranda, engaged in reading a letter. "Oh, Alicia!" she called as she reached the foot of the steps. "You're the very person I most want to see!" Sound of Jane's voice caused Alicia to glance up in startled fashion. She had been faintly smiling over her letter when first Jane glimpsed her. Now her pale face underwent a swift, ominous change. She hastily rose. "I didn't wish to see _you_," she said stiffly, and marched into the house. Jane's primary impulse was to follow her and demand an explanation. The rebuff, however, had stirred again into life the old, rebellious pride which had formerly caused her so much unhappiness. For a moment she stood still, hands clenched, cheeks flaming with mortification. Then with a bitter smile she walked slowly up the steps and into the house. After that affront Alicia would wait a long time before she, Jane Allen, would seek an explanation. "Well, it has come," she said sullenly, as she entered her room where Judith sat at the dressing table, recoiling her long brown hair. "What's come? By 'it' do you mean yourself?" Judith turned in her chair with a boyish grin. "No," Jane answered shortly. "Alicia Reynolds has gone back to her old chums." "You don't mean it!" Judith's hands dropped from her hair. In her surprise she let go of half a dozen hair pins she had been holding in one hand. "Now see what you made me do," she laughingly accused. "Get down and help me pick them up." "Oh, bother your old hairpins!" exclaimed Jane savagely. "I'm awfully upset about this, Judy. I felt last night as if I should have gone to Alicia and asked her what was the matter. This is some of Marian Seaton's work." "Of course it is," calmly concurred Judith. "I haven't the least idea of what it's all about, but I agree with you just the same. I'll agree even harder when I do find out." In a few jerky sentences Jane enlightened Judith. "So that's the way the land lies," commented Judith. "Well, I'm not surprised. Take my word for it the ignoble Noble has had a hand in this. Just the same I don't believe Alicia has gone back to Marion Seaton. She's merely hurt over some yarn that's been told her. You'd better see her, Jane, and have it out with her." "I won't do it." Jane shook an obstinate head. "Alicia ought to know better than listen to those girls. She knows how badly Marian Seaton behaved last year about basket-ball. She knows that Marian is untruthful and dishonorable. If she chooses to believe in a person of that stamp then she will have to abide by her choice." It was the stubborn, embittered Jane Allen of earlier days at Wellington who now spoke. "Only the other day I said to Dorothy that I didn't hate Marian Seaton any longer; that I felt only sorry for her. I said, too, that there must be some good in her if one could only find it. What a simpleton I was!" The sarcastic smile that hovered about Jane's red lips, fully indicated her contempt of her own mistaken sentiments. "Adrienne was right," she said after a brief pause. "She said she could never forget nor forgive an injury. I thought I could, but I can't. I mean I don't want to." Her brows meeting in the old disfiguring scowl, Jane began pacing the room in what Judith had termed her "caged lion" fashion. "Oh, forget it," counseled Judith, casting a worried glance at Jane's gloomy, storm-ridden face. "Don't let Marian Seaton's hatefulness upset you, Jane. You behaved like a brick about your room and that letter. This isn't half as bad as that mix-up was. You said your own self that you were going to ignore anything she tried to do against you. Now go ahead and keep your word. You've lots of good friends. You should worry." "I haven't so many," Jane sharply contradicted. "I can count them on my fingers. I don't make friends as easily as you do, Judy." "Just the same a lot of fuss was made over you last spring when you won the big game for our team," Judith sturdily reminded. "That's not friendship. That was only admiration of the moment. The same girls who cheered me then would probably be just as ready to turn against me if they happened to feel like it," pointed out Jane skeptically. "No wonder I used to hate girls. Very few of them know what loyalty and friendship mean." "You're hopeless." Judith made a gesture of resignation. With a chuckle she added: "Why not challenge Marian Seaton to a duel and demolish her? Umbrellas would be splendid weapons. I have one with a lovely crooked handle. You could practice hooking it around my neck and when the fateful hour came you could bring the double-dyed villain to her knees with one swoop. Wouldn't that be nice?" "You're a ridiculous girl, Judy Stearns." Jane was forced to laugh a little at Judith's nonsense. "_You're_ a goose yourself to get all worked up over nothing," grinned Judith. "I can't say I blame you for throwing up the stupendous labor of hunting out Marian's good qualities. In my opinion 'There ain't no such animal.' But you're a very large-sized goose if you allow her to spoil your sophomore year for you." "I don't intend she shall spoil it," Jane grimly assured. "I've stood a good deal from her without ever even once trying to strike back. I'm not sure that I've done right in allowing her to torment me as she has without ever asserting myself. There's a limit to forbearance. I may feel some day that I've reached it." Judith smiled but said nothing. She had too high an opinion of Jane to believe that her proud-spirited roommate would ever descend to the level of her enemies. Given an opportunity for revenge, she believed that Jane would scorn to seize it. "Have you invited your freshman yet?" she asked with sudden irrelevancy. "No, I haven't had time to see any one of them yet," Jane answered. "I asked Miss Lorimer, a cute little girl from Creston Hall, this morning after chapel, but she said she'd already been invited," informed Judith. "I must find out if the three eligible freshmen here have escorts yet. I suppose they have, with so many sophs in the house. The ignoble Noble's not an eligible." The luncheon bell now interrupted the talk. It seemed to Jane as she took her place at table that spiteful triumph lurked in the sharp glance Elsie Noble flashed at her. The conversation carried on by herself, Adrienne and Dorothy, centered almost entirely on the coming dance. From Adrienne, Jane learned that the Hall's three freshmen had already received invitations. When the little French girl announced this, Jane again fancied that she read satisfaction in the sharp features of the quarrelsome freshman. Though the latter had not addressed a word to her tablemates since her advent among them, she never missed a word they said. All three were well aware of this and it annoyed them not a little. When just before dinner that evening Judith and Jane compared notes, it was to discover the same thing. Neither had been successful in securing a freshman to escort to the dance. "I've asked five girls and every one of them turned me down," Judith ruefully acknowledged. "I thought I'd start early, but it seems others started earlier." "I've asked two different girls, but both have escorts," frowned Jane. "I sha'n't ask any more. I thought Miss Harper, the second girl I asked, refused me rather coolly. I want to do my duty as a soph, but I won't stand being snubbed." "Let's go and see what luck Ethel and Adrienne have had," proposed Judith. Indifferently assenting, Jane accompanied Judith to her friends' room. "Ah, do not ask me!" was Adrienne's disgusted outburst, "These freshmen are, of a truth, too popular. Four this day I have invited, but to no purpose." "I'm going to take Miss Simmons, a Barclay Hall girl, to the dance," informed Ethel. "I asked her this morning and she accepted." "Well, we seem out of luck," sighed Judith. "Do you know whether Mary and Norma have invited their freshmen?" "Mary's going to take Miss Thomas, an Argyle Hall girl. Norma hasn't asked any one yet," was Ethel's prompt reply. "You girls just happened to ask the wrong ones, I guess. Try again to-morrow. There are more than enough freshies to go round this year." After a little further talk, Jane and Judith went back to their room. "What do you think about it?" Judith asked abruptly the instant they were behind their own door. "I don't know. It's probably as Ethel says, 'a happen-so.' I can't think of any other reason, unless----" Jane stopped and eyed Judith steadily. "Unless some one in the freshman class has set the freshmen against us," quickly supplemented Judith. "Yes, that's what I was thinking. It doesn't seem possible in so large a class. Still one girl can sometimes do a good deal of mischief." "You mean Miss Noble?" Judith was too much in earnest to use the derisive name she had given the disagreeable freshman. "Yes," affirmed Jane. "If she helped to turn Alicia against me, she is quite capable of going further. So far as we know, you and Adrienne and I are the only sophs who've been turned down all around. Norma hasn't asked any one yet. Anyway, she's a junior." "It looks rather queer, so queer that I'm going to make it my business to ask a few questions to-morrow. If there's really anything spiteful back of this, believe me, little Judy will find it out." CHAPTER XII NORMA'S "FIND" The end of the next day was productive of no better results so far as Adrienne, Judith and Jane were concerned. Playing escort to their freshman sisters seemed not for them. That evening a quintette of girls gathered in Ethel's room to discuss the peculiar situation. The quintette consisted of Ethel, Adrienne, Jane, Judith and Norma Bennett. "There's something not right about it," Judith emphatically declared. "I've tried all day to get a clue to the mystery, but nothing doing. Nobody seems to want the pleasure of our company to the dance. What luck have you had, Norma?" "Oh, I invited a little girl named Freda Marsh. She lives away off the campus," replied Norma. "She and three other girls have rented the second floor of a house and do their own cooking. They are all poor and very determined to put themselves through college." "When did you discover this find?" Judith showed signs of active interest. "Miss Marsh sits next to me at chapel," replied Norma. "After chapel this morning I asked her to go to the dance. She seemed awfully pleased. Then she told me where she lived and about herself and her chums. They all hail from a little town in the northern part of New York State." "Wicked one, why did you not tell me this before?" playfully demanded Adrienne. "I haven't had a chance, Imp, until now," smiled Norma. "This is the first time I've seen you to-day except at a distance." "Ah, yes, it is true!" loudly sighed Adrienne. "This noon I came late from the laboratory after a most stupid chemistry lesson. Such hands! They were the sight! I feared I should wash them away before they became presentable. After the classes this afternoon I must of a necessity go to the library. So it was dinner time when I returned, and thus passed the time." "You're forgiven." Her blue eyes full of affection, Norma laid an arm over Adrienne's shoulder. She had every reason to adore the impulsive, warm-hearted little girl. "Norma, do you suppose Miss Marsh's friends have received invitations to the dance?" Jane broke in eagerly. "I don't know, Jane. I can find out for you in the morning at chapel." "I wish you would. If they haven't, tell Miss Marsh that we would love to be their escorts and that we'll call on them to-morrow evening. How about it, girls?" Jane turned questioning eyes from Judith to Adrienne. "It's a fine idea!" glowed Judith. "I'm sorry I didn't know about them before. The freshman class is so large this year. I know only a few of the girls as yet." "I am indeed well suited." Adrienne waved an approving hand. "Shall we not go to make the call soon after dinner to-morrow night?" "Yes, as early as we can," acquiesced Judith. "That is, provided these three girls haven't been asked." "It would be nice to go and see them anyway," declared Ethel. "We ought to get acquainted with them. Where do they live, Norma?" "At 605 Bridge Street. It's almost a mile from here. So Miss Marsh said." "To go back to what you said a while ago, Judy, what makes you think there is any special reason for the girls' refusing you and Adrienne and Jane as escorts?" questioned Norma concernedly. "Jane and I just think so. That's all. We think some one's to blame for it." "To blame. Who then is to blame?" A swift flash of suspicion had leaped into Adrienne's big black eyes. "Some one not far away, perhaps," replied Judith significantly. "That's the way it looks to me." "But could it be? She is but one among many," reminded Adrienne. She understood quite well whom Judith meant. "She's the only freshman who would be interested in making trouble," argued Judith. "She has probably been egged on by others who are _not_ freshmen." "Still it's not fair to lay it to her when we don't know anything definite," remarked Ethel. "I'm only supposing," explained Judith. "I'm not saying positively that I think she's guilty. I'm only saying that it seems probable." "I doubt it." Ethel shook a dubious head. "I may be wrong," Judith admitted. "Anyway, it won't matter, if these three girls accept our invitation. It will show the plotters, if there really are any, that they haven't bothered us a bit." "I'm sorry, girls, but I'll have to go." Norma rose from her chair. "I haven't looked at my books yet and I must study to-night." "You're not the only one," cheerfully commented Judith, getting to her feet. "Come on, Jane. We have our own troubles in the study line." With this the talking-bee broke up, Norma promising faithfully to be sure to deliver next morning the message intrusted to her. Directly after dinner the following evening the five friends set out for 605 Bridge Street. Greatly to the delight of the three most interested parties, Norma had given out the pleasant news that the trio of girls they were to call upon were without special invitations to the coming dance. The beauty of the soft autumn night made walking a pleasure. Five abreast, the callers strolled through the twilight, making the still air ring with their fresh voices and light, happy laughter. The house where the four freshmen lived was an unpretentious dwelling, built of wood and painted a dull gray. A straggling bit of uneven lawn in front by no means added to its appearance. Even in the concealing twilight it had a neglected look. It was in glaring contrast to stately Madison Hall with its green, close-clipped lawns and wide verandas. "What cheerlessness!" exclaimed Adrienne under her breath. Grouped about the door, Norma rang the bell. A tired-eyed, middle-aged woman answered it. Yes, Miss Marsh was in, she declared listlessly. A clear, pleasant voice from above stairs affirmed that information. Next instant a sweet-faced, brown-eyed girl had reached the landing and was greeting her callers with a pretty cordiality that was infinitely pleasing. "Do come upstairs to our house," she invited. "It's a very unpretentious place, but home-like, we think." Norma introducing her friends to Miss Marsh, the five girls followed their hostess up the narrow stairway and were ushered into a good-sized living-room. A rag rug covered a floor, stained dark at the edges. An old-fashioned library table, a quaint walnut desk with many pigeon holes, a horse-hair covered settee and a few nondescript, but comfortable-looking chairs completed the furniture. On the table, strewn with books, a reading lamp gave forth a mellow light. The walls, papered in tan with a deep brown border, were dotted with passe-partouted prints, both in color and black and white. The whole effect, though homely, was that of a room which might indeed be called a living room. "Please help yourselves to seats," hospitably urged their winsome hostess. "Excuse me for a moment while I call the girls. They are just finishing the washing of the supper dishes and getting things in shape for breakfast. We get everything ready the night before so as not to be late in the morning," she explained. Then, with a smiling nod, she left her guests. "It's a comfy old room, isn't it?" was Judith's guarded observation. "This house-keeping idea of theirs is a clever one." "That Miss Marsh is a dear," murmured Ethel. "I've seen her once or twice before on the campus, I think." "I have the feeling that we shall like these girls," commented Adrienne. "This Miss Marsh has the sweet face and the courteous ways." The entrance of their hostess and her chums prevented further exchange of opinion. "These are my pals, Ida Leonard, Marie Benham and Kathie Meddart," smiled Freda, going on to name each of her callers as she performed the introduction. "You see I remembered all your names and to whom they belonged." When a number of girls have the will to become acquainted it does not take them long to do so. Almost immediately a buzz of animated impersonal conversation began. "We came here to deliver our invitations in person," Jane finally said with a smile. "Miss Leonard, I'd love to be your cavalier for the freshman frolic." "Thank you. I'd love to go to it with you, I'm sure," accepted Ida Leonard, a tall, thin girl with fair hair and a plain, but interesting face. Jane having set the ball rolling, Adrienne promptly invited Marie Benham, a slim little girl with an eager, boyish face, framed in curly brown hair. This left Kathie Meddart, an extremely pretty girl of pure blonde type, to Judith. Considerable merriment arose over the extending and acceptance of the invitations. Poverty had not robbed the four young hostesses of a cheery, happy-go-lucky air that charmed their more affluent guests. For an hour the congenial company talked and laughed as only girls can. Kathie finally excusing herself, disappeared kitchenward, presently returning with a huge, brown pitcher of lemonade and a plate piled high with crisp little cakes, which she assured were of her own making. Needless to say, they disappeared with amazing rapidity, the guests loudly acclaiming their toothsome merits. "I'm glad you like them," declared Kathie, pink with pleasant confusion. "I took a course in cookery at a night school at home last year. I often used to make this kind of cakes for parties. I had lots of orders and made enough money to pay my tuition fees at Wellington for this year." "How splendid!" approved Jane. Her approval was echoed by the others. "I'm hoping, after I get acquainted here in college, to do a little of that sort of thing," confided Kathie rather shyly. "I could spare an hour or so a day to do it. Only I don't know how to go about it." "Would you--could you--would you care to make some for me, some day?" hesitated Jane. "They would be simply great if one were giving a spread." "Why, that's ever so kind in you," glowed Kathie. "When I just spoke of it I wasn't fishing for an order. I mentioned it before I thought." "It's a good thing you did. I'll order two dozen for my own special benefit the minute my check comes," laughed Judith. "I sha'n't give Jane Allen one. I'll sit in a corner of our room and gobble them all up." "I adore those cakes!" Adrienne clasped her small hands. "Would it then be possible that I might have some to-morrow? Perhaps two dozen? Ah, but I am not the greedy one. I will share with my friends, even most selfish Judy." This provoked a laugh at Judith's expense. So it was, however, that Kathie received her first order which she agreed to deliver the next day. As a matter of fact, she had been the only one to demur when Freda had announced that the Madison Hall girls were coming there that evening. She had advanced the argument that "those rich Madison Hall girls won't care to ask us to the dance when they see how poor we are." Now she wondered how she could ever have so misjudged such a delightful lot of girls. CHAPTER XIII THE EXPLANATION When at length the quintette of callers regretfully agreed that they must be getting back to the Hall, Freda said rather nervously: "Please don't go just yet. I--we--there is something we think we ought to tell you." "Very well, tell us," invited Judith gaily. She had an idea that the something might relate to the all-important question of gowns. If Freda were worrying over that, Judith proposed to dismiss the subject lightly. Precisely the same thought had occurred to Jane, who noted Freda's sudden flush and evident confusion. "Something--well--not very pleasant happened this afternoon," Freda continued. "A--we had a caller--a girl----Why shouldn't I be frank? This girl was of the freshman class. We saw her at class meeting the other day, but we have never been introduced to her. She brought a paper with her and asked us to sign it. It was about three of you girls; Miss Allen, Miss Dupree and Miss Stearns, and----" "About us?" chorused a trio of astonished voices. "Yes," nodded Freda, her color heightening. "It began, 'We, the undersigned,' I can't recall the exact words, but it was an agreement not to accept an invitation from any one of you to the dance or to notice you throughout the year, because of the discourteous and hateful way you had treated a member of the freshman class. There were----" "How perfectly disgraceful!" burst indignantly from Judith. "What did I tell you, girls? I knew there was something wrong. We didn't expect to find it out in this strange way, though. Well, 'murder will out,' as the saying goes." "You said the paper began, 'We, the undersigned'?" questioned Jane in a clear, hard voice. "How many names were signed to it?" "I can't say positively." Freda looked distressed. "You see, it made me so disgusted that I handed it back the instant I had read it. The girl offered it to my chums, too, but they wouldn't look at it. She said that nearly all the members of the class had signed it. I know better. I believe not half the class had signed." "Would you object to telling us the name of the girl who brought you the paper to sign?" steadily pursued Jane. "I wouldn't object; no. Why should I? A girl like that deserves no clemency," Freda returned spiritedly. "The trouble is, I don't know her name. She is small and dark, with sharp black eyes and a pointed chin. She's very homely, but dresses beautifully. She----" "Thank you. We know who she is," interrupted Judith. "Her name is Elsie Noble, and she lives at Madison Hall." "Ah, but she is the hateful one," sputtered Adrienne. "It was most kind in you, Miss Marsh, and your friends also, to thus refuse to sign this hideously untruthful paper. We have done this girl no harm. Rather, it is she who would harm us because we have respected our own rights." "I suspected it to be a case of spite work," asserted Freda. "It is not usual for a class in college to adopt such harsh measures." "We were rather surprised at her coming to us with the paper," put in Kathie. "We've seen her with a crowd of girls who don't appear to know that we are on the map. She said she understood that you girls were going to invite us to the dance and felt it her duty to call on us and object to our accepting your invitations." "But how could she possibly know that?" cried out Ethel Lacey. "No one except the five of us knew it until Norma told you this morning." "I hope you don't think----" began Freda. A hurt look had crept into her soft, brown eyes. "How could we possibly think such a thing?" cut in Jane assuringly. "We can readily understand that Miss Noble's call must have been a complete surprise to you. On the contrary, we are very grateful to you and your friends for not signing the paper." "Yes, indeed," nodded Judith. "Frankly, we suspected that something unpleasant was in the wind. When first we heard about the dance, we each invited freshmen whom we knew. Every one of them turned us down. We didn't think anything of that in the beginning. We supposed we had just happened to invite the wrong ones. Afterward we thought differently." "I am sorry we didn't make it our business to get acquainted earlier with you girls. We really should have, you know," Judith apologized. "We were so busy getting started in our classes that we hadn't had time yet to be sociable. Jane and I had both agreed to try to know every girl in the freshman class this year. I'm glad it has turned out like this. I'm sure we'll all have a splendid time at the dance, no matter whether some people like it or not." "I'm very sure of it, too," declared Kathie Meddart. "I can't understand how a girl could be so contemptible as to deliberately set out to injure others." "Oh, well, she hasn't succeeded," reminded Judith, "so why should we care? We've invited our freshmen in spite of her." "What are you going to do about that paper?" Ida Leonard asked a trifle curiously. "If I were you girls, I think I would make a fuss about it. We'll stand by you if you do." "Indeed we will," echoed Marie Benham. "I wouldn't allow such a document to travel about college." "It's hard to decide what to do," Jane said gravely. "It might be wiser to ignore the whole thing. I don't know. We'll have to think it over, I guess. I thank you girls for your offer to stand by us." Aside from Freda's opinion that spite had actuated the circulation of the damaging paper, she and her chums had exhibited an admirable restraint concerning it. They had evidently accepted Adrienne's sketchy explanation of it at its face value. This courteous disinclination to pry had been especially noted and approved by Jane. It added to the high opinion she already cherished of the four freshmen. They had been moved solely by a sense of duty to inform herself and her companions of the outrageous paper. Jane felt strongly that an explanation was due them, yet she hated to make it. It would be too much like gossiping, she thought. "Adrienne told you, a little while ago, that we had done Miss Noble no harm," she said slowly. "That is really all that I think ought to be said about this affair. Are you satisfied to leave it so?" "Perfectly," replied Freda. "I'd rather it would be that way. I can see no good in dragging up unpleasant things. We'd rather not hear about them." "The paper itself speaks for those who drew it up," smiled Marie. "It's easy to place the blame where it belongs." Ida and Kathie's warmly expressed opinion coincided with that of their companion. "Shall we not speak of more pleasant things? What of the dance? At what time shall we come for you?" Adrienne had addressed herself to Freda. Glad to get away from the distasteful topic they had been discussing, the girls began to make their arrangements for the freshman frolic. After a little further talk, the five callers took their leave. "Well, what are we going to do about it?" demanded Judith, the moment they had reached the street. "I agree with that nice Miss Benham. We can't afford to have a paper like that going the rounds of the college." "I will of my own accord go to the Prexy. He is of _mon père_ the old friend. He will not allow that such mischief should be done." Adrienne threateningly wagged her curly head, as she made this vengeful announcement. "Good for you, Imp!" lauded Judith. "I think either Prexy or Miss Rutledge ought to be told," concurred Ethel. "It would nip the whole business in the bud. There'll be more of this sort of thing if it isn't stopped right away. "Did you hear what I said, Jane?" she questioned over her shoulder to Jane, who was walking behind her with Norma. Ethel, Adrienne and Judith had taken the lead. "Yes, I heard. Let's wait until we get back to the Hall to talk this over," Jane grimly proposed. "We'll have time to settle it before the ten-thirty bell." "Come on, then. Forward march!" ordered Judith. "The sooner we get there the longer we'll have to talk." This important point settled, a brisk hike to the Hall became the order. "Don't stop to talk to anyone," commanded Judith, as they scampered up the front steps. "Make a bee-line for our room. I'll hang out a 'Busy' sign, so that we won't be disturbed." Five minutes later the "Busy" sign was in place and the key turned in the lock. "Three of us can sit on my couch. That means you, Imp and Ethel. Now, Jane and Norma, draw up your chairs. Ahem!" Judith giggled. "What is the pleasure of this indignation meeting? You know what we think, Jane. Let's hear from you and Norma." "Oh, I haven't any voice in the matter," smiled Norma. "That is, I've no right to decide anything." "Neither have I, but I'm speaking just the same," laughed Ethel. "I say, 'On to Prexy with the horrible tale.'" "I think we'd best handle this affair if we can without the faculty's help," Jane said quietly. "If we went to anyone it ought to be Miss Rutledge. I'd rather not tell even her. I hate telling tales." "I don't," disagreed Judith. "If we let it go without saying a word, we'll have trouble right along. It ought to be stamped out _now_." "I intend that it shall be," Jane tersely assured. "How?" Judith's query rang with skepticism. "By going straight to Miss Noble and ordering her to stop it," was Jane's determined reply. "I shall ask her to give me that paper." "A lot of good that will do." Judith gave a short laugh. "You might as well tell the wind to stop blowing." "It will do this much good," retorted Jane. "We shall give Miss Noble her choice between giving up that paper or being reported to the faculty." "Who's going to tell her all this?" demanded Judith in a slightly ruffled tone. "I am," returned Jane composedly. "And I. I shall be there also," instantly supported Adrienne. "Very fine. It looks as though I'd be there myself." Judith's annoyed expression vanished in a wide grin. "When do we do this valiant stunt?" she inquired facetiously. "When does the great offensive take place?" "We'll have to put it off until to-morrow," Jane answered. "It's too late to do it to-night. We'll go to her just before dinner, or else right after. There won't be time enough in the morning or at noon." "Suppose she won't let us inside her room?" argued Judith. "She isn't rooming alone," was Jane's reminder. "I intend to see Alicia Reynolds to-morrow and find out just why she wouldn't talk to me the other day. I promised myself that I'd never ask her. But something I saw to-day makes me feel that I must. This Miss Noble has been making trouble between us. I'm convinced of that. It can't go on. The tangle between Alicia and me must be straightened out by a frank understanding of what caused it. Once that is done, Alicia will stand by us, I believe." "But you said yourself that she'd gone back to Marian Seaton." Judith looked amazement of Jane's sudden change of opinion. "So I thought," admitted Jane, "until I saw her pass Marian on the campus to-day without speaking. It came to me right then that only Miss Noble was to blame for the snub Alicia gave me. But I was too proud to run after Alicia and have it out with her. Now I'm going to do it." CHAPTER XIV OPENLY AND ABOVEBOARD When Jane awoke the next morning her first thought crystalized into a determination to interview Alicia Reynolds before the day was over. Speculating as to her best opportunity, she decided that it should be at the end of the morning recitations. For once she would cut her recitation in Horace, which came the last hour in the morning. Alicia had no recitation at that hour. She would probably be in her room and alone. Jane also knew that Elsie Noble was occupied with a class at that time. If looks could have killed, Jane and Adrienne would undoubtedly have been carried lifeless from the dining room that morning. At breakfast Elsie Noble's thin face wore an expression of spiteful resentment, which she made no effort to conceal. She was inwardly furious over her failure to rally the four Bridge Street freshmen to her standard. In consequence, she was more bitter against Jane and Adrienne than ever. It further increased her rancor to hear Adrienne prattling with child-like innocence to Dorothy Martin of the coming dance. Knowing very well what she was about, the little girl kept up a tantalizing chatter that was maddening in the extreme to the defeated plotter. Unacquainted with the true state of affairs, Dorothy's genuinely expressed interest in the Bridge Street girls merely added fuel to the fire. "Ah, but they are indeed delightful!" Adrienne wickedly assured, her black eyes dancing with mischief. "We shall be proud of our freshmen, when we escort them to the dance. Shall we not, Jeanne?" "Yes, indeed. You must meet them, Dorothy. You'll like them all immensely. They're a splendid, high-principled lot of girls." Signally amused by Adrienne's tactics, Jane could not resist this one little fling at her discomfited tablemate. She hoped it would serve to enlighten the latter in regard to at least one thing. Her second recitation, spherical trigonometry, over, Jane hurried across the campus toward the Hall, keeping a sharp lookout for Alicia. It was just possible she might meet the latter on the campus. Reaching the veranda, Jane lingered there. If she could waylay Alicia as she came in, so much the better. With this idea paramount, she sat down in a high-backed porch rocker and waited. She could not help reflecting a trifle sadly that thus far her sophomore year had run anything but smoothly. She had looked forward to peace, whereas she was in the midst of strife. And all because Marian Seaton did not like her. That dislike dated back to her initial journey across the continent to Wellington. If she had not antagonized Marian then, she wondered if she and Marian would have become enemies. She decided that they must have. They had nothing whatever in common. Light, hurrying feet on the walk brought Jane's retrospective musings to an end. She saw Alicia a second before the latter saw her. Promptly rising, she headed Alicia off neatly as she gained the steps. "I want to speak to you, Alicia," she greeted evenly. "You must listen to me." "I have nothing to say to you. Please let me alone." A dull flush mantled Alicia's pale cheeks as she thus spoke. Her tones indicated injury rather than anger. "But I have something to say to you," persisted Jane. "I must know positively why you have turned against me. It's not fair in you to keep me in the dark. Do you think it is? What have I done to deserve such treatment?" Stopping on the step below Jane, Alicia stared hard at the quiet, purposeful face looking down on her. "I believed in you, Jane," she said sadly, with a little catch of breath. "You made me admire you. Then you spoiled it all. It hurt me so. I--I--don't want to talk about it." She took an undecided step to the right, as though to pass Jane and flee into the house. "Don't go, Alicia. Let's get together and straighten things out." Jane laid a gentle hand on the other girl's arm. "I'm sure we can. You promised last year to be my friend. Have you forgotten that?" "How can I be the friend of a girl who talks about me?" Alicia cried out bitterly. "A girl who only pretends friendship?" "So, that's it. I thought as much. Now tell me what I said about you." Something in Jane's steady glance caused Alicia's eyes to waver. "You told Ethel Lacey that you wished you didn't have to invite me to go with you girls to the Inn the other night, but you felt that you could hardly get out of it. That I expected you to do it. You know that's not true. I'd never intrude where I wasn't wanted." "Did Ethel tell you this?" Jane asked composedly. "No. Someone else overheard you say it," retorted Alicia. "And that 'someone else'?" "I won't tell you. I promised I wouldn't." "You don't need to tell me, because I _know_." Jane emphasized the _know_. "It's not true. I didn't say that. This is what I said." As well as she could recall it, she repeated the conversation that had taken place between herself and Ethel. "I asked Ethel to invite you because I didn't want you to go to your room," she explained. "Miss Noble and I are not on speaking terms. Did you know that?" "Yes, I knew it," Alicia admitted. "I was told it was your fault. I didn't believe it until----" She paused, uncertainty written large on every feature. She had begun to glimpse the unworthiness of her doubts. "Until Miss Noble came to you with this untruthful tale about me," finished Jane. Alicia was silent. She could not truthfully contradict this pertinent statement. "Which of us do you believe, Alicia?" Jane put the question with business-like directness. Alicia mutely studied Jane's resolute face. Honesty of purpose looked out from the long-lashed, gray eyes. She mentally contrasted it with another face; dark, spiteful and furtive. "I believe you. Forgive me, Jane." Her lips quivering, Alicia stretched forth a penitent hand. "There's nothing to forgive." Jane was quick to grasp the hand Alicia proffered. "I ought to have come straight to you," quavered the penitent. "I wish you had. Thank goodness, it's all right now. Let's sit down in the porch swing, Alicia. There are several things yet to be said and this is the time to say them." Her hand still in Alicia's, Jane gently pulled her toward the swing. When they had seated themselves, she continued: "I don't like to say things behind anyone's back, but in this case it's necessary. Miss Noble has started her freshman year as a trouble maker. She is very bitter against me for several reasons. When I came back to college, I found that Mrs. Weatherbee had given her my room. She understood that I was not coming to Madison Hall this year. I'm telling you this because I suspect that it is news to you." "It certainly _is_." Alicia showed evident surprise. "I supposed Elsie Noble had been assigned to room with me from the start. She never said a word about it to me." "She didn't want you to know it. I don't wish to explain why. I'll simply say that Mrs. Weatherbee decided I had first right to the room. It made Miss Noble very angry. She came back to the room after she had left it. Adrienne, Judith and I were there. She made quite a scene. I hoped it would end there, but it hasn't. Since then she has tried to set not only you against me, but others also. She has circulated a paper among the freshmen against Judith, Adrienne and I which some of them have signed." "How perfectly terrible!" was Alicia's shocked exclamation. "She certainly has kept very quiet about it to me. I never suspected such a thing." "I can't see that it has done us much harm," Jane dryly responded. "It's come to a point, however, where we feel that we ought to assert ourselves. We are here for study, not to quarrel, but we won't stand everything tamely." "I don't blame you. I wouldn't, either. I'm sure Marian Seaton is behind all this," declared Alicia hotly. "Ever since I came back to the Hall she's been trying to talk to me. Small good it will do her. When I broke friendship with her last year it was for good and all." "When you wouldn't speak to me the other day, I thought you had gone back to her," confessed Jane. "Just a little before that Dorothy and I had been saying that we thought we ought to try to make Marian see things differently. Afterward I was so angry I gave up the thought as hopeless. It may not be right to say to you, 'Let Marian alone,' when one looks at it from one angle. The Bible says, 'Love your enemies.' On the other hand, it seems wiser to steer clear of malicious persons. Marian _is_ malicious. She's proved that over and over again. No one but herself can make her different." "I _know_ it's best for me to keep away from her," asserted Alicia. "My influence wouldn't be one, two, three with her. Whenever I tried last year to be honest with myself she just sneered at me. It's either be like her or let her alone, in my case. There's no happy medium. So I choose to let her alone." "We all have to decide such things for ourselves," Jane said reflectively. "It seems too bad that Marian's so determined to be always on the wrong side. I've decided to let her stay there for the present. If this affair of the paper involved only myself, I'd probably do nothing about it. But it's not right to let Judith and Adrienne suffer for something that's really meant for me." "What are you going to do?" inquired Alicia. "That's what I've been leading up to. With your permission I intend to have a reckoning with Miss Noble in your room. I'd like you to be there when it happens. Judith and Adrienne will be with me. Are you willing that it should be so?" "Yes, indeed," promptly answered Alicia. "When is the grand reckoning to be?" "This afternoon just before dinner. I can say my say in short order. Of course if she's not in, I'll have to postpone it until later." "I can let you know as soon as she comes in from her last class," volunteered Alicia. "No, I'd rather not have it that way." Jane smiled whimsically. "It's had enough to have to go to work and deliberately plan this hateful business. It has to be gone through with. That's certain. We'll just take our chance of finding her in. When you hear us knock, I wish you'd open the door. It's all horrid, isn't it? I feel like a conspirator." Jane made a gesture indicative of utter distaste for the purposed program. "It's honest, anyhow. It's not backbiting and underhandedness," Alicia stoutly pointed out. "No, it isn't," Jane soberly agreed. "That's the only thing that reconciles me to do it. It's dealing openly and aboveboard with treachery and spite." CHAPTER XV THE RECKONING "_Voila!_ We are ready. Let us advance!" proclaimed Adrienne with a smothered chuckle, when at ten minutes to six a determined trio left Adrienne's room on the fateful errand to the room next door. "Don't you dare giggle when we get in there," warned Judith in a whisper, as Jane rapped sharply on the door. "We must make an imposing appearance if we can," she added with a grin. "Who knows? I may giggle myself." True to her word, it was Alicia who admitted them with, "Hello, girls! Come in." As the three entered, a figure lolling in a Morris chair by the window sprang up with an angry exclamation. "I will not have these people in my room, Alicia Reynolds! Do you hear me? I won't!" Elsie Noble had turned on Alicia, her small black eyes snapping. "Half this room happens to be mine," tranquilly reminded Alicia. "Have a seat, girls." "No, thank you. We won't stay long enough for that." Jane's tone was equally composed. "We came to see _you_, Miss Noble." "I won't stay," shrieked the enraged girl, and started for the door. Alicia reached it ahead of her. Calmly turning the key, she dropped it into her blouse pocket. "Yes; you will stay, Elsie," she said with quiet decision. "You tried to make trouble between Jane and me. We've found you out. Now, you'll listen to what Jane has to say to you. If you don't, you may be sorry." Her back against the locked door, Elsie Noble glared at her captors for an instant in speechless fury. Then she found her voice again. "I'll report every one of you for this! It's an outrage!" she shrilled. The threat lacked strength, however. A coward at heart, she already stood in fear of the accusing quartette which confronted her. "Just a moment, Miss Noble. We have no desire to detain you any longer than we can help." Jane's intonation was faintly satirical. "We came here for two purposes. One is to tell you that you must stop making trouble for us among your classmates. You know what you have done. So do we. Don't do it again. I will also trouble you for that paper you have been circulating among the freshmen." "I don't know what you're talking about," hotly denied the culprit. Her eyes, however, shifted uneasily from those of her accusers. "Oh, yes you do." Judith now took a hand. "You ought to know. Don't you remember? You began it, 'We the undersigned,' and ended your little stunt with the names of as many freshmen as were foolish enough to listen to you." "You seem to think you know a whole lot," sneered Elsie. "I'm very sure not one of you ever saw such a paper as you describe." "We did not see it, but we know four girls who did," Jane informed with quiet significance. "They were asked to sign it and refused. They are quite willing to testify to this should we see fit to take the matter to President Blakesly or Miss Rutledge." "You wouldn't dare do such a thing!" the cornered plotter cried out defiantly. "He--you--he wouldn't listen to such a--a--story as you're trying to tell. He has something better to do than listen to gossiping sophomores. Miss Rutledge wouldn't listen, either." "I don't think either President Blakesly or Miss Rutledge would refuse to listen to anything that had to do with one student's attempt to injure another," was Jane's grave response. "However, that is not the point. You must make up your mind either to give me that paper and your promise to stop your mischief-making, or else defend yourself as best you can to the faculty. Naturally, we would prefer to settle the matter here and without publicity. If it is carried higher, it will involve not only you, but all the others who signed the paper. If this concerned me alone, I would not be here. But I cannot allow my friends to suffer, simply because they are my friends." Jane delivered her ultimatum with a tense forcefulness that admitted of no further trifling. "I can't--I won't--I----" floundered Elsie, now more afraid than angry. "How do I know that you wouldn't take it to President Blakesly if I gave it to you?" she demanded desperately. "Ah! She admits that she has it!" exclaimed Adrienne triumphantly. The little girl had hitherto kept silent, content to let Jane do the talking. "She is of a truth quite droll." "Yes, I have it!" Elsie fiercely addressed Adrienne. "I'm going to keep it, too, you horrid little torment." It was Jane who now spoke, and with a finality. "A moment more, please. I want to ask you two questions, Miss Noble. The first is: 'How did you happen to overhear the private conversation between Miss Lacey and myself that you repeated so incorrectly to Alicia?' The second is: 'How did you know that we intended to invite the Bridge Street girls to the freshman frolic?' We had mentioned it to no one outside, except Miss Marsh, who certainly did not tell you." "I won't answer either question," sputtered Elsie. "You can't make me tell you. You'll never know from me." "I was sure you wouldn't answer." Jane smiled scornfully. "I asked you merely because I wanted to call your attention to both instances. That's all. I'm sorry we can not settle this affair quietly. If you will kindly stand aside, Alicia will unlock the door." "I--you mustn't tell President Blakesly!" There was a hint of pleading in the protesting cry. Thoroughly cowed by the fell prospect she was now facing, Elsie crumpled. "You're mean, too--mean--for--anything!" she wailed, and burst into tears. "You--ought to be--ashamed--to--come--here--and--bully me--like--this. I'll give you--the--paper--but--I'll hate you as long as I live, Jane Allen!" Sheer intensity of emotion steadied her voice on this last passionate avowal. Handkerchief to her eyes, she stumbled across the room to the chiffonier. Jerking open the top drawer, she groped within and drew forth a folded paper. Turning, she threw it at Jane with vicious force. It fluttered to the floor a few feet from where she stood. Very calmly Jane marched over and picked it up. Unfolding it, she glanced it over. "Please read it, girls," she directed, handing it to Judith. The latter silently complied and passed it to Adrienne, who in turn gave it to Alicia. Alicia's face grew dark as she perused it. An angry spot of color appeared on each cheek. "How could you?" she said, her eyes resting on her roommate in immeasurable contempt. "You did perfectly right in coming here, Jane," she commented, as she returned the paper to the latter. "I am ashamed to think I ever allowed this girl's spite to come between us. I should have known better." "It's all past. It won't happen again, Alicia. Now----" With a purposeful hand Jane tore the offending paper to bits. Stepping over to the waste basket she dropped them into it. "This incident is closed," she sternly announced to the sullen-faced author of the mischief. "You understand that there are to be no more of a similar nature involving us or any other girls here at Wellington?" "Yes," muttered Elsie. "Thank you." Jane had intended the "Thank you" to be her last word. Something in the expression of abject defeat that looked out from that lowering face stirred her to sudden pity. "I'm sorry this had to happen, Miss Noble," she said, almost gently. "There's only one thing to do; forget it. We intend to. Won't you? I'm willing to begin over again and----" "Don't preach to me! I hate you! I'll never forgive you!" Out of defeat, resentment flared afresh. Darting past the group of girls, Elsie Noble gained the door which was now unlocked. She flashed from the room slamming the door behind her with a force that threatened to shake it from its hinges. "Some little tempest," cheerfully averred Judith. "Jane, let me congratulate you. You did the deed." "Don't congratulate me." Jane scowled fiercely. "I feel like--well, just what she said I was--a bully. She's not so much to blame. She's a poor little cat's-paw for Marian Seaton." "She's to blame for letting herself be influenced by Marian," disagreed Judith. "How do you suppose she found out about our going to invite the Bridge Street freshmen to the dance?" "She must have, of a certainty, listened at our door," declared Adrienne. "I don't believe she could hear a thing that way," disagreed Judith. "These doors are heavy. The sound doesn't go through them. Besides, she couldn't stand outside and eavesdrop long without being noticed by some one passing through the hall. Girls are always coming and going, you know." "Yet how could she otherwise know these things?" insisted Adrienne. "Give it up." Judith shook her head. "It's a mystery. She knew them. Maybe some day we'll know how she learned. We'll probably find out when we least expect to. Just stumble upon it long after we've forgotten all about it." CHAPTER XVI PLAYING CAVALIER That evening after dinner, Jane indulged in one of her dark, floor-tramping moods. The disagreeable interview of the afternoon had left a bad taste in her mouth. She had done what she had deemed necessary, but at heart she was intensely disgusted with herself. She wondered what Dorothy Martin would have done, given the same circumstances. She longed to tell Dorothy all about it, yet she felt that it belonged only to those whom it directly concerned. "Do sit down and behave, Jane," admonished Judith. "You make me nervous. Your tramp, tramp, tramp gets into my head and I can't study. You act as though you'd committed a murder and hidden the body in the top drawer of the chiffonier." "Excuse me, Judy. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to disturb you. I guess the whole affair has gotten on my nerves." With this apology, Jane sought a chair and made a half-hearted attempt at study. Gradually she drew her mind from unpleasant thoughts and proceeded to concentrate it upon her lessons for the next day. It was not until she and Judith were preparing for bed that the latter re-opened the subject. "Adrienne and I tried a little stunt of our own after dinner to-night," she confessed somewhat sheepishly. "Imp went into her room and I stood outside the door. She read a paragraph out loud from a book, but I couldn't understand a word she said. I could just catch the sound of her voice and that was all." "Humph!" was Jane's sole reply. "Yes, 'humph' if you want to. It goes to show that the ignoble Noble never got her information that way. The question is, 'How did she get it?'" "I don't know and I don't care," returned Jane wearily. "Please, Judy, I want to forget the whole thing." "I don't. I'm going to be an investigating investigator and solve the mystery. Watch slippery Judy, the dauntless detective of Madison Hall. Leave it to her to puzzle out the puzzle." "Better forget it," advised Jane shortly. "Oh, never! Let me have at least one worthy object in life, won't you?" was Judith's blithe plea. "Never mind, Imp will support and admire my ambition, even if you don't." Judith was not in the least cast down by the defeat of an unworthy foe. She was glad of it. Brought up among girls, she was too much used to such squabbles to take them to heart. For the next three days she and Adrienne amused themselves by planning wild schemes to entrap the "ignoble Noble" and wring from her a confession of her nefarious methods. So wild, indeed, were their projects that the mere discussion of them invariably sent them into peals of laughter. As a matter of fact, neither could devise a plausible scheme by which they might discover what they burned to know. Both were agreed that chance alone would put them in possession of the much desired information. Wednesday evening of the following week saw Jane, Adrienne, Judith and Norma set off in a taxicab for 605 Bridge Street to escort their new friends to the freshman frolic. Due to the demand for taxicabs for that evening, they had been able to secure only one, whereas they needed two. They had decided to overcome this difficulty by having the driver make two trips, carrying four girls at each trip. According to Judith, "We could all squeeze into one taxi, but I have too much respect for my costly apparel to risk it." The quartette of escorting sophomores made a pretty picture that evening as they trooped down the steps of the Hall to the waiting taxicab. Jane had chosen a particularly stunning frock of silver tissue, worn over a foundation of dull green satin. In lieu of flowers, a single beautiful spray of English ivy trailed across one white shoulder. The gown was the handsomest she owned and she had originally intended to save it for a later festivity. Realizing that she must inevitably become a target for the displeased eyes of those who disliked her, she had decided that so far as apparel went she would leave no room for criticism. Adrienne, who loved daring colors, had elected to appear in a chiffon creation, the exact shade of an American Beauty rose. It set off her dark, vivid loveliness to perfection. Designed by herself, it had been fashioned by a French woman who attended to the making of her distinguished mother's gowns. In consequence, it was a triumph of its kind. As a last touch, a cluster of short-stemmed American Beauties nestled against the low-cut bodice of the gown. Judith looked charming in a white net over apricot taffeta with a bunch of sunset roses tucked into the black velvet ribbon sash that completed the costume. Norma was wearing the becoming blue and white gown Jane had given her the previous year. Since that first eventful freshman dance, when Jane had played fairy godmother to her, she had worn the exquisite frock only once. Now it looked as fresh and dainty as it had on that immemorial night. Trimmed as it was with clusters of velvet forget-me-nots, Norma wore no natural flowers. Though she had by her summer's work in the stock company earned immunity from drudgery, she had earned no more than that. With the exception of this one gown, she dressed almost as simply as in the old days. She confined her wardrobe to one or two serviceable one-piece dresses, a coat suit and a quantity of dainty white silk blouses and lingerie. These last were fashioned and laundered by her own clever fingers. "I hope we're not too fine for our girls," Norma remarked anxiously as the four skipped, one after the other, from the taxicab at the Bridge Street address. "I thought of that, too, but I decided that they'd like it if we looked our very smartest. They are too independent to feel crushed by a mere matter of fine clothes," was Jane's opinion. The frank admiration with which the four freshmen exclaimed over their gorgeous escorts served to point to the accuracy of her opinion. "You're regular birds of Paradise!" laughed Freda. "We are certainly lucky to capture such prizes. We're not a bit splendiferous, ourselves. But then, why should we be? It wouldn't match with our humble status." "You look sweet, every one of you," praised Judith. "Your gowns are dear. They are wonderfully becoming." "We made them ourselves last summer," explained Kathie with a little air of pride. "We clubbed together and bought a bolt of this white Persian lawn. Ida crocheted these butterfly medallions set in Freda's gown and mine. Then Marie embroidered the designs on hers and Ida's gowns. Each dress is a little different from the other, yet they all look pretty much alike." "They are all beautiful," Jane warmly assured. She could say so in absolute truth. Simple, graceful lines, combined with dainty hand-wrought trimmings had produced four frocks which would have sold at a high price in an exclusive city dress shop. "Ah, but you are the clever ones!" bubbled Adrienne. "It is we who must be proud of you. I would that _ma mère_ could see these frocks. She would, of a certainty, rave with the delight. _Ma mère_, you must know, is the true Frenchwoman who appreciates highly the beautiful handwork such as this." "You rather take us off our feet," smiled Marie. "We were not expecting it, you know." The brightness in her own eyes was reflected in that of her chums. Girl-like, they found exquisite happiness in being thus appreciated. "We'd better be starting," Jane presently proposed. "We could get only one taxi, so four of us will have to go first and four more in a second load." Jane's anxiety to be starting lay not entirely in her natural impatience of delay. She was not quite easy in mind regarding the reception awaiting them. Marian Seaton had been chosen to stand in the receiving line. That in itself was sufficient to make her believe that the earlier the ordeal of formal greeting could be gone through with the better it would be for all concerned. She did not doubt that Marian was in full possession of the facts concerning her cousin's recent defeat. It would be exactly like Marian to create a disagreeable scene. If this had to happen, she preferred that it should take place before the majority of the crowd arrived. She had expressed this fear to Judith who had scouted at the idea on the grounds that Marian "wouldn't be crazy enough to make an idiot of herself before everybody." "You and Adrienne go first with your ladies, Judy," she continued. "If you don't mind, I wish you'd wait in the corridor for the rest of us. We'll be only a few minutes behind you." "It's just like this, girls," she turned to the four freshmen. "I'm not borrowing trouble, but if any of the sophs in the receiving line act--well--not very cordial, you needn't be surprised. It will be because of that paper you girls wouldn't sign. I hadn't mentioned it before, but----" Jane paused. "The girl gave it to us. We destroyed it," she added with a briefness that did not invite questioning. "I'm glad you destroyed it," congratulated Freda. "So am I," came in concert from her three chums. "We're not a bit sensitive," lightly assured Ida Leonard. "We aren't going to let a few snubs spoil our good time." "I guess we'll be sufficient unto ourselves," predicted Kathie optimistically. "Now we'd better get our flowers, pals, so as not to keep our distinguished cavaliers waiting." Excusing themselves, the quartette of freshmen repaired to the tiny back porch, where the four bouquets of roses sent them by their escorts had been carefully placed in water to keep them fresh against the time of use. "They are awfully thoroughbred, aren't they?" commented Judith in an undertone. "Never a question about that ignoble Noble mix-up. Honestly, Jane, do you think Marian will behave like a donkey?" Laughter greeted this inquiry. Jane immediately grew grave. "It wouldn't surprise me," she shrugged. "We can't expect, naturally, that she will notice us as we pass her in the receiving line. Certainly we sha'n't notice her. If only she doesn't say something hateful to us that will attract attention. I mean, about our freshmen." The return into the room of the latter, each laden with a big bouquet of fragrant roses, cut short the conversation. Half an hour and the eight girls were reunited in the corridor leading to the gymnasium. Each cavalier gallantly offering an arm to the freshman of her choice, they walked two by two into the gymnasium, which had been transformed for the night into a veritable ball room. It was already fairly well filled with daintily gowned girls, who stood about, or sat in little groups, talking animatedly. Near the entrance to the room, the reception committee were lined up in all their glory. Jane's quick glance discerned Marian Seaton, resplendent in an elaborate gown of pale blue satin, standing at the far end of the line. Her usually arrogant features wore an expression of fatuous complacency. It took wing the instant she spied Jane and her friends. "Now it's coming," was Jane's mental conviction, as she noted the swift lowering change in the other girl's face. Heading the little procession with Ida Leonard, Jane suddenly saw her way clear. She could only hope that the others of her group would take their cue from her. CHAPTER XVII THE EAVESDROPPER Politely responding to the greetings extended to herself and Ida as they advanced down the line, they came at last to the girl who stood next to Marian. The instant Jane had touched hands with the former she drew Ida's arm within her own and turned abruptly away, without giving Marian time to do more than glare angrily after her. Jane realized very well that what she had done was in the nature of a rudeness, yet she felt that under the circumstances it was justifiable. To her great relief, Judith, Adrienne and Ethel did precisely the same thing. "Well, we came through with our heads still on," congratulated naughty Judith in Jane's ear, the moment they had won clear of the fateful receiving line. "Clever little Janie. I saw and I heeded. Our dear Marian looked ready to bite. I think she would have snapped anyway, if we'd given her half a chance. Good thing she was on the end. I'm sure nobody noticed." "I hope no one did," Jane sighed. "I hated to do it. I think, too, she intended to be hateful. I saw it in her face, so I just slid away without giving her a chance. I'm glad that ordeal's over. Now I must find some partners for Ida. The dancing will soon begin." This proved an easy task. Whatever might be freshman opinion of Jane Allen, she had more friends among the sophomores than she had believed possible. In touch socially with her class for the first time since her return to Wellington, she was amazed at the smiling faces and gay greetings which she met at every turn. It had a wonderfully cheering effect on her, coming as it did on the heels of the recent freshman demonstration of ill-will. It gave her a thrill of intense happiness. She resolved to put away every vexatious thought and enjoy the frolic with all her might. That she had successfully put her resolution into effect was evidenced by her bright eyes and laughing lips when, two hours afterward, she and Judith seated themselves on a wicker settee after a one-step which they had danced together for old time's sake. "I'm having a splendiferous time!" glowed Judith. "You can see for yourself how much that old paper amounted to. Most of these freshmen have been lovely to me. I've steered clear of the ones who looked doubtful. I've had a few scowls handed to me. It's been easy to pick out the ignoble Noble's satellites by their freezing stares. I wonder who escorted our noble little friend? Cousin Marian, no doubt," she added, with her ever-ready chuckle. "No doubt," was Jane's dry repetition. "Let's go and get some lemonade, Judy," she proposed irrelevantly. "Just watching that crowd around the punch bowl makes me thirsty." "I'm in need of a few cups of lemonade myself," concurred Judith amiably. Attempting to rise, an ominous ripping sound informed Jane that Judith had been unconsciously sitting on a fold of the silver tissue overdress to her gown. "Oh, what a shame! I didn't know I was sitting on your overskirt, Jane. That's too bad!" Judith hastily got to her feet to ruefully inspect the amount of damage she had done. "It's nothing," Jane assured lightly. "Let's drink our lemonade and then go over to the dressing room. I can pin this tear so it will stay, I guess. The gathers are only ripped out a little." Having drunk two cups of lemonade apiece, they strolled on toward the dressing room. It was the little side room the freshman team had used the previous year when playing basket-ball. Nor were they aware, as they crossed the wide room, arm in arm, that a certain pair of pale blue eyes jealously watched them. As they disappeared through the dressing-room door, Marian Seaton hurried after them, disagreeable purpose written on her face. Quite oblivious to the fact that she was one of a welcoming committee, she had fully intended to say something cutting to Jane when the latter should arrive that evening in the gymnasium. Having missed one opportunity she did not propose to miss a second. This time Jane Allen should hear what she had to say. At the slightly opened door she heard words which brought her to an abrupt halt. It was not the first time she had listened at that selfsame door. Edging close, she turned her back to it. Facing the big room, her pale eyes roved over it with studied carelessness. Her ears, however, were sharply trained to catch the sound of two voices that drifted plainly out to her. Meanwhile Judith, unaware of listeners, was gayly remarking as she pinned up the tear in Jane's overdress: "This reminds me of the tear in the white lace dress that caused such a fuss last year. It was a good thing you were around to help Norma out of that mix-up. If it hadn't been for you, Edith Hammond would have gone straight to Mrs. Weatherbee and told her that it was Norma who stole her dress. I must say, Edith acted splendidly about it afterward. I never thought she had it in her to do as she did." "Things looked pretty black for poor Norma that day until I made things right with Edith," reminisced Jane. "She was determined to make Norma give back her dress when all the while----" "It was Judy Stearns who had really stolen it," merrily supplemented Judith. "I'll never forget Edith's face when I told her I was sorry to say that the real thief was Judith Stearns," laughed Jane. "I was the thief, all right enough, but only a few people knew it. Alas, my fatal failing!" grinned Judith. "There! I guess that will stay. Let's go. I hear the enlivening strains of a fox trot. That means us." It also meant to the listener outside that her time of eavesdropping was up. Before the two occupants of the dressing room had reached the door Marian Seaton had hurried away from it, her original intention quite forgotten. CHAPTER XVIII DIVIDING THE HONORS Once the sophomores had done their duty in the way of entertaining their freshmen sisters, they promptly turned to their own affairs. Following the freshman frolic a busy week of sophomore electioneering set in. It was succeeded by a class meeting that barely escaped being a quarrel. At least a third of the class had, it appeared, enlisted under Marian Seaton's banner. These ardent supporters who had espoused her cause in the previous year and had been defeated, again came to the front with belligerent energy. Though lacking in numbers, they were strong in disagreeable opposition. Christine Ellis' nomination of Judith Stearns for president, which was seconded by Alicia Reynolds, caused one after another of Marian's adherents to rise to their feet in hot objection. For five minutes or more the chairman of the nomination committee had her hands full in subduing the rebels. Stung by the insult, Judith arose, white with righteous wrath, to decline the nomination. Repeated cries of, "Sit down, Judy. We want you for our president!" "What's the matter with Judy? She's _all_ right!" and, "Judy Stearns or nobody!" drowned the refusal she strove to utter. In the end she threw up her hands in a gesture of despair and sat down, amid approving cheers from her triumphant supporters. The nomination of Alicia Reynolds as vice-president was hardly less opposed by the other faction, though it was carried in spite of protest. With deliberate intent to shame, Barbara Temple calmly nominated Maizie Gilbert as treasurer, thereby astounding the objectors to momentary dumbness. They soon rallied, however, and one of their number hastily seconded the nomination, which was carried. Emboldened to action, Maizie promptly nominated Leila Brookes, one of her friends, for secretary. This nomination was avidly seconded by another of Marian's adherents and also carried. Having won their point against unworthy opposition, the majority could afford to be generous. The final result of the election found honors equally divided between the two sets of girls, a condition of affairs which promised anything but a peaceful year for 19--. Gathered at Rutherford Inn that evening for a spread in honor of Judith, given by Christine and Barbara, the latter expressed herself frankly in regard to the afternoon's proceedings. "That class meeting was as nearly a riot as could be," she declared disgustedly. "I expected to engage in hand-to-hand combat before it ended. I thought the best way to shame that crowd was to give them the chance, they didn't want to give us." "They snapped at it, too," Christine Ellis said scornfully. "I'll never forgive you girls for making me president when I didn't want to be," was Judith's rueful assertion. "We would never have forgiven you if you had backed out," retorted Ethel Lacey. "I didn't have the least word to say about it. Nobody would listen to me." Judith's comical air of resignation provoked a laugh. "You should thus be pleased that you are well-liked, Judy," asserted Adrienne. "And Alicia, here, we were delighted with your success, _ma chere_." "I never dreamed of being nominated." A faint color stole into Alicia's pale face. "I'd much rather it had been one of you girls." "I'm heartily glad I was out of it all," declared Jane with emphasis. "There's only one thing I really want this year in the way of college honors." "To make the sophomore team?" asked Christine. "Yes." An eager light sprang into Jane's gray eyes. "You'll make it, Jane," predicted Barbara. "You can outplay us all. Some of us are going to lose out, though. There are five of us here who are going to try for it. Judy, Adrienne, you, Christine and I. Of course we can't all make it. Quite a lot of sophs are going to try for it this year besides us. Marian Seaton will be one of them, I suppose." "She'll make it, if any of her friends happen to be judges at the try-out," commented Judith sagely. "I hope Dorothy Martin will be chosen as one of the judges. She can be depended upon to do the fair thing. Miss Hurley was awfully unfair last year. I wish Dorothy'd be chosen as our manager." "We ought to do a little practicing, girls," urged Jane. "Let's start in to-morrow afternoon, provided we can have the gym. I understand the freshman team have been monopolizing it ever since their try-out last week." "Who's on the freshman team?" asked Ethel curiously. "I don't know. Haven't been over to see them work," Jane replied. "Have any of you?" She glanced about the round table at her friends. A general shaking of heads revealed the fact that no one had. "It's queer, but somehow I can't get interested in the freshmen," confided Barbara Temple. "A lot of them acted awfully stand-offish toward me on the night of the dance." "I noticed the same thing!" exclaimed Christine in surprise. "I thought it was my imagination. Those four girls you folks brought were sweet, though." "They are dandy girls," interposed Judith hastily, and immediately launched forth in praise of the Bridge Street freshmen. Though she could have very quickly explained the strained attitude of the freshman class to Christine and Barbara, she held her peace. She decided, however, to have a talk that night with Jane. It was not fair that these two loyal friends should be kept in the dark about what bade fair to affect them unpleasantly. That she was not alone in her opinion became manifest when, toward nine o'clock, Alicia, Ethel, Adrienne, Jane and herself bade Christine and Barbara good night and went on across the campus toward Madison Hall. "Jane," began Judith abruptly, "I think we ought to tell Christine and Barbara about that freshman business. I didn't want to say a word until I'd put it up to you girls." "Yes, I suppose we ought to tell them." Jane spoke almost wearily. "I didn't say anything about it to-night because I hated to drag it all up again. If you see either of the girls to-morrow, Judy, you'd better explain matters. I don't want to. I'm sick of the whole business." "I'm heartily sick of my roommate. I can tell you that," said Alicia. "If I had known when that girl walked into my room that she was Marian Seaton's cousin I should have refused to room with her. She's completely under Marian's thumb. Whatever Marian tells her to do she does. You'd think after what happened the other day that she'd be too angry ever to speak to me again. Well, she isn't. She tries to talk to me whenever we're together. She told me yesterday that I had made a terrible mistake in giving up Marian for you girls." "Marian put her up to that," declared Judith. "Of course she did," nodded Alicia. "Elsie had the nerve to tell me that Marian felt dreadfully over the horrid way I'd treated her. She blames Jane for it, and says she'll get even with her for it. I blame myself for being so hateful last year. Jane showed me how to be the person I'd always wanted to be, but was too cowardly then to be it." "Jane is of us all the loyal friend," broke in Adrienne. "Sometimes she wears the fierce scowl and has the look of the lion, yet I am not afraid of her. See, even now she scowls, but she will not eat us. She scowls thus to hide the embarrassment." The bright moonlight betrayed plainly the deep scowl between Jane's brows to which Adrienne had called attention. "Imp, you're a rascal." Jane's brows immediately smoothed themselves. "You know altogether too much about me. I was embarrassed. That's a fact. What Alicia said made me feel rather queer because I don't think I deserved it. I can't be the person I want to be myself, let alone showing anybody else. That's what has been bothering me right along. I'd like to be able to rise above caring whether or not Marian Seaton tries to get even with me." "You can't do it, Jane, and be just to yourself," Alicia said very positively. "I know Marian a great deal better than I wish I did. She'll never stop trying to work against you as long as you're both at Wellington. She'll never let a chance slip to make trouble for you. I'd advise you to be on your guard and the very next time she tries anything hateful, go to Miss Rutledge with the whole story of the way she's treated you ever since you came to college." "I couldn't do that. Not for myself, I mean. If it were something hateful she'd done to one of you girls, I could. I would have truly gone to Miss Rutledge or even Prexy with that paper, because it was injurious to Judy and Imp; not because of myself." "Never mind, Jane. I am here to protect you," Judith reminded gaily. "I'd fight for you as quickly as you'd fight for me. Just remember that." Judith began the little speech lightly. She ended with decided purpose. "I know it, Judy." Walking as she was beside her roommate, Jane slipped an affectionate hand within Judith's arm. "If Marian plays on the team with you girls, then look out," further advised Alicia. "She'll do something to stir up trouble, you may depend upon it. I know I'm croaking, but I can't help it." "Wait till she makes the team," grinned Judith. "She may find herself outplayed at the try-out. If she does, little Judy won't weep. No, indeed. I'll give a grand celebration in honor of the joyful event." "I, also, will shed few tears," Adrienne drily concurred. "Ah, but I shall look forward to that most grand celebration! So at last this very wicked Marian shall perhaps be the cause of some little pleasure to us." Jane could not resist joining in the laugh that greeted this naïve assertion. She wished she could feel as little concern about the matter as did Judith and Adrienne. Alicia's warning against Marian had taken hold on her more strongly than she could wish. To Jane it seemed almost in the nature of a prophesy of disaster. She found herself inwardly hoping with her friends that Marian would not make the team. Instantly she put it aside as unworthy of what she, Jane Allen, desired to be. A good pioneer must forge ahead, surmounting one by one each obstacle that rose in the path. Again it came to Jane in that moment, out under the stars, that it could make no difference to her what Marian Seaton did or did not do to her, so long as she, an intrepid pioneer, steadily kept to work at clearing her own bit of college land. She had earlier expressed this conviction to Dorothy. Later it had been swept away by bitter doubts as to whether she could continue to maintain a lofty indifference toward Marian's spiteful activities. Would she be obliged eventually to descend to Marian's level and fight her with her own weapons? She had more than once, of late, darkly considered the question. Now she knew that so long as Marian's spleen directed itself against her, and her alone, she could never do it. She would fight for her friends, but never for herself. CHAPTER XIX RANK INJUSTICE At half-past four o'clock on the Wednesday following the sophomore class elections, the sophomore basket-ball try-out took place in the gymnasium. Twenty girls of the sophomore class had elected to enter the lists, while the usual number of freshmen and upper class spectators lined the walls of the big room. Among the ten bloomer-clad girls who were finally picked for the deciding tussle, five wore the dark green uniforms that had identified them the previous year as the official freshman team. They were Judith, Jane, Adrienne, Christine Ellis and Marian Seaton. Among the other five contestants, Barbara Temple and Olive Hurst, both of last year's practice team, had survived. The other three girls were disappointed aspirants of the previous year's try-out, who had sturdily returned to the lists for a try at making the sophomore team. When the shrill notes of the whistle sent the ten into deciding action, it became immediately evident that it would be nip and tuck as to the winners. In every girlish heart lived the strong determination to be among the elect. In consequence, the zealous ten treated the spectators to a most spirited exhibition of basket-ball prowess. When it had ended, the players ran off the floor, breathlessly to await the verdict. With the exception of two of them, opinion was divided. Regarding these two, there was no doubt in the minds of the watchers that Jane Allen and Adrienne Dupree, at least, had made the team. They were distinctly eligible. Each in her own fashion had shown actual brilliancy of playing. The others had done extremely well. How well was a matter which must be left to the three judges to decide. While the ten impatiently waited for the decision, over in the judges' corner a spirited discussion was going on between Dorothy Martin and the two seniors who were officiating with her in the capacity of judges. One of them, Selina Brown, had already been appointed as basket-ball manager of the teams for the year. "I do not agree with you, Miss Brown," Dorothy was protesting, her fine face alive with righteous vexation. "In my opinion, Miss Stearns has completely outplayed Miss Seaton. In fact she has always been the better player of the two. Granted, Miss Seaton is an excellent player, but Miss Stearns outclasses her. I say this in absolute fairness. Try them out again and you will see, even if you don't now." "I am sorry to be obliged to differ with you regarding Miss Stearns, but Miss Seaton must be my first and last choice. Miss Nelson quite agrees with me. Do you not?" She turned triumphantly to the third judge for corroboration. "I--really--yes, I think Miss Seaton is the better player." The reply, begun hesitatingly, went on to firmness. Laura Nelson had the grace to color slightly, however, as she made it. Indebted to Marian Seaton for several rides in the latter's limousine, as well as hospitable entertainment at Rutherford Inn, she felt compelled to stand by at the critical moment. She had been privately given to understand beforehand that Marian was to make the team, whoever else failed. "The majority rules, I believe, Miss Martin." A disagreeable smile hovered about Miss Brown's thin lips as she said this. "It does, but----" Patent contempt looked out from Dorothy's steady eyes. "But what?" sharply challenged Selina Brown. "It is an unfair majority," was the quiet accusation. "As the other four players have been chosen, I will leave you to make the announcement." So saying, Dorothy turned abruptly and walked away, too greatly incensed to trust herself longer in the company of the pair whom she had flatly accused of unfairness. Straight across the gymnasium she walked to where Judith, Jane, Christine, Barbara and Adrienne stood, an eager group. "Girls," she said, in a wrathfully impressive voice, "I'm going to stand here beside you. When the announcement of the team is made you'll understand why." "What's the matter, Dorothy?" anxiously questioned Christine. Four pairs of eyes riveted themselves wonderingly on Dorothy's flushed, indignant face. None of the quartette had ever before seen sweet-tempered Dorothy Martin so manifestly angry. Something of an unusual nature must have happened. "Don't ask me now. Listen!" A loud blast from the whistle, held to Selina Brown's lips, was now enjoining silence. Immediately after the sound had died away, a hush fell upon the great room as the senior manager stepped forward and announced: "For the official sophomore team the following players have been chosen: Adrienne Dupree, Barbara Temple, Christine Ellis, Jane Allen, and Marian Seaton. To act as subs: Olive Hurst and Marjory Upton." Immediately she went on with a speech, meant to be politely consoling to the defeated contestants. A faint, concerted gasp arose from the little group collected about Dorothy. This, then, was the explanation of Dorothy's indignation. "It's an outrage! I'm going to protest!" muttered Jane, her tones thick with wrath. "No, I'm going to refuse to play on the team." "And I also," echoed Adrienne hotly. "Let's do it!" urged Christine, catching Barbara by the arm. "Right now, before that Miss Brown gets through with her hypocritical speech." "No, girls, you mustn't. I--I--don't--want you to," quavered Judith. "We've got to, Judy! It's rank injustice, piled high!" declared Christine tempestuously. "If you do--I'll hate all of you!" Judith desperately threatened. "You've got to stay on the team, simply because I'm not on it. I'm not blind and neither are you. One of us had to go to make room for Marian Seaton. It would have been Jane, I'm sure, if she hadn't played so well. They didn't quite dare do it. So I had to take it. We don't know what's back of it. Maybe it's been done on purpose to bring about the very thing you want to do. I say, don't give in to it. Stick to the team." "Judy's right, girls," interposed Dorothy. "Don't resign. You might only be pleasing a number of persons by doing so." Further counsel on her part was cut off by a flock of sophomores who had come up to congratulate the winners. The latter were wearing their triumph far from exultantly. Jane was scowling in her most ferocious fashion. Adrienne's piquant features were set and unsmiling. Christine and Barbara appeared constrained and ill at ease. Judith alone had conjured up a brave little smile with which to mask the hurt of her defeat. "It's a shame you didn't make the team, Judy!" sympathized one tactless sophomore. "Judy _did_ make the team, by rights," Dorothy defended, unflinching purpose in the calm assertion. "I want it distinctly understood that she was _my_ choice." "We thought, too, that she should have been chosen," exclaimed Alice Kirby, another sophomore, with a vigorous nod of her head. "It seems funny----" "It's anything but funny," Dorothy cut in sharply. "Pardon me, Alice, I didn't intend to be rude to you. I'm dreadfully disgusted over this affair. I'll leave you to guess the reason." "It's not hard to guess," retorted Alice significantly. "With Judy a better player than Miss Seaton and yet not even chosen to sub, something's twisted at Wellington. I rather think it will stay twisted, too, as long as a certain person has two out of three judges on her side." Alice had been one of Judith's most ardent supporters at the recent class election. "Well, I'm glad you have such a clear idea of things," grimly returned Dorothy. "Kindly pass it on. I'm not saying that vindictively, either. I want everybody I know to understand that I consider this an unfair decision and that I absolutely refuse to countenance it. Miss Brown recently asked me to act as referee in the games this year. I accepted. Now I'm going straight to my room to write her my resignation." "You mustn't do that, Dorothy," Judith again protested. "It's dear in you. I surely appreciate it. Really, I don't mind so very----" Judith stopped, the wistfulness in her blue eyes contradicting her unfinished denial. "But if you resign, Dorothy, there'll be no one to stand by us later," reminded Christine gloomily. "I've thought of that, too, but it doesn't sway me. This is a matter of principle. I could not be Judith's friend if I accepted this injustice to her." "It is indeed wise that Dorothy should do this," Adrienne sagely wagged her curly head. "First, it is but fair to you, Judy. Again we shall gain rather than lose for this reason. Soon all must know why Dorothy has thus resigned. She wishes it to be no secret. _Voila!_ For the rest of the year these two most unfair seniors must have a care. The eyes of many will be upon them. The pitcher may go once too often to the well. _N'est ce pas?_" She turned to her listeners for corroboration. Wily child that she was, she had decided to impress this view on those present, knowing that it would be accepted and remembered. "We had thought, the four of us," she impressively continued, including her three teammates and herself in a sweeping gesture, "to resign from the team. Because Judy does not desire it, we shall remain only to please her. Judy has the great heart and the broad mind. She has not the narrow soul of some persons of whom I might speak, only that these names leave the bad taste in my mouth." "Hurrah for Judy! Three cheers for Adrienne!" enthusiastically proposed one of the highly impressed sophomores. The hearty burst of acclamation which suddenly rent the air was anything but welcome to a number of girls still lingering in the gymnasium. Surrounded by a coterie of her own adherents, which included Leila Brooks, Elsie Noble, Maizie Gilbert, and a number of upper class girls, Marian Seaton's pale eyes darted a spiteful glance at the noisy worshippers of the girls she detested. "Boisterous things!" she exclaimed disdainfully. "The idea of their setting up such a howl about that Judy Stearns when she didn't even make sub, let alone making the team. If they knew what I know about her, not one of those sophs outside of her own crowd would ever speak to her again." "What do you know about her? Don't be stingy, Marian." "Why not let us into the know?" were some of the cries that greeted Marian's dark insinuation. "I'll keep what I know to myself for the present. I am too charitable to make trouble for that girl, even if she has done her utmost to injure me. I'll never tell anyone unless there comes a time when I feel it necessary to speak." Marian assumed an air of virtuous tolerance that caused Maizie Gilbert to eye her with reluctant admiration. She alone knew what her roommate was driving at. "I'm really relieved because you girls haven't carried on like wild Indians about my making the team," she continued sweetly. "I hate being made conspicuous." She was inwardly furious because her supporters had failed to become wildly jubilant over her success. "Three cheers for Marian!" hastily proposed Elsie, realizing that it was not yet too late to save herself from Marian's private displeasure. Far from being disgusted with the belated mead of praise, for which she had fished, Marian beamed patronizingly as the cheers were given. These sounds of requisitioned acclamation were wafted to the ears of Selina Brown and Laura Nelson, who were in the act of leaving the gymnasium. "Well, she partly got what she wanted," remarked Selina Brown grimly as they left the building and set off for Creston Hall where both lived. "I expect that she'll be peeved because things didn't go entirely her way. I made a fatal mistake in asking Dorothy Martin to be one of the judges," pursued Selina. "I had forgotten about her being so thick with that Allen girl. Marian never mentioned it, either, until afterward. Then she made a big fuss, but it was too late to renege. Last year I let basket-ball alone. I'd had enough of it the first two years here at Wellington. I wasn't in touch with these girls that Marian's so down on. Roberta Hurley was managing the teams then, you know. She recommended me to Miss Rutledge as her successor. I wish now I'd refused to act as manager." "I'm sorry _I_ had anything to do with it," regretted Laura Nelson. "Of course, Marian has been lovely to both of us. I was stupid enough to mistake it for real friendship until she came right out the other night and asked us to keep those three girls off the team. Then I knew she'd only been getting an axe ready for us to grind." "Oh, I saw through her from the first, but I thought I'd humor her. We've had a good many rides and dinners at her expense. I supposed it would be easy enough to keep those three off the team. When I saw them play I knew differently. That Jane Allen is a wonder with the ball; the little French girl, too. If I had dropped either of them the sophs would have raised the roof. I had to save my own reputation. It didn't matter so much about the Stearns girl. She and Marian were pretty evenly matched." "She's a better player than Marian," frankly disagreed Laura. "As it is, I think we are in for trouble. We've antagonized Dorothy Martin. You heard what she said to us. She won't hesitate to say it to anyone else who claims Miss Stearns ought to have made the team. Dorothy's always stood high at Wellington. She has lots of friends." "Oh, she'll calm down," predicted Selina. "She hates to be crossed. Personally, I don't admire her. She poses too much. She's either a prig or a hypocrite. A little of both, I guess. When Marian raged about my asking her to act as judge she said she knew for a fact that Dorothy's father had lost all his money and that Dorothy was hanging on to Jane Allen and this French girl, I never can remember her name, because they took her around with them and spent lots of money on luncheons and dinners." "Then she's no better than we are!" exclaimed Laura, looking relief at this piece of news. "Of course she isn't," retorted Selina. "As nearly as I can make out it's nip and tuck between Marian and this Jane Allen as to which of them will run the sophomore class. One has about as much principle as the other. Marian has been nice to us. The Allen girl has never bothered herself to get acquainted with us. I understand she's very haughty. I should have really enjoyed keeping her off the team, but I didn't dare do it." "Then you think we ought to stick to Marian?" Laura asked rather dubiously. "Yes. Why not? So long as it suits us to do it. We can easily handle her if she shows her claws. She won't, though. She knows that I could drop her from the team if I chose. She won't dare say a word because the rest of the team are against her. I'll very quickly remind her of it if she is wrathy about to-day's affair." "Suppose anything--well--disagreeable for us--should come of it?" Despite Selina's assurances, Laura was not quite satisfied. "What do you mean?" queried Selina impatiently. "Suppose Miss Stearns' friends should take it up and raise a regular riot about it? A lot of sophs went over to her after the try-out. You saw them and heard them cheering her. Dorothy Martin was there with the crowd. She went straight to them from us. I tell you, I don't like it, Selina. I think we were foolish to lay ourselves open to criticism. We're seniors, you know, and so are supposed to set a good example for the other classes." "Oh, stop worrying about it," roughly advised Selina. "Wait and see what happens. If the sophs start to fuss, I can soon settle them." "How?" demanded Laura incredulously. "By taking Marian off the team and putting the Stearns girls on," promptly informed Selina. "If I lose Marian's friendship by it, I'll gain Dorothy Martin's and Jane Allen's. As I'm not devoted to any of these girls, I'm not particular which side I'm on, so long as it's the side that does the most for me." CHAPTER XX THE RISE OF THE FRESHMAN TEAM Returned to Madison Hall that afternoon, Dorothy Martin went directly to her room to put into effect the spoken resolution she had made in the gymnasium. The brief note she dashed off in a strong, purposeful hand, read: "MY DEAR MISS BROWN: "Kindly appoint someone else in my place as referee for the coming games. I must firmly decline to act in that capacity. "Yours truly, "DOROTHY MARTIN." Deciding to send it through the regular mail channels, she stamped and addressed it, and promptly consigned it to the mail box. When it presently came into the hands of Selina Brown, it cost the latter some moments of uneasy speculation. She had not reckoned on Dorothy's going thus far. As it happened the note came as a climax to a trying session she had spent with Marian Seaton on the previous evening. Marian had come over to Creston Hall after dinner with blood in her eye. She was decidedly out of sorts over the partial failure of her scheme and did not hesitate to take Selina to task for it. Selina, as her elder and a senior, had vast ideas of her own regarding the proper amount of respect due her from a mere sophomore. Armed with a dignity too great to descend to open quarrel, she soon reduced angry Marian to reason. "You ought to be thankful to me for putting you on the team," she had coldly reminded. "Goodness knows Laura and I have had trouble enough over it already. I proved my friendship for you. Now be good enough to appreciate it and stop criticizing me. I consider it in very bad taste." After Marian had finally departed in a more chastened frame of mind, Selina pondered darkly concerning the "friendship" she had flaunted in Marian's face. She decided that Marian would have to show more appreciation if she expected any further favors. Dorothy's note served again to arouse in Selina renewed resentment toward Marian. She was now at odds with one of the most popular girls at Wellington, and what had she gained? A few automobile rides and dinners, bestowed upon her by a girl in whom gratitude was a minus quality. Selina was distinctively aggrieved. She could only hope, as she carefully reduced Dorothy's note to bits and dropped them into the waste basket, that this was the end of the matter. It had all been aggravating in the extreme. Three days passed and nothing more happened. She had half expected that the four friends of Judith who had made the team might send in their resignations. She wished they would. A new team would be far less likely to give trouble later on. But no resignations arrived. In fact, a visit to the gymnasium on the third afternoon revealed the sophomore team at practice. She wondered how Marian had the temerity to go calmly to work with four girls whom she detested, and who in turn must heartily detest her. Aside from Marian, who beamed and nodded to her, no one else on the team appeared to note her presence. It was mortifying, to say the least. But the end was not yet. Though Dorothy had made no secret of her resignation from basket-ball activities, it took the news several days to reach the ears of the freshman class. "Too bad Dorothy's given up referee's post this year, isn't it?" was the casual remark that set the ball of reinstatement rolling. It was made to a member of the freshman team by Alice Kirby. There was a purposeful gleam in her eye despite the apparent carelessness of the comment. It immediately provoked a volley of questions, which Alice answered with prompt alacrity. The effect upon the freshman was electrical. She left Alice post haste to gather up her teammates and hold a council of war. The very next afternoon the council waited upon Miss Rutledge with a most amazing story. They wanted to play basket-ball that year. Oh, very much indeed! Still, they didn't care to play without Dorothy Martin as referee. Yes, Dorothy had been appointed by Miss Brown, but she had resigned. No, it was not because she was too busy. Yes, they knew the reason. They could not blame her. Nevertheless they wanted her back. It did not take long after this to explain that Dorothy had resigned because Judith Stearns had been unfairly treated. Everyone who had been at the try-out must know that Judy Stearns had outplayed Marian Seaton. She had not been chosen but Marian had. Dorothy had protested to Miss Brown. It had done no good. So she had resigned. Miss Rutledge had listened patiently to the tale poured forth by the justice-seeking quintette. When it had ended she quietly promised them that she would look into the matter and see what could be done. On the following morning, Dorothy, Laura Nelson and Selina each found a note awaiting them in the house bulletin board, requesting them to call on Miss Rutledge at four-thirty that afternoon. Dorothy was frankly puzzled over her note. Having a clear conscience she could think of no reason for the summons. Selina, however, was apprehensive. Immediately she jumped to the conclusion that Dorothy had reported her to Miss Rutledge. Laura was also of the same opinion. As the two Creston Hall girls walked dejectedly down a corridor of Wellington Hall to the dean's office that afternoon, sight of Dorothy just ahead of them confirmed their worst fears. Invited by Miss Rutledge to take seats, the three bowed distantly to one another. "I sent for you three young women," began Miss Rutledge, "because of a rather peculiar story which has come to my ears concerning the recent basket-ball try-out. The freshman team is up in arms because you have given up referee's post, Miss Martin. They wish you to keep the position. They have requested me to take the matter up with you in their behalf." Selina and Laura both looked amazement at this statement. It was certainly not what they had expected. Dorothy too showed marked surprise. An amused little smile hovered about her lips. "It is nice in them to want me," she said gravely. "I appreciate their loyalty. That is all I can say." "That is hardly enough to satisfy them or me," replied the dean. "I must ask you to tell me why you resigned your post." "I would rather not answer that," Dorothy said with gentle firmness. "Very well. I will ask you another question. Did you resign because you considered that Miss Stearns had been unfairly treated at the try-out?" Dorothy hesitated, then answered with a low, "Yes." "Please explain in what way she was unfairly treated," relentlessly pursued the dean. "Miss Stearns made a better showing at the try-out than Miss Seaton. She was one of the five best players. Miss Seaton would have ranked eighth in my opinion. She was chosen instead of Miss Stearns." "You were one of the judges, I believe?" "Yes. My choice was Miss Stearns." "You were also one of the judges, Miss Brown?" The dean had now turned to Selina. "Yes." "And you, Miss Nelson?" "Yes." A guilty flush dyed Laura's cheeks. "Two against one in favor of Miss Seaton?" commented Miss Rutledge. "Let me ask you two young women this. Were you both satisfied in your own minds that Miss Seaton was the better player?" "I was," declared Selina boldly. "I--I----" The scrutiny of the dean's steady eyes disconcerted Laura. She could not bring herself to look into them and utter a deliberate untruth. "I--it was hard to judge between them," she finally faltered. "They--they were almost equally matched in my opinion." "Still, you must have thought Miss Seaton a little the better player, else you would not have chosen her," asserted Miss Rutledge smoothly. "We had the right to our opinion," broke in Selina quickly, determined to save Laura from crumpling to the point of blurting forth the truth. "That is true," agreed the dean, "provided it was a fair opinion. Miss Martin states that it was not." "Miss Martin has no business to say that," retorted Selina hotly. "She has, if that is her opinion. She has the same privilege that you have," was the grave reminder. "According to the statement just made by Miss Nelson, she was not at all sure of Miss Seaton's playing superiority over that of Miss Stearns. In that case, why did you not order the game resumed, especially to test out these two players? That would have been the best method of procedure." "Because it wasn't necessary. Miss Nelson gave her decision at once in favor of Miss Seaton." "She seemed decidedly uncertain just now about it," said the dean dryly. "As it happens, the members of the freshman team are of the same opinion as Miss Martin. They claim that Miss Stearns completely outplayed Miss Seaton. That it was too evident to be overlooked. I might investigate this affair more thoroughly, but I do not wish to do so. As seniors, all of you should be above reproach. Each knows best, however, what is in her heart." Laura wriggled uncomfortably, looking ready to cry. Selina put on an air of studied indifference. Dorothy presented the calm serenity of one whose integrity cannot be assailed. For a long silent moment the dean's eyes traveled from face to face. Then she said: "We shall settle this matter by another try-out to-morrow afternoon at half-past four. I shall attend it. When you leave here, Miss Brown, kindly post a notice in the bulletin board calling the sophomore team to practice to-morrow. State that it is by my order. Miss Martin, please notify Miss Stearns that I wish her to be there, also, ready to play. I will appoint two seniors to act with me as judges. I am familiar, as you know, with the game. This try-out will not affect the other members of the team. We shall drop one of them temporarily to give Miss Stearns the opportunity of playing against Miss Seaton. I rarely interfere in the matter of college sports, but in this instance I feel compelled to take action." "I suppose, if Miss Stearns wins, it will mean the loss of my position as senior manager!" exclaimed Selina. She was too thoroughly disgruntled to realize to whom she was speaking. "Why should it? You have assured me of your honesty of purpose," flashed back the dean. Selina's discourteous manner of addressing her she could ignore. The import of the speech was, however, another matter. It contained self-condemnation. Selina herself realized her mistake the instant Miss Rutledge replied. She turned red as a peony. "I--I--just thought you might wish to appoint someone else," she said lamely. "If you had admitted to me that you treated Miss Stearns unfairly, it would certainly become necessary to appoint another manager," replied Miss Rutledge. "You have not done so. In fact you have stated quite the opposite. On the contrary, I must also accept Miss Martin's word that she is speaking the truth as she sees it." "Thank you, Miss Rutledge," was Dorothy's sole comment. "If Miss Stearns wins against Miss Seaton at the new try-out it will be by pure luck," declared Selina, with a desperate attempt at retrieving her previous incautious remark. "There will, at least, be no question of unfair treatment involved." The blunt reply should have warned Selina that she was not bettering her case. Instead, her belated attempt at caution flew away on the wings of anger. "I think it's very unfair to Marian Seaton to hold another try-out!" she exclaimed. "She won her position on the team fairly enough. This whole affair is nothing but a plot to put Miss Stearns on the team and drop Miss Seaton from it. Miss Stearns has four friends on the sophomore team who have persuaded the freshman team to do what they themselves don't dare do. As Miss Martin has frankly accused both Miss Nelson and myself of unfairness, I will say plainly that I think her a party to the plot. I dare say Miss Stearns knows all about it." "Miss Brown, you are not here to criticize my methods," sternly rebuked the dean. "Granted that you are entitled to your own opinion, harsh as it is, you must either be in a position to prove your accusations or else not make them. Can you prove them?" "No, I can't. Neither can Dorothy Martin prove hers." "I can obtain the signatures of at least thirty girls who were of the same mind as myself at the try-out." It had come to a point where Dorothy refused longer to remain mute. Incensed by Selina's bold attempt to malign her friends and herself, she now turned to Miss Rutledge and said: "I wish you to know, Miss Rutledge, that the four sophomores chosen, besides Miss Seaton, to make the team fully intended to resign from it because of their loyalty to Miss Stearns. She begged them not to do so. She was very brave over the disappointment. I am positive that neither she nor her friends would be guilty of asking the girls of the freshman team to take up the matter. Certainly I would not." "I know you would not," quietly reassured the dean. "We will drop this discussion where it now stands. It is unbecoming, to say the least. I am greatly annoyed that it should have arisen among members of the senior class. It is ended. Let it be forgotten. The try-out to-morrow will decide the question. I would prefer you not to give up your position as referee, Miss Martin. Will you reconsider your resignation?" "I will, since you desire it." Dorothy bowed acquiescence. "Then the matter is settled," was the concluding announcement. "I shall expect all three of you to be present at the try-out to-morrow afternoon." This was virtually a command. Had Selina dared, she would have coldly declined to obey it. As it was she said nothing. Miss Rutledge's tones indicating that the interview was concluded, she rose, bade the dean a chilly "Good afternoon," and departed, accompanied by Laura. Dorothy also rose to go, but the dean detained her with a kindly: "Just a moment, Dorothy. I wish a private word with you. I know you too well to believe you to be at fault in this matter." "I am not at fault, Miss Rutledge," was the composed answer. "I thank you for believing in me." "There seems to be a great deal more behind this affair than appears on the surface," the dean said significantly. "That is true," Dorothy affirmed. "Since the beginning of last year a struggle has been going on here at Wellington between right and wrong. The girl who represents right is too noble to complain. She will fight things out unaided, and she will win." "You refer to Judith Stearns?" interrogated the dean. "No; not Judith." Dorothy shook her head. "Judith has merely been used as a scapegoat. I would prefer not to say more. The girl who is in the right would not wish it. She has been advised to come to you, but refuses to do so. She is very determined on that point." "And you approve of her stand?" The dean eyed Dorothy quizzically. "Yes." Dorothy's affirmative came unhesitatingly. "I should feel the same under similar circumstances." "Then you would advise me not to go too deeply into things?" There was a decided twinkle in the dean's eyes as she said this. She had known Dorothy too long not to feel the utmost confidence in her. "I can't imagine myself as advising Miss Rutledge," she said prettily, her sober face lighting into a smile. The smile, instantly returned, indicated perfect understanding. "I think you are right, Dorothy. I shall not interfere, except in the matter of a new try-out, unless I am approached by the girl of whom you speak. Frankly, I have no idea of whom she may be. These disagreements among the students at Wellington seldom reach my ears. When they do I always endeavor to see justice done the wronged party." When Dorothy had presently left her, however, Miss Rutledge sat pondering over the intricacies of girl nature. Hailing from the far West she was inclined to view the world from a man's standpoint. She was, therefore, wholly in sympathy with a girl who could sturdily fight her own battles without asking help of anyone. She could almost wish that the identity of such an one might some day be revealed to her. CHAPTER XXI REINSTATEMENT Outside Wellington Hall, Laura and Selina stopped long enough to hold a hurried conversation. As a result they both set their faces toward Madison Hall to inform Marian Seaton of what was in store for her. "It's simply outrageous!" she stormed, when Selina had gloomily finished relating the dire news. "I won't go to the gym to-morrow. Miss Rutledge has no right to interfere with the teams." "She seems to think she has," shrugged Selina. "You'll have to do one of two things. Either resign now from the team, or go to the try-out to-morrow and take your chance of winning against Miss Stearns." "I won't do either," flatly declared Marian. "I made the team and I won't be cheated of my position on it." "Do you think you can outplay Miss Stearns?" asked Laura anxiously. "You didn't the other day, you know." "You'd best resign," cut in Selina sharply, without giving Marian time to answer Laura's question. "If you go to the gym to-morrow it's going to create a lot of gossip about Laura and me. Dorothy Martin hasn't made a secret of her opinion of the other try-out. With Miss Rutledge there to-morrow as one of the judges and neither Laura nor I acting with her, it's going to look pretty bad for us." "I tell you I sha'n't be there to-morrow," snapped Marian. "Then you'll get yourself into trouble with Miss Rutledge and lose your position anyway," returned Selina with equal asperity. "I've already told you that I have received instructions to post a notice calling the sophomore team to practice by her order. If you resign now, that will end the whole thing. Of course the Stearns girl will get your position on the team. Still you can save your own dignity and ours by pretending in your resignation that you are deeply hurt. You can say, too, that you would have been very willing to give up your position on the team to Miss Stearns if you'd understood that she wanted it so much." "But I'm not willing to do any such thing," angrily contended Marian. "I'll take my chance against Judith Stearns to-morrow before I'll tamely resign like that. Come to think of it, it would be much more dignified on my part to go to the gym. You, not I, have been accused of unfairness. You put me on the team, you know." "Yes, and why did I?" flung back Selina hotly. "Because you asked me to do it. Now you think you can hang the unfairness on my shoulders and slip free of it yourself. Well, you can't. I know that Judith Stearns can outplay you. If I thought she couldn't, I'd say go ahead. But she can. As you won't resign of your own accord, I'm going to demand your resignation. If you don't give it to me in writing, I'll go straight back to Miss Rutledge and tell her the whole thing. I'd rather confess to her than have everybody down on Laura and me after to-morrow." "You wouldn't do that. You can't scare me," sneered Marian. "Oh, wouldn't I? Wait a little. You'll see." "You'd be expelled from college. Just remember that. You'd find yourself worse off than if you kept still," triumphantly prophesied Marian. "_We_ wouldn't be expelled. _You_ probably would be. We'd be severely reprimanded and Miss Rutledge would be down on us for the rest of the year. But you started the whole thing. You're the real offender. It would go hard with you." "I'm sorry I asked you to help me, Selina Brown!" Marian exclaimed bitterly. "You're a treacherous snake! After all I've done for you, you turn against me like this." For the next five minutes she continued to express her candid and very uncomplimentary opinion of Selina. When she paused to take breath, Selina's only retaliation was, "Come on, Laura. We'll have to hurry if we expect to catch Miss Rutledge in her office. I suppose we'd best go to her house and wait for her. We'll be surer of seeing her then." It had the desired effect. Marian crumpled, shed a few tears of pure rage, but finally wrote the resignation which Selina dictated. "It worked!" was Selina's relieved exclamation, the moment they were out of Madison Hall. "She's a great coward, for all her boldness. She gave in more easily than I'd expected. You can imagine me confessing anything like that to Miss Rutledge, now can't you?" Selina accompanied the query with a derisive laugh. It was echoed by Laura, though rather nervously. "It was horrid to have to bully her." Laura made a gesture of distaste. "I'm glad we're safely out of it. We'd best keep out of such tangles hereafter, and let the sophs alone." "I intend to," Selina said with grim decision. "I shall keep the managership of the teams, but I'll steer clear of trouble after this. Now let's hustle home. I must write Miss Rutledge a note and enclose Marian's resignation. I'll ask her to answer, stating whether it is satisfactory and asking what I am to do. I'll pretend that I found the resignation waiting for me at Creston Hall." Half an hour later, Selina had written her letter and dispatched it to Warburton Hall, the faculty house where Miss Rutledge lived, by the small son of Mrs. Ingram, the matron of Creston Hall. When the dean had read and re-read the two communications, she looked decidedly grave. After a brief interval of thoughtful meditation, she wrote Selina the following reply: "DEAR MISS BROWN: "Kindly write to Miss Seaton and accept her resignation from the sophomore team. Do not post the notice I requested you to post. It will not be necessary. Write to Miss Stearns notifying her that Miss Seaton has resigned from the team and that I wish her to accept the position thus left vacant. "Yours truly, "GERTRUDE RUTLEDGE." When the next morning's mail brought Judith the amazing news, unwillingly penned by Selina Brown, she was literally dumfounded. The mail arriving while she was at breakfast, she garnered the note from the house bulletin board on her way upstairs from the dining-room. "For goodness' sake, read this!" she almost shouted, bursting in upon Jane, who was preparing to go to her first recitation. "I don't know what to make of it!" A slow smile dawned on Jane's lips as she perused the agitating note. "Marian never resigned by her own accord," she said. "It looks as though her scheme had somehow proved a boomerang. Someone stood up for you, Judy, mighty loyally. Miss Rutledge's name being mentioned in the note tells me that. Was it Dorothy, I wonder? No; it wasn't. She promised us that she wouldn't go to Miss Rutledge about it." "It's a mystery to me," declared Judith. "I don't know what to do. I wonder----" A rapping at the door sent her scurrying to open it. "Why, Dorothy!" she exclaimed. "How did you know I wanted to see you?" "I didn't know. I came because I have a special message for you from Miss Rutledge. She sent for me to come to her last night after dinner. I spent the evening with her and arrived here too late to see you. I was dying to tell Jane this morning at breakfast, but couldn't, of course, until I'd seen you. I'm glad you're both here. By the way, Judy, did you receive a note from Selina Brown?" "I certainly did," emphasized Judith. "What's the answer to all this, Dorothy? I was never more astonished in all my life than when I read her note. What made Marian Seaton resign from the team, and why does Miss Rutledge want me to take her place? I'd just about made up my mind to go and ask her, when you came." "You needn't," smiled Dorothy. "She has asked me to explain things to you in confidence. I'm going to take the liberty of including Jane. I'll explain why presently." "I won't feel hurt if you don't, Dorothy," Jane said earnestly. "Perhaps you'd really rather tell Judy alone." "No. I want you to hear the whole thing," Dorothy insisted. Whereupon she recounted what had occurred on the previous afternoon in the dean's office. "I wanted you to know, Jane, just why I told Miss Rutledge that this affair was a hang-over from last year. I know she has no idea of whom I meant by the girl who was standing up for right. She may suspect Marian as being the other girl. I can't say as to that. I'm glad she knows now that there is such a condition of affairs at Wellington. She will not forget it if anything else comes up. She will be very well able to put two and two together, if need be." "I'd never go to her of my own accord," Jane said with an emphatic shake of her russet head. "You might be sent for some day, just as I was yesterday," returned Dorothy. "But you haven't yet explained why Marian resigned, Dorothy," reminded Judith. "What did Miss Rutledge say about it?" "She said that she had received a note from Selina, with Marian's resignation enclosed. Marian's reason for resigning was that she had learned you were dissatisfied over her appointment on the team. She preferred to give you her position rather than have you continue to make trouble about it." Dorothy's lips curled scornfully as she said this. "Then I won't accept it!" Judith blazed into sudden anger. "The idea of her writing such things about me! How can Miss Rutledge ask me to replace Marian after that? I won't do it." "Yes, Judy, you must," Jane declared quietly. "Marian wrote that hoping you'd hear of it and refuse. She knew you'd insist on learning the particulars before you accepted. Miss Rutledge has shown her faith in you by asking you to replace Marian on the team." "Selina Brown is behind the whole thing," asserted Dorothy. "I believe it," quickly concurred Jane. "It's easy to see through things. She didn't want another try-out; so she made Marian resign. She must have used a pretty strong argument to do it. It was a case of the biter being bitten, I imagine." "Exactly," Dorothy agreed. "Selina Brown and Laura Nelson ought to have more principle than engage in anything so dishonorable. They've managed to wriggle out of it at Marian's expense, but they have both lost caste by it. Depend upon it, a great many girls here will have their own opinion of the whole affair and it won't be complimentary to Marian, Selina and Laura." "Someone may say that I am to blame for Marian's resigning," advanced Judith doubtfully. "Someone undoubtedly will," concurred Jane, "but it won't carry much weight. You have too many friends, Judy, to bother your head about the spiteful minority. You were unfairly dealt with at the try-out. That's generally known. Now you've come into your own through a hitch in Marian's plans. She couldn't get back on the team again under any circumstances. You're not standing in her way. Don't stand in your own." "I guess I'd better accept," Judith reluctantly conceded. "From now on I shall go armed to the teeth. Marian Seaton is apt to camp on my trail," she added with a giggle. "Good gracious, girls! Look at the time! We'll be late to chapel." Absorbed in conversation, the trio had completely forgotten how swiftly time was scudding along. "Late to chapel! Chapel will be over before ever we get there if you don't hurry!" exclaimed Jane ruefully. Accordingly the three made a hasty exit from the room and the Hall, hurrying chapelwards at a most undignified pace. That afternoon Judith sent her letter of acceptance to Selina Brown. The next day she reported in the gymnasium for practice with her old teammates. It was a joyful reunion, made more conspicuous by the attendance of a goodly number of sophomores, who had got wind of the news and who cheered Judith lustily when she appeared. The freshman team, who had so loyally fought for her, also made it a point to drop in on the practice and offer their congratulations. The jubilant majority was undoubtedly heart and soul for Judith. Whatever the "spiteful minority," as Jane had put it, thought of her, she quite forgot in the delight of being at last really and truly on the official team. "We certainly are a fine combination!" exulted Christine at the end of an hour's spirited work with the ball. "The freshmen will have to look out. And to think they were the ones to give Judy back to us!" Christine, Adrienne and Barbara were among the few who knew that the freshman team had protested to Miss Rutledge. The five freshmen themselves had kept the matter fairly quiet. They had been sent for and privately informed by Miss Rutledge that Miss Seaton had resigned from the sophomore team of her own accord and that Miss Stearns was entitled to the vacancy. They had also been gravely charged to let that end all discussion of the subject. Their point gained, they obeyed orders, except for a certain amount of curious speculation among themselves as to how it had come about. In the end they agreed that Marian must have heard of their visit to Miss Rutledge and resigned out of pure mortification. Jane, Judith and Dorothy kept the greater knowledge of the affair to themselves. Not even Adrienne knew the true facts. Selina Brown and Laura Nelson also found wisdom in silence. They were not hunting further trouble. They had had enough. Selina had been allowed to keep her managership of the teams, and was shrewd enough to appreciate that another slip would be decidedly disastrous to her. Thereafter she became such a stickler for fair play as to prove decidedly amusing to at least three girls. Marian Seaton found refuge in the "hurt feelings" policy as dictated to her by Selina. To her particular satellites she posed as a martyr and affected a lofty disdain for "certain girls who have no principle." Inwardly she was seething with resentment against Judith. She confided to Maizie, her stand-by, that she didn't know which of the two she hated most, Judith Stearns or Jane Allen. She laid her latest defeat, however, at Judith's door. She believed that Judith had been the secret means of inciting the freshman team to protest and she was determined to be even. Furthermore, she confided to Maizie that it would be only a matter of time until Judith Stearns must lose every friend she had. CHAPTER XXII MAKING OTHER PEOPLE HAPPY Following on the heels of Judith's advent into the team came an unheralded and wonderful surprise for Dorothy Martin. One crisp Saturday afternoon in early November, Jane Allen ran up the steps of Madison Hall, her face radiant. Attired in riding clothes, she had just come from the stable, where she had left Firefly after a long canter across country. Into the house and up the stairs she dashed at top speed, bound for Dorothy Martin's room. "Come," called a cheerful voice, in answer to her energetic rapping. "Oh, Dorothy!" Jane fairly bounced into the room. "Get on your hat and coat and come along. I've something to show you." "What is it? Where is it?" gaily queried Dorothy. "To mend or not to mend, that is also the question. Shall I go on mending my pet blouse that's falling to pieces altogether too fast to suit me, or drop it and go gallivanting off with you?" "There's no question about it. You must come. If you don't, you'll be sorry all the rest of the year," predicted Jane. "Now sit and mend your old pet blouse if you dare!" "I dare--not," Dorothy laughed. Rising she laid aside the silk blouse she was darning and went to the wardrobe for her wraps. "I'm a very poor senior these days," she added. "I can't buy a new blouse every day in the week. I have to make my old ones last a long time." "You always look sweet, Dorothy," praised Jane, "so you don't need to care whether your blouses are old or new. They're never anything but dainty and trim." "Thank you for those glorious words of praise," was Dorothy's light retort. "You're welcome, but do hurry," urged Jane. "Where do we go from here?" quizzed Dorothy as they started down the drive. "I sha'n't tell you. Wait and see, Miss Impatience. This is a very mysterious journey." In this bantering strain the two continued on to the western gate of the campus, passed through and started down the highway. "I know where we're going!" finally exclaimed Dorothy. "We're going to the stable to see Firefly! Funny I didn't guess it before, with you in riding clothes. You're going to show me some new trick you've taught Firefly. There! Did I guess right?" "Yes, and no. That's all I'll tell you. Come on. One minute more and you'll see the great sight." Jane caught Dorothy's hand and rushed her toward the stable. Still keeping firm hold on her friend, she led her straight to the roomy box-stall which accommodated Firefly. "Oh, Jane!" Dorothy cried out in sudden rapture. "What a beautiful horse. Why, he looks almost enough like Firefly to be his brother. Where did you get him? What in the world are you going to do with two horses?" "He's not mine," Jane replied. "He is----" She stopped, her gray eyes dancing. "He belongs to a dear friend of mine. Her name is Dorothy Martin." Dorothy stared, as though wondering if Jane had suddenly taken leave of her senses. "Wake up, Dorothy!" Jane laid an affectionate hand on Dorothy's shoulder. "He's yours. Dad sent him to you. He's come all the way from Capitan to see you. Aren't you going to say 'How de do' to him?" "Jane--I----" Dorothy turned and hid her head against Jane's shoulder. "This is a nice way to welcome poor Midnight," laughed Jane, as her arm went round Dorothy. Her own voice was not quite steady. "I--I--it's too much," quavered Dorothy, raising her head. "I can't believe that beauty is for me. It's too wonderful to be true. I must be dreaming." "But it _is_ true. If you don't believe me, read this." Jane drew a square, white envelope from the pocket of her riding coat and offered it to Dorothy. "It's for you, from Dad," she explained. "I've been keeping it until Midnight came. This is the outcome of a plot. A real plot between Dad and me." Dorothy took the letter, her eyes still misty. "We'll read it together, Jane," she said. Arms entwined about each other's waists, the two girls read Henry Allen's letter to his daughter's friend. "DEAR MISS DOROTHY," it began. "Jane has written me that Firefly complains a great deal about being lonely. He misses Midnight, an old chum of his. So I decided that Midnight might come East, provided he had someone to look after his welfare. Jane has told me so much about you, and that you resemble one who, though gone from us, grows ever dearer with years. "Because of this, and because of your many kindnesses to my girl, I hope you will accept Midnight for your own special pet. He is very gentle and, in my opinion, quite as fine a little horse as Firefly. You cannot, of course, expect Jane to say that. I send him to you with my very best wishes and trust that you and Jane will have many long rides together. "My sister and I look forward to meeting you next summer. Jane tells me that she will surely bring you home with her when college closes next June. We shall be delighted to welcome you to El Capitan. My sister joins me in sending you our kindest regards. "Yours sincerely, "HENRY ALLEN." "It's just like good old Dad!" Jane cried out enthusiastically. "You'll love Midnight, Dorothy. Come and get acquainted with him. I've a whole pocketful of sugar for him and Firefly." In a daze of happiness Dorothy followed Jane into the roomy stall and was soon making friendly overtures to Midnight, who responded most amiably. There was still one more feature of the program, however, which Jane hardly knew how to bring forward. "Dorothy," she began rather hesitatingly. "I hardly know how to say it, but--well--this stall is large enough for both Midnight and Firefly. They were chums at home and will get along beautifully together. Won't you let me look after them both? You know what I mean?" "I'm glad you came out frankly with that, Jane." Dorothy's color had heightened. "No, I couldn't let you do that. I shouldn't feel right about it. I've been thinking hard ever since I read your father's letter. I believe it's right for me to accept Midnight, because you both want me to have him and have gone to so much trouble to bring him here. I've thought of a way out of the difficulty. Only yesterday a freshman came to me and asked me to tutor her in trigonometry. She's been conditioned already and needs help. I told her I'd let her know. I wasn't sure whether I wanted to do it. I've never tutored and I could get along without the extra money. But now, it will come in just beautifully. I can earn enough to pay for Midnight's keep. You understand how I feel about it." "Yes. I know I'd feel the same," nodded Jane. "That's why I hated to say anything. I want you to do whatever you think best. Anyway, Firefly and Midnight can be in the same stall and that will help some. You must let me do that much." "It will help a great deal. I'm not sure that I ought to let you do even that," demurred Dorothy. "Of course you ought," Jane said sturdily. "You must mind Dad, you know. He depends on you to look after Midnight's welfare. This is the largest, nicest stall in the stable. Now you must see your saddle. It's Mexican and almost like mine. I put it in the locker with mine. They're too valuable to be left lying about loose." Lingering for some little time while Dorothy made further acquaintance with her new possession, the two girls strolled back to the Hall through the November dusk. Dorothy was exuberantly joyful over the wonderful thing that had happened to her, and correspondingly grateful to those responsible for it. Jane was also brimming with quiet happiness. She wished every other day of her sophomore year could be as delightful as this one. What splendid rides she and Dorothy would have together! Jane left Dorothy at the door of the latter's room and went on to her own in a beatific state of mind. It was certainly far more blessed to give than to receive. "Well, how did the gift party come off?" was Judith's question, as Jane closed the door behind her. Judith was the only one who had been let into the secret. "Oh, splendidly!" Jane exclaimed. "She fell in love with Midnight the minute she saw him. I wish you rode, Judy. I'd have Dad send you a horse, too." "Of course you would, generous old thing," was the affectionate reply. "But I'm not to be trusted with a noble steed. Neither would I trust said steed. I can admire Firefly, but at a safe distance. I'd rather stick to the lowly taxi or my two feet to carry me over the ground. By the way, did you look at the bulletin board on your way upstairs?" "No; I didn't stop. I saw a couple of the girls reading a notice. What's happened?" "Our dear Marian has met with a loss." Judith's grin belied her mournful accents. "Not her position on the team. Oh, my, no! She's not advertising _that_. She's lost a valuable diamond ring, and has offered twenty-five dollars reward to the finder. The very idea! Just as if a Wellington girl would accept a reward if she happened to find the ring. I call that an insult." "It's bad taste, to say the least." Jane looked slightly scornful. "Does the notice state where she believes she lost the ring?" "Yes; it says, 'Somewhere between Madison Hall and the library, or in Madison Hall.' Between you and me, I wonder if she really did lose a ring? It would be just like her to start this new excitement about herself on purpose to get sympathy. She must be awfully peeved yet over basket-ball. I feel almost like a villain at practice. Still, it certainly wasn't my fault." "I'm thankful there's no one here at the Hall she could lay suspicion upon," frowned Jane. "Norma's beyond reach of injustice now. I'd rather hope it was a real loss than a camouflage." "Well, she might say that I had stolen it. Wouldn't that be a glorious revenge?" Judith jokingly inquired. "Don't be so ridiculous, Judy Stearns." Jane's frown changed to a smile at this far-fetched supposition on Judith's part. "Oh, she'll probably find it again one of these days, after everyone's forgotten about it and gone on to some other great piece of news," Judith unfeelingly asserted. "You see how sympathetic I am." "I see. I also see the clock. It's time I changed these riding togs for a dress. I'll barely have time before the dinner gong sounds." Jane rose from the chair she had briefly occupied while listening to Judith, and began hurriedly to remove her riding habit. Quickly rearranging her thick, curling hair, she dived into the closet that held her own and Judith's dresses. Selecting a fur-trimmed frock of dark green broadcloth, she hastily got into it. As she hooked it a little smile played about her lips. The news of Marian's loss already forgotten, Jane was again thinking of the pleasant little scene enacted in the boarding stable, where Firefly and Midnight now stood side by side. "You must go down to the stable with us to-morrow and look Midnight over, Judy," she suddenly remarked, then went on with an enthusiastic description of Dorothy's new treasure. * * * * * While she thus dwelt at length upon Midnight's good points, in a room not far distant two girls were conducting a most confidential session. "How long do you think we ought to wait before--well, you know?" Marian Seaton was asking. "Oh, about three weeks, I should say," lazily returned Maizie Gilbert. "We'll have to go slowly. It will take three or four months to do the thing properly. If we rushed it, it wouldn't be half as effective as to take our time. What about Elsie?" "We'll tell her about the dress business, but no more than that. She mustn't know a word about the rest. She has a frightful temper, you know. If she happened to get good and mad at me, she'd tell everything she knew to the very first person she ran across. She'll be properly shocked when she hears about the dress. We'll tell it to her as a great secret," planned Marian. "I won't say anything outright about the ring. I'll leave it to her to draw her own conclusions. She's rabid about Judy Stearns. It seems she has heard that Judy nicknamed her the 'ignoble Noble.'" "That's a funny one!" Maizie appeared to derive signal enjoyment from this revelation. "I fail to see anything funny about it." Marian stiffened perceptibly. "Please remember, Maiz, that Elsie is _my_ cousin." "Oh, I haven't forgotten it. That's a funny nickname, just the same." Maizie calmly declined to be thus easily suppressed. "It suits me to know that Elsie heard about it," Marian said, after an instant's vexed silence. She knew better than to continue to oppose Maizie. For one of her sluggish temperament, Maizie could turn decidedly disagreeable when she chose. "Yes, it comes in very nicely just now," drawled Maizie. "Elsie needs a spur to keep her going. Keep her in a rage and she's a fine little mischief-maker. Let her calm down and she's likely to crumple. She really has some idea of principle, only she doesn't know it. I wonder if she'll ever find it out." "Do you mean to insinuate that _I_ haven't?" demanded Marian crossly. "No; I say it plainly. Neither you nor I have any principle," declared Maizie with her slow smile. "We might as well be honest about it. We never are about anything else, you know. It doesn't worry me. It's rather interesting, I think. Keeping things stirred up relieves the dull monotony. There's always the chance that we may win. We have never won yet, you know. We're still here, though, and that's a consolation. This latest idea of yours ought to amount to something in the long run." "Really, Maiz, you are the most cold-blooded girl I ever met!" Marian cried out in exasperation. "Sometimes I feel as if I didn't understand you at all." "I don't pretend to understand myself," returned Maizie tranquilly. "It would be too much trouble to try. Besides, self-analysis might be fatal to my comfort. I might dig up a conscience, and that would be a bore. I'd rather take it easy and smile and be a villain still. Changes are so disagreeable. You'd find that out, if one came over me. You'd be minus a valuable ally." "Do you mean that as a threat?" Marian laughed. There was, however, a note of anxiety in her question. She had no desire to lose so valuable an ally as Maizie. "A threat? No. Don't be scared. I'm still wandering along under the Seaton banner. I suppose I'm rather fond of you, Marian. Don't know why, I'm sure. You're thoroughly selfish, and we quarrel continually. That's the real reason for it, I suspect. You keep things going. That's your chief charm. Then, too, you've been fair enough with me. Whatever you may do to others isn't my concern. I don't intend that it shall be. If I were to start in the other direction I couldn't stop halfway. I'd keep on going. Then where would you be? As I said before, 'Changes are disagreeable.' So I'm going to stay on your side and, take my word for it, it's a mighty good thing for you." CHAPTER XXIII A NEW FRIEND In spite of the peculiarly sinister talk between Marian Seaton and Maizie Gilbert, nothing unusual occurred during the next few weeks to disturb the peace of either Judith or Jane. Thanksgiving came and went with the usual round of college gaieties. Four days being too short a holiday to permit the majority of the Wellington girls going home, they remained at college and did much celebrating. On Thanksgiving Day the first in the series of three basket-ball games was played between the sophomores and the freshmen. The sophomores won, though the freshmen gave them a hard tussle, the score standing 22-18 in favor of the sophs when the hotly contested game ended. Both teams made a fine appearance on the floor. Neither team had adhered to class colors that year in choosing their basket-ball suits. The freshmen wore suits of navy blue, decorated with an old rose "F" on the front of the blouse. A wide rolling sailor collar of the same color further added to the effect. The sophomores had elected to be patriotic, and wore khaki-colored suits, unrelieved by a contrasting color. It was a decided innovation of its kind and they liked it. Afterward the sophomore team privately agreed that the girls of the freshman team were real thoroughbreds. They accepted their defeat in the most good-humored fashion and heartily congratulated their opponents on their playing. As Right Guard, Jane proved herself worthy of the position. She played with a dash and skill that was noticeable even above the good work of the other players. Her mind was too fully centered on the contest to realize this until at the end of the game she was mobbed by a crowd of enthusiastic sophs. They marched her in triumph twice around the gymnasium to the cheering, ringing accompaniment of "Who's Jane Allen? Right, right, right Guard!" Jane never forgot that stirring cry of "Right Guard!" It conveyed to her a higher meaning than mere basket-ball glorification. It fell upon her ears as an admonition to do well. To do right, to be right, and to stay right. It was almost as if she had been elected by her own soul to be a guardian of right. That night the losing freshman team did something unprecedented in the history of Wellington. They entertained their conquerors at dinner at Rutherford Inn. More, Jane was amazed to find herself the guest of honor and had to respond to the highly complimentary toast, "Right Guard Jane," given by Florence Durham, the freshman captain. So Jane's Thanksgiving holiday came and went in a blaze of well-earned glory. Happy in this unexpected appreciation of herself, which appeared to be steadily growing, she came to feel that things had at last begun to take an upward turn. With Christmas rapidly approaching and everything still serene, pleasant immunity from the disagreeable was still hers. Neither had Judith met with anything disturbing to her happiness, beyond an occasional spiteful glance from Marian Seaton when she chanced to encounter the latter in the Hall or on the campus. "I guess Marian has given up the ghost," Judith suddenly remarked to Jane one evening before dinner, as the two sat in their room going over their long Christmas lists. "I believe I ought to send her a consolation present. A wooden tiger on wheels would be nice. I saw some lovely ones in the Ten-Cent Store at Chesterford. All painted with dashing yellow and black stripes and fixed so that they waggle their heads when you touch 'em." "Don't mention her," grimaced Jane. "You'll break the spell. We've had absolute peace and rest since her last uprising. I wonder if she ever found her ring?" "I don't believe so. A girl told me not long ago that she saw Marian take the notice from the bulletin board and tear it up. She overheard her say that she might just as well have not posted it, for all the good it had done. That she had hoped that the reward she offered might count. But evidently it hadn't. Now what did she mean by that?" "Nothing or everything," shrugged Jane, and again turned her attention to her list of names. "More likely everything," Judith declared uncharitably. "She probably meant something dark and insinuating. I guess that the only person who could earn the reward would be herself. I can just imagine her returning the ring to herself and paying herself twenty-five dollars reward." Judith chuckled as she mentally visioned Marian Seaton graciously bestowing a reward upon herself. Jane smiled a little, also, but made no comment. Engaged in the delightful occupation of planning pleasure for her friends, she did not wish the subject of Marian Seaton to intrude upon it. "I don't have to worry about my present-buying this year," she presently remarked. "Aunt Mary will buy everything for me that I need. All I have to do is to send her a list of the presents I'm going to give and she will shop for me." "It was splendid in your father and your aunt to come to New York for the holidays," approved Judith warmly. "They both knew how disappointed I was last year because I couldn't go home for Christmas," Jane answered. "They are doing this for my special benefit. I surely appreciate it, for Dad loathes the East, and Aunt Mary hates railway traveling. I'm awfully sorry that neither you nor Dorothy can be with us. We'd love to have you, but I know that you want to be with your father, and Dorothy, of course, wants to be at home with her folks." "Yes, Father wants me at home this year. I'm glad we are to have the full three weeks' vacation. I don't imagine that twelve days business last year worked very well. The girls made such a fuss about it, and a lot of them came back late. I'm going to ask my aunt to give a house party for me at Easter. Then I'll invite all our crowd and we'll have a great old celebration. Christmas is a bad time for a college girl house party. Everyone's anxious to be at home with her own people. Easter's different." "Yes, that's true," nodded Jane. "What are you going to give our four freshmen, Judy?" "Long white gloves; a pair apiece," was the prompt reply. "They have none, I know, or they would have worn them at the freshman frolic." "That will be nice. I know what I'd like to give them. I believe they'd be pleased, too." "What?" Judith eyed Jane interestedly. "Furs. Not the most expensive, of course. I wouldn't care to overwhelm them. I thought of black fox muffs and scarfs for Kathie and Freda, and gray squirrel for Ida and Marie. None of them have furs. I have four or five sets and a fur coat, too. I feel selfish to have so much, when they have nothing." "That's perfectly sweet in you, Jane," lauded Judith. "You're always a generous old dear, though." "Why shouldn't I be generous?" demanded Jane. "Dad wants me to be. He never cares how much money I spend, but he likes to have me think about others. He's a great old giver himself. He says that the only way to take the curse off of having a lot of money is to use it in helping to make the other fellow happy. I wish I could take time to tell you all the kind things he's done with his money. It seems as though the more he gives the more he has." "If everyone who had money were like him we'd have an ideal world, I guess," declared Judith. "I have quite a lot of money coming to me when I'm twenty-one. I was named for my grandmother and she left it to me. When I get it I shall try to do as much good with it as I can. I don't want to be selfish. I'm afraid I think too much about my own pleasure, though." Jane smiled at this rueful confession. Judith was generous to a fault. She was always far happier in giving than in receiving. "You're not selfish, Judy," she assured. "We all think a good deal more about our own fun than we should, perhaps. We spend lots of money on spreads and dinners and treats. I've been thinking seriously about it lately. After Christmas, I'm going to invite our crowd to our room some evening and propose something that I believe we might agree to do. You needn't ask me what it is, for I sha'n't tell you." "All right, don't," grinned Judith. "I've enough on my mind now to keep me busy until after the holidays. I was never curious, even in my infancy. If I was, I don't recall it. In fact, I don't remember much about that particular period of my young life. I was born absent-minded, you know, and have never outgrown it." "You've done pretty well this year," smiled Jane. "You haven't committed a single crime, so far, along that line." "Shh!" Judith warned. "Praise is fatal. I'll surely do something now to offset it. I'm on the verge. Only yesterday noon I laid my little leather purse on my wash stand. After classes I met Mary Ashton on the campus and invited her to go to the drugstore with me to have hot chocolate. When I went to pay for it, I took my little silver soap dish out of my coat pocket. I'd grabbed it up and stuffed it in there instead of my purse. You can imagine how silly I felt! Mary had to pay for our chocolate. So I know that I'm on the verge. This Christmas rush has gone to my head. I'm going to make you censor every last package I send. I'm not to be trusted," Judith ended with a deep sigh. "I'll keep my eye on you," promised Jane, much amused at the affair of the soap dish. "Thank you; thank you!" Judith responded with exaggerated gratitude. "Now I must leave you. I promised Mrs. Weatherbee to go to her room before dinner. She just finished a perfectly darling white silk sweater she's been knitting for her niece. It has a pale blue collar and it's a dream. She wants to try it on me. I am about the same build as her niece." With this Judith departed, leaving Jane in rapt contemplation of her Christmas list. She was well satisfied with the selection of gifts she purposed to lay on the altar of friendship. She hoped she had forgotten no one. She decided to write at once to her Aunt Mary, who was already in New York, and enclose a list of the articles she wished her aunt to purchase for her. Judith presently returned to dwell animatedly on the beauties of the silk sweater. "It's the sweetest thing ever," she glowed. "It's awfully becoming to me. It's all finished and after dinner I'm going to take it out to mail for Mrs. Weatherbee. I told her I didn't know whether I could be trusted with it or not. I might run away with it." "Are you going to take it to the postoffice?" asked Jane. "If you are I have a letter I wish you'd mail there for me. I'd go with you but I have a frightfully long translation in French prose for to-morrow. I can't spare the time." "Oh, I'm only going as far as the package box at the east end of the campus. Mrs. Weatherbee's going to weigh and stamp the package here and send it special delivery instead of registering it." "Then you can drop my letter in the post box. That is, if I finish it before the dinner gong rings." Glancing up at the clock, which showed a quarter to six, Jane hastily resumed her writing. The gong sounding before the letter was completed, Judith obligingly volunteered to "hang around" after dinner until it was ready for mailing. "Now don't put this letter in your coat pocket, Judy," cautioned Jane, when half an hour after dinner she delivered it into Judith's keeping. "If you do, you'll forget it, mail the package and come marching back to the Hall with my letter still in your pocket. I'm anxious for it to be collected to-night; then Aunt Mary will get it some time to-morrow." "I'll mail it. Don't you worry," Judith assured. "I'll carry it in my hand every step of the way. It's raining. Did you know it? I hope it will turn to snow by to-morrow. I like the weather good and cold around Christmas time." "Oh, well, it's over a week until Christmas. We'll probably have plenty of snow by then," Jane commented. "Better take your umbrella." "Never!" refused Judith. "One package and a letter are about as much as I can safely carry at a time. I might jam the umbrella into the package box and come home with Mrs. Weatherbee's package held over my head. Let well enough alone, Jane. I'll wear my raincoat and run for it." Slipping on her raincoat and pulling a fur cap over her head, Judith took the letter and started off, stopping in the matron's room for the package she had offered to mail. "Whew!" was her salutation on reappearing in her room perhaps twenty minutes later. "Maybe it isn't raining, though, and it's as dark as can be. I put your letter and the package under my coat and made a mad dash for the mail box. Got rid of them both in a hurry, and made a still madder dash back home. Another time, I'll consult the weather before I offer my noble services as runner. Any way, your letter is on its way. So is the sweater, and the girl who gets it is lucky." "I'm ever so much obliged to you, Judy. I hope Aunt Mary sends my stuff right away, so that I'll have it on hand to give before I go to New York. It won't take more than two days to buy it. Allowing three for it to arrive, I'll have it in good season, I guess." The next few days were fraught with considerable anxiety for Jane, until the arrival of numerous huge express packages, set her doubts at rest. Then a busy season of wrapping and beribboning gifts ensued. The blessed fever of giving was abroad at Wellington and the cheerful bustle and stir of Christmas pervaded every nook and corner of college. Two evenings before Christmas, Jane and Judith invited their particular chums to their room for a good-bye spread. The party spent a jubilant evening, feasting and exchanging gifts and good wishes. On the next day, Jane and Judith bade each other an affectionate farewell and departed for their respective destinations. Adrienne and Norma accompanied Jane to New York, there to spend the holidays with the Duprees. Adrienne's distinguished mother was filling a long engagement at a theater there, and the Duprees had opened their home in New York for the time being. Norma expected to fill a two-weeks' engagement in a stock company, obtained for her by Mr. Dupree, and was to be the guest of the kindly Frenchman and his little family. The three girls were delighted at this state of affairs, as Jane looked forward to meeting the Duprees and Adrienne was equally eager to know Jane's father and aunt. In consequence, the trio had made countless holiday plans which they purposed to carry out. All in all, it was a red-letter three weeks for the three Wellington girls. Jane found New York a vastly different city when peopled by those dear to her. During her brief shopping trip there the previous winter she had not liked New York. Now she discovered that it was a most wonderful place in which to spend a holiday. In spite of the constant round of theaters, dinners, luncheons and sight-seeing into which she was whirled, she took time to look sharply about her for those to whom Christmas meant only a name. Accompanied by Mrs. Dupree, she and Adrienne made several visits to poverty-stricken sections of the great city, leaving substantial good cheer behind them. She also discovered a special protégé in a meek-faced young girl who occupied the position of public stenographer in the hotel where the Allens were staying. Dressed in deep mourning, the girl at once enlisted Jane's sympathy. She promptly made her acquaintance and the two girls became instantly friendly. It needed but the information that Eleanor Lane had recently, lost her mother to strengthen the bond of acquaintance to actual friendship. Democratic Henry Allen and his sister quite approved of Jane's interest in the lonely little stranger, and Eleanor was invited frequently to dine or lunch with them. "It seems odd," she said to Jane one afternoon near the end of the blissful holiday as Jane lingered beside her desk, "but your name has sounded familiar to me from the first. I've heard it before but I can't think when or where. I only know it's familiar. It bothers me not to be able to place it." "It's awfully aggravating to have a dim recollection of something and not be able to make it come clear," Jane agreed. "My name isn't an uncommon one. There may be dozens of Jane Allens in the world, for all I know." "Yes, there may be. I hear and see so many names, I wonder that I can ever keep any of them straight in my mind," smiled Eleanor. "Perhaps it will come to me all of a sudden some day. If it does, I'll write you about it." "Yes, do. You know we are going to correspond. When I come to New York again I shall surely look you up," declared Jane. "And you must come and spend a week-end with me at Wellington." Girl-fashion, the two had advanced to the "visiting" stage of friendship. Sad little Eleanor regarded Jane as a bright and wonderful star that had suddenly dawned upon her gray horizon. Jane liked Eleanor for her sweet amiability and pleasant, unassuming manner. She also admired her intensely, because Eleanor was actually engaged in successfully earning her own living. This, in itself, seemed quite marvelous to Jane, who had never earned a penny in her life. "Girls are really wonderful, after all, Dad," she confided to her father, as the two sat side by side on a big leather davenport in the sitting room of the Allens' private suite, indulging in a confidential talk. It was the last night of Jane's stay in New York. The next day would find her saying fond farewells to her father and aunt. They intended to remain in New York for a few days after Jane's departure for Wellington College, then make a brief tour of the larger eastern cities before returning to the West. "It seems queer to me now that I used to dislike them so much," Jane continued, shaking a deprecating head at her former adverse opinion of girls in general. "I wouldn't know what to do now without my girl friends. I seem to be making new ones all the time, too. There's Eleanor, for instance. I've grown ever so fond of her. I think it would be fine to have her make me a visit next summer. She never goes anywhere in particular. She just works hard all the time. Dorothy thinks she can't come to Capitan until August, so I could have Eleanor there in July." "Invite whom you please, Janie. The more the merrier. All I want is to see my girl happy," was the affectionate response. "And I _am_ happy, Dad," Jane ardently assured. "You and Aunt Mary have given me the finest Christmas I could possibly have. I'll go back to Wellington feeling as if I owned the earth. After such a glorious vacation as this has been, I'll have every reason in the world to be a good pioneer. I'll re-tackle my bit of college land for all I'm worth, and improve it as much as I can through the rest of my sophomore year. It looks a lot better already than it did last year." Jane spoke with the glowing enthusiasm of perfect happiness. The joy of Christmas had temporarily driven from her mind even the vexatious memory of Marian Seaton and her petty spite. Quite the contrary, Christmas had not reduced Marian to any such beatific state. She accepted it as a mere matter of course, and spent it in Buffalo, as the guest of Maizie Gilbert. Privately, she wished it over and done with. For once, she was impatient to return to Wellington, there to further a certain enterprise of her own from which she expected to gain decided results. CHAPTER XXIV THE LISTENER Returned to Wellington, Jane and Judith both agreed that in spite of their holiday fun, each had missed the other dreadfully. They had plenty to talk about and much to show each other in the way of beautiful gifts which had fallen to their lot. Judith was jubilant over the acquisition of a knitted white silk sweater, which she assured Jane was an exact counterpart of the one Mrs. Weatherbee had knitted for her niece. "My Aunt Jennie made it for me," she explained, as she proudly exhibited it to Jane. "I bought the silk and she did the work. I told her about the one Mrs. Weatherbee made for her niece and dandy Aunt Jennie offered to knit one for me like it. Wasn't that nice in her? I'm going to show it to the girls and then put it away until Spring. It will be sweet with a white wash satin skirt. I'm going to have some made just to wear with it. Let's give a spread, Jane, to the crowd. Then we can show them our Christmas presents. It will give you a chance, too, to get that great secret idea of yours off your mind. You see I haven't forgotten about it." Jane smilingly agreed that it would be a good opportunity and the spread was accordingly planned for the next evening. Christine, Barbara, Dorothy, Norma, Alicia, Adrienne, Ethel and Mary Ashton were the chosen few to be invited. It was not until the little feast provided by Judith and Jane had been eaten and the ten girls still sat about the makeshift banqueting board, that Jane, urged by Judith to "Speak up, Janie," began rather diffidently to speak of her cherished new idea. "I don't know whether you'll agree with me or not," she said. "If you don't, please say so frankly, because if we should decide to do what I'm going to propose we'll all have to be united in thinking it a good idea. "It's like this," she continued. "We all spend a good deal of money on luncheons and dinners and spreads. We feel, of course, that we have a perfect right to do as we please with our allowance checks. So we have. Still, when one stops to think about quite a number of girls at Wellington who are straining every nerve to put themselves through college, it seems a little bit selfish to spend so much on one's own pleasures. "Suppose we agreed to give only two spreads a month. There are ten of us here. We could each put a dollar a month into a common fund. That would give us ten dollars to spend on the two spreads, five dollars on each. During the month we'd see how much of our allowances we could save. Whatever we had left at the end of the month would go into the common fund. No one of us would be obliged to give any particular sum. Whatever we gave would be a good-will offering. One of us would be treasurer. We'd buy a toy-bank and the treasurer would take charge of it. Whenever one of us wanted to give something we'd go to her and drop the money in the bank. Not even she would know what we gave. The first of every new month she'd take the money out, count it and put it in the Chesterford Trust company for us." "But suppose we save quite a lot, what would we do with it?" asked Barbara Tennant. "We wouldn't need it for ourselves. We'd have to----" "That's what I'm coming to," interposed Jane. "We'd start a fund to help the poorer Wellington students along. There is no College Aid Society here. I don't know why none has ever been organized. I suppose there haven't been so very many poor girls at Wellington. Until three years ago there were no scholarships offered. There are only two now. There will be three soon. My father has promised me that." Jane's lips curved in a tender little smile, as she quietly made this announcement. There was no hint of boastful pride in her tones; nothing save becoming modesty and deep sincerity. "This money we collected would be open to any student to draw upon who made requisition for it," she explained. "But would the girls who need it ask for it?" questioned Norma. "You see I know how it feels to be very, very poor. If I hadn't found such a splendid way to earn my tuition fees and board, I'm afraid I could never bring myself to ask for help in that way. It would seem like begging." "Oh, we'd loan the money; not give it," promptly assured Jane. "We'd loan it without interest, to be repaid at convenience. You know the 'Beatrice Horton' books. Well, in those stories the girls at Exley College started such a fund. They gave entertainments and shows to help it along. Then they received money contributions from interested persons, too. "I don't know whether we'd ever do as they did. I like the idea of the self-denial gifts from just the crowd of us. We could let the money pile up this year and if we had enough by next October we could start our Student's Aid Fund." "We could keep up the good work during our vacations, too," enthusiastically suggested Mary Ashton. "A little self-denial then wouldn't hurt us, I guess, I think it would be fun for each of us to pledge ourselves to earn at least ten dollars this summer to put into the fund. Norma and Adrienne are the only ones of us here who ever earned a dollar. Dispute that if you can." "I dispute it," grinned Judith. "My father once gave me a silver dollar for keeping quiet a whole hour. I was only five at the time I earned that fabulous sum." "I've earned lots of dollars for churches and hospitals at bazaars," declared Christine. "I suppose most of us have. But that's not like earning money for ourselves." "Well, everybody here is going to earn _ten_ dollars this coming summer," stated Judith positively. "It would be still more fun if we each agreed to write a poem telling how we earned our ten dollars. We'd have a grand reunion as soon as we were all back in college and each of us would read her own poetic gem right out loud, so that we could all appreciate it." Judith's proposal was greeted with laughter and accepted on the spot. The girls were no less enthusiastic over Jane's worthy plan and each expressed herself as ready and willing to do her bit toward furthering its success. Before the ten-thirty bell drove the revelers from the scene of revelry, Adrienne had been appointed to act as treasurer. Jane had been unanimously chosen, but declined, suggesting Adrienne in her stead. Thus from one girl's generous thought was presently to spring an organization that would grow, thrive and endure long after Jane Allen had been graduated from Wellington College to a wider field in life. That evening's jollification was the last for the participants until fateful mid-year, with its burden of examinations should come and go. The nearer it approached the more devoted became the Wellingtonites to study. Even basket-ball practice fell off considerably. The second game between the freshmen and sophomore teams was set for the third Saturday in February. This meant ample time for practice after the dreaded examinations were out of the way. On the whole January seemed fated to pass out in uneventful placidity so far as Jane and Judith were concerned. Elsie Noble continued to glower her silent disapproval of her tablemates three times a day, but that was all. Since the disastrous failure of the scheme to leave Jane, Judith and Adrienne in the lurch at the freshman frolic, she had made no further attempts at unworthy retaliation for her supposed grievances. Marian Seaton also appeared to be too fully occupied with her own affairs to undertake the launching of a new offensive against the girls she so greatly disliked. In fact, she behaved as though she had forgotten their very existence. For this they were duly grateful. Only one incident occurred during the month which brought Marian's name up for discussion between Judith and Jane. Judith arrived in her room late one afternoon with the news that Maizie Gilbert had lost a valuable sapphire and diamond pin. Notice of the loss had appeared on the main bulletin board at Wellington Hall. It was worded almost precisely as had been the notice previously posted by Marian regarding the loss of her diamond ring. Judith again confided to Jane her sturdy disbelief concerning Maizie's loss. As in the case of Marian, she attributed it as a silly determination to attract undue attention. Jane frowned reflectively at Judith's supposition, but refused to commit herself. "I don't want to talk or even think about either Marian or Maizie," she said shortly. "I've been living in perfect peace since Christmas and I hate to break the spell. I'm trying to keep my mind on study just now. Are you aware, Judy Stearns, that exams begin to-morrow?" "I am. I am prepared--in a measure. Ahem!" Judith snickered, adding: "A very small measure." "Are you going to study to-night?" Jane demanded. "If you're not, then away with you. I'm going to be fearfully, terribly, horribly busy. Don't interrupt me. That means you. Alicia is coming in after dinner to-night. We are going to conduct a review." "All right, conduct it," graciously sanctioned Judith. "I'm not going to study to-night. I never do the last evening before exams. I just try to keep what I already know in my head and let it go at that. Guess I'll inflict my charming self upon Adrienne and Ethel. They're not going to study, either." "Do so; do so," approved Jane with smiling alacrity. "I'm sure they'll love to have you." "Certainly they will. I am always welcome everywhere--except _here_, on the dread eve of the stupendous ordeal which we shall presently be called upon to endure." Judith struck an attitude and continued to declaim dramatically. "Who am I that I should desire for a moment to remain where I am not desired. I will flee to the welcome haunt of my true friends. We'll make merry and make fudge at the same time. And I sha'n't bring you a single speck of squdgy, fudgy fudge," she ended in practical tones. "I can live without it," informed Jane drily. "Be as merry as you please, but be quiet about it. Remember, a lot of girls will be trying to study." "Oh, we won't get ourselves disliked," airily assured Judith. "We'll be as quiet as can be. We know how to behave during such times of stress." Jane merely smiled. Judith and Adrienne together meant much hilarity. Dinner over, Alicia appeared to hold student vigil with Jane. Judith as promptly betook herself to Adrienne's room for an evening's relaxation. There she found Norma, who had also elected to eschew study for fudge. It may be said to the quartette's credit that, though hilarity reigned during the fudge making, it was of a subdued order. When the delicious concoction of chocolate and walnut meats was at last ready for sampling, the four girls sat down to eat and talk to their hearts' content. The conversation drifting to the all-important subject of dress, Adrienne exclaimed in sudden recollection: "Ah, Judy, but I must show you the sweet frock which I have this day received from _ma mère_. It is, of a truth, the dream. But wait one moment! You shall thus see for yourself." Springing up from her chair, the little girl darted to a curtained doorway, the entrance to a roomy closet, containing her own and Ethel's gowns. It was at least five minutes when she reappeared, minus the new gown, an angry light in her big, black eyes. "What's the matter, Imp?" questioned Ethel concernedly. For answer, Adrienne laid a warning finger to her lips with a mysterious wag of her curly head toward the curtained doorway. Her finger still on her lips, she picked up a pencil from the writing table and scribbled industriously for a moment or two on a pad of paper. Silently she handed the pad to Judith, who read it, opened her eyes very wide and passed the pad to Ethel. Ethel, in turn, handed it to Norma. Suddenly Adrienne broke the silence; speaking in purposely loud tones. "I have the great secret to tell you, girls. It is of a certainty most amazing. Wait until I return. I shall be absent from the room but a moment. Then you shall hear much that is interesting." Flashing to the door, she paused, frantically beckoning her friends to follow her. Next instant the four had made a noiseless exit into the hall and were grouped before the door of the next room. Very cautiously, Adrienne's small fingers sought the door knob and turned it. Slowly, soundlessly, she opened the door and stepped cat-footed into the room. A little line of three, emulating her stealthy movement, tip-toed after her into a room empty of occupants. Straight to a curtained doorway Adrienne flitted, followed by her faithful shadows. Sweeping the chintz curtain aside with a lightning movement of her hand, she paused. Looking over her shoulder, three girls saw a motionless figure lying flat on the closet floor. In that fraction of a second the figure suddenly acquired motion and speech. A scramble, an appalled "Oh!" and a very angry and thoroughly frightened girl was on her feet, confronting Adrienne. Her companions had now fallen back a little from the doorway. The listener now made a futile attempt at composure. "What--why----" she gasped. "Come out of this closet, dishonorable one," commanded Adrienne sternly. "Ah, but it is I who had the luck to discover you in the act of listening. Had you not too hastily shut the register when you heard me enter the closet on the other side, I should never have guessed. Come out instantly." The imperious repetition of the command served its purpose. Adrienne backed out of the closet into the room, followed by Elsie Noble. The latter's small black eyes refused to meet those of her accuser. The blazing red of her cheeks betrayed her utter humiliation. For a brief instant no one spoke. Then Elsie recovered speech. "Get out--of--my--room, you--spies!" she stammered in a furious, rage-choked voice. "Ah, but it is you who are the great spy!" scornfully exclaimed Adrienne. "There is no longer the mystery. So you must have listened often to Ethel and myself as we privately talked. Have you then no shame to be thus so small--so contemptible?" "No, I haven't. I----" Elsie's attempt to brazen things out ended almost as soon as it began. Her guilty, shifting gaze had come to rest on Norma's grave, sweet face. It wore an expression of wondering pity. Elsie turned and bolted straight for her couch bed. She threw herself downward upon it, beating the pillows with her clenched fists, in a fury of tempestuous chagrin. "I think we'd best go, girls." It was Norma who spoke. "Alicia will soon be in. I don't believe we'd care to have even her know about this. Perhaps it would be just as well for us to forget that it's happened." This charitable view of the matter brought Elsie's head from the pillow with a jerk. She sat up and stared hard at Norma, as if unable to credit the latter's plea for clemency in her behalf. "I am satisfied to have thus solved a mystery. Now I wish to forget it." Adrienne made a sweeping gesture, as though to blot out the disagreeable incident with a wave of her hand. "It certainly wouldn't be a pleasant memory," dryly agreed Judith. "Anyhow, we know now something we've wanted to know for a long time. That's about all that one feels like saying, except that one hopes it won't happen again." "I guess it won't. Let's go, girls," was all that Ethel said. Without another word the quartette turned to the door, leaving Elsie to her own dark meditations. She could hardly believe that she had thus easily escaped. It appeared that these girls whom she had been so sure she despised, had no mind for retaliation. They were simply disgusted with her. For the first time, a dim realization of her own unworthiness forced itself upon Elsie. It was not strong enough to impel her to run after those who had just disappeared and apologize for her fault. Nevertheless, Adrienne's accusing question, "Have you then no shame to be thus so small; so contemptible?" rang in her ears. It dawned painfully upon her that she _was_ ashamed of herself. More, that she was done with eavesdropping for good and all. Early in the year she had stumbled upon the discovery that the register in the dress closet could be efficiently used as a listening post. Its position, low in the wall between the two closets, made it possible for her to hear plainly the conversation of those in the next room when both sides of the register stood open. This state of matters had existed when first she made the discovery. More, the side opening into the dress closet belonging to Adrienne and Ethel had remained open. This proved conclusively to Elsie that she was alone in her discovery. Fearful lest Alicia should note the sound of voices proceeding from the next room, she had been careful to keep the register closed whenever Alicia was present in their room. At times when the latter was absent, Elsie had noiselessly opened it and taken up her position in the closet as an eavesdropper. Now she began miserably to wish that she had never done it. Meanwhile, Adrienne's first move on re-entering her room was to dash into the adjoining closet and close the treacherous register with an energetic hand. To block further listening, she promptly stowed a suitcase on end against it. "_Voila!_ I have now remedied the trouble," she announced, as she emerged from the closet. "We shall not need that register to give the heat to us. I have closed it and placed against it the suitcase. Strange we never before noticed." "Better late than never," commented Judith. "Funny the way our little mystery was solved, wasn't it?" "I should never have known, had she not made the noise in closing the register on her side," explained Adrienne. "I had but bent over to lift the box containing my new gown when I noticed the register, heard the sound and, of a sudden, grew suspicious. I recalled that it could not be Alicia. So I was most determined to know if my suspicion was the idle one. It was not. You saw for yourselves. It was all most disagreeable. I had the feeling of shame myself to thus discover this girl listening." "So had I," echoed Ethel. "It _was_ rather horrid," declared Judith. "Maybe it will teach her a much-needed lesson. The ignoble Noble is a splendid name for her. I'm proud of myself for having thought of it." "I think she was really ashamed of herself," Norma said quietly. "I couldn't help feeling a little bit sorry for her. She pretended to be very defiant, when all the time she looked humiliated and miserable. I believe she was truly sorry, but couldn't bring herself to say so." "She will too soon forget," shrugged Adrienne. "A few minutes with her cousin, that most detestable Seaton one, and her regrets will vanish. Once you said, Judy, that we should solve our little mystery when we least thought. So you are indeed the prophet. We can expect no gratitude from this girl, because we have thus overlooked her fault. Still, I have the feeling that she will trouble us no more. _Voila!_ It is sufficient." CHAPTER XXV THE ACCUSATION Adrienne's prediction that a few moments with Marian Seaton would effectually banish Elsie Noble's remorse, provided she felt remorse, proved not altogether correct. The beginning on next day of the mid-year examinations served as a partial escape valve for Elsie's feeling of deep humiliation. By the end of the week she was divided between remorse and resentment. The latter over-swaying her, she fell back on Marian for sympathy. Marian's sympathy was not specially satisfying. She actually laughed over Elsie's aggrieved narration of the affair of the dress closet, and coolly informed her cousin that she should have locked _her_ door before attempting any such maneuver. The only grain of consolation which she bestowed was, "You needn't feel so bad about what those sillies think of you. They'll have something more serious to think about before long. It's high time Maiz and I took a hand in things." "What are you going to do?" Elsie sulkily demanded. "You'll know when the time comes," was the brusque reply. A reply that sent Elsie back to her room, sullenly wondering what Marian was "up to" now. Strangely enough, Marian's vague threat awoke within her a curious sense of uneasiness. She was not so keen for retaliation now. She darkly surmised that Marian intended somehow to make trouble for Judith Stearns and Norma about the last year's affair of the stolen gown. Once she had been ready to believe Marian's assertion that Judith had been guilty of theft. She was not nearly so ready now to believe it. As for Norma! Elsie could still see Norma's sweet face, with its gentle blue eyes pityingly bent on her. Marian might say all she pleased. Norma Bennett was fine and honest to the core. She had always secretly admired Norma for her wonderful talent. Now she admired Norma for herself. If Marian undertook to injure Norma----Elsie set her thin lips in a fashion denoting decision. Mid-year came and went, however, with nothing to disturb the outward serenity of Madison Hall. A brief season of jubilation followed the trial of examinations. The new college term began with the usual flurry accompanying the rearranging of recitation programs and getting settled in classes. Basket-ball ardor was revived and practice resumed by the freshman and sophomore teams, pending the second game to be played on the third Saturday in February. On the Monday evening before the game, Marian Seaton and Maizie Gilbert held a private session with Mrs. Weatherbee. It lasted for half an hour and when the two girls emerged from the matron's office, they left behind them a most shocked and perplexed woman. The story which they had related to her would have seemed preposterous, save that it touched upon a private matter of her own that had of late vaguely annoyed her. For some time after the two had left her office, she wrestled with the difficulty which confronted her. Nor had she decided upon a course of action when she retired that night. For two days she continued in doubt, before she was able to make up her mind regarding the handling of the troublesome problem. After dinner on Wednesday evening she sent the maid upstairs with certain instructions and promptly retired to her room. "Mrs. Weatherbee wants to see us in _her room_?" marveled Judith, addressing Molly, the maid who had delivered the message. "Are you sure she said her _room_?" "Yes, Miss Judith. That's what she said," returned Molly positively. "She said please come right away." "That means us." Judith turned to Jane as Molly vanished. "Now why do you suppose she wants to see us in her room? She must have something very private to say or she'd talk with us in her office." "I don't like it at all!" Jane exclaimed with knitted brows. "Something's gone wrong. But what? Can you think of any reason for it?" "No, I can't. We haven't committed any horrible crimes that I can recall," returned Judith lightly. "Come on. We might as well go and find out the meaning of this thusness. We should worry. We haven't done anything to deserve a call-down." One look at Mrs. Weatherbee's grave face as she admitted them to her room convinced both that something disagreeable was impending. "Sit down, girls," the matron invited, in her usual reserved fashion. "I have sent for Miss Bennett. She will be here in a moment." This merely added to Jane's and Judith's perplexity. Jane shot a bewildered glance toward Judith, as the two silently seated themselves. Directly a light rapping at the door announced Norma's arrival. She was also formally greeted and requested to take a seat. For a moment the matron surveyed the trio as though undetermined how to address them. When she finally spoke, there was a note of hesitation in her voice. "A very peculiar story has been told me," she said, "which intimately concerns you three girls, particularly Miss Stearns. Much as I dislike the idea, I am obliged, as matron of Madison Hall, to investigate it. "Certain students at the Hall have made very serious charges against you, Miss Stearns. These charges are partially based on something that occurred here last year, of which I had no knowledge. I----" "_Mrs. Weatherbee!_ I insist on knowing at once what these charges are!" Judith was on her feet, her usually good-natured face dark with righteous indignation. "Sit down, Miss Stearns," commanded the matron not ungently. "I intend to go into this unpleasant matter fully with you. A valuable diamond ring belonging to Miss Seaton and a diamond and sapphire pin belonging to Miss Gilbert have disappeared. Though 'Lost' notices were posted regarding these articles, their owners have come to me stating their private belief that you are responsible for their disappearance." "But surely you can't believe any such thing about me!" Judith cried out in distress. "Do you realize that those two girls actually accuse _me_ of being a _thief_?" "Wait a moment, please." The matron raised a protesting hand. "Let me finish what I wished to say. Miss Seaton does not believe you guilty of intentional theft. She accused you of being a kleptomaniac. She also accuses Miss Allen and Miss Bennett of knowing it and aiding you in keeping your failing a secret." "What?" almost shouted Judith. "Oh, this is too much!" It was Jane who now sprang furiously up from her chair, her gray eyes flashing. "I won't endure it. I insist, Mrs. Weatherbee, that you send for these girls and let us face them." "Yes, send for them! I won't leave this room until Marian Seaton takes back every single thing she's said about me," was Judith's wrathful ultimatum. "I was about to suggest when you and Miss Allen interrupted me that I had thought it advisable to bring you girls together. Still, I deemed it only fair to let you understand the situation beforehand," stated the matron rather stiffly. "I have already sent Miss Seaton and Miss Gilbert word to come here at eight o'clock. It lacks only five minutes of eight. They will be here directly. We will not go further in this matter until they come. You will oblige me by resuming your chairs." Mrs. Weatherbee's expression was that of a martyr. She was in for a very disagreeable session and she knew it. Marian's accusation against Judith made necessary an investigation. It had come to a point where Judith's honesty must be either conclusively proved or disproved beyond all shadow of doubt. If Judith, as Marian boldly declared, were really a kleptomaniac, she was a menace to Madison Hall. Ordinarily Mrs. Weatherbee would have been slow to believe such a thing. The fact, however, that the silk sweater which she had intrusted to Judith to mail had never reached its destination, had implanted distrust in the matron's mind. To have recently learned that Judith had been exhibiting to her girl friends a sweater that answered to the description of the one she had knitted for her niece was decidedly in line with her private suspicions. Neither had she forgotten Judith's laughing assertion to the effect that she was not sure she could be trusted not to run off with the sweater. Jane and Judith reluctantly reseating themselves, an embarrassing silence fell. Each of the three girls was busy racking her brain to recall the circumstance of last year upon which Marian Seaton had based her charge. None could bring back any of that nature in which Marian had figured. The sound of approaching footfalls, followed by a light knock at the door, came as a relief to the waiting four. Next instant Marian and Maizie had stepped into the room in response to the matron's "Come in." A bright flush sprang to Marian's cheeks as she glimpsed the trio of stern-faced girls. She had not anticipated being thus so quickly brought face to face with those she had maligned. Maizie appeared merely sleepily amused. "Kindly be seated, girls." Mrs. Weatherbee motioned them to an upholstered settee near the door. Casting a baleful glance at Jane, Marian complied with the terse invitation. Maizie dropped lazily down beside her, her slow smile in evidence. Matters promised to be interesting. "Miss Seaton," the matron immediately plunged into the business at hand, "you may repeat to Miss Stearns, Miss Allen and Miss Bennett what you have already told me concerning the affair of last year. Miss Stearns has been informed of your charges against her. She wishes to defend herself." "I certainly do," emphasized Judith, "and I shall make you take it all back, too, Miss Seaton." "I'm sorry I can't oblige you by taking it all back," sneered Marian. "I can merely repeat a little of a conversation that occurred between you and Miss Allen in which you condemned yourself." "Very well, repeat it," challenged Judith coolly. As nearly as she could remember, Marian repeated the talk between Jane and Judith, to which she had dishonorably listened on the night of the freshman frolic. "You were heard to admit that you had stolen a gown from Edith Hammond," she triumphantly accused. "That Edith blamed Miss Bennett and that she confessed you had stolen it. Also that Miss Allen settled for it and you all agreed to keep it a secret. Worse yet, you and Miss Allen only laughed and joked about what you called 'your fatal failing.' Deny if you can that you two had such a conversation." During this amazing recital the faces of at least three listeners had registered a variety of expressions. Marian's spiteful challenge met with unexpected results. Of a sudden the trio burst into uncontrolled laughter. "Girls," rebuked Mrs. Weatherbee sharply, "this is hardly a time for laughter. Miss Stearns, do you or do you not deny that you and Miss Allen held the conversation Miss Seaton accuses you of holding?" "Of course we did," cheerfully answered Judith, her mirthful features sobering. "Then you----" "_We_ were in the dressing room on the night of the freshman frolic when it took place," broke in Jane. "May I ask where _you_ were, Miss Seaton, when you overheard it?" Jane's gray eyes rested scornfully upon Marian as she flashed out her question. "I--I wasn't anywhere," snapped Marian. "I--someone else overheard it." "Then 'someone else' should have taken pains to learn the truth before spreading malicious untruth," tensely condemned Jane. Turning to the matron, she said bitterly: "Mrs. Weatherbee, this whole story is simply spite-work; nothing else. When I have explained the true meaning of Judith's and my talk together in the dressing-room, you will understand everything. Judith's fatal failing is not kleptomania. It's merely absent-mindedness." Rapidly Jane narrated the incident of the missing white lace gown, belonging to Edith Hammond, in which herself, Judith and Norma had figured in the previous year. She finished with: "I shall ask you to write to Edith for corroboration of my story. I must also insist on knowing the name of the girl who overheard our talk. She must be told the facts. We cannot afford to allow such injurious gossip to be circulated about any of us. Judith in particular. Further, it is ridiculous even to connect her with the disappearance of Miss Seaton's ring and Miss Gilbert's pin." "Oh, is it?" cried Marian in shrill anger, "Just let me tell you that both the ring and the pin were stolen from our room. We posted a notice and offered a reward, hoping to get them back without raising a disturbance. It's easy enough for you to make up the silly tale you've just told. I don't believe it. You're only trying to cover the real truth by pretending that Miss Stearns is absent-minded. It's not hard to see through your flimsy pretext." "That will do, Miss Seaton." Mrs. Weatherbee now took stern command of the situation. "I have no reason to believe that Miss Allen has not spoken the truth. This affair seems to consist largely of a misunderstanding, coupled with a good deal of spite work. You will oblige me by giving me the name of the girl who overheard the conversation." Marian did not at once reply. Instead, she cast a hasty, inquiring glance at Maizie. The latter answered it with a slight smile and a nod of the head. "It was my cousin, Miss Noble, who overheard the conversation," she reluctantly admitted. "She repeated it to me in confidence. She does not wish to be brought into this affair. You will kindly leave her out of it entirely." "Your dictation is unbecoming, Miss Seaton," coldly reproved the matron. "I shall use my own judgment in this matter." "You are all excused," she continued, addressing the ill-assorted group. "We will leave this matter as it stands for the present. When I have decided what to do, I will send for you again. Until then, not a word concerning it to anyone." Marian and Maizie rose with alacrity. They had no desire to prolong the interview. It had not panned out to suit them. Jane's concise explanation of the gown incident had practically turned a serious offense into a laughable blunder. Mrs. Weatherbee undoubtedly believed Jane. After listening to her, she had not asked either Norma or Judith a single question. Instead, she had closed the discussion with a curtness that was not reassuring to the plotters. "Elsie will have to help us out," were Marian's first words when she and Maizie reached their room. "She'll be raving when I tell her. She'll have to do it, though. If she doesn't, I'll threaten to tell all the girls about the way that little French snip caught her listening at the register." "You might as well have owned up that it was you who listened outside the dressing-room," shrugged Maizie. "Then you could have passed the whole thing off as a misunderstanding. That would have ended it. Now we're both in for a fine lot of trouble." "Then why did you nod your head when I looked at you?" asked Marian fiercely. "Oh, just to keep things going," drawled Maizie. "I like to see those girls all fussed up about nothing. Besides, Weatherbee can't do anything very serious about our part of it. She can say we are mischief-makers and call us down and that's all. No one except ourselves knows the truth about the ring and the pin. That's the only thing that could really get us into trouble." "No one will ever know, either," declared Marian. "They're both in the tray of my trunk. We'll take them home with us at Easter and leave them there. That will be safest." "You certainly leaped before you looked, this time," chuckled Maizie. "That gown business was funny." "Well, how was I to know? I heard Judy Stearns say she stole it," retorted Marian testily. "The whole thing sounded suspicious enough to hang our losses on. Just the same I shall keep on saying now that I believe she stole our stuff. Mrs. Weatherbee needn't think she can make me keep quiet. I have a perfect right to my own belief and I'll see to it that others besides myself share it." CHAPTER XXVI THE STAR WITNESS In Jane's and Judith's room a highly disgusted trio of girls held session directly they had left Mrs. Weatherbee. Far from feeling utterly crushed and humiliated by Marian's accusations, Judith was filled with lofty disdain of Marian's far-fetched attempt to discredit her. "I suppose I ought to feel dreadfully cut up over being accused of theft," she said, "but I can't. The whole business seems positively unreal. Jane, do you believe it was the ignoble Noble who overheard us talking that night?" "No; I think it was either Maizie or Marian," returned Jane positively. "Didn't you see them exchange glances? Then Maizie nodded. They had agreed to put the blame on Miss Noble." "I wonder if she had agreed to let them," remarked Norma. "I suppose she had. Otherwise, Marian wouldn't have dared use her name." "_I_ wonder what Mrs. Weatherbee will do about it," emphasized Jane. "There's more than weird unreality to it, Judy. You mustn't forget that Marian has accused you of taking her ring and Maizie's pin. She hasn't withdrawn that accusation. She won't withdraw it. I am very sure of that." "Well, she needn't," retorted Judith. "We know how much it's worth. So does Mrs. Weatherbee. You heard what she said about spite work. She's very much displeased with Marian and Maizie. She'll probably send for us to-morrow night and them, too. Then she'll lay down the law and order the whole thing dropped. She must see herself how unjust it is. Your explanation about Edith's dress was enough to show that. Just because the pin and ring are missing is no sign that I should be accused of their disappearance. Besides, they've been posted as 'Lost.' That clears me, doesn't it?" "It ought to, but it doesn't," replied Jane soberly. "Marian and Maizie will go on insinuating hateful things about you, even if they are ordered to drop the matter. Then there's Miss Noble. She's on the outs with us and on Marian's side. Unless we can do something ourselves to make these girls drop the affair, they won't drop it." "If Mrs. Weatherbee can't stop them, we certainly can't," Judith responded rather anxiously. "I guess, though, that she can. She's awfully determined, you know. I'm going to put my faith in her and not worry any more about it. I dare say if a thorough search were made of Marian's and Maizie's room the lost jewelry would be found," she predicted bitterly. "That's precisely my opinion," nodded Jane. "If it comes to it I shall tell Mrs. Weatherbee so. I'd rather wait a little, though, to see how things pan out. This is Wednesday. I hope it will be settled and off our minds before Saturday. We'd hate to go into the game with the least bit of shadow hanging over us." "Oh, I guess it will be settled before then." Nevertheless Judith looked a trifle solemn. Despite her declaration that she did not intend to worry, Jane's prediction had taken uncomfortable hold on her. "I think she ought to have settled it to-night," was Norma's blunt opinion. "It wouldn't surprise me if she really wrote to Edith Hammond. Mrs. Weatherbee's peculiar. I know, because I've worked for her. She probably believes Jane, yet she's in doubt about something. I could tell that by the way she acted." "You don't believe she suspects me of stealing those girls' jewelry, do you?" questioned Judith in quick alarm. "I hardly think that," Norma said slowly. "I only know she's not quite in sympathy with you, Judy. If she had been she wouldn't have hesitated to settle things then and there." Norma's surmise was more accurate than not. Marian Seaton's sneering assertion that alleged absent-mindedness on Judith's part cloaked a grave failing had not been entirely lost on the matron. She could not forget the missing sweater. Was it possible, she wondered, that there might be truth in Marian's accusation? Privately she resolved to do three things before passing final judgment. She would write to Edith for corroboration of the gown story. She would make further inquiry, concerning Judith's absent-mindedness, of Dorothy Martin. She would have a private talk with Elsie Noble. This last was solely to determine whether Marian had spoken the truth in regard to Elsie's having overheard the fateful conversation. She was as doubtful of Marian as she was of poor Judith. Mrs. Weatherbee intended to delay making inquiry of either Dorothy or Elsie until she had received a reply to a special delivery letter which she had dispatched to Edith Allison, nee Edith Hammond. In the interim Judith had gone from hopefulness to anxiety and from anxiety to nervousness. In consequence, she failed to play on Saturday with her usual snap and vigor, and had not her teammates put forth an extra effort, her unintentional lagging would have lost them the game. As it was they won it by only two points. Completely disgusted with herself, Judith broke down in the dressing-room and sobbed miserably. A proceeding which made Christine, Barbara and Adrienne wonder what in the world had happened to upset cheery, light-hearted Judy. Back in her room, Judith cried harder than ever. "I'm all upset," she wailed, her head on Jane's comforting shoulder. "I don't see why Mrs. Weatherbee hasn't sent for us about that miserable business. It's got on my nerves." "Never mind," soothed Jane. "If she doesn't let us know about it by Monday afternoon, I'll go to her myself. If I knew positively that Marian Seaton wrote the letter that nearly lost me my room, I'd tell Mrs. Weatherbee. It would only be giving her what she deserves." Monday morning, however, brought Mrs. Weatherbee a letter from Edith Hammond, over which she smiled, then looked uncompromisingly severe. Her stern expression spelled trouble for someone. Meanwhile, on the same morning, Jane also received a letter which made her catch her breath in sheer amazement. It was from Eleanor Lane and stated: DEAR JANE: "I've remembered at last. Now I know why your name seemed so familiar. Last fall a Miss Seaton was staying at the hotel with her mother. She dictated a letter to me, the carbon copy of which I am enclosing. She told me that she was having the letter typed for a joke and asked me to sign it 'Jane Allen.' I knew that wasn't her name, because I had heard a bell-boy page her several times and knew who she was. She said that you were her cousin and that she was only sending the letter for fun, that it wouldn't do you the least bit of harm. "I didn't like her at all. She was very hateful and supercilious. I thought at the time that the letter was a queer kind of joke, but I'd never been to college so I wasn't in a position to criticize it. Anyway, it wasn't my business, so I typed it and signed it as she requested. That's where I saw your name. I thought I would send you the letter and ask you if it was really a joke. I found it the other day in going over my files and it worried me. I realized that I had done a very foolish thing in signing it. I should have refused to do so. "This is the second letter I've written since I last heard from you, so hurry up and write me soon. With much love, "Ever your friend, "ELEANOR." The shadow of a smile flickered about Jane's lips as she unfolded the sheet of paper enclosed in Eleanor's letter and glanced it over. As by miracle the means of retaliation had been placed in her hands. She decided that she would wait only to see what the day might bring forth. If by dinner time that evening Mrs. Weatherbee had made no sign, she would go to the matron after dinner with a recital that went back to the very beginning of her freshman year. She would tell everything. Nothing should be omitted that would serve to show Marian Seaton to Mrs. Weatherbee in her true colors. If, on the other hand, Mrs. Weatherbee sent for Judith, Norma and herself that evening and exonerated Judith in the presence of her enemies, Jane determined that she would not, even in that event, withhold the story of Marian's long-continued persecution of herself and her friends. Undoubtedly Marian and Maizie would be asked to leave Madison Hall; perhaps college as well. Mrs. Weatherbee would be sufficiently shocked and incensed to carry the affair higher. Jane hoped that she would. She had reached a point where she had become merciless. While Jane was darkly considering her course of action, Mrs. Weatherbee was finding Monday a most amazingly exciting day. The morning mail brought her Edith's letter. Directly afterward she hailed Dorothy Martin as the latter left the dining-room and marched Dorothy to her office for a private talk. When it ended, Dorothy had missed her first recitation. Mrs. Weatherbee, however, had learned a number of things, hitherto unguessed by her. Shortly after luncheon a meek-eyed, plainly dressed little woman was ushered into her office. In her mittened hands the stranger carried a package. Sight of it caused the matron to stare. Her wonder grew as the woman handed it to her. "If you please, ma'am," blurted forth the stranger, red with embarrassment, "I hope you won't feel hard towards me. I know I oughtta come to you before. My husband found this here package in a rubbish can. He works for the town, collectin' rubbish. He found it jus' before Christmas and brung it home t' me. "You c'n see for yourself how the name o' the party it was to go to had been all run together, so's you can't read it. The package got wet, I guess. But your name's plain enough up in the corner. I knowed I ought ta brung it here first thing, but I--I--opened it. I knowed I hadn't oughtta. Then I seen this pretty silk sack and I wanted it terrible. "I says to myself as how I was goin' to keep it. It wasn't my fault if you throwed it into the rubbish can by mistake. My husband he said I hadda right to it, 'cause findin' was keepin'. So I kep' it, but it made me feel bad. I was brung up honest and I knowed it was the same as stealin'. "But I wanted it terrible, jus' the same. I never see anything han'somer, an' it looked swell on me. I put it on jus' once for a minute. It didn't give me no pleasure, though. I felt jus' sneaky an' mean. After that I put it away. Once in a while I took a look at it. Then my little girl got a bad cold. She was awful sick. I forgot all about the sack. She pretty near died. I sat up with her nights for quite a while. When she got better I thought about the sack again, and knowed that God had come down hard on me for bein' a thief. So I jus' got ready an' brung it back. It ain't hurt a mite, an' I hope you won't make me no trouble, 'cause I've had enough." Mrs. Weatherbee's feelings can be better imagined than described. The return of the missing sweater at the critical moment was sufficiently astounding, not to mention the pathetic little confession that accompanied its return. She felt nothing save intense sympathy for her humble caller. When the latter took her leave a few moments later, she went away wiping her eyes. Far from making her any "trouble," Mrs. Weatherbee had treated her with the utmost gentleness. The stately, white-haired woman with the "proud face" had not only thanked her for returning the "sack," she had asked for her humble caller's address and expressed her intention of sending the little sick girl a cheer-up present. Left alone, Mrs. Weatherbee sat smiling rather absently at the dainty blue and white bit of knitting which she had taken from its wrapper. She thought she understood very well how it had happened to stray into the rubbish can. She now recalled that the rubbish cans about Chesterford and at the edge of the campus were much the shape and size of the package boxes used by the postal service. Given a dark, rainy night and an absent-minded messenger, the result was now easy to anticipate. Here was proof piled high of Judith Stearns' "fatal failing." There was but one thing more to be done before winding-up summarily an affair that had been to her vexatious from the beginning. She had obtained plenty of evidence for the defense. Now she turned her attention to the prosecution. She had yet to hold a private word with Elsie Noble. This she resolved to do directly the freshman in question had returned to the Hall from her afternoon classes. Elsie, on her part, had been looking forward to this very interview with a degree of sullen satisfaction. On the day following the scene in Mrs. Weatherbee's room, Marian had informed her cousin of all that had taken place. As a result, Elsie had flown into a tempestuous rage over having been dragged into the trouble by Marian. "You've got to do as I say, Elsie. If you don't, you'll be sorry," Marian had coldly threatened. "Maiz and I will drop you. Besides, I'll tell Mrs. Weatherbee all about that register business. Then she'll believe you listened outside the dressing-room, no matter how much you may deny it." "I'll do as I please," Elsie had furiously retorted, and flung herself out of Marian's room. Not at all alarmed by her cousin's anger, Marian had confidently remarked to Maizie: "Elsie doesn't dare go back on us. She'll do as I tell her. She always fusses a lot, then gives in. She has no more time for those three prigs than we have." For once she was mistaken. Elsie had changed, though she alone knew it. Her secret admiration for Norma had paved the way to better things. She now rebelled at the thought of facing this sweet, truthful-eyed girl with a lie on her own lips. Marian's threat to expose her fault had awakened her to a bitter knowledge of her cousin's unbounded malice. She experienced a belated revulsion of feeling toward Judith Stearns. Jane Allen's explanation of the gown incident, scornfully repeated to Elsie by Marian, now stood for truth in Elsie's mind. Having gone thus far, Elsie next mentally weighed Marian's bolder accusation against Judith concerning the missing jewelry. Face to face with her cousin's utter lack of principle, for the first time it occurred to her to wonder whether Marian might not know better than anyone else the whereabouts of the missing pin and ring. She decided to do a little private investigating of her own. When, at five o'clock on the fateful Monday afternoon, the maid brought her word that Mrs. Weatherbee wished to see her, she went downstairs to the matron's office, fully equipped for emergency. The recital which she indignantly poured into the latter's shocked ears was the climax to an eventful day for Mrs. Weatherbee. It may be said to Elsie's credit that she did not spare herself or even attempt to palliate her own offenses. She made a frank confession of her faults and expressed an honest and sincere contrition for them which showed plainly that her feet were at last planted upon the solid ground of right. She was no longer the "ignoble Noble." "After what I've told you, I know you won't allow me to live here at the Hall any more," she said huskily. "I deserve to be punished. I'm going to accept it, too, as bravely as I can. I've been doing wrong all year, but at last I've come to my senses. I know that for once I'm doing right and it comforts me a good deal." This straightforward avowal would have moved to compassion a far harder-hearted woman than was Mrs. Weatherbee. The matron realized that the dry-eyed, resolute-faced girl seated opposite her had been punished sufficiently by her own conscience. "I shall _not_ ask you to leave Madison Hall, my dear child," she assured very gently. "I wish you to stay on here because I am convinced that would be best for you. In justice to others, however, I must ask you to come to my room this evening, prepared to stand by me in whatever I may require of you." "I thank you, Mrs. Weatherbee," Elsie said with deep earnestness. "I'll be only too glad to stand by you. I'm going upstairs now to get my wraps and I sha'n't be here to dinner to-night. I know Marian will be looking for me as soon as she receives word from you to come to her room. It will be best for me not to see her again until then. Don't you think so?" "Under the circumstances, I should prefer that you hold no conversation with her beforehand," agreed the matron. Thus ended the momentous interview. Woman and girl pledged their good faith in a warm hand clasp, and Elsie left the office feeling like one from whose shoulders a heavy burden had suddenly dropped. * * * * * "_Where_ is Elsie?" was Marian Seaton's desperate inquiry, when at five minutes to eight she entered her room, following a fruitless search for her cousin. "Search me," shrugged Maizie. "Very likely Weatherbee never said a word to her. I know she hadn't as late as luncheon to-day, for I asked Elsie and she said 'No.' We're just as well off without her. She has no more diplomacy than a goose. She's been so grouchy all week, that I don't trust her." "Oh, she's harmless," frowned Marian. "Now listen to me, Maizie. If, when we get into Weatherbee's room, things don't look favorable, we'd better be ready to slide out of the whole business. We can withdraw the charge, you know. That will end the whole thing." Maizie made no reply, save by smiling in her slow, aggravating fashion. She had her own ideas on the subject, but she was too indifferent of results to express them. At least, so she believed. Her indifference fell away a trifle, however, as she and Marian were presently ushered into Mrs. Weatherbee's room by a most stony-faced matron. Instead of finding there three girls, a disturbing fourth was present. Decidedly disturbing to Marian's peace of mind. At sight of Elsie Noble, who sat stolidly beside Norma on the davenport, Marian's face darkened. Walking straight over to her cousin, she asked furiously: "Where were you this evening?" "That will do, Miss Seaton." Mrs. Weatherbee now took command of the situation. "Kindly sit down and allow me to manage this affair." With a baleful glance at Elsie, Marian sullenly obeyed the stern voice. "It is not necessary to go into the subject of why you are here," began the matron, addressing the silent group of girls. "I will proceed at once to business. I shall first read you a portion of a letter from Edith Allison, formerly Edith Hammond." Taking up an open letter from a pile of papers that lay on a small table beside her, she read aloud: DEAR MRS. WEATHERBEE: "What a shame that such an unfortunate misunderstanding should have arisen over that unlucky white lace gown of mine. It was really a ridiculous mistake all around. Jane's explanation, of course, convinced you of that. It would never have happened if Judy's gown and mine had not been so nearly alike. We all had a good laugh over it, when Jane finally straightened out the tangle. "I can't understand Miss Seaton's not knowing about Judy's absent-mindedness. It was the joke of the freshman class last year. She figured prominently in the grind book. I am extremely indignant to hear that her honesty has ever been doubted. She is one of the finest, most honorable girls I have ever known. I am very glad you wrote me about this." "I shall not read the remainder of this letter, as it has no further bearing on the case," announced the matron in dignified tones. "Miss Seaton," she turned coldly to Marian, "Miss Noble assures me that she never overheard a conversation such as you attributed to her. I have, therefore, drawn my own conclusions. They are not flattering to you or Miss Gilbert. I now ask you and I demand a truthful answer, which of you two overheard that conversation?" "I refuse to answer you," snapped Marian, her face flaming. "I am answered," returned the older woman gravely. "The subject of the gown is now closed. We will take up that of your missing jewelry. I will now inform you that it has been found." "Found!" Marian sprang to her feet in pretended surprise. "Then the person who stole it must have given it back!" She cast a malicious glance at Judith as she thus exclaimed. "Miss Seaton!" Never before had Mrs. Weatherbee's voice held such a degree of utter displeasure. "You know, as does also Miss Gilbert, the utter injustice of such remarks. You know, too, where to look for the jewelry. It has never been out of your possession." "I haven't it. I don't know where it is." Marian's voice rose in shrill contradiction. "Oh, yes you do, Marian," bluntly differed Elsie Noble. "The ring and pin are in a little white box in the tray of your trunk. I saw them there yesterday. I went into your room while you were both out yesterday and hunted for them. After you showed me how spiteful you could be, I decided you were capable of even that. So I thought I'd find it out for myself, and I did." "Not a word she says is true," Marian fiercely denied. "She's an eavesdropper and a mischief-maker. She----" "Mrs. Weatherbee knows all about me," coolly informed Elsie. "She knows, too, that I'm done with all that. You needn't deny that the pin and ring weren't there yesterday. I saw them. You may have put them somewhere else by now, though." "Will you please not interrupt me?" Marian had decided to make a last desperate attempt to crawl out of the snarl she was in. She fully realized the seriousness of the situation. Addressing the matron, she said brazenly, "I came here to-night with the intention of withdrawing my charge against Miss Stearns. Miss Gilbert and I had decided that she was innocent. Whoever took the jewelry must have become frightened and put it back without my knowing it. I will go at once and look in my trunk, since my cousin insists that it is----" "You will kindly remain where you are," ordered Mrs. Weatherbee tersely. "Later, I shall insist on seeing both the ring and the pin. You and Miss Gilbert will now apologize to Miss Stearns for the trouble you have caused her. You will also apologize to Miss Allen and Miss Bennett." "I was mistaken about the gown and the jewelry," Marian admitted with a toss of her head. She was addressing no one in particular. "I have nothing more to say." "I was also mistaken," drawled Maizie imperturbably. Nevertheless a curious look of dread had crept into her sleepy black eyes. Matters were at their worst, it appeared. Things had been stirred up altogether too much for safety. Elsie had proved anything but harmless. "Do you accept this apology?" inquired the matron of the three defendants. "I do, provided Miss Seaton promises strictly to have _nothing more to say_ in future against any of us to anybody," stipulated Judith with quiet finality. "I will accept it under the same conditions," Jane said quietly. "And I," nodded Norma. "Neither Miss Seaton nor Miss Gilbert will circulate any more injurious reports about anyone," assured Mrs. Weatherbee grimly. "This matter in itself is sufficient to warrant suspension from college. "I regret that there is still another grave charge against you," she continued, fixing the guilty pair with a relentless gaze. "I have been informed that you, Miss Seaton, are the author of a malicious letter signed 'Jane Allen,' which I received before college opened." This time it was Jane who received a shock. She had come to the matron's room prepared to take up the cudgels in Judith's behalf. Elsie Noble's unexpected stand on the side of right had been amazing enough. Elsie had certainly been the chief witness for the defense. Was it she who had told Mrs. Weatherbee about the letter? "I haven't the least idea of what you mean," Marian haughtily retorted. "That's not true," contradicted the invincible Elsie. "You know perfectly well that you sent that letter to Mrs. Weatherbee. You told me so yourself." "I did nothing of the kind," persisted Marian. "Then how did I know about it?" triumphantly demanded Elsie. "I mentioned it to Mrs. Weatherbee. _She_ never mentioned it to me. If I had known then just how spiteful you could be I'd never have let you write it. You told me before I came to Wellington that Jane Allen was a hateful, deceitful, untruthful girl who had done you a lot of harm. I know now that _she_ isn't. I know that _you_ are. I'm sorry that you're my cousin and I don't intend to have anything further to do with you." When Elsie had begun speaking, Mrs. Weatherbee had been on the point of checking her. She refrained, however, because she realized suddenly that Marian deserved this arraignment. She had manufactured trouble out of whole cloth; now she fully merited her cousin's plain speaking. "You have said a good deal about injustice, Mrs. Weatherbee. I think it very unfair that I should be accused of something which I don't in the least understand," began Marian, with a fine pretense of injured innocence. "I should like to see the letter you accuse me of writing." From underneath the pile of papers on the table, the matron drew forth a typed letter. She handed it to Marian without a word. Marian read it, then laughed disagreeably. "No wonder Elsie knew of it," she sneered. "This is some of her work. She was crazy to get into Madison Hall with us. She knew there would be no vacancies. I had told her that. She listened to what I had said about Miss Allen, every word of it's true, too, by the way, and had someone type this letter. After that she applied for admission. Very clever indeed, Elsie, but you mustn't lay it to me. The signature is certainly not in my handwriting." It was now Marian's turn to look triumphant. "The whole trouble with Elsie is that I threatened to expose her for eavesdropping," she continued. "She has made me all this fuss simply to be even. She knows that she is responsible for this letter. The fact that she mentioned it to you, Mrs. Weatherbee, is proof enough, I should say. Certainly you have no proof that I had anything to do with it, beyond what she says. Her word counts for nothing." A breathless silence followed Marian's bold turning of the tables. Elsie gave a sharp gasp of pure consternation. "Oh, I didn't do it!" she stammered, casting an appealing glance about her. "I--hope--you--don't--believe----" "Here is the proof that you didn't," broke in Jane Allen's resolute tones. She had resolved to come to the defense of the girl who had so sturdily defended Judith. From her blouse she had drawn Eleanor's letter and the carbon copy of the letter which Mrs. Weatherbee had received. When the latter had finished examining both, she looked up and said in a dry, hard voice: "This is the most dishonorable affair I have ever known to happen at Wellington. I shall certainly take it up with Miss Rutledge. There is now no room left for doubt regarding the authorship of this letter. It is undeniably your work, Miss Seaton. It remains yet to be discovered what part Miss Gilbert played in it." Without further preliminary, the incensed matron read aloud Eleanor's letter. Marian Seaton turned from red to pale as she listened. Maizie kept her eyes resolutely on the floor. This last bit of evidence was too overwhelming to be disputed. It could not be explained away. "What have you to say to this?" demanded Mrs. Weatherbee of Marian. "Nothing," was the muttered reply. The matron had a great deal to say. For the next ten minutes she lectured the culprits with scathing severity. "I shall recommend that you be expelled from college, Miss Seaton. Miss Gilbert, were you also a party to this affair?" "Yes," was the tranquil response, "I knew all about it. Can't say I'm very proud of it. Still, it's rather too late now for regrets." Maizie raised her unfathomable black eyes from their studied scrutiny of the floor. Quite by chance they met Jane's gray ones. Jane had a peculiar impression as of a veil that had been slowly lifted, revealing to her a Maizie Gilbert who had the possibilities of something higher than malicious mischief-making. Obeying an impulse which suddenly swayed her, she turned to the matron. "Mrs. Weatherbee," she said, "can't this affair be settled now and among ourselves? After all, no great harm has really come of it. The missing jewelry has been found, Judith has been exonerated, I still have my room, and no one except those present knows what has taken place here to-night. We are willing to forget it if you are. I am speaking for Judith and Norma. I am sure Elsie doesn't want her cousin to be expelled. Can't we blot it out and begin over again?" "I should like it to be that way," said Judith quietly. Norma nodded silent concurrence. "I'll never forgive Marian, but I'd hate to see her expelled," Elsie said, after a brief hesitation. "I don't think Maizie ought to be, either. It's not half as much her fault as Marian's." Perhaps this latest turn of the tide amazed Mrs. Weatherbee most of all. For a time she silently scanned the group of girls before her. She had not reckoned that the defense would suddenly swing about and plead for the defeated prosecution. "I cannot answer you now, Miss Allen," she gravely replied. "I can appreciate, however, your generosity of spirit. I shall ask all of you to leave me now. Later I will inform you of my decision." Each feeling that there was nothing more to be said, the six girls obediently rose to depart. Marian walked to the door, looking neither to the right nor left. Without waiting for Maizie she made a hurried exit. Maizie took her time, however. Her hand on the door knob she turned and addressed Jane. "You're a real Right Guard," she said in her slow, drawling fashion. "Not only on the team, but in everything else. I'm sorry it took me so long to find it out." CHAPTER XXVII CONCLUSION As a result of the events of the previous evening, Marian Seaton and Maizie Gilbert put in a very bad day. It began by a wild fit of weeping on Marian's part, after breakfast and in her room that morning. At breakfast she managed to keep up a semblance of her usual self-assured, arrogant manner, but the moment she reached her room she crumpled. "Don't be a baby, Marian," was Maizie's rough advice, as she stolidly prepared to go to her first recitation of the day. "You brought this trouble on yourself. You might as well take the consequences without whimpering. You'd better cut your first recitation. Your eyes are a sight." "I'm not going to _any_ of my classes to-day. Go on about your own business and let me alone," was Marian's equally rude retort. Maizie merely shrugged at this announcement and went stoically upon her way. She was made of sterner stuff than her unworthy roommate, and with the realization that she had behaved very badly indeed, she had now steeled herself to accept her punishment bravely. Marian, on the contrary, moped in her room all morning, went to Rutherford Inn for a lonely luncheon and returned to the Hall and her room to weep again and ponder darkly over her unhappy situation. She tried in vain to prepare an argument by which she might clear herself should Mrs. Weatherbee decide to expose her wrong-doing to Miss Rutledge. She could think of nothing that might carry weight. The case against her was too complete to afford the slightest loophole for escape. As the day dragged on she gave up in despair. She made up her mind that her only hope now lay in appealing to Mrs. Weatherbee for mercy. She resolved to pretend deep remorse and promise a future uprightness of conduct to which she had no intention of living up. At five o'clock that afternoon, Maizie walked in upon the despondent Marian with: "Mrs. Weatherbee wants to see us in her room. The maid just told me. I'm glad of it. I'm anxious to have the matter settled." "If Mrs. Weatherbee tells us that she is going to report us to Miss Rutledge, Maizie, we must beg her not to do it," quavered Marian. "We must promise her anything rather than let her go to Miss Rutledge. That's what I intend to do and so must you." Maizie regarded Marian with the air of one who was carefully weighing the cowardly counsel. All she said was: "Come on. We mustn't keep her waiting." First glance at the matron's face as they were admitted to her room filled both girls with renewed apprehension. She looked more uncompromisingly stern than ever. With a brusque invitation to be seated, she took a chair directly opposite them and began addressing them in cool, measured tones: "My original intention was to defer a decision of your case for several days, at least," she said. "Thinking the matter over to-day, I came to the conclusion that the sooner this disagreeable affair was settled and off my mind, the better pleased I should be. "Both of you deserve expulsion from college. I am sure that Miss Rutledge would be of the same opinion were I to lay the matter before her. Frankly, I have decided not to do so simply on account of Miss Stearns and Miss Allen. These two young girls have shown themselves great enough of spirit to overlook the injury you have endeavored to do them. This has made a marked impression upon me, so great, in fact, that I have determined not to report this very disagreeable affair to Miss Rutledge. Since it has occurred at the Hall and has no bearing on any one outside the Hall, I feel that I am justified in settling it as I deem wisest for all concerned. "The fact that you are both young girls, also, has something to do with it. In my opinion it is a very shocking matter for a young woman to be expelled from college. You have been under my charge for almost two years, and I feel in a measure responsible for you. On this account and because Miss Stearns and Miss Allen have interceded for you, I shall not inform Miss Rutledge of your dishonorable conduct. "For the remainder of the college year I shall allow you to continue under my charge at the Hall. When you leave Madison Hall in June, however, it will be with the understanding that you cannot return to it the following autumn. You must make arrangements to live at another campus house." Thus far neither girl had been given the least opportunity of speaking. As it happened, neither had the slightest desire to speak. Both were feeling too intensely relieved for words. First to recover from the good news that she and Maizie would escape the punishment they merited, Marian Seaton now said with a faint touch of asperity: "Why won't you allow us to come back to Madison Hall next year, Mrs. Weatherbee? We prefer it to any other campus house. If we give you our word of honor to let Judith Stearns and her crowd alone, isn't that sufficient?" "No, Miss Seaton, it is not. I repeat that you must make other arrangements for next year. One thing more and we will conclude this interview. You must both pledge yourselves to good behavior while you are here. If I hear of any attempts on your part to malign a fellow student, either by word or deed, I shall revoke my decision and put your case before Miss Rutledge. Nothing except absolute fair play on your part will be tolerated here. That is all. You are at liberty to go." Fighting back her anger, Marian arose, and with a stiff, "Thank you, Mrs. Weatherbee," walked to the door. She was congratulating herself that she had not been forced to ask favors of that "hard-hearted old tyrant." Maizie rose, but made no attempt to follow Marian. Instead she raised unfathomable black eyes to the matron and said: "You are kinder to us than we deserve. I thank you." Then she turned abruptly and followed Marian from the room. Back in their own room, she walked over to her bed and sat down on it and eyed Marian reflectively. "Well, what's the matter with you?" asked Marian crossly. "You make me tired. Why did you say to that old dragon that she'd been kinder to us than we deserved? It wasn't necessary. The idea of her turning us out of Madison Hall. And we can't do anything to stop her, either. She has the whip hand and she knows it. It's a positive outrage and the whole affair is Elsie's fault, the hateful little hypocrite. She'll be sorry. I'll never rest until I pay her back for this." "It strikes me," drawled Maizie, "that there's been altogether too much of this 'paying back' business. You'd best drop it, Marian. You are not a success in that line. As for me, I'm tired of it. I used to think it great fun and exciting, but now I know that it's petty, mean and unworthy. If I could be as true to myself as Jane Allen is, I'd be happy." "_Jane Allen!_" exclaimed Marian in exasperation. "I _hate_ the very sound of her name. I suppose now, since you seem to admire her so much, you'll begin running after her." "No, not yet," was the tranquil response. "Perhaps never. I don't know. I'm going to stick to you for the present. I've been a party to your schemes and it wouldn't be right to desert you. But from now on, I am going to be fair with these girls. I warn you not to come to me with any plans of yours for getting even with them. I won't listen to them. If you are wise you won't make them. But you won't be wise. I know you too well. Only don't count on me to help you. The old Maizie is dead. I don't know what the new one's going to be like. I'll have to wait and find out." "You're a big goose," sneered Marian. "I never thought you'd be so silly. And all on account of that priggish Jane Allen. She's----" "She's a fine girl," declared Maizie with an ominous flash of her black eyes. "I only wish you and I were more like her." Meanwhile, in company with Judith Stearns, the objects of Maizie's newly discovered admiration were on their way to Mrs. Weatherbee's room. Immediately Marian and Maizie had departed, the matron had sent for Jane and Judith. For an hour they remained in friendly and very earnest conclave with Mrs. Weatherbee. When at last they left her, it was with the feeling that everything was once more right with their little world. The instant the door of their own room closed behind the two, they expressed their emotions by clinging to each other in joyful embrace. "Thank goodness, it's come out all right!" exclaimed Judith. "We'd never have felt quite comfortable if Mrs. Weatherbee had taken it higher. Marian and Maizie would have been expelled from Wellington, that's certain. It is enough punishment for them to have been told that they couldn't come back to Madison Hall next year and wouldn't be allowed to stay here for the rest of this year only on the promise of strict good behavior." "I can't feel sorry about that part of it," declared Jane. "I think we are justified in being glad that Marian Seaton will be in another campus house next year. To tell you the truth I wouldn't mind Maizie's being here. She's a strange girl, Judy. There's a lot to her beneath that lazy, indifferent manner of hers. I'll never forget the way she looked when she turned to me and spoke about my being Right Guard." "She looked as though she'd been asleep for a long time and then had suddenly waked up," nodded Judith. "And Elsie Noble! I can't get over the way she turned around and stood up for us. Just to think, too, she told Mrs. Weatherbee that it was Norma who had made her feel as though she wanted to be different. And Norma never even knew how much Elsie admired her." "It shows that a person who does right and thinks right is bound to influence others without ever saying a word," Jane said reflectively. "Yes, that's so," Judith agreed. "One never knows how much every little thing one says and does is going to impress others. I shall have to be pretty careful how I behave in future. My fatal failing's likely to land me in penitentiary yet, if I don't reform," she added with a giggle. "You'll have to learn to distinguish between a rubbish can and a package box, Judy," laughed Jane. During the confidential talk with Jane and Judith, Mrs. Weatherbee had told Judith all about the missing sweater and its amazing return into her hands. "It wouldn't have happened if some one hadn't moved that rubbish can up near the package box," asserted Judith. "It was so dark, and raining so hard I didn't stop to look. The lids of the rubbish can lift up on each side from the middle, you know. Of course, if I had my mind on what I was doing it wouldn't have happened, but I didn't. "Mrs. Weatherbee didn't say so, but I'm sure she must have thought that the sweater Aunt Jennie made me was the missing one," Judith opined. "Honestly, Jane, I believe if it hadn't been for that, she never would have listened to Marian Seaton's accusations against me." ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Transcriber's Notes 1. Punctuation has been normalized to contemporary standards. 2. Table of Contents added in this text was not present in original edition. 
20473	----	Grace Harlowe's Third Year at Overton College By JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A. M. Author of The Grace Harlowe High School Girls Series, Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College, Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College, Grace Harlowe's Fourth Year at Overton College. PHILADELPHIA HENRY ALTEMUS COMPANY Copyright, 1914 [Illustration: The Eight Originals Were Spending a Last Evening Together.] CONTENTS I. The Last Evening at Home II. The Arrival of Kathleen III. First Impressions IV. Getting Acquainted with the Newspaper Girl V. Two Is a Company VI. An Unsuspected Listener VII. An Unpleasant Summons VIII. Elfreda Prophecies Trouble IX. Opening the Bazaar X. The Alice in Wonderland Circus XI. Grace Meets With a Rebuff XII. Thanksgiving at Overton XIII. Arline Makes the Best of a Bad Matter XIV. Planning the Christmas Dinner XV. A Tissue Paper Tea XVI. A Doubtful Victory XVII. Hippy Looks Mysterious XVIII. Old Jean's Story XIX. Telling Ruth the News XX. Elfreda Realizes Her Ambition XXI. Alberta Keeps Her Promise XXII. Grace's Plan XXIII. What Emma Dean Forgot XXIV. Conclusion LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS The Eight Originals Were Spending a Last Evening Together. The Emerson Twins Looked Realistically Japanese. "Here is the Letter You Wrote the Dean." "She was Standing Close to the Door." Grace Harlowe's Third Year at Overton College CHAPTER I THE LAST EVENING AT HOME "Now, then, everyone join in the chorus," commanded Hippy Wingate. There was an answering tinkle from Reddy's mandolin, the deeper notes of a guitar sounded, then eight care-free young voices were raised in the plaintive chorus of "My Old Kentucky Home." It was a warm night in September. Miriam Nesbit and seven of the Eight Originals were spending a last evening together on the Harlowes' hospitable veranda. They were on the eve of separation. The following day would witness Nora's and Jessica's departure for the conservatory. Grace and Miriam would return to Overton at the beginning of the next week, and the latter part of the same week would find the four young men entered upon their senior year in college. "Very fine, indeed," commented Hippy, "but in order to sing properly one ought to drink a great deal of lemonade. It is very conducive to a grand opera voice," he added, confiscating several cakes from the plate Grace passed to him and holding out his empty lemonade glass. "But you haven't a grand opera voice," protested David. "That is only a flimsy excuse." "We won't discuss the matter in detail," returned Hippy with dignity. "I am prepared to prove the truth of what I say. I will now render a selection from 'Il Trovatore.' I will sing the imprisoned lover's song--" "Not if I have anything to say about it," growled Reddy. "Suit yourself, suit yourself," declared Hippy, shrugging his shoulders. "You boys will be sorry if you don't let me sing, though." "Is that a threat?" inquired Tom Gray with pretended belligerence. "A threat?" repeated Hippy. "No, it is a fact. I am contemplating a terrible revenge. That is, I haven't really begun to contemplate it yet. I am just getting ready. But when I do start--well, you'll see." "I think it would be delightful to hear you sing, 'Ah, I Have Sighed to Rest Me,' Hippy," broke in Nora sweetly, a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. "Can I believe my ears? The stony, unsympathetic Nora O'Malley agrees with me at last. She likes my voice; she wishes to hear me sing, 'Ah, I Have Sighed to Rest Me.' 'Tis true, I _have_ sighed to rest me a great many times, particularly in the morning when the alarm clock put an end to my dreams. It is a beautiful selection." "Then, why not sing it?" asked Nora demurely. "Because I don't know it," replied Hippy promptly. "Just as I suspected," commented Nora in disgust. "That is precisely why I asked you to sing." "What made you suspect me?" inquired Hippy, apparently impressed. "I suspected you on general principles," was the retort. "If you had had any general principles you wouldn't have suspected me," parried Hippy. "I won't even think about you the next time," was the withering reply. Nora rose and made her way to the other end of the veranda, perching on the porch railing beside Tom Gray. "Come back, Nora," wailed Hippy. "You may suspect me." "Isn't he too ridiculous for anything?" whispered Nora, smothering a giggle and trying to look severe. Her attempt failed ignominiously when Hippy, with an exaggeratedly contrite expression on his fat face, sidled up to her, salaamed profoundly, lost his balance and sprawled on all fours at her feet. A shout of merriment arose from his friends. Hippy, unabashed, scrambled to his feet and began bowing again before Nora, this time taking care not to bend too far forward. "You are forgiven, Hippy," declared Miriam. "Nora, don't allow your old friend and playmate to dislocate his spine in his efforts to show his sorrow." "You may stop bowing," said Nora grudgingly. "I suppose I'll have to forgive you." Hippy promptly straightened up and perched himself on the railing beside Nora. "I didn't say you might sit here," teased Nora. "I know it," replied Hippy coolly. "Still, you would be deeply, bitterly disappointed if I didn't." "Perhaps I should," admitted Nora. "I suppose you might as well stay," she added with affected carelessness. "Thank you," retorted Hippy. "But I had made up my mind not to move." "Had you?" said Nora indifferently, turning her back on Hippy and addressing Tom Gray. Whereupon Hippy raised his voice in a loud monologue that entirely drowned Tom's and Nora's voices. "For goodness' sake, say something that will please him, Nora," begged Tom. "This is awful." Hippy babbled on, apparently oblivious of everyone. "I have something very important to tell you, Hippy," interposed Nora slyly. Hippy stopped talking. "What is it?" he asked suspiciously. "Come over to the other end of the veranda and find out," said Nora enigmatically. Hippy accepted the invitation promptly, and followed Nora to the end of the veranda, unmindful of Tom Gray's jeers about idle curiosity. Those who read "Grace Harlowe's Plebe Year at High School," "Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School," "Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School" and "Grace Harlowe's Senior Year at High School" will have no trouble in recognizing every member of the merry party of young folks who had taken possession of the Harlowes' veranda. The doings of Tom, Hippy, David, Reddy, Nora, Jessica, Anne and Grace have been fully narrated in the "High School Girls Series." There, too, appeared Miriam Nesbit, Eva Allen, Eleanor Savelli and Marian Barber, together with the four chums, as members of the famous sorority, the Phi Sigma Tau. With the close of their high school days the little clan had been separated, although David, Reddy and Hippy were on the eve of beginning their senior year in the same college. Nora and Jessica were attending the same conservatory, while Grace, Anne and Miriam Nesbit were students at Overton College. During their freshman year at Overton, set forth in "Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College," the three girls had not met with altogether plain sailing. There had been numerous hitches, the most serious one having been caused by their championship of J. Elfreda Briggs, a freshman, who had unfortunately incurred the dislike of several mischievous sophomores. Through the prompt, sensible action of Grace, assisted by her friends, Elfreda was restored to favor by her class and became one of Grace's staunchest friends. "Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College" found the three friends sophomores, and wholly devoted to Overton and its traditions. Their sophomore days brought them a variety of experiences, pleasant and unpleasant, and, as in their freshman year, Grace and Miriam distinguished themselves on the basketball field. It was during this year that the Semper Fidelis Club was organized for the purpose of helping needy students through college, and that Eleanor Savelli, the daughter of a world-renowned virtuoso, and one of the Phi Sigma Tau, visited Grace and helped to plan a concert which netted the club two hundred dollars and a substantial yearly subscription from an interested outsider. The difficulties that arose over a lost theme and the final outcome of the affair proved Grace Harlowe to be the same honorable, straightforward young woman who had endeared herself to the reader during her high school days. "Why doesn't some one sing?" asked Grace plaintively. A brief silence had fallen upon the little group at one end of the veranda, broken only by Nora's and Hippy's argumentative voices. "Because both the someones are too busy to sing," laughed Jessica, casting a significant glance toward the end of the veranda. "Hippy, Nora," called David, "come over here and sing." "'Sing, sing, what shall I sing?'" chanted Hippy. "Shall it be a sweetly sentimental ditty, or shall I sing of brooks and meadows, fields and flowers?" "Sing that funny one you sang for the fellows the night of the Pi Ipsilon dinner," urged David. "Very well," beamed Hippy. "Remember, to the singer belongs the food. I always negotiate for refreshments before lifting up my voice in song." "I will see that you are taken care of, Hippy," smiled Mrs. Harlowe, who had come out on the veranda in time to hear Hippy's declaration. "Hello, Mother dear," called Grace, "I didn't know you were there." The young people were on their feet in an instant. Grace led her mother to a chair. "Stay with us awhile, Mother," she said. "Hippy is going to sing, and Nora, too." "Then I shall surely stay," replied Mrs. Harlowe. "And after the songs you must come into the house and be my guests. The table is set for seven." "How nice in you, Mother!" exclaimed Grace, kissing her mother's cheek. "You are always doing the things that make people happy. Nora and Hippy, please sing your very best for Mother. You first, Hippy, because I want Nora to sing Tosti's 'Serenata,' and a comic song afterward will completely spoil the effect." Hippy sang two songs in his own inimitable fashion. Then Nora's sweet, high soprano voice began the "Serenata" to the subdued tinkling accompaniment of Reddy's mandolin. Two years in the conservatory had done much for Nora's voice, though its plaintive sweetness had been her natural heritage. As they listened to the clear, rounded tones, with just a suspicion of sadness in them, the little company realized to a person that Nora's hopes of becoming known in the concert or grand opera world were quite likely to be fulfilled. "How I wish Anne were here to-night," lamented Grace, after having vigorously applauded Nora's song. "She loves to hear you sing, Nora." "I know it," sighed Nora. "Dear little Anne! I'm so sorry we can't see her before we go back to the conservatory. While we have been sitting here singing and enjoying ourselves, Anne has been appearing in her farewell performance. I am glad we had a chance to visit her this summer, even though we had to cross the state to do it." "She will be here to-morrow night, but we shall be at the end of our journey by that time," lamented Jessica. "I wish we might stay and see her, but we can't." "Never mind, you will meet her at Christmas time, when the Eight Originals gather home," comforted Miriam. "But we'd like to see her now," interposed David mournfully. "What is Oakdale without Anne?" At that moment Mrs. Harlowe, who, after Nora's song, had excused herself and gone into the house, appeared in the door. "Come, children," she smiled, "the feast is spread." "May I escort you to the table?" asked David gravely, offering her his arm. Heading the little procession, they led the way to the dining room, followed by Reddy and Jessica, Hippy and Nora, Grace, Tom and Miriam. There for the next hour goodfellowship reigned supreme, and when at last the various members of the little clan departed for home, each one carried in his or her heart the conviction that Life could never offer anything more desirable than these happy evenings which they had spent together. "I can't tell you how much I missed Anne to-night," said Grace to her mother as, arm in arm, they stood on the veranda watching their guests until they had turned the corner of the next street. "We all missed her," replied her mother, "but I believe David felt her absence even more keenly than we did. He is very fond of Anne. I wonder if she realizes that he really loves her, and that he will some day tell her so? She is such a quiet, self-contained little girl. Her emotions are all kept for her work." "I believe she does," said Grace. "She has never spoken of it to me. David has been her faithful knight ever since her freshman year at high school, so she ought to have a faint inkling of what the rest of us know. I am sorry for David. Anne's art is a powerful rival, and she is growing fonder of it with every season. If, after she finishes college, she were to marry David, she would be obliged to give it up. Since the Southards came into her life she has grown to love her profession so dearly that I don't imagine she would sacrifice it even for David's sake." "It sounds rather strange to hear my little girl talking so wisely of other people's love affairs," smiled Mrs. Harlowe almost wistfully. "I know what you are thinking, Motherkin," responded Grace, slipping both arms about her mother and drawing her gently into the big porch swing. "You needn't be afraid, though. I don't feel in the least sentimental over any one, not even Tom Gray, and I like him better than any other young man I know. I am far more concerned over what to do once I have finished college. I simply must work, but I haven't yet found my vocation. Neither has Miriam. Jessica thinks she has found hers, but she found Reddy first, and he does not intend that she shall lose sight of him. Hippy and Nora are a great deal fonder of each other than appears on the surface, too. Their disagreements are never private. Nora said the other day that she and Hippy had had only one quarrel, and--this is the funniest bit of news you ever heard, Mother--it was because Hippy became jealous of a violinist Nora knows at the conservatory. Imagine Hippy as being jealous!" Grace talked on to her mother of her friends and of herself while Mrs. Harlowe listened, thinking happily that she was doubly blessed in not only her daughter, but in having that daughter's confidence as well. CHAPTER II THE ARRIVAL OF KATHLEEN "There is a whole lot in getting accustomed to things," remarked J. Elfreda Briggs sagely, as she stood with a hammer and nail in one hand, a Japanese print in the other, her round eyes scanning the wall for an appropriate place to hang her treasure. "It's a beauty, isn't it?" declared Miriam, passing over her roommate's remark and looking admiringly at the print, which her roommate had just taken from her trunk. "What, this?" asked Elfreda. "You'd better believe it is. Goodness knows I paid enough for it. But I wasn't talking about this print. I was talking about our present junior estate. What I wonder is, whether being a junior will go to my head and make me vainglorious or whether I shall wear the honor as a graceful crown," ended the stout girl with an affected smile, which changed immediately to a derisive grin. "I should say, neither," responded Miriam slyly. "I don't believe anything would ever go to your head. You're too matter-of-fact, and as for your graceful crown, it would be over one ear within half an hour." Both girls laughed, then Elfreda, having found a spot on the wall that met with her approval, set the nail and began hammering. "There!" she exclaimed with satisfaction. "That is exactly where I want it. Now I can begin to think about something else." "I wonder why Grace and Anne haven't paid us a call this morning?" mused Miriam, who sat listlessly before her trunk, apparently undecided whether to begin the tedious labor of unpacking or to put it off until some more convenient day. "I'll go and find them," volunteered Elfreda, dropping her hammer and turning toward the door. "They must be at home." Five minutes later she raced back with the news that their door was locked and the "out indefinitely" sign was displayed. "That is very strange," pondered Miriam, aloud. "I wonder where they have gone?" "Why on earth didn't they tell us they were going? That's what I'd like to know," declared Elfreda. "Perhaps Mrs. Elwood knows something about it," suggested Miriam. The mere mention of Mrs. Elwood's name caused Elfreda to dart through the hall and downstairs to the living-room in search of the good-natured matron. Failing to find her, she walked through the kitchen to the shady back porch, where Mrs. Elwood sat rocking and reading the newspaper which the newsboy had just brought. "Oh, Mrs. Elwood," she cried, "have you seen Grace and Anne? We can't find them." "Didn't Miss Dean tell you?" asked Mrs. Elwood in a surprised tone. "Miss Dean," repeated Elfreda disgustedly. "No wonder we didn't know what had become of them. With all Emma's estimable qualities, she is the one person I know whom I would not trust to deliver a message. I beg your pardon, Mrs. Elwood, I didn't mean that you were in any sense to blame. We ought to have warned you, only Emma is such a splendid girl that one hates to mention a silly little thing like that. Just forget that I said it, will you?" Mrs. Elwood smiled. "I quite understand, Miss Briggs," she said gravely. "The message Miss Harlowe left with me was this: 'If the girls ask where we have gone, tell them that we received a telegram and had to go to the station. All explanations when we come back.'" "That settles it," groaned Elfreda. "We know only enough to whet our curiosity. And we can't find out more unless we follow them to the station. We can't do that, either. It would not look well. Besides, we are not invited." Elfreda had been rapidly reflecting aloud, much to Mrs. Elwood's amusement. "I'll have to go back and tell Miriam," she finished. "But why did they lock their door?" asked Miriam, when Elfreda had repeated her information. "I don't know," returned Elfreda thoughtfully. "Yes, I do know!" she exclaimed with sudden inspiration. "I think Grace was afraid she might have a repetition of last year's performance." "'Last year's performance,'" repeated Miriam in a puzzled tone. "Yes, don't you remember the Anarchist?" retorted Elfreda, with a reminiscent grin. "Of course!" exclaimed Miriam, laughing a little at the recollection. "Wasn't she formidable, though, when she slammed the door in our faces?" Elfreda nodded. "She is all right now. At least she was when she visited me. I never saw a girl blossom and expand as she did. Pa liked her. He thought she was smart. She is, too. She has lived so entirely with that scientific father of hers that she has absorbed all sorts of odds and ends of knowledge from him. That is why college and girls and the whole thing terrified her." "Terrified her," said Miriam incredulously. "I thought matters quite the reverse." "That was precisely what I thought until she told me that, no matter how vengeful she looked, she was always afraid of the girls. She never seemed to be able to say the right thing at the right moment. That was why she used to scowl so fiercely when any one spoke or looked at her." "I don't think it was altogether fear of the girls that caused her to lock us out that day," observed Miriam, a gleam of laughter appearing in her black eyes. "I don't suppose it was," retorted Elfreda good-humoredly. "She says she knows her disposition to be anything but angelic. But she is trying, Miriam. You wait and see for yourself how the new Laura Atkins behaves." "But to go back to the subject of the door, what makes you think Grace locked it on account of last year?" persisted Miriam. "Oh, I don't know," answered Elfreda vaguely. "I just thought so, that's all." "We'll ask her when she comes, just for fun," declared Miriam. "Why not go downstairs and sit on the back veranda with Mrs. Elwood? We can hear the girls as soon as they come into the yard." "All right," agreed Elfreda. "Do you care if I take my magazine along? I am not quite through with an article I began this morning." "I object seriously," smiled Miriam. "I shall expect you to entertain me. You can finish reading your article later." Elfreda glanced up quickly from the magazine she held in her hand. Then, catching sight of her friend's smiling face, she tucked her magazine under one arm, linked her free arm through Miriam's and marched her toward the stairs. They had reached the foot of the stairs and were half way down the hall when the sound of voices caused both girls to stand still, listening intently. "That sounds like Grace's voice!" exclaimed Elfreda. With one accord they turned about, hurrying to the veranda at the front of the house in time to see Grace and Anne approaching. Both girls were laden with luggage, while between them walked an alert little figure, tugging a bag of golf sticks, a fat, black leather hand bag and a camera. "What manner of woman have we here?" muttered Elfreda, regarding the newcomer with quizzical eyes. But before Miriam found time to reply the newcomer set her luggage in the middle of the walk, and running up to Miriam and Elfreda, said with a frank laugh: "This is Miriam and this is Elfreda. You see I know both of you from Mabel's description." "Who--what--" began Elfreda. "Girls," said Grace, who had by this time come up with the animated stranger, "this is Miss West, a friend of Mabel Ashe's. My telegram was from Mabel asking me to meet Miss West, and as Anne and I were on the porch when it came, and the train we were to meet was due, we didn't stop for explanations or hats, but raced down the street as fast as we could go." While Grace was talking, Kathleen West was shaking hands vigorously with Miriam and Elfreda. "I'm so glad to know you," she said, "and I think I'm going to like you. I'm not so sure about liking college, even though I've worked so hard to get here. I hope to goodness I don't flunk in the exams." "I am sure that any friend of Mabel's is bound to be ours also," said Miriam courteously. She had not made up her mind regarding the newcomer. "Thank you. From what she said I should imagine that you and she were on very good terms," returned the stranger lightly. "Of course you know who I am and all about me." Grace smiled. "Not yet, but we are willing to hear anything you wish to tell us." "Oh, that's so!" exclaimed the stranger. "Mabel wrote about me, but her letter hasn't reached you yet, and, of course, telegrams can't be very lengthy unless you wish to spend a fortune or the office has a franchise. There I go again about the office. I might as well tell the truth and have done with it: I'm a newspaper woman." CHAPTER III FIRST IMPRESSIONS Miriam smiled involuntarily, Grace looked surprised, Elfreda indifferent, and Anne amused. The word "woman" seemed absurdly out of place from the lips of this girl who looked as though she had just been promoted to long dresses. "Oh, yes, I know I look not more than eighteen," quickly remarked Kathleen West, noticing Miriam's smile. "But I'm not. I'm twenty-two years old, and I've been on a newspaper for four years. Why, that's the way I earned my money to come here. I'll tell you about it some other time. It's too long a story for now. Besides, I'm hungry. At what time are we to be fed and are the meals good? I have no illusions regarding boarding houses." "The meals are excellent," replied Anne. "You must have dinner with us. Then we will see about securing a room for you. I think you will be able to get in here. This used to be considered a freshman house, but all those who were freshmen with us have stayed on, and if last year's freshmen stay, too, then Wayne Hall will be full and--" "I won't get in," finished the young woman calmly. "Come into the house now and meet Mrs. Elwood," invited Grace. "Then you can learn your fate." "Yes, I can just make room for you," Mrs. Elwood was saying a few minutes later. "Miss Evans is not coming back, and Miss Acker is going to Livingstone Hall. Her two particular friends are there. Miss Dean wishes to room alone this year, so that disposes of the vacancy left by Miss Acker. But the half of the room Miss Evans had is not occupied. It is on the second floor at the east end of the hall." "Then I'll take it," returned Kathleen promptly, "and move in at once. I may not stay here long, but at least I'll be happy while I stay. But if I should survive all these exams, there will be cause for rejoicing and I'll give a frolic that you will all remember, or my name's not Kathleen West. Is there any one who would love to help me upstairs with my things?" "Well, what do you think of her?" asked Elfreda abruptly. Having helped Kathleen to her room with her luggage they had left her to herself and were now in their own room. Miriam stood looking out the window, her hands behind her back. At Elfreda's question she turned, looked thoughtfully at her roommate, then said slowly: "I don't know. I haven't decided. She's friendly and enthusiastic and hard and indifferent all in the same moment. I think her work has made her so. I believe she has hidden her inner self away so deep that she has forgotten what the real Kathleen is like." "I believe so, too, Miriam," agreed Elfreda. "I could see that you weren't favorably impressed with her. I could see--" "You see entirely too much," laughed Miriam. "I haven't even formed an opinion of Miss West yet. I wonder how long she has known Mabel Ashe? Not very long, I'll wager." An hour later Grace appeared in the door, waving a letter. "Here's Mabel's letter!" she cried. "Come into my room, and we will read it." "The letter was not far behind the telegram," remarked Anne, as she closed the door of their room and seated herself on the couch beside Miriam. "Do hurry, Grace, and read us what Mabel has to offer on the subject of Kathleen Mavourneen--West, I mean," corrected Elfreda with a giggle. Grace unfolded the letter and began to read: "MY DEAR GRACE:-- "Please forgive me for neglecting you so shamefully, but I am now wrestling with a real job on a real newspaper and am so occupied with trying to keep it that I haven't had time to think of anything else. Father is deeply disgusted with my journalistic efforts. He wished me to go to Europe this summer, but the light of ambition burns too vividly to be quenched even by my beloved Europe. When next I go abroad it will be with my own hard-earned wages. "I haven't done anything startling yet; I have been chronicling faithfully the doings of society. As most of the elect are out of town, my news gathering has not been in the nature of a harvest. However, I am still striving, still hoping for the day when I shall leave society far behind and sally forth on the trail of a big story. "But, I am diverging from one of the chief purposes of this letter. It is to introduce to you Kathleen West, an ambitious and particularly clever young woman, who is a 'star' reporter on this paper. It seems that she and I have changed ambitions. I sigh for journalistic fame, and she sighs for college. She has done more than sigh. She has been saving her money for ever so long, determined to take unto herself a college education. I admire her spirit and have praised Overton so warmly--how could I help it?--that she has decided to cast her lot there. Hence my telegram, also this letter. Please be as nice with her as you know how to be, for I am sure she will prove herself a credit to Overton. "I shall hope to see you some time during the fall. I am going to try to get a day or two off and run down to see you. Tell Anne the Press is greater than the Stage, and tell Elfreda and Miriam that I am collecting the autographs of famous people and that theirs would be greatly appreciated, particularly if attached to letters. I must bring this epistle to an abrupt close, and go out on the trail of an engagement, the rumor of which was whispered to me last night. With love to you and the girls. "MABEL. "P. S. Frances sails for home next week." "What a nice letter," commented Elfreda. "It is just like her, isn't it!" "Yes," replied Grace slowly. "Girls, do you suppose Mabel and Miss West are really friends?" "Not as we are," replied Miriam, with a positive shake of her head. "Elfreda and I were talking of that very thing while you were in your room. Elfreda said she didn't believe that Mabel had known Miss West long." "What is the matter with us?" asked Grace, a trifle impatiently. "Here we are prowling about the bush, trying to conceal under polite inquiry the fact that we don't quite approve of Miss West. We would actually like to dig up something to criticize." "There is nothing like absolute freedom of speech, is there?" said Elfreda, with a short laugh. "It is true, though," said Grace stoutly. "It isn't fair, either. She has done nothing to deserve it. Besides, Mabel likes her." "Mabel doesn't say in her letter that she likes her," reminded Anne. "She says Miss West is clever and that she admires her spirit." "You, too, Anne?" said Grace reproachfully. "I don't like her," declared Elfreda belligerently. "If it weren't for Mabel's letter I'd leave her strictly to her own devices." "We ought to be ashamed of ourselves!" exclaimed Grace. "We have met Miss West with smiles, and here we are discussing her behind her back." "I didn't meet her with smiles," contradicted Elfreda. "I was as sober as a judge all the time we stood talking to her. She is too flippant to suit me. She doesn't take college very seriously. I could see that." "There goes the dinner bell!" exclaimed Grace, with sudden irrelevance to the subject of the newspaper girl. "Let us stop gossiping and go to dinner." At dinner Grace was not sorry to note that Kathleen West had been placed at the end of the table farthest from her. Through the meal she found her eyes straying often toward the erect little figure of the newcomer, who, exhibiting not a particle of reserve, chatted with the girls nearest to her with the utmost unconcern. "I suppose her newspaper training has made her self-possessed and not afraid of strangers," reflected Grace. But she could not refrain from secretly wondering a little just how strong a friendship existed between Kathleen West and Mabel. CHAPTER IV GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH THE NEWSPAPER GIRL "It was just this way," began Kathleen West, setting down her tea cup and looking impressively from one girl to the other, "Long before I graduated from high school I had made up my mind to go to college. Now that I have passed my exams and have become a really truly freshman, I'll tell you all about it." Elfreda and Miriam were giving a tea party with Grace, Anne and Kathleen West as their guests. It was a strictly informal tea and both hostesses and guests sat on the floor in true Chinese fashion, kimono-clad and comfortable. A week had passed since Kathleen's advent among them. She had spent the greater part of that time either in study or in valiant wrestling with the dreaded entrance examinations, but she had managed, nevertheless, to drop into the girls' rooms at least once a day. In spite of the almost unfavorable impression she had at first created, it was impossible not to acknowledge that the newspaper girl possessed a vividly interesting personality. As she sat wrapped in the folds of her gray kimono, arms folded over her chest, she looked not unlike a feminine Napoleon. Elfreda's quick eyes traced the resemblance. "You look for all the world like Napoleon," she observed bluntly. "Thank you," returned Kathleen with mock gratitude. "I can't imagine Napoleon in a gray kimono at a tea party, but I feel imbued with a certain amount of his ambition. By the way, would any of you like to hear the rest of my story?" she asked impudently. "I'm rather fond of telling it." "Excuse me for interrupting," apologized Elfreda. "Go on, please." "Where was I?" asked Kathleen. "Oh, yes, I remember. Well, as soon as I had fully determined to go to college, I began to save every penny on which I could honestly lay hands. I went without most of the school-girl luxuries that count for so much just at that time. You girls know what I mean. Mother and Father didn't wish me to go to college. They planned a course in stenography and typewriting for me after I should finish high school, and when I pleaded for college they were angry and disappointed. They argued, too, that they couldn't possibly afford to send me there. As soon as I saw that I was going to have trouble with them, I kept my own counsel, but I was more determined than ever to do as I pleased. At the beginning of the vacation before my senior year in high school I went to the only daily paper in our town and asked for work. The editor, who had known me since I was a baby, gave me a chance. Father and Mother made no objection to that. They thought it was merely a whim on my part. But it wasn't a whim, as they found out later, for I wrote stuff for the paper during my senior year, too, and when I did graduate I turned the house upside down by getting a position on a newspaper in a big city. Father and Mother forgave me after awhile, but not until I had been at work on the other paper for a year. "At first I did society, then clubs, went back to society again, and at last my opportunity came to do general reporting. I was the only woman on the staff who had a chance to go after the big stories. I have been doing that only the last two years, though. "Naturally, I made more money on the paper than I would as a stenographer. I saved it, too. It was ever so much harder to hang on to it in the city. There were so many more ways to spend it. But I kept on putting it away, and, now, by going back on the paper every summer, I will have enough to see me through college." "But why do you wish so much for a college education when you are already successful as a newspaper woman?" asked Elfreda. "Because I want to be an author, or an editor, or somebody of importance in the literary world, and I need these four years at college. Besides, it's a good thing to bear the college stamp if one expects always to be before the public," was the prompt retort. "Suppose you were to find afterward that you weren't going to be before the public," said Elfreda almost mischievously. "But I shall be," persisted Kathleen, setting her jaws with a little snap. "I always accomplish whatever I set out to do. On the paper they used to say, 'Kathleen would sacrifice her best friend if by doing it she could scoop the other papers.'" "What do you mean by 'scoop the other papers'?" queried Elfreda interestedly. "Why, to get ahead of them with a story," explained Kathleen. "Suppose I found out an important piece of news that no one else knew. If I gave it to my paper and it appeared in it before any other newspaper got hold of it then that would be a scoop." "Oh, yes, I see," returned Elfreda. "Then a scoop might be news about anything." "Exactly," nodded Kathleen. "The harder the news is to get, the better story it makes. People won't tell one anything, and when one does find out something startling, then there are always a few persons who make a fuss and try to keep the story out of the paper. They generally have such splendid excuses for not wanting a story published. I never paid any attention to them, though. I turned in every story I ever ran down," she concluded, her small face setting in harsh lines. "But didn't that make some of the people about whom the stories were written very unhappy?" asked Miriam pointedly. "I suppose so," answered Kathleen. "But I never stopped to bother about them. I had to think of myself and of my paper." "How long have you known Mabel Ashe?" asked Grace, abruptly changing the subject. Something in the cold indifference of Kathleen's voice jarred on her. "Just since she appeared on the paper," returned Kathleen unconcernedly. "She is very pretty, isn't she? But prettiness alone doesn't count for much on a newspaper. Can she make good? That is the question. She imagines that journalism is her vocation, but I am afraid she is going to be sadly disillusioned. She seems to be a clever girl, though." "Clever," repeated Grace with peculiar emphasis. "She is the cleverest girl we know. While she was at Overton, she was the life of the college. Everyone loved her. I can't begin to tell you how much we miss her." "It's very nice to be missed, I am sure," said Kathleen hastily, retreating from what appeared to be dangerous ground. "I hope I shall be eulogized when I have graduated from Overton." "That will depend largely on your behavior as a freshman," drawled Elfreda. "What do you mean?" asked Kathleen sharply. "I thought freshmen were of the least importance in college." "So they are to the other classes," returned Elfreda. "They are of the greatest importance to themselves, however, and if they make false starts during their freshman year it is likely to handicap them through the other three." "Much obliged for the information," declared Kathleen flippantly. "I'll try not to make any false starts. Good gracious! It is half-past ten. I had no idea it was so late. I've had a lovely time at your tea party. I'm going to send out invitations for a social gathering before long." She rose lazily to her feet, and carefully set her cup on the table. "I suppose Miss Ainslee will be sound asleep," she remarked, yawning. "Lighting the gas will awaken her and she will be cross. She goes to bed with the chickens." "Don't light it, then," suggested Grace. "You can see to undress with the blind up. There is full moon to-night." "Why shouldn't I light it?" asked Kathleen. "Half of the room is mine. I wouldn't grumble if the case were reversed. She will soon grow used to the light. I intend occasionally to read or study after hours. Don't tell me it is against the rules. I know it. But circumstances, etc. I'll see you to-morrow. I wish I were a junior. The freshmen I have met so far are regular babies. I'm going to study hard next summer and see if I can't pass up the sophomore year. There is nothing like having a modest ambition, you know." With this satirical comment the newspaper girl nodded a pert good night and left the room. No one spoke after she had gone. "I must go to bed," said Grace, breaking the significant silence that had fallen on the quartette. "Come, Anne, it's twenty minutes to eleven. Good night, girls." "What do you think of Miss West, Anne?" asked Grace a little later as they were preparing to retire. "I don't like to say," returned Anne slowly. "She's remarkably bright--" Anne paused. Her eyes met Grace's. "I know," nodded Grace understandingly. "We will try to keep a starboard eye on her. She is going to find college very different from being a newspaper woman." Grace smiled faintly. The word "woman," as applied to Kathleen West, seemed wholly amusing. "I don't think she showed particularly good taste in speaking as she did of Mabel Ashe," criticized Anne, a moment later. "I didn't intend to say that, but I might as well be perfectly frank with you, Grace." "I was sorry she spoke as she did, too," agreed Grace. She did not add that the newspaper girl's half slighting remarks about Mabel Ashe still rankled in her loyal soul. It was chiefly to please Mabel that she and her friends had hospitably received this stranger into their midst, prepared to do whatever lay within their power to make her feel at home with them. And she had dared to speak almost disparagingly of the girl who was beloved by every student in Overton who knew her. In spite of her resolution to keep a "starboard eye" on the freshman, Grace felt infinitely more like leaving the ungrateful freshman to shift for herself. "Well, what about her?" Elfreda asked bluntly of Miriam, as she piled the tea cups one inside the other. "What about who?" returned Miriam tantalizingly. "You know very well" declared Elfreda; "but, if I must be explicit, what do you think of Miss West now?" "What do you think?" counter-questioned Miriam. "I think she has more to learn than I had when I came here," said Elfreda speculatively, "and unless I am very much mistaken it will take her longer to learn it." CHAPTER V TWO IS A COMPANY "Grace! Grace Harlowe!" called a clear, high voice. On hearing her name, Grace, who was on the point of entering the library, turned to greet Arline Thayer, who came running up the walk, flushed and laughing. "Did you say you had won prizes as a champion fast walker?" she inquired laughingly. "I saw you clear across the campus, and I've been running at top speed ever since. I had just breath enough left to call to you. Where have you been hiding? I haven't seen you for ages. Ruth thinks you have deserted her. Don't bother going to the library now. Suppose we go down to Vinton's and have luncheon. Have you eaten yours? I never eat luncheon at Morton Hall on Saturday afternoon." "I'll answer your questions in the order they were asked," laughed Grace. "No, I am not a champion fast walker. I haven't been hiding, and I still live at Wayne Hall, though a certain young person I know has evidently forgotten it. Ruth owes me a visit, and I haven't had my luncheon. You mustn't tempt me from my duty, for I am on the trail of knowledge. I must spend at least two hours this afternoon looking up a multitude of references." "Come and have luncheon first and look up your references afterward," coaxed Arline. "Then, perhaps, I can help you," she added artfully. "Perhaps you can," returned Grace dubiously. Their eyes meeting, both girls laughed. "Come with me, at any rate, then," declared Arline. "All right. Remember, I must not stay away from work over an hour. I really have a great deal to do. Isn't it a glorious day, though? Elfreda and Miriam went for a five-mile tramp. Elfreda is determined to play basketball in spite of her junior responsibilities, therefore she is obliged to train religiously." "Who is going to play on the junior team this year?" asked Arline. "Elizabeth Wade, and that little Tenbrook girl, Marian Cummings, Elfreda and Violet Darby make the team. Neither Miriam nor I intend to play. Elfreda begged hard, but we thought it better to stay out of the team this year. We have played basketball so long, and having been in two big games, it is time we resigned gracefully; besides, I want to see Elfreda reap the benefit of her faithful practice and distinguish herself. She has tried so hard to make the team." "I am glad Elfreda is to have her chance," smiled Arline. "We are sure to see her make the most of it. I'm sorry now that I never went in for basketball." "It is a wonderful old game!" exclaimed Grace with enthusiasm. "Last year was my sixth year on a team. I was captain of our freshman basketball team at home. That reminds me, Arline, aren't you and Ruth coming home with me for the Easter vacation? I am asking you early so no one else will have a chance. I know it is useless to ask you to come for Christmas." "I think I can come for Easter," replied Arline, "and I don't know of any reason why Ruth can't. I shall write to Father at once and ask him if we can go. I want to tell you something, Grace--confidentially, of course. Father is very fond of Ruth. He and I had a talk this summer, and he wishes to adopt her. Just think of having Ruth for my very own sister!" Arline paused, her eyes shining. Grace nodded understandingly. "What does Ruth say?" she asked. Arline's face clouded. "She doesn't say anything except that she thinks it better for her to go on in her own way. She is the queerest girl. She seems to think that it wouldn't be right to allow Father to adopt her and take care of her. She says she has everything she needs now, and that I have been far too good to her. Father and I simply made her spend the summer with us." "Wouldn't it be wonderful if Ruth should find her father?" said Grace musingly. "I don't believe she ever will," returned Arline. "It's too bad." Her flower-like face looked very solemn for a moment, then brightened as she exclaimed: "Oh, I almost forgot my principal reason for wishing to see you. The Semper Fidelis Club hasn't held a meeting this year, and we must begin to busy ourselves. I have heard of five different girls who need help, but are too proud to ask for it. I am sure there are dozens of others, too. We must find some way to reach and help them. We have plenty of money in our treasury now, and we can afford to be generous. Here we are at Vinton's. Shall we sit in the mission alcove for luncheon? I love it. It is so convenient when one wishes to indulge in strictly confidential conversation." Once seated opposite each other in the cunning little alcove furnished in mission oak, Arline continued animatedly: "Last spring, when we talked about giving an entertainment, you proposed giving a carnival in the fall. Well, it is fall now, so why not begin making plans for our carnival! What shall we have, and what do we do to draw a crowd?" "We held a bazaar in Oakdale that was very successful," commented Grace. "We held it on Thanksgiving night and half the town attended it. We made over five hundred dollars. I think a bazaar would be better than a carnival." Grace did not add that the money had been stolen while the bazaar was at its height and not recovered until the following spring, by no other person than herself. Those who have read "Grace Harlowe's Senior Year at High School" will remember the mysterious disappearance of the bazaar money and the untiring zeal with which Grace worked until she found a clew to the robbery, which led to the astonishing discovery that she made in an isolated house on the outskirts of Oakdale. During the progress of the luncheon Grace gave Arline a detailed account of the various attractions of which their bazaar had boasted. "We can ask some girl who sings to preside at the Shamrock booth and sing Irish songs as Nora O'Malley did," planned Grace. "We can't have the Mystery Auction, because we don't care to ask the girls for packages, and we can't have the Italian booth, either, it would be too hard to arrange, but we can have a gypsy camp and a Japanese booth and an English tea shop and two or three funny little shows. The best thing to do is to call a meeting of the club and put the matter before them. Almost every girl will know of some feature we can have." "I suppose the dean will allow us to use the gymnasium," mused Arline. "We had better get permission first of all. Then we can call our meeting." Grace looked at her watch. "I've stayed ten minutes over my hour, Arline," she reminded the little curly-haired girl. "Never mind," was the calm reply, "you can stay ten minutes longer in the library. Oh, Grace, don't look at her now, but who is that girl just sitting down at that end table? I am sure she lives at Wayne Hall. Some one told me she was a freshman." "If you had been calling faithfully on the Wayne Hall girls, you wouldn't need to be told the names of the new ones," flung back Grace. Then, allowing her gaze to slowly travel about the room, her eyes rested as though by chance on the girl designated by Arline. An instant later she had bowed to the newcomer in friendly fashion. "Who is she?" murmured Arline, her eyes fixed upon Grace. "Her name is Kathleen West," returned Grace in a low tone. "Don't say anything more. Here she comes." Kathleen was approaching their table, a bored look on her small, sharp face. "How are you?" she said nonchalantly. "I thought I'd come over here. Having tea alone is dull. Don't you think so?" Arline's blue eyes rested on the intruder for the fraction of a second. She resented the intrusion. "Miss West, this is Miss Thayer, of the junior class," introduced Grace good-naturedly. Both girls bowed. There was an awkward silence, broken by Kathleen's abrupt, "I knew I had seen you before, Miss Thayer," to Arline. "That is quite possible," said Arline, rather stiffly. "I believe I remember passing you on the campus." "Oh, I don't mean here at Overton," drawled Kathleen. "I saw you in New York with your father last summer." "With my father?" was Arline's surprised interrogation. "Yes. Isn't Leonard B. Thayer your father?" "Why, how did you know? Have you met my father?" Arline's blue eyes opened wider. "I've seen him," said Kathleen laconically. "I tried to interview him once, but couldn't get past his secretary." "Miss West is a newspaper woman, Arline," explained Grace. "That is, she was one. She has deserted her paper for Overton, however." "How interesting," responded Arline courteously. "Do you like college, Miss West?" "Fairly well," answered Kathleen. "It doesn't really matter whether I like it or not. I am here for business, not pleasure. Perhaps Miss Harlowe has told you how I happened to be here." "Miss Thayer and I had some weighty class matters to discuss," said Grace, smiling a little. "We weren't talking of any one in particular. Miss Thayer did inquire your name when she saw me bow to you. I answered just as you came toward us," added Grace honestly. "I knew you were talking about me," declared Kathleen flippantly. "One can always feel when one is being discussed." A quick flush rose to Grace's cheeks. Usually tolerant toward everyone, she felt a decided resentment stir within her at this cold-blooded assertion that she and Arline had been gossiping. Arline's blue eyes sent forth a distinctly hostile glance. "You were mistaken, Miss West," she said coldly. "What was said of you was entirely impersonal." "Oh, I don't doubt that in the least," Kathleen hastened to say. She had decided that the daughter of Leonard B. Thayer was worth cultivating. "I am sorry you misunderstood me; but do you know, when you made that last remark you looked as your father did the day he wouldn't tell me a thing I wanted to know." Kathleen's sharp features were alive with the interest of discovery. Despite their brief annoyance Grace and Arline both laughed. Kathleen took instant advantage of the situation. "Suppose we order another pot of tea," she said hospitably. It was fully half an hour later when the three girls left Vinton's. "Oh, my neglected references," sighed Grace. "I must not lose another minute of the afternoon. Which way are you girls going?" "I think I'll go as far as the library with you, Grace," decided Arline. The interruption by Kathleen had greatly interfered with her plans. "I might as well go with you," remarked Kathleen innocently. "I have nothing to do this afternoon." A little frown wrinkled Arline's smooth forehead. Grace, equally disappointed, managed to conceal her annoyance. Then, accepting the situation in the best possible spirit, she slipped her hand through Arline's arm, at the same time giving it a warning pressure. During the walk to the library Kathleen endeavored to make herself particularly agreeable to Arline, a method of procedure that was not lost upon Grace. Later as she delved industriously among half a dozen dignified volumes for the material of which she stood in need, Kathleen's pale, sharp face, with its thin lips and alert eyes, rose before her, and, for the first time, she admitted reluctantly to herself that her dislike for the ambitious little newspaper girl was very real indeed. CHAPTER VI AN UNSUSPECTED LISTENER "Those in favor of giving a bazaar on the Saturday afternoon and evening of November fifteenth say 'aye,'" directed Arline Thayer. A chorus of ayes immediately resounded. "Contrary, 'no,'" continued Arline. There was a dead silence. "Carried," declared the energetic little president. "Please, everyone think hard and try to advance an idea for a feature inside of the next ten minutes." The twelve young women known as the Semper Fidelis Club were holding a business meeting in Grace Harlowe's and Anne Pierson's, room. The two couch beds had been placed in a kind of semicircle and eight members of the club were seated on them. The other three young women sat on cushions on the floor, while Arline presided at the center table, which had been placed several feet in front of the members. "The meeting is open for suggestions," repeated Arline after two minutes had elapsed and not a word had been said. "If any one has a suggestion, she may tell us without addressing the chair. We will dispense with formality," she added encouragingly. "Of course, we know we are going to have the gypsy encampment and the Irish booth and the Japanese tea room, but we want some really startling features." "We might have an 'Alice in Wonderland' booth," suggested Elfreda. "'Alice' stunts always go in colleges. The girls are never tired of them." "What on earth is an 'Alice in Wonderland booth'?" asked Gertrude Wells curiously. "I don't know what it is yet," grinned Elfreda. "The idea just came to me. I suppose," she continued reflectively, "we could have all the animals, like the March Hare, for instance, and the Dormouse. Then there's the Mock Turtle and the Jabberwock. No, that's been done to death. Besides, it's in 'Through the Looking Glass.' We could have the Griffon, though, and then, there's the Duchess, the King, the Queen, and the Mad Hatter. I'd love to do the Mad Hatter." Elfreda paused, eyeing the little group quizzically. "I think that's a brilliant idea, Elfreda!" exclaimed Grace warmly. "Great!" exulted three or four girls, in lively chorus. "I'll tell you what we could have," cried one of the Emerson twins. "Why not make it an 'Alice in Wonderland Circus,' and have all the animals perform?" "We are growing more brilliant with every minute," laughed Arline. "That is a positive inspiration, Sara." "A circus will exactly fill the bill. It is sure to be the biggest feature the Overton girls have ever spent their money to see," predicted Elfreda gleefully. "Ruth Denton, you will have to be the Dormouse." "Oh, I can't," blushed Ruth. "Oh, you can," mimicked Elfreda. "I'll help you plan your costume." "Will the club please come to order," called Arline, for a general buzz of conversation had begun. "We shall have to choose part of our animals from outside the club. We can't all be in the circus. Grace and Miriam are going to dress as gypsies. Julia and Sara," smiling at the black-eyed twins, who looked precisely alike and were continually being mistaken for each other, "are going to be Japanese ladies, aren't you, girls?" The twins nodded emphatically. "Those in favor of an Alice in Wonderland Circus please say 'aye,'" dutifully stated Arline. The motion was quickly carried. "That is only one feature," she reminded. "This meeting is open for further suggestions. Let us have the suggestions first, then we can discuss them in detail afterward." After considerable hard thinking, a "bauble shop," a postcard booth, and a doll shop were added. The latter idea was Ruth Denton's. "Now that it is fall, Christmas isn't so very far off. Almost every girl has a little sister or a niece or a friend to whom she intends to give a doll," she said almost wistfully. "We could pledge ourselves to contribute one doll at least, and as many more as we please. Then we could draw on the treasury for a certain sum and invest it in dolls. We could dress a few of them as college girls, too. I'm willing to use part of my spare time to help the good work along. Perhaps it wouldn't be a success," she faltered. "Success!" exclaimed Arline, stumbling over Gertrude Wells's feet and treating Ruth to an affectionate hug. "I think it's perfectly lovely. We can have a live doll, too. Do any of you know that exquisite little freshman with the big blue eyes who rooms at Mortimer Hall?" "I do. Her name is Myra Stone," responded Julia Emerson. "She looks like a big doll, doesn't she!" "She does," commented Arline. "That is precisely what I was thinking. Dressed as a live doll and placed on exhibition in the middle of the booth, she would prove a drawing card. Will you ask her to meet us at the gymnasium on Monday at five o'clock? We will try to see the others we want for the bazaar before Monday. We had better decide now just who is going to be left over for the circus." "There is only one objection to little Miss Stone," said Gertrude Wells thoughtfully. "She is a freshman. I am afraid this mark of upper class favor may cause jealousy." "The freshmen ought to be glad one of their class is to have the honor of being chosen," retorted Grace, opening her gray eyes in surprise. "They ought to, but they won't be," predicted Gertrude dryly. "There are a number of revolutionary spirits among the freshmen this year. That queer little West girl, who styles herself a 'newspaper woman' and looks like a wicked little elf, is the ringleader." "She is very bright, Gertrude, and she deserves a great deal of credit for the way she has worked and studied to fit herself for college," defended Grace, her old love of fair play coming to the surface. "That may all be so. I believe it is, if you say so, Grace, but why doesn't she display common sense enough to settle down and obey the rules of the college? She doesn't transgress the study rules, but she is lawless when it comes to the others. Besides, she runs roughshod over traditions, and all that they imply. She--well--" Gertrude hesitated, then, flushing slightly, stopped. "You mean she is tricky, don't you?" asked Elfreda promptly. "I could see that before I talked with her five minutes." Grace shook her head disapprovingly at Elfreda. Something in her glance caused Elfreda to subside suddenly. "If there is no further business of which to dispose, will some one make a motion that we adjourn!" asked Arline quietly. The motion was made and seconded, but before any one had time to step into the hall, a slight figure flitted from her position before the almost closed door, and disappeared into the room at the end of the hall. "We must be sure and see the dean as soon as we can, Arline," called Grace after Arline, who was hurrying down the hall to overtake Ruth. "I'll see her to-morrow afternoon," assured Arline, with a parting wave of her hand as she disappeared down the stairs. "And I'll make it my business to see her to-morrow morning," muttered Kathleen West vindictively, who, standing well within the shadow of her own door at the end of the hall, had heard the remark and the reply. "Who knows but that the Semper Fidelis Club may not be able to give their great bazaar after all. They certainly won't if I can prevent them. I'll never forgive them for discussing me as they have this afternoon." There was an unpleasant light in the newspaper girl's eyes, as, closing the door of her room, she went to her desk and opening it, sat down before it, picking up her pen. After a little thought she began to write, and when she had finished what seemed to be an extremely short letter, she slipped it into the envelope with a smile of malicious satisfaction. She had found a way to retaliate. CHAPTER VII AN UNPLEASANT SUMMONS "Here's a letter for you, Grace," called Elfreda, who had run downstairs ahead of Grace to survey the contents of the house bulletin board before going in to breakfast. Grace surveyed the envelope critically, tore it open and unfolded the sheet of paper inside. In another moment a little cry of consternation escaped her. "What's the matter?" asked Elfreda curiously, trying to peer over her shoulder. "It--it's a summons from the dean," said Grace a trifle unsteadily. "What do you suppose it means?" "Nothing very serious," declared Elfreda confidently. "How can it? Think over your past misdeeds and see if you can discover any reason for a summons." Grace shook her head. "No," she said slowly. "I can't think of a single, solitary thing." "Then don't worry about it," was Elfreda's comforting advice. "Whatever it is, you are ready for it." As Grace entered the dean's office that morning a vague feeling of apprehension rose within her. The dean, a stately, dark-haired woman with a rather forbidding expression, which disappeared the moment she smiled, glanced up with a flash of approval at the fine, resolute face of the gray-eyed girl who walked straight to her and said firmly, "Good morning, Miss Wilder." "Good morning, Miss Harlowe," returned the dean quietly. Then picking up a letter that lay on the middle of her desk, she said gravely: "I received a very peculiar letter this morning, Miss Harlowe, and as it concerns not only you, but a number of your friends as well, I thought it better to send for you. You may throw light upon what at present seems obscure." Grace mechanically stretched forth her hand for the open letter and read:-- "When giving an entertainment in any of the halls or in the gymnasium, is it not usually customary, not to say courteous, to ask permission of the president of the college or the dean beforehand? The young women whose names appear on the enclosed list evidently do not consider any such permission necessary. For the past week preparations for a bazaar have been going briskly forward, to be held in the gymnasium on the evening of November ----. For inside information inquire of Miss Harlowe. "A WELL WISHER." Grace read the note through twice, then, looking squarely at the dean, she said: "May I see the enclosed list?" The dean handed her a smaller slip of paper on which appeared the names of the girls who had been present at the meeting in her room. Grace scanned the slip earnestly. Her color rose slightly as she returned it to Miss Wilder. "The names on this list are the names of the young women who belong to the Semper Fidelis Club. After the concert last spring it was partly decided to give a bazaar the following autumn. The other day the club met in my room to talk over the matter. As we were all in favor of giving one, the meeting was open for the discussion of ideas for attractive features. Finally something was proposed that was so very clever we couldn't help adopting it. I assure you, Miss Wilder, we had no thought of doing anything definite about the bazaar without first obtaining proper permission to give it and to use the gymnasium as our field of operation. In fact, Miss Thayer promised me on the afternoon of the meeting that she would see you the following afternoon. She is the president of the club. I haven't seen her since then." Grace paused, looking worried. "Miss Thayer has not been here," returned Miss Wilder kindly. "However, your explanation is sufficient, Miss Harlowe. I am reasonably sure that the writer of this letter has either misunderstood the situation, or has been misinformed. To be candid, very little credence can be placed on the information contained in an anonymous letter. In fact, my reason for sending for you had to do with that, rather than the implied charge the letter makes. I wish you to examine this handwriting," she touched the letter which Grace still held in hand. "Do you recognize it?" There was a slight interval of silence. Grace devoted herself to the examination of the letter and the slip of paper. Then, handing it to the dean, she said frankly: "I have no recollection of having seen this handwriting before to-day." The dean folded the letter, placed the list of names inside its folds and returned it to the envelope. "This is the first anonymous letter that has ever been brought to my notice," she said gravely. "I trust it will be the last. It is hard to believe that a student of Overton would resort to such petty spite, for that seems to be its keynote. It is practically impossible, however, to find the writer among so many girls." Grace would have liked to say that this was not the first anonymous letter that had been brought to her notice. The ghost of a disturbing, unsigned note that had almost wrecked Elfreda's freshman happiness rose and walked before her. Could it be possible that the same hand had written the second note? Grace was startled at her own thought. "May I see the note again, Miss Wilder?" she asked soberly. This time she scrutinized the writing even more closely. There was something familiar, yet unfamiliar, about the formation of the letters. Finally she handed it back. "It is a mystery to me," she said, with a little sigh. "I am so glad you understood about the bazaar." Before the dean could reply the click of approaching heels was heard. A moment later a light knock sounded on the door. At a nod from the dean, Grace opened it, and stood face to face with Arline Thayer. "Why, Grace Harlowe!" she exclaimed in her sweet, high voice. "I didn't know you were here. Did you get my message? Good afternoon, Miss Wilder," she added, following Grace inside the office. "Good afternoon, Miss Thayer," smiled Miss Wilder, indicating a chair, which Arline accepted. "I owe you and the Semper Fidelis Club an apology for not having delivered their message. I spent yesterday nursing a headache and was not able to attend any of my classes. Miss Harlowe has already asked your permission to hold a bazaar in the gymnasium, I believe." "Yes," returned Miss Wilder pleasantly. "I am willing to allow the Semper Fidelis Club carte blanche for one night. I approve warmly of both the club and its object. I shall, of course, ask formal permission of the president, but that need not necessarily delay your plans. The concert given by your club last year was a most enjoyable affair and proved very profitable to the club, did it not?" Grace answered in the affirmative. "We were fortunate in being able to secure Savelli, the virtuoso," she replied. "It was by the merest chance that he happened to have that one evening free. His daughter, Eleanor, who is one of my dear friends, and I telephoned to New York City to ask him to play for us. We saved him until last as a surprise number." "The audience fully appreciated his playing," returned Miss Wilder. "To hear the great Savelli was an unexpected privilege. I shall look forward to your bazaar with pleasurable anticipation and I wish you success." Grace looked searchingly into the smiling, dark eyes of the dean. "Thank you so much, Miss Wilder," she said earnestly. "I felt sure you would understand." "We should like Professor Morton to open the bazaar, and would appreciate a speech from you also," added Arline. "I shall be pleased to help the club in any way I can," assured Miss Wilder graciously as the two girls were about to leave the office. "I am certain that Professor Morton will echo my sentiments." Something in the older woman's quiet tones made Grace feel that the anonymous letter had entirely failed in its object. CHAPTER VIII ELFREDA PROPHESIES TROUBLE Not until the two girls were well outside did either venture to speak. Then their eyes met. "Did you receive my message?" asked Arline abruptly. "Your message," repeated Grace. "No, I didn't receive any message. By whom did you send it?" "Emma Dean," declared Arline. "She was at Morton House yesterday for luncheon, and I ran across her in the hall. I asked her to ask you if you would see Miss Wilder after classes yesterday afternoon." "Emma Dean again," laughed Grace. "Didn't you know, Arline, that the Dean messenger service is absolutely unreliable? Emma is always perfectly willing to deliver a message, but never remembers to deliver it. Only last week Elfreda made an engagement with a dressmaker who sews for Emma. In the meantime Emma went to the dressmaker's house for a fitting, and the woman asked her to tell Elfreda to come for her fitting on Thursday instead of Friday night. Emma forgot it before she was a block from the dressmaker's, and poor Elfreda dutifully trudged off to her fitting instead of accepting an invitation to a theatre party that the girls got up on Friday afternoon. The dressmaker wasn't in and Elfreda went home angry. Emma delivered the message the next day." "No wonder you didn't receive mine then," laughed Arline. "How did you happen to find me?" asked Grace. "Oh, I wasn't looking for you," replied Arline. "I thought as long as I felt better, I had better call on Miss Wilder, too. But," said Arline, a puzzled look creeping into her eyes, "if you didn't receive my message, how did you happen to be in the dean's office?" "I received a summons," answered Grace quietly. "The dean wished to see me about--well--" Grace hesitated. "I should like to tell you about it," she went on. "Miss Wilder did not ask me to keep the matter a secret. That was understood, I suppose. But, Arline, I think it would be better to ask her permission before telling even you." "Is it anything about me or about the club?" asked Arline curiously. "It is something about the club," replied Grace enigmatically. "Then suppose we go back and ask her now," proposed Arline. "No," negatived Grace wisely, "it wouldn't do. Wait a little. I shall see her again in a day or two. Then I may have a chance to ask her." "All right," sighed Arline disappointedly. "Now that we have permission we must go to work with a will. The 'Circus' must meet and plan the costumes. Each girl will have to furnish her own. Ruth said she thought she could design them all, and cut them out if the girls could do their own sewing." "Ruth is doing too much," demurred Grace. "Remember she is going to help dress dolls for the doll shop." "I know it," responded Arline, "but, thanks to the Semper Fidelis Club, she doesn't have to burden herself with mending. Besides, I keep her so busy with my clothes she doesn't have time to do anything for outsiders. Some of the girls were so provoking. They used to give her their work at the eleventh hour, and then send for it before she had half a chance to finish it. They didn't exert themselves to pay her, however. It was weeks, sometimes, before they gave her the money. They usually forgot about it and spent their allowance money for something else. I think I have already told you that Father would adopt Ruth if she would consent to it. But she is a most stiff-necked young person. She says she must work out her own salvation, and that too much comfort might spoil her for doing good work in the world." "Do you suppose her father is really dead?" asked Grace thoughtfully. "Oh, I think he must be," returned Arline quickly. "Even if he isn't dead, there is only one chance in a thousand of her finding him. When I went home last June I had one of my famous talks with Father. We decided that I needed a competent person to look after me in college, and Father asked Ruth to accept the position of companion. Then she could room with me and be free from this hateful sewing. But she wouldn't do it, the proud little thing! I like her all the better for her pride, though," concluded Arline in a burst of confidence. "I think she is right about making her own way," declared Grace. "If I were placed in her circumstances I imagine I should look at the matter in the same light. Really, Arline, I often think that girls as happily situated as you and I do not half appreciate our benefits." "I know it," agreed Arline. "Still, I am wide awake to the fact that a single room, pretty clothes and a generous allowance are not to be despised. I have grown so used to my way of living that to adopt Ruth's wouldn't be easy. I'd be worse off than she, for I don't know how to mend or sew or do anything else that is useful. I wonder if the girls would like me as well poor as rich," she said almost wistfully. "Goose!" scoffed Grace. "Of course they would. How could any one help liking you? To change the subject, when shall we call a meeting of the bazaar specialists? We might as well post a notice on the big bulletin board. It will do more to advertise the bazaar than anything else." "Grace, you are a born advertiser," cried Arline. "There will be a crowd around that bulletin board all day. Will you write the notice to-night? Oh, did I tell you? I'm going to have my horse here this year. Father wants me to ride." "How lovely!" exclaimed Grace with a little sigh. "How I wish I had a horse. I'd willingly use all my allowance to feed one, if Father could afford to buy him for me." "Mabel Ashe has the handsomest horse I ever saw," said Arline. "He is black as jet. You know I often see her in New York during vacations. We have ridden together several times." "You mean Elixir," returned Grace. "I have never seen him, but I have heard of him. That reminds me, Mabel is coming down here for Thanksgiving. I received a letter from her yesterday." "I wish she could come down for the bazaar," sighed Arline regretfully. "So do I," responded Grace heartily. At the corner above Wayne Hall Arline left Grace with a warning, "Don't forget to post that notice." As Grace reached the steps of the Hall the front door opened and two girls stepped out on the porch, followed by an alert little figure whose small face wore an expression of malicious amusement. "Do come again," she was saying in clear, high tones. "I've heard some very interesting things this afternoon." Looking down, simultaneously, three pairs of eyes were leveled on Grace and conversation instantly ceased. Grace walked quietly up the steps and, with a courteous "good afternoon," passed into the house and up the stairs to her room. Her face was unusually sober as she slowly pulled the hatpins from her hat. "How did Miss West happen to meet them?" she said half aloud. "Meet whom?" asked Elfreda, who had come into the room in time to hear Grace's half musing question. "Oh, Elfreda. How you startled me!" exclaimed Grace. "How did Miss West meet whom? That's what I am curious to know," returned Elfreda, regarding Grace with lively interest. "Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton, Inquisitive," answered Grace. "Where did you see them?" asked Elfreda, exhibiting considerable excitement. "On the front porch. They had evidently been making a call on Kathleen." "Then look out," predicted Elfreda. "They began back in the freshman year with me. Last year it was Laura Atkins and Mildred Taylor. This year it will be Kathleen West, and you mark my word, she won't reform at the end of the year as the rest of us did." "'Quoth the raven, "nevermore",'" laughed Grace. "Well, you'll see," declared Elfreda gloomily. "I'm sorry Kathleen West lives here. I thought we were going to have a peaceful year. But every fall apparently brings its problem. Really, Grace, I can't help feeling terribly remorseful to think that it is I who have caused all this trouble. If I hadn't been such an idiot when I first came here, you and Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton might at least be on speaking terms." "You mustn't think about such ancient history, Elfreda," admonished Grace. "We all do things for which we are afterward sorry. I daresay I should have offended those two girls in some other way before my freshman year was over. Both sides were to blame. I suppose we were naturally antagonistic." "That is one way of putting it," muttered Elfreda, scowling over her past misdeeds. "Come, come, Elfreda, don't glower over what has been forgotten," smiled Grace, patting Elfreda's plump shoulder. "You may forget," declared the stout girl solemnly, "but I never shall." CHAPTER IX OPENING THE BAZAAR It was Saturday afternoon, and the Semper Fidelis bazaar had just been opened. Grace Harlowe, attired in her gypsy costume, for which she had sent home, stood watching the gay scene, her eyes glowing with interest and pleasure. Professor Morton, the president of the college, had set his seal of approval on the bazaar by making a short speech. Then the dean had added a word or two, and the applause had died away in a pleasant hum of conversation that arose from the throng of students and visitors that more than comfortably filled the gymnasium. "I don't see how those girls managed to accomplish so much in so short a time," remarked the dean to Miss Duncan. "I understand Miss Harlowe was a prime mover in the work." "Yes," replied Miss Duncan. "Miss Harlowe seems to have plenty of initiative. She is one of the most active members of this new club, who have taken upon themselves the responsibility of helping needy students through college. I understand their treasury is already in a flourishing condition, thanks to their own efforts and a timely contribution they received after their concert last spring. I consider Miss Harlowe the finest type of young woman I have encountered during all my years of teaching," replied Miss Duncan warmly, which was a remarkable statement from this rather austere teacher. "The junior class is particularly rich in good material," replied the dean. "I could name at least a dozen young women whom I consider splendid types of the ideal Overton girl." Utterly unaware of the approval of the faculty, Grace had paused for a moment outside the gypsy encampment to cast a speculative eye over the crowd, which seemed to be steadily increasing. "It is a brilliant success," she said to Arline gleefully, who had come up and now stood beside her. "I am so glad, but so tired. I do hope everyone will like the bazaar, and have a good time this afternoon and to-night. Everything has gone so beautifully. There hasn't been a sign of a hitch. Oh, yes, there was one." Her face clouded for a second. Then she looked at Arline brightly. "I'm not going to think of it. There are so many nice things to remember that one little unpleasantness doesn't count, does it?" "I think it counts," declared Arline stubbornly. "I shall never forget it as long as I live. Why, it nearly spoiled our bazaar. It was dreadful to have some one spread the story of our circus, and just what we intended to have, when we wanted the whole thing to be a surprise." "Really, I think the person who told the tales did us a good turn after all," laughed Grace. "The girls were ever so much more anxious to attend the bazaar after they heard of the circus. Every girl loves 'Alice in Wonderland,' I think. And then the Sphinx is a first-class surprise." "Isn't it funny?" chuckled Arline, who, in her short, white, embroidered dress, pale blue sash, blue silk stockings and heelless blue kid slippers, her golden hair hanging in curls, tied up on one side with a blue ribbon, looked exactly as Lewis Carroll's immortal Alice might have looked if she had been inspired with life. "Alice" was allowed to show herself to the public before the performance, and on catching sight of Grace had run across the gymnasium to her in true little girl fashion. Never before had Overton's big gymnasium been so peculiarly and gayly arrayed. At one end a numerous band of gypsies had pitched their tents and here Grace and Miriam, garbed in the many-colored raiment of the Zingari, jingled their tambourines in their familiar but ever-popular Spanish dance, and read curious pink palms itching to know the future. Adjoining the gypsy encampment was a doll shop, over which the cunning freshman, Myra Stone, dressed as a sailor doll, presided. Then came the Japanese tea shop, with the Emerson twins as proprietors, looking so realistically Japanese that Arline declared she didn't believe they were the Emerson twins, but two geisha girls straight from Japan. At intervals, when their patrons had all been served, they sidled up to the center of the shop and performed a quaint Oriental dance for the entertainment of their guests. [Illustration: The Emerson Twins Looked Realistically Japanese.] Violet Darby had been asked to preside at the Shamrock booth instead of Arline, as had first been suggested, Arline having been elected to portray the world-renowned Alice. As an Irish colleen, Violet, however, proved a distinct success, and thrilled her hearers with "Kathleen Mavourneen" and "The Harp that Once Through Tara's Halls." Her voice held that peculiarly sweet, plaintive quality so necessary to bring out the beauty of the old Irish melodies, and Grace and Anne both agreed that there was only one who could surpass her. There was only one Nora O'Malley. Farther on four pretty sophomores, dressed as Norman peasant girls, were dispensing cakes and ices to a steadily increasing patronage. There was a postcard and souvenir booth, around which a crowd seemed perpetually stationed. The souvenirs consisted mainly of small black and white or water color sketches contributed by the artistic element of Overton. Occupying one entire end of the room was the circus ring, and on this public attention was centered. A gayly decorated poster at the door bore the pleasing information that there would be four performances, at two-thirty, four-thirty, eight-thirty, and nine-thirty, respectively, in which would appear the "Celebrated Alice in Wonderland Animals." The club had originally planned to keep the matter of the circus as a surprise until the patrons of the bazaar should enter the gymnasium, but in some mysterious manner the secret had leaked out. Even the identity of certain animals was known, and when this unpleasant news had reached the ears of the "animals" themselves a meeting was called, which almost put an end to the circus then and there. After due consideration the performers agreed to go on with the spectacle, but many and indignant were the theories advanced as to the manner in which the news had traveled abroad. That the information had gone forth through a member of the club or any one taking part in the circus no one of them believed. Complete ostracism threatened the offender or offenders provided she or they, as the case might be, were discovered. Later the members of the club were forced to admit that, although the principle of the act was reprehensible, the act itself had served only as a means of advertising, and had aroused the curiosity and interest of the public. After several earnest discussions on the part of the club, the admission fee had been fixed at twenty-five cents, and the public had been invited. As a college town Overton's "public" was largely made up of the classes rather than the masses, and many of the visitors claimed Overton as their Alma Mater. The students, however, were the hope on which the club based its dreams of profit. "No girl could walk around the gymnasium without spending money. She couldn't resist those darling shops. They are all too fascinating for words," Arline had declared rapturously as she and Grace were taking a last walk around the great, gayly decorated room before going to luncheon that day. Now, as they stood side by side anxiously watching the steadily increasing tide of visitors, they agreed that their efforts were about to be rewarded. "Isn't it splendid!" exulted Arline. "And, oh, have you seen the Sphinx, and isn't she great! How did Emma happen to think of her, let alone getting her up?" "S-h-h!" cautioned Grace in a warning tone. "Some one might hear you." "Oh, I forgot. Sphinxes are supposed to be shrouded in mystery, aren't they?" "This one is," smiled Grace. Then her face sobered instantly. "I hope no one else besides ourselves finds out. We ought to keep her identity a secret. I think the idea is simply great, don't you?" Arline nodded. "Come on over and see her," she coaxed. A moment later they stood before the entrance to a small tent, hung with a heavy curtain. Pushing the curtain aside, Arline stepped into the tent. A burnoosed, turbaned Arab standing inside salaamed profoundly. The two girls giggled, and there was a stifled, most un-Arab-like echo from the bronzed son of the desert. Then they paused before a platform about four feet in height on which reposed what appeared to be a gigantic Sphinx, her paws stiffly folded in front of her. "Ask me a question." This sudden, mysterious croak that issued from inside the great head caused Arline to start and step back. "Ask me a question. I am as old as the world. I am the world's great riddle, the one which has never been solved. Ask me a question, only one, one only." The eerie voice died away into yards of drapery that extended in huge folds from the back of the head and far out on the platform. "How on earth did you ever get into that affair, and who made it?" asked Arline curiously. "Mystery, all is mystery," croaked the Sphinx. "But you said you would answer my question!" persisted Arline. "Which one?" plaintively inquired the voice. "Both," declared Arline boldly. "Only one, only one," was the provoking reply. "Then, who made it?" asked Arline. "It was made ages ago." Emma Dean's familiar drawl startled both Grace and Arline. "My brother had it made for a college play called 'Sphinx.' When we began to plan for the bazaar I sent home for it. I was so afraid it wouldn't arrive on time. My brother hired an old man who does this wonderful papier mache work to make it. I made the paws. Rather realistic, aren't they? All this drapery came with the head. I am inside the head, sitting on a stool. It's rather dark and stuffy, but it's lots of fun, too. I can appear before the audience at any moment. The head is built over a light frame. There is an arrangement inside the head that makes promenading possible. In fact, I had practiced an attractive little dance--" "Hurrah!" cried Arline. "Another feature. When shall we have it! Won't that be splendid?" "Not this afternoon. Late in the evening," counseled Emma. "I don't wish to dance more than once, and you know what a college girl audience means. Now, is there anything else you want to know?" There was a sudden murmur of voices outside which silenced Emma immediately. Then Alberta Wicks, Mary Hampton and Kathleen West were ushered into the tent. "I am the Sphinx," began the far-away voice again in the mammoth head. "Ask me a question." Bowing to the newcomers rather coldly, Grace and Arline turned to leave the tent. But Grace reflected grimly as she lifted the tent flap that if any one of the trio had been the all-wise Sphinx, instead of her friend Emma Dean, there were several questions she might have asked that would have been disconcerting to say the least. A little later she strolled back to the Sphinx's tent, only to find that amiable riddle besieged by an impatient throng of girls who were eager to spend their money for the mere sake of hearing the Sphinx's ridiculous answers to their questions, and incidentally to try if possible to discover her identity. Emma had succeeded in changing her voice so completely that the far-away, almost wailing tones of the Egyptian wonder had little in common with her usual drawl. She and her faithful Arab had thoroughly enjoyed the attempts of the various girls to discover who was inside the great head and voluminous drapery. "I would never have known who was in there if Emma herself had not told me. I don't believe any one outside the club knows either," was Grace's conclusion as she returned to her own booth. But in this she was mistaken. CHAPTER X THE ALICE IN WONDERLAND CIRCUS The Alice in Wonderland Circus went down in the annals of Overton as the most original "stunt" ever attempted by any particular class. 19-- bore its honors modestly, but was inordinately proud of the achievement of the Semper Fidelis Club. The animals' costumes had been designed by Ruth and Elfreda. After much poring over half a dozen editions of "Alice," the original illustrations by "John Tenniel" had appealed most strongly to them, and these had been copied as faithfully as possible in style and color. The only important dry goods store in Overton had been ransacked for colored cambrics, denim and khaki, and under the clever fingers of Ruth, who seemed to know the exact shape and proportion of every one of the Wonderland "animals," the Dormouse, the Griffon and the Rabbit had been fitted with "skins." Elfreda had skilfully designed and made the Mock Turtle's huge shell and flappers, the Griffon's wings, not to mention ears for at least half the circus, and Gertrude Wells, whose clever posters were always in demand, obligingly painted bars, dots, stripes or whatever touch was needed to make the particular animal a triumph of realism. The King and Queen looked as though they might have stepped from the pages of the book, and the Duchess, as played by Anne, was a masterpiece of acting. The circus opened with a grand march of the animals. Then followed the "Mad Hatter Quadrille," called by the Mad Hatter and danced by the March Hare, the Dormouse, the Rabbit, the Griffon, the Mock Turtle, the Dodo, the Duchess and Alice. Then the Mad Hatter stepped to the center of the ring, flourished his high hat, bowed profoundly, and made a funny little speech about the accomplishments of the animals, each one walking solemnly into the middle of the ring as his name was called and clumsily saluting the audience. Then the real circus began. The Dormouse skipped the rope, the Rabbit balanced a plate on his nose, the Griffon, with a great flapping of wings, laboriously climbed a ladder and jumped from the top rung to the ground, a matter of about six feet, where he bowed pompously and waved his long claws to the audience. Then the Mock Turtle sang "Beautiful Soup," and wept so profusely he toppled over at the end of the song and lay flopping on his back. The Mad Hatter and the Griffon hastily raised him only to find he had made a dreadful dent in his shell. This did not hinder him from joining his friend, the Griffon, in "Won't You Join the Dance?" which stately caper they performed around Alice, while the other animals stood in a circle and marked time with their feet, solemnly waving their paws and wagging their heads in unison. The Cheshire Cat, who had a real Chessy Cat head which Gertrude Wells had manufactured and painted, and who wore Arline's long squirrel coat with a squirrel scarf trailing behind for a tail, executed a dance of quaint steps and low bows. The Dodo jumped or rather walked through three paper hoops, which had to be lowered to admit his chubby person. The King and Queen gave a dialogue, every other line of which was "Off with her head," and the Mad Hatter performed an eccentric dance consisting of marvelous leaps and bounds that took him from one side of the ring to the other with amazing rapidity. When he made his bow the audience shouted with laughter and encored wildly, but with a last nimble skip the panting Hatter made for the Griffon's ladder and, seating himself upon it, refused to respond beyond a nod and a careless wave of his hand. Later he left his perch and proceeded to convulse his audience by sitting on his tall hat and taking a bite from his teacup, the three-cornered bite having been carefully removed beforehand and held temporarily in place with library paste until the proper moment. As the Mad Hatter, Elfreda was entirely in her element. Her unusually keen sense of humor prompted her to make her impersonation of the immortal Hatter one long to be remembered by those who witnessed the performance given by the famous animals. She was without doubt the feature of the circus and the spectators were quick to note and applaud her slightest movement. The circus ended with an all-around acrobatic exhibition. The Dodo performed on the trapeze. The Mock Turtle and the Cheshire Cat took turns on a diminutive springboard. The March Hare and the Dormouse energetically jumped over a small barrel. The Queen and the Duchess had a fencing match, the Queen using her sceptre, the Duchess the rag baby she carried, and to which she had sung the "Pepper Song" at intervals during the performance. The King tossed four colored balls into the air, keeping them in motion at once. The Rabbit went on balancing his plate until it slid off his nose, but being tin it struck the ring without breaking. The Griffon lumbered up and down his ladder, while the King and Alice, stepping down to the front of the ring, sang their great duet, "Come, Learn the Way to Wonderland," while, one by one, the animals left off performing their stunts and, surrounding Alice and the King, came out strongly on the chorus: "Come, learn the way to Wonderland. None of the grown folks understand Just where it lies, Hid from their eyes. 'Tis an enchanted strand Where the Hare and the Hatter dance in glee, Where curious beasts sit down to tea, Where the Mock Turtle sings And the Griffon has wings, In curious Wonderland." After the animals had romped out of the ring, and romped in again to take an encore, the audience, who had occupied every reserved seat in the gallery opposite the ring, and packed every available inch of standing room there, came downstairs, while those who had stayed downstairs and peered over one another's shoulders, made a rush for the reserved seat ticket window. Mr. Redfield, the old gentleman who had contributed so liberally to the Semper Fidelis Club, chuckled gleefully over the circus and put in a request that it be given again at the next public entertainment under the auspices of the club. The second performance was given toward the close of the afternoon, and was even more enthusiastically received. None of the performers left the gymnasium for dinner that night. They preferred to satisfy their hunger at the various booths. "Oh, there goes Emma," laughed Grace, as late that evening she caught a glimpse of the Egyptian mystery parading majestically down the room ahead of her, then stopping at the Japanese booth to exchange a word with the giggling Emerson twins, who thought the Sphinx the greatest joke imaginable. A little later as Grace was about to return to the gypsy camp she heard a sudden swish of draperies behind her. Glancing hastily about, she laughed as she saw the Sphinx's unwieldy head towering above her. "Oh, Great and Wonderful Mystery--" began Grace. But Emma answered almost crossly: "Don't 'Great and Wonderful Mystery' me. This head is becoming a dead weight, and I'm thirsty and tired, and, besides, something disagreeable just happened." "What was it?" asked Grace unthinkingly. Then, "I beg your pardon, Emma, I didn't realize the rudeness of my question. Pretend you didn't hear what I said." "Oh, that is all right," responded Emma laconically. "I don't mind telling you if you will promise on your honor as a junior not to tell a soul." "I promise," agreed Grace. "It's about that West person," began Emma disgustedly. "I overheard a conversation between her and her two friends to-night. How did she become so friendly with Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton? They addressed one another by their first names as though on terms of greatest familiarity." "I don't know, I am sure," answered Grace slowly. "I seldom see either Miss Wicks or Miss Hampton. When they lived at Stuart Hall I used frequently to pass them on the campus, but since they have been living at Wellington House I rarely, if ever, see either of them. It is just as well, I suppose." "Thank goodness, this is their last year here," muttered Emma. "We shall have peace during our senior year at least, unless some other disturber appears on the scene." "Why, Emma Dean!" exclaimed Grace, "what is the matter with you to-night? You aren't a bit like your usual self." "Then, I'm a successful Sphinx," retorted Emma satirically. "Of course you are," smiled Grace. "But you can be a successful Sphinx and be yourself, too. But you haven't yet told me anything." "I'm coming to the information part now," went on Emma. "About an hour ago, while the circus was in full swing, I slipped out of my Sphinx rig and, asking Helen to watch it,--she is made up as the Arab, you know,--I went for a walk around the bazaar. I was sure no one knew that I was the Sphinx, and the Sphinx was I, for I hadn't told a soul except the club girls and Helen. You know I've been purposely taking occasional walks about the gymnasium as Emma Dean. I went over to the Japanese booth for some tea, and while I was drinking it the circus ended and the girls began to pile into the garden for tea. All of a sudden I heard some one say, 'Why didn't you bring your Sphinx costume along, Miss Dean?' It was that horrid little West girl who spoke. Her voice carried, too, for every one in the garden heard her, and they all pounced upon me at once. It made me so angry I rushed out without waiting for my tea, and inside of five minutes the news had circled the gym, and the Sphinx had ceased to be the world's great mystery. I got into the costume again, but the fun was gone. I didn't answer any more questions and I didn't do my dance. I was looking for you to tell you that the Sphinx was about to give up the ghost." "How could Miss West be so spiteful?" asked Grace vexedly. "Where do you suppose she heard the news, and who told her? You don't suppose--" Grace stopped abruptly. A sudden suspicion had seized her. "Don't suppose what?" interrogated Emma sharply. "Nothing," finished Grace shortly. "Yes, you do suppose something," declared Emma. "I know just what you are thinking. You believe as I do, that Miss West listened--" "Don't say it, Emma!" exclaimed Grace. "We may both be wrong." "Then you do believe----" "I don't know," said Grace bravely. "I admit that suspicion points toward Miss West, but until we know definitely, we must try to be fair-minded. I have seen too much unhappiness result from misplaced suspicion. I know of an instance where a girl was sent to Coventry by her class for almost a year on the merest suspicion." "Not here?" questioned Emma, her eyes expressing the surprise she felt at this announcement. "No," returned Grace soberly. There was finality in her "no." "And the moral is, don't jump at conclusions," smiled Emma. "Come on down to my lair while I remove my Sphinx-like garments and step forth as plain Emma Dean. Don't look so sober, Grace. I've put my suspicions to sleep. I'll give even Miss West the benefit of my doubt. I will even go so far as to forgive her for spoiling my fun to-night. Now smile and say, 'Emma, I always knew you to be the soul of magnanimity.'" Grace laughed outright at this modest assertion, and obligingly repeated the required words. "Now that my reputation has been once more established, and because I don't feel half so wrathful as I did ten minutes ago," declared Emma, "let us lay the Sphinx peacefully to rest and do the bazaar arm in arm." CHAPTER XI GRACE MEETS WITH A REBUFF It was several days before the pleasant buzz of excitement created by the bazaar had subsided. With a few exceptions the Overton girls who had turned out, almost in a body, to patronize it, were loud in their praises of the booths, and spent their money with commendable recklessness. Outside the circus it was difficult to say which booth had proved the greatest attraction. But late that evening, after the crowd had gone home and the proceeds of the entertainment were counted, the club discovered to their joy that they were nearly six hundred dollars richer. Arline had laughingly proclaimed the Semper Fidelis Club as a regular get-rich-quick organization with honest motives. By the time the last bit of frivolous decoration had been removed from the gymnasium, and the big room had recovered its usual business-like air, the bazaar had become a bit of 19--'s history, and Thanksgiving plans were in full swing. There had been two meetings of the club, but to Grace's surprise no mention had been made of Kathleen West's intentional betrayal of Emma Dean's identity. Grace felt certain that the majority of the club had heard the story, and with a thrill of pride she paid tribute to her friends, who, in ignoring the thrust evidently intended for the club itself, had shown themselves as possessors of the true Overton spirit. After Emma's one outburst to Grace against Kathleen she said no more on the subject. Even Elfreda, who usually had something to say about everything when alone with her three friends, was discreetly silent on the subject of the newspaper girl. Long ago she had delivered her ultimatum. To be sure, she went about looking owlishly wise, but she offered no comment concerning Kathleen's unpleasant attitude. For the time being Grace had put aside all disturbing thoughts and suspicions, and was preparing to make the most of the four days' vacation. Mabel Ashe was to be her guest on Thanksgiving Day, and this in itself was sufficient to banish everything save pleasurable anticipations from her mind. Then, too, there was so much to be done. The Monday evening preceding Thanksgiving Grace hurried through her lessons and, closing her books before she was at all sure that she could make a creditable recitation in any of her subjects, settled herself to the important task of letter-writing. "There," she announced with satisfaction, after half an hour's steady work, "Father and Mother can't say I forgot them. Let me see, there are Nora and Jessica, Mrs. Gray and Mabel Allison. Eleanor owes me a letter, and, oh, I nearly forgot the Southards, and there is Mrs. Gibson. I shall have to devote two nights to letter-writing," she added ruefully. "I do love to receive letters, but it is so hard to answer them." "Isn't it, though?" sighed Anne, who was seated at the table opposite Grace, engaged in a similar task. "Now I wish we were going home, don't you, Grace?" "Yes," returned Grace simply. "But we can't, so there is no use in wishing. However," she continued, her face brightening, "we are going to have Mabel with us, and that means a whole lot. All Overton will be glad to see her--that is, all the juniors and seniors and the faculty and a few others." "There is only one Mabel Ashe," said Anne softly. "Won't it be splendid to have her with us?" Grace nodded. Then, after writing busily for a moment, she looked up and said abruptly: "There is just one thing that bothers me, Anne, and that is the way Miss West is behaving. What shall I tell Mabel when she asks me about her? In my letters I haven't made the slightest allusion to anything." "Tell Mabel the truth," advised Anne calmly. "By that I don't mean that you need mention the Sphinx affair, but if you say to her frankly that we have tried to be friendly with Miss West and that she appears especially to dislike us, she will understand, and nine chances to one she will be able to point out the reason, which so far no one seems to know." "I suppose I had better tell her," sighed Grace. "I hate to begin a holiday by gossiping, but something will have to be done, or Mabel will find herself in an embarrassing position, for I have a curious presentiment that Miss Kathleen West will pounce upon her the moment she sees her, just to annoy us." Since the evening of the bazaar, when Kathleen had nodded curtly to Grace at the entrance to the Sphinx's tent, she had neither spoken to nor noticed the four girls who had in the beginning received her so hospitably. No one of them quite understood the newspaper girl's attitude, but as she was often seen in company with Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton, they were forced to draw their own conclusions. Grace fought against harboring the slightest resemblance to suspicion against the two seniors and their new friend. "Does Miss West know that Mabel is coming to Overton for Thanksgiving?" asked Anne. "No," returned Grace, looking rather worried. "I suppose some one ought to tell her." "I'll tell her, if you like," proposed Anne quietly. "I think she is in her room this evening. I heard her say to one of the girls at dinner that she intended to study hard until late to-night." "No," decided Grace, "it wouldn't be fair for me to shirk my responsibility. Mabel wrote me about Kathleen West in the first place, and I promised to look out for her. If she doesn't yearn for my society, it isn't my fault. I'm not going to be a coward, at any rate. I'll go at once, while my resolution is at its height. She can't do more than order me from her room, and having been through a similar experience several times in my life I shan't mind it so very much," concluded Grace grimly, closing her fountain pen and laying it beside her half-finished letter. "I'm going now, Anne. I hope she won't be too difficult." Grace walked resolutely down the hall to the door at the end. It was slightly ajar. Rapping gently, she stood waiting, bravely stifling the strong inclination to turn and walk away without delivering her message. She heard a quick step; then she and Kathleen West confronted each other. Without hesitating, Grace said frankly: "Miss West, Miss Ashe is to be my guest on Thanksgiving Day. Of late you have avoided me, and my friends as well. But Mabel is our mutual friend. So I think, at least while she is here, we ought to put all personal differences aside and unite in making the day pleasant for her." "Nothing like being disinterested, is there?" broke in the other girl sneeringly, her sharp face looking sharper than ever. "I can quite understand your anxiety regarding not letting Miss Ashe know how shabbily you have treated me. Your promises to her didn't hold water, did they? And now you are afraid she will find you out, aren't you? Don't worry, I shan't tell her. She'll learn the truth about you and your three friends soon enough." "You know very well I had no such motive," cried Grace, surprised to indignation. "Besides, I know of no instance in which either my friends or I have failed in courtesy to you." "How innocent you are!" mimicked Kathleen insolently. "You must think me very blind. Remember, I haven't worked for four years on a newspaper without having learned a few things." Grace felt her color rising. The retort that rose to her lips found its way into speech. "No doubt your newspaper work has taught you a great deal, Miss West," she said evenly, "but I have not been in college for over two years without having learned a few things, also, of which, if I am not mistaken, you have never acquired even the first rudiments. I am sorry to have troubled you. Good night." With a proud little inclination of the head, Grace turned and walked down the hall to her own room, leaving the self-centered Kathleen with an angry color in her thin face and the unpleasant knowledge that though she might be in college, she was not of it. CHAPTER XII THANKSGIVING AT OVERTON In spite of the awkwardness of the situation precipitated by the belligerent newspaper girl, Thanksgiving Day passed off with remarkable smoothness. Greatly to Grace's surprise, in the morning after Mabel's arrival at Wayne Hall Kathleen West had appeared in the living-room where Mabel was holding triumphant court, greeted her with apparent cordiality, and after remaining in the room for a short time had pleaded an engagement for the day, and said good-bye. "Too bad she couldn't stay with us and go to the game, isn't it?" Mabel had declared regretfully. "I suppose she is obliged to divide her time. Miss West is so clever. She must be very popular?" she added inquiringly. At that moment Elfreda purposely began an account of the latest practice game in which her team had played, and Mabel, who was an ardent basketball fan, failed to notice that her questioning comment had been neither answered nor echoed. To the relief of the four friends the subject of Kathleen West was not renewed during Mabel's stay, and when, that night, she went to the station surrounded by a large and faithful bodyguard, all adverse criticism against the girl for whom she had spoken was locked within the breasts of the four who knew. On the Friday after Thanksgiving the first real game between the freshmen and the sophomore teams took place in the gymnasium. The freshmen won the game, much to Elfreda's disgust, as she had pinned her faith on the sophomores. The triumphant team marched around the gymnasium, lustily singing a ridiculously funny basketball song which it afterward developed had been composed by none other than Kathleen West. "Too bad she isn't up to her song," had been Elfreda's dry comment, with which the other three girls privately agreed. The Morton House girls issued tickets for a play, which had to be postponed because the leading man (Gertrude Wells) spent Thanksgiving in the country and missed the afternoon train to Overton. Nothing daunted, Arline descended upon Grace, Miriam and Anne, pressed them into service and sent them scurrying about to the houses and boarding places of the girls they knew to be at home, with eleventh-hour invitations to a fancy dress party to be held at Morton Hall in lieu of the play, which had to be postponed until the following week. Arline had stipulated that the costumes must be strictly original. Wonderland costumes were to be tabooed. "If we present the circus again later on we don't want to run the risk of giving any one the slightest chance to grow tired of seeing the animals," had been her wise edict. That night a mixed company of gay and gallant folks danced to the music of the living-room piano at Morton House. Those receiving invitations had immediately planned their costumes and by eight o'clock that evening, resplendent in their own and borrowed finery, were on their way to the ball. At ten o'clock there had been a brief intermission, when cakes and ices were served. This had been an unlooked-for courtesy on the part of Arline, who had plunged recklessly into her month's allowance for the purchase of the little spread. The ball had lasted until half-past eleven o'clock, and the participants, after singing to Arline and rendering her a noisy vote of thanks, had gone home tired and happy. Saturday had been devoted to the "odds and ends" of vacation. The majority of the girls, having stayed in Overton, paid long-deferred calls, gave luncheons or dinners at Vinton's or Martell's, or, the day being unusually clear, went for long walks. Guest House was the destination of a party of girls of whom Grace made one, and which also included Miriam, Elfreda, Laura Atkins, Violet Darby and half a dozen other young women who had elected the five-mile walk, supper, and a return by moonlight. Arline, Anne and Ruth had at the last moment decided to attend an illustrated lecture on Paris, to be held in the Overton Theatre that afternoon, with the gleeful prospect of cooking their supper at Ruth's that evening, an occasion invariably attended with at least one laughable mishap, as neither Arline's nor Anne's knowledge of cooking extended beyond the art of boiling water. On the way back from Guest House the pedestrians had stopped at Vinton's for a rest and ices. As they trooped in the door, they passed Kathleen West, accompanied by Alberta Wicks, Mary Hampton, and a freshman whom Grace had frequently noticed in company with the newspaper girl. Several of the girls with her bowed to the passing trio, but Grace fancied there was a lack of cordiality in their salutations. She also imagined she noticed a fleeting gleam of malice in Alberta Wicks's face as the senior passed their table. Inwardly censuring herself for allowing any such impression to creep into her mind, Grace dismissed it with an impatient little shake of the head. The walking party indulged in a second round of ices before leaving Vinton's. Everyone seemed to be in a particularly happy mood, and long afterward Grace looked back on this night as one of the particular occasions of her junior year, when everyone and everything seemed to be in absolute harmony. All the way home this exalted, elated mood remained with her. She smiled to herself as she leisurely prepared for bed at the recollection of her happy evening. Elfreda's sharp, familiar knock on the door caused her to start slightly, then she called, "Come in!" "Hasn't Anne come home yet?" asked Elfreda, glancing about her, then, shuffling across the room in her satin mules, she curled herself comfortably on the end of Grace's couch, and, surveying Grace with friendly, half-quizzical eyes, said shrewdly, "Well, what's the latest on the bulletin board?" "I don't know," smiled Grace. "I didn't look at the one in the hall and as for the one over at the college, I haven't paid any attention to it for the last two days. My letters usually come to Wayne Hall." Elfreda sniffed disdainfully. "I don't mean either of those bulletin boards, and you know it, too, Grace Harlowe. I could see danger signals flying to-night, even if you couldn't. I don't see how you could have missed them." She eyed Grace searchingly, then said, with conviction, "I don't believe you did miss them. They were too plain to be missed." Grace hesitated, then said frankly: "To tell you the truth, Elfreda, I did fancy for a moment that Miss Wicks favored me with a very peculiar look. Then I decided it to be a case of imagination on my part. Those girls haven't troubled us this year. I don't know----" she began slowly. Elfreda interrupted her with an emphatic: "That is just what I've been telling you. That's what I mean by danger signals. Those two girls will never forgive you for making them ridiculous the night they locked me in the haunted house. Last year they had to content themselves with simply being disagreeable, because they could find no particularly weak spot in our sophomore armor. They accomplished very little with Laura Atkins and Mildred Taylor. This year it's different." Elfreda paused to give full effect to her words. Then she ended slowly and impressively: "Don't think I'm trying to court calamity, but I am certain that perky little newspaper woman, as she styles herself, is going to prove a thorn in your side. You had better write to Mabel and explain matters, then leave Miss Kathleen West alone. She hasn't spoken to you since the day of the bazaar, so I can't see that your junior counsel is of any particular use to her." "Still, it seems a shame to give up; besides, it is the first thing Mabel ever asked me to do," demurred Grace. "I know, I've thought of that," continued Elfreda a little impatiently. "But I don't think you are justified in wasting your whole year's fun worrying about some one who isn't worth it. If Mabel knew, she would be the first one to indorse what I have just said." "I'm not wasting my year, Elfreda mine," contradicted Grace good-naturedly. "Just think what a nice time we had to-night! And I'm getting along splendidly with all my subjects. I belong to the Semper Fidelis Club, and am having the jolliest kind of times with you girls. That doesn't sound much like wasting my year, does it?" "I didn't say you had wasted it," retorted Elfreda gruffly. "I said, or rather intended to say, that you would be likely to waste it. You are the sort of girl who ought to have the best Overton can offer, because--well--because you deserve it. You think too much about other people, and not enough about yourself," she concluded shortly. "What a selfish Elfreda," laughed Grace, walking across the room and sitting down beside the stout girl, whose round face looked unusually severe. "One might think Elfreda Briggs never did an unselfish act in all her twenty-two years. Now I am going to give you a piece of your own advice. Stop worrying--about me. Whatever my just desserts are, they'll overtake me fast enough. Hurrah! Here is our little Anne. Did you have a nice time, dear, and what did you cook for supper?" "I always have a nice time at Ruth's," smiled Anne, "but, if you had seen the three cooks all trying to spoil the broth and succeeding beyond their wildest expectations, you would have been greatly edified." "I can imagine Arline Thayer gravely bending over that little gas stove of Ruth's," said Grace. "She had all sorts of splendid ideas about what we might make, but no one had the slightest idea as to how to make anything she proposed." "I am afraid none of us would ever set the world on fire as cooks," observed Elfreda with sarcasm. "Where's Miriam?" asked Anne, slipping out of her coat and unpinning her hat. "Writing to her mother," returned Elfreda. "Now tell us what you cooked." Frequent bursts of laughter arose as Anne described Arline's valiant attempt at making a Spanish omelet from a recipe in a cook-book she had purchased that very day for twenty-five cents at the little book store just below the campus. "It was called the 'Model Housewife,' but the omelet was really a dreadful affair," continued Anne. "Then I let the potatoes boil dry and they scorched on the bottom, and no one knew how to make a cream dressing for the peas. "Ruth made a Waldorf salad. We had a bottle of dressing, thank goodness. And Arline made coffee, which she really does know how to make. We had olives and pickles and cakes, and two dozen of those cunning little rolls from that German bakery down the street. So we really managed to get enough to eat after all. There wasn't much left except the omelet, and no one wanted that." "I don't suppose it would be of the least use to propose tea," said Grace innocently. "Well, of course, if you insist," declared Elfreda politely. At this juncture Miriam appeared in the door. "I thought I'd drop in for a minute. You were making so much noise I suspected that a tea party was in progress," she said significantly. "We were just talking about making tea," declared Anne. "In fact, I was on the point of remarking that tea was really the one thing needed to complete our happiness." A little gust of laughter greeted this pointed remark. It echoed down the hall, and was carried through the half-opened door of the room at the end, where a girl sat busily engaged in writing a theme. She lay down her pen, listened for a moment, then went on writing, a sarcastic little smile playing about her lips. But in her eyes flashed two danger signals. CHAPTER XIII ARLINE MAKES THE BEST OF A BAD MATTER "What shall we do for our eight girls this year?" asked Grace reflectively of Arline Thayer. It was barely two weeks until Christmas and the two girls had decided to spend their half holiday in doing the Overton stores. "I know the stock better than the saleswomen themselves do," chuckled Arline, "but it is great fun to go on exploring expeditions and watch other people buy the things. Of course, I always buy something, too, unless I am deep in that state of temporary poverty that lies in wait for me at the end of every month." "Of course you do," agreed Grace, with an answering chuckle. "Even though it is a hat and you feel obliged to dispose of it before going home, so that the Morton House girls won't laugh at you." "Who told you about it?" asked Arline in a half-vexed tone. "You told me, don't you remember?" asked Grace. "Oh, yes, of course. Wasn't I a goose?" "Thank you," bowed Grace mockingly. "Oh, I don't mean because I told you," apologized Arline hastily. "I mean, wasn't I a goose to buy it? It was in this very store. It looked so pretty. I was determined to have it. Outside the store it looked quite different. It was a perfectly honest dollar-and-a-half hat. But in the store under the electric lights it was really a pretentious affair. Ruth was with me at the time, and, wise little pilot that she is, tried to steer me past it. But I was determined to have it. After I left Ruth, I opened the box and looked at it in broad daylight, and then I happened to meet my washerwoman's daughter, and I gave it to her. It was so fortunate I met her, wasn't it?" finished Arline plaintively. "For the washerwoman's daughter, yes," returned Grace. "It served me right for buying it. I spend too much money foolishly," said Arline self-accusingly. "I'm going to stop being so reckless. Suppose my father were to lose all his money and I couldn't even come back to college next year? I would, though. I'd go and live with Ruth and borrow enough money of the Semper Fidelis Club to see me through my senior year. Then, I suppose, I'd have to teach or something afterward. I think it would be 'or something.' I don't believe teaching is my vocation." Grace listened in smiling silence to Arline's remarks. A vision of the little blue-eyed golden-haired girl who always did exactly as she pleased in the prim guise of a teacher was infinitely diverting. "You haven't answered my question about our girls yet," reminded Grace, as they walked down the center aisle of the larger of the two Overton stores, stopping frequently at the various counters to examine the display of holiday wares. "Haven't you any suggestions?" counter-questioned Arline. "I have been depending on you for inspiration." "Nothing new or original," answered Grace doubtfully. "Last year's stunt was beautifully carried out, but we can't repeat it this year without running the risk of some one finding out just who our eight girls are and all about them. Then, too, what we did last year was on the spur of the moment. If we tried to do the same thing this year it might fall flat, on account of being too carefully planned. Besides, these girls have the privilege of borrowing from the Semper Fidelis fund now, and I imagine most of them have done so. Of course, only the treasurer knows that." "It looks to me as though there were more real need of a little Christmas cheer," declared Arline thoughtfully. "Couldn't we arrange some kind of entertainment to take place before we all go?" "But that wouldn't seem much like Christmas unless it happened on Christmas Day," objected Grace. "We'll all be at home then." "Why not have a talk with Miss Barlow?" proposed Arline eagerly. "You are the one to do it. You know her better than I do. Suppose we call upon her within the next few days. Then you can find out what she and her friends intend to do. If she says they are all going to stay here, then ask her if she wouldn't like to--" Arline paused and looked rather helplessly at Grace. "That's as far as I can go," she confessed. "I haven't the least idea of what I should ask her." "I am equally destitute of ideas," agreed Grace. "Perhaps the inspiration is yet to come." "It will have to come soon then, or we won't have the time to carry it out," commented Arline dryly. "Keep it in mind, and if you think of anything let me know instantly, won't you?" Grace gave the desired promise and thought no more of it until she and Arline almost came into violent collision just outside the library the following Monday evening. "Grace Harlowe!" exclaimed the little girl. "I was coming to Wayne Hall to see you the instant I finished here. It has come, Grace! The great inspiration! But it is a dreadful disappointment to me." Several big tears chased each other down Arline's rosy cheeks. Her lip quivered, and with a little, choking sob she sat down on the lowest step of the library and began to cry softly. "Arline, dear child, whatever is the matter?" cried Grace in quick alarm. A moment later she had slipped to the step beside Arline, passing one arm about her friend's shoulder. She could scarcely believe this weeping, disconsolate little creature to be the smiling, self-assured Arline Thayer, who was forever receiving flowers from admiring freshmen crushes. "Father's going to--Europe--on--important business," quavered Arline brokenly. "He--he sails to-morrow morning and he can't possibly return before the middle of January." She raised her sad little face to Grace's sympathetic one, then, straightening up, she went on bravely, "We had so many lovely Christmas plans." "Come home with me, Arline," begged Grace. "I'd love to have you." Arline shook her blonde head, at the same time slipping her hand into Grace's. "I thought of that, too," she returned softly. "I was going to ask you if I might go home with you for Christmas. Then Ruth and I had a talk. I had asked her to go home with me, and she had refused because she is so afraid of outwearing her welcome. Then came Father's letter. Ruth was a dear about that. She said at once that if I wished to go home and felt that I needed her she would go, but I couldn't bear to think of spending Christmas in that big, lonely house. It is Father that makes it seem so wonderful to go home." Arline's lip quivered piteously. "He and I could be happy if we were the poorest of the poor. You must visit me some time, Grace. Perhaps we could have an Easter house party. Wouldn't that be splendid?" Arline's woe-be-gone face brightened. Grace patted her hand. "Get up, Arline, before some one sees you," she advised. "Whoever heard of proud little Daffydowndilly Thayer crying like an ordinary mortal?" Grace went on soothing Arline in this half-serious fashion, which presently had its effect. "You are so comforting, Grace," sighed Arline, as she rose from the steps, an expression of gratitude in her pretty blue eyes. "Can't you walk over to the house with me? I want you to hear my plan and tell me what you think of it." "I could put off my library business until to-morrow," reflected Grace, smiling a little. "It will be a case of doing as I please instead of doing as I ought. Still, as a loyal member of Semper Fidelis it is my duty to comfort my sorrowing comrades. Don't you think so?" Arline laughed an almost happy response to Grace's question. "But I mustn't stay long," warned Grace a little later, as, seated opposite Arline in the latter's room, she awaited the unfolding of Arline's "inspiration." "I'm going to stay here for Christmas," announced Arline with the finality of one who knows her own mind. "Ruth is coming up to live with me for the whole vacation, too. That isn't the inspiration, though. That is only the first part of it. The second part is that Ruth and I are going to see to the eight girls, and all the others who aren't going away from Overton. What do you think of that?" "I think it is dear in you, Arline," responded Grace very earnestly. "I only wish I might stay to help you. However, Father and Mother have first claim on my vacation. But let me help you plan and get things ready before I go. I'll be here until a week from next Thursday, you know." "Oh, I shall need you," Arline assured Grace. "I thought we might have Christmas dinner at Vinton's and Martell's, too. I've thought it all out. Both restaurants depend largely on the Overton girls' patronage. Naturally, they are very dull at Christmas time. My idea was to interview both proprietors and see if for once they wouldn't combine and furnish the same menu at the same price per plate, the price to be not more than fifty cents. It must be just an old-fashioned turkey dinner with plenty of dressing and vegetables. We must have plum pudding, too, and all the things that go with a real Christmas dinner." "But neither Vinton's nor Martell's would serve that sort of Christmas dinner for fifty cents," said Grace slowly. "I don't wish to discourage you, but--" "I know that, too," broke in Arline eagerly, "but no one else need know. I'm going to take my check that Father always gives me for theatres and things when I'm at home, and spend it to make up the difference. It will more than cover the extra expense of the dinner. I'd like to give the dinner to the girls, but of course that is out of the question. They wouldn't like it. However, if they are allowed to pay fifty cents for it they will feel independent, and, nine chances out of ten, won't trouble themselves about the actual cost of the dinner, as have some persons I might mention," ended Arline meaningly. Both girls laughed. Then Grace said admiringly: "It is a splendidly unselfish idea, and you and Ruth are the very ones to carry it out. Shall you have a play or anything afterward?" "Yes, if we can find a good one. I thought we might have a New Year's masquerade party here. It will be an innovation for these girls. I am not very sure of anything yet, except that I am not going to New York and that I must do something to amuse myself while the rest of my friends are reposing in the bosoms of their families. After all, mine is really a selfish motive," said the little girl whimsically. "Hush!" exclaimed Grace, laying her hand lightly against Arline's lips. "I shall not allow you to say slighting things of yourself. I have just one remark to make. Be very diplomatic, Arline. If any of these girls who can't afford to go home for the holidays were even to imagine themselves objects of charity, your dinner plan would be a failure. Don't tell a soul about it except Ruth." "I know," nodded Arline wisely. "I had thought of that, too. Never fear, I won't breathe it to another soul." "My half hour is more than up," exclaimed Grace ruefully, glancing toward the little French clock on Arline's chiffonier. "I must hurry away this instant. I'll see you again in a day or two. I am so sorry for your disappointment. You're the bravest little Daffydowndilly. If my prospects of going home were suddenly swept away, I'm afraid I'd be too busy with my own woes to think about making other people happy." "You would do just what I am planning to do, Grace Harlowe," declared Arline emphatically. "After all, perhaps it is just as well I can't always have my own way. I might become a monument of selfishness." "There doesn't seem to be much danger of it," laughed Grace, as she put on her hat and slipped into her long coat. "There is a strong possibility, however, that 'not prepared' will be my watchword to-morrow. I think I shall write a theme on the decline of the art of study and use personal illustrations. It seems such a shame that mid-years had to come skulking along on the very heels of Christmas, doesn't it?" Arline nodded. "I haven't looked at my French for to-morrow, either," she confessed, "and I've been saying 'not prepared' for the last two recitations. Ruth and I have planned a systematic study campaign during vacation, so you see the ill wind will blow some little good," she concluded wistfully. Grace smiled very tenderly at the little, golden-haired girl who was bearing her cross bravely, almost gayly. "Good-night, little Daffydowndilly," she said impulsively, bending to kiss Arline's rosy cheek. "I think you can teach all of us a lesson in real unselfishness." CHAPTER XIV PLANNING THE CHRISTMAS DINNER The ensuing days before Christmas were filled to the brim with business for Grace and Arline, who had been making secret tours of investigation about Overton with regard to the girls who were not going to their homes or to friends for the vacation. The managers at Martell's and Vinton's had been interviewed, and both proprietors had agreed to furnish practically the same dinner at the same price, which was considerably more than fifty cents, and was to be paid privately from Arline's own pocket money. "I feel like a conspirator," confided Arline to Grace as the two girls sat at the library table in the living room at Wayne Hall late one afternoon going over a long list of names and addresses which they had obtained by dint of much walking and inquiring. "But it is such a delightful conspiracy," reminded Grace. "One doesn't often conspire to make other people happy. I hope the girls will fall in readily with your plan." "I shall have to be as wise as a serpent," smiled Arline, "and as diplomatic as--as--Miriam Nesbit. She is the most diplomatic person I ever knew." "Isn't she, though?" agreed Grace smilingly. "Yes, my dear Daffydowndilly, you have a delicate task before you. Playing Lady Bountiful to the girls who are left behind without them suspecting you won't be easy. There are certain girls who would languish in their rooms all day, rather than accept a mouthful of food that savored of charity. I don't believe our eight girls ever suspected us of playing Santa Claus to them last year." "Oh, I am certain they never knew," returned Arline quickly. "Of course, there was a remote chance that they and the various girls, who contributed might compare notes. But those who gave presents and money were in honor bound not to ask questions or even discuss the matter among themselves. I know the Morton House girls never said a word, too." "Neither did the Wayne Hallites," rejoined Grace. "Even Miriam, Anne and Elfreda asked no questions." "Doesn't it seem wonderful to think that girls can be so splendidly impersonal and honorable?" commented Arline admiringly. "College is the very place to cultivate that attitude. Living up to college traditions means being honorable in the highest sense of the word. There are plenty of girls who come here without realizing what being an Overton girl means, until they find themselves face to face with the fact that their standards are not high enough. That is why one hears so much about finding one's self. College is like a great mirror. When one first enters it, one takes a quick glance at one's self and is pleased with the effect. Later, when one stops for a more comprehensive survey, one discovers all sorts of imperfections, and it takes four years of constant striving with one's self as well as one's studies to make a satisfactory reflection." "What a quaint idea!" exclaimed Grace. "We might evolve a play from that and call it 'The Magic Mirror.' That would be a stunt for a show. Miriam Nesbit could do a college girl. She looks the part. But here, I am miles off my subject. Suppose we go back to our girls. How are you going to propose the dinner plan, Arline?" "I'm going to wait until every last girl that is going home has departed, bag and baggage; then I shall post a bulletin on the big board, asking all the stay-heres to meet me in the gymnasium," planned Arline. "I shall say that as I am going to stay over and didn't fancy eating my Christmas dinner alone I thought perhaps the girls who had no particular plans for the day would like to join me at either Martell's or Vinton's. Then I'll explain about the price of the dinner, etc., all in a perfectly offhand manner, and let them do the rest. There are anywhere from one to two hundred girls who live at the various rooming and boarding houses who will be glad to come. Many of them have never been inside either Vinton's or Martell's. You would hardly believe it, but it's true." "I do believe it," said Grace soberly. "It seems a shame, too, when I think of the amount of time and money we spend there." "Well, I haven't grown philanthropic enough to give up going to either one," declared Arline. "They are my havens of refuge when Morton House cooking deteriorates, as it frequently does. Ask me for my cloak or even my best new pumps, but don't tear me away from my favorite haunts." "I won't," promised Grace. "I am afraid I feel the same. No chance for reformation along that line. Shall we send the eight girls gifts or a present of money this year, or both?" "I suspect they have all borrowed from the Semper Fidelis fund this year," was Arline's quick answer. "Suppose we send presents, and ask our club girls alone to contribute toward them. If every one we asked gave two dollars apiece, that would mean twenty-four dollars. We could invest it in gloves, neckwear and pretty things that most poor girls are obliged to do without. We gave money last year because those girls had no one to help them. This year Semper Fidelis stands behind them. Besides, some one might find it out this time. I said I was certain they never knew, but I always had a curious idea that Miss Barlow suspected you, Grace. Whenever I meet her she always speaks of you with positive reverence." A flush rose to Grace's face. "How ridiculous," she murmured. "You are the real heroine of that adventure. Have you decided on your programme for the week yet?" "Only the costume party and a basketball game, if we can scare up two teams, and a winter picnic at Hunter's Rock, if it isn't too cold. A play, if we can gather up enough actors, and a dance in the gymnasium. I'm going to give an afternoon tea, and that's all, I think. They will have to amuse themselves the rest of the time," finished Arline with a sigh. "There are so many ifs attached to my plans." "I predict a busy two weeks for you," said Grace, "but then--" From the room adjoining, which opened into the living room and was used as a parlor, came the sound of a slight cough. Grace was on her feet in an instant. With a bound she sprang toward the curtained archway and, pushing it aside, peered sharply into the room. It was empty. "Did you hear some one cough, Arline?" she asked anxiously. "Yes," replied Arline, who had joined her. "The sound came from in here, didn't it?" "So I imagined," declared Grace in a puzzled tone. "Perhaps it came from the hall. No one could have escaped from here before I reached the door without my hearing them. It startled me, because we had been talking so confidentially. I glanced in as we passed the door when we went into the living room and there wasn't a soul in sight. Whoever coughed a few moments ago must have slipped into the room and slipped out again." "Then, whoever it is has heard the very things we didn't wish known!" exclaimed Arline in consternation. "Now I can't carry out any of my plans. How perfectly dreadful!" "Perhaps it was Mrs. Elwood," said Grace hopefully. "Mrs. Elwood is far too stout to walk so lightly and vanish so rapidly," discouraged Arline. "I--it--must have been some one who was trying to hear." "If that is the case, the person is in this house and must be found and sworn to secrecy," said Grace sternly. "I am afraid we were talking too loudly. However, the person may have only come as far as the door, then passed on upstairs. Suppose we go up and ask all the girls. We shall feel better satisfied, and they won't object to being interviewed." But all efforts to locate the accidental or intentional listener failed. Many of the girls had not yet come in from their classes, and those whom Grace found in their rooms had evidently been there for some time. Kathleen West was among those still out. Miss Ainslee informed her visitors of this fact with an unmistakable sigh of relief that Grace interpreted with a slight smile. As she went slowly down the stairs to the living room, followed by Arline, whose baby face wore an expression of deepest gloom, the door bell rang and the maid admitted the newspaper girl. She swept past the two juniors who stood at the foot of the stairs without the slightest sign of recognition, and neither girl saw the look of triumph that animated her face the instant she had turned her back upon them and hurried up the stairs. "What shall we do?" asked Arline as once more they seated themselves at the library table opposite each other. "We can't do anything until we find the girl who listened, and the question is how are we to find her?" Grace made a little gesture of despair. Arline shrugged her dainty shoulders. "I don't know. Perhaps she will never repeat what she has heard. Curiosity alone may have prompted her to listen. We may be agreeably disappointed." Grace shook her head. "I wish I could believe that," she said. "I don't wish to croak, but I have a curious conviction that the person who listened had a motive deeper than mere curiosity." CHAPTER XV A TISSUE PAPER TEA "What in the name of all mysterious is going on between you and Alice-In-Wonderland Daffydowndilly Thayer?" demanded Elfreda Briggs as she lovingly wrapped a large pasteboard box in white tissue paper and tied it with a huge bow of scarlet satin ribbon. "This is Miriam's present," she drawled calmly. "You will observe that she has obligingly turned her back while I am engaged in wrestling with wrapping it. I never could tie a bow. I have had this box in the closet for a week, and it has fallen out every time we opened the door, but Miriam, beloved angel, hasn't shown the slightest curiosity. You may look, my dear, the big box is all put away," she declared, as though addressing a very small child. "What a ridiculous person you are, J. Elfreda Briggs," laughed Miriam. "One might think me at the kindergarten age, instead of your guardian and keeper." "Tell me what it is, Elfreda," teased Grace. "On one condition," answered Elfreda, reaching for a small square box and beginning to wrap it in holly paper. "Tell me what you and Arline are planning!" "It's a secret," returned Grace. "I'd love to tell you, but I am pledged until the day we go home. When we are all in the train and it has started on the home stretch then you shall know." "There is no time like the present," invited Elfreda. "No," laughed Grace, shaking her head. "Not now. I have given my promise to Arline." "She won't tell even me," smiled Anne Pierson, who, with Grace, had carried her Christmas gifts to Miriam's and Elfreda's room, in answer to Elfreda's invitation to a tissue paper tea. "Bring all your stuff," Elfreda directed. "There will be plenty of paper and ribbon and twine and tea and cakes if I have time to go for them." Cheered with the prospect of tea and cakes, which were a certainty in spite of Elfreda's provisional promise, the two guests had come, their arms full of bundles. "Well, if she won't tell _you_, the rest of us might as well save our breath," declared Elfreda. "Never mind, we have only two more days to wait. Oh, aren't you glad you're going home? I have been homesick for the last three days. I'm glad we are going to stay in Fairview and have an old-fashioned Christmas. I am going to drive to the woods and cut down my own Christmas tree, too." "That reminds me, Miriam, we must make up a party and go to Upton Wood to see old Jean. We didn't see him last summer on account of his being away up in northwestern Canada. He went as a guide. Don't you remember? In Mother's last letter she wrote that he had been seen in Oakdale. That means that he has come back to his cabin in Upton Wood." "Hurrah!" exclaimed Miriam, waving a long, narrow package over her head. "That means a winter picnic, and supper at old Jean's cabin." "Who is old Jean?" asked Elfreda curiously. "Come down to Oakdale between Christmas and New Year and go with us on the picnic," teased Miriam. "You can see old Jean for yourself." "Can't do it," responded Elfreda. "I am strictly Pa's and Ma's girl this time. I've promised." "Then I suppose I shall have to enlighten you," smiled Grace. "Jean is an old Frenchman, a hunter who drifted down to Oakdale from somewhere in Canada. He has a log cabin in Upton Wood, a forest just east of Oakdale. To him I owe the beautiful set of fox furs, you have so often admired. He had the skins dressed for me, and Mother sent them to a furrier's in New York and had them made into a muff and scarf for me. I have known him since I was a little girl." "Lucky you," commented Elfreda. "There, I've finished my packages. I'm going out to buy cakes. You have worked nobly. This Saturday afternoon, at least, has been well spent, thanks to my tissue paper tea. Now we'll have real tea." Piling her smaller packages into a neat heap, she made a dive for her long brown coat and fur cap. "Don't dare to touch one of those packages. You might guess what is in them. Good-bye. I'll be back before you know it." As the door closed after her with a resounding bang, Miriam remarked affectionately: "Elfreda is in her element. She loves to play hostess and give tea parties." "She is becoming one of the important girls in college, isn't she?" observed Anne. "I was so glad to see her rushed by the Phi Beta Gammas." "She was more moved than she would admit over being asked to join them," returned Miriam. "She used to make ridiculous remarks about them and call them the P. B. Gammas, but in her heart she looked upon them with positive awe. Wasn't it nice to think we were all asked?" "I should say so," agreed Grace. "It would have been dreadful if one of us had been left out." She patted her sorority pin with intense satisfaction. "In spite of belonging to the most important sorority in college, there never will be another sorority like the Phi Sigma Tau, will there, girls?" "No," said Miriam, smiling with a reminiscent tenderness at sound of the familiar name. "Dear old P. S. T.," murmured Anne. "How I wish we might call a meeting now and have every member present." "There is bound to be one vacant place when we gather home next week," said Grace a trifle sadly. "The Lady Eleanor," sighed Miriam. "I hope we'll see her some time next year." The arrival of Elfreda, her arms filled with bundles, cut short Miriam's reflections. One by one Elfreda calmly laid down her packages and began preparations for her tissue paper tea. The stout girl's mood seemed to have changed, however. She answered her companions' gay sallies rather abstractedly, with the air of one whose thoughts were anywhere but on her guests. Several times Grace glanced up to find Elfreda's eyes fixed reflectively upon her. When, at five o'clock, she announced her intention of going for a walk before dinner, Elfreda gave her another peculiar look and announced her intention of accompanying her. Anne and Miriam, who had elected to occupy the time before dinner in writing to the Southards, declined Grace's invitation, and as the two girls walked briskly down the street, Elfreda breathed a deep sigh of relief. "With all due respect to Miriam and Anne, I am glad they didn't join us," she said coolly. "What is on your mind now?" asked Grace shrewdly. "So you realize at last that there is something on my mind, do you!" retorted Elfreda grimly. "I began to think you never could. I made all kinds of signals to you with my eyes." "I thought they were signals, but wasn't sure," said Grace quickly. "Well, you can be sure now. I don't want you to think me a Paul Pry, but I know all about that Christmas business last year." "What 'Christmas business'?" asked Grace sharply. "You know very well what I mean, the eight girls and all that." "Why--who----" began Grace in displeased astonishment. "No, I didn't try to find out," interrupted Elfreda. "You know me better than that. No one told me, either. I just put two and two together. I could see last year that----" "Is there anything you can't see?" exclaimed Grace. "Not much," responded Elfreda modestly. "I knew, of course, you would do something for those girls this year." "You could see that, I suppose," said Grace satirically. "Exactly," nodded Elfreda with an irresistible grin. Their eyes meeting, both girls laughed. Elfreda's face sobered first. "My news isn't pleasant, Grace. Read this." Slipping her hand into her coat pocket she drew forth a half sheet of paper partly covered with writing. Grace received it wonderingly: "Two Overton College Girls Play Lady Bountiful to Their Needy Classmates," she read. The words were arranged to form headlines, and below was written: "The latest whim of two wealthy students of Overton College has taken the form of Sweet Charity, and impecunious students of Overton whose finances will not permit of their making long railway journeys home for Christmas are to be the object of these young women's solicitude. Their less fortunate classmates will be their guests at a dinner on Christmas which by special arrangement will be served at----" The writing ended with the bottom of the sheet. "What do you think of that?" demanded Elfreda laconically. A tide of crimson rose to Grace's face. "I think it is contemptible," she cried. "When and where did you find it, Elfreda?" "Just outside the door of the room at the end of the hall," replied Elfreda. "I picked it up as I was coming back from the delicatessen shop." Grace's eyes flashed. "I suspected as much," she said shortly. "What does this look like to you, Elfreda?" "Newspaper copy," replied Elfreda promptly. "It isn't the first, either. I happen to know she writes college stuff and sends it to her paper every week. I knew that long ago. I subscribed to the Sunday edition of her paper on purpose. I know her articles, too. She signs them 'Elizabeth Vassar.' I have been quietly censoring them all along, ready to object if she once overstepped the line. So far she hasn't. I didn't know this was her copy until I had read it. Then it dawned upon me what the whole thing meant. This is the beginning of an article designed purely for spite. It is a direct stab at you and Arline. I suppose certain other people have influenced her against you, Grace. These very people will see to the circulation of the paper here at Overton, too, when the article appears, or I'm no prophet." "I suppose so," assented Grace almost wearily. "I am sure I can't think of any reason other than spite for this." She took a few steps in silence, her eyes bent on the sheet of paper. "You had better hurry and do something about this," advised Elfreda, lightly touching the paper with her forefinger, "or it will be too late." Grace glanced up with a slight start. "Once she finds the first of her copy missing it won't take her long to rewrite it," reminded Elfreda. "She may have mailed it by this time, although I hardly think so. I am afraid you will have trouble with her. She looks like one of the do-as-I-please-in-spite-of-you kind. What's the matter, Grace? What makes you look so funny?" "I know where I saw it!" exclaimed Grace enigmatically, apparently deaf to Elfreda's questions. "It was in the note. She wrote it. Strange I never thought of that." "Grace Harlowe," demanded Elfreda with asperity, "have you suddenly taken leave of your senses?" "No," returned Grace, her gray eyes gleaming wrathfully, her lips set in a determined line as she faced about. "I've just found them. Yes, Elfreda, I shall certainly call on Miss West, and at once." CHAPTER XVI A DOUBTFUL VICTORY During the walk to Wayne Hall, Elfreda could scarcely keep pace with Grace's flying feet. She made no complaint, however, but kept sturdily at her companion's side, holding her breath and closing her lips tightly to keep from panting. Grace ran into her own room for a moment, then back to Elfreda, who stood waiting in the upstairs hall. "Shall I leave you here?" she asked in a low tone as Grace returned, a second folded paper in her hand. "No," replied Grace. "I think it would be well for you to go with me. I don't know any one else I'd rather have," she added honestly. "Thank you," bowed Elfreda, flushing and looking embarrassed at the compliment. "I'll never desert Micawber--Harlowe, I mean." "Look serious. I am ready," said Grace softly. Then she knocked imperatively upon the door. There was a tense moment of waiting, then the door was opened by Kathleen West herself. Her sharp face looked still sharper as she eyed her visitors with ill-concealed disapproval. "Good evening, Miss West," said Grace with distant politeness. "If you are not too busy, can you spare Miss Briggs and me a few moments? We have something of grave importance to say to you." "Please make your business as brief as possible," snapped Kathleen, holding the door as though ready to close it in their faces the instant they stated their errand. "Thank you," said Grace with unruffled calm. "We had better step inside your room, for a moment, at least. The hall is hardly the place for what I have to say." The newspaper girl darted a swift, appraising glance at Grace. Her shrewd eyes fell before the steady light of Grace's gray ones. "Come in," she said shortly, then in a sarcastic tone, "Shall I close the door?" "It would be better, I think," returned Grace in quietly significant tones. The color flooded Kathleen West's sallow face. Her eyes began to flash ominously. "Your tone is insulting, Miss Harlowe!" she exclaimed. "I answered your question, Miss West," returned Grace evenly. "However, I did not come here to quarrel with you. My errand has to do with the articles you write for the Sunday edition of your paper which you sign 'Elizabeth Vassar.' Miss Briggs has been following them for some time with a great deal of interest. This afternoon she found a part of what is evidently copy for an article." Before Grace could go on Kathleen West had turned imperatively toward Elfreda. "Give it to me at once," she commanded. "I have hunted high and low for it. Your finding it is very strange, I must say. I am sure it was never off my desk." Elfreda half closed her eyes and regarded the newspaper girl with the air of one viewing a rare curiosity for the first time. "Then your desk must be on the hall floor just outside the door," was her dry retort. "At least that is where I found this paper." A certain significant ring in the girl's voice admitted of no contradiction. For a brief interval no one spoke. Then Elfreda said smoothly, "As we appear to understand that point, go on, Grace." "Give me my copy," reiterated Kathleen sullenly, before Grace had a chance to continue. "Miss West," returned Grace very quietly, "Miss Briggs and I have read the copy which Miss Briggs found, and I have come here to say that you will be doing not only yourself but a great many other girls an injustice if you make public Miss Thayer's plans for the girls who remain at Overton for the holidays. Miss Thayer wishes the girls to feel perfectly independent in this matter, and whatever she contributes privately toward it is strictly her own affair. If this article appears on the school and college page, some of these girls are sure to hear of it and feel humiliated and resentful, particularly if the rest of the article is as callously cruel as its beginning." Kathleen West laughed disagreeably. "That is not my affair. I have agreed to furnish my paper with snappy college news. This makes a good story. To supply my paper with good stories is my first business." "Pardon me," retorted Grace scornfully, "I should imagine that loyalty to one's self and one's college constituted an Overton girl's first business." "I can't see that this particular story has anything to do with being loyal to Overton," sneered Kathleen. "As for being loyal to myself, that is for me to judge. Who dares say I am disloyal?" "Nothing very daring about that," drawled Elfreda. "I say so." "You," stormed Kathleen. "Who are you?" "J. Elfreda Briggs," murmured the stout girl sweetly. "Yes," continued Kathleen sneeringly, "I have heard of the jumble you made of your freshman year. It took a number of influential friends to pull you into favor again, I believe." "Not half such a jumble as you are making of yours," smiled Elfreda. Then she went on gravely: "I am glad you mentioned that freshman year. I did behave like an imbecile. Thanks to a number of girls who believed I was worth bothering with, I have learned to know what Overton requires of me. If you are wise, you'll face about, too. You will find it pays, and there are all sorts of pleasant compensations for what one expends in effort. That's all. I've said my say." A curious, half-admiring expression flitted across Kathleen's thin little face. Then, turning to Grace, she said defiantly: "Give me my copy. I don't wish to rewrite it and I am going to send it to-night." "I'm sorry you won't be fair about this, Miss West," said Grace regretfully, "but perhaps I can induce you to change your mind." "I don't understand you," said Kathleen West stiffly. Grace held a folded paper before the newspaper girl's eyes. "Here is the letter you wrote the dean regarding our bazaar. The dean gave it to me. She does not nor never will know who wrote it, unless you, yourself, tell her. That is something, however, that you and your conscience must decide. Here also is your page of copy. Under the circumstances, don't you think you might destroy this page and the others?" [Illustration: "Here is the Letter You Wrote the Dean."] Kathleen took the proffered papers with a set, enigmatic expression on her pointed features. Slowly she walked to her desk, picked up several sheets of copy and placing them with the sheet in her hand offered them to Grace. Grace shook her head. "I will take your word," she said. With a shrug of her shoulders the newspaper girl tore the papers across, then into bits, tossing them into her waste basket. "You win," she said with slangy effectiveness, then she added--"this time." "Thank you," responded Grace gravely. "Good night, Miss West." Kathleen did not respond. Grace's hand was on the doorknob when the newspaper girl said harshly: "Wait. Don't think your lofty sentiments about college honor and all that nonsense impressed me to the point of destroying that copy. Once and for all I want you to understand that college ideals and traditions are not worrying me. I did not come to Overton to moon. I am only using college as a means to the end. What you offered me was a fair exchange. As you know a great deal too much about certain things, it is just as well to be on the safe side. I dare say I shall stumble on something else in the news line just as good as the charity dinner stunt." With a shrug of her shoulders that conveyed far more than words, she walked over to the window, turning her back directly upon her callers, nor did she change her position until an instant later the sound of the closing door announced to her that her unwelcome visitors had departed. CHAPTER XVII HIPPY LOOKS MYSTERIOUS "Merry, Merry Christmas everywhere, Cheerily it ringeth through the air," sang Grace Harlowe joyously as she twined a long spray of ground pine about the chandelier in the hall, then stepping down from the stool on which she had been standing, backed off, viewing it critically. "Oh, but it's good to be home!" she trilled, making a rush for her mother, who had just appeared in the door, and winding both arms tightly about her. "My own little girl," returned her mother fondly. "How Father and I have missed you!" "That's my greatest drawback to perfect happiness," sighed Grace, rubbing her soft cheek against her mother's: "Not to be able to be in two places at once. Now, if you were with me at Overton I wouldn't have a thing left to sigh for. You don't know how much I miss you, Mother, and Father, too. Sometimes I grow so homesick that I can't read or study or do anything but just think of you. Anne says she can always tell when I am extra blue." "Your college life is only the beginning of our parting of ways, dear child. Mother would like to keep you safe and sheltered at home, but you are too active, too progressive, to be content as a home girl," said Mrs. Harlowe rather sadly. "You are likely to discover that your work lies far from Oakdale, but you know that whatever or wherever it may be your father and I will wish you Godspeed. You are to be perfectly free in the matter of choosing your future business of life." "Don't I know that, you dearest, best mother a girl ever had!" exclaimed Grace, a quick mist clouding her gray eyes. "But never fear, I shan't ever stay away from you long at a time. I couldn't." Unwinding her arms from about her mother's neck, Grace linked one arm through Mrs. Harlowe's and marched her into the adjoining living room. "Doesn't it look exactly like Christmas?" she asked proudly. "See the tree. Isn't it a beauty? We have loads of presents, too. Isn't Miriam a goose and a dear all rolled into one? She won't come to my Christmas tree because she isn't one of the Eight Originals. I asked her to be a Ninth Original, but she said 'No.' She is coming, though, only she doesn't know it. David received a telegram from Arnold Evans yesterday. He is expected to-night on the six o'clock train. Miriam doesn't know that, either. She thinks he was unable to come, and won't she be surprised when he appears to escort her to our house?" Grace laughed gleefully in anticipation of Miriam's astonishment at sight of Arnold Evans, who was always a welcome addition to their little company. Two immeasurably happy days had passed since the train from the east had steamed away from Oakdale, leaving three eager girls on the platform of the station. The evening train had brought Eva Allen, Marian Barber, Jessica Bright and Nora O'Malley. Grace, Miriam and Anne, accompanied by a slender, brown-eyed young woman, whom they addressed as Mabel, had met the train. Jessica Bright's radiant delight at beholding the face of her foster sister, Mabel Allison, can be better imagined than described. Mabel and her mother had arrived three days before, and were to divide their month's stay in Oakdale between the Gibsons of Hawk's Nest, an estate several miles from Oakdale, and the Brights. Jessica's aunt, Mr. Bright's only sister, who had never married, now presided over the Bright household, with a grace and hospitality that gained for her not only the reputation of a delightful hostess, but the adoration of Jessica's friends as well. It was now the day before Christmas, and that evening Grace had invited her dearest friends to help her keep Christmas Eve. "Just as though we could get along without Miriam!" she exclaimed enthusiastically. "You haven't any idea, Mother, what a power for good she is at Overton. It isn't half so much what she says as the way she says it. She has so much tact. Elfreda worships her." "I am sorry Elfreda could not come home with you," commented Mrs. Harlowe. "We were all sorry," returned Grace regretfully. "She may run down for a day before we go back to college. We have promised her a winter picnic in Upton Wood and a supper at old Jean's if she comes. That ought to tempt her. Oh, there's the bell. I know that is Anne! She promised to be here early. The Eight Originals are going to trim the tree, you know." Grace rushed to the front door to open it for Anne, who staggered into the hall, her arms full of packages. "Oh, catch them," she gasped. "I'm going to drop them all and two of them are breakable." Grace sprang forward to relieve Anne of her load. One fat package fell to the floor and rolled under the living-room sofa. Grace made a laughing dive after it. Then, dropping to her knees, peered under the sofa, dragged it forth in triumph and presented it to Anne. Anne thanked her. "It is for Hippy," she smiled. "You might know that it would behave in an extraordinary manner. I've been so busy this morning. I was up before seven, helped Mother with the breakfast, went on a shopping expedition, and now I'm here. It isn't eleven o'clock yet, either." "Imagine Everett Southard's leading woman washing dishes," smiled Grace. "She did, though," rejoined Anne cheerfully, "and swept the dining room and kitchen, too. I have an invitation to deliver. I am going to entertain the Eight Originals and Mrs. Gray at my house next Tuesday evening. You'll receive a real summons to my party by mail." "How formal," said Grace gayly. "However, Miss Harlowe accepts with pleasure Miss Pierson's kind invitation, etc." "Miss Pierson is duly honored by Miss Harlowe's prompt acceptance," laughed Anne. "Do the boys know about bringing their presents here?" "Oh, yes," returned Grace. "There goes the door bell!" She hurried to the door, flinging it wide open to admit three stalwart young men whose clean-cut, boyish faces shone with good humor. "Hurrah for old Kris Kringle!" cried Hippy, who was in the lead, as he skipped nimbly into the living-room, and set down the heavy suit case he carried with a flourish. Then backing into David Nesbit, who stood directly behind him, he said apologetically: "I beg your pardon, David, but if you will insist in taking up so much space you must expect to have your toes trampled upon." "I don't take up one half as much space as you do," flung back David. "True; I hadn't looked at the matter in that light," Hippy agreed hastily. "Let us change the subject. I am so pleased, Grace, to know that you are giving this little affair in my honor. I really didn't expect to----" "Be put out of the house," finished Reddy with a menacing step toward Hippy. "Exactly," agreed Hippy. "No, I don't mean that at all. I was about to say that I really didn't expect to be obliged to put Reddy Brooks out of the house for threatened assault. It seems too bad to mar the gentle peace of Christmas by such deeds of violence." Hippy sighed loudly, then with a gesture of finality warily sidled toward Reddy, an expression of deadly determination on his round face. The sound of a ringing laugh from the doorway caused him to forget his grievance and make for the door as fast as his legs would carry him. "Reddy, you are saved," he announced, leading Nora O'Malley into the room. "Thank your gentle preserver, Miss O'Malley." "You mean you are saved," corrected Reddy with a derisive grin. "All the same, all the same," retorted Hippy airily. "I am saved because you are saved, and you are saved because I am saved. We are both saved this time, aren't we, Grace?" "Yes, I forbid either one of you to usher the other out," laughed Grace. "There, Reddy, you heard!" exclaimed Hippy. "Now heed." "Have you seen Jessica this morning, Nora?" asked Reddy, answering Hippy's admonition with a withering look. "She will be here later," replied Nora. "She has gone shopping with Mabel, who is going to Hawk's Nest for Christmas Eve." "We are all booked for Christmas Day with our families," smiled David. "Thank goodness we have them," said Hippy with a seriousness that surprised even himself. "Same here, Hippy," agreed David gravely. "And here," was the united response from the others. Jessica, who had seen Mabel Allison into the car Mrs. Gibson had sent to convey her to Hawk's Nest, was the next arrival. Later Tom Gray appeared with a grip and a suit case. When the real work of trimming the tree began, Hippy retired to the library table with the plea that he had not yet tagged his gifts. To that end he wrote what seemed to Nora O'Malley, who eyed him suspiciously, a surprising amount of cards, chuckling softly to himself as he wrote. Happening to catch her eye he looked rather guilty, then, cocking his head to one side, simpered languishingly, "What shall I say to thee, heart of my heart?" Nora's tip-tilted little nose was promptly elevated still higher, and she walked away without observing the triumphant gleam in Hippy's blue eyes. At one o'clock the Eight Originals halted for luncheon, which proved to be a merry meal. By half-past two o'clock the tall balsam tree, heavy with its weight of decorations and strange Christmas fruit, was pronounced finished, and the party of jubilant young people reluctantly separated to assemble after dinner for one of their old-time frolics. The evening train brought Arnold Evans, and Miriam found herself whisked down Chapel Hill toward Grace's home by David and Arnold despite her protests that neither she nor Arnold really belonged. "You and Arnold are the honorary members," David reminded her, "and are, therefore, eligible to all our revels." When, at eight o'clock, the little group of guests, which included Mrs. Gray, had gathered in the Harlowe's cozy living room and to Mr. Harlowe had fallen the honor of playing Santa Claus, something peculiar happened. Nearly all the gifts fell to Hippy, who rose with every repetition of his name, bowed profoundly, grinned significantly in his best Chessy-cat manner and, swooping down upon the gifts, gathered them unto himself. As he was about to take smiling possession of a large, flat package an indignant, "Let me see that package, Mr. Harlowe," from Nora O'Malley caused all eyes to be focused upon it. "Just as I suspected," sputtered Nora, glaring at the offending Hippy, whose grin appeared to grow wider with every second. Taking the package from Mr. Harlowe, she triumphantly held up a holly-wreathed card that had been deftly concealed beneath a fold of tissue paper, and read, "To Grace, with love from Nora." "Discovered!" exclaimed Hippy in hollow tones, making a dive for the package and failing to secure it. Nora held it above her head. "Here, Grace, it's yours," she explained. "Don't pay any attention to that other card." Grace had turned her attention to a large tag that was fastened to the holly ribbon with which the package was tied. She read aloud, "To my esteemed friend, Hippy, from his humble little admirer, Nora O'Malley." The instant of silence was followed by a shout of laughter, in which Nora joined. "You rascal!" she exclaimed, shaking her finger at Hippy. "I knew you were planning mischief when you sat over there writing those cards. Take all those presents, girls. I am sure they don't belong to this deceitful reprobate." Hippy at once set up a dismal wail, and clutched his packages to his breast, dropping all but two in the process. These were snapped up by Reddy and Nora almost before they touched the floor. "Here's the umbrella I thought I bought for Tom," growled Reddy, as he ripped off the simple inscription, "To Hippy, with love, Reddy." "Yes, and here is the monogrammed stationery I ordered made for Jessica," added Nora, glaring at the stout young man, who smiled blithely in return as one who had received an especial favor. "You are holding on to two of my presents, though," he reminded. Nora made a hasty inspection of the packages, then shoved the two presents toward him. "There they are," she said severely. "If I had known how badly you were going to behave, I wouldn't have given you a thing." "Take your scarf pin, Indian giver," jeered Hippy, holding out a small package, then jerking it back again. "How do you know it's a scarf pin?" inquired Nora. "My intuition tells me, my child," returned Hippy gently. "Then your intuition is all wrong," declared Nora O'Malley disdainfully. "Always ready to argue," sighed Hippy. "Mrs. Gray, I appeal to you, don't allow Hippy and Nora to start an argument. There won't be either time or chance for anything else." "Hippy and Nora, be good children," laughingly admonished the sprightly old lady. "Look out for Hippy's cards," David cautioned Mr. Harlowe. The rest of the gifts were distributed without accident, and then by common consent a great unwrapping began, accompanied by rapturous "ohs," and plenty of "thank yous." It was almost one o'clock on Christmas morning before any of the guests even thought of home. After the tree had been despoiled of its bloom, an impromptu show followed in which the young folks performed the stunts for which they were famous. Then came supper, dancing, and the usual Virginia Reel, led by Mr. Harlowe and Mrs. Gray, in which Hippy distinguished himself by a series of quaint and marvelous steps. "One more good time to add to our dozens of others," said Miriam Nesbit softly as she kissed Grace good night. "I feel to-night as though I could say with particular emphasis: 'Peace on Earth, Good Will Toward Men.'" "And I feel," said Hippy, who had overheard Miriam's low-toned remark, "as though I had been unjustly and unkindly treated. I was cheated of over half my Christmas gifts by those unblushing miscreants known as David Nesbit, Reddy Brooks and Tom Gray. Nora O'Malley helped them, too." "Jessica and Reddy, will you take me home to-night?" asked Nora sweetly, edging away from the complaining Hippy. "We shall be only too pleased to be your escort," Reddy answered with alacrity, casting a sidelong glance of triumph at Hippy. "And I shall be only too pleased to annihilate Reddy Brooks for daring to suggest any such thing," retorted Hippy, striding toward the offending Reddy. "Come, come, Hippy," laughed Mrs. Harlowe, who enjoyed Hippy's pranks as much as did his companions, "this is Christmas, you know. Why not let Reddy live?" "Very well, I will," agreed Hippy, "but only to please you, Mrs. Harlowe. Once we leave here, the annihilation process is likely to begin at the first disrespectful word on the part of a certain crimson-haired individual whose name I won't mention. It will be a painful process." "There isn't the slightest doubt about it being painful to you," was Reddy's grim retort. "I wonder if I had better wait until after Christmas to do the deed," mused Hippy. "There's Reddy's family to consider. Perhaps I had better--" "--behave yourself in future and not refer to your friends as 'miscreants' after appropriating their Christmas presents," lectured David Nesbit. "All right, I agree to your proposition on one condition," stipulated Hippy. "Something to eat, I suppose," said David wearily. "No; you are a wild guesser as well as a slanderer. If Nora O'Malley will withdraw the cruel request she just made I will forgive even Reddy." And when the little party of young folks started on their homeward way the forgiving Hippy with Nora O'Malley on his arm marched gayly along behind the forgiven, but wholly unappreciative Reddy. CHAPTER XVIII OLD JEAN'S STORY "It's 'Ho for the forest!'" sang Tom Gray jubilantly, as he waved his stout walking stick over the low stone wall that separated the party of picnickers from Upton Wood. "Isn't it magnificent?" asked Grace of Anne, her gray eyes glowing as she looked ahead at the snowy road that stretched like a great white ribbon between the deep green rows of pine and fir trees. "Perfect," agreed Anne dreamily, who was drinking in the solemn beauty of the snow-wrapped forest, an expression of reverence on her small face. "I wonder if the snow in the road is very deep?" soliloquized Jessica unsentimentally. "How can you break in upon our rapt musings with such commonplaces?" laughed Grace. "To return to earth; I don't imagine the snow is deep. This road is much traveled, and the snow looks fairly well packed. What do you say, Huntsman Gray?" She turned to Tom with a smile. "It isn't deep. All aboard for Upton Wood!" called Tom cheerily. "Come on, Grace." He extended a helping hand to her. But Grace needed no assistance. With a laughing shake of her head she vaulted the low wall as easily as Tom himself could have cleared it. Nora followed her, then Miriam, while Anne and Jessica were content to allow themselves to be assisted by David and Reddy. Then the picnickers swung into the wide snow-packed road that wound its way to the other end of Upton Wood, a matter of perhaps ten miles. Being a part of the road to the state capital and a famous automobile route it was sedulously looked after and kept in good condition, and was therefore not difficult to travel. The cabin of old Jean, the hunter, was situated some distance from the main road in the thickest part of the forest. The day before, the five young men, with a bobsled filled with grocers' supplies, had driven to the point of the road nearest the cabin and a brisk unloading had followed. After their first trip to the cottage old Jean had returned to the sleigh with them, his fur cap awry, gesticulating delightedly and chattering volubly as he walked. Of a surety Mamselle Grace and her friends were welcome. He deplored the fact that they had insisted upon bringing their own provisions, but David, who suspected the old hunter's larder to be none too well stocked with eatables, had quieted Jean's remonstrances with the diplomatic assertion that the affair having been planned by the "Eight Originals Plus Two," as they had now agreed to call themselves, and given in honor of the old hunter himself, it was their privilege to pay the piper. Jean had shaken his head rather dubiously over the miscellaneous heap of groceries that spread over at least a quarter of his floor, but his first protest had been laughingly silenced by the five sturdy foresters, who threatened to turn him out of house and home if he did not allow his friends to celebrate in peace. On this particular morning Jean had been up and doing since five o'clock. He had decorated his cabin walls with ground pine and evergreen, and as a last touch had, with many chuckles, suspended from the ceiling an unusually perfect piece of mistletoe, which he had tramped into Oakdale early that morning to secure. He had cleaned his rifle first, then swept and scrubbed his cabin floor, and the pine table off which he ate, until the most critical housekeeper could have found no fault with the shining cleanliness of the place. The rousing fire that he built in the big fireplace soon dried the floor, and after arranging his few household effects to the best advantage, Jean busied himself with getting in a good supply of wood before his young guests, who had set the hour of three o'clock for their arrival, should appear upon the scene. It was precisely ten minutes to three when the little company reached the top of the hill at the foot of which nestled old Jean's cottage, and halted for a moment before descending. "Sound the call of the Elf's Horn, Tom," demanded Grace. "I only wish I could sound it. I've tried over and over again, but I can't do it." "It is a gift which the fairies reserve for only a few favored mortals," teased Tom. "Then I am not one of them," declared Grace. "I have watched for fairies since I was a little girl and never met with one yet. I know every individual fairy in Grimms', Andersen's and Lang's by reputation, too." "What about your fairy prince?" was Tom's quick question. The two pairs of gray eyes met. Grace smiled with frank amusement. "I have never looked for a fairy prince," she said lightly. "I never cared half so much about the fairy princes and the clothes and weddings as I did about giants, witches and spells, mysterious happenings and magic mirrors. I loved 'The Brave Little Tailor' and 'The Youth Who Could Not Shiver and Shake.'" "I always liked the 'False Bride' and 'Rapunzel,'" remarked Jessica sentimentally, who had come up beside Grace and Tom. "Of what are you talking?" asked Nora, who had caught Jessica's last word. "We were naming the fairy tales we always liked best." "I always liked the 'Magic Fiddle,'" said Nora, with a reminiscent chuckle. "I used to keep a copy of Grimms' Fairy Tales in my desk at school, just for that story. It always made me giggle. I could fairly see all those poor people dancing whether they wished to dance or not. Ask Hippy what his favorite fairy tale is," she dimpled, lowering her voice. "Say, Hippopotamus," called Tom, "what's your favorite fairy tale?" Hippy, who stood a little to one side, appeared to think deeply, then said with a sentimental smile: "The 'Table Prepare Thyself' story. Oh, if I might have had such a table!" Hippy sighed dolefully. "Then I would never have been obliged when out on these excursions to humbly beg for crumbs to sustain my failing strength till such time as you slow-pokes saw fit to eat." "Don't I always give you things to eat when everyone else laughs at you?" demanded Nora belligerently. "Yes, my noble benefactor," whined Hippy, "but you didn't to-day." "I don't intend to, either," was Nora's unfeeling response. "I purposely told Tom to ask you that. I knew you'd name one that had a good deal about eating in it." "Stop squabbling," commanded Reddy, his fingers fastened in the back of Hippy's collar, "or down the hill you go. Keep quiet, now, Tom is going to perform." Tom placed his hands to his mouth. His friends listened intently. Then came the peculiar whistle that sounded like the note of a trumpet. Tom whistled repeatedly, and two minutes later they saw old Jean come racing up the steep path toward them. He had heard the mysterious Elf's Horn. "Never forgot it, did you, Jean?" laughed Tom, seizing the old man's hand and shaking it warmly. "No, Monsieur Tom; once I hear, it is impossible that I should forget," replied Jean in his quaint English. "An' now that you have honor me this afternoon, it is well that you come to my cabin where the fire burn for you an' the coffee wait, an' all is ready for my frien's who mak' so long walk for the sake of ol' Jean." "Of course we did, Jean," smiled Grace as they started for the cabin. "Don't we always come to see you when we are home from college?" "It is true, Mamselle Grace," returned Jean solemnly. "I am lucky man to have such fren's." "Don't look so sad over it, Jean!" exclaimed Hippy. "Be merry, and gayly dance as I do." He essayed several fantastic steps over the frozen ground, stubbed his toe on a projecting root and lunged forward, falling heavily into a huge snowdrift, his hands and face plowing into the snow. "Ha, ha!" jeered Reddy. "'Be merry, and gayly dance as I do.' No, thank you. I prefer to walk along like an ordinary human being." "That is exactly what you are," was Hippy's calm retort from the snowdrift, "'an ordinary human being.'" Floundering out of the drift he shook himself free of snow and, undaunted by his fall, went on skipping and pirouetting toward the cabin, while his companions shrieked mirthful comments into his apparently unhearing ears. How fast the afternoon and evening slipped away! The girls insisted on helping Jean with the dinner, and at half-past five the whole party sat down at the rude table that had been improvised by the boys the day before. Eating in the heart of the forest made things taste infinitely better than at home. Never before had there been such coffee, or steak, or baked potatoes! There was dessert, too--Mrs. Nesbit's famous fruit cake and Mrs. Harlowe's equally prized mince pie, besides fruit and nuts, Jean adding the latter to the feast. Then everyone's health was drunk in grape juice, and it was almost seven o'clock before Jean and his guests rose from the table. "Ten minutes to seven," declared David, consulting his watch. "We must leave here at eight o'clock. We ought to be home by nine. I feel very responsible for these youngsters, Jean. It was I who agreed to play chaperon." "Youngsters, indeed," growled Reddy scornfully. "Listen to Methuselah." "Tell us a story before we go, Jean," begged Grace. She loved to hear the old hunter tell in his quaint way of his many perilous adventures in the great northwestern woods of Canada, where he had spent so many years of his life. "If Mamselle Grace like I will tell of w'en I track the fierce panther who have kill my lambs, an' what happen to me." "Oh, splendid!" cried Grace. "We should love to hear it." The glow from the big back log reflected the interested faces of the others. Jean's stories were always well received. Settling himself cross-legged on the floor, his back against the wall, he related how, after tracking a panther all day, he had slipped while going down a steep bank and losing his footing had plunged to the bottom. How he had lain there bruised and helpless with a broken leg, expecting at any time to see the beast he had been tracking bear down upon him. How at last, after hours of unspeakable agony, help had come in the shape of a tall, strongly built young man, whose cabin was not far off and who had carried Jean to it, then, after roughly setting the injured leg, and making his patient as comfortable as might be expected under the circumstances, he had ridden thirty miles for a doctor, then tended the old hunter until his leg healed. "Ten week I stay in bed an' this good frien' take care of me. He inten' to go to Alaska for gold. He say he have wife once an' baby but they die in railroad wreck. He never see their bodies. He very sad. The fire in the train burn everybody, all t'ings." Jean waved his arms comprehensively. "He stay by me until I am well. Then he say, 'Jean, come along to Alaska.' But I say, 'No. I am too ol'. I wish live all my days in Canada woods.' So he go on. After many years he write. Only last summer I have receive his letter. He have found plenty gold, an' is rich. He say when he come back, then he will buy for me a new rifle an' give me much money. But what does Jean care for money? Rather I would see my frien' whose letter I have always keep." The old man ceased speaking and looked retrospectively into the fire. Then, without speaking, he rose, shuffled to a small table in one corner of the room, and opening the drawer took from it a well-thumbed envelope. Returning to the group he handed it to Grace, saying proudly: "This is the letter my frien' write. Will Mamselle Grace read?" Grace obediently took the letter from the envelope. "My dear Jean:" she read. "How can I ever forgive myself for neglecting you so long? I can only say that though I have failed to make good my promise to write, you have never been forgotten by me. Jean, I am sorry you didn't come here with me. I found gold, more than I can spend in a lifetime, and I have made you a stockholder in my mine. I am coming back to the States next spring and will look you up first of all. I am sending this to the old address, trusting that if you are not there it will be forwarded to you. I used to think it would be glorious to be rich, but now that I am alone in the world, money seems a poor substitute for my lost happiness. "Let me hear from you soon, Jean, and address your letter, Post Office Box 462, Nome, Alaska. I hope you are well and happy. You always were a sunshiny old chap. Here's hoping. "Your old friend, "DENTON." "Is it not a very gran' letter?" asked old Jean with anxious pride. "My frien' Denton have study in college, too." "Indeed it is, Jean," agreed Anne warmly. "Your friend seems to be the right sort of comrade, even if he is a bad correspondent," remarked David Nesbit. "Something like me," murmured Hippy gently. No one appeared to notice this modest assertion. "Sounds like a page from a best seller, doesn't it, Grace?" asked Tom laughingly. Grace did not answer. She was gazing at the signature of the letter with perplexed eyes. She was wondering why the name Denton seemed so familiar. Remembrance came suddenly--Ruth, of course. With that recollection came a sudden startling train of thought. Ruth's father had gone west, had been heard from in Nevada, then disappeared. Jean's friend had lost his wife and child on a westbound train. Here, however, Grace's supposition proved weak. Both wife and child had been burned to death in the railroad wreck. Still, mistakes in identification were frequently made on such painful occasions. Grace went back to her first supposition. "It is the only shred of a clew that I have run across yet," she reflected. "I am going to hang to it and see where it leads. And to think that perhaps old Jean once knew Ruth's father. It's unbelievable." "We must start in ten minutes." David's crisp, business-like tones brought her to a realization of her immediate surroundings. "Ten minutes is long enough for me to say what is on my mind," Grace said eagerly. Then she began to tell of Ruth, her poverty, and her great wish to know whether her father were dead or alive. Knowing Grace as they did, her friends guessed that she had something of real importance to impart. When she came to the part about Ruth's father going west after promising to send for his little family, a light began to dawn upon them, and Jessica exclaimed: "Why, they must have been killed while on their way to join him!" "It is so. Mamselle speak the truth!" almost shouted Jean. "It was then they die. He have tol' me so many times." "Then the man who saved Jean must have been Ruth's father!" exclaimed Miriam, "and a dreadful mistake was made in telling him his child was dead, too. The packet fastened by a cord about Ruth's neck ought easily to have proved her identity. Perhaps the packet was stolen." "Then how did Ruth come by the watch and letter?" asked Grace. "I give it up," replied Miriam. "It certainly is a tangled web." "But we shall straighten it," said Grace resolutely. "The next thing to do is to find Mr. Denton. Tell me, Jean, how many years since you first met Mr. Denton?" Jean counted laboriously on his fingers. "Twelve years," he finally announced, "an' say his family have died six years then." "Eighteen years," mused Grace, "and Ruth is twenty-two. The years seem to tally with the rest of the story, too. Will you give me Mr. Denton's address and allow me to write to him, Jean?" "Whatever Mamselle Grace wishes shall be hers," averred Jean. "Then I'll write the letter to-morrow. The sooner it is written and sent, the sooner we shall receive an answer to it," declared Grace. "That is unless he is dead. But I have a strange presentiment that he is alive. What do you think, Jean?" she turned to the old hunter, who nodded sagely. "I think my frien', he alive, too," agreed Jean, "an' I hope, mebbe I shall see again." "You shall see him and so shall Ruth, if letters can accomplish your wish, Jean," promised Grace. "Eight o'clock," announced David judicially. No one paid the slightest attention to him, however, Ruth Denton's affairs being altogether too engrossing a matter for discussion. It was half-past eight when, after a hearty vote of thanks and three cheers for old Jean, the picnickers climbed the little hill and took the moonlit homeward trail. CHAPTER XIX TELLING RUTH THE NEWS "Yes, it was a busy two weeks," declared Arline Thayer, "and yet, oh, Grace, you can't possibly know how slowly the time has gone. I am sure I could live all the rest of my life on a desert island if I had the Semper Fidelis crowd with me. Of course, Ruth helped a whole lot, but you know Ruth isn't a butterfly like I am. She has had so many cares and disappointments that she isn't as gay in her wildest moments as I am in my ordinary ones. Besides, it was so hard to be sure that I was doing and saying the right thing. I was so afraid of hurting some one's feelings, or of being accused of trying to patronize those girls. "The dinner passed off beautifully. Every girl who stayed over was there. It cost me most of my check." Here Arline smiled rather ruefully. "But you never saw so many happy girls. Many of them had never been to either Martell's or Vinton's for dinner. I was at Vinton's and Ruth was at Martell's. No one had the slightest idea that there was anything cut and dried. We did all the other stunts; the play and the masquerade, and I am so tired." Arline curled herself up on Grace's couch, looking like an exhausted kitten. "I wonder if Elfreda has any tea," she said plaintively. "Of course she has," smiled Grace. "So have I. I'll make you some at once. Then I have something perfectly amazing to tell you. You won't remember whether you are tired or not after you hear my news." Taking the little copper tea-kettle, Grace went for water, leaving Arline considerably mystified and mildly excited. When at last the tea was ready, and Grace had placed crackers, nabisco wafers and a plate of home-made nut cookies on the table between them, Arline said impatiently, "Do begin." "Daffydowndilly, this is the strangest news you ever heard. Ready?" "Ready," echoed Arline. "We believe Ruth's father is still living and in Alaska." There was a little cry of rapture from Arline as she hastily set down her cup and caught Grace's hand in hers. "Congratulations," she trilled. "I knew you'd find him. I've seen it in your eye for months." "Nonsense," laughed Grace, "I don't deserve a particle of credit. It was quite by accident that I learned what I know of him." There-upon an account of their visit to old Jean followed, and Arline was soon in full possession of the details. "Shall you tell Ruth?" was her first question after Grace had finished. "What would you do?" Grace asked. "I don't think it would be best to tell her yet," returned Arline slowly. "Suppose we were to find that he had died or disappeared again since your old hunter received his letter. Think how dreadful that would be after telling her that he was alive and well. We must not arouse her hopes until we know." Grace nodded gravely. "That is what I thought. I am glad you are of the same mind. No one here except yourself and Elfreda have been told. Of course, Anne and Miriam heard it at the same time I did. I wrote to Mr. Denton at once, but I suppose my letter isn't more than half way to Nome yet." "Oh, it is the greatest thing that ever happened," exulted Arline. "Ruth's father found at last, away up in old, cold Alaska. Hurrah!" "Stop making so much noise," cautioned Grace, "while I tell you what I propose doing. It is two weeks since I wrote to Mr. Denton. I am going to write another letter to him before long. If he doesn't answer that, I shall stop for a while, then write again. If he is not in Nome I shall request the post-master to forward the letters, if possible." At this juncture a knock sounded on the almost closed door, then Elfreda came hurrying in, her cheeks glowing from her walk in the January wind. "Were you talking secrets?" she demanded, without stopping to greet Arline. "No,--that is--yes," replied Arline. "Grace was telling me about Ruth's father and--" Elfreda dropped on the couch beside Arline with a groan of dismay. "Why didn't you close the door?" she asked gloomily. "Why? What has happened?" questioned Grace anxiously. "Nothing much," retorted Elfreda, "only that West person was standing as close to your door as she could possibly stand without attracting marked attention. She was listening, too. I saw her when I reached the first landing. At first I thought I would walk up to her and call her to account for eavesdropping. But before I could make up my mind just what to do she went on down the hall to her room. I suppose you will hear about this affair of Ruth finding her father from a dozen different sources to-morrow. She will go directly to the Wicks-Hampton faction with the news. She may have gone already." [Illustration: "She was Standing Close to the Door."] "This is dreadful," gasped Grace in consternation, "but our own fault. Will I ever learn to keep my door closed and either whisper my secrets or else lock them behind my lips?" "It was my fault," declared Arline contritely. "I was shouting, 'Ruth's father found at last!' at the top of my voice. Grace told me to subside." "Perhaps she only heard that much," comforted Elfreda, trying to be a little more hopeful. "Suppose she tells Ruth," suggested Arline nervously. Grace's eyes met those of her friend's in genuine alarm. Without a word she went to the closet and reaching for her coat and furs slipped them on. Jamming her fur cap down on her head, she pinned it securely, thrust her hands into her muff and walked to the door. "Elfreda, you will take care of Arline, won't you? She is going to stay with me for dinner. I am going to Ruth's and I think perhaps I had better go alone. I'll be back as soon as possible, and bring Ruth with me, if I can. Tell Mrs. Elwood that Ruth will be here. I must be off. I will see you at dinner." Grace was out of the room and down the stairs in a twinkling. As she set off toward Ruth's at a rapid pace she wondered if there was not some way in which she might capitulate with this strange girl who seemed so determined to blot the pages of her freshman year with unworthy deeds. "I am so disappointed," Grace reflected. "I did wish to like her because she was Mabel's friend, but she is so--so--different." It cost Grace an effort to end her sentence mildly. "But I'm not going to gossip about her, even to myself." After ringing three times Ruth's tired-eyed landlady opened the door to Grace with a mumbled apology about being in the attic when the bell rang. Grace hurried up the two flights of stairs and down the long, bare hall to Ruth's room. She paused an instant before knocking, half expecting to hear the sound of voices inside. All was still. Grace knocked twice, pausing between knocks. It was a signal Ruth and her intimate friends had adopted. Ruth answered the signal, a book in her hand. She gave a little cry of delight at seeing Grace. "How funny! I was just thinking of you. Come in and take off your wraps. Did you come to help me cook supper? You promised me you would some day." "No; I came to take you back to Wayne Hall with me. But, first of all, has Kathleen West been here to see you within the past half hour?" said Grace, stepping into the room and closing the door after her. "No," replied Ruth wonderingly. "Why do you ask? But do sit down, Grace." "I'm so glad," sighed Grace, sitting on the edge of the chair, "because she overheard something that I wish to tell you first." "I don't understand," was Ruth's perplexed answer. "I don't blame you for not understanding," smiled Grace. Then she rose, and, crossing the room, put her hands on her friend's shoulder. "Ruth," she said gently, "if you might have one wish granted to you, what would you wish?" "To find my father," was the instant reply. "That is what I thought you would say," returned Grace quietly. "Can you bear good news?" "Yes." Ruth's face had turned very white. She pulled one of Grace's hands from her shoulder, holding it in hers. "Tell me," she whispered tensely. Grace's gray eyes filled with tears. The hungry look in Ruth's eyes told its own story. "He is alive, Ruth," she said, steadying her voice. "At least he was alive less than six months ago. I'll begin at the very first and tell you everything." It was half an hour later when the two friends set out for Wayne Hall. "I am so happy; it seems as though I must be with you girls to-night," declared Ruth. "I am so anxious to see Arline. My Daffydowndilly will be happy, too, for my sake. And Grace, I have a strange presentiment that I shall see him before long. I can't think of him as anything but alive. I'm so glad that you told me. It would have been a dreadful shock to have had the news come through Miss West or her friends." "She hasn't the slightest idea that we know she was in the hall," said Grace. "I imagine you will hear of your father through half a dozen different sources in the morning. I don't believe she intended to tell you to-day. I think it was part of her plan to take you by surprise and completely unnerve you. Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton are efficient town criers," Grace added bitterly. "She depended on them to spread the news in the cruelest way." "Why, Grace, I never heard you speak so bitterly of any one before!" exclaimed Ruth. "Ruth, to tell the honest truth, I am thoroughly disgusted with those two girls," confessed Grace wearily. "They have been at the bottom of every annoyance I have had since I came to Overton. It may not be charitable to say so, but I shall certainly not regret seeing them graduated and gone from Overton. I know it sounds selfish, but I can't help it. I mean it. And now we are going to talk only of delightful things. I think we ought to give a spread to-night in honor of you. It isn't every day one finds a long-lost father. Arline is going to stay to dinner, and, of course, she'll stay afterward." Grace's proposal of a spread met with gleeful approval, and in spite of a hearty six-o'clock dinner, there was no lack of appetite when at ten o'clock Elfreda, who insisted on taking the labor of the spread upon her own shoulders, appeared in the door announcing that it was ready. By borrowing Grace's table and using it in conjunction with her own, employing the bureau scarf for a centerpiece, and filling up the bare spaces with paper napkins, the table assumed the dignity of a banqueting board. There were even glasses and plates and spoons enough to go round and one could have either grape juice or tea, Elfreda informed them. "You'd better take tea first, though, because there are only two bottles of grape juice, and we need that for the toast to Ruth's father. Of course if you insist upon having grape juice----" "Tea," was the judiciously lowered chorus from the obliging guests. "Thank you," bowed Elfreda. "I wouldn't have given you the grape juice, at any rate." By half-past ten nothing remained of the feast but the grape juice, and the guests began clamoring insistently for that. "We are breaking the ten-thirty rule into microscopic pieces," declared Elfreda as she dropped slices of orange and pineapple on the ice in the bottom of the glasses, added orange juice, sugar and grape juice. "If it isn't sweet enough, help yourself to sugar. The bowl is on the table. And you can only have one straw apiece. The commissary department is short on straws. A word of warning, don't drink the toast to Ruth's father through a straw," she ended with a giggle. The giggle proved infectious and went the round of the table. Grace was the first to remember the toast to be drunk. Elfreda had just poured the sixth, her own glass of grape juice, and slipped into her place at the table. Rising to her feet Grace said simply, "To Ruth's father. May she see him soon." The toast was drunk standing. Ruth still looked rather dazed. She could not yet think of her father as a reality. "I thank you all," she said tremulously, her eyes misty. "Of course you know I am not quite certain of my great happiness, but I am going to write to Father to-morrow, and perhaps before long I'll have a letter to show you." "If Ruth is to be surprised now, some one will have to get up early in the morning," declared Elfreda with satisfaction, as she collected the dishes for washing after the guests had departed. "And that some one will be doomed to feel foolish," added Miriam. CHAPTER XX ELFREDA REALIZES HER AMBITION Midyears, a season of terror to freshmen, a still alarming period to sophomores, but no very great bugbear to the two upper classes, came and went. During that strenuous week the usual amount of midnight oil was burnt, the usual amount of feverish reviewing done, and the usual amount of celebrating indulged in when the ordeal was passed. "Don't forget the game to-morrow," said J. Elfreda Briggs to the girls at her end of the breakfast table one morning in early March. "The only one this year in which the celebrated center, Miss Josephine Elfreda Briggs, will take part. Sounds like a grand opera announcement, doesn't it? Maybe it hasn't taken endless energy to keep that team together and up to the mark. But our captain is a hustler and we are marvels," she added modestly. "I need no bard to sing my praises," began Miriam mischievously. "I didn't say 'I,'" retorted Elfreda. "I said 'we.'" "Meaning 'I'," interposed Emma Dean wickedly. "As you like," flung back Elfreda sweetly. "You needn't come to the game, you know, if you think it is to be a one-player affair." "Oh, I'll be there, never fear," Emma assured her. "I have a special banner of junior blue to wear." Only one color had been chosen by 19-- for their junior year, one of the new shades of blue which Gertrude Wells had at once renamed "junior" blue. It was greatly affected by the juniors for ties, belts, hat trimmings and girdles. "Doesn't it seem strange not to be on the team this year, Miriam?" asked Grace. "That is, when one stops to think about it. It never occurred to me until this moment how much I have missed basketball. Mabel Ashe said that we'd just simply drift away from it this year, and so we have. Now we are going to cheer Elfreda on to victory." "Elfreda is an artist in making baskets," commended Miriam. "Much obliged," rejoined Elfreda, "but your praise doesn't turn my head in the least. You can judge better of my artistic qualities after the game." "We hope to secure seats in the gallery," said Anne. "The front ones, of course, are reserved for the faculty, but if we go to the gym very early we may get good seats." "I am not going to wait for you, if you don't mind, Miriam," remarked Elfreda, rising. "I must see our captain before going to chapel this morning." "Run along," said Miriam. "I am not going to chapel this morning. I must have that extra time for my biology. I can use it to good advantage, too. There won't be any noise or disturbance in the room," she added slyly. Elfreda gave Miriam a reproachful glance over her shoulder as she left the dining room. "You'll be sorry for 'them cruel words' some day," she declared. "For instance, the next time my services as a chef are desired," and was gone. Miriam left the dining room a little later, going directly upstairs. Grace and Anne lingered to talk with the girls still at breakfast, half expecting to hear the news of Ruth's father brought up. Nothing was said on the subject, however, and Grace wondered if Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton could possibly have come to their senses and refused to take part in whatever mischief Kathleen had planned. How glad she would be, she reflected, if the two seniors, who had caused her so many unpleasant thoughts and moments turned out well after all. After the service that morning she waited for Ruth, who was one of the last of the long procession of girls who filed out of the chapel. Arline was with her and made a rush for Grace the moment she caught sight of her. "I have been watching for you," she said eagerly. "I haven't heard a word, and neither has Ruth. Perhaps they were more honorable than we believed them to be." "I thought that, too," rejoined Grace. "It has been almost a week since I told Ruth. We may never hear a word concerning it." "It wouldn't make much difference now," said Arline. "Ruth knows, and there isn't really anything to be said except that after many years' separation she may find her father. She need not care who knows that." "It was the cruel shock to her that I thought of, and so did Kathleen West," explained Grace. "She seems determined to hurt some one's feelings by 'notoriety' methods. Her newspaper work has made her hard and unfeeling. She is always trying to dig up some one's private affairs and make them public property. I imagine our two seniors have placed a restraining hand on this last affair. I hope Mabel Ashe will never grow cruel and unfeeling--and dishonorable." "She won't," predicted Arline. "Father knows many delightful newspaper women who are above reproach. Besides, Mabel will never remain on a newspaper long enough to change. There is a certain young lawyer in New York City who adores her, and I think she cares for him. There is no engagement yet, but there will be inside of a year or my name is not Arline Thayer." "Really?" asked Grace, her eyes widening with interest. "She has never so much as intimated it to me." "I know a little about it, for we have mutual friends in New York. Besides, Father knows the man. I've met him. He's a dear, and awfully handsome." Having lingered to talk until the last moment the two girls were obliged to part abruptly and scurry off to their recitation rooms, which lay in different directions. They met late in the afternoon in the gymnasium to watch Elfreda's last practice playing before the game, but in their momentary basketball enthusiasm the topic of the morning's conversation was not touched upon. The game between the sophomore and junior teams was looked upon as an event of extreme importance. Elfreda's love for the game and the story of her persistent effort to reduce her weight in order to glitter as a prominent basketball star had become familiar to not only her upper class friends, but throughout the college as well. She had several freshmen adorers, who sent her violets and vied with one another in entertaining her whenever she had an hour or two to spare them. In fact, J. Elfreda Briggs was becoming an important factor in the social life of Overton, with the satisfaction of knowing that she had won a place in the hearts of her admirers through her own merit. Considerable preparation in the way of decorations had been made. About the balcony railing green and yellow bunting mingled with that of junior blue. The two front rows were well filled with members of the faculty, who wore ribbon rosettes with long ends and carried banners of blue, or green and yellow, as the case might be. The Semper Fidelis Club, resplendent in cocked hats of junior blue and wide blue crepe paper sashes fastened in the back with immense butterfly bows, occupied places directly behind the faculty. They had gone to the gymnasium an hour and a half before the game in order to secure these seats, and were now ranged in an eager, exultant row, impatiently awaiting the entrance of the two teams. With the shrill notes of the whistle began one of the most stubborn conflicts ever waged between two Overton teams. From the instant the ball was put in play and the players leaped into action the interest of the spectators never wavered. During the first half of the game the sophomores valiantly contested every foot of the ground, and it was only at the very end of the half that the juniors succeeded in making the score six to four in their favor. In the last half the doughty sophomores rose to the occasion and tied the score with their first play. Then Elfreda, with unerring aim, made a long overhand throw to basket that brought forth deafening applause from the spectators. The sophomores managed to gain two more points, but the juniors again managed not only to gain two points, but to pile up their score until a particularly brilliant play to basket on the part of Elfreda closed the last half with the glorious reckoning of seventeen to twelve in favor of the juniors. Immediately a hubbub arose from the gallery. The Semper Fidelis Club burst forth into a victorious song they had been practising for the occasion, while another delegation of juniors also rent the air with their chant of triumph over their sophomore sisters. After Elfreda had experienced the satisfaction of being escorted round the room by her classmates, who continued to sing spiritedly at least three different songs at the top of their lungs, she was hurried into the dressing room by the Semper Fidelis Club. The moment she was dressed she was seized by friendly hands and marched off to Vinton's to a dinner given by the club in honor of her. For the present, at least, she was the most important girl in college, and feeling the weight of her new-born fame, she was unusually silent, almost shy. "Elfreda can't accustom herself to being a celebrity," laughed Miriam. "She is terribly embarrassed." "That is really the truth," confessed Elfreda. "I've always wanted to be a basketball star, but it seems funny to have the girls make such a fuss over me." "You deserve it!" exclaimed Gertrude Wells. "You were the pride of the team. I never want to see a better game. That last play of yours was a record breaker." The other members of the club joined in Gertrude's praise of Elfreda's playing. The stout girl's face shone with happiness. To her it was one of the great moments of her college life. It was after seven o'clock when the diners left Vinton's. The club gallantly escorted Elfreda to the very door of Wayne Hall and left her after singing to her and giving three cheers. Grace, Anne, Miriam, Arline, Ruth, Mildred Taylor and Laura Atkins were her body guard up the stairs. At the landing Laura Atkins called a halt and invited every one present to a jollification in her room that night in honor of Elfreda. While Elfreda was explaining that she didn't wish the girls to go to any trouble for her, although her eyes shone with delight at being thus honored, the door bell rang repeatedly, and the maid, grumbling under her breath, admitted Emma Dean, who skipped up the stairs two at a time. "I'm always late," she announced cheerfully, "but hardly ever too late. I stopped at the big bulletin board. I noticed a letter there addressed to you, Grace. It was marked 'Important' in one corner. I had half a mind to bring it with me, then--well--you know how one feels about meddling with some one else's mail." "I'm sorry you didn't bring it with you. Don't hesitate to do so next time," returned Grace regretfully. "However, it won't take long to run across the campus for it. I'll go now before I take off my hat and coat. Thank you for telling me about it, Emma." "You are welcome," called Emma after her as Grace ran to her room for her wraps. Always on the alert for home letters, under no circumstances could she have been content to wait quietly until the next day for the coveted mail. If it were from her mother or father she could read it over and over before bedtime and go to sleep happy in the possession of it, and if it were from one of her numerous friends it would be joyfully received. The handwriting on the envelope Grace took from the bulletin board looked strangely familiar. Tearing it open, she glanced hastily over the few lines of the letter, an expression of incredulity in her eyes, for the note said:-- "MY DEAR MISS HARLOWE:-- "May I come to Wayne Hall to see you to-morrow evening at half-past seven o'clock? Please leave note in the bulletin board stating whether this will be convenient for you. "Yours sincerely, "ALBERTA WICKS." Grace read the note again, then mechanically folding it, returned it to its envelope, and walked slowly back to Wayne Hall divided between her disappointment in the letter, and speculation as to the purport of Alberta Wicks's proposed call. CHAPTER XXI ALBERTA KEEPS HER PROMISE During the following day Grace pondered not a little over the possible meaning of Alberta Wicks's note. She wrote an equally brief reply, stating that she would be at Wayne Hall the following night at the appointed time, and tried, unsuccessfully, to dismiss the matter from her mind. It persisted in recurring to her at intervals, and when, at exactly half-past seven o'clock, Alberta Wicks was ushered into the living room, Grace's heart beat a trifle faster as she went forward to greet her guest, who looked less haughty than usual, and who actually smiled faintly as she returned Grace's greeting. "I know I am the last person you ever expected to see," began Alberta, looking embarrassed, "but I simply felt as though I must come here to-night. Are we likely to be interrupted?" she asked suddenly. "Perhaps we had better go upstairs to my room," suggested Grace. "My roommate is away this evening." "Thank you," replied the other girl. She followed Grace upstairs with an unaccustomed meekness that made Grace marvel as to what had suddenly wrought so marked a change in this hitherto disagreeable senior. Once the two girls were seated opposite each other, Alberta leaned forward and said earnestly: "I know that you must dislike me very, very much, Miss Harlowe, and I always supposed that I disliked you even more, but I have lately come to the conclusion that I admire you more than any girl I know." Grace looked at her guest in uncomprehending wonder. Could this be the sneering, insolent Miss Wicks who was speaking? There was no sign of a sneer on her face now. She spoke with a simple directness that could not fail to impress the most sceptical. "I have been hearing about you from a source entirely outside Overton," she continued, "from a Smith College senior who lives in Oakdale. She visited a friend of mine during the holidays. I live in Boston, you know." "I didn't know," began Grace, then with a little exclamation: "It can't be possible! You don't mean Julia Crosby?" "Yes," nodded Alberta. "I do mean Julia Crosby. Thanks to her, I have had my eyes opened to a good many things. I--am--sorry--for everything, Miss Harlowe." Her voice faltered. "I--never--saw--myself as I was--until Miss Crosby made me see. Directly after meeting her she asked me if I knew you, and I spoke slightingly of you. She said very decidedly that you were one of her dearest friends, and defended you to the skies. She told me about your saving her from drowning, and of how badly she had once behaved toward you, and how brave and loyal you were. Then we had a long talk and she made me promise to square things with you the minute I came back, but I haven't had the courage until to-day." She paused and looked appealingly at Grace. Without hesitation Grace held out her hand. "I am not a very formidable person," she smiled. "I am so glad you know Julia Crosby, too. She must have told you of the good times we used to have together in Oakdale." Alberta nodded. She could not yet trust her voice. "Julia wanted me to go to Smith with her," Grace went on rapidly in order to give her guest a chance to recover herself. "At first I thought seriously of it, but later Anne and Miriam and I decided on Overton. And we haven't been disappointed, not for an hour! I wouldn't exchange Overton for any other college in the United States," she ended with loyal pride. "Don't you love Overton, Miss Wicks?" "No," returned the other girl shortly. "It is too late for that sort of thing for me. I forfeited my right long ago. No one will miss me when I leave. Other than Mary, I have no real friends, even in my own class, and you know what most of the juniors think of us." Alberta's tone was very bitter. "Of course, we have no one but ourselves to blame, but just lately I've begun to wish that I had been different." There was an awkward silence. Grace made a vain effort to think of something to say to this hitherto unapproachable senior who had suddenly become so humble. Before she could frame a reply Alberta continued almost sullenly: "I don't know why I should care so much. But after Julia Crosby told me how you saved her life when she broke through the ice into the river and what a splendid girl you were, I felt awfully ashamed of myself. She talked to me and made me promise I would come to see you as soon as I returned to Overton. I am afraid I would have stayed away, though, if it hadn't been for something else." Grace's eyes were frankly questioning, but she still said nothing. "It is about that Miss West," said the senior, as though in answer to Grace's mute inquiry. "I am sorry to say that I encouraged her to do all sorts of revolutionary things when she first came here. I discovered she disliked you and your friends, and I was glad of it. I never lost an opportunity to fan the flame." "But why did she dislike us?" asked Grace. "That is the thing none of us understand. We were prepared to like her because Mabel Ashe had written me, asking me to look out for her. You know they worked on the same newspaper. We did everything we could to make her feel at home, until suddenly she began to cut our acquaintance. Later on something happened that made her angry with me, but to this day none of us knows why she cut us in the first place." "She never said a word to Mary or me about Mabel Ashe," declared Alberta in frowning surprise. "We supposed she had come to Wayne Hall as a stranger and had been snubbed by your crowd of girls. She was furiously angry with you because she wasn't asked to help with the bazaar. She wanted to be in the circus, and said you asked other freshmen and slighted her." "And I never dreamed she would care," returned Grace wonderingly. "If we had only asked her to take part, all these unpleasantnesses might have been avoided. You see, we didn't intend to ask any freshmen, but we finally asked Myra Stone because she made such a darling doll. Oh, I'm so sorry." "I wouldn't be if I were you," declared Alberta dryly. "Judging from what I know of her, I don't think she deserves much sympathy. I just prevented her from publishing Miss Denton's private affairs broadcast through the medium of her paper." "You don't mean she--" began Grace. Alberta nodded. "Yes, she wrote a story in a highly sensational style and brought it to me to read. She was going to send it to her paper, then mail copies of the edition in which the story appeared to a number of girls here. She had a long list, which she showed me, and wanted me to promise to help her address the papers and send them to the various girls. But after I had that talk with Julia Crosby I vowed within myself that the little time I had left at Overton should be devoted to some better cause than planning petty, silly ways of 'getting even.' I can't tell you how thankful I am that I have had this chance to live up to a little of what I promised myself I would do. There is just one thing I'd like to know, and that is the truth of the story concerning Miss Denton's father." "I shall be glad to tell you all I know, which is really very little," answered Grace, and once more repeated the story of what their holiday visit to the old hunter had brought forth. "I wrote to Mr. Denton to the address in Nome the very next day after we were out at Jean's and have written once since then, and so has Ruth, but we have never received an answer. Still, I believe that we shall yet hear from him. I feel certain that he is still living. I really hated to tell Ruth, and raise her hopes only to destroy them again by having to say that he had never answered our letters, but we decided that it was best for her to know. She has been so brave and dear. We told Miss Thayer, and my three friends know it, too, but we don't want any one else to know unless Ruth really finds her father. It is her own personal affair, you see." "But how did Miss West find it out?" was Alberta's question. Grace shook her head. "Don't ask me," she said, a hint of scorn in her eyes. "I am so glad you prevailed upon her to give up the plan, for Ruth's sake and for her own as well." "She was very determined at first, but she finally weakened and promised to drop the whole idea after she found that we were opposed to her plan," rejoined Alberta. "You did a good day's work for Ruth," smiled Grace, holding out her hand to the other girl. Alberta leaned forward in her chair and took Grace's hand in both of hers. "I wish I hadn't been so blind, Miss Harlowe. If I had only tried to know you long ago. There is so little of my college life left I can't hope to win your respect and liking." "Don't try," laughed Grace. "You have my respect already, as for my liking, I'd be very glad to say 'Alberta Wicks is my friend.'" "Can you say that and really mean it?" asked Alberta almost incredulously. "I would not say it unless I were quite certain that I meant it," Grace assured her. "Your coming here to-night proved clearly that you were ready to forget all past differences. Then, why should I hold spite or nurse a grievance? Now, we are not going to say another word about it. I should like to have you spend the evening with me. I am going to invite Miriam and Elfreda to a conversation and tea party in honor of you." "Oh, no!" protested Alberta, half rising. "They wouldn't come. Elfreda will never forgive me for causing her so much trouble." "Elfreda has forgotten all about what happened to her as a freshman. At least she has forgiven you," added Grace. "She and Miriam will be glad to know that we are friends." Grace spoke confidently, though she did have a brief instant of doubt as to just how Elfreda would regard Alberta's belated repentance. To her intense relief, however, when leaving Alberta for a moment she ran down the hall to invite Miriam and Elfreda, the one-time stout girl offered no other comment than a grumbled, "Just like you, Grace Harlowe." "But will you come to my tea party?" persisted Grace. "Of course we will," accepted Miriam. "She knows about it all, she knows, she knows," droned Elfreda. "What's the use in asking me anything when Miriam is here?" "All right." Grace turned to go. "I'll expect to see both of you within the next ten minutes. Don't change your mind after I have gone." "See here, Grace Harlowe!" Elfreda rose from her chair and walked toward Grace. "I should like to know--" "Don't say it, Elfreda," interrupted Grace. "Just say you'll come. If you don't come Alberta will go back to Stuart Hall, disappointed and resentful at having her friendly overtures rejected. She is at the critical stage now, Elfreda, dear, and needs encouragement and cheering up. She is a trifle bitter, and has the blues, too, although she is too stiff-necked to admit it." "You needn't be afraid. I wasn't going to throw cold water on the tea party. Of course we'll attend, and bring the whole two pounds of fruit cake we bought to-day with us. You can take our new cups and saucers, too, can't she, Miriam? What I should like to know is how it all happened." "I can't stop to tell you now. Wait until Anne comes home to-night and we'll congregate. I want to see Arline, too. I have a plan that just came to me a little while ago, and I should like to hear what you think of it. I must hurry back to my guest. Come to my room as soon as you can." "Now I wonder what she has on her mind?" smiled Miriam. "I imagine it has something to do with Alberta Wicks." "Do you know," remarked Elfreda, looking up with a sudden tender light in her usually matter-of-fact face, "there's a line in 'Hamlet' that always makes me think of Grace. It's the one in which Hamlet speaks of his father. He says, 'I shall never look upon his like again.' Substituting 'her' for 'his,' that is exactly what I think about Grace." * * * * * The next morning Grace awoke with the feeling of one who has had something disagreeable suddenly disappear from her life. "What happened last night?" she asked herself, then smiled as the memory of what had passed the evening before returned. "I'm so glad," she said half under her breath. "Glad of what?" asked Anne, who, wrapped in her kimono, sat sleepily on the edge of her bed, trying to make up her mind to stay awake. "That Alberta Wicks came to see me," replied Grace. "I hate quarrels and misunderstandings, Anne, yet I seem destined to become involved in them. Do you suppose it is because I have a quarrelsome disposition?" Grace had slipped out of bed, and, wrapping herself in her bath robe, trotted across the room and seated herself beside Anne, one arm thrown across her friend's shoulder. "Quarrelsome? You are a positive snapping turtle," Anne assured her gravely. "I am so glad I have only one more year of your detestable society before me. Now you know the truth. Kill me if you must," she added in melodramatic tones. "I'll be merciful and let you live until after Easter," laughed Grace. "That reminds me, Anne. I am going to ask Ruth to go home with us. I know she is anxious to talk with Jean, although she wouldn't say so for the world. She is always in mortal fear of intruding. Arline knows that I am going to invite Ruth. I'm going there this very morning if I can manage to hustle down to her room before my biology hour," concluded Grace, rising from the couch with an energy that nearly precipitated Anne to the floor. "We forgot to congregate last night after Alberta went home, it was so late. I'll tell you my plan to-night. But we won't try to carry it out until after Easter." Ruth cried a little on Grace's comforting shoulder when, an hour later, she delivered her Easter invitation. To Grace's satisfaction, she accepted without a protesting word. She remembered only that Jean, the hunter, had known her father and she had a wistful desire to take old Jean by the hand for her father's sake. Arline had promised to spend Easter with Grace, but her father had planned a trip to the Bermudas for her and Ruth. Realizing that it would be best for Ruth to go to Oakdale, she cheerfully put aside her own personal desire for Ruth's companionship and urged Ruth to go home with Grace. Elfreda had accepted Laura Atkins's invitation to spend Easter with her, and was already convulsing the three Oakdale girls with excerpts from conversations to take place, supposedly, between herself and Laura's learned father. "I have been reading up a lot on the pterodactyl and ichthyosaurus and other small, playful animals of the beginning of the world variety," she confided to Miriam. "I expect to astonish him." "I am reasonably sure that you will," was Miriam's mirthful reply. "I wish you were coming home with me, instead." "So do I." Elfreda's shrewd eyes grew wistful. "I know I'd have the best time ever if I went home with you, but I feel as though I ought to go with Laura. She would have been so disappointed if I had refused her invitation. That sounds conceited, doesn't it? But you can see how things are, can't you?" "I can, indeed," returned Miriam, and the significance of her tone left no doubt in Elfreda's mind regarding her roommate's understanding of things. CHAPTER XXII GRACE'S PLAN The Easter vacation slipped away at the same appalling rate of speed that had marked the passing of all Grace's holidays at home. There were so many pleasant things to do and so many old friends to welcome her return to Oakdale that she sighed regretfully to think she could not possibly accept one half of the invitations that poured in upon her from all sides. Nora and Jessica had come from the conservatory to spend Easter at home, so had the masculine half of the "Eight Originals Plus Two." Then, too, the Phi Sigma Tau, with the exception of Eleanor Savelli, had renewed their vows of unswerving loyalty, and their numerous sessions ate up the time. There was one day set aside, however, on which the little clan had paid a visit to Jean, the old hunter, and Ruth had experienced the satisfaction of seeing and talking with a man who had been her father's friend. The old woodsman had been equally delighted to take Arthur Denton's child by the hand, and the tears had run down his brown, weather-beaten cheeks as he looked into Ruth's face and exclaimed at the resemblance to her father that he saw there. "You shall yet hear. You shall yet see, Mamselle," he had prophesied with a fullness of belief that made Grace resolve to keep on writing to the address Jean had given her for a year at least, whether or not she received a line in return. She, too, felt confident that Arthur Denton still lived. She was, therefore, more disappointed than she cared to admit when, on returning to Overton, she failed to find an answer to the letters which she had sent to Nome at stated intervals. Ruth, apprehensive and sick at heart, by reason of hope deferred, was striving to be brave in spite of the bitterness of her disappointment. From the beginning she had sternly determined not to be buoyed by false hopes, then if she never heard from the letters that she and Grace had sent speeding northward, she would have nothing to disturb her peace of mind other than the regret that her dream had never come true. Yet it was hard not to think of her father and not to hope. A late Easter made a short April, and May was well upon them before the students of Overton College awoke to the realization that it was only a matter of days until the senior class would be graduated and gone; that the juniors would be seniors, the sophomores juniors, and even the humblest freshman would taste the sweetness of sophomoreship. To Grace the rapid passing of the last days of her junior year brought a certain indefinable sadness. There were times when she wished herself a freshman, that she were ending her first year of college life rather than the third. Only one more year and it would all be over. Then what lay beyond? Grace never went further than that. She had no idea as to what life would mean to her when her college days were past. She had not yet found her work. Anne would, no doubt, return to her profession. Miriam intended to study music in Leipsig at the same conservatory where Eleanor Savelli's father and mother had met. Elfreda had long since announced her intention of becoming a lawyer. Ruth fully expected to teach, and even dainty Arline had hinted that she might take up settlement work. Grace was thinking rather soberly of all this, late on Saturday afternoon as she walked slowly across the campus toward Wayne Hall. "I really ought to begin to think seriously of my future work," she thought. "Father and Mother would only be too glad to have me stay at home with them, but I feel as though I ought to 'be up and doing with a heart for any fate' instead of just being a home girl. Miss Duncan said the last time I talked with her that I would some day hit upon my work when I least expected it. I hope it will happen soon. Oh, there goes Alberta Wicks!" she cried aloud. "I must see her at once. Alberta!" Alberta Wicks, who was within hailing distance, turned abruptly and walked toward Grace. "Where have you been of late? I haven't seen you. Did you receive my note?" asked Grace, holding out her hand to the other girl. "Yes," returned Alberta, a slow red creeping into her cheeks. "I meant to come to Wayne Hall, but----" She paused, then said with a touch of her old defiance, "I might as well tell you the truth, I am rather afraid of the girls there." "'Afraid of the girls!'" repeated Grace. "Why are you afraid of them, Alberta?" "Because I've been so disagreeable," was the low reply. "They were very sweet with me the night of your tea party, but I felt as though they bore with me for your sake." "On the contrary, they were pleased to entertain you," replied Grace with a sincerity that even Alberta could not doubt. "I hope you will come again soon, and I wish you would bring Miss Hampton with you." "Thank you," returned Alberta, but her hesitating reply was equivalent to refusal. "She wants to come, but she still believes we don't like her," reflected Grace, as Alberta said good-bye and walked away with an almost dejected expression on her face. "Now is the time to put my plan into execution. I had forgotten it until seeing Alberta brought it back to me. I must propose it to the girls to-night." From the evening on which Alberta had kept her promise to Julia Crosby and come to Wayne Hall to make peace, Grace had experienced a strong desire to help her sweeten and brighten the last days of her college life. With this thought in mind she had evolved the idea of giving Alberta and Mary a surprise party at Wellington House and inviting the Semper Fidelis girls as well as certain popular seniors and juniors who would be sure to add to the gayety of the affair. But when after dinner she broached the subject to her three friends, who had seated themselves in an expectant row on her couch to hear her plan, she was wholly unprepared for the amount of opposition with which it was received. "I can't see why we should exert ourselves to make things pleasant for those two girls," grumbled Elfreda. "For almost three years they have taken particular pains to make matters unpleasant for us. The other night I treated Miss Wicks civilly for your sake, Grace, not because I am fond of her." "I am afraid you will have considerable trouble in making the other girls promise to help you," demurred Miriam. "Neither Miss Wicks nor Miss Hampton have ever done anything to endear themselves to the girls here at Overton. Personally, I believe in letting well-enough alone in this case. If you wish to entertain them at Wayne Hall, of course we will stand by you. But I don't believe it would be wise to attempt to give a semi-public demonstration. It would be very humiliating for you if the girls refused to help you." "But if they promise to help they are not likely to break their word," argued Grace, "and I shall make a personal call upon every girl on my list." "Aren't you afraid that a 'list' may cause jealousy and ill-feeling on the part of certain girls who are not included in it?" was Anne's apprehensive question. "And you, too, Anne!" exclaimed Grace in a hurt voice, looking her reproach. "No, I don't see why it should cause any ill-feeling whatever. We are not making it a class affair. There will be perhaps thirty girls invited. Aside from the surety that we'll have a good time, I believe we will be going far toward displaying the true Overton spirit. Of course, if you girls feel that you don't wish to enter into this with me, then I shall have to go on alone, for I am determined to do it. At least you can't gracefully refuse to come to the surprise party," she ended, with a little catch in her voice. "Grace Harlowe, you big goose!" exclaimed Elfreda, springing to Grace's side and winding both arms about her. "Did you believe for one instant that we wouldn't stand by you no matter what you planned to do? I am ashamed of myself. If it hadn't been for me, you would never have had any trouble with either Alberta Wicks or Mary Hampton. Plan whatever you like, and I set my hand and seal upon it that I'll aid you and abet you to the fullest extent of my powers." "And so will I," cried Miriam. "I am sorry I croaked." "And to think I was a wet blanket, too," murmured Anne, patting one of Grace's hands. "You are perfect angels, all of you," declared Grace, her gray eyes shining. "I know I am always dragging you into things, and making you help me for friendship's sake." "But they are always the right sort of things," retorted Elfreda, with an affectionate loyalty. "Let us atone for our defection by making ourselves useful," proposed Anne, picking up paper and pencil from the writing table. "I'll write the names of those eligible to the surprise party if you'll supply them." After considerable discussion, erasing, crossing out and re-establishing the list of names was finally declared to be satisfactory. "Is there any particular friend of either of these girls that we have forgotten to include?" asked Anne, as she carefully scanned the list. "What of Kathleen West?" asked Elfreda. Grace shook her head. "I believe it would be better not to ask her," she said. "She wouldn't come; besides, she might--" Grace stopped. She had been tempted to say that Kathleen would be likely to tell tales and spoil the surprise. "I know what you were going to say. You believe she would tell Alberta our plans and spoil the party," was Elfreda's blunt comment. "Well, so do I believe it. Any one can see that." Grace smiled at Elfreda's emphatic statement. "It is wiser not to ask her," she said again. "There are four of us, and we can count on Arline and Ruth; that leaves twenty-four girls to be invited. Divided, that is six girls to each one of us. You must each choose the six girls you will agree to see and make it your business to invite them to the party. Try to make them promise to come, for we don't want to change the list." "What are we going to have to eat?" asked Elfreda. "That is an extremely important feature of any jollification. I always think of things to eat, even though I don't eat them. Just thinking of them can't make one stout, and it is a world of satisfaction." "We had better have different kinds of sandwiches, olives and pickles, and what else?" asked Grace. "Ice cream and cake. We might have salted nuts and lemonade, too," added Miriam. "It sounds good to me," averred Elfreda, relapsing into slang. "But don't rely on the girls to bring this stuff. Assess them fifty cents apiece with the understanding that another tax will be levied if necessary." "That is sound advice," laughed Miriam, "but it means that the duty of making of the sandwiches must fall upon us." "I guess I can stand it," nodded Elfreda with a sudden generosity. "I'll take the sandwich making upon myself, if you say so. You all know perfectly well that I can neither be equalled nor surpassed when it comes to the 'eats' problem. Candidly, I'm ashamed of myself because I didn't respond when Grace first asked me to help, and this sandwich task is going to be my act of atonement. So, Anne, you and Miriam had better get busy, too, and decide what yours will be, for we've all been found guilty of lacking college spirit, and we've got to make good." "I will pledge myself to collect the money for the refreshments as a further act of atonement," volunteered Anne. "And I will do the shopping for you when the money is collected," promised Miriam. "Thanks to the careful training of J. Elfreda Briggs, I know what to buy and where to buy it." "But you are leaving nothing for me to do," protested Grace. "There will be plenty of things for you to do," declared Elfreda. "You will have to keep an eye on us and see that we perform our tasks with diplomacy and skill." "It requires a great deal of diplomacy to make sandwiches, doesn't it, Elfreda?" was Anne's innocent observation. "You know very well I wasn't referring to the making of the sandwiches," retorted Elfreda, with a good-natured grin. "It is the delivering of the invitations that is going to require a wily, sugar-coated tongue. The majority of the girls are not fond of either Alberta Wicks or Mary Hampton. The very ones you believe will help you may prove to be the most prejudiced." "I am well aware of that fact," flung back Grace laughingly. "I received an unexpected demonstration of it a few moments ago." "So you did," responded Elfreda unabashed. "I hadn't forgotten it, either. Therefore I repeat that you will have your hands full managing the ethical side of this surprise party. You will have to interview the girls we can't persuade to come, for there are sure to be some of them who will raise the same objections that we did, and if they do accept, it will be only to please Grace Harlowe." CHAPTER XXIII WHAT EMMA DEAN FORGOT The surprise party did much toward placing Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton on a friendly footing with the members of their own class and the juniors. Strange to relate, there had been little or no reluctance exhibited by those invited in accepting their invitations, and as a final satisfaction to Grace the night of the party was warm and moonlit. The astonishment of the two seniors can be better imagined than described. Grace had purposely made an engagement to spend the evening with them, and under pretense of having Alberta Wicks try over a new song, had inveigled them to the living room, where the company of girls had trooped in upon them, and a merry evening had ensued. Wholly unused to friendly attentions from their classmates, Alberta and Mary, formerly self-assured even to arrogance, did the honors of the occasion with a touch of diffidence that went far toward establishing them on an entirely new basis at Overton, and they said good-night to their guests with a delightful feeling of comradeship that had never before been theirs. It had been agreed upon by the Semper Fidelis girls that they should extend the right hand of fellowship as often as possible to the two seniors during the short time left them at Overton. It was Grace who had proposed this. "We must do all we can to help them fill the last of their college days with good times. Then they can never forget what a great honor it is to call Overton 'Alma Mater,'" she had argued with an earnestness that could not be gainsaid. Now that this particular shadow had lifted, Grace was still concerned over her utter failure to keep her word to Mabel Ashe regarding the newspaper girl. When Kathleen had discovered that Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton now numbered themselves among Grace's friends, she religiously avoided the two seniors as well as the Semper Fidelis girls. She became sullen and moody, apparently lost all interest in breaking rules and studied with an earnestness that evoked the commendation of the faculty, and caused her to be classed with the "digs" by the more frivolous-minded freshmen. Her reputation for dashing off clever bits of verse also became established, and her themes were frequently read in the freshman English classes and occasionally in sophomore English, too. In spite of her literary achievements, however, she remained as unpopular as ever. To the girls who knew her she was too changeable to be relied upon, and her sarcastic manner discouraged those who ventured to be friendly. "If I haven't been able to keep my word to Mabel it isn't because I have not tried," Grace Harlowe murmured half aloud, as she walked toward her favorite seat under a giant elm at the lower end of the campus, an unopened letter in her hand. Grace tore open the envelope and immediately became absorbed in the contents of the letter. "I wish she could come up here for commencement," she sighed, "and I wish she knew the truth about Kathleen West. I can't write it. It would seem so unfair and contemptible to present my side of the story to Mabel without giving Kathleen a chance to present hers. That is, if she really considers that she has one." "I knew I'd find you here," called a disconsolate voice, and Emma Dean appeared from behind a huge flowering bush. "I've a terrible confession to make, and there's no time like the present for admitting my sins of omission and commission. Please put a decided accent on omission." "Now what have you forgotten to do?" laughed Grace. "It can't be anything very serious." "You won't laugh when I tell you," returned Emma, looking sober. "I shall never be agreeable and promise to deliver a message or anything else for any one again. I am not to be trusted. Here is the cause of all my sorrow." She handed Grace a large, square envelope with the contrite explanation: "Words can't tell you how sorry I am. It has been in the pocket of my heavy coat since the week before I went home for the Easter holidays. I went over to the big bulletin board the day before you went home and saw this letter addressed to you. I wish I had left it there, as I did last time. There was one for me, too, so I put them both in my coat pocket, intending to give you yours the moment I reached Wayne Hall. But before I was half way across the campus I met the Emerson twins, and they literally dragged me into Vinton's for a sundae. By the time I reached the hall, all remembrance of the letters had passed from my mind. "I didn't take my heavy coat home with me, and when I came back to Overton the weather had grown warm, so I did not wear it again. This afternoon it fell on the floor of my closet, and when I picked it up I noticed something white at the top of one of the pockets. There! Now I've confessed and I shall not blame you if you are cross with me. My letter didn't amount to much. It was from a cousin of mine, whose letters always bore me to desperation. Now, say all the mean things to me that you like. I'm resigned," invited Emma, closing her eyes and folding her hands across her breast. "I'm not going to scold you, Emma," declared Grace, laughing a little. "I wonder who this can be from? The postmark is almost obliterated. However, I'll soon see." "Do you want me to go on about my business?" was Emma's pointed question. "Certainly not. Pardon me while I read this. Then I'll walk to the Hall with you. It is almost dinner time." As Grace unfolded the letter the inside sheet fell from it to the ground. As she bent to pick it up her eyes lingered upon the signature with an expression of unbelieving amazement stamped upon her face. Then she glanced down the first page of the letter. "Oh, it can't be true! It's too wonderful!" she gasped. "Oh, Emma, Emma, if I had only received this the day it came!" "I knew it was something important," groaned Emma. "And I was trying to be so helpful." Unmindful of Emma's remorseful utterance, Grace went on excitedly: "Only think, Emma, it is from Ruth's father. He is alive and well and frantic with joy over the news that Ruth did not die in that terrible wreck." Grace sprang from her seat and seized Emma by the arm. "Come on," she urged, "I must tell the girls at once." Grace ran all the way to Wayne Hall, and bursting into her room pounced upon Anne and hustled her unceremoniously into Miriam's room, where Elfreda and Miriam viewed their noisy entrance with tolerant eyes. A moment afterward Emma Dean appeared, out of breath. In a series of excited sentences, Grace told the glorious news. "But I must read you what he says," she said, her eyes very bright. "MY DEAR MISS HARLOWE:-- "What can I say to you who have sent me the most welcome message I ever received? It is as though the dead had come to life. To think that my baby daughter, my little Ruth, still lives, and has fought her way to friends and education. It is almost beyond belief. I cannot fittingly express by letter the feeling of gratitude which overwhelms me when I think of your generous and whole-souled interest in me and my child. I have certain matters here in Nome to which I must attend, then I shall start for the States, and once there proceed east with all speed. It will not be advisable for you to answer this letter, as I shall have started on my journey before your answer could possibly reach me. I shall telegraph Ruth as soon as I arrive in San Francisco. I have not written her as yet, because you said in your letter to me that you did not wish her to know until you had heard from me. I thank you for trying to shield her from needless pain, and I am longing for the day when I can look into Ruth's eyes and call her daughter. Believe me, my appreciation of your kindness to me and to Ruth lies too deep for words. With the hope that I shall be in Overton before many weeks to claim my own, and thank you and your friends personally, "Yours in deep sincerity, "ARTHUR NORTHRUP DENTON." "Well, if that isn't in the line of a sensation, then my name isn't Josephine Elfreda Briggs! And to think Ruth's father has actually materialized and is coming to Overton? When did you receive the letter, Grace?" "It came just before the Easter vacation," interposed Emma Dean bravely, without giving Grace a chance to answer. "I might as well tell you. I took it from the big bulletin board, put it in my coat pocket to bring to Grace and forgot it. Don't all speak at once." Emma bowed her head, her hands over her ears. Then an immediate buzz of conversation arose, and Emma came in for a deserved amount of good-natured teasing. "What is the date of the letter!" asked Elfreda. "The twenty-sixth of February," replied Grace. "It must have been on the way for weeks." "And in Emma's pocket longer," was Miriam's sly comment. "But he should have arrived long before this," persisted Elfreda. "I wonder if he received Ruth's letter." "Perhaps he didn't start as soon as he intended," said Anne. "That may be so. Nevertheless, he has had plenty of time to attend to his affairs and come here, too," declared Elfreda. "I wouldn't be surprised to see him almost any day." "Wouldn't it be splendid if he were to come here in time to see Ruth usher at commencement?" smiled Grace. "He'd better hurry, then," broke in Emma Dean, "for commencement is only two weeks off. Shall you tell Ruth? Who is going with you to tell her, and when are you going?" "After dinner, all of us," announced Elfreda. "Aren't we, Grace?" Grace nodded. "Then I shall join the band," announced Emma. "Although I proved a delinquent and untrustworthy messenger, still you must admit that at last I delivered my message." CHAPTER XXIV CONCLUSION The last of June, in addition to its reputed wealth of roses, brought with it exceedingly hot weather, but to the members of the senior and junior classes, whose eyes were fixed upon commencement, the warm weather was a matter of minor importance. It was the first Overton commencement in which the three Oakdale girls had taken part, and greatly to their satisfaction they had been detailed to usher at the commencement exercises. Arline, Ruth, Gertrude Wells, the Emersons and Emma Dean had also acted as ushers, and on the evening of commencement day the Emerson twins had given a porch party to the other "slaves of the realm," as they had laughingly styled themselves. It had been a momentous week, and the morning after commencement day Grace awoke with the disturbing thought that her trunk remained still unpacked, that she had two errands to do, and that she had promised to meet Arline Thayer at Vinton's at half-past nine o'clock that morning. "I am glad it isn't eight o'clock yet," she commented to Anne, as she stood before the mirror looking very trim and dainty in her tailored suit of dark blue. "I'm going to put on my hat now, then I won't have to come upstairs again. I'll do my errands first, then it will be time to meet Arline, and I'll be here in time for luncheon. After that I must pack my trunk, and if I hurry I shall still have some time to spare. Our train doesn't leave until four o'clock. Will you telephone for the expressman, Anne?" Anne, who was busily engaged in trying to make room in the tray of her trunk for a burned wood handkerchief box which she had overlooked, looked up long enough to acquiesce. "There!" she exclaimed as the box finally slipped into place, "that is something accomplished. Hereafter, I shall leave this box at home. Every time I pack my trunk I am sure to find it staring me in the face from some corner of the room when I haven't a square inch of space left. I'll keep my handkerchiefs in the top drawer of the chiffonier next year." "I wish I had no packing to do," sighed Grace. "You never seem to mind it." "That is because I am a trouper, and troupers live in their trunks," smiled Anne. "Packing and unpacking never dismay me." "Isn't it fortunate, Anne, that our commencement happened a week before that of the boys? We can be at home for a day or two before we go to M---- to attend their commencement." "I can't realize that our boys are men, and about to go out into the world, each one to his own work," said Anne. "They will always seem just boys to us, won't they?" "Yes, the spirit of youth will remain with them as long as they live," prophesied Grace wisely, "because they will always be interested in things. And if one lives every day for all it is worth and goes on to the next day prepared to make the best of whatever it may bring forth, one can never grow old in spirit. Look at Mrs. Gray. She never will be 'years old,' she will always be 'years young.' I am so anxious to see Father and Mother and Mrs. Gray and the girls, but I hate saying good-bye to Overton. Every year it seems to grow dearer." "That is because it has been our second home," was Anne's soft rejoinder. A knock at the door, followed by a peremptory summons in Elfreda's voice, "Come on down to breakfast," ended the little talk. By half-past eight o'clock Grace was on her way toward Main Street, bent on disposing of her errands with all possible speed. The vision of her yawning trunk, flanked by piles of clothing waiting patiently to be put in it, loomed large before her. Later on, keeping her appointment with Arline, she heroically tore herself from that fascinating young woman's society and hurried toward Wayne Hall, filled with laudable intentions. Anne had finished her packing and departed to pay a farewell visit to Ruth Denton. "Oh, dear," sighed Grace, "I hate to begin. I suppose I had better put these heavy things in first." She reached for her heavy blue coat and sweater, slowly depositing them in the bottom of the trunk. Her raincoat followed the sweater, and she was in the act of folding her blue serge dress, when a knock sounded on the door, and the maid proclaimed in a monotonous voice, "Telegram, Miss Harlowe." The blue serge dress was thrown into the trunk, and Grace dashed from the room and down the stairs at the maid's heels. Her father and mother were Grace's first thought. What if something dreadful had happened to either of them! The bare idea of a telegram thrilled Grace with apprehension. Her fingers trembled as she signed the messenger's book and tore open the envelope. One glance at the telegram and with an inarticulate cry Grace darted up the stairs and down the hall to her room. Stopping only long enough to seize her hat, she made for the stairs, the telegram clutched tightly in her hand. "Oh, if Anne or Miriam were only here," she breathed, as she paused for an instant at Mrs. Elwood's gate to look up and down the street, then set off in the direction of the campus. At the edge of the campus she paused again, glancing anxiously about her in the vain hope of spying Ruth or Miriam, then she started across the campus toward Morton House. As she neared her destination, the front door of the hall opened and a familiar figure appeared. It was followed by another figure, and with a little exclamation of satisfaction Grace redoubled her pace. "Ruth! Arline!" she cried, her face alight: "Can't you guess? It has come at last. Here it is. Read it, Ruth." Ruth had turned very pale, and was staring at Grace in mute, questioning fashion. "You don't mean----" her voice died away in a startled gasp. "I do, I do," caroled Grace, tears of sheer happiness rising in her gray eyes. "Read it, Ruth. Oh, I am so glad for your sake. Three more hours and you will see him. It seems like a fairytale." Ruth stood still, reading the telegram over and over: "Arrive Overton 2:40. Will you and Ruth meet me? Arthur N. Denton." "And to think," said Arline, in awe-stricken tones, "that Ruth is actually going to see her father!" "My very own father." The tenderness in Ruth's voice brought the tears to Arline's blue eyes. Grace was making no effort to conceal the fact that her own were running over. "You mustn't cry, girls," faltered Ruth. "It's the happiest day of--my--life." Then she buried her face in her hands and ran into the house. Grace and Arline followed, to find her huddled on the lowest step of the stairs, her slender shoulders shaking. "I--I can't help it," she sobbed. "You would cry, too, if after being driven from pillar to post ever since you were little, you'd suddenly find that there was some one in the world who loved you and wanted to take care of you." "Of course you can't help crying," soothed Grace, stroking the bowed head. "Arline and I cried, too. This is one of the great moments of your life." "Dear little chum," said Arline softly, sitting down beside Ruth and putting her arms around the weeping girl, "your wish has been granted." An eloquent silence fell upon the trio for a moment, which was broken by the sound of voices in the upstairs hall. Ruth and Arline rose simultaneously from the stairs. "Come up to my room," urged Arline, "and we will finish our cry in private." "I have no more tears to shed," smiled Grace, "and I dare not go to your room." "Dare not?" inquired Arline. "I haven't finished my packing, and our train leaves at four-thirty. Oh!" Grace sprang to her feet in sudden alarm. "I asked Anne to telephone for the expressman. Perhaps he has called for my trunk, and gone by this time. If he has, I shall have to reopen negotiations with the express company at once in order that it shall reach the station in time. Will you meet me at the station at a quarter-past two o'clock, or can you stop for me at the Hall?" "I'll be at the Hall at two o'clock," promised Ruth. Filled with commendable determination to finish her packing as speedily as possible, Grace hurried home and up the stairs, unpinning her hat as she ran. Dashing into her room, she dropped her hat on her couch, then stared about her in amazement. The piles of clothing she had left had disappeared, and, yes, her trunk had also vanished. "Where--" she began, when the door opened and three figures precipitated themselves upon her. "Don't say we never did anything for you," cried Elfreda. "We didn't overlook a single thing," assured Anne. "It isn't every one who can secure the services of professional trunk packers." "'Will you, won't you, will you, won't you, Come and join the dance?'" caroled Elfreda off the key, as she did a true mock turtle shuffle around Grace. Joining hands, the three girls hemmed Grace in and pranced about her. "What is going on in here?" demanded Emma Dean, appearing in the doorway. "Is the mere idea of being seniors going to your heads?" "I ought to be the one to dance, Emma," laughed Grace. "I went out of here with my room in chaos and my trunk unpacked, and came back to find it not only packed but gone. Thank you, girls," she nodded affectionately to her chums. "No one exhibited any such tender thoughtfulness for me," commented Emma. "I had to wrestle with my packing unaided and alone. And how things do pile up! I could hardly find a place for all my stuff." "Oh, I almost forgot my great news," cried Grace. Then she produced the telegram, and a buzz of excited conversation began which lasted until the luncheon bell rang. Ruth was punctual to the moment, and after receiving the affectionate congratulations of the girls, she and Grace started for the station on the, to Ruth, most eventful errand of her young life. "How shall I know him, Grace, and how will he know me?" she said tremulously. "I don't know," returned Grace rather blankly. "That part of it hadn't occurred to me. Still, Overton is only a small city, and there won't be many incoming passengers. It's a case of outgoing passengers this week. I have an idea that we shall know him," she concluded. When, at exactly 2:40, the train pulled into the station, two pairs of eyes were fixed anxiously on the few travelers that left the train. Suddenly Grace's hand caught Ruth's arm, "There he is! Oh, Ruth, isn't he splendid? Come on. Don't be afraid. I feel certain he is Arthur Northrup Denton." Seizing Ruth's hand, she led her, unresisting, to meet a tail, broad-shouldered, smooth-faced man, whose piercing gray eyes constantly scanned the various persons scattered along the platform. His brown hair was touched with gray at the temples, and his keen, resolute face bespoke unfaltering purpose and power. With Grace to think was to act. She took an impulsive step toward the tall stranger, confronting him with, "I am Grace Harlowe. I am sure you are Mr. Denton." "Yes, I am Arthur Denton, and----" "This is your daughter, Ruth," declared Grace hurriedly, pushing Ruth gently forward. An instant later the few persons lingering on the station platform saw the tall stranger fold the slender figure of Ruth in a long embrace. "I was sure you were Ruth's father," declared Grace as, a little later, they were speeding through the streets of Overton in the taxicab Mr. Denton had engaged at the station. "The moment I saw you I felt that you could be no one else." Ruth sat with her hand in her father's, an expression of ineffable tenderness on her small face. She was content to listen to him and Grace without joining in the conversation. Her greatest wish had been fulfilled and she was experiencing a joy too deep for words. Mr. Denton explained to them that his long silence had been due to a series of misadventures that had befallen him on his way from Alaska to San Francisco. He had received only one letter from Grace and none from Ruth, as he had left Nome directly after receiving Grace's letter. The others had evidently reached Nome after his departure and had not been forwarded to him. The boat on which he had taken passage had been wrecked and he had barely escaped drowning. He had been rescued by an Indian fisherman from the icy waters of Bering Sea, and taken to his hut, where for days he had lain ill from exposure to the elements. At the earliest possible moment he had embarked for San Francisco, then journeyed east. He had purposely refrained from telegraphing until within a day's journey from Overton, fearing that something might occur to delay his meeting with his daughter. Ruth, who had already planned to remain in Overton during the summer and work at dressmaking, smiled in rapture as she heard her father plan a long sight-seeing trip through the west which would last until time for her return to college in the fall. They drove with Grace to Wayne Hall, promising to return to the station in time to meet her friends and say good-bye to her, Mr. Denton assuring her that he hoped some day to repay the debt of gratitude which he owed her. Three familiar figures ran downstairs to meet Grace as she stepped into the hall. "We've been waiting patiently for you," announced Elfreda. "Did he materialize?" from Anne. "What do you think of him?" was Miriam's quick question. "Come into the living-room and I'll tell you," said Grace. "We won't have much time to talk, though. It is after three o'clock now." "No; come upstairs to our room," invited Elfreda. "We have a special reason for asking you." Grace obediently accompanied the three girls upstairs. The first thing that attracted her eye was a tray containing a tall pitcher of fruit lemonade and four glasses. Elfreda stepped to the table and began pouring the lemonade. When she had filled the glasses she handed them, in turn, to each girl. "To our senior year," she said solemnly, raising her glass. "May it be the best of all. Drink her down." "What a nice idea," smiled Grace as she set down her glass. "It was Elfreda's proposal," said Miriam. "She made the lemonade, too." "Then let us drink to her." Grace reached for her glass and Miriam for the pitcher. "I'll do the honors this time," declared Miriam. "Here's to the Honorable Josephine Elfreda Briggs, expert brewer of lemonade, model roommate and loyal friend." "Oh, now," protested Elfreda, "what made you spoil everything? I was just beginning to enjoy myself." "The pleasure is all ours," retorted Anne. "Besides, you are getting nothing but your just deserts. We are only glad to have a chance to demonstrate our deep appreciation of your many lovely qualities, Miss Briggs," she ended mischievously. "Yes, Miss Briggs," laughed Grace, "you are indispensable to this happy band, Miss Briggs. You must be blind if you can't see that." "Very blind indeed, Miss Briggs," agreed Miriam Nesbit. "But because you are so blind, Miss Briggs, I shall endeavor, in a few well chosen words, Miss Briggs, to make you see what is so plain to the rest of us." Whereupon Miriam launched forth into a funny little eulogy of Elfreda and her good works which caused the stout girl to exclaim in embarrassment, "Oh, see here, Miriam, I'm not half so wonderful as I might be. If you said all those nice things about yourself or Grace or Anne it would be more to the point." "But it might not be true," interposed Grace. "And we quite agree with Miriam," added Anne. Elfreda surveyed them in silence, an unusually tender expression in her shrewd blue eyes. "I can see that I have a whole lot to be thankful for," she said after a moment. "Next year I am going to try harder than ever to live up to your flattering opinion of me. Then I know that I can't fail to be a good senior." Just how completely Elfreda carried out her resolution and what happened to Grace Harlowe and her friends during their senior year in college will be found in "Grace Harlowe's Fourth Year at Overton College." THE END. * * * * * HENRY ALTEMUS COMPANY'S Best and Least Expensive Books for Boys and Girls The Motor Boat Club Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK The keynote of these books is manliness. The stories are wonderfully entertaining, and they are at the same time sound and wholesome. No boy will willingly lay down an unfinished book in this series. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB OF THE KENNEBEC; Or, The Secret of Smugglers' Island. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB AT NANTUCKET; Or, The Mystery of the Dunstan Heir. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB OFF LONG ISLAND; Or, A Daring Marine Game at Racing Speed. 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The Young Engineers Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK The heroes of these stories are known to readers of the High School Boys Series. In this new series Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton prove worthy of all the traditions of Dick & Co. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN COLORADO; Or, At Railroad Building in Earnest. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN ARIZONA; Or, Laying Tracks on the "Man-Killer" Quicksand. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN NEVADA; Or, Seeking Fortune on the Turn of a Pick. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN MEXICO; Or, Fighting the Mine Swindlers. Boys of the Army Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK These books breathe the life and spirit of the United States Army of to-day, and the life, just as it is, is described by a master pen. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS IN THE RANKS; Or, Two Recruits in the United States Army. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS ON FIELD DUTY; Or, Winning Corporal's Chevrons. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS AS SERGEANTS; Or, Handling Their First Real Commands. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS IN THE PHILIPPINES; Or, Following the Flag Against the Moros. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS AS LIEUTENANTS; Or, Serving Old Glory as Line Officers. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS WITH PERSHING; Or, Dick Prescott at Grips with the Boche. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS SMASH THE GERMANS; Or, Winding Up the Great War. Dave Darrin Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK DAVE DARRIN AT VERA CRUZ; Or, Fighting With the U. S. Navy in Mexico. DAVE DARRIN ON MEDITERRANEAN SERVICE. DAVE DARRIN'S SOUTH AMERICAN CRUISE. DAVE DARRIN ON THE ASIATIC STATION. DAVE DARRIN AND THE GERMAN SUBMARINES. DAVE DARRIN AFTER THE MINE LAYERS; Or, Hitting the Enemy a Hard Naval Blow. The Meadow-Brook Girls Series By JANET ALDRIDGE THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS UNDER CANVAS. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS ACROSS COUNTRY. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS AFLOAT. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS IN THE HILLS. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS BY THE SEA. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS ON THE TENNIS COURTS. High School Boys Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK In this series of bright, crisp books a new note has been struck. Boys of every age under sixty will be interested in these fascinating volumes. THE HIGH SCHOOL FRESHMEN; Or, Dick & Co.'s First Year Pranks and Sports. THE HIGH SCHOOL PITCHER; Or, Dick & Co. on the Gridley Diamond. THE HIGH SCHOOL LEFT END; Or, Dick & Co. Grilling on the Football Gridiron. THE HIGH SCHOOL CAPTAIN OF THE TEAM; Or, Dick & Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard. Grammar School Boys Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK This series of stories, based on the actual doings of grammar School boys, comes near to the heart of the average American boy. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS OF GRIDLEY; Or, Dick & Co. Start Things Moving. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS SNOWBOUND; Or, Dick & Co. at Winter Sports. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS IN THE WOODS; Or, Dick & Co. Trail Fun and Knowledge. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS IN SUMMER ATHLETICS; Or, Dick & Co. Make Their Fame Secure. High School Boys' Vacation Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK "Give us more Dick Prescott books!" This has been the burden of the cry from young readers of the country over. Almost numberless letters have been received by the publishers, making this eager demand; for Dick Prescott, Dave Darrin, Tom Reade, and the other members of Dick & Co. are the most popular high school boys in the land. Boys will alternately thrill and chuckle when reading these splendid narratives. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' CANOE CLUB; Or, Dick & Co.'s Rivals on Lake Pleasant. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS IN SUMMER CAMP; Or, The Dick Prescott Six Training for the Gridley Eleven. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' FISHING TRIP; Or, Dick & Co. in the Wilderness. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' TRAINING HIKE; Or, Dick & Co. Making Themselves "Hard as Nails." The Circus Boys Series By EDGAR B. P. DARLINGTON Mr. Darlington's books breathe forth every phase of an intensely interesting and exciting life THE CIRCUS BOYS ON THE FLYING RINGS; Or, Making the Start in the Sawdust Life. THE CIRCUS BOYS ACROSS THE CONTINENT; Or, Winning New Laurels on the Tanbark. THE CIRCUS BOYS IN DIXIE LAND; Or, Winning the Plaudits of the Sunny South. THE CIRCUS BOYS ON THE MISSISSIPPI; Or, Afloat with the Big Show on the Big River. The High School Girls Series By JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A.M. These breezy stories of the American High School Girl take the reader fairly by storm. GRACE HARLOWE'S PLEBE YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, The Merry Doings of the Oakdale Freshman Girls. GRACE HARLOWE'S SOPHOMORE YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, The Record of the Girl Chums in Work and Athletics. GRACE HARLOWE'S JUNIOR YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, Fast Friends In the Sororities. GRACE HARLOWE'S SENIOR YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, The Parting of the Ways. The Automobile Girls Series By LAURA DENT CRANE No girl's library--no family book-case can be considered at all complete unless it contains these sparkling twentieth-century books. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT NEWPORT; Or, Watching the Summer Parade. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS IN THE BERKSHIRES; Or, The Ghost of Lost Man's Trail. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS ALONG THE HUDSON; Or, Fighting Fire in Sleepy Hollow. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT CHICAGO; Or, Winning Out Against Heavy Odds. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT PALM BEACH; Or, Proving Their Mettle Under Southern Skies. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT WASHINGTON; Or, Checkmating the Plots of Foreign Spies. 
17988	----	Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 17988-h.htm or 17988-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/1/7/9/8/17988/17988-h/17988-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/1/7/9/8/17988/17988-h.zip) GRACE HARLOWE'S FIRST YEAR AT OVERTON COLLEGE by JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A. M. Author of The Grace Harlowe High School Girls Series, Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College, Grace Harlowe's Third Year at Overton College, Grace Harlowe's Fourth Year at Overton College. [Illustration: J. Elfreda Had Evidently Found Friends. _Frontispiece_.] Philadelphia Henry Altemus Company Copyright, 1914, by Howard E. Altemus CONTENTS Chapter Page I. Off To College 7 II. J. Elfreda Introduces Herself 15 III. First Impressions 29 IV. Miriam's Unwelcome Surprise 44 V. An Interrupted Study Hour 55 VI. A Disturbing Note 62 VII. Grace Takes Matters Into Her Own Hands 72 VIII. The Sophomore Reception 84 IX. Disagreeable News 95 X. The Making of The Team 102 XI. Anne Wins a Victory 109 XII. Ups and Downs 118 XIII. Grace Turns Electioneer 125 XIV. An Invitation and a Misunderstanding 132 XV. Greeting Old Friends 142 XVI. Thanksgiving with the Southards 150 XVII. Christmas Plans 161 XVIII. Basketball Rumors 171 XIX. A Game Worth Seeing 181 XX. Grace Overhears Something Interesting 190 XXI. An Unheeded Warning 206 XXII. Turning the Tables 214 XXIII. Virginia Changes Her Mind 227 XXIV. Good-bye to their Freshman Year 239 Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College CHAPTER I OFF TO COLLEGE "Do you remember what you said one October day last year, Grace, when we stood on this platform and said good-bye to the boys?" asked Anne Pierson. "No, what did I say?" asked Grace Harlowe, turning to her friend Anne. "You said," returned Anne, "that when it came your turn to go to college you were going to slip away quietly without saying good-bye to any one but your mother, and here you are with almost half Oakdale at the train to see you off to college." "Now, Anne, you know perfectly well that people are down here to see you and Miriam, too," laughed Grace. "I'm not half as much of a celebrity as you are." Grace Harlowe, Miriam Nesbit and Anne Pierson stood on the station platform completely surrounded by their many friends, who, regardless of the fact that it was half-past seven o'clock in the morning, had made it a point to be at the station to wish them godspeed. "This is the second public gathering this week," remarked Miriam Nesbit, who, despite the chatter that was going on around her, had heard Grace's laughing remark. "I know it," agreed Grace. "There was just as large a crowd here when Nora and Jessica went away last Monday. Doesn't it seem dreadful that we are obliged to be separated? How I hated to see the girls go. And we won't be together again until Christmas." "Oh, here come the boys!" announced Eva Allen, who, with Marian Barber, had been standing a little to one side of the three girls. At this juncture four smiling young men hurried through the crowd of young people and straight to the circle surrounding the three girls, where they were received with cries of: "We were afraid you'd be too late!" and, "Why didn't you get here earlier?" "We're awfully sorry!" exclaimed David Nesbit. "We had to wait for Hippy. He overslept as usual. We threw as much as a shovelful of gravel against his window, but he never stirred. Finally we had to waken his family and it took all of them to waken him." "Don't you believe what David Nesbit says," retorted Hippy. "Do you suppose I slept a wink last night knowing that the friends of my youth were about to leave me?" Hippy sniffed dolefully and buried his face in his handkerchief. "Now, now, Hippy," protested Miriam. "If you insist on shedding crocodile tears, although I don't believe you could be sad long enough to shed even that kind, we shall feel that you are glad to get rid of us." "Never!" ejaculated Hippy fervently. "Oh, if I only had Irish Nora here to stand up for me! She wouldn't allow any one, except herself, to speak harsh and cruel words to me." "We shan't be able to speak many more words of any kind to you," said Miriam, consulting her watch. "The train is due in ten minutes." When Grace Harlowe and her three dear friends, Nora O'Malley, Jessica Bright and Anne Pierson, began to make history for themselves in their freshman year at Oakdale High School, none of them could possibly imagine just how dear they were to become to the hearts of the hundreds of girls who made their acquaintance in "Grace Harlowe's Plebe Year at High School." The story of their freshman year was one of manifold trials and triumphs. It was at the beginning of that year that Grace Harlowe had championed the cause of Anne Pierson, a newcomer in Oakdale. Then and there a friendship sprang up between the two girls that was destined to be life long. The repeated efforts of several malicious girls to discredit Anne in the eyes of her teachers, and her final triumph in winning the freshman prize offered to the class by Mrs. Gray, a wealthy resident of Oakdale, made the narrative one of interest and aroused a desire on the part of the reader to know more of Grace Harlowe and her friends. In "Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School" the girl chums appeared as basketball enthusiasts. In this volume was related the efforts of Julia Crosby, a disagreeable junior, and Miriam Nesbit, a disgruntled sophomore, to disgrace Anne and wrest the basketball captaincy from Grace. Through the magnanimity of Grace Harlowe, Miriam and Julia were brought to a realization of their own faults, and in time became the faithful friends of both Anne and Grace. During "Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School" the famous sorority, the Phi Sigma Tau, was organized by the four chums for the purpose of looking after high school girls who stood in need of assistance. In that volume Eleanor Savelli, the self-willed daughter of an Italian violin virtuoso, made her appearance. The difficulties Grace and her chums encountered in trying to befriend Eleanor and her final contemptuous repudiation of their friendship made absorbing reading for those interested in following the fortunes of the Oakdale High School girls. Their senior year was perhaps the most eventful of all. At the very beginning of the fall term the high school gymnasium was destroyed by fire. Failing to secure an appropriation from either the town or state, the four classes of the girls' high school pledged themselves to raise the amount of money required to rebuild the gymnasium. In "Grace Harlowe's Senior Year at High School" the story of the senior class bazaar, the daring theft of their hard-earned money before the bazaar had closed, and Grace Harlowe's final recovery of the stolen money under the strangest of circumstances, furnished material for a narrative of particular interest. After graduation the four chums, accompanied by their nearest and dearest friends, had spent a long and delightful summer in Europe. On returning to Oakdale the real parting of the ways had come, for Nora and Jessica had already departed for an eastern city to enter a well known conservatory of music. Marian Barber and Eva Allen were to enter Smith College the following week, Eleanor Savelli had long since sailed for Italy, and now the morning train was to bear Miriam Nesbit, Grace Harlowe and Anne Pierson to Overton, an eastern college finally decided upon by the three girls. "Last year we left you on the station platform gazing mournfully after the train that bore _me_ away from Oakdale," remarked Hippy reminiscently. "How embarrassed I felt at so much attention, and yet how sweet it was to know that you had gathered here, not to see David Nesbit, Reddy Brooks, Tom Gray or any such insignificant persons off to school, but that I, Theophilus Hippopotamus Wingate, was the object of your tender solicitations." "I expected it," groaned David. "I don't see why we ever woke him up and dragged him along." "As I was about to say when rudely interrupted," continued Hippy calmly, "I shall miss you, of course, but not half so much as you will miss me. I hope you will think of me, and you may write to me occasionally if it will be a satisfaction to you. I know you will not forget me. Who, having once met me, could forget?" Hippy folded his arms across his chest and looked languishingly at the three girls. A chorus of giggles from those grouped around the girls and derisive groans from the boys greeted Hippy's sentimental speech. Suddenly a long, shrill whistle was heard. "That's your train, girls," said Mr. Harlowe, who with Mrs. Harlowe, Mrs. Nesbit and Mary Pierson had drawn a little to one side while their dear ones said their last farewells to their four boy friends. The circle about the three girls closed in. The air resounded with good-byes. The last kisses and handshakes were exchanged. Reckless promises to send letters and postcards were made. Then, still surrounded, Grace, Miriam and Anne made their way to the car steps and into the train. Grace clung first to her mother then to her father. "How can I do without you?" she said over and over again. Tears stood in her gray eyes. She winked them back bravely. "I'm going to show both of you just how much I appreciate going to college by doing my very best," she whispered. Her father patted her reassuringly on the shoulder while her mother gave her a last loving kiss. "I know you will, dear child," she said affectionately. "Remember, Grace," added her father, a suspicious mist in his own eyes, "you are not to rush headlong into things. You are to do a great deal of looking before you even make up your mind to leap." "I'll remember, Father. Truly I will," responded Grace, her face sobering. "All aboard! All aboard!" shouted the conductor. Those who had entered the train to say farewell left it hurriedly. "Good-bye! Good-bye!" cried Grace, leaning out the car window. From the platform as the train moved off, clear on the air, rose the Oakdale High School yell. "It's in honor of us," said Grace softly. "Dear old Oakdale. I wonder if we can ever like college as well as we have high school." CHAPTER II J. ELFREDA INTRODUCES HERSELF. For the first half hour the three girls were silent. Each sat wrapped in her own thoughts, and those thoughts centered upon the dear ones left behind. Anne, whose venture into the theatrical world had necessitated her frequent absence from home, felt the wrench less than did Grace or Miriam. Aside from their summer vacations they had never been away from their mothers for any length of time. To Grace, as she watched the landscape flit by, the thought of the ever widening distance between her and her mother was intolerable. She experienced a strong desire to bury her face in her hands and sob disconsolately, but bravely conquering the sense of loneliness that swept over her, she threw back her shoulders and sitting very straight in her seat glanced almost defiantly about her. "Well, Grace, have you made up your mind to be resigned?" asked Miriam Nesbit. "That sudden world-defying glance that you just favored us with looks as though the victory was won." "Miriam, you are almost a mind reader," laughed Grace. "I've been on the verge of a breakdown ever since we left Oakdale, and in this very instant I made up my mind to be brave and not cry a single tear. Look at Anne. She is as calm and unemotional as a statue." "That's because I'm more used to being away from home," replied Anne. "Troupers are not supposed to have feelings. With them, it is here to-day and gone to-morrow." "Yes, but you were transplanted to Oakdale soil for four years," reminded Grace. "I know it," returned Anne reflectively. "I do feel dreadfully sad at leaving my mother and sister, too. Still, when I think that I'm actually on the way to college at last, I can't help feeling happy, too." "Dear little Anne," smiled Grace. "College means everything to you, doesn't it? That's because you've earned every cent of your college money." "And I'll have to earn a great deal more to see me through to graduation," added Anne soberly. "My vacations hereafter must be spent in work instead of play." "What are you going to do to earn money during vacations, Anne?" asked Miriam rather curiously. "I might as well confess to you girls that I'm going to do the work I can do most successfully," said Anne in a low voice. "I'm going to try to get an engagement in a stock theatrical company every summer until I graduate. I can earn far more money at that than doing clerical work. I received a long letter from Mr. Southard last week and also one from his sister. They wish me to come to New York as soon as my freshman year at college is over. Mr. Southard writes that he can get an engagement for me in a stock company. I'll have to work frightfully hard, for there will be a matinee every day as well as a regular performance every night, and I'll have a new part to study each week. But the salary will more than compensate me for my work. You know that Mary did dress-making and worked night and day to send me to high school. Of course, my five dollars a week from Mrs. Gray helped a great deal, but up to the time Mr. Southard sent for me to go to New York City to play Rosalind I didn't really think of college as at all certain. Before I left New York for Oakdale, Mr. and Miss Southard and I had a long talk. They made me see that it was right to use the talent God had given me by appearing in worthy plays. Mr. Southard pointed out the fact that I could earn enough money by playing in stock companies in the summer to put me through college and at the same time contribute liberally to my mother's support. "The home problem was really the greatest to be solved. I felt that it wouldn't be right for me to even work my way through college and leave Mary to struggle on alone, after she had worked so hard to help me get a high school education. So the stage seemed to be my one way out after all. And when once I had definitely decided to do as Mr. Southard recommended me to do I was happier than I had been for ages." "Anne Pierson, you quiet little mouse!" exclaimed Grace. "Why didn't you tell us all this before? You are the most provoking Anne under the sun. Here I've been worrying about you having to wait on table or do tutoring and odds and ends of work to put yourself through college, while all the time you were planning something different. We all know you're too proud to let any of your friends help you, but since you are determined to make your own way I'm glad that you have chosen the stage, after all." "I think you are wise, Anne," agreed Miriam. "With two such people as Mr. Southard and his sister to look after you, there can be no objection to your following your profession." "I am glad to know that you girls look at the matter in that light," replied Anne. "Suppose we had offered any objections?" asked Grace. "I'll answer that question," said Miriam. "Anne would have followed the path she had marked out for herself regardless of our objections. Am I right, Anne?" "I don't know," said Anne, flushing deeply. "You have all been so good to me. I couldn't bear to displease my dearest friends, but it would be hard to give up something I knew could result in nothing save good for me." Anne paused and looked at Grace and Miriam with pleading eyes. "Never mind, dear," comforted Grace. "We approve of you and all your works. We are not shocked because you are a genius. We are sworn advocates of the stage and only too glad to know that it has opened the way to college for you." "Shall you let the fact that you have appeared professionally be known at Overton?" asked Miriam. "I shall make no secret of it," returned Anne quietly, "but I won't volunteer any information concerning it." "I wonder what our freshman year at Overton will bring us," mused Grace. "I have read so many stories about college life, and yet so far Overton seems like an unknown land that we are about to explore. From all I have heard and read, exploring freshmen find their first term at college anything but a bed of roses. They are sometimes hazed unmercifully by the upper classes, and their only salvation lies in silently standing the test. Julia Crosby says that she had all sorts of tricks played on her during her first term at Smith. Now she's a sophomore and can make life miserable for the freshmen. I am going to try to cultivate the true college spirit," concluded Grace earnestly. "College is going to mean even more to me than high school. I don't imagine it's all going to be plain sailing. I suppose, more than once, I'll wish myself back in Oakdale, but I'm going to make up my mind to take the bitter with the sweet and set everything down under the head of experience." "To tell you the truth," Miriam said slowly, "I am not enthusiastic over college. I value it as a means of continuing my education, and I'll try to live up to college ideals, but I'm not going to let anyone walk over me or ridicule me. I'm willing 'to live and let live,' but, as Eleanor Savelli used to say when in a towering rage, 'no one can trample upon me with impunity.'" "I wonder when we shall see Eleanor again," said Anne, smiling a little at the recollection called up by Miriam's quotation. "That reminds me," exclaimed Grace. "I have a letter from Eleanor that I haven't opened. It came this morning just before I left the house." Fumbling in her bag, Grace drew forth a bulky looking letter, bearing a foreign postmark, and tearing open the end, drew out several closely folded sheets of thin paper covered with Eleanor's characteristic handwriting. "Shall I read it aloud?" asked Grace. "By all means," said Miriam with emphasis. Grace began to read. Anne, who sat beside her, looked over her shoulder, while Miriam, who sat opposite Grace, leaned forward in order to catch every word. They were so completely occupied with their own affairs, none of them noticed that the train had stopped. Suddenly a voice shrilled out impatiently, "Is this seat engaged?" With one accord the three girls glanced up. Before them stood a tall, rather stout young woman with a full, red face, whose frowning expression was anything but reassuring. "Yes--no, I mean," replied Grace hastily. "I thought not," remarked the stranger complacently as she stolidly seated herself beside Miriam and deposited a traveling bag partly on the floor and partly on Grace's feet. "These seats are ridiculously small," grumbled the stranger, bending over to jam her traveling bag more firmly into the space from which Grace had hastily withdrawn her feet. Then straightening up suddenly, her heavily plumed hat collided with the hand in which Grace held Eleanor's letter, scattering the sheets in every direction. With a little cry of concern Grace sprang to her feet and, stepping out in the aisle, began to pick them up. Having recovered the last one she turned to her seat only to find it occupied by their unwelcome fellow traveler. "I changed seats," commented the stout girl stolidly. "I never could stand it to ride backwards." Grace looked first at the stranger then from Miriam to Anne. Miriam looked ready for battle, while even mild little Anne glared resentfully at the rude newcomer. Grace hesitated, opened her mouth as though about to speak, then without saying a word sat down in the vacant place and began to rearrange the sheets of her letter. "I'll finish this some other time, girls," she said briefly. "Oh, you needn't mind me," calmly remarked the stranger. "I don't mind listening to letters. That is if they've got anything in them besides 'I write these few lines to tell you that I am well and hope you are the same.' That sort of stuff makes me sick. Goodness knows, I suppose that's the kind I'll have handed to me all year. Neither Ma nor Pa can write a letter that sounds like anything." By this time Miriam's frown had begun to disappear, while Anne's eyes were dancing. Grace looked at the stout girl rather curiously, an expression of new interest dawning in her eyes. "Are you going to college?" she asked. "Well, I rather guess I am," was the quick reply. "I'll bet you girls are in the same boat with me, too. What college do you get off at?" "Overton," answered Grace. "Then you haven't seen the last of me," assured the stranger, "for I'm going there myself and I'd just about as soon go to darkest Africa or any other heathen place." "Why don't you wish to go to Overton?" asked Anne. "Because I don't want to go to college at all," was the blunt answer. "I want to go to Europe with Ma and Pa and have a good time. We have loads of money, but what good does that do me if I can't get a chance to spend it? I'd fail in all my exams if I dared, but Pa knows I'm not a wooden head, and I'd just have to try it again somewhere else. So I'll have to let well enough alone or get in deeper than I am now." The stout girl leaned back in her seat and surveyed the trio of girls through half-closed eyes. "Where did you girls come from and what are your names?" she asked abruptly. "Partners in misery might as well get acquainted, you know." Grace introduced her friends in turn, then said: "My name is Grace Harlowe, and we three girls live in the city of Oakdale." "Never heard of it," yawned the girl. "It must be like Fairview, our town, not down on the map. We live there, because Ma was born there and thinks it the only place on earth, but we manage to go to New York occasionally, thank goodness. Ever been there?" she queried. "Once or twice," smiled Miriam Nesbit. "Great old town, isn't it?" remarked their new acquaintance. "My name is J. Elfreda Briggs. The J. stands for Josephine, but I hate it. Ma and Pa call me Fred, and that sounds pretty good to me. Say, aren't you girls about starved? I'm going to hunt the dining car and buy food. I haven't had anything to eat since eight o'clock this morning." J. Elfreda rose hurriedly, and stumbling over her bag and Grace's feet, landed in the aisle with more speed than elegance. "You'd better come along," she advised. "They serve good meals on this train. Besides, I don't want to eat alone." With that she stalked down the aisle and into the car ahead. "It looks as though we were to have plenty of entertainment for the rest of our journey," remarked Anne. "I prefer not to be entertained," averred Miriam dryly. "Personally, I am far from impressed with J. Elfreda. She strikes me as being entirely too fond of her own comfort. Now that she has vacated your seat, you had better take it, Grace, before she comes back." Grace shook her head. "I don't dislike riding backward," she said, "if you don't mind having her sit beside you. Perhaps some one will leave the train by the time she comes back; then she will leave us." "No such good fortune," retorted Miriam. "She prefers our society to none at all. I think her advice about luncheon isn't so bad, though. Suppose we follow it?" Five minutes later the three girls repaired to the dining car and seated themselves at a table directly across the aisle from their new acquaintance. J. Elfreda sat toying with her knife and fork, an impatient frown on her smug face. "These people are the limit," she grumbled. "It takes forever to get anything to eat. If I'd ordered it yesterday, I'd have some hopes of getting it to-day." Then, apparently forgetting the existence of the three girls, she sat with eyes fixed hungrily on the door through which her waiter was momentarily expected to pass. By the time that the chums had given their order to another waiter, J. Elfreda's luncheon was served and she devoted herself assiduously to it. When Grace and her friends had finished luncheon, however, the stout girl still sat with elbows on the table waiting for a second order of dessert. "Good gracious!" remarked Miriam as they made their way back to their seats. "No wonder J. Elfreda is stout! I suppose I shouldn't refer to her, even behind her back, in such familiar terms, but nothing else suits her. I'm not charitable like you, Grace. I haven't the patience to look for the good in tiresome people like her. I think she's greedy and selfish and ill-bred and I wouldn't care to live in the same house with her." "You're a very disagreeable person, Miriam, in your own estimation," laughed Grace, "but fortunately we don't take you at your own valuation, do we, Anne?" "Miriam's a dear," said Anne promptly. "She always pretends she's a dragon and then behaves like a lamb." "What time is our train due at Overton?" asked Miriam, ignoring Anne's assertion. "We are scheduled to arrive at Overton at five o'clock," answered Grace. "I wish it were five now. I'm anxious to see Overton College in broad daylight." At this juncture J. Elfreda made her appearance and sinking into the seat declared with a yawn that she was too sleepy for any use. "I'm going to sleep," she announced. "You girls can talk if you don't make too much noise. Loud talking always keeps me awake. You may call me when we get to Overton." With these words she bent over her bag, opened it, and drew out a small down cushion. She rose in her seat, removed her hat, and, poking it into the rack above her head, sat down. Arranging her pillow to her complete satisfaction, she rested her head against it, closed her eyes and within five minutes was oblivious to the world. The three travelers obligingly lowered their voices, conversing in low tones, as the train whirled them toward their destination. Their hearts were with those they had left, and as the afternoon began to wane, one by one they fell silent and became wrapped in their own thoughts. Grace was already beginning to experience a dreadful feeling of depression, which she knew to be homesickness. It was just the time in the afternoon when she and her mother usually sat on their wide, shady porch, talking or reading as they waited for her father to come home to dinner, and a lump rose in her throat as she thought sadly of how long it would be before she saw her dear ones again. Far from being homesick, self-reliant Miriam was calmly speculating as to what college would bring her, while Anne, who had quite forgotten her own problems, sat eyeing Grace affectionately and wondering how soon her friend would make her personality felt in the little world which she was about to enter. And J. Elfreda Briggs, of Fairview, slept peacefully on. CHAPTER III FIRST IMPRESSIONS "Overton! Overton!" was the call that echoed through the car. After handing down the hats of her friends, Grace reached to the rack above her head for her broad brimmed panama hat. Obeying a sudden kindly impulse, she carefully deposited J. Elfreda's hat in the sleeping girl's lap, touched her on the shoulder and said, "Wake up, Miss Briggs. We are nearing Overton." J. Elfreda sleepily opened her eyes at the gentle touch, saying drowsily, "Let me know when the train stops." Then closed her eyes again. Miriam shrugged her shoulders with a gesture that signified, "Let her alone. Don't bother with her." At that moment the train stopped with a jolt that caused the sleeper to awake in earnest. She looked stupidly about, yawned repeatedly, then catching a glimpse of a number of girls on the station platform, clad in white and light colored gowns, she became galvanized into action, and pinning on her hat began quickly to gather up her luggage. "Good-bye," she said indifferently. "I'll probably see you later." Then, rapidly elbowing her way down the aisle she disappeared through the open door, leaving the chums to make their way more slowly out of the car. As they stepped from the car to the station platform Grace caught sight of her at the far end of the station in conversation with a tall auburn-haired girl and a short dark one. A moment later she saw the three walk off together. "J. Elfreda found friends quickly," remarked Anne, who had also noticed the stout girl's warm reception by the two girls. "I wonder what we had better do first. What is the name of the hotel where we are to stop?" "The Tourraine," replied Miriam. The newcomers looked eagerly about them at the groups of daintily gowned girls who were joyously greeting their friends as they stepped from the train. "I had no idea there were so many Overton girls on the train," remarked Grace in surprise. "The majority of them seem to have friends here, too. I wonder which way we'd better go." "By the nods and becks and wreathed smiles with which those girls over there are favoring us, I imagine that we have been discovered," announced Miriam, rather sarcastically. Grace and Anne glanced quickly toward the girls indicated by Miriam. A tall, thin, fair-haired girl with cold gray-blue eyes and a generally supercilious air occupied the center of the group. She was talking rapidly and her remarks were eliciting considerable laughter. Amused glances, half friendly, half critical, were being leveled at the Oakdale trio of chums. Grace flushed in half angry embarrassment, Anne merely smiled to herself, while Miriam's most forbidding scowl wrinkled her smooth forehead. "I think we had better inquire the way to our hotel and leave here as soon as possible," Grace said slowly. A sudden feeling of disappointment had suddenly taken possession of her. She had always supposed that in every college new girls were met and welcomed by the upper classes of students. Yet now that they had actually arrived no one had come forward to exchange even a friendly greeting with them. "Well, if this is an exhibition of the true college spirit, deliver me from college," grumbled Miriam. "I must say----" Miriam's denunciation against college was never finished, for at that juncture a soft voice said, "Welcome to Overton." Turning simultaneously the three girls saw standing before them a young woman of medium height. Her hand was extended, and she was smiling in a sweet, friendly fashion that warmed the hearts of the disappointed freshmen. She wore a tailored frock of white linen, white buckskin walking shoes that revealed a glimpse of silken ankles, and carried a white linen parasol that matched her gown. She was bareheaded, and in the late afternoon her wavy brown hair seemed touched with gold. "I am so glad to meet you!" exclaimed the pretty girl. "You are freshmen, of course. If you will tell me your names I'll introduce you to some of the girls. Then we will see about escorting you safely to your boarding place. Have you taken your examinations yet?" "No," replied Miriam. "We have that ordeal before us." Her face relaxed under the friendly courtesy accorded to them by this attractive stranger. She then introduced Grace and Anne. Their new acquaintance shook hands with the two girls, then said gayly, "Now tell me your name." Miriam complied with the request, then stated that through a friend of her mother's they had engaged a suite of rooms at the Tourraine, an apartment hotel in Overton, until their fate should be decided. "The Tourraine is the nicest hotel in Overton," stated Mabel. "I am always in the seventh heaven of delight whenever I am fortunate enough to be invited to dine there." "Then come and dine with us to-night," invited Miriam. Mabel Ashe shook her head. "It's very nice in you," she said gravely, "but not to-night. Really, I am awfully stupid. I haven't told you my name. It is Mabel Ashe. I am a junior and pledged to pilot bewildered freshmen to havens of rest and safety." "Do you consider freshmen impossible creatures?" asked Anne Pierson, her eyes twinkling. The young woman laughed merrily. "Oh, no," she replied. "You must remember that they are the raw material that makes good upper classmen. It takes a whole year to mould them into shape--that is, some of them. Now, come with me and I'll see that you meet some of the upper class girls." As they were about to accompany their new acquaintance down the platform, a tall, fair-haired girl walked toward them followed by the others upon whom Miriam had commented. "Wait a minute, Mabel," she called. "I've been trying to get hold of you all afternoon." "You're just in time, Beatrice," returned Mabel Ashe. "I wish you to meet Miss Harlowe, Miss Nesbit, and Miss Pierson, all of Oakdale. Girls, this is Miss Alden, also of the junior class." Beatrice Alden smiled condescendingly, and shook hands in a somewhat bored fashion with the three girls. "Pleased to meet you," she drawled. "Hope you'll be good little freshmen this year and make no trouble for your elders." "We shall try to mind our own affairs, and trust to other people to do the same," flashed Miriam, eyeing the other girl steadily. Grace looked at her friend in surprise. What had caused Miriam to answer in such fashion? There was an almost imperceptible lull in the conversation, then Mabel Ashe introduced the other girls. "Now we will see about your trunks, and then perhaps you would like to walk up to the college," she said briskly. "It isn't far from here. Some of the girls prefer to ride in the bus, but I always walk. I can show you some of the places of interest as we go." "Come over here, Mabel, dear," commanded Beatrice Alden, who had moved a little to one side of the group. Mabel excused herself to her charges, and looking a little annoyed, obeyed the summons. Beatrice talked rapidly for a moment in coaxing tones, but Mabel shook her head. Grace, who stood nearest to them, heard her say, "I'd love to go, Bee, and its awfully nice in you to think of me. I'll go to-morrow, but I can't leave these poor stranded freshmen to their own homesick thoughts to-day. You know just how we felt when we landed high and dry in this town without any one to care whether we survived or perished." "If you won't go to-day, then don't trouble about it at all," snapped Beatrice. "I know plenty of girls who will be only too glad to accept my invitation, but I asked you first, and I think you ought to remember it. You know I like you better than any other girl in college." "You know I appreciate your friendship, Bee," returned Mabel, "but truly I wish you cared more for other girls, too. There are plenty of girls here who need friends like you." "Yes, but I don't like them," snapped Beatrice. "I'm not going to make a martyr of myself to please any one. My mother is very particular about my associates at Overton, and I don't intend to waste my time trying to make things pleasant for the stupid, uninteresting girls of this college. I did not come to Overton to take a course in doing settlement work. I came here to have a good time, and incidentally to study a little." "Now, now, Bee, don't try to make me believe you haven't just as much college spirit as the rest of us," admonished Mabel in a low tone. "Don't be cross because I can't go to-day. Come with me, instead, and help look after these verdant freshmen. There was a positive army of them who got off the train." Without replying Beatrice turned and walked sulkily away toward the other end of the platform. Mabel looked after her with a half frown. "I am afraid we are causing you considerable inconvenience," demurred Grace. "Please do not deprive yourself of any pleasure on our account." "Nonsense," smiled Mabel. "I am not depriving myself of any pleasure. Oh, there goes one of my best friends!" Putting her hands to her mouth she called, "Frances!" A tall slender girl, with serious brown eyes and dark hair, who was leisurely crossing the station platform, stopped short, glanced in the direction of the sound, then espying Mabel hurried toward her. "Good old Frances," beamed Mabel. "You heard me calling and came on the run, didn't you? This is the noblest junior of them all, my dear freshmen. Her name is Frances Veronica Marlton. Doesn't that sound like the heroine's name in one of the six best sellers?" Mabel introduced the three girls in turn. "Now let us be on our way," she commanded, looking up and down the station platform at the fast dissolving groups of girls. "I don't see any more stray lambs. I think the committee appointed to meet the freshmen has fulfilled its mission. And now for your hotel. It is past dinner time and I know you are hungry and anxious to rest." Picking up Grace's bag she led the way through the station followed by Grace and Miriam. Anne walked behind them with Frances Marlton. The little company set off down the main street of the college town at a swinging pace. It was a wide, beautiful street, shaded by tall maples. The houses that lined it were for the most part old-fashioned and the wayfarers caught alluring glimpses of green lawns dotted with flower beds as they walked along. "It makes me think of High School Street in Oakdale!" Grace exclaimed. "If ever I feel that I'm going to be homesick, I'll just walk down this street and make believe that I'm at home! That will be the surest cure for the blues, if I get them." Mabel Ashe, who was now walking between Grace and Miriam, looked at Grace rather speculatively. "You won't get them," she predicted. "You'll have so many other things to think of, you won't think of yourself at all. Here we are at the college campus. Over there is Overton Hall." The eyes of the newcomers were at once focussed on the stately gray stone building that stood in the center of a wide stretch of green campus, shaded by great trees. At various points of the campus were situated smaller buildings which Mabel Ashe pointed out as Science Hall, the gymnasium, laboratory, library and chapel. In Overton Hall, Mabel explained, were situated certain recitation rooms, the offices of the president, the dean and other officials of the college. Around the campus were the various houses in which the more fortunate of the hundreds of students lived. It was very desirable to secure a room in one of these houses, but somewhat expensive and not always easy to do. Rooms were sometimes spoken for a whole year in advance. "Do you room on the campus?" asked Grace. "Yes," replied Mabel. "I live at Holland House. I was fortunate enough to have a friend graduate from here and will me her room. I entered Overton the autumn following her graduation." "One of our Oakdale girls is a junior here," remarked Grace. "Her name is Constance Fuller. She graduated from high school when we were sophomores. We do not know her very well, and had quite forgotten she was here. This afternoon on the train, Anne, who never forgets either faces or names, suddenly announced the fact. I wonder if she has arrived yet. We came early, I believe, but that is because we are obliged to take the entrance examinations." "Now I know why the name, Oakdale, seemed so familiar!" exclaimed Mabel Ashe. "I have heard Constance mention it. She is one of my best friends. Does she know that you are to be here?" "No," replied Grace. "We haven't seen her this summer. We were away from Oakdale." Grace did not wish to mention their trip to Europe, fearing their companion might think her unduly anxious to boast. One of the things against which Julia Crosby, her old time Oakdale friend, and a senior in Smith College, had cautioned her, was boasting. "Avoid all appearance of being your own press agent," Julia had humorously advised. "If you don't you'll be a marked girl for the whole four years of your college career. The meek and modest violet is a glowing example for erring freshmen." "I'll remember, Julia," Grace had promised, and she now resolved that she would think twice before speaking once, whatever the occasion might be. "Constance has not arrived yet," said Mabel. "I heard her roommate say this morning that she expected her to-morrow. She rooms at Holland House, too. I shall tell her about you the moment I see her. This is the Tourraine," she announced, pausing before a handsome sandstone building and leading the way up the steps that led to the broad veranda, gay with porch boxes of flowers and shaded by awnings. "Won't you come up to our rooms?" asked Miriam. "Not to-night, thank you," replied Mabel. "Frances and I will be over bright and early to-morrow morning to pilot you to the college. Then you can find out about the examinations. Good-night and pleasant dreams." Extending their hands in turn to the three girls and nodding a last smiling adieu, the two courteous juniors left them on the hotel veranda. "I must admit that I have been agreeably disappointed," said Miriam Nesbit as the three girls stood for a moment before entering the hotel to watch the retreating backs of their new acquaintances. "I, too," replied Grace. "I can't begin to tell you how dejected I felt while we stood there on the station platform and no one came near us or appeared to be aware of our existence." "It was enough to discourage the most optimistic freshman," averred Anne. "I wonder who J. Elfreda Briggs's friends were," commented Miriam. "She never said a word about knowing any one at Overton. I imagine she is a thoroughly selfish girl, and the less I see of her in college the better pleased I shall be." As their suite of rooms had been engaged in advance it needed but a word to the clerk on Grace's part, then each girl in turn registered and they were conducted to their suite. "This suite seems to be supplied with all the comforts of home," observed Miriam, looking about her with satisfaction. "I am thankful to have reached a haven of rest where I can bathe my grimy face and hands." "So am I," echoed Grace, setting down her suit case and sinking into an easy chair with a tired sigh. "I am starved, too. Let us lose no time in getting ready for dinner. After dinner we can rest." For the next half hour the travelers were busily engaged in removing the dust of their journey and attiring themselves in the dainty summer frocks which they had taken thought to pack in their suit cases. "I'm ready," announced Grace at last, as she poked a rebellious lock of hair into place, and viewed herself in the mirror. "So am I," echoed Anne. "And I," from Miriam. "Why not walk down stairs? We are on the second floor, and I never ride in an elevator when I can avoid doing so." The trio descended the stairs and made their way to the dining room, where they were conducted to a table near an open window which looked out on a shady side porch. "So far I haven't been imbued with what one might call college atmosphere," remarked Miriam, after the dinner had been ordered and the waiter had hurried off to attend to their wants. "I felt a certain amount of enthusiasm while those upper class girls were with us, but it has vanished," said Anne. "I am just a professional staying at a hotel." "I imagine we won't begin to regard ourselves as being a part of Overton College until after we have tried our examinations and found an abiding place in some one of the college houses. I hope we shall be able to get into a campus house. I have always understood that it is ever so much nicer to be on the campus. We really should have made arrangements before-hand, and if we hadn't waited until the last moment to decide to what college we wished to go we might be cosily settled now." "Perhaps we are only fulfilling our destiny," smiled Miriam Nesbit. "Perhaps," agreed Grace in a doubtful tone. "Once we are in our hall or boarding house I dare say we will shake off this feeling of constraint and become genuine Overtonites." "Had we better study to-night?" inquired Grace as they made their way from the hotel dining room. "I think it would be a wise proceeding," agreed Miriam. "I want to go over my French verbs." "So do I," echoed Grace. "Let's study until ten, and then go straight to bed." Ten o'clock stretched well toward eleven before Grace put down her text book with a tired little sigh and declared herself too sleepy for further study. It had been arranged that Miriam should occupy the one room of the suite while Grace and Anne were to share the other, which had two beds. The long journey by rail had tired the travelers far more than they would admit. For a few moments, after retiring, conversation flourished between the two rooms, then died away in indistinct murmurs, and the prospective Overton freshmen slept peacefully as though safe in their Oakdale homes. CHAPTER IV MIRIAM'S UNWELCOME SURPRISE The two days that followed were busy ones for Grace, Anne and Miriam. The morning after their arrival Mabel Ashe and Frances Marlton appeared at half-past eight o'clock to conduct them to Overton Hall. There they registered and were then sent to the room where the examination in French was to be held. Examinations in the other required subjects followed in rapid succession and it was Friday before they had settled themselves in Wayne Hall, the house in which they were to live as students of Overton College. Wayne Hall was a substantial four-story brick house, just a block from the campus. It was looked upon as a strictly freshman house, but occasionally sophomores lived there, as the rooms were well-furnished and the matron, Mrs. Elwood, had a reputation for looking out for the welfare of her girls. To their delight Grace and Anne had been allowed to room together, while Miriam had by lucky chance secured a room to herself across the hall. "If that poor little yellow-haired freshman hadn't failed in all her examinations I shouldn't be rooming alone," said Miriam rather soberly as she dived into the depths of the now almost emptied trunk. "Did you meet her?" asked Grace, who, seated on the bed beside Anne, watched Miriam's unpacking with interested eyes. "No," replied Miriam. "One of the freshmen at the table told me about her. She said that the poor girl cried all day yesterday and last night. She didn't dare write her father, who, it seems, is very severe, that she had failed. He won't know she's coming until she reaches home." "What a pity," said Anne sympathetically. "It must be dreadful to fail and know that one must face not only the humility of the failure, but the displeasure of one's family too." "If I had failed in my examinations neither Father nor Mother would have said one reproachful word," said Grace. "Of course I'm sorry for her," said Miriam, "but considering the fact that I am now going to room alone, I shall write to Mother and ask her to send me the money to furnish this room as I please. I'd like to have a davenport bed, and I want a chiffonier and a dressing table to match. There's room here for a piano, too. I'll have it over in this corner and then I'll----" Rap, rap, rap! sounded on the door. "Come in," called Miriam frowning at the interruption. The door opened to admit Mrs. Elwood, and following in her wake, laden with a bag and two suit cases, her hat pushed over her eyes, a half-suspicious, half-belligerent expression on her face, was J. Elfreda Briggs. "Well I never!" she gasped in astonishment, dropping her belongings in a heap on the floor and making a dive for the nearest chair. "You're the last people I ever expected to see. Where have you been, anyway? I supposed you'd all flunked in your exams, given up the job, and gone back to Glendale, Hilldale--what's the name of that dale you hail from?" "Oakdale," supplemented Anne slyly. "Yes, that's it. Oakdale. Foolish name for a town, isn't it?" During this outburst Mrs. Elwood had stood silent, looking at J. Elfreda with doubtful eyes. Now she said apologetically, "I'm very sorry, Miss Nesbit, but could you--that is--would you mind having a roommate after all? My sister, Mrs. Arnold, who manages Ralston House just down the street from here, took Miss Briggs because she thought one of her girls wasn't coming back. Now the girl is here and she has no place for Miss Briggs. Of course, if you insist on not having a roommate, my sister and I will see that Miss Briggs secures a room in one of the other college houses." Mrs. Elwood paused and looked questioningly at Miriam, who stood silent, an inscrutable expression on her face. Grace and Anne, remembering Miriam's dislike for the stout girl, wondered what her answer would be. The settling of the question was not left to Miriam, for during the brief silence that followed Mrs. Elwood's deprecatory speech J. Elfreda had been making a comprehensive survey of her surroundings. "It's all right, Mrs. Elwood," she drawled. "Don't worry about me. I like this room and I guess I can get along with Miss Nesbit. You may telephone the expressman to have my trunk sent here. I'm not going back to Ralston House with you. I'm too tired. I'm going to stay here." Mrs. Elwood looked appealingly at Miriam, as though mutely trying to apologize for J. Elfreda's disregard for the rights of others. Miriam's straight black brows drew together. She stared at their unwelcome guest with a look that caused a slow flush to rise to the stout girl's face. Suddenly her face relaxed into a smile of intense amusement, and extending her hand to J. Elfreda, she said, "You are welcome to half this room, if you care to stay." "Well, I never!" exclaimed the other girl for the second time, as she shook the proffered hand. "Honestly, I thought you were going to give me a regular freeze out. You looked like a thunder cloud for a minute. I expect it won't be all sunshine around here, this year, for I'm used to having things go my way, and I guess you are, too." "Then perhaps learning to defer to each other will be good practice for both of us," suggested Miriam. "Perhaps it will, but I doubt if we ever practise it," was the discouraging retort. "I'll notify my sister that you are to be here, Miss Briggs," broke in Mrs. Elwood. "Then I'll see that this room is made ready for two. Thank you, Miss Nesbit." She turned gratefully to Miriam. "All right," answered J. Elfreda indifferently. "You can fix it up if you want to, but I warn you that I'll probably buy my own furniture and throw out all this." She waved a comprehensive hand at the despised furniture. "You are at liberty to make whatever changes you wish," Mrs. Elwood responded rather stiffly, and without further remark left the room. "She didn't like my remark about her furniture," commented the stout girl, "but I'm not worrying about it. It's funny that I should run into you girls, though. What kind of a time have you been having here, and did you pass all your exams?" The girls replied in the affirmative, then Grace asked the same question of Elfreda. "Of course," was the laconic answer. "I had a tutor all summer, besides I told you on the train that I wasn't a wooden head." "Where did you stay until you went to Ralston House?" asked Anne. "We saw you go away from the station with two girls when you left the train, and we've seen you twice at a distance during examinations, but this is the first chance we've had to talk with you." J. Elfreda stared at Anne, her eyes narrowing. "Do you want to know just what happened to me?" she asked slowly. "Well, I'll tell you three girls about it, because I've got to tell some one and I don't believe you'll spread the story." "We won't tell anyone," promised Grace. "How about you two?" asked the stout girl. "I'll answer for both of us," smiled Anne. "All right then, I'll tell you. Now remember, you've promised." The girls nodded. "Well, it was this way," began Elfreda. "When I left the train I hadn't gone six steps until two girls walked up to me and asked if I were a freshman. They said they were on the committee to meet and look after the girls who were entering college for the first time. I said that was very kind of them and asked them to show me the way to Ralston House. They picked up my suit cases and we started out. They asked me my name and all sorts of questions and I told them a little about myself," continued the stout girl pompously. "They seemed quite impressed, too. Then one of them said she thought I had better see the registrar before going to Ralston House, for the registrar would be anxious to meet me. They both said I was quite different from the rest of the new girls, and made such a lot of fuss over me that I invited them into that little shop across from the station to have ice cream." "And then?" asked Miriam. "Then," said J. Elfreda impressively, "after they had had two sundaes apiece, at my expense, they played a mean trick on me. They took me into a big building a little further down the street, down a long hall, and left me sitting on a seat outside what I supposed was the registrar's office. They said I must wait there and the registrar's clerk would come out and conduct me to the registrar. They said that it was against the rules to walk into the office and that it was the business of the clerk to come out every half hour and conduct any one who was waiting into the registrar's private office. "Well, I sat there and sat there. It made me think of when I was a kiddie and used to watch the cuckoo clock to see the bird come out. But there wasn't even a bird came out of that door," continued Elfreda gloomily. "People passed up and down the hall, and every once in a while a man would walk right into the place without knocking, or seeing the clerk, or anything else. "After I had sat there for at least two hours, I made up my mind to go in even if I were ordered out the next minute. I marched up to the door and opened it and walked into the office. There was no one in sight but a young woman who was putting on her hat. 'Where's the registrar?' I asked. 'He hasn't been here to-day,' she said. 'I thought the registrar was a woman,' I said. She seemed surprised at that and asked what made me think so. I said that two of the students had told me so. Then she looked at me in the queerest way and began to smile. 'Do you want to see the registrar of Overton College?' she asked. 'Of course I do,' I said, for I began to suspect that something was wrong. Then she stopped smiling and said it was too bad, but whoever had sent me there had played a trick on me and brought me to the office of the Register of Deeds. Instead of Overton Hall I was in the county court house. Now can you beat it?" finished Elfreda slangily. "I should say not," cried Grace indignantly. "I think it was contemptible in them to accept your hospitality and then treat you in that fashion. No really nice girl would do any such thing, even in fun." "I should say not," sympathized Miriam, forgetting that she did not yearn for J. Elfreda as a roommate. "What did you do after you discovered your mistake?" "I left the Register's office, his deeds, and all the rest of that building in pretty short order," continued Elfreda. "When I reached the street I went straight back to the station and hired a carriage to take me to Ralston House. Mrs. Arnold gave me my supper even though it was late, and the next day I saw the registrar in earnest. I told her the whole story and described the girls. I didn't know their names, but she said she thought she knew who they were from the description. So I suppose she'll send for me before long to identify them." "But you're not going to?" questioned Grace in astonishment. "Why not?" returned the stout girl calmly. "Do you think I'll let slip a chance to get even with them? I guess not." "But this will be carried to the dean and they will be severely reprimanded and the whole college will know it," expostulated Grace. "Well, the whole college should know it," stoutly contended Elfreda. "I'll show those two smart young women that I'm not as green as I appear to be." Grace was on the verge of saying that J. Elfreda would have shown more wisdom by keeping silent, but suddenly checked herself. She had no right to criticize J. Elfreda's motives. To her the bare idea of telling tales was abhorrent, while this girl gloried in the fact that she had exposed those who annoyed her. "I'm sorry you told the registrar," she said slowly. "Perhaps in the rush of business she'll forget about it." "She'd better not," threatened Elfreda, "or she'll hear it from me. When it comes to getting even, I never relent. I'm just like Pa in that respect. However, let's change the subject. Now that I'm here, show me where I can put my clothes," she added, addressing Miriam. "Do you keep your things in order? I never do. The morning I left home Ma said she felt sorry for my future roommate." Elfreda kept up a brisk monologue as she opened one of her suit cases and began hauling out its contents. Miriam made a gesture of hopeless resignation behind the stout girl's back. "I must go to my room and get ready for dinner," said Grace, her eyes dancing. "Coming, Anne?" Anne nodded and the two girls beat a hasty retreat. Elfreda's calm manner of appropriating things and Miriam's resigned air were too much for them. Once inside their room they gave way to uncontrolled merriment. "I knew I'd laugh if I stayed there another second," confessed Anne. "Poor Miriam. I heartily agree with Ma, don't you?" "Yes," smiled Grace. Then, her face sobering, she added, "I am afraid she is laying up trouble for herself. I wish she hadn't told." CHAPTER V AN INTERRUPTED STUDY HOUR The first two weeks at Overton glided by with amazing swiftness. There was so much to be done in the way of arranging one's recitations, buying or renting one's books and accustoming one's self to the routine of college life that Grace and her friends could scarcely spare the time to write their home letters. There were twenty-four girls at Wayne Hall. With the exception of four sophomores the house was given up to freshmen. Grace thought them all delightful, and in her whole-souled, generous fashion made capital of their virtues and remained blind to their shortcomings. There had been a number of jolly gatherings in Mrs. Elwood's living room, at which quantities of fudge and penuchi were made and eaten and mere acquaintances became fast friends. The week following their arrival a dance had been given in the gymnasium in honor of the freshmen. The whole college had turned out at this strictly informal affair, and the upper class girls had taken particular pains to see that the freshmen were provided with partners and had a good time generally. At this dance the three Oakdale friends had felt more at home than at any other time since entering Overton. In the first place, Mabel Ashe, Frances Marlton and Constance King had come over to Wayne Hall in a body on the evening before the dance and offered themselves as escorts. Furthermore, the scores of happy, laughing girls gliding over the gymnasium floor to the music of a three-piece orchestra reminded Grace of the school dances in her own home town. J. Elfreda had also been escorted to the hop by Virginia Gaines, one of the sophomores at Wayne Hall, who had a great respect for the stout girl's money, and it was a secret relief to Grace that she had not been left out. Now the dance was a thing of the past, and nothing was in sight in the way of entertainment except the reception and dance given by the sophomores to the freshmen. This was a yearly event, and meant more to the freshmen than almost any other class celebration, for the sophomores, having thrown off freshman shackles, took a lively hand in the affairs of the members of the entering class. It was sophomores who under pretense of sympathetic interest wormed out of unsuspecting freshmen their inmost secrets and gleefully spread them abroad among the upper classes. It was also the sophomores who were the most active in enforcing the standard that erring freshmen were supposed to live up to. The junior and senior classes as a rule allowed their sophomore sisters to regulate the conduct of the newcomers at Overton, only stepping in to interfere in extreme cases. Grace and her friends had met nearly all the members of the sophomore class at the freshman dance, but in reality they had very few acquaintances among them that bade fair to become their friends. "I don't suppose we'll have the honor of being escorted to the reception by sophomores," remarked Grace several evenings before the event, as she and Miriam strolled out of the dining room. "We'll have to go in a crowd by ourselves and look as though we enjoyed it." "Why not stay at home?" yawned Miriam. "I'm not as over-awed at the idea of this affair as I might be." "No," replied Grace, shaking her head. "It wouldn't do. We ought to go. The dance is to be given in honor of the freshmen, and it's their duty to turn out and make it a success. Are you going to study your Livy to-night, Miriam?" "If I can," replied Miriam grimly. "It depends on what my talkative roommate does. If she elects to give me another instalment of the story of her life before she came here, Livy won't stand much chance. We have progressed as far as her twelfth year, and I was just on the point of learning how she survived scarlet fever when the doctor didn't expect her to live, last night, when she happened to remember that she hadn't looked at her history lesson and I was mercifully spared further torture." "Poor Miriam," laughed Grace. "But you could have said you didn't want her the day Mrs. Elwood brought her here. What made you decide to let her stay? I saw by your face something interesting was going on in your mind." Miriam looked reflectively at Grace. "I don't know I'm sure just why I let her stay. It wasn't because I wished to please Mrs. Elwood, though she is so nice with all of us. I had a curious feeling that I ought to take J. Elfreda in hand. If it had been you whose room she invaded you wouldn't have hesitated even for a second. Ever since you and I settled our differences back in our high school days I've always held you up to myself as an example. Now, honestly, Grace, you would have taken her in without a murmur, wouldn't you?" "Ye-e-s," said Grace slowly, her face flushing. "I would have said she might stay, I think. But, Miriam, you mustn't hold me up as an example. I couldn't be more generous and loyal and broadminded than you." "In the words of J. Elfreda, 'let's change the subject,'" said Miriam hastily. "Where's Anne?" "Anne is out visiting the humblest freshman of them all," replied Grace. "Her name is Ruth Denton. Anne singled her out in English the other day, scraped acquaintance with her, and found that she has a room in an old house in the suburbs of the town. She takes care of her own room, boards herself and does any kind of mending she can get to do from the girls to help her pay her way through college. Anne only found her last week, but I have promised to go to see her, too, and I want you to go with me." They had paused at the door of Miriam's room. Her hand on the door, she said earnestly, "I'd love to go, Grace. I might know that you and Anne couldn't rest without championing some one's cause." "What about you and J. Elfreda?" questioned Grace slyly. "Oh, that's different," retorted Miriam. Opening the door she glanced about the room. Her own side was in perfect order, but J. Elfreda's half looked as though it had been visited by a cyclone. The cover of her couch bed was pulled askew and the sofa pillows ornamented the floor. Shoes and stockings were scattered about in wild disorder. Her dressing table looked as though the contents had been stirred up and deposited in a heap in the center. From the top drawer of the chiffonier protruded a hand-embroidered collar, and a long black silk tie hung down the middle of the piece of furniture, giving it the effect of being draped in mourning. Catching sight of this Grace pointed to it, laughing. "It looks as though she were in mourning, doesn't it?" "For her sins, yes," replied Miriam grimly. "Isn't this room a mess, though? I've picked up her things ever so many times, but I'm tired of it. Come in here to-night, Grace. I want to see how it seems to have my dearest friend in my room, all to myself." "All right," laughed Grace. "I'll get my books." Five minutes later she reappeared and, cosily establishing herself in the Morris chair that Miriam insisted she should occupy, the girls began their work. For the time being silence reigned, broken only by the sound of turning leaves or an occasional question on the part of one or the other of the two. Finally Miriam closed her book triumphantly. "That's done," she exulted. "Now for my English." "I wish I was through with this," sighed Grace, eyeing her Livy with disfavor. "I never do learn my lessons quickly. I have to study ever so much harder than you and Anne. Now, if it were basketball, then everything would be lovely. Still, you're a champion player, too, Miriam, so you've more than your share of accomplishments. Anne, too, excites my envy and admiration. She can act and stand first in her classes, too, while I have to work like mad to keep up in my classes and am not a star in anything. Perhaps during this year I shall develop some new talent of which no one suspects me. It won't be for study, that's sure." Miriam smiled to herself, but said nothing. She knew that Grace already possessed a talent for making friends and an ability to see not only her own way clearly, but to smooth the pathway of those weaker than herself that was little short of marvelous. She knew, too, that before the end of the school year Grace's remarkable personality was sure to make itself felt among her fellow students. "What are you smiling to yourself about, Miriam?" demanded Grace. But at this juncture the door was burst violently open and J. Elfreda Briggs dashed into the room, threw herself face downward on her disordered bed and gave way to a long, anguished wail. CHAPTER VI A DISTURBING NOTE Miriam and Grace sprang to their feet, regarding the sobbing, moaning girl in blank amazement. "What on earth is the matter, Elfreda," said Miriam. The answer was another long wail that made the girls glance apprehensively toward the door. "She'll have to be more quiet," said Grace, "or else every girl in the house will hear her and come in to inquire what has happened." Going over to the couch, she knelt beside Elfreda and said almost sharply, "Elfreda, stop crying at once. Do you want all the girls in the house to hear you?" "I don't care," was the discouraging answer, but in a lower tone, nevertheless; but she continued to sob heart-brokenly. "Tell me about it, Elfreda," said Grace more gently, taking one of the girl's limp hands in hers. "Something dreadful must have happened. Have you had bad news from home?" "No-o-o," gasped the stout girl. "It's the sophomores. I can't go to the reception. They won't let me." Her sobs burst forth afresh. Grace rose from her knees, casting a puzzled glance toward Miriam. "I wonder what she means." Then placing her hands on Elfreda's shoulders she raised her to a sitting position on the couch and dropping down beside her put one arm over her shoulder. Miriam promptly sat down on the other side, and being thus supported and bolstered by their sympathetic arms, Elfreda gulped, gurgled, sighed and then said with quivering lips, "I wish I had taken your advice, Grace." "About what?" asked Grace. Then, the same idea occurring to them simultaneously, Miriam and Grace exchanged dismayed glances. Elfreda had come to grief through reporting the two mischievous sophomores to the registrar. "About telling the registrar," faltered Elfreda, unrolling her handkerchief from the ball into which she had rolled it and wiping her eyes. "I'm so sorry," Grace said with quick sympathy. "You're not half so sorry as I am," was the tearful retort. "I'll write to Pa and Ma that I want to go home next week. They'll make a fuss, but they'll send for me." "Are your father and mother very anxious that you should stay here?" asked Miriam. "A good deal more anxious than I am," responded Elfreda. "Ma picked out Overton for me long before I left high school. She thinks it the only college going and so does Pa." "Then, of course, they will be disappointed if you go home without even trying to like college." "I can't help that," whined Elfreda. "I can't stay here and have the whole college down on me, and that's what will happen. You girls don't know how serious it is." "I think you had better begin at the beginning and tell us everything," suggested Miriam, a trifle impatiently. "It was the night of the freshman hop that they began to be so mean," burst forth Elfreda. "I went to the dance with Virginia Gaines, that sophomore who sits next to me at the table." "Who do you mean by 'they'?" asked Grace. "Alberta Wicks, the tall red-haired girl, and Mary Hampton, the short dark one. They took me over to the court house," was the prompt answer. "The registrar reported them to the dean. She sent for them the very day of the dance and gave them an awful talking to and they were perfectly furious with me for telling. They found out that Virginia had invited me to the dance, and told her the whole story. She was horrid to me, and hardly spoke to me all the way to the gymnasium or coming home. They must have told every girl I know, for not one of them would come near me. I had to sit around all evening, for I didn't know half a dozen girls, and you three were too busy to look at me. You can imagine I had a slow old time, and I was glad to get home. Maybe you noticed I wasn't very talkative that night after we got back to the house, Miriam?" Miriam nodded. "After that, Virginia and I didn't speak. I didn't care much anyhow, for she made me tired," continued Elfreda. "But when the talk about the sophomore reception began I saw that they were going to hand me a whole block of ice. It was bad enough to have them cut me in classes and on the street, but I had set my heart on the reception and wrote to Ma to send me a new dress. It came yesterday. It's pale blue with pearl trimmings and it's a dream. But what good does it do me now?" She stared gloomily ahead of her for an instant, then went on: "Of course, I knew no one would invite me, but I made up my mind to ask if I could go along with you folks, and I was going to ask you to-night, when just before dinner a boy came here with this note." From the inside of her white silk blouse she drew forth an envelope addressed to "Miss J. Elfreda Briggs." Handing it to Grace she said briefly: "Read it." Grace drew a sheet of paper from the envelope, unfolded it and read: "Miss Briggs: "In reporting to the registrar two members of the sophomore class you have offended not merely those members, but the class as well. You have shown yourself so entirely incapable of understanding the first principles of honor, that Overton would be much better off without you. Do not attempt to attend the sophomore reception. If you are wise you will leave Overton and enter some other college. "The Sophomore Class." Grace handed the note to Miriam. "What do you think of it?" asked Miriam, looking up from the last line. "I don't know what to think," rejoined Grace. "It doesn't seem as though a whole class would rise up to settle what is really a personal affair. Even though the sophomores are angry, they have no right to threaten Elfreda and advise her to leave Overton. If the dean knew of this affair I am afraid there would be war indeed." "Shall I tell her?" asked Elfreda eagerly. "I think I'd better; then they won't dare to make me leave college." "Listen to me, Elfreda," said Grace firmly. "No one can make you leave college unless you fail in your studies or do something really reprehensible, but there is one thing you must make up your mind to do if you wish to stay here, and have the girls like you." "What is it?" inquired Elfreda suspiciously. "You mustn't tell tales," was Grace's frank answer. "No matter what the girls do or say to you, don't carry it to the officials of the college." "Do you mean that I'm to submit to all kinds of insults and not take my own part?" demanded Elfreda, forgetting her grief and assuming a belligerent air. "You are not fighting your own battles when you carry your grievances to the dean, the registrar, or any other member of the faculty," said Grace gravely. "You are merely giving them unpleasant information to which they dislike to listen." "Humph!" was the contemptuous ejaculation. "The dean made it hot for the girls just the same. I guess she didn't object much to hearing about it." "You are not looking at things in their true light, Elfreda," put in Miriam. "I'll venture to say that when the members of the faculty were students they were just as careful not to tell tales as are the girls here to-day. Of course, if students are reported to them, they are obliged to take action in the matter, but I'm sure that they'd rather not hear about the girls' petty difficulties." "'Petty difficulties!'" almost screamed Elfreda. "Well, I like your impudence." Jerking herself from the girls' embrace she stood up and walked to the other side of the room. Stumbling over one of her shoes she kicked it viciously aside, then, leaning her head against the door, her sobs broke forth afresh. In a twinkling Miriam was beside her. "Poor Elfreda," she soothed. "You are tired and worn out. Take off your hat and coat and bathe your face. You'll feel ever so much better after you've done that. You mustn't be cross with Grace and me. We are only trying to help you. While you are bathing your face, I'll make some chocolate and we'll have a cozy little time. Won't that be nice?" Elfreda nodded, winked back her tears, and slowly drawing the pins from her hat, flung it on the foot of her bed. Her coat followed, and seizing her towel from the rack she stalked out of the room and down the hall to the bath room. "Miriam, you're a darling and a diplomat!" exclaimed Grace, closing the door, which the stout girl had left wide open. "Chocolate is the one thing calculated to reduce J. Elfreda to reason. We will feed her, then renew our lectures on tale-bearing. Never call me a reformer. I am certain that before the year is over J. Elfreda won't know herself." "Nonsense," scoffed Miriam. "She is an interesting specimen, and furnishes variety, of a certain kind," she added with an impish grin, glancing comprehensively at the disordered room. "As long as I have taken her unto myself as a roommate I might as well do what I can for her. What seems so strange to me is that with all her money she is so crude and slangy. She doesn't seem to have any ideals or much principle either. Yet there is something sturdy and frankly independent about her, too, that makes one think she's worth bothering with after all." "How did her father make his money?" asked Grace. "Lumber," replied Miriam. "They own tracts of timber land in Michigan. Elfreda can have anything she asks for." Grace sat down on Miriam's bed, her chin in her hands. She was thinking of the note she had just read and wondering what had better be done. Miriam, despite her avowal that she was tired of picking up her roommate's scattered clothing, busied herself with reducing Elfreda's half of the room to some semblance of order. Going to the closet, she took down an elaborate Japanese silk kimono and laid it across the foot of Elfreda's bed. "What had we better do about this note?" Grace asked, picking it up from the table and re-reading it. "What do you think?" questioned Miriam. "I think we had better ask the advice of some upper class girl," said Grace. "I'm going to see Mabel Ashe to-morrow morning. I'll tell her about it. Elfreda mustn't be cheated out of her right to go to the reception." "But if the whole sophomore class objects to her, what then?" "I don't believe the whole sophomore class does object to her," returned Grace. "I have a curious conviction that not many of them know her even by sight. I think that this note was written for spite." "Do you think Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton wrote it?" queried Miriam. "I don't want to accuse any one of writing it, but they are the only students who would have an object in doing so," declared Grace. "I hear Elfreda coming down the hall. Don't say anything more about it just now," she added in a lower tone. "My goodness, I forgot all about the chocolate!" exclaimed Miriam, scurrying to a little oak cabinet in one corner of the room and taking out the necessary ingredients. "Here, Grace, open this can of evaporated cream with the scissors. You can use that paperweight for a hammer." Fifteen minutes later, wrapped in the folds of her kimono, J. Elfreda sat drinking chocolate and devouring cakes as though her very existence depended upon it. "You girls are ever so much nicer than I thought you'd be," she said reflectively, between cakes. "I must say that I'm agreeably disappointed in you, Miriam. I was pretty sure you were a regular snob, but you're nothing like one. I couldn't help thinking about what you said, Grace, while I was bathing my face," she continued. "It made me mad for a minute, but I've come to the conclusion that you were talking sense, and from now on the faculty will have to go some to get any information from me." CHAPTER VII GRACE TAKES MATTERS INTO HER OWN HANDS "We have had, what might be considered by some people, a momentous evening," remarked Grace as Anne Pierson walked into their room shortly before ten o'clock. Having left the now almost cheerful Elfreda to the good-natured ministrations of Miriam, Grace had said good night and returned to her own room for a few more minutes of silent devotion to Livy. "What happened?" asked Anne as she hung up her wraps, took down her kimono, and prepared to be comfortable. "What might be expected," returned Grace, and briefly recounted what had transpired in Miriam's room. "Wasn't it nice of Miriam to make a fuss over her, though?" said Anne warmly. "Yes, of course, but it isn't Miriam's amiability that I'm thinking about at present. It's what we'd better do to straighten out this trouble for Elfreda," said Grace anxiously. "I felt glad when I came to Overton that I did not have to worry about any one but myself, and now I'm confronted with Elfreda's troubles." "I think it would be best to see Miss Ashe first," agreed Anne, after a brief silence. "That settles it, then, I'll go. Tell me about your new freshman friend, Anne." "She's a very nice girl," Anne replied, "and has lots of the right kind of courage. She lives in a big, bare room in the top of an old house, clear down at the other end of the town, and the way she has made that room over to suit her needs is really wonderful. She has one corner of it curtained off for her kitchen and has a cupboard for her dishes, what there are of them. She cooks her meals over a little two-burner gas stove, and does her own washing and ironing. Every spare moment she has she devotes to doing mending. She does it beautifully, too. Ever so many girls have given her their silk stockings and lingerie waists to darn." "Poor little thing," mused Grace. "I suppose she never has a minute to play. I don't see how she manages to do all that work and study, too. I wish we could do something to help her." "I don't know what we could do," returned Anne thoughtfully. "I imagine she wouldn't accept help. She strikes me as being one of the kind who would rather die than allow her friends to pay her way." "There must be some way," Grace said speculatively, "and some day we'll find it out." "Sometimes I feel as though I had earned my college money too easily," confessed Anne. "The work I did on the stage wasn't work at all, it was pure pleasure. Ruth Denton's work is the hardest kind of drudgery." "But think how hard you worked to win the scholarship," reminded Grace. "That was work I loved, too," replied Anne, shaking her head deprecatingly over her own good fortune. "Never mind," laughed Grace. "Just think of how hard you might have had to work if you hadn't been a genius, and that will comfort you a little." "Grace, you are too ridiculous," protested Anne, flushing deeply. "Anne, you are entirely too modest," retorted Grace. "Come on, little Miss Nonentity, let's go to bed or I won't get up early enough to-morrow morning to see Mabel Ashe before my first recitation." "All right," yawned Anne. "To-morrow night I must stay in the house and write letters. I've owed David a letter for a week. I wonder why Nora and Jessica don't write." "They promised to write first, you know," said Grace. "If we don't hear from them by Saturday we'd better send them a postcard to hurry them up. Let's go down to that little stationer's shop to-morrow and see what they have. I must find one that will suit Hippy's peculiar style of beauty." Laughing and chatting of things that had happened at home, a subject of which they never tired, Grace and Anne prepared for bed. The next morning Anne awoke first. Glancing at the little clock on the chiffonier she exclaimed in dismay. They had overslept, and there was barely time to dress and eat breakfast before chapel. "Oh, dear," lamented Grace as she slipped into her one-piece gown of pink linen, "now I can't go to see Mabel until after luncheon. How provoking!" But it was still more provoking to find, when she called at Holland House, late that afternoon, that Mabel Ashe had made a dinner engagement with several seniors and had just left the house. "What had I better do about it?" Grace asked herself. "Shall I put it off until to-morrow or shall I take matters into my own hands? It's only four days now until the reception, and those girls may do a great deal of talking during that time." She paused on the steps of Holland House and looked across the campus toward Stuart Hall. "I'm sure I heard some one say that both Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton live there," Grace reflected. "I don't like to do it, but it's the only thing I can think of to do." Squaring her shoulders Grace crossed the campus, a look of determination on her fine face. Mounting the steps of Stuart Hall she deliberately rang the bell. Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton were both in, the maid stated, ushering Grace into the big, attractively furnished living room. A moment later there was a scurry of footsteps on the stairs and Alberta Wicks, followed by Mary Hampton, entered the room. Grace rose from her chair to greet them. "Good afternoon," she said pleasantly. "I shall have to introduce myself. I am Grace Harlowe of the freshman class. I saw you at the dance the other night but did not meet you." "How do you do?" returned Alberta Wicks in a bored tone, while the other girl nodded indifferently. "I remember your face, I think. I'm not sure. There was an army of freshmen at the dance. The largest entering class for a number of years, I understand." "Freshmen are perhaps not important enough to be remembered," returned Grace, smiling faintly. Then deciding that there was nothing to be gained by beating about the bush she said earnestly, "I hope you will not think me meddlesome or presuming, but I came here this afternoon to talk with you about something that concerns a member of the freshman class. I refer to Miss Briggs, whom I am quite certain you know." "Miss Briggs," repeated Alberta Wicks, meditatively. "Let me see, I think we met her----" "The day she came to college," supplemented Grace. "How did you know that?" was the sharp question. "I saw you and Miss Hampton when you approached her, and also when you walked away from the station with her," Grace said quietly. "Miss Briggs rode part of the way on the train with us to Overton." A deep flush rose to the faces of both young women at Grace's indisputable statement. There was an uncomfortable silence. "I know also," continued Grace, "that you conducted her to the county court house instead of the registrar's office and left her to find out the truth as best she might." "Really," sneered Alberta, "you seem to be extremely well informed as to what took place. It is quite evident that Miss Briggs published the news broadcast." "She did nothing of the sort," retorted Grace coldly. "She did tell my roommate and me, and I regret to say that she also told the registrar, but she now realizes her mistake in doing so." "Her realization comes entirely too late," was the sarcastic reply. "She should have thought things over before going to the registrar with anything so silly." "Ah!" ejaculated Grace. "I am glad to hear you admit that the trick you played was silly. To my mind it was both senseless and unkind. However, I did not come here to-day to discuss the ethics of the affair. Miss Briggs has received a note forbidding her attendance at the sophomore reception and advising her to leave Overton. It is signed 'Sophomore Class.' It states her betrayal of two sophomores to the registrar as the cause of its origin. What I wish to ask you is whether the sophomores have really taken action in this matter, or whether you wrote this note in order to frighten Miss Briggs into leaving college?" "I do not admit your right to interfere, and I shall certainly not answer your question, Miss Harlowe. You are decidedly impertinent, to say the least," replied Alberta in a tone of suppressed anger. "I cannot understand why you should take such an unprecedented interest in Miss Briggs's affairs and I shall tell you nothing." [Illustration: "I Am Sorry That We Have Failed to Come to an Understanding."] "Very well," said Grace composedly. "I see that I shall have to go to each member of the sophomore class in turn in order to find out the truth. I cannot believe that these girls are so lacking in college spirit as to ostracize a newcomer, even though she did act unwisely." "You would not dare to do it!" exclaimed Mary Hampton excitedly. She had hitherto taken no part in the conversation. "Why not?" asked Grace. "I am determined to go to the root of this matter. I don't intend Miss Briggs shall leave college, or be sent to coventry either. She has acted hastily, but she will live it down, that is, unless word of it has traveled too far. Even so, I hardly think she will leave college. I am sorry that we have failed to come to an understanding." Grace walked proudly toward the door. Inwardly she was deeply disappointed at having failed, but she gave no sign of feeling her defeat. "Come back!" commanded Alberta Wicks harshly, as Grace stood with her hand on the door knob. Grace turned and walked toward them. Her face gave no sign of her surprise. "Do you really intend to take up this affair with every member of the sophomore class?" demanded Alberta, eyeing Grace sharply. There was a faint note of dismay in her voice, despite her attempt to appear unconcerned. "Yes," answered Grace firmly. "The only alternative would be to take it to the faculty, and that is not to be thought of. I shall make a personal appeal to each sophomore for Miss Briggs." "Then I suppose rather than bring down a hornet's nest about our ears, we might as well tell you that the majority of the class know nothing of this. A number of sophomores, with a view to the good of the college, decided themselves to be justified in sending the letter to Miss Briggs. We do not wish young women of her type at Overton, and Miss Briggs will do well to go elsewhere. She will never be happy at Overton." "Is that a threat?" asked Grace quickly. Alberta merely shrugged her shoulders in answer to Grace's question. "You may call it what you please," remarked Mary Hampton sullenly. "Thank you," said Grace gravely. "I think I have a fair idea of the situation. I believe I know too, just how many sophomores were concerned in the writing of the letter, and am sure that their adverse opinion will neither make nor mar Miss Briggs. Good afternoon." With this Grace walked serenely out of the house, leaving behind her two discomfited and ignominiously defeated young women. "Do you believe she would have kept her word and put the matter before the class?" asked Mary Hampton after Grace had gone. "Yes," responded Alberta, frowning. "She wouldn't have hesitated. She meant what she said. She is one of those tiresome persons who is forever advocating fair play. She only does it as a pose. She imagines, I suppose that it will attract the attention of the upper class girls. I should like to teach her a lesson in humility, but it is dangerous, for with all her faults she is by no means stupid, and unless we were very careful we would be quite likely to come to grief." CHAPTER VIII THE SOPHOMORE RECEPTION It was the night of the sophomore reception and the gymnasium was ablaze with light and color. All day the valiant sophomore class had labored as decorators. Sofa cushions, portieres, screens and anything else that might add to the beauty of the decorations had been begged and borrowed from good-natured residents of the campus and nearby boarding houses. There were great branches of red and gold leaves festooning and hiding the gymnasium apparatus, and the respective sophomore and freshman colors of blue and gold were in evidence in every nook and corner of the big room. There was a real orchestra of eight pieces from the town of Overton, seated on a palm-screened platform which had been erected for the occasion; while a long line of freshmen in their best bib and tucker crowded up to pay their respects to the receiving line of sophomores, headed by the class president. The freshmen of Wayne Hall had elected to go together, and Ruth Denton had also been invited to take dinner and dress with Anne, then go with her and her friends to the reception. At first Ruth demurred on account of her gown, which was a very plain little affair of white dotted swiss. Then Grace had come to the rescue and insisted that Ruth should wear a very beautiful white satin ribbon belt with long, graceful ends, belonging to her, which quite transformed the simple frock. There was also a white satin hair ornament to match, and Miriam's clever fingers had done her soft brown hair in a new, becoming fashion. Even Elfreda had insisted on lending her a white opera cape and praising her appearance until the little girl was in a maze of delight at so much unexpected attention. Grace, Anne, and Miriam had put on their graduating gowns and Elfreda was arrayed in all the glory of the gown she had ordered for the occasion and afterward entertained so little hope of wearing. Just as they were ready to start the door bell rang. There was a sound of laughing voices and the patter of slippered feet on the stairs, and Mabel Ashe, accompanied by Frances Marlton, Constance Fuller, and two other juniors, appeared on the landing. "Better late than never," announced Mabel cheerily, as Grace appeared in the doorway. "We've come to take you to the reception. We weren't invited until the eleventh hour, but we're making up for lost time." "Why, I didn't know juniors were invited to the reception," exclaimed Grace, taking Mabel's extended hand in both her own. "Judging from all outward signs I suppose you are going to the reception, else why wear your costliest raiment?" "Your deduction is not only marvelous but correct," returned Mabel. "We were invited because the sophomores found themselves lacking not in quality, but quantity. There weren't nearly enough sophomore 'gentlemen' to go round, so we juniors were pressed into service. "I'm so glad," returned Grace warmly. "We know nearly all the freshmen, but we know only a few sophomores. We were lamenting to-night because we expected to be wall flowers." "Not if Frances and I can help it," promised Mabel. "Girls, I want you to meet Miss Graham and Miss Allen, both worthy juniors. You already know Constance." The "worthy juniors" nodded smilingly as Mabel presented Grace and her friends. "Get your capes and scarfs," directed Mabel briskly. "We must be on our way. I'm sure it's going to be a red-letter affair. The sophomores have nearly worked their dear heads off to impress the baby class. Do you girls all dance, and how many of you can lead?" "Miriam and I," answered Grace. "Anne is not tall enough. Elfreda and Ruth will have to answer for themselves." Ruth Denton confessed to being barely able to dance. Elfreda, who looked really handsome in her blue evening gown, answered in the affirmative. Grace noted with secret satisfaction that the stout girl was keeping strictly in the background and making no effort to push herself forward. "If she only behaves like that all evening the girls will be sure to like her, and if anything comes up later about this registrar business there won't be such fuss made over it," Grace reflected. "Come on, Grace!" Frances Marlton's merry tones broke in on Grace's reflections. "I'm going to be your faithful cavalier. I'll offer you my arm as soon as we get downstairs. We never could walk two abreast in state down these stairs." Grace followed Frances's lead, smiling happily. Julia Graham, a rather stout, pleasant-faced young woman in pink messaline, bowed to Miriam. Anne found herself accepting the arm of Edith Allen, while Constance Fuller took charge of Ruth Denton. The crowning honor fell to J. Elfreda, for Mabel Ashe walked up to her, slipped her arm in that of the astonished girl, saying impressively, "May I have the pleasure, Miss Briggs?" The little party fairly bubbled over with high spirits as they set out for the gymnasium in couples, but to Elfreda the world was gayest rose color. To be escorted to the reception by the most popular girl in college was an honor of which she had never dreamed. Only a few days before she had resigned all hope of even going, but through the magic of Grace Harlowe she was among the elect. For almost the first time in her self-centered young life, she was swept by a wholly generous impulse to do the best that lay within her in college if only for Grace's sake. While she listened to Mabel's gay sallies, answering them almost shyly, her mind was on the debt of gratitude she owed Grace, who, without mentioning her visit to Alberta Wicks, had assured her that she had made inquiry and found that the letter was not the work of the sophomore class as a body. Grace had refused to voice even a suspicion regarding the writer's identity, but had so strongly advised Elfreda to pay no attention to the cowardly warning, but attend the reception as though nothing had happened, that the stout girl had taken her advice. Grace was now quietly jubilant over the way things had turned out. She was so glad Mabel had chosen Elfreda. "I wonder how she knew," she said half aloud. "How who knew, and what did she know?" inquired Frances quickly. "Nothing," replied Grace, in sudden confusion. "I was just wondering." "I know what you were wondering and I'll tell you. A certain junior who is a friend of a certain sophomore told Mabel certain things." "Frances, you are a wizard!" exclaimed Grace in a low tone. "How did you know of what I was thinking?" "The question is," replied Frances, "do you understand me?" "I think I know who the sophomore is," hesitated Grace, "but I don't understand about the junior." "And I can't tell you," replied Frances gravely. "I can only say that Mabel likes you very much, Grace, and that a certain junior who is fond of Mabel is jealous of your friendship. Both Mabel and I admire your stand in the other matter. You are measuring up to college standards, my dear, and I am sure you will be an honor to 19----." Frances finished her flattering prediction just as they stepped inside the doorway of the gymnasium. Before Grace had time to reply they found themselves among a bevy of daintily gowned girls that were forming in line to pay their respects to the president of the sophomore class and five of her classmates who formed the receiving party. After this formality was over the girls walked about the gymnasium, admiring the decorations. Mabel Ashe was fairly overwhelmed by her admirers. It seemed to Grace as though she attracted more attention than the receiving party itself. It was: "Mabel, dear, dance the first waltz with me;" "Come and drink lemonade with us, Queen Mab," and "Why, you dear Mabel, I might have known the sophomores couldn't get along without you." "She knows every girl in college, I believe," remarked Anne to Edith Allen, as Mabel stood laughing and talking animatedly, the center of an admiring group. "Every one loves her from the faculty down," replied Edith. "She hadn't been here six weeks as a freshman until the whole class was sending her violets and asking her out to dinners. She was elected president of the freshman class, too, and had the honor of refusing the sophomore nomination. They want her for junior president, but she will refuse that nomination, too. She is as unselfish and unspoiled as the day she came here and the most sympathetic girl I have ever known. We are all madly jealous of Frances." Anne smiled at this statement. "It is nice to be liked," she said simply. "That is the way it is with Grace at home." "I'm not surprised," replied Edith, regarding Grace critically. "She has a fine face. That Miss Nesbit seems nice, too. She is a beauty, isn't she?" Anne replied happily in the affirmative. To her praise of her two dearest friends was as the sweetest music. "Shall we dance?" said Edith, rising and offering her arm in her most manly fashion. A moment later the two girls joined the dancers, who were circling the floor with more or less grace to the strains of a waltz. "What kind of a time are you having?" asked Grace an hour later as she and Miriam met in front of one of the lemonade bowls. "I'm enjoying it ever so much," was the enthusiastic answer. "I've met a lot of sophomores that I've been wanting to know, and they have been so nice to me. Have you seen Elfreda lately?" "No," said Grace with a guilty start. "I've been having such a good time I forgot her. Let's go and find her now." The two began a slow promenade of the room in search of the missing girl. Suddenly Grace clutched her friend's arm. "Look over there, Miriam!" she exclaimed. Seated on a divan beside Mabel Ashe and surrounded by half a dozen sophomores was J. Elfreda. She was talking animatedly and the girls were urging her on with laughter and cries of "Now show us how some one else in Fairview looks." "What do you suppose she is saying?" wondered Miriam. "Let's go over." They neared the group just in time to hear Elfreda say, "The president of the Fairview suffragist league." Then her round face set as though turned to stone. Her eyes took on a determined glare, and drawing down the corners of her mouth she elevated her chin, rose from the divan and shrilled forth "Votes for Women" in a tone that fairly convulsed her hearers. Then suddenly catching sight of Grace and Miriam she sat down abruptly and said with an embarrassed gesture of dismissal, "The show's over. I see my friends are looking for me. I'll have to go." "You funny, funny girl!" exclaimed Mabel Ashe. "What a treasure you'll be when we give college entertainments. You'll make the Dramatic Club some day." "Nothing like it," returned Elfreda, resorting to slang in her embarrassment. "Where did you ever learn to mimic people so cleverly?" asked one sophomore. "Oh, I don't know," replied Elfreda almost rudely. "I've imitated folks ever since I was a kid--little girl," she corrected. "You said you'd waltz with me to-night, Miriam, so come on. That's a Strauss waltz, and I don't want to miss it. Please excuse me," she said, turning to the assembled girls. She was making a desperate effort to be polite when she preferred to be rude. "Mabel Ashe, you're the dearest girl," Grace burst forth as the little crowd dissolved and strolled off in different directions. "You have been lovely to Elfreda, and instead of her evening being spoiled, you know what I mean, she has actually made a sensation." "I am not the only one who has been looking out for J. Elfreda's interests," reminded Mabel. "I am glad that she has this talent. It will help her to make friends with the girls, and if nothing more is said about the registrar affair she will soon have a following of her own." "Do you think anything more will be said?" asked Grace anxiously. "Not if I can help it," was the response. It was almost midnight when, after seeing Ruth Denton home, the four girls climbed the steps of Wayne Hall. "It was lovely, wasn't it, Anne?" declared Grace as she slipped into her kimono and began taking the pins from her hair. "Yes," said Anne with a half sigh. She was deliberating as to whether she had better tell Grace a disturbing bit of conversation she had overheard. After all it wasn't worth repeating. She had simply heard one freshman say to another that she had been prepared to like Miss Harlowe, but something she had heard had caused her to change her mind. Anne suspected that in some way Elfreda's troubles had been shifted to Grace's shoulders. CHAPTER IX DISAGREEABLE NEWS "Hurrah!" cried Miriam Nesbit gleefully, coming into the living room of Wayne Hall where Grace sat at the old-fashioned library table absorbed in writing a theme for next day's composition class. "What's happened?" asked Grace curiously, looking up from her writing. "We're to go over to Exeter Field to-morrow for a try out in basketball. I do hope we'll both make the team." "So do I," agreed Grace promptly. "But there are so many girls that we may not be even chosen as subs. Besides, our playing may not compare with that of some of the others." "Nonsense," returned Miriam stoutly. "Your playing would stand out anywhere, Grace, even on a boys' team. I consider myself a fair player, too," she added, flushing a little. "I should say you are!" exclaimed Grace. "Who told you about the try out?" "It's on the bulletin board. I don't see how you missed it." "I didn't look at the bulletin board this morning. I meant to, then something else took my attention, and I forgot all about it." The "something else" had been the extremely frigid manner in which two freshmen she particularly liked had greeted her as she caught up with them on the way to her Livy class that morning. Grace wondered not a little at this cavalier treatment, but could arrive at no satisfactory conclusion regarding it. She finally tried to dismiss the matter by ascribing it to over-sensitiveness on her part, but every now and then it haunted her like an offending spectre. "I always look at the bulletin board, no matter what happens," declared Miriam emphatically. "I must hurry upstairs and impart the glorious news to Elfreda. We had elected to spend Saturday afternoon in moving our furniture about, hoping to gain a few square inches of room space, but we'll have to postpone doing it. We can do it the first rainy Saturday. Hurry along with your paper and come upstairs. I'm going to make tea, and I've acquired a new kind of cakes. They're chocolate covered and taste like home and mother." After Miriam had gone upstairs Grace sat staring at her theme with unseeing eyes. Disagreeable thoughts would come, and try as she might she could not drive them away. She had been snubbed and she could not forget it. Giving herself a little impatient shake she turned her attention to her theme and went on writing rapidly. Half an hour later she folded it neatly, placed it inside one of her books, and went slowly upstairs. She found Miriam, Anne and Elfreda seated on the floor deep in tea drinking. Before them was a plate piled high with the new kind of cakes, and a five-pound box of candy that Elfreda had received from New York that morning. "Sit down here, Grace," invited Anne, making room for her friend. "Give her some tea this minute, Miriam. She is a working woman and needs nourishment. Did you finish your theme, dear?" Grace nodded. Then taking the cup Miriam offered she dropped two lumps of sugar in it, and began drinking her tea in silence. "What's the matter, Grace?" asked Anne anxiously. "Nothing," replied Grace. "I feel reflective. I suppose that's why I haven't anything to say. Did Miriam tell you about the basketball try out on Exeter Field?" "Yes; but not for mine--I mean--I'm not interested in basketball," amended Elfreda, hastily. "I tell you this trying to cut out slang is no idle dream." There was a shout of laughter from the three girls. "Now, see here," bristled the stout girl. "You needn't laugh at me. What I meant was that--that it is very difficult to refrain from the use of slang," finished Elfreda with such affected primness that the laughter broke forth afresh. "Humph!" she ejaculated disgustedly. "I don't see anything to laugh at. Goodness knows I'm trying hard to break myself of the habit." "Of course you are," sympathized Anne. "We aren't laughing at you. It was the funny way you ended your last sentence." Elfreda's face relaxed into a good-natured grin. "I am funny sometimes," she admitted calmly. "Even Pa, who doesn't smile once a year, says so." "I must go," said Anne, rising. "I haven't looked at my history lesson, and it is frightfully long, too." "I'll go with you," announced Grace. "I must mend my blue serge dress. I stepped on it while going upstairs this morning and tore it just above the hem. I had to change it for this, and was almost late for chapel." "I waited for you in the hall as long as I could," said Anne. "I meant to ask you what happened, but forgot it. Grace, what do you suppose Elfreda said before you came upstairs?" "I can't possibly guess," rejoined Grace. "J. Elfreda's remarks are varied and startling." The two girls were now in their own room. "These are nice ones," averred Anne. "She said that you and Miriam and I were the first girls she'd ever cared much about. She said that she had never tried to do anything to please any one but herself until she came here. Then when you stood up for her, and fixed things so she could go to the reception, she said she held up her right hand and swore to herself that she'd try to be worthy of our friendship. That's why she's trying not to use slang, and to be more generous. She keeps her things in order, too. You noticed how nice everything looked to-day." "Miriam, not I, is responsible for the change," said Grace. "She is a born diplomat. She knows exactly how to proceed with J. Elfreda. I hope there won't be anything more said about the registrar affair, though. I want Elfreda to like college better every day." "Grace," said Anne hesitatingly, "if I tell you something, will you promise not to worry over it?" "What do you mean?" asked Grace quickly, a puzzled look in her eyes. "I can't promise not to worry until I know that there's nothing to worry over. If you have heard something disagreeable about me, I'm not afraid to listen." "I know it," said Anne. Then she went on almost abruptly. "I heard two freshmen talking about you the other night at the reception. One of them said that she had been prepared to like you, but had heard something that had caused her to change her mind." Anne looked distressed. For a moment Grace sat very still. "Oh, dear!" lamented Anne. "I'm sorry I told you. Now I've hurt your feelings." "Nonsense!" retorted Grace stoutly. "It will take more than that to hurt my feelings. I am beginning to see a light, however. At the reception the other night Frances told me that Mabel had heard about my call at Stuart Hall from a senior who is a friend of a certain sophomore. Now, that sophomore is either Miss Wicks or Miss Hampton. It looks as though these two girls were not willing to let bygones be bygones. I haven't the slightest idea what they may have said about me, but I am sure they must have circulated some untruthful report among the freshmen. I don't like to accuse any one of being untruthful, but I am quite sure that I have done nothing reprehensible. Now that you have told me I'm going to watch closely. If a number of the girls snub me, I shall know that it is serious." "Then you will fight for your rights, won't you?" pleaded Anne. "It isn't fair that you should be misjudged for trying to help Elfreda." "I don't know," replied Grace doubtfully. "It might not be worth while. I have a theory that if one is right with one's conscience nothing else matters." Anne shook her head dubiously. "That won't protect you from unpleasantness unless the girls think so, too. Our freshman year is our foundation year, and if we allow any one even to think that we are not putting our best material into it, the shadow is likely to follow us to the very threshold of graduation. It is easy enough to start a rumor but once let it gain headway, it is almost impossible to check it. Nearly all of your sophomore year in high school was spoiled through standing up for me. That's why I'm so determined to make you look out for your own interests." While Anne was earnestly urging Grace to action, Grace was frantically rummaging in her closet for her blue dress. It was several minutes before she found it. If the blue dress could have spoken it would have borne witness to the fact that its owner dashed her hand suspiciously across her eyes before emerging from the closet with it over her arm. CHAPTER X THE MAKING OF THE TEAM Saturday dawned clear and sunshiny. It was an ideal autumn day, and luncheon at Wayne Hall was eaten rapidly. Everyone was eager to give an opinion regarding the basketball try out, and with one or two exceptions each girl cherished the secret hope of making the team. Anne was one of the exceptions. She had no basketball yearnings. She was ready and willing to be an enthusiastic and loyal fan, but aside from walking and dancing she had no desire to take an active part in college sports. She was extremely proud of Miriam's and Grace's fine playing, however, and never doubted for an instant that both girls would make the team. "I'm sure you and Miriam will be chosen," she asserted to Grace, as the latter stood before her mirror, viewing herself in her new felt walking hat, that had arrived that morning. The two friends had run up to their room after luncheon to hurry into their coats and hats, preparatory to going to Exeter Field. Anne eyed Grace admiringly. "Your new hat is so becoming," she said. "I think yours is ever so pretty, too," returned Grace. "It looks like new. No one would know that you bought it last season. You take such good care of your clothes, Anne. I wish I could take as good care of mine. I hang them up and keep them in repair, but somehow they just wear out all at once." "Don't stop to mourn over wearing out your clothes on this gala day," laughed Miriam Nesbit, who had appeared in the open door in time to hear Grace's plaintive assertion. She was wearing a becoming suit of blue and a blue hat to match. "Where's Elfreda?" asked Grace. "She's going, too, isn't she?" Miriam nodded, then said slyly, "If she ever gets ready." Just then an anguished voice called out, "Miriam, please come back. That pin you fastened in the back of my waist is sticking me and I can't reach it." Miriam flew to the rescue, smothering an involuntary laugh as she ran. Five minutes later she and Elfreda, in a new brown suit and hat, wearing the expression of a martyr, joined Grace and Anne on the veranda, and the four set out for Exeter Field. "I'm not going to talk about certain things to-day, Grace, but did you notice that all the girls at our table were as nice with you as ever?" said Anne in a low tone. "Yes; I noticed it," returned Grace. "If they continue to be the same, I shall think that we have been making a mountain of a molehill." "Look at that crowd ahead of us," called Miriam. A veritable procession of girls wound its way up the hilly street to Exeter Field. There were big girls and little girls, all talking and laughing happily, until the still October air rang with the sound of their gay, young voices. The majority of them were well-dressed, although here and there might be seen a last year's hat or coat that no one seemed to notice or to mind. Overton had a reputation for democracy in spite of the fact that most of its students came from homes where there was no lack of money. Arriving at the field the four girls followed the crowd, which for the most part made for a long, low building at one end of the field. "Where are they going?" asked Grace. "For ice cream, of course," replied a young woman who stood near enough to overhear Grace's question. "Oh, I want some ice cream," piped up Elfreda. "Very well, my child, you shall have it," said Miriam in a grave, motherly tone. The young woman who had answered Grace's question glanced at Miriam with twinkling eyes. Then she smiled broadly. That smile warmed Grace's heart. "Won't you come with us?" she asked. "Thank you, I believe I will," she replied. "I think I have the advantage. I know you are Miss Harlowe, but you don't know me. My name is Gertrude Wells, and I am a freshman, too. Now, suppose you introduce your little friends, and we'll go over to the club restaurant. I was waiting for my chum, but she has evidently deserted me." Grace decided that she liked Miss Wells better than any other freshman she had met. She had a dry, humorous way of saying things that kept them all in a gale of laughter. Elfreda, too, seemed especially interested in her, and exerted herself to please. After their second ice all around they strolled over to where the manager of the college athletics association was marshaling the candidates for the try out. Grace and Miriam hurried off to the training quarters at one end of the field to put on their gymnasium suits. The girls who wished to play were formed into teams and tried out against one another and the most promising of the players ordered to step off to one side after having lined up for play three times. It was after four o'clock when Grace and Miriam were called to the field. The long wait had made Grace rather nervous. Miriam, however, was cool and self-possessed, and played with snap and vigor. "I don't know what ails me," said Grace despairingly, as she and Miriam stood waiting for the next line up. "I didn't play my best. I tried to, but I couldn't." "You're nervous," rejoined Miriam. "Just make yourself believe you are back in the gym at home and you can show them some star playing." "I will," promised Grace. "See if I don't." It was after five o'clock before the last ambitious freshman had been given a chance to display her basketball prowess or lack of it. Grace had made good her word and forgetting her nervousness had played with the old-time dash and skill that had won fame for her in her high-school days. Her playing had elicited cries of approval from those watching and she had the satisfaction of hearing, "You play an excellent game, Miss Harlowe," from the manager. Miriam, after her third trial, also received her full measure of applause, and flushed and happy the two girls clasped hands delightedly when they received word that they were to report for practice at four o'clock Monday afternoon. As they were leaving the field to go to the training shed Gertrude Wells hurried toward them. "Miss Harlowe," she called, "please wait a minute." Grace paused obediently while Miriam and Anne walked on ahead. "Will you and your friends, Miss Nesbit, Miss Briggs and Miss Pierson, come over to Morton Hall to-night at half-past seven o'clock. I have invited a number of my freshmen friends, and I'd love to have you come, too. It's Saturday night you know, so you won't have to worry about recitations to-morrow." "Thank you," replied Grace. "I will come with pleasure. Girls," she called to the three ahead, "come back here." Gertrude repeated her invitation, which was instantly accepted. "Be sure to come early," was her parting admonition. "This is our first freshman invitation," remarked Grace after Gertrude had left them. "I'm so glad. I had begun to think we would never get acquainted with the rest of our class." "I understand that 19---- is the largest class Overton has ever had," said Anne. "All the more reason why we should be proud of it," declared Miriam quickly. "I wonder what they'll have to eat," said Elfreda reflectively. A derisive giggle greeted this remark. "Well, you needn't laugh," retorted Elfreda good-naturedly. "I didn't say that because I'm so fond of eating. I was just wondering whether it would be worth while to eat supper or not." "Take my advice and eat your supper, Elfreda," laughed Anne. "I have an idea that we shall be fed on plowed field, fudge or something equally nourishing." "Humph!" commented Elfreda. "That's just about what I thought. I hope we have something sour for supper to-night. I'm getting tired of sweet stuff. It's frightfully fattening, too." "What on earth has come over you, Elfreda," laughed Grace. "I thought you were devoted to chocolate and bonbons." "I was," confessed Elfreda, "until I saw you and Miriam play basketball this afternoon. I was crazy to play, too. But imagine how I'd look on the field. I couldn't run six yards without puffing. I'm going to try to get thinner, and perhaps some day I can make the team, too." CHAPTER XI ANNE WINS A VICTORY The pleasurable excitement of making the team and receiving the invitation to the spread had driven all thought of the conversation overheard by Anne from Grace's mind. Above all things Grace wished if possible to establish friendly relations with every member of her class. Now that she and her friends were invited to Morton House they would meet a number of new girls. The Morton House girls had the reputation of being both jolly and hospitable. Grace had the feeling that so far they had made little or no social headway among their classmates. Aside from Ruth Denton and the students at Wayne Hall they knew practically no other freshmen. "This spread will help us to get in touch with some of the girls we don't know," she confided to Anne while dressing that night for the party. "I hope so," replied Anne. "We seem to be rather slow about making friends here at Overton; that is, among the freshmen. We really know more upper class girls, don't we?" "Yes," assented Grace. "But after to-night things will be different." It was only a few minutes' walk to Morton House and the four girls enjoyed the brief stroll. "I wonder if we're too early," said Grace, consulting her watch. "It lacks three minutes of being half-past seven. That's Morton House, isn't it?" pointing at the substantial brick house just ahead of them. The little party climbed the stone steps. Miriam rang the bell. Almost instantly the door opened and Gertrude Wells smilingly ushered them into the hall. "So glad you have come," she said. "All the other girls are here." "We need not have been afraid of being too early, then," laughed Grace. "Hardly," smiled Gertrude, "the majority of us live here. There are twenty freshmen in this house, and we invited ten more from outside. Thirty girls in all, but the living room is large enough to hold us, and Mrs. Kane doesn't mind if we make a good deal of noise. Come upstairs to my room and take off your wraps. Then we'll join the crowd." A little later they followed their hostess downstairs to the big living room, that seemed fairly overflowing with girls. The buzz of conversation ceased as they entered. Gertrude introduced them one after another to the assembled crowd of young women, who received them with varying degrees of cordiality. Anne's observant eyes noted that one group of girls in the corner barely acknowledged the introduction. She also noted that the two freshmen whose conversation she had overheard at the reception formed the center of that group. The four girls found seats at one end of the room and the conversation began again louder than ever. Grace and Miriam found themselves surrounded by half a dozen girls who were eager to know where they had learned to play basketball. Elfreda espied two freshmen who recited history in the same class with her and was soon deep in conversation with them. Anne, being left to her own devices, sat quietly watching the throng of animated faces around her. With her, the study of faces was a favorite pastime, and she furtively watched the little knot of girls, whose lack of cordiality had been so noticeable to her. They were carrying on a low-toned conversation among themselves, and by the frequent glances that were being cast first in the direction of Grace, then Elfreda, Anne knew that the story of Elfreda's report to the registrar was being talked over. Anne felt her anger rising. Why should Grace be made to suffer for Elfreda's mistake, and why should Elfreda have her freshman year spoiled on account of that mistake. Of course, no one liked a tale bearer, but Elfreda would never again tell tales. Besides, why should the freshmen undertake to champion the cause of two sophomores, unless the latter had entirely misrepresented things? Anne could never tell what prompted her to rise and stroll over to the group. The young women were so busily engaged in their conversation that they did not notice her approach. Anne heard one of them say in a disgusted tone, "I can't understand why Gertrude invited them. She knows we dislike them." "She seems very friendly with them," grumbled another girl. "If I had known they were to be here I should have stayed upstairs or gone out rather than meet them. They showed extremely bad taste accepting Gertrude's invitation." "Perhaps they don't know that we are down on them," suggested a pale-faced girl rather timidly. "Of course they know it," sputtered one of the two disgruntled freshmen. "Nell and I almost cut that Miss Harlowe the other morning. Don't try to stand up for her, Lillian. She and that Miss Briggs are beneath the notice of the really nice girls here. Overton doesn't want bullies and tale-bearers. They're not in accordance with college spirit." The contempt with which these words were uttered stung Anne to action. Stepping forward she said quietly, although her eyes flashed, "Pardon me, but I could not help hearing what you said. Will you permit me to speak a few words in defense of my friend, Grace Harlowe?" An astonished silence fell over the group of girls. Before one of them had time to recover from her surprise at Anne's intrusion, she began to speak in low tones that attracted no attention outside themselves, but whose earnestness carried conviction to those listening: "You are evidently not in possession of the true account of what happened to Miss Briggs the day she came to Overton. You know, perhaps, that two sophomores took advantage of her verdancy and hazed her. Perhaps they neglected to state, however, that they accepted her invitation to eat ice cream before they returned her hospitality by conducting her to the hall of a public building where they left her to wait for the registrar. Considering the fact that she was tired from her long ride, and had had no supper, I think it was an extremely poor exhibition of the much vaunted Overton spirit. It was late that night before she reached her boarding house. She was naturally indignant and next day reported the matter to the registrar. This, I must admit, was unwise on her part. She is very sorry, now, that she did so." "All this is not news to us," snapped Marian Cummings, one of the two freshmen Anne had overheard at the reception. She stared insolently at Anne. "But what I am about to tell you will perhaps surprise you," Anne answered evenly. "Miss Briggs received a note purporting to come from the whole sophomore class. The writer of the note threatened her with vague penalties if she attended the sophomore reception, and practically ordered her to leave college." The girls looked at one another without answering. This silence showed only too plainly that this was indeed news. "Miss Briggs showed the letter to Miss Nesbit, her roommate, and to Miss Harlowe," Anne continued composedly. "She was heartbroken over it and would have left Overton if Miss Harlowe had not persuaded her to stay. Miss Harlowe did a little investigating on her own account. She suspected two sophomores of being responsible for the letter, believing the rest of the class knew nothing about it. She called on the two young women and forced them to admit their knowledge of the note. Both denied writing it. It is evident that they have misrepresented matters among their friends. As far as Grace Harlowe is concerned she is utterly incapable of doing a mean or dishonorable act. We were classmates in high school and she was beloved by all who knew her." Anne paused and glanced almost appealingly around the circle of tense faces. Then Elizabeth Wade, the other hostile freshman, said slowly: "Girls, I am inclined to think we have been imposed upon. Miss Pierson, I will be perfectly frank with you. We knew nothing about the note. Personally, I consider it an outrageous thing to do, and in direct violation of what we are taught regarding college spirit. Briefly, what we did hear was that Miss Briggs had reported two sophomores for playing an innocent trick on her, and that Miss Harlowe had urged her to do so. Also that Miss Harlowe had visited the two upper classmen and, after rating them in a very ill-bred manner, had ordered them to apologize to Miss Briggs." Anne smiled. "I can't help smiling," she apologized. "If you knew Grace as I know her, you'd smile, too." Marian Cummings's face softened. "I do wish to know her, now," she smiled. "After what you've told us I think the rest of us feel the same. I'm glad you made us listen to you, Miss Pierson." "So am I," "and I," agreed the other girls. Anne's face flushed with joy at her victory. "I hope 19---- will be the best class Overton has ever turned out," she said simply, "and I hope that any misunderstandings that may arise will be cleared away as easily as this one has been." "Suppose we go over and congratulate Miss Harlowe on her playing this afternoon," proposed a tall freshman, "and we might incidentally pay our respects to Miss Briggs. We must help her to live up to her good resolutions, you know," she added slyly. Anne was in a maze of delight at her success. The other guests had been so busily engaged with their own little groups, no one of them had overheard Anne's defense of her friend. Grace, who was giving an eager account of the famous game that won her team the championship during her sophomore year at high school, looked up in surprise at the crowd of merry girls which suddenly surrounded her. For an instant she looked amazed, then smiled at them in the frank, straightforward fashion that always made friends for her. Gertrude Wells, who, with three other freshmen, had been in the kitchen preparing the refreshments, appeared in the door just in time to see the girls surround Grace. She smiled contentedly, and nodding to the fluffy-haired little girl standing beside her said gleefully: "What did I tell you? Look in there." The fluffy-haired little girl obeyed. "How did you do it?" was the quick answer. "They did it themselves. I just did the inviting and they did the rest. Of course there was a certain amount of chance that they wouldn't get together, but it was worth taking. After meeting her this afternoon I felt sure that the girls were wrong, but I wished them to find out for themselves. How it happened, I don't know, but we are sure to hear the story after the party is over." While Gertrude Wells was congratulating herself on the success of her experiment, Grace Harlowe was remarking to Miriam Nesbit that she thought Gertrude Wells would be an ideal president from 19---- and that she intended pointing out this fact to the freshmen of Wayne Hall. CHAPTER XII UPS AND DOWNS At breakfast the next morning Grace began her campaign, and she continued to sing Gertrude Wells's praises when she encountered a group of her freshmen friends after the services. Then Anne, Miriam, Elfreda and she went for a stroll down College Street and into Vinton's for ices. Here they encountered quite a delegation of girls from Morton House, among whom was Gertrude herself, and a great deal of mysterious intriguing went on behind that young woman's back, who, quite unconscious of the honor about to be thrust upon her, was telling her chum that she thought Grace Harlowe would make a good president for 19----. On her way home Grace exclaimed delightedly: "Look across the street, girls! There is Mabel Ashe. Let's go over and speak to her." Suiting the action to the word the four girls hurried across the street to greet their favorite. Mabel smiled pleasantly, stretching forth a welcoming hand, but the young woman with her regarded their presence as an intrusion and glared her displeasure at the newcomers. "How do you do, Miss Alden?" ventured Grace politely, but Miss Alden stared over her head and with a frigid, "Really, Mabel, under the circumstances, you'll have to excuse my leaving you," she turned and marched off in the other direction. "I suppose we are the circumstances," said Grace, with a faint smile. She was furiously angry at the unlooked-for snub, but refused to show it. Anne looked distressed, Miriam was frowning, while Elfreda glowered savagely. "Don't mind what she says," soothed Mabel. "She feels awfully cross this afternoon because she has met with a disappointment. She has an invitation to a Pi Kappa Gamma dance and she has been refused permission to go. Result, she is in a raging, tearing humor." "But I thought one could always go to a fraternity dance if properly chaperoned," remarked Grace innocently. "One can," mimicked Mabel, "if one doesn't ask permission to go too often, and if one has no conditions to work off. Now, you see why Mistress Beatrice is obliged to languish at home while the man who invited her will no doubt have to invite some other girl, who is lucky enough to have no conditions." "Isn't it rather early in the year to be conditioned?" asked Miriam. "Yes, but Beatrice has been cutting classes ever since she came back this year," confided Mabel. "I am not betraying a confidence in telling you this. She admits that she neglects her work. She says she is going to settle down after mid-year's exams and work." "I think she's about the most snobbish proposition I ever came across," announced Elfreda. "It would serve her right if she did flunk in her examinations. I hope with all my heart she falls down with an awful bump." Elfreda had forgotten her former aspirations toward cultivating the true college spirit. "You mustn't wish even your bitterest enemy bad luck," smiled Mabel Ashe. "Superstitious people say that the bad luck will be visited on the head of the one who wishes it." "I'm not superstitious," retorted Elfreda. "Of course, I believe that pins cut friendship, and that it's bad luck to see the new moon through the window, or to walk under a ladder. It's a sure sign of death to break a looking glass or dream of white flowers, too, and to drop a spoon means certain disappointment, but aside from a few little things like that, I certainly don't believe in signs." "Oh, no, you don't believe in signs," chorused the girls, in gleeful sarcasm. "Well, I don't," reiterated Elfreda. "That is, not a whole lot of them." "Good-bye, children, I must leave you at this corner," announced Mabel. "Come and see me soon. I'll look you up the first evening I have free." "I should think that Miss Alden would hate herself," remarked Elfreda scornfully, as she marched along beside Grace. "She hates you, that's sure enough." "Nonsense, why should Miss Alden hate me? You are letting your imagination run away with you, Elfreda," laughed Grace. "Don't you believe it," declared Elfreda doggedly. "She doesn't like you, because Mabel likes you, and she likes Mabel. Some one told me the other day that she can't bear to have Mabel look cross-eyed at any other girl here. She claims that it's because she loves her so much, but I think it's because she wants to have the most popular girl at Overton for her friend," finished the stout girl shrewdly. "What shall we do this afternoon?" called Miriam Nesbit over her shoulder. "Go on boosting our candidate," laughed Anne. "Let us go for a walk after dinner. We will call on Ruth Denton. Then we'll take her with us to Morton House. That will be a nice way for her to meet the Morton House girls. While we are there we can find out how the land lies. Then we will take Ruth home with us for supper and the rest of the evening, if she doesn't have to study." At the dinner table that day Grace again introduced the subject of the class election and was pleased to note that her suggestion regarding Gertrude Wells as the best possible choice for class president had borne fruit. The two sophomores at the table who had been through two class elections, having just elected their president, smiled tolerantly at the excitement exhibited by the "babies," and advised them not to elect in haste and repent at leisure. "Why don't you children find out something about what the rest of the class think before you rush into electing Miss Wells, just to please two or three girls?" asked Virginia Gaines, the sophomore who had assiduously cultivated the acquaintance of Elfreda--then dropped her at the first sign of trouble. "We sophomores wouldn't allow ourselves to be influenced by cliques. We consider the good of the class of more importance than the good of any individual member." She smiled disagreeably at Grace, who looked at her steadily, then said, "Was your remark intended for me and my friends, Miss Gaines?" "Not necessarily," flung back the sophomore, "unless you feel that it applies to you and to them." "No, I don't believe it does," declared Grace with a quiet smile. "In fact, I quite agree with you in saying that the good of the class should always come first. That is why we are all anxious to nominate Miss Wells for president of 19----." A dull flush rose to Virginia Gaines's sallow face. She was not quick-witted and could think of no reply. The other freshmen at the table were taking no pains to disguise their glee at Grace's retort. Virginia's sarcastic comment had proved a boomerang and she had gained nothing by launching it. She hurried through with her dessert and left the table without another word, casting a half malignant look at Grace as she went. "Virginia's mad, And I am glad," sang a freshman softly as the door banged. "Please, don't," said Grace soberly. "I'm sorry she's angry, but I couldn't help it. I seem always fated to arouse sophomore ire." "I wouldn't mind a little thing like that," comforted Elfreda. "I'd rather be the enemy than the friend of some girls." "But I don't want to be the enemy of any girl," declared Grace, looking almost appealingly about the table. "Of course you don't," soothed Emma Dean, a tall, near-sighted girl at the end of the table, who had the reputation of making brilliant recitations. "You couldn't antagonize the rest of us if you tried. That is, unless you deliberately broke my glasses." A shout of laughter went up from the table. Virginia Gaines, who had lingered in the hall, heard it, and her face darkened. In spite of Grace's declaration for peace she had made an enemy. CHAPTER XIII GRACE TURNS ELECTIONEER Directly after dinner that afternoon, the four girls, looking very smart in their new fall suits and hats, set out for Ruth's. They found her seated at her little table eating a very humble dinner of her own cooking. "I'm sorry I can't offer you anything to eat. I have 'licked the platter clean,' you see. But won't you have some tea? I think I have cups enough to go round, only I'm afraid I haven't enough saucers." "Thank you," began Elfreda, "but--" then a warning pinch from Miriam caused her to eye the latter reproachfully and subside. "We'd love to have tea with you," smiled Miriam. "Wouldn't we, girls?" Elfreda, who had divined the reason for the pinch, said "yes" with the others, and Ruth bustled about with pink cheeks and a delicious air of importance. She took down from the cupboard shelf a box of Nabiscos that she had been treasuring for some such occasion as the present, placing them on a little hand-painted plate, the only piece of china she possessed. When the tea was made the guests emptied the little tea-pot and ate all of the Nabiscos, to the intense satisfaction of their hostess, to whom entertaining was a new and delightful pastime. "Now, you must put on your wraps and go with us," commanded Grace, setting her cup on the table. "We are going to Morton House to make our party call. The future president of 19---- lives there. That is, we think she is the future president and we hope to make others think so, too." Ruth obediently went to the closet where her plain little hat and shabby, old-style coat hung. She looked hesitatingly from the smartly tailored suits of her guests to her own well-worn coat, then with a proud little lifting of her head, she took it down and began putting it on. During their walk to Morton House the girls met several freshmen they knew, and these were faithfully interviewed as to their preference in the matter of 19----'s president. To Grace's delight none of them had made any choice in regard to candidates, so her glowing remarks as to Gertrude Wells's ability to make a good president fell on fertile soil. Fortune favored them, for when they reached Morton House they found Miss Wells out and two-thirds of the girls downstairs in the living room listening to the new songs that the curly-haired little girl at the piano had received from New York the day before. She was in the middle of one when the girls entered the room. Grace held up a warning finger and pointed to the piano. The song ended several notes short and the little girl turned her head toward her audience, saying, "I knew some one came in." "Won't you sing for us?" asked Anne, who loved music. The little girl's voice reminded her of Nora O'Malley's, and Nora's singing had always been a source of delight to Anne. "Not now," smiled the singer. "I wish to talk, but I'll sing for you later." "We came over this afternoon," said Grace to the girl sitting next to her, "to find out who Morton House wants for president. We would like to have Miss Wells----" Grace was interrupted by a little cry of delight. The girl sprang to her feet and cried, "Hear! hear!" Then she took Grace by the shoulders and laughingly commanded, "Arise, occupy the center of the room and tell the girls what you have just told me." Before she knew it Grace was standing in the middle of the room, earnestly advocating Gertrude Wells's cause, while the Morton House girls were making as much demonstration as was considered decorous on Sunday. Grace concluded with, "I'm quite sure that every girl at Morton House will vote for Miss Wells and every freshman at Wayne Hall, too. Before class meeting next Friday I hope to be able to convince the majority of 19---- that they will make no mistake in voting for Miss Wells." Grace sat down amid subdued applause, and every one began talking to her neighbor about the coming election. Ruth Denton listened to the gay chatter with shining eyes. She had forgotten all about her shabby suit. Presently the curly-haired little girl came over and sat down beside her, asking her if she liked college. Ruth looked admiringly at the little girl, whose dainty gown, silk stockings and smart pumps bespoke luxury, and answered earnestly that she liked it better every day. "You must come and see me," said the curly-haired little girl, whose name was Arline Thayer. "We recite Livy in the same section, so we have something in common to grumble about. Isn't the lesson for to-morrow terrific, though?" "I haven't looked at it to-day," confessed Ruth happily. "I study hard on Sunday as a rule, but to-day is the first time, you see----" Ruth hesitated. "I see," said Arline kindly. "Hereafter you mustn't study all day on Sunday. You must come and take dinner with me next Sunday and stay all afternoon. Promise, now, that you'll come." "Oh, thank you. I'd love to come," stammered Ruth. She could scarcely believe that this dainty little girl who wore such pretty clothes had actually invited her to dinner at Morton House. "Did you have a good time, Ruth?" asked Miriam, as they started for home late that afternoon. "Don't ask her," interposed Anne mischievously. "She forsook me and hob-nobbed openly all afternoon with that curly-haired girl, Miss Thayer. I am terribly jealous, and there is a deadly gleam in my eye." "Please, don't think, Anne----" began Ruth nervously, looking distressed. "I am past thinking," retorted Anne melodramatically. "The time for action has come. I shall challenge my rival to a duel the first time I see her. We will fight with----" "Brooms," grinned Elfreda. "I once fought a duel down in our orchard with my cousin Dick. Brooms were the chosen weapons. We certainly did great execution with them. They were new ones and the brushy part kept getting in our way until we happened to think of cutting it off and fighting with the handles. After that things went more scientifically, until Dick hit me on the nose by mistake. I wailed and shrieked and had the nose bleed, and Ma whipped Dick and sent him home. That was about the only duel I ever fought," concluded the stout girl reflectively, "but if there's the slightest possibility of either of you choosing brooms for weapons, I'll give you the benefit of my experience by training you for the fray." "Shall I take her at her word, Ruth?" laughed Anne. "No, I'm not worth all that trouble," returned Ruth half shyly. "We won't have time to escort you home, Ruth," remarked Grace, looking at her watch. "We must leave you at this corner. Be a good child and don't sit up all night to study. Come over Tuesday evening to dinner, and we'll all study together." "Thank you, I will if I don't have too much mending on hand," replied Ruth. "Good-bye. I can't begin to tell you how much I've enjoyed being with you." "Don't try," advised Elfreda laconically. "We've had just as much fun as you have." Miriam and Grace exchanged glances. Elfreda was making rapid strides along the road to fellowship. "I like that girl," she announced as Ruth disappeared around the corner. "She has lots of pluck. When we asked her to go out with us to-day she looked at her old coat and hat, then at us. I could see that she was ashamed of them. But she wasn't ashamed for more than five seconds. She straightened up and looked as proud as a princess. I could see----" "A great deal more than we did," finished Miriam. "I believe you have eyes in the back of your head, Elfreda." "I don't miss much," agreed Elfreda modestly. "I saw you and Grace look at each other when I said we'd had just as much fun as Ruth," she added slyly. "I know what you were both thinking, too. You were thinking that I wasn't so selfish as when I came here. You needn't color so because I caught you. I am selfish, but I'm beginning to find out, just the same, that there are other people in the world besides myself." CHAPTER XIV AN INVITATION AND A MISUNDERSTANDING The class elections went off with a snap. Grace nominated Gertrude Wells for president. There were two other nominations, and after the three young women had gone through the ordeal of inspection before the class, the votes were cast. Gertrude Wells was elected president by an overwhelming majority, and the nomination and election of the other class officers quickly followed. The next night Grace and Miriam gave a dinner in honor of her election at Vinton's, to which twelve girls were invited, and for a week the new president was feted and lionized until she laughingly declared that a return to the simple life was her only means of re-establishing her lost reputation for study and avoiding impending warnings. The class of 19---- soon became used to being a regularly organized body and held its class meetings with as much pride as though it were the most important organization in college. Thanksgiving plans now occupied the foreground, and as the vacation was too short even to think about going home, the girls began to make plans to spend their brief holiday as advantageously as possible at or at least very near Overton. "There's a football game over at Willston, on Thanksgiving Day," remarked Grace, looking up from the paper on which she was jotting down possible amusements for vacation. Miriam had run into Grace's room for a brief chat before dinner. "We don't know any Willston men, though. I think football is ever so much more interesting when one knows the players. If we were nearer the boys we might attend a fraternity dance once in a while." "David says in his last letter that he is waiting impatiently for the holidays. Just think, Grace, won't that be splendid to be back in dear old Oakdale again?" "It seems years since I kissed Mother and Father good-bye," said Grace, rather wistfully. "How I'd like to be at home for Thanksgiving." "Don't think about it," advised Miriam. "I was as blue as indigo last night. Let's keep our minds strictly on what we're going to do with our holiday. What have you put down?" "The football game first. Then I have tickets for a play that the Morton House girls intend to give. We might go to Vinton's for supper on Thanksgiving night. If we have a Thanksgiving dinner here that day it's safe to say supper won't amount to much. I think----" Grace did not finish with what she was saying. A quick step sounded down the hall and an instant later Anne ran into the room waving an open letter in her hand. "Girls, girls!" she cried, "you never can guess!" "What is it? Tell us at once," commanded Grace, springing from her chair. "You've received good news from some one we know." "Yes," replied Anne happily. "My letter is from Miss Southard. She wishes us to spend Thanksgiving with her and her brother in New York City. Isn't that glorious, and do you think we'll be allowed to go?" "Hurrah!" cried Grace. "Since we can't go home, it's the very nicest sort of plan. I think we'll be allowed to go. We haven't any conditions to work off, and I haven't planned to do any extra studying either. Thank goodness, my allowance had an extra ten dollars attached to it this month. Mother wrote that she thought I might need the money, and I do. I couldn't possibly have stretched my regular allowance over this trip." "I have money enough, I think," said Miriam. "I am a thrifty soul. I saved ten dollars out of my last month's allowance. It was really extra money that I had asked Mother for. I intended to buy a sweater and then changed my mind." "The expenses of my trip will have to come out of my college money," confessed Anne, a trifle soberly, "but I'd be willing to spend twice that much to see the Southards. Mr. Southard is playing 'Hamlet' and so we shall have the opportunity of seeing him in what the critics consider his greatest part." "Remember, we haven't asked permission to go, yet," remarked Grace. "The registrar couldn't be so cruel as to refuse us," said Miriam cheerfully. "Let's besiege her fortress in a body." "When shall we make our plea?" "To-morrow morning after chapel," suggested Anne. "Then we'll have more time to plan our trip." The registrar's office was duly besieged the next morning, as agreed, and the three girls hurried off to their classes with beaming faces. When they returned to Wayne Hall after recitations that afternoon it was to find Elfreda hanging over the railing in the upstairs hall, an unusually solemn expression on her face. "Are you going?" she called down anxiously. "Yes," nodded Grace. "At three o'clock Wednesday afternoon." Elfreda gave a smothered exclamation that sounded like, "What a shame," and disappeared into her room, slamming the door. "I'm coming into your room for a while," said Miriam. "Elfreda will open the door before long." "Yes, do," returned Grace hospitably. "Is she angry because you are going away over Thanksgiving?" "No, not angry, but awfully disappointed. She almost cried last night when I told her about it. I suspect she is crying now. She's like an overgrown child at times." "I'm sorry we can't take her with us," deplored Grace. "Does she know where we are going?" "Yes," returned Miriam. "She was practically thunderstruck when she learned we were to visit the Southards. The queer part of it is this. She saw Mr. Southard and Anne in 'As You Like It' last year. She thinks Mr. Southard the greatest actor she ever saw, and she even spoke of Anne's cleverness as Rosalind; she doesn't know it was Anne who played the part." "Anne doesn't wish her or any one else here to know it," cautioned Grace. "Do you suppose any other girl here saw Anne as Rosalind?" "Goodness knows," replied Miriam, with a shrug. "There's an old saying that 'murder will out.' If any one here did see her, sooner or later she'll be identified and lionized." "That's just why I don't wish the girls here to know," protested Anne, who had been listening to the conversation of her friends, a slight frown puckering her smooth forehead. "I don't care to be patronized and petted, but secretly held at arms' length because I am a professional player. If the girls find out that I played Rosalind in Mr. Southard's company I'll never hear the last of it." In her anxiety Anne's voice rose above its customary low key. In fact, all three had been talking rather loudly, and the entire conversation had been carried straight to the ears of the girl who stood outside the almost closed door. Elfreda had come across the hall to hear the details of the proposed visit, but had remained outside the door transfixed at what she heard. Then she found her voice. "So that's your idea of true friendship, is it?" demanded an angry, choking voice that caused the surprised young women to start and look toward the door. Elfreda stepped into the room, her face flushed with anger, her blue eyes fairly snapping. "You make a great fuss over me when there's nothing going on, but none of you would invite me to go with you to New York, when you know I'm crazy to go. And that's not enough, you can't get along without talking about me. I heard every word Anne said. I know now that it was she who played Rosalind in 'As You Like It' last winter, because I saw her with my own eyes. If you girls had been as honorable as you pretend to be you'd have told me about it and I never would have said a word. But, no, Anne was afraid to tell, for fear she'd 'never hear the last of it,'" sneered Elfreda, mimicking Anne. "She's right, too. She never will. I'll not stop until I tell every girl at Overton the whole story. When you come back," she went on, turning to Miriam, "you'll find that I've moved. I thought you were nice and I tried to be like you, but now I don't care to live in the same house with you, and I don't intend ever to notice any of you again. With that she rushed across the hall, slammed the door, and turned the key. "Locked out," said Miriam grimly. "I hope she'll let me in before the dinner bell rings. I'd like to change this grimy blouse for a clean one. I'll try to reason with her, once she opens the door." "Shall we go in, too, and try to explain matters?" asked Anne. "I didn't say that she would tell the girls about my stage work. Surely, she understands, too, that we are not at liberty to invite her to go with us. I'll tell you what I will do. I'll telegraph the Southards and ask permission to invite her. They will be perfectly willing for us to bring her." "That might be a good plan," reflected Grace. "Don't waste another minute, Anne, but telegraph Miss Southard at once." "Yes, go ahead," counseled Miriam, "and while you're gone I'll try to pacify Elfreda." But all Miriam's efforts to restore peace failed. When a little later she knocked gently on the door, Elfreda unlocked it, but received her roommate's friendly overtures in sulky silence. After dinner, for the first time since the sophomore reception, she spent the evening in Virginia Gaines's room and that night the two girls prepared for sleep without exchanging a word. Meanwhile Anne telegraphed, "May we bring friend? Will explain later. Anne," and was anxiously awaiting a reply. It came the next morning while they were at breakfast and read: "Your friends always welcome. Telegraph train you will arrive. Mary Southard." Anne passed the telegram to Grace, who sat next to her. After one quick glance at it Grace passed it to Miriam. Elfreda, who sat directly opposite her, watched the passing of the telegram with compressed lips. Miriam, raising her eyes from the yellow slip, found those of her angry roommate fixed on her in mingled curiosity and disdain. Ignoring the look she said quietly, "I should like to see you for a moment after breakfast, Elfreda. I have something to tell you." The stout girl's eyes narrowed. She glanced about the table and saw Virginia Gaines watching her with a disagreeable smile. The sophomore raised her eyebrows and shrugged her shoulders as though to say, "So, you are going to allow her to order you about." Elfreda's face grew dark with angry purpose. She leaned well forward across the table and said in a tone of suppressed fury: "Kindly keep your remarks to yourself. I don't care to hear them." "Very well," replied Miriam coldly, although her eyes flashed and the temper that had been all but uncontrollable in days gone by threatened to burst forth in all its old fury. Several girls smiled, and Virginia Gaines laughed aloud. "A new declaration of independence has evidently been signed," she jeered. "Too bad, isn't it, Miss Harlowe? You'll have to begin all over again on some one else." "I am not likely to trouble you, at any rate, Miss Gaines," returned Grace pointedly. This time the laugh was at Virginia's expense. A dull flush overspread her plain face. Her angry eyes met Grace's steady gray ones, then fell before the honest contempt she read there. During that brief instant she saw herself through Grace's eyes and the sharp retort that rose to her lips remained unuttered. In the next instant Grace was sorry for her rude retort. It would have been far better to remain silent, she reflected. By answering she had shown Virginia that the latter's taunt had annoyed her. "I wish I hadn't answered Miss Gaines," she confided to Miriam as they were leaving the dining room. "It doesn't add to one's freshman dignity to quarrel." "I am glad you did," returned Miriam. "It was a well-merited snub, and she deserved it." CHAPTER XV GREETING OLD FRIENDS To spend their brief holiday with the Southards was the next best thing to going home, in the opinion of the Oakdale girls. Mr. Southard met them at the station with his automobile, and a twenty minutes' drive brought them to the Southard home. Miss Southard met them at the door with welcoming arms. She was particularly delighted to see Anne, for the few weeks Anne had spent in their house had endeared her to the Southards and made them wish her their "little sister" in reality rather than by fond adoption. "What shall we do after dinner to-night?" asked Miss Southard, as she showed her guests to their rooms after the first affectionate greetings had been exchanged. "Everett, as you know, is appearing as Hamlet, and wishes you to see him in the part. However, he has engaged a box for us for to-morrow night. To-night we will go to some other theatre if you wish." "To tell you the truth," replied Anne, slipping her hand into that of the older woman, "we'd rather spend the evening quietly with you. That is, unless you care particularly about our going out." Miss Southard's face revealed her pleasure at this announcement. "Would you really?" she asked. "I should like to have you girls to myself rather than go to the theatre, but I supposed you would prefer seeing a successful play to staying at home with me." "Nothing could drag us from the house after that confession," laughed Grace. "For my part I think it would be much nicer to stay at home. We have so much to tell you." Dinner was a merry meal. Mr. Southard, who in the meantime had come in from the theatre, became so absorbed in the conversation of his young guests that both he and his sister forgot the time. The entrance into the dining room of James, his valet, with his hat and coat, and the warning words, "Ten minutes past seven, sir," caused him to spring from his chair, glance at his watch with a rueful smile, and hurry out to where his car stood waiting for him. "It's nice to be an idol of the public, but it's hard on the idol just the same," sighed Grace, as the door closed after him. "Shall we see him again to-night?" "You may stay up and wait for him if you wish," returned Miss Southard, "but it will be after midnight. 'Hamlet' is a long play." "I saw Mr. Southard in 'Hamlet' long before I knew him," remarked Anne. "My father and I were in New York rehearsing the play in which I afterwards refused to work. The manager of our company was a friend of Mr. Southard. One night he asked me if I would like to see the greatest actor in America play 'Hamlet.' I said that Everett Southard was the only man I ever wished to see in the role. I shall never forget how I felt when he handed me a slip of paper. It was in Mr. Southard 's handwriting and called for two seats at the theatre where he was playing. He said he had asked Mr. Southard for the passes purposely for me, because," Anne flushed slightly, "he insisted that in me lay the making of a great artist, and that I ought to see nothing but the great plays, enacted by great players." "How interesting!" exclaimed Grace. "You never told us anything about your stage days before. What did you think after you saw 'Hamlet'?" "I went about in a dream for days afterward," confessed Anne. "Then, I began to hate the play we were rehearsing, and finally ended by refusing to stay in the company. Mother was with my sister in Oakdale, so I went to them. I felt that there was no chance for me to ever become great. I had no faith in my own ability, and I was determined not to waste my life as a second or third rate actor. So I gave up the stage and decided to try to get an education, then teach. You know the rest of my story. Now comes the hardest part. After giving up all idea of the stage, the door that I thought was barred has been opened to me. The unbelievable has come to pass, and I have in a measure achieved what once seemed unattainable. Do you think that I ought to bury my one talent when my college days are over and become a teacher, or do you believe that I should put it to good use by becoming an exponent of the highest dramatic art?" Anne paused, looking almost melancholy in her earnestness. "My dear child," said Miss Southard gravely. "You are straining your mental eyes with trying to look into the future. Wait until graduation day comes. By that time you will know what is best for you to do. As far as your work in the theatre is concerned, I consider that it is far more to your credit to use the talent God has given you to help yourself through college, than to wear yourself out doing tutoring or servants' work. There is no stigma attached to my brother's art, why should there be to yours?" "Good for you, Miss Southard," cheered Grace. "I'll tell you a secret. Anne thinks just as you do, only she won't say so." "While you are here, Anne, Everett wishes you to meet Mr. Forest, the manager of the stock company he wrote you about," continued Miss Southard. "He is a playwright, producer and manager all in one, isn't he?" asked Miriam. "I have seen ever so many pictures of him, and read a great deal about him. They say he is always on the lookout for material for stars." "Yes," returned Miss Southard. "He was in Europe during Anne's engagement here last winter. Nevertheless, he heard of her and asked Everett a great many questions about her. I think he will offer her an engagement for next summer with a certain stock company which he controls." "How can I ever repay you and Mr. Southard for all you have done for me?" said Anne earnestly. "By accepting the engagement," laughed Grace. "Grace is right," agreed Miss Southard. "Everett and I are trying to help Anne in the way we think best." "Then I will be pleasing myself, too," confessed Anne. "For I love my dramatic work as well as I do that of the college. Now, let us talk about Oakdale and all our friends. We have so many things to tell you." It was after eleven o'clock when the girls retired. They had decided not to stay up until Mr. Southard's return. Once in their rooms they found themselves too sleepy for conversation and five minutes after their lights were out they were fast asleep. They were up in good season the next morning, as it had been agreed that they should be present at the morning service in the church the Southards attended. Thanksgiving dinner was to be served at exactly half past twelve o'clock, instead of at night, for Mr. Southard had a matinee as well as an evening performance to give and never left the theatre for dinner during this short intermission. In church that morning as she sat listening to the beautiful service, Grace felt that she had everything for which to be thankful. In her heart she said an earnest little prayer for all those unfortunates to whom life had grudged even bread. She resolved to be more kind and helpful during the coming year, and prayed that she might see the right clearly and have the courage always to choose it. "I felt as though I wanted to be superlatively good all the rest of my life," confessed Miriam on the way home. "That minister preached as though he loved the whole world and wished it to be happy." "He does. He is a very fine man," said Miss Southard, "and does splendid work among the very poor people. It will perhaps surprise you to know that he was at one time an actor of great promise in Mr. Southard's company. Then he received the conviction that his duty lay in entering the ministry and he left the stage, entered a theological institute and after receiving his degree came back to New York as the pastor of a small church on the East Side. Everett and I were among his most faithful parishioners. Then later on he received an appointment to the church we just left, and has been there ever since." "That will be an interesting story to tell the girls when we go back to college," said Grace thoughtfully. "He is a wonderful man, he made me feel as though it paid to do one's best." "That is the reason he has been so successful in his work, I suppose," remarked Anne. "He makes other people feel that it pays to be good, too." From the subject of the actor-minister the conversation drifted to Overton. Miss Southard listened interestedly to Grace's vivid description of the college, the various halls and even the faculty. "Then you are satisfied with your choice? You never wish that you had entered Vassar or Smith or any other college?" "Yes, I am satisfied," declared Grace, while Miriam and Anne echoed her reply, but Grace might have truthfully added that there were times when even the glorious privilege of being an Overton freshman had its drawbacks. CHAPTER XVI THANKSGIVING WITH THE SOUTHARDS Thanksgiving dinner was served at exactly half-past twelve o'clock, and eaten with much merriment and good cheer. At half-past one Mr. Southard was obliged to leave his sister and guests, and at two o'clock they were getting into their wraps, preparatory to accompanying Miss Southard to another theatre to see one of the most successful plays of the season. That night they saw the actor in "Hamlet," and his remarkable portrayal of the ill-fated Prince of Denmark was something long to be remembered by the three girls as well as by the rest of the enthusiastic assemblage that witnessed it. "I shall never forget the awful look in his poor eyes," said Grace solemnly. Then she joined in the insistent applause that Everett Southard's art had evoked. Presently the actor appeared and bowed his appreciation of the tribute. Then he made his exit nor could he be induced to appear again. Anne sat as though turned to stone. She could not find words to express the emotions that had thrilled her during Mr. Southard's marvelous portrayal of the role. His own personality was completely submerged in that of the melancholy ghost-ridden youth, who, dedicating his life to the purpose of avenging his father's murder, welcomed death with open arms when his purpose had been accomplished. She had seen a great play and a great actor. The first time she saw "Hamlet" she left the theatre heartsick and discouraged. To-night she was leaving it alert and triumphant. "Anne has been touched by the finger of Genius," smiled Miss Southard, as she marshaled her charges to their automobile. "How did you know?" asked Anne, but in spite of her smiling lips her brown eyes were full of tears. "My dear, living with Everett has taught me the signs," said his sister simply. "I should like to play Ophelia to Mr. Southard's Hamlet," said Anne dreamily. "Perhaps you will have the chance to do so some day. Everett thinks you would be a more convincing Ophelia than the young woman you saw in the part to-night," encouraged Miss Southard. Anne looked so delighted at those words that Miriam and Grace exchanged swift glances. It was evident that the genuine love of her profession lay deep within the soul of their friend. "We will go for a short drive, then come back for Everett," planned Miss Southard. "He has promised to hurry to-night--then we will have a nice little supper at home." Their hostess and her brother had agreed that there should be no after-the-theatre suppers at any of the so-called fashionable restaurants for their young guests. "I am sure their mothers would not approve of it," Miss Southard had said, "and I feel that I am responsible for them every moment they are here." The party at home was an informal affair in which there were many cooks, but no broth spoiled. To see Mr. Southard earnestly engaged in making a Welsh rarebit, an accomplishment in which he claimed to be highly proficient, one would never have suspected him of being able to thrill vast audiences by his slightest word or gesture. "I can't believe that only two hours ago you were 'Hamlet,'" laughed Grace. "You look anything but tragic now." "He looked every bit as tragic just a moment ago. I saw a distinct Hamlet-like expression creep into his face," stated Miriam boldly. "You have sharp eyes," smiled Mr. Southard. "I happened to remember that I had forgotten what goes into this rarebit next. I could feel myself growing cold with despair. Then the inspiration came and now it will be ready in two minutes." The rarebit was voted a success. After decorating the actor with a bit of blue ribbon on which Miriam painstakingly printed "first premium" with a lead pencil, he was escorted to the head of the table and congratulated roundly upon being able not only to act but to cook. The next morning every one confessed to being a trifle sleepy, but appeared at breakfast at the usual time. After breakfast Mr. Southard carried Anne off to met Mr. Forest, while Miss Southard, Miriam and Grace decided to go for a drive through Central Park. It was a clear, cold, sparkling day with just enough snow to make it seem like real Thanksgiving weather. "Too bad Anne can't be with us," said Grace regretfully. "Everett will take her for a drive before bringing her home," replied Miss Southard. Shortly after their return to the house Mr. Southard and Anne returned from their drive. Anne's eyes were sparkling and her cheeks rosy as she ran up the steps. "Anne must have heard good news!" exclaimed Grace, running from her post at one of the drawing room windows into the hall, Miriam at her heels. "The deed is done, girls," laughed Anne. "Behold in me the future star of the Forest Stock Company. It doesn't sound much like Rosalind, does it? and it means awfully hard work, but I'll earn enough money next summer to almost finish paying my way through college." "Hurrah!" cried Grace. "We won't allow you to become lonesome. We will come and visit you during vacation." "That ought to reconcile me to having to work all summer," smiled Anne. "I shall be selfish and manage to have some of you girls with me all the time." "How do you like Mr. Forest?" asked Miriam. "Ever so much," returned Anne. "Like most successful men, he is quiet and unassuming. Mr. Southard and he did almost all the talking. I spoke when I was spoken to and did as I was bid." "Good little Anne," jeered Miriam. "As a reward of merit we will take you shopping this afternoon." "How would you like to go to the opera to-night?" asked Mr. Southard. "'Madame Butterfly' is to be sung." "Better than anything else, now that I've seen 'Hamlet'!" exclaimed Grace, with shining eyes. Miriam and Anne both expressed an eager desire to hear Puccini's exquisite opera, and Miss Southard called two of her friends on the telephone, inviting them to join the box party. The same evening gowns had to do duty for the opera as well as for "Hamlet," but this did not detract one whit from their pleasant anticipations. "The people who saw us at the theatre the other night won't see us at the opera," argued Grace. The three girls were in Grace's room holding a consultation on the subject of what to wear. "That is if they saw us at all," laughed Miriam. "Elfreda says Oakdale isn't down on the map, you know." "That reminds me, what excuse did you make to Miss Southard about Elfreda not coming with us, Anne?" asked Grace. "I merely said she had changed her mind about coming." "Did you mention that she changed it violently?" slyly put in Miriam. "I did not," was the smiling assertion. "I don't like to think about it, let alone mention it." "Do you suppose she'll improve the opportunity and tell Anne's private affairs all over college?" questioned Miriam. "I don't know," said Grace briefly. "Let us put her out of our minds for now. It won't do any good to worry about what she may or may not do. When we go back to Overton we shall know." That night the girls listened to the wonderful voice of the prima donna whose name has become synonymous with that of "Chu Chu San," the little Japanese maid. Anne wondered as she drank in the music whether this beautiful young prima donna had ever had any scruples about appearing before the public. Miriam was thinking that David would be bitterly disappointed when he knew that Anne was going back to the stage during vacation. While, though she would not have confessed it for worlds, the throbbing undercurrent of heart break that ran through the music was filling Grace with unmistakable homesickness. She wanted her mother and she wanted her badly. What would she not give to feel her mother's dear arms around her. When the curtain shut out the still form of the Japanese girl and the prima donna received her usual ovation, the tears that stood in Grace's eyes were not alone a tribute to the singer and the tragic death of Chu Chu San. * * * * * On Saturday morning the girls went on another shopping expedition, and in the afternoon attended a recital given by a celebrated pianist. After the recital, instead of going home, Miss Southard surprised her guests by taking them over to the theatre where her brother was playing. Mr. Southard had arranged that they should be admitted to his dressing room. It was the same theatre in which Anne had played the previous winter and several of the stage hands recognized her and bowed respectfully to her as she passed through to the actor's dressing room. They found him still in costume. He never changed to street clothing on matinee days. "You are respectfully and cordially invited to eat dinner in my dressing room," announced Mr. Southard the moment they were fairly inside the door. "I have ordered dinner for six o'clock." Eating dinner in a dressing room was an innovation as far as Grace and Miriam were concerned, but to Anne it was nothing new. It had been in the usual order of things during her brief engagement in "As You Like It." As it was after five o'clock when they arrived it seemed only a little while until a waiter appeared with table linen and silver, which Mr. Southard ordered arranged on the table that had been brought in for the occasion. Then the dinner was served and eaten with much gayety and laughter. After dinner, a pleasant hour of conversation followed, and later on the visitors were introduced to the various members of the company. Unlike many professionals who have achieved greatness, Mr. Southard was thoroughly democratic, and displayed none of the snobbish tactics with his company which so often humiliate and embitter the lesser lights of a theatrical company. At eight o'clock they said good-bye to the actor. Through the courtesy of Mr. Forest they were to witness a play in which a wonderful little girl of fifteen who had taken New York by storm was to appear. After the play they were to pick up Mr. Southard at his theatre and go home together. That night another jolly little supper was held in the Southards' dining room, then three sleepy young women fairly tumbled into their beds, completely tired out by their eventful day. As the return to Overton was to be made on the noon train, the Southard household rose in good season on Sunday morning. Breakfast was rather a quiet meal, for the shadow of saying good-bye hung over the little house party. "When shall we see you again, I wonder?" sighed Miss Southard regretfully. "You are going home for Christmas, I suppose." "Oh, yes," replied Grace quickly. "I wish you might spend it with us, but I suppose it would be out of the question. You must come to Oakdale next summer. We can't entertain you with plays and recitals, but we can get up boating and gypsy parties. The boys will be home, then, and we can arrange to have plenty of good times. Will you come?" "With pleasure if all is well with us at that time," promised Mr. Southard, and his sister. When the last good-byes had been said and the girls were comfortably settled for the afternoon's ride that lay before them they were forced to admit that they were just a little tired. "We have had a perfectly wonderful holiday," asserted Grace, "and the Southards are the most hospitable people in the world, but it seems as though I'd never make up my lost sleep. I shall become a rabid advocate of the half-past ten o'clock rule for the next week at least. I wonder how the boys spent Thanksgiving. Of course they went to the football game. I'll warrant Hippy ate too much." "I wish Jessica and Nora could have been with us," remarked Anne. "Miss Southard wrote them, too, but they couldn't come. Did you see Nora's telegram?" "Yes," replied Grace. "It said a letter would follow. I suppose she'll explain in that. Well, it's back to college again for us. I wonder if Elfreda has moved." "We shall know in due season," returned Miriam grimly. "I have visions of the appearance of my hapless room, if she has vacated it. I expect to see my best beloved belongings scattered to the four corners or else piled in a heap in the middle of the floor." "Perhaps she has thought it over and come to the conclusion that there are worse roommates than you," suggested Anne hopefully. The early winter darkness was falling when the three girls hurried up the stairs at Wayne Hall as fast as the weight of their suit cases would permit. Miriam's door was closed. She knocked on it, at first softly, then with more force. Hearing no sound from within she turned the knob, flung open the door and stepped inside. Striking a match, she lighted the gas and looked about her. The room was in perfect order, but no vestige of Elfreda's belongings met her eye. The stout girl had kept her word. CHAPTER XVII CHRISTMAS PLANS The month of December seemed interminably long to Grace Harlowe. Since her visit to the Southards the longing to be at home remained with her. She hung a little calendar at the head of her bed and every night marked off one day with an air of triumph. During the three weeks that followed their trip to New York, Overton had not been the most congenial spot in the world for Grace or Anne. 19---- was a very large class, and considered itself extremely democratic; nevertheless, the story of Anne's theatrical career was bandied about among the freshmen and passed on to the sophomores, until the truth of it was lost in the haze of fiction that surrounded it. A certain percentage of the class who knew Everett Southard's standing in the theatrical world and understood that Anne must have the highest ability to be able to play in his company treated the young girl with the deference due an artist. Then there were a number of young women who, though fond of attending the theatre, looked askance at the clever men and women whose business it was to amuse them. They approved of the theatre, but for them the foot-lights divided the two worlds, and they wished no trespassing of the stage folks on their territory. Quite their opposite were the girls who were desperately stage struck and cherished secret designs on the stage. They were extremely friendly for the sake of plying Anne with questions about her art. At first Anne's position among her classmates was rather difficult to define. After the ball which Elfreda had set in motion had rolled itself to a standstill for want of more gossip to keep it going, Grace saw with secret trepidation that despite the loyalty of a few, Anne had lost caste at Overton. "History is repeating itself," she remarked gloomily to Miriam, as together the two left the library one afternoon and set out for a short walk before dinner. "Anne told me last night that the girls in her elocution class are very distant since she came back from New York. It's Elfreda's fault, too. How could she deliberately try to make it hard for a girl like Anne?" A slow flush mounted to Miriam's forehead. She gave Grace a peculiar look. Grace, interpreting the look, exclaimed contritely: "Forgive me, Miriam. I wasn't thinking of you when I spoke." "I know it," replied Miriam. "It seems as though I can never do enough for Anne to make up for behaving so contemptibly toward her in high school." "Anne had forgotten all that, ages ago," comforted Grace. "Don't think about it again." "I'd like to find an opportunity for a serious talk with Elfreda," returned Miriam. "I think I could bring her to her senses. She keeps strictly away from me. She knows that I wish to talk with her, too. I wonder how she likes rooming with Virginia, or rather how Virginia likes rooming with her." "She is furious with both Anne and me," declared Grace. "She won't look at either of us. It seems a pity, too. She can be awfully nice when she chooses, and I had begun to feel as though she belonged with us. Here we are on the threshold of 'Peace on Earth, Good Will Toward Men,' and are at odds with at least five different girls. Miss Alden doesn't like us because Mabel Ashe does. Miss Gaines disapproves of us on general principles. Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton dislike me for defending Elfreda's rights. Elfreda thinks us disloyal and deceitful. And it isn't mid-year yet. We are not what you might call social successes, are we?" she concluded most bitterly. "Still we have made some staunch friends like Ruth and Mabel and Frances. Then there are the girls at Morton House, and Constance Fuller, and I think the freshmen at Wayne Hall are friendly." "Perhaps they are," sighed Grace. "I hope I'm not growing pessimistic, but I can't help feeling that the girls in our own class are not as friendly as the upper class girls have been. I supposed it would be just the opposite." Miriam was on the point of saying that she wished she had been wise enough to refuse to room with Elfreda. Then she bit her lip and remained silent. "I'm glad I've kept up in all my work," Grace said after they had walked some distance in silence. "Mother will be glad and so will Father. I've done my level best not to disappoint them, at least." She sighed, then said abruptly, "Have you bought all your presents yet?" "I bought some of them in New York. I shopped as long as my money held out. Almost all the things were for the girls here. I'll have to buy my home presents in Oakdale." "That is just about my case," remarked Grace. "I sent Eleanor's almost two weeks ago, and Mabel Allison's last week. And I gave Miss Southard hers and her brother's with strict injunctions not to open them until Christmas." "So did I," laughed Miriam. "I forgot to mention it to you at the time. I hope I haven't left out any one. I shall have to ask Mother for more money, too." The few intervening days before Christmas seemed all too short to the students who were going home for their Christmas vacations. Interest in study declined rapidly. Those girls who usually made brilliant recitations distinguished themselves by just scraping through, while those who were inclined to totter on the ragged edge unhesitatingly confessed themselves to be unprepared. One had, of course, to decide just what to pack, whether to take the morning or evening train and whether it would be worth while to take one's books home on the chance of studying a little during vacation. These were weighty problems to solve satisfactorily, and coupled with the constant, "Have I forgotten any one's present?" were sufficient to drive all idea of study to the winds. In spite of the mischief Elfreda had endeavored to make, Grace found that she had calls enough to pay to fill in every unoccupied moment before going home. Late in the afternoon of the day before leaving Overton, she started out alone to pay two calls, going first to Morton House to say good-bye to Gertrude Wells and Arline Thayer. Gertrude was in and welcomed her with enthusiasm, but, to her disappointment, Arline was out. She spent a pleasant half hour with 19----'s president, then, looking out at the rapidly gathering twilight, said with a start: "I didn't know it was so late. I must go down to Ruth Denton's before dinner." "Perhaps you'll meet Arline there," suggested Gertrude. "She was going there, too. She and Ruth are great friends. She was greatly disappointed to learn that Ruth has been invited somewhere else for Christmas. She had set her heart on taking her home with her. Considering the fact that Arline's father has so much money, she is an awfully nice little girl. She isn't in the least snobbish or overbearing." "I like her immensely," agreed Grace. "Do you know whether Ruth accepted the invitation, Gertrude?" she asked suddenly. "Arline said she thought Ruth wanted to go with her, but was too loyal to the other girl to even intimate any such thing," replied Gertrude. Five minutes later the two students had exchanged good-byes and Grace was on her way to Ruth's with Gertrude's words ringing in her ears. Several weeks ago she had invited Ruth to go with her to Oakdale for the holidays. At first Ruth had demurred, then accepted with shy gratitude. The three Oakdale girls had become greatly attached to Ruth, and Anne, in particular, had looked forward to taking her home with them. Grace had purposely forestalled Anne in inviting Ruth, because she had decided in her mind that her facilities for entertaining were greater than Anne's. She had managed so adroitly, however, that Anne had never even dreamed of her real motive in inviting the lonely little girl. Now, there was Arline Thayer's invitation to be considered. Grace suspected that Ruth secretly worshipped dainty little Arline. She would have died rather than admit to the girls who had been so good to her that she could find it in her heart to care more for another Overton girl than for them. "I'm sorry, of course," Grace murmured to herself as she hurried along through the shadows, "but I'm going to make her accept Arline's invitation. She can go home with us at some other time." She rang the bell at the dingy old house where Ruth lived, was admitted by the tired-faced landlady and ran upstairs two at a time. Ruth's door stood partly open. Grace heard Arline Thayer say regretfully, "You are sure you can't go, Ruth?" Then she heard Ruth say, very quietly: "I am quite sure I can't. I promised Grace first." Without waiting to hear more, Grace walked briskly into the room, saying decisively, "Of course she can go, Arline." "Why, Grace Harlowe, where did you come from?" exclaimed Arline, her blue eyes opening wide with surprise. "From downstairs," laughed Grace. "Just in time, too, to make Ruth change her mind. Now, Ruth, tell us the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Wouldn't you rather go to New York City with Arline than to Oakdale with us?" Ruth flushed. "That isn't a fair question," she protested. "It isn't because I care more about going to New York than Oakdale. It is----" she hesitated. "Because you care more for Arline than for us," finished Grace calmly. "I understand the situation, I think. Your friendship for Arline is growing to be the same as mine for Anne. Naturally, you'd rather be with her than with any one else. Now, Arline, I'll leave her in your hands. We wouldn't have her go to Oakdale with us if she begged on her knees to do so," concluded Grace. "Grace Harlowe, you're a dear!" exclaimed Arline, catching Grace's hand in both of her warm little palms. "I just love you. Next to Ruth, I think you are the nicest girl at Overton. Thank you a thousand times for being so nice over Ruth. Now, you simply must go," she announced, turning to Ruth. "I will," answered Ruth happily. "You don't blame me for saying so?" she asked, looking pleadingly at Grace. "Not after having just given my official consent," retorted Grace. "Your penalty for deserting us is that you must come to see us at Wayne Hall to-morrow. We have rich gifts for you. Now I must go. Are you going my way home?" "No," answered Arline. "I'm sorry, but Ruth and I are going to cook our own supper. I've been asked to help. We are going to have a regular feast. Won't you stay and help eat it? Ruth doesn't care who I invite," she added saucily. "Please stay, Grace," begged Ruth. Grace shook her head. "Not to-night. Invite me some evening after the holidays. Good-bye, Arline." She extended her hand, but Arline put both arms around Grace's neck, kissing her warmly. "I hope I can do something for you some day," she whispered. After the usual good wishes for a Merry Christmas had been exchanged, Grace emerged from the house, filled with that sense of warmth and elation that comes from having made others happy. She smiled to herself as her mother's face rose before her. It was only a matter of hours now until she would see her. She could almost hear her father's voice and feel his hand on her shoulder in the old caressing way. Smiling to herself Grace walked rapidly on toward Wayne Hall, so rapidly, in fact, that she ran squarely against a tall girl, who, coming from the opposite direction, had apparently been traveling at the same rate of speed. The collision occurred directly under the arc light. The tall girl gave a smothered exclamation and would have rushed on, but Grace put forth a detaining hand, saying: "Stop a moment, Elfreda. I wish to say something to you." "I don't wish to hear anything you have to say," sneered Elfreda. "Take your hand off my arm. You can't fool me twice. I know What a hypocrite you are." Grace's hand dropped to her side. "I beg pardon," she said formally. "I am sorry you have such a bad opinion of me. I was about to say that Anne, Miriam and I join in wishing you a Merry Christmas." "You can keep your good wishes," snapped Elfreda. "I don't want them." With that she turned on her heel and walked angrily away from Grace and reconciliation. CHAPTER XVIII BASKETBALL RUMORS After the holidays a great interchanging of visits began at Overton that drove away, for the time being, the terrifying shadows of the all too rapidly approaching mid-year examinations. Almost every girl had brought back with her some treasure that she insisted her friends must see, or some delicious goody they must taste. It was all very delightful, but extremely demoralizing as far as study was concerned. Santa Claus had been particularly kind to Anne, Grace and Miriam, as Miriam's muff and scarf of Russian sable, Grace's camera, and Anne's diamond ring (a present from the Southards) testified. Then there were the less expensive but equally valued remembrances in the way of embroidered sofa pillows, center pieces, and collar and cuff sets, every stitch of which had been taken by the patient fingers of their girl friends. Miriam and Grace, while at home, had been given permission to raid the preserve closet and had brought back an assortment of jellies, preserved fruits and pickles, tucking them in every available space their trunks and suit cases contained, regardless of the risk of breaking glass. The evening after their arrival they had picked out a number of the choicest goodies in their stock and accompanied by Anne had called on Ruth Denton. They found her wrapped in the folds of a blue eiderdown bathrobe, Arline's Christmas present to her. There were slippers to go with it, she declared, proudly thrusting forth a felt-incased foot for their inspection. A most mysterious thing had happened, however. The night before she had gone on her vacation two large boxes had been delivered to her by a messenger. One of them contained a beautiful navy blue cloth suit, the other a dark blue velvet hat. On a plain card were written the words, "'Take the goods the gods provide.' I Wish you a Merry Christmas." "Have you the card?" Grace asked, after the first exclamations regarding the mysterious boxes had subsided. Ruth opened the top drawer of her bureau and took out a card. Then going to her wardrobe she displayed the blue suit on its hanger, then took the new hat from the shelf. "Here they are," she said. The three girls praised the suit and hat so warmly that a flush of pure pleasure in her clothes rose to Ruth's face. Grace, however, examined the inside of the coat and the lining of the hat with the utmost care. Every telltale mark had been removed. Even the boxes themselves were plain. The giver had evidently wished his or her identity to remain a mystery. The writing on the card was not particularly distinctive. There was only one thing of which Grace made mental note. The s's were unfinished and the a's were not closed at the top. This in itself amounted to little, and Grace decided that as far as she was concerned the mystery would have to remain unsolved. So she said nothing about this unimportant discovery, and handed Ruth's treasures back to her without comment. "I thought Arline might have sent it," declared Ruth, "but she swears solemnly she knows nothing of it, and has given me her word that she had nothing whatever to do with it." "You'll find out some day if you have patience," declared Miriam. "Sooner or later good deeds like that are sure to come to light." "I wish I knew," sighed Ruth, "but if I had known, then I couldn't have accepted them, you see." "Evidently the person who sent them was aware of that," reflected Anne. "Therefore, it is some one who knows all about Ruth Denton's pride." The flush on Ruth's face deepened. "I can't help it," she said. "I don't like to feel dependent on any one." On the way to Wayne Hall, the mysterious presents formed the main subject for discussion. "We ought to have Elfreda's opinion," laughed Miriam. "She would find a clue. Don't you remember what she said about Ruth's pride the first time we took her to call on Ruth?" "Yes," replied Grace absently. Then the full force of Miriam's words dawning on her she looked at her friend in a startled way. "I know who sent Ruth those presents. It was Elfreda herself. I'm sure of it. She knew Ruth to be too proud to accept clothes, so she sent them anonymously. Now I know why those 'a's' and 's's' looked so familiar. That's Elfreda's writing. I know she did it. She just had to be nice in spite of herself," concluded Grace. "But why do you think it was Elfreda?" persisted Miriam. "It was what you said that put me on the right track," replied Grace. "I believe she made up her mind that day to send Ruth the suit and hat." "If she did send them, there is still hope that she will come back to us," said Anne. It was agreed among the three girls that not even Ruth should be told of their suspicions, and that if any possible opportunity arose to conciliate Elfreda it should be promptly seized. During the short space of time that elapsed before the dreaded examination week swooped down upon them, the three friends were too busy preparing for the coming ordeal to give much thought to the discovery they had made. Elfreda avoided them so persistently that there seemed small chance of getting within speaking distance. It was a week of painful suspense, broken only by brief outbursts of jubilation when some particularly formidable examination, that everyone had worried over, seemingly to the point of gray hairs, turned out better than had been expected. In the campus houses wholesale permission to burn midnight oil had been granted. Lights shone until late hours and flushed faces bent earnestly over text books as though trying to absorb their contents verbatim. On Friday, the strain, that had been lessening imperceptibly with each succeeding examination, snapped, and Overton began to think about many things that had no bearing on examinations. "I'm almost dead!" exclaimed Grace, coming into her room on Friday afternoon and dropping into the Morris chair near the window. "I'm tired, too," returned Anne, who had come in just ahead of her, and was engaged in putting her freshly laundered clothing in the two drawers of the chiffonier that belonged to her. "Thank goodness, we have four whole days of rest between terms at any rate," sighed Grace. "I'm going to skate and be out of doors as much as I can. I must make a few calls, too. I'm going to give a dinner at Vinton's, too. I'll invite Mabel, Frances, Gertrude Wells, Arline Thayer, Ruth, of course. That makes five," counted Grace on her fingers. "Oh, yes, Constance Fuller, six, you two girls, and myself. That makes nine. I told Mother about it when I was at home and she gave me the money for it. I'll have it Tuesday night. The new term begins Wednesday. To-morrow I'll go calling and deliver my invitations in the morning. There's a trial basketball game to-morrow afternoon." "When will there be a real game?" asked Anne. "I haven't heard you mention basketball for ages." "Christmas and examinations put a damper on it, but now all the girls are anxious to play and we have challenged the sophomores to play against us the second Saturday afternoon in February. I am going to play right guard, and Miriam is to play left forward. A Miss Martin is our center, and two freshmen I don't know very well are to play the left guard and right forward. We have a good team. Miss Martin is a wonder. You can see us practice if you wish, Anne." "Perhaps I will," returned Anne. "Who is on the sophomore team?" "I don't know," answered Grace. "I don't have much to say to the sophomores. Most of them appear to dislike me, consequently I shall greatly enjoy vanquishing them at basketball." At the dinner table that night a discussion concerning Saturday's practice game arose, to which Grace and Miriam listened quietly without taking part. "I suppose I ought to go to this practice game, to see what the freshmen team can do. I think we can make them look sick and sorry before we are through with them," drawled Virginia Gaines. Grace and Miriam exchanged lightning glances. This was the first intimation they had received that Virginia intended to play on the sophomore team. Miriam frowned. She was thinking of the time when she had been Grace's enemy on the basketball field and off. The recollection was not pleasant. It was very unfortunate that they had to oppose Virginia. Miriam determined to look out for herself and Grace, too, on the day of the game. Involuntarily her face hardened with resolve. She set her lips firmly, then glancing in the direction of Virginia she saw Elfreda, who sat next to the sophomore at the table, eyeing her intently. There was a disagreeable smile on the stout girl's face as she leaned toward Virginia and made a low-toned remark. Miss Gaines looked toward Miriam, smiled maliciously, and shrugged her shoulders. "That's a danger signal," decided Miriam. "She does mean mischief. I'll speak to Grace about it as soon as we go upstairs." But before they left the dining room the door bell rang. The maid admitted Gertrude Wells and Arline Thayer, and in the pleasure of seeing them, Miriam's resolve to warn Grace was quite forgotten. The practice game ended in an overwhelming advantage for Grace's team. The other team behaved good-naturedly over their defeat and challenged the winners to play again the following Saturday. They promptly accepted the challenge, and, when the second practice game was played, again came off victorious. Grace's old basketball ardor had returned threefold and every available moment found her in the gymnasium hard at work. The other members of the teams had imbibed considerable of her enthusiasm. Miss Martin, the center, laughingly said Grace was a human whirlwind and simply made the rest of the team play to keep up with her. Miriam's playing also evoked considerable praise. The first Saturday in February marked the last game with the Number Two team. It turned out to be quite an event and the gallery of the gymnasium was crowded with a mixed representation of classes. Virginia Gaines and Elfreda sat in the first row, and as the play proceeded Virginia watched the skilful tactics of Miriam and Grace with anything but enthusiasm. Elfreda, narrowly watching her companion, read apprehension in Virginia's face, although she made light of the playing of the freshmen team and predicted an easy victory for the sophomores. Scarcely knowing why she did so, Elfreda had doggedly insisted that if the sophomores hoped to beat that freshman team, they would have to play exceptionally well. Whereupon an argument arose regarding the respective merits of the two teams that lasted all the way to Wayne Hall, and ended in the two girls not speaking to each other again that night. "Did you see Elfreda in the gallery this afternoon?" asked Anne, as she and Grace left the gymnasium and set out for Wayne Hall. Anne had waited in the dressing room until Grace finished dressing. "I did not see any one," laughed Grace. "I was far too busy. I am surprised to learn that she came to the game." "She was there, in the third row balcony," replied Anne. "She sat with Virginia Gaines, who looked ferocious enough to bite." "I wish something would happen to make Elfreda see that we are her friends," sighed Grace. "She will see, some day," predicted Anne. "Sooner or later she will realize her mistake and come back to us." CHAPTER XIX A GAME WORTH SEEING The second Saturday in February dawned anything but encouragingly. The night before a blizzard had set in, and at one o'clock Saturday afternoon the temperature had dropped almost to zero. The wind howled and shrieked dismally, and to venture out meant to nurse frozen ears as a result of facing the blast. But neither wind nor weather frightened the enthusiastic basketball fans. With knitted and fur caps pulled down over their ears they gallantly braved the storm. Even the majority of the faculty were in the front seats that had been reserved for them and by two o'clock every available inch of space in the gallery was filled. The sophomore colors of blue and gold mingled with the red and white of the freshmen colors in the decorations that were displayed lavishly about the gymnasium. The faculty, too, wore the colors of their respective favorites, while the president of the college held two immense bouquets, one of red, the other of yellow roses, showing that he at least was impartial. On each side of the gallery a group of girls stood ready to lead their respective classes in the basketball choruses that are sung solely With the object of urging the teams on to deeds of glory. These choruses had been written hurriedly by loyal fans who had more enthusiasm than ability as verse writers, and fitted to popular airs. The fact that they possessed neither rhythm nor style troubled no one. The main idea was to make a great deal of noise in singing them, and nothing else counted. The freshmen and sophomore substitutes were the first to emerge from their dressing rooms on either side of the gymnasium, dressed in their respective gymnasium suits of black and blue, the sleeves and sailor collars of which were ornamented with their colors. They were greeted with a gratifying burst of song from both sides which lasted until they took their places, eager and alert, ready to make good if the opportunity presented itself. After a brief interval the dressing room doors opened again and the real teams appeared. This time the burst of song became so jubilantly noisy that the president of the college half rose in his seat as though to signal for order, then, apparently changing his mind, settled himself in his chair, smiling broadly. Immediately the song ended the referee's whistle blew and the great game began. From the moment the ball was put in play it was plain to the spectators that this was to be a game worth seeing. The sophomores, with Virginia Gaines as center, adopted whirlwind tactics from the start and the freshmen did little more than defend themselves during the first half, which came to an end without either side scoring. That the freshmen could hold their own was evident, and when the whistle blew for the second half the freshmen in the gallery applauded their team with renewed vigor. During the brief intermission Grace and Miriam had clasped hands and vowed to outplay the sophomores in the second half or perish in the attempt. The three other members had thereupon insisted on being included in the vow, and when the five girls trotted to their respective positions at the sound of the referee's whistle, it was with a determination to stoutly contest every inch of the ground. Luck seemed against them, however, for the sophomores scored through the clever playing of Virginia Gaines. The freshmen then set their teeth and resolved to die rather than allow the enemy to score again. Then Miriam secured the ball and dodging and ducking this way and that she passed the ball to another player who made the basket and the score was tied. This put the sophomores not only on the anxious seat, but also on their mettle, and try as they might the freshmen found themselves unable to pile up their score. The end of the second half crept nearer and the score still remained tied. Grace, who was becoming more and more apprehensive as the minutes passed, stood anxiously watching the ball, which was being played perilously near their opponents' goal. Catching the eyes of Miriam, who stood nearest it, Grace made a desperate little upward motion. Miriam understood and redoubled her efforts to secure the ball, which she finally did by springing straight up into the air and intercepting it on its way to the basket. A shout went up from the freshmen which grew to a roar. Miriam had thrown the ball unerringly to Grace, who caught it, and facing quickly toward the freshman goal, balanced herself on her toes preparatory to tossing her prize into the basket. "She'll never make it," groaned a freshman. But her remark was lost in the clamor. With one quick, comprehensive glance, Grace measured the distance, then with a long, swift overhand toss she sent the ball curving through the air. It dropped squarely into the basket, bounded up in the air, then dropped gently into place. [Illustration: Grace Measured the Distance.] For the next few minutes pandemonium reigned in the gymnasium. The happy freshmen burst into song and drummed on the floor in expression of their glee. The freshmen team had outplayed that of the sophomores. Only once before in the history of the college had such a thing occurred. To Grace Harlowe and Miriam Nesbit was given the principal credit for this latest victory. Grace's goal toss had been a record-breaker. Never had a freshman been known to make such a toss. Now that the excitement was over, Grace felt suddenly weak in the knees. She started for a seat at the side of the gymnasium, but before she reached it there was a rush from the freshman class. Her classmates lifted her to their shoulders and began parading about the gymnasium floor, singing: "Nineteen---- is looking sad, Tra la la, Tra la la, I wonder what has made her mad, Tra la la, Tra la la, Her coaching was in vain, The freshman team has won again, Little sophomores, run away, Come again some other day." Then there followed a song that brought a shout of laughter from hundreds of throats, and one in which the sophomores did not join: Backward, turn backward, O ball in your flight, Why did you drop in the basket so tight? Sadly the sophomores are rueing the day They asked the freshmen in their yard to play, Sophomore banners are hung at half mast, Sophomore tears they are falling so fast, Sophomore faces are turned toward the wall, Sophomore pride has had a hard fall. Grace had been seized and carried around and around the gymnasium on the shoulders of her exulting classmates, who sang lustily as they marched, then gently deposited her in the dressing room. Miriam also had received that honor. When the two girls left the dressing room twenty minutes later, they were taken charge of by a delegation of admiring freshmen and informed that there would be a dinner given that night at Vinton's in honor of them. An air of deep gloom pervaded the sophomore dressing room, however. Virginia Gaines dressed in gloomy silence. One or two of her team ventured to speak to her. She answered so shortly that they did not trouble her further, but went out talking among themselves as soon as they had changed their gymnasium suits for street clothing. Outside Elfreda waited impatiently. "I thought you were never coming," grumbled the stout girl. Then the unpleasant side of her disposition, which she had tried to eliminate during her brief friendship with the Oakdale girls, came to the surface and she said maliciously: "I thought you said they couldn't play, Virginia. Funny, wasn't it, that you had such a poor idea of their playing? It was the best game I ever saw, but all the star playing was on the freshman side." Virginia's face grew dark. "Stop trying to be sarcastic," she stormed. "I won't stand it. Do you hear me?" "Yes, I hear you. I'm not deaf," returned Elfreda dryly. "As for standing it, you don't have to. Good-bye." Turning sharply about she set off in the opposite direction, her hands in her pockets, a look of intense disgust on her round face. "That's the end of that," she muttered. "I'll move to-morrow. This time it will have to be out of Wayne Hall, unless----." Then she shook her head almost sadly: "Not there," she added. "She wouldn't have me for a roommate." CHAPTER XX GRACE OVERHEARS SOMETHING INTERESTING After the famous basketball game a marked change was noticeable in the attitude of the freshman class toward the Oakdale girls. Grace and Miriam received numerous invitations to dinners and spreads, in which Anne was frequently included. Then the girls at Wayne Hall gave a play in which Anne enacted the role of heroine, stage manager, prompter, and producer, besides doing all the coaching. After that her star was also in the ascendant and the little slights and coolnesses that had been noticeable after Elfreda's ill-timed gossip had done its work, died a natural death. The stout girl had lost no time in leaving Virginia. The evening after her quarrel with the sophomore she had moved her belongings into the hall the moment she reached her room, then gone downstairs and demanded another room. As it happened, a freshman whose cousin lived at Morton House had invited her to share her room. She had departed that very afternoon and Mrs. Elwood offered Elfreda the now vacant half of her room. Emma Dean, the tall, near-sighted freshman, occupied the other half. There was a single room in the house of Mrs. Elwood's sister, but Elfreda had refused to consider it. Despite the fact that there were now four young women at Wayne Hall with whom she was not on speaking terms, she could not bring herself to leave the house. In her inmost heart she knew that it was because she did not wish to leave the three girls she had repudiated, but not for worlds would she have acknowledged this to be the case. Several times she had been on the point of throwing her pride to the winds and apologizing to Grace, Miriam and Anne for her childish behavior. Then she would scoff at her own weakness and go doggedly on. Her new roommate, Emma Dean, was a cheery sort of girl who lived every day as it came and refused to borrow trouble. She never criticized other girls, nor did she gossip, and she was extremely thoughtful of the comfort of her roommate. After several days of dubious speculation the stout girl decided she liked Emma, and Emma decided that Elfreda was rather an agreeable disappointment. There were two young women, however, who had suddenly appeared to take a great interest in Elfreda. Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton had met Elfreda in Vinton's late one afternoon, and had made distinctly friendly overtures to her. At any other time she would have passed them by in disdain, but on that particular occasion, feeling gloomy and downcast, she decided to forget her grievance against them. Then, too, she did not know them to be the girls who had sent her the anonymous letter. Grace had never told her the truth of the affair, so she played unsuspectingly into their hands. They had invited her to have ice cream with them, and she had insisted that they be her guests at dinner. After that they had invited her to Stuart Hall to dinner and she had entertained them at Wayne Hall one evening, greatly to the surprise of Grace, who suddenly remembered that, after all, Elfreda was not so much to blame as she did not know the truth. But why should these two girls accept the hospitality of the very girl they had tried to drive away from Overton? It was a puzzle that Grace could not solve. She discussed it with Anne and Miriam but they could throw no light on the mystery. The coming of the Easter vacation gave the three girls more pleasant matters of which to think. This time Ruth Denton accompanied them to Oakdale as Grace's guest, while Miriam invited Arline Thayer also, as a surprise to Ruth. When Arline serenely joined them at the station the morning of their departure, Ruth could hardly believe the evidence of her own eyes. The two weeks in Oakdale flew by on wings. With the boys and the other members of the Phi Sigma Tau at home, too, there were more things to do and places to go than could possibly be squeezed into that brief space of time. Arline Thayer, who was a joyous, irrepressible spirit, announced with conviction that Oakdale was even nicer than New York. She and Nora became sworn friends and the joint guardians of Hippy, who declared that he never would have believed there were two such relentless tyrants in the world, if he had not seen them face to face. Mrs. Gray, who had been in Florida during the Christmas holidays, had returned in time to welcome her adopted children home. She was especially delighted to see Anne and would scarcely allow the quiet little girl out of her sight. She had been greatly disappointed because Anne had refused to accept from her the money for her college education, but secretly exulted in Anne's independence and smiled to herself when she thought of a certain clause in her will that had amply provided for her adopted daughter's future welfare. Altogether it was a vacation long to be remembered, and the four originals separated with the glad thought that the next time they met it would be months instead of weeks before their little company would again set their faces in opposite directions. The night after their return to Overton, Grace, after having made a conscientious effort to study, threw down her history in despair. "I know a great deal more about the history of Oakdale than I do about the history of Rome," she sighed. "I wish I had never heard of trigonometry," returned Anne, shutting her book with a snap. "I can't think of anything except the good time we've had. Home has completely upset my student mind." She rose, laid down her book and walked listlessly toward the window. It had been an unusually warm day for early spring and the night air had that suspicion of dampness in it that betokens rain. "It will rain before morning," she declared. "There isn't a star in sight and the moon has gone behind a cloud." Grace joined Anne at the window. The two girls stood peering out into the darkness of the spring night. "I feel as though I'd like to go out and walk miles and miles to-night," declared Grace. "So do I," agreed Anne. Then glancing back at the clock, she remarked, "It's twenty minutes past ten. Too late for us to go now. We can go to-morrow night, can't we?" Grace nodded. "We'll get our work done early, or, better still, we can go walking early in the evening and study when we come back. I wish you'd remind me that I must call on Mabel Ashe this week. In fact, all three of us ought to go over to Holland House." The next day, however, Anne remembered regretfully that she had promised to help a troubled freshman through the mazes of an especially trying trigonometry lesson, while Miriam had a theme to write which she had neglected until the last minute, and had to rush through on record time. "You're a set of irresponsible young things who don't know your own mind from one minute to the next," laughed Grace. "As I can't very well go walking alone, I'll make my call on Mabel." Directly after dinner she set out for Holland House and Mabel's delighted: "I'm so glad you came, Grace. Where have you been keeping yourself?" sounded very sweet to Grace, who adored Mabel and outside of her own particular chums liked her better than any other girl she knew at home or in college. The two young women were deep in conversation when a rap sounded at the door. Mabel opened it, looked inquiringly at the girl who stood outside and exclaimed contritely: "Oh, Helen, I'm so sorry I forgot all about you. I'll get ready this minute. Come in. Miss Harlowe, this is Miss Burton. Grace, I wonder if you will mind making a call to-night. I promised Helen I'd take her down to Wellington House and introduce her to a junior friend of mine who plays golf. Helen is a golf fiend." "So am I," laughed Grace. "I brought my golf bag to Overton, but didn't play much in the fall. I'm going to try it, though, as soon as the ground is in shape." "How nice!" exclaimed Helen Burton, with a friendly smile that lighted up her rather plain face and brought the dimples to her cheeks. "We can have some nice times together. You had better come with us now." "Thank you, I shall be pleased to go," replied Grace politely. "I have never been in Wellington House. It is an upper class house, isn't it?" "Yes," replied Mabel. "It is given up entirely to juniors and seniors. It is the oldest house on the campus, and very difficult to get into. Personally, I like Holland House better. I had an opportunity to get into Wellington House last fall, but refused it." Grace noted that Mabel frowned slightly and set her lips as though determined to shut out an unpleasant memory. To reach Wellington House was merely a matter of crossing one end of the campus. Grace looked about her curiously as they were ushered into the long, old-fashioned hall that extended almost to the back of the house. They entered the parlor at one side of the hall and sat down while Mabel excused herself and ran upstairs after Leona Rowe, the junior she had come to see. She had hardly disappeared before a flaxen head was poked in the door and a surprised voice said: "For goodness sake, Helen Burton, when did you rain down? You are just the one I want to see. What do you think of to-morrow's German? I can't translate it. It's frightfully hard. Come up and help me, dearest." The ingratiating emphasis she placed on the word "dearest" caused both Grace and Helen to laugh. "All right, I will for just two minutes. Want to come upstairs, Miss Harlowe?" Grace smilingly shook her head. "I'll stay here in case Mabel comes back." "Thank you," returned Helen. "Miss Harlowe, this is Miss Redmond." The two girls exchanged friendly nods. Then the flaxen-haired girl led the way, followed by Helen Burton, and Grace settled herself in the depths of a big chair to await their return. As she sat idly wondering what the subject of her next theme should be, the sound of voices reached her ears, proceeding from the back parlor that adjoined the room in which Grace sat. Two girls had entered the other room, but the heavy portieres which hung in the dividing arch, hid them from view. The voices, however, Grace recognized with a start as belonging to Beatrice Alden, the disagreeable junior, and Alberta Wicks of the sophomore class. "I'll be glad when my sophomore year is over," grumbled Alberta Wicks. "Mary and I have asked for a room here. I hope we get it. If we do we will be able, at least, to eat our meals without the eternal accompaniment of Miss Harlowe's and Miss Nesbit's doings. Ever since that basketball game, Stuart Hall has talked of nothing else." "Are there many freshmen at Stuart Hall?" asked Beatrice Alden. "Too many to suit me," was the emphatic answer. "If you are so down on freshmen in general, how in the world do you manage to endure that dreadful Miss Briggs?" "J. Elfreda is a joke," replied Alberta. "Nevertheless, she is a very useful joke. In the first place, she has plenty of money to spend, and we see to it that she spends a good share of it on us. Then, too, we can borrow money of her. She is a great convenience. The funny part of it is she doesn't know about that letter we wrote. For once that priggish Miss Harlowe did manage to hold her tongue to some purpose." "Suppose she does find out?" "She can't prove that we wrote the note," was the quick retort. "When Miss Harlowe tried to pin us to it that day at Stuart Hall I merely said that a number of sophomores felt justified in sending the note. Of course, she drew her own conclusions, but conclusions are far from proof, you know. She would hardly dare circulate any reports concerning it. We aren't going to bother with J. Elfreda much longer at any rate. It's getting too near warm weather to risk being bored to death. Mary expects a check from home soon, and I've written Mother for some extra money, so we won't need hers. Besides, I don't wish to let our acquaintance lap over into my junior year. She's frightfully ill bred, and I'm going to begin to be more careful about my associates next year." "What a frightful snob you are, Bert," said Beatrice rather disgustedly. "Well, you are my first cousin, you know," retorted Alberta significantly. "I never considered you particularly democratic." "I'm not deceitful, at any rate," reminded Beatrice. "If I dislike a girl I take no pains to conceal it, and I am certainly not a grafter." "Neither am I, Beatrice Alden, and the fact of your being my cousin doesn't give you the right to insult me. I intended to tell you about a stunt we had planned for Friday night, but since you seem to be so conscientious about Miss Briggs, I shan't tell you anything." Then a silence fell that was broken the next instant by the violent slam of the front door. Grace rose to her feet, took a step forward, paused irresolutely, then pushing apart the heavy curtains walked into the other room. Beatrice Alden stood unconcernedly running through the leaves of a magazine she had picked up from the table. "Miss Alden!" The senior turned quickly, looking inquiringly, then sternly, at Grace. "How long have you been here?" she said abruptly. "I heard part of the conversation," replied Grace coldly. "When you began talking I recognized your voices, then I heard my name mentioned, and true to the old adage about listeners I heard no good of myself. When I heard Miss Briggs's name spoken I decided that under the circumstances I was justified in listening further, as I intended at any rate to announce my presence and just what I heard as soon as you two had finished speaking. Miss Wicks's sudden departure prevented me from carrying out my intention as far as she was concerned. I shall, however, notify her at the earliest opportunity." Grace paused, looking squarely at the older girl. Beatrice Alden's expression of intense displeasure gave way to one of reluctant admiration with dislike struggling in the background. "You are extremely frank in your statements, Miss Harlowe," she said sarcastically. "There is no reason why I should not be," returned Grace composedly. "Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton, for reasons best known to themselves, chose to make Miss Briggs the victim of an unwomanly practical joke on the very day of her arrival at Overton. I think you are in possession of the story. Miss Briggs's method of retaliation was unwise, I will admit, but Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton had no right to try to drive her from Overton on account of it. In her distress over a certain anonymous letter she received, Miss Briggs came to me, and I, suspecting the source from which the letter came, tried as best I could to straighten out the tangle, without allowing Miss Briggs to know who was at fault. "Since then, unfortunately, a misunderstanding has arisen between us. I have now no influence whatever with Miss Briggs, and she has played directly into the hands of the only two enemies she has in college. All along I have been certain that Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton meant mischief. What I have heard to-day confirms it. Miss Alden, you are Miss Wicks's cousin. I heard her say so. As a true Overton girl, will you not use your influence with her in persuading her to abandon whatever plan she and Miss Hampton have made to annoy Miss Briggs?" Beatrice Alden eyed Grace reflectively but said nothing. Grace looked pleadingly at the irresponsive junior. For a moment tense silence reigned. Then Beatrice Alden shook her head. "I'm sorry, Miss Harlowe," she said soberly. All trace of hauteur had disappeared. "But you know how angry Alberta was when she left here. She wouldn't listen to me. I doubt if she speaks to me again this year. She has a frightful temper and holds the slightest grudge for ages. She will carry out her plan now, merely to show me how utterly she disregards my disapproval." "I'm sorry, too," smiled Grace ruefully. "I shall try to see Miss Briggs, but she is utterly unapproachable." The two girls looked into each other's eyes. Then they both laughed. Beatrice Alden stretched out her hand impulsively. "We're both in an evil case, aren't we?" she laughed. Grace met the hand half way. "But we are of the same mind, aren't we?" she asked. "Yes," replied Beatrice simply. She hesitated, looked rather confused, then added: "I used to think I disliked you, Miss Harlowe, but I find my feelings toward you are quite the opposite. I hope we shall some day be friends." "I hope so, too," agreed Grace earnestly. "We have a mutual friend, you know, in Mabel Ashe, although yours and Mabel's friendship began long before I came to Overton." A shadow crossed Beatrice's face. Grace noted it and interpreted it correctly. "You are very fond of Mabel, are you not, Miss Alden?" she asked. "Very," was the short answer. "Anne Pierson is the dearest girl friend I have in the world," declared wily Grace. "Then two Oakdale girls who are studying in an eastern conservatory of music come next, and after that Miriam Nesbit. There are also three other girls, members of a high school sorority to which I belong, and a girl in Denver, who have very strong claims on my affection. I have a number of dearest friends, you see. Some time I should like to tell you more of them." Beatrice had brightened visibly as Grace talked. She now felt assured that this attractive freshman with her clear grey eyes and straightforward manner would never attempt to monopolize Mabel's entire attention. At this moment Mabel's voice was heard at the head of the stairs. She descended, followed by Leona Rowe and Helen Burton. "Why, hello, Bee!" cried Mabel. "I asked for you upstairs, but was told you were out." "So I was," smiled Beatrice, "but I'm here now. What is your pleasure?" "Come over to Holland House and have tea and cakes and candy, if there's any left in the box of Huyler's that came last night. Every girl in the house sampled it. You know what that means." "I'll go for my hat and coat," returned Beatrice brightly. "See you in a minute." She ran lightly up the stairs, smiling to herself. Helen and Leona rushed out in the hall to interview a girl who had just come in. Finding themselves alone for the moment Mabel turned to Grace with a solemnly inquiring air, "How did you do it?" she asked in a low tone. "I'll tell you some other time," replied Grace. "It was a surprise to me, but the chance just happened to come and I took advantage of it." The return of the three young women cut off further opportunity for explanation, but as Grace walked back to Holland House, one arm linked in that of Mabel Ashe, while Beatrice Alden, heretofore frigid and unapproachable, walked at the other side of the popular junior, she could not help wishing a certain other tangle might be as easily straightened. CHAPTER XXI AN UNHEEDED WARNING The next day found Grace rather at a loss how to proceed in the case of Elfreda. From what she had overheard it was evident that Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton had decided to make Elfreda the victim of some well-laid plot of their own. What the nature of it was Grace had not the remotest idea. To approach Elfreda was embarrassing to say the least. To warn her against the two mischievous sophomores without being able to state anything more definite than what she had overheard at Wellington House was infinitely more embarrassing. "What time had I best try to see her?" Grace asked herself. She had come from Overton Hall with Anne and Miriam late that afternoon and the three girls had lingered on the steps of Wayne Hall, reluctant to go indoors. Spring was getting ready to fulfill all sorts of tender promises she had made to her children. The buds on the trees were bursting into tiny new green leaves. The crocuses were in bloom in the yards along College Street, and the grass on the campus was growing greener every hour. The roads, too, were obligingly drying, so that adventurous walkers might visit their favorite haunts in the country surrounding Overton without running the risk of wading in the mud. There was Guest House, the famous colonial tea shop that had been built and used as an inn during the Revolution. In this quaint historic place ample refreshment was to be found. There one could satisfy one's appetite with dainty little sandwiches, muffins and jam, tea cakes and tea, fresh milk or buttermilk. There was also Hunter's Rock that overhung the river, and whose smooth, flat surface made an ideal spot for picnickers. It was five miles from Overton, but extremely popular with all four classes, and from early spring until late fall, it was occupied on Saturday by various gay gipsy parties from the college. Then there were canoes for the venturesome, and staid old rowboats for the cautious, to be hired at a nominal sum, while girlish figures dotted the golf course and the tennis courts. Girls strolled about the campus in the early evenings, or gathered in groups on the steps of the campus houses. It was the time of year when spring creeps into one's blood, making one forget everything except the blueness of the sky, the softness of the air and the lure of green things growing. "I must go into the house," sighed Miriam Nesbit. "I have that appalling trigonometry lesson for to-morrow to prepare from beginning to end. I haven't looked at it yet." "I peeped at it yesterday," said Anne. "It's the worst one we've had, so far." "The end is not yet," reminded Grace. "Well it will be in sight before long. Our freshman year is almost over, didn't you know it, children!" queried Miriam laughingly. "It has seemed long in some respects and short in others," reflected Grace. "I think--" Grace paused. A tall, rather stout girl came hurriedly up the walk. She stalked up the steps and into the house without looking to the right or left. Even in that fleeting moment Grace noted that she seemed rather excited and that she carried in her hand an open letter. "I wonder if now would be a good time to tackle her," speculated Grace. Then deciding that, after all, there was nothing to be gained without making a venture, Grace walked resolutely to the door. "I'll see you later, girls," was her only remark as she passed inside. Once outside Elfreda's door, Grace did not feel quite so confident. Summoning all her courage, however, she knocked. An impatient voice called, "Come in," and Grace accepted the rather ungracious invitation to enter. J. Elfreda sat facing the window intent upon the letter Grace had seen in her hand. She turned sharply as the door closed, then catching sight of Grace, sprang to her feet, her face clouded with anger. "How dare you come in here?" she stormed. "You said 'Come in,' Elfreda," returned Grace quietly. "Yes, but not to you," raged Elfreda. "Never to you. Leave my room instantly and don't come back again." "I won't trouble you long," returned Grace. "I came to put you on your guard against two young women who are about to make mischief for you. I am very sorry I did not tell you long ago that Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton were the originators of the anonymous letter which caused you so much unhappiness. I suspected as much at the time, and accused them of writing it. They neither affirmed nor denied their part in the affair, although they admitted that certain members of the sophomore class wrote the letter. I threatened to take up the matter with the sophomore class if the two young women persisted in making you unhappy, and this threat evidently influenced them to drop their crusade against you. "To a certain extent I feel responsible for what has followed, for if I had told you this before you would hardly have afterward become friendly with them. However, I can do this much. From a conversation I overheard the other day I am convinced that Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton intend to play a practical joke on you on Friday night. I am afraid that it will not be of the tame variety either, and may cause you trouble. These two girls do not like you, Elfreda, and they have not forgiven you nor never will." "You are awfully anxious to make me think that no one but you and your friends ever liked me, aren't you?" sneered Elfreda. "Well, just let me tell you something. Those girls may have their faults, but they aren't stingy and selfish, at all events. This letter here is an invitation to----, well, I shan't tell you what it is, but it's far from being a practical joke, I can assure you." Grace looked doubtfully at Elfreda, who stood very erect, her head held high with offended dignity. Perhaps, after all, she had been too hasty. Perhaps the two sophomores really intended playing some harmless trick. Then the words, "We are not going to bother with J. Elfreda much longer," returned with a force that left Grace no longer in uncertainty. "Elfreda," she said earnestly, "I wish you would listen to me for once. Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton are not your friends. If you accept their invitation for Friday night you will be sorry. Take my advice, and steer clear of them." "Please mind your own business and get out of my room," commanded Elfreda fiercely. Casting one steady, reproachful look at the angry girl, Grace left the room in silence. Once outside her own door she clenched her hands and fought back her rising emotion. Tears of humiliation stood in her gray eyes, then winking them back bravely, she drew a long breath and opened her door. Anne, who in the meantime had come upstairs, turned expectantly. "What luck?" she questioned. "None," returned Grace shortly. "She ordered me out of her room." At this juncture Miriam Nesbit joined them. "What's the latest on the bulletin board?" she inquired, smiling mischievously. "Don't laugh, Miriam," rebuked Grace. "Things are serious. Elfreda has some sort of engagement for Friday night with those two girls. She almost told me what it was, then changed her mind and invited me to mind my own business and leave her room. I'm going to try to find out something about Friday night and see that she gets fair play. After that I shall never trouble myself about her," concluded Grace, her voice trembling slightly. "Don't feel so hurt at Elfreda's rudeness, Grace," soothed Miriam. "She doesn't mean half she says. She'll be sorry some day." "I wish 'some day' was before Friday," replied Grace mournfully. "I wonder who else is to take part in this affair?" "Watch Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton," advised Anne quietly. "That's sound advice," agreed Grace. "I appoint you and Miriam as secret service agents. You must unearth the enemy's plans for Friday night." "What will you do if we should happen to stumble upon them?" asked Miriam curiously. "I don't know, yet," said Grace slowly. "It will depend entirely on what they are. Since we can't prevent Elfreda from going to her fate, we may be obliged to go along with her. If I were to ask you girls to drop everything and follow me on Friday night, would you do it?" Anne and Miriam nodded. "Then that's settled," was her relieved comment. "I am going to take two other girls into our confidence. I shall tell Mabel Ashe and Frances Marlton. They will come to the rescue if I need them. Besides they are juniors, and if I am not mistaken, upper class support may be very desirable before we are through with this affair." "And all this anxiety over J. Elfreda," smiled Miriam. "But to tell you the truth, girls, I shall be only too glad to fare forth in the cause of Elfreda. I thought her a terrible cross when she first came, but now I am positively lonesome without her, and I don't care how soon she comes back." CHAPTER XXII TURNING THE TABLES For the next two days the three girls bent their efforts toward discovering the plot on foot against Elfreda, but to little purpose. So far, Grace had refrained from imparting her vague knowledge of what impended to Mabel and Frances. Her naturally self-reliant nature would not allow her to depend on others. She preferred to solve her own problems and fight her own battles if necessary. Whatever the two sophomores had planned was a secret indeed. By neither word nor sign did they betray themselves, and by Thursday evening Grace was beginning to show signs of anxiety. "I haven't been able to find out a thing," she declared dispiritedly to Anne. "I suspect one other girl, but I'm not sure about her. Anne, do you think Virginia Gaines is in this affair, too?" "Hardly," replied Anne. "She and Elfreda are not friendly, and Elfreda could not be coaxed to go where she is likely to see Miss Gaines." "But suppose Virginia Gaines kept strictly in the background, yet helped to play the trick," persisted Grace. "Of course she could easily do that," admitted Anne. "But what makes you think she would?" "Just this," replied Grace. "I saw her in conversation to-day with Mary Hampton. They were standing outside Science Hall. They didn't see me until I was within a few feet of them. Then they said good-bye in a hurry, and rushed off in opposite directions. Now, what would you naturally infer from that?" "It does look suspicious," agreed Anne. "That is what causes me to believe Virginia Gaines to be one of the prime movers in this affair," was the quiet answer. "They are all very clever. Too clever, by far, for me." A knock at the door caused Grace to start slightly. "Come in!" she called, then exclaimed in surprise as the door opened: "Why, Miriam, where did you go? You disappeared the moment dinner was over." "I had to go to the library," replied Miriam quickly. "Do you know whether the girls on both sides of us are out?" Grace nodded. "What's the matter, Miriam?" she asked curiously. "What has happened? You look as mysterious as the Three Fates themselves." "I've made a discovery," announced Miriam, taking a book from under her arm and opening it. "I found something in this book that you ought to see. I was in one of the alcoves to-night looking for a book that I have been trying to lay hands on for a week. It has been out every time. To-night I found it and inside the leaves I found this." She handed Grace a folded paper. Grace unfolded it wonderingly and began to read aloud: "Dear Virginia: "We decided that the haunted house plan would be quite likely to subdue a certain obstreperous individual. We have already invited her to a moonlight party at Hunter's Rock, as you know. Once she is there we will see to the rest. Sorry you can't be with us, but that would give the whole plan away. A little meditation in spookland will do our friend good, and this time if she is wise she will keep her troubles to herself. Of course, if any one should see her going home in the wee small hours of the morning it might be unpleasant for her, but then, we can't trouble ourselves over that. "Yours, hastily, "Bert." Grace stared first at Anne, then Miriam, in incredulous, shocked surprise. "What a cruel girl!" she exclaimed. "Poor Elfreda!" "Of course, the writer meant Elfreda," agreed Miriam. "'Bert,' I suppose, stands for Alberta. In the first place, what haunted house does she mean?" "I don't know," answered Grace, knitting her brows. "Wait a minute! I'll go down and ask Mrs. Elwood." Within five minutes she had returned, bristling with information. "I found out the whole story," she declared. "It is an old white house not far from Hunter's Rock. Two brothers once lived there, and one disappeared. It was rumored that he had been killed by his older brother, and that the spirit of the murdered man haunted the place so persistently that the other brother left there and never came back. They say a white figure, carrying a lighted candle, walks moaning through the rooms." "How dreadful!" shivered Anne. "It is bad enough to think of those girls coaxing Elfreda to go there. I believe they intend to persuade her to go there, then leave her, too." "We might show Elfreda this note," reflected Miriam. "No; on second thought I should say we'd better make up a crowd and follow the others to Hunter's Rock. Of course, we won't stay there. Those girls are breaking rules by going there at night. We shall be breaking rules, too, but in a good cause." A long conversation ensued that would have aroused consternation in the breast of a number of sophomores, had they been privileged to hear it. When the last detail had been arranged, Grace leaned back in her chair and smiled. "I think everything will go beautifully," she said, "and several people are going to be surprised. Miriam, will you see Mabel Ashe, Constance Fuller and Frances Marlton in the morning? Anne, will you look out for Arline Thayer and Ruth? That will leave Leona Rowe and Helen Burton for me, and, oh, yes, I'll have a talk with Emma Dean." To all appearances, Friday dawned as prosaically as had all the other days of that week, but in the breasts of a number of the students of Overton stirred an excitement that deepened as the day wore on. As is frequently the case, the object of it all went calmly on her way, taking a smug satisfaction in the thought that she was the only freshman invited to the select gathering of sophomores who were to brave the censure of the dean, and picnic by moonlight at Hunter's Rock. For almost the first time since her arrival at college Elfreda felt her own popularity. Despite her native shrewdness, she was particularly susceptible to flattery. To be the idol of the college had been one of her most secret and hitherto hopeless desires. Now, in the sophomore class she had found girls who really appreciated her, and who were ready to say pleasant things to her rather than lecture her. She was glad, now, that she had dropped Grace and her friends in time, and resolved next year that she would put the width of the campus between herself and Wayne Hall. As she slipped on her long blue serge coat that night--the air was chilly, though the day had been warm--a flush of triumph mounted to her cheeks. Then glancing at the clock she hurriedly adjusted her hat. Her appointment was for half-past seven. Alberta said the party was to be in honor of her and she must not keep her friends waiting. She looked sharply about her to see who was in sight. She had been pledged to secrecy. Alberta had said they would return before half-past ten, so there would be no need of asking Mrs. Elwood to leave the door unlocked for her. Then she walked briskly down the steps and up the street. Fifteen minutes before she left the house, three dark figures had marched out single file down the street. Two blocks from the house they had been met by a delegation of dark figures, and without a word being spoken, the little party had taken a side street that led to Overton Drive, a public highway that wound straight through the town out into the country. The company had proceeded in absolute silence, and finally leaving the road had turned into the fields and plodded steadily on. It was the new of the moon and the landscape was shrouded in heavy shadows. On and still on the silent procession had traveled, and when their eyes, now accustomed to the darkness, had espied the outlines of a tumble-down, one-story house that stood out against the blackness of the night a halt had been made and each dark figure had taken from under her arm a bundle. Then the faint rustle of paper accompanied by an occasional giggle or a smothered exclamation had been heard, and last but most remarkable, the dark figures had given place to a company of sheeted ghosts who had glided over the fields with true ghost-like mien and disappeared in a little grove just off the highway. In the meantime, Elfreda had been received with acclamation by the treacherous sophomores, who vied with each other as to who should be her escort. There were nine girls, and each of them also bore a bundle, which contained not sheets, but the eatables for the picnic. This procession also set out in silence, which was broken as soon as the town was left behind. Alberta, who walked with her arm linked in Elfreda's, began to relate the story of the haunted house. "Do you suppose for one minute that that house is really haunted?" said Elfreda sceptically. "No one knows," was the disquieting reply. "People have seen strange sights there." "What sights?" demanded Elfreda. "They say the murdered brother walks through the house and moans," replied Alberta, shuddering slightly. "That's nonsense," said Elfreda bravely. Nevertheless, the idea was not pleasant to contemplate. "I don't believe in ghosts," she added. "I dare you to go into the room where the man was murdered," laughed Mary Hampton. "I'm not afraid," persisted Elfreda. "Prove it, then," taunted Mary. "All right, I will," retorted Elfreda defiantly. "Show me the room when we get there and I'll go into it." "I don't think we ought to go near that old house at night," protested a sophomore. "We'd get into all sorts of trouble as it is, if the faculty knew we were out." "Now, don't begin preaching," snapped Alberta Wicks. "If you are dissatisfied, go home." "I wish I'd stayed at home," growled the other sophomore wrathfully. While this conversation was being carried on, the party was rapidly nearing the haunted house. They halted directly in front of it, and Mary Hampton said, "Now, Miss Briggs, make good your promise." Elfreda walked boldly up to the house, although she felt her courage oozing rapidly. "I'll go inside with you, and show you the room. It's that little room off the hall," volunteered Alberta. The outside door stood wide open. Elfreda peered fearfully down the little hall, then stepped resolutely into the little room at one side of it. A door slammed. There was the sound of a key turning in a lock, a rush of scurrying feet; then silence. Across the field fled the dark figures, nor did they stop until they had crossed the highway and entered the little grove that led to Hunter's Rock. Suddenly a piercing scream rang out. It was followed by a succession of wild cries, and with one accord the terror-stricken conspirators made for the highway. But at every step a white figure rose in the path filling the air with weird, mournful wails. Fright lent speed to sophomore feet, and without daring to look behind, eight badly scared girls ran steadily along the road to Overton, intent only on putting distance between themselves and the terrifying apparitions that had sprung up before them. If they had stopped to deliberate for even five seconds they would, in all probability, have stood their ground, but the silent, ghostly figures that had bobbed up as by magic, coupled with the tale of the haunted house which Alberta had related, was a little too much for even vaunted sophomore courage. A death-like stillness followed the ignominious flight of the plotters. Then from behind a tree stepped a white figure and a cautious voice called softly: "Come on, girls. They have gone. We must hurry and let Elfreda out of that awful house." At this command a ripple of subdued laughter rose from all sides and the ghosts began to appear from their nearby hiding places. "Wasn't it funny?" laughed a tall ghost with the voice of Frances Marlton. "I know several sophomores who will walk softly for the rest of this year at least," predicted another ghost, ending with the giggle that endeared Mabel Ashe to all her friends. "These masks are frightfully warm," complained a diminutive spectre. A quick movement of her hand and the mask was removed, showing the rosy face of Arline Thayer. "Keep your mask on, Arline," warned Gertrude. "Even in this secluded spot some one may be watching you." The party proceeded with as little noise as possible to the haunted house. Pausing at the front door a brief council was held. Then removing their masks and the sheets that enveloped them, Grace and Miriam resolutely entered the hall and went straight to the locked door, behind which Elfreda was a prisoner. The key had been left in the lock. It turned with a grating sound. Slipping her hand in the pocket of her sweater, Grace produced a tiny electric flashlight which she turned on the room. In one corner, seated on the floor, her back against the wall and her feet straight in front of her, sat Elfreda. She eyed the flashing light defiantly, then saw who was behind it and said grimly: "I might have known it. If I had taken your advice I wouldn't be here now." "Oh, Elfreda!" exclaimed Grace. "I'm so glad you are not frightened. It was a cruel trick, but, thank goodness, we found out about it in time." Elfreda rose and walked deliberately up to Grace and Miriam. "I'm sorry for everything," she said huskily. "I've been a ridiculous simpleton, and I don't deserve to have friends. Will you forgive me, girls? I'd like to start all over again." "Of course we will. That was a direct, manly speech, Elfreda," laughed Miriam, but there were tears in her own eyes which no one saw in the darkness. She realized that in spite of her childish behavior she was fond of the stout girl and was glad that peace had been declared. "Let us forget all about it, shake hands and go home," proposed Grace, "or we may find ourselves locked out." The two girls shook hands with Elfreda, and all around again for good luck, then linking an arm in each of hers they conducted the rescued prisoner to where the rest of the party awaited them. During their absence the ghosts had doffed their spectral garments and the instant the three joined them the order to march was given. Once fairly in Overton, conversation was permitted, and on the same corner where they had met, the rescuers parted, after much talk and laughter. "Come into my room and have tea to-night, Elfreda," invited Miriam, as they entered the house. "I have a pound of your favorite cakes." "I'd like to come to stay," said Elfreda wistfully. "But I've been too hateful for you ever to want me for a roommate again." "It's rather late for you to move now," replied Miriam slowly. "But I'd love to have you with me next year." "Would you, honestly?" asked Elfreda, opening her eyes in astonishment. "Honestly," repeated Miriam, smiling. "I'll think about it," returned Elfreda, flushing deeply. "But there is nothing to think about," protested Miriam. "I wouldn't ask you if I did not care for you." "That isn't it," said Elfreda in a low tone. "It isn't you. It's I. Don't you understand? You are letting me off too easily. I don't deserve to have you be so nice to me." "We wish you to forget about what has happened, Elfreda," said Grace earnestly. "Everyone is likely to make mistakes. We are not here to judge, we are here to help one another. That is one of the ways of cultivating true college spirit." "I'll tell you one thing," returned Elfreda, her eyes shining, "whether I cultivate college spirit or not, I'm going to try to cultivate common sense. Then, at least, I'll know enough to treat my best friends civilly." CHAPTER XXIII VIRGINIA CHANGES HER MIND What the vanquished sophomores thought of the trick that had been played on them was a matter for speculation. Once back in Overton, the truth of the situation had dawned upon them. Their common sense told them that real ghosts, if there were any, never congregated in companies the size of the one that had risen to haunt them the previous night. Obviously some one had overheard their plan to picnic at Hunter's Rock and treated them to an unwelcome surprise. It did not occur to any one of them until they had returned to their respective houses that they had left J. Elfreda locked in the haunted abode of the two brothers. Then consternation reigned in each sophomore breast. Directly after chapel the next morning, eight young women were to be seen in an anxious group just outside the chapel. Several freshmen and two or three juniors glanced appraisingly at them, then passed on. "Did you notice the way that Miss Wells looked at me this morning?" muttered Mary Hampton to her satellites. "Never mind a little thing like that," snapped Alberta Wicks. "The question is, where is J. Elfreda? If she is still shut up in that house we might as well go home now instead of waiting to be sent there." "Nonsense, Bert," scoffed one of the sophomores. "You are nervous. We may not be found out." "Found out! J. Elfreda will be raging. She'll go straight to the dean, the minute she is free. Oh, why didn't we think to run back and let her out in spite of those ridiculous white figures?" "What made you lock her in there, then, if you were afraid she'd tell?" asked one of the others rather sarcastically. "Yes, that's what I say!" exclaimed a second. "This affair has been very silly from start to finish. I'm ashamed of myself for having been drawn into it, and in future you may count me out of any more such stunts." "You girls don't understand," declared Alberta Wicks angrily. "We only meant to even an old score with the Briggs person. We were going to call for her on the way home, and tell her that we had evened our score. She wouldn't have breathed it to a soul. She knew that we'd make life miserable for her next year if she did. She wouldn't tell a little thing like that, but to leave her there all night. That really was dreadful. Mary and I are in for it. That's certain." "If I'm not mistaken, there goes Miss Briggs now!" exclaimed a girl who had been idly watching the students as they passed out of the chapel. "Where? Where?" questioned Mary and Alberta together. The sophomore pointed. "Yes; it is J. Elfreda," almost wailed Alberta Wicks. "I'm going straight back to Stuart Hall and pack my trunk. Come on, Mary." "Better wait a little," dryly advised the sophomore who had announced her disapproval of the night's escapade. "You may be sorry if you don't." "Good-bye, girls," said Alberta abruptly. "If I hear anything, I'll report to you at once. Now that J. Elfreda is among us, we'd better steer clear of one another for a while at least." She hurried away, followed by Mary Hampton. "That was my first, and if I get safely out of this, will be my last offense," said another sophomore firmly. "All those who agree with me say 'aye.'" Five "ayes" were spoken simultaneously. In the meantime, Grace was trying vainly to make up her mind what to do. Should she go directly to the two mischievous sophomores, revealing the identity of the ghosts, or should she leave them in a quandary as to the outcome of their unwomanly trick? One thing had been decided upon definitely by Grace and her friends. They would tell no tales. Grace could not help thinking that a little anxiety would be the just due of the plotters, and with this idea in mind determined to do nothing for a time, at least, toward putting them at their ease. But there was one person who had not been asked to remain silent concerning the ghost party, and that person was Elfreda. Grace had forgotten to tell her that the night's happenings were to be kept a secret and when late that afternoon she espied Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton walking in the direction of Stuart Hall she pursued them with the air of an avenger. Before they realized her presence she had begun a furious arraignment of their treachery. "You ought to be sent home for it," she concluded savagely, "and if Grace Harlowe wasn't----" "Grace Harlowe!" exclaimed Alberta, turning pale. "Do you mean to tell me that it was she who planned that ghost party?" "I shall tell you nothing," retorted Elfreda. "I'm sorry I said even that much. I want you to understand, though, that if you ever try to play a trick on me again, I'll see that you are punished for it if I have to go down on my knees to the whole faculty to get them to give you what you deserve. Just remember that, and mind your own business, strictly, from now on." Turning on her heel, the stout girl marched off, leaving the two girls in a state of complete perturbation. "Had we better go and see Miss Harlowe?" asked Mary Hampton, rather unsteadily. "The question is, do we care to come back here next year?" returned Alberta grimly. "I'd like to come back," said Mary in a low voice. "Wouldn't you?" "I don't know," was the perverse answer. "I don't wish to humble myself to any one. I'm going to take a chance on her keeping quiet about last night. I have an idea she is not a telltale. If worse comes to worst, there are other colleges, you know, Mary." "I thought, perhaps, if we were to go to Miss Harlowe, we might straighten out matters and be friends," said Mary rather hesitatingly. "Those girls have nice times together, and they are the cleverest crowd in the freshman class. I'm tired of being at sword's points with people." "Then go over to them, by all means," sneered Alberta. "Don't trouble yourself about your old friends. They don't count." "You know I didn't mean that, Bert," said Mary reproachfully. "I won't go near them if you feel so bitter about last night." It was several minutes before Mary succeeded in conciliating her sulky friend. By that time the tiny sprouts of good fellowship that had vainly tried to poke their heads up into the light had been hopelessly blighted by the chilling reception they met with, and Mary had again been won over to Alberta's side. Saturday evening Arline Thayer entertained the ghost party at Martell's, and Elfreda, to her utter astonishment, was made the guest of honor. During the progress of the dinner, Alberta Wicks, Mary Hampton and two other sophomores dropped in for ice cream. By their furtive glances and earnest conversation it was apparent that they strongly suspected the identity of the avenging specters. Elfreda's presence, too, confirmed their suspicions. In a spirit of pure mischief Mabel Ashe pulled a leaf from her note book. Borrowing a pencil, she made an interesting little sketch of two frightened young women fleeing before a band of sheeted specters. Underneath she wrote: "It is sometimes difficult to lay ghosts. Walk warily if you wish to remain unhaunted." This she sent to Alberta Wicks by the waitress. It was passed from hand to hand, and resulted in four young women leaving Martell's without finishing their ice cream. "You spoiled their taste for ice cream, Mabel," laughed Frances Marlton, glancing at the now vacant table. "I imagine they are shaking in their shoes." "They did not think that the juniors had taken a hand in things," remarked Constance Fuller. "Hardly," laughed Helen Burton. "Did you see their faces when they read that note?" "It's really too bad to frighten them so," said Leona Rowe. "I don't agree with you, Leona," said Mabel Ashe firmly. Her charming face had grown grave. "I think that Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton both ought to be sent home. If you will look back a little you will recollect that these two girls were far from being a credit to their class during their freshman year. I don't like to say unkind things about an Overton girl, but those two young women were distinctly trying freshmen, and as far as I can see haven't imbibed an iota of college spirit. Last night's trick, however, was completely overstepping the bounds. If Miss Briggs had been a timid, nervous girl, matters might have resulted quite differently. Then it would have been our duty to report the mischief makers. I am not sure that we are doing right in withholding what we now know from the faculty, but I am willing to give these girls the benefit of the doubt and remain silent." "That is my opinion of the matter, too," agreed Grace. "It is only a matter of a few days until we shall all have to say good-bye until fall. During vacation certain girls will have plenty of time to think things over, and then they may see matters in an entirely different light. I shouldn't like to think that almost my last act before going home to my mother was to give some girl a dismissal from Overton to take home to hers." A brief silence followed Grace's remark. The little speech about her mother had turned the thoughts of the girls homeward. Suddenly Mabel Ashe rose from her chair. "Here's to our mothers, girls. Let's dedicate our best efforts to them, and resolve never to lessen their pride in us with failures." [Illustration: Over the Tea and Cakes the Clouds Dispersed.] When Elfreda, Miriam, Anne and Grace ran up the steps of Wayne Hall at a little before ten o'clock they were laughing and talking so happily they failed to notice Virginia Gaines, who had been walking directly ahead of them. She had come from Stuart Hall, where, impatient to learn just what had happened the night before, she had gone to see Mary and Alberta. Finding them out she managed to learn the news from the very girl who had declared herself sorry for her part in the escapade. This particular sophomore, now that the reaction had set in, was loud in her denunciation of the trick and congratulated Virginia on not being one of those intimately concerned in it. But Virginia, now conscience-stricken, had little to say. She still lingered in the hall as the quartette entered, but they passed her on their way upstairs without speaking and she finally went to her room wishing, regretfully, that she had been less ready to quarrel with the girls who bade fair to lead their class both in scholarship and popularity. It was fully a week afterward when a thoroughly humbled and repentant Virginia, after making sure that Anne was out, knocked one afternoon at Grace's door. "How do you do, Miss Gaines," said Grace civilly, but without warmth. "Won't you come in?" Virginia entered, but refused the chair Grace offered her. "No, thank you, I'll stand," she replied. Then in a halting fashion she said: "Miss Harlowe, I--am--awfully sorry for--for being so hateful all this year." She stopped, biting her lip, which quivered suspiciously. Grace stared at her caller in amazement. Could it be possible that insolent Virginia Gaines was meekly apologizing to her. Then, thoughtful of the other girl's feelings, she smiled and stretched out her hand: "Don't say anything further about it, Miss Gaines. I hope we shall be friends. One can't have too many, you know, and college is the best place in the world for us to find ourselves. Come in to-night and have tea and cakes with us after lessons. That is the highest proof of hospitality I can offer at present." "I will," promised Virginia. Then impulsively she caught one of Grace's hands in hers. "You're the dearest girl," she said, "and I'll try to be worthy of your friendship. Please tell the girls I'm sorry. I'll tell them myself to-night." With that she fairly ran from the room, and going to her own shed tears of real contrition. Later, it took all Grace's reasoning powers to put Elfreda in a state of mind that verged even slightly on charitable, but after much coaxing she promised to behave with becoming graciousness toward Virginia. Over the tea and cakes the clouds gradually dispersed, and when Virginia went to her room that night, after declaring that she had had a perfectly lovely time, Grace took from her writing case the note that Miriam had found, and tore it into small pieces. She needed no evidence against Virginia. CHAPTER XXIV SAYING GOOD-BYE TO THEIR FRESHMAN YEAR The few intervening days that lay between commencement and home were filled with plenty of pleasant excitement. There were calls to make, farewell spreads and merry-makings to attend, and momentous questions concerning what to leave behind and what to take home to be decided. The majority of the girls at Wayne Hall had asked for their old rooms for the next year. Two sophomores had succeeded in getting into Wellington House. One poor little freshman, having studied too hard, had brought on a nervous affection and was obliged to give up her course at Overton for a year at least. There was also one other sophomore whose mother was coming to the town of Overton to live and keep house for her daughter in a bungalow not far from the college. It now lacked only two days until the end of the spring term, and what to pack and when to pack it were the burning questions of the hour. "There will be room for four more freshmen here next year," remarked Grace, as she appeared from her closet, her arms piled high with skirts and gowns. Depositing them on the floor, she dropped wearily into a chair. "I don't believe I can ever make all those things go into that trunk. I have all my clothes that I brought here last fall, and another lot that I brought back at Christmas, and still some others that I acquired at Easter. If I had had a particle of forethought I would have taken home a few things each trip. Don't dare to leave the house until this trunk is packed, Anne, for I shall need you to help me sit on it. If our combined weight isn't enough, we'll invite Elfreda and Miriam in to the sitting. I am perfectly willing to perform the same kind offices for them. Oh, dear, I hate to begin. I'm wild to go home, but I can't help feeling sad to think my freshman joys are over. It seems to me that the two most important years in college are one's freshman and senior years. "Being a freshman is like beginning a garden. One plants what one considers the best seeds, and when the little green shoots come up, it's terribly hard to make them live at all. It is only by constant care that they are made to thrive and all sorts of storms are likely to rise out of a clear sky and blight them. Some of the seeds one thought would surely grow the fastest are total disappointments, while others that one just planted to fill in, fairly astonish one by their growth, but if at the end of the freshman year the garden looks green and well cared for, it's safe to say it will keep on growing through the sophomore and junior years and bloom at the end of four years. That's the peculiarity about college gardens. One has to begin to plant the very first day of the freshman year to be sure of flowers when the four years are over. "In the sophomore year the hardest task is keeping the weeds out, and during the junior and senior years the difficulty will be to keep the ground in the highest state of cultivation. It will be easier to neglect one's garden, then, because one will have grown so used to the things one has planted that one will forget to tend them and put off stirring up the soil around them and watering them. I'm going to think a little each day while I'm home this summer about my garden and keep it fresh and green." Grace laid the gown she had been folding in the trunk and looked earnestly at Anne as she finished her long speech. "What a nice idea!" exclaimed Anne warmly. "I think I shall have to begin gardening, too." "Your garden has always been in a flourishing condition from the first," laughed Grace. "The chief trouble with mine seems to be the number of strange weeds that spring up--nettles that I never planted, but that sting just as sharply, nevertheless. It hurts me to go home with the knowledge that there are two girls here who don't like me. I know I ought not to care, for I have nothing to regret as far as my own conduct is concerned, but still I'd like to leave Overton for the summer without one shadow in my path." "Perhaps, when certain girls come back in the fall they will be on their good behavior." "Perhaps," repeated Grace sceptically. The entrance into the room of Elfreda and Miriam, who had been out shopping, brought the little heart talk to an abrupt close. "We've a new kind of cakes," exulted Miriam. "They are three stories high and each story is a different color. They have icing half an inch thick and an English walnut on top. All for the small sum of five cents, too." "We bought a dozen," declared Elfreda, "and now I'm going out to buy ice cream. This packing business calls for plenty of refreshment to keep one's energy up to the mark. I've thought of a lovely plan to lighten my labors." "What is it?" asked Grace. "Your plans are always startlingly original if not very practical." "This is practical," announced the stout girl. "I'm going to give away my clothes; that is, the most of them. I found a poor woman the other day who does scrubbing for the college who needs them. I found out where she lives and I'm going to bundle them all together and send them to her. I don't wish her to know where they came from. I'll just write a card, and--" The three broadly smiling faces of her friends caused her to stop short and regard them suspiciously. "What's the matter?" she said in an offended tone. Grace ran over and slipped her arm about the stout girl's shoulders. "You are the one who sent Ruth her lovely clothes last Christmas. Don't try to deny it. I was sure of it then." "Oh, see here," expostulated Elfreda, jerking herself away, her face crimson. "I--you--" "Confess," threatened Miriam, seizing the little brass tea kettle and brandishing it over Elfreda's head. "I won't," defied Elfreda, laughing a little in spite of her efforts to appear offended. "One, two," counted Miriam, grasping the kettle firmly. "All right, I did," confessed Elfreda nonchalantly. "What are you going to do about it?" "Present you with your Christmas gifts now," smiled Miriam. "You wouldn't look at us last Christmas, so we've been saving our gifts ever since. Wait a minute, girls, until I go for mine." As she darted from the room, Grace said softly: "We hoped that you would understand about Thanksgiving and that everything would be all right by Christmas, so we planned our little remembrances for you just the same. Then, when--when we didn't see you before going home for the holidays, Anne suggested that we put them away, because we all hoped that you'd be friends with us again some day." Rummaging in the tray of her trunk she produced a long, flat package which she offered to Elfreda. Anne, who, at Grace's first words, had stepped to the chiffonier, took out a beribboned bundle, and stood holding it toward the stout girl. Another moment and Miriam had returned bearing her offering. "I wish you a merry June," declared Miriam with an infectious giggle that was echoed by the others. Then Elfreda opened the package from Miriam, which contained a Japanese silk kimono similar to one of her own that her roommate had greatly admired. Grace's package contained a pair of long white gloves, and Anne had remembered her with a book she had once heard the stout girl express a desire to own. "You had no business to do it," muttered Elfreda. Then gathering up her presents she made a dash for the door and with a muffled, "I'll be back soon," was gone. It was several minutes before she reappeared with red eyes, but smiling lips. Then a long talk ensued, during which time the art of trunk-packing languished. It was renewed with vigor that evening and continued spasmodically for the next two days. In the campus houses the real packing dragged along in most instances until within two hours of the time when the trunks were to be called for. Then a wholesale scramble began, to make up for lost minutes. One of the most frequent and painful sights during those last two days was that of a wrathful expressman, glaring in impotent rage while an enterprising damsel opened her trunk on the front porch to take out or put in one or several of her various possessions which, until that moment, had been completely forgotten. The night before leaving Overton the four girls paid a visit to Ruth Denton. The plucky little freshman had refused an invitation to spend the summer with Arline Thayer, but had accepted a position in Overton with a dress-maker. The last two weeks of her vacation she had promised to spend with Arline at the sea-shore. Their last morning at Overton dawned fair and sunshiny. Grace, who had risen early, stood at the window, looking out at the glory of the sparkling June day. The campus was a vast green velvet carpet and the pale green of the trees had not yet changed to that darker, dustier shade that belongs only to summer. Back among the trees Overton Hall rose gray and majestic. Grace's heart swelled with pride as she gazed at the stately old building surrounded by its silent, leafy guard. "Overton, my Alma Mater," she said softly. "May I be always worthy to be your child." "What are you mooning over?" asked Anne, who had slipped into her kimono and joined Grace at the window. "I'm rhapsodizing," smiled Grace, her eyes very bright. "I love Overton, don't you, Anne?" Anne nodded. "I'm glad we didn't go to Wellesley or Vassar, or even Smith. I'd rather be here." "So would I," sighed Grace. "Next to home there is no place like Overton. I almost wish I were coming back here next fall as a freshman." "But it's against the law of progress to wish one's self back," smiled Anne, "and being a sophomore surely has its rainbow side." "And it rests with us to find it," replied Grace softly, placing her hand on her friend's shoulder. A little later, laden with bags and suit cases, the three Oakdale girls, accompanied by Elfreda, walked out of Wayne Hall as freshmen for the last time. "When next we see this house it will be as sophomores," observed Elfreda. "I'm glad we are all going home on the same train. Do you remember the day I met you? I thought I owned the earth then. But I have found out that there are other people to consider besides myself. That is what being a freshman at Overton has taught me." "That's a very good thing for all of us to remember," remarked Grace. "I'm going to try to practise it next year." "You won't have to try very hard," returned Elfreda dryly. "How much time have we?" "Almost an hour," replied Miriam, looking at her watch. "Then we've time to stop at Vinton's for a farewell sundae. It's our last freshman treat. Come on, everybody," invited the stout girl. "No more sundaes here until next fall," lamented Miriam, as they sat waiting for their order. "I shall miss Vinton's. There is nothing in Oakdale quite like it." "And I shall miss you girls," declared Elfreda bluntly. "Why don't you pay us a visit, then?" suggested Miriam. "We expect to be at home part of the time this summer." "Perhaps I will," reflected Elfreda. "But you must write to me at any rate." At the station groups of happy-faced girls stood waiting for the train. "We are going to have plenty of company," observed Anne. "Do you remember how forlorn we felt when we were cast away on this station platform last fall? We won't feel so strange next September." "We shall feel very important instead," laughed Miriam. "It will be our turn to escort bewildered freshmen to their boarding places." "Yes, and we'll see that they don't stray, too," retorted Elfreda grimly. "Or mistake the Register for the registrar," smiled Grace. What befell Grace and her friends during their sophomore year is set forth fully in "Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College." How they lived up to their girlish ideals, finding the "rainbow side" of their sophomore year, is a story that no admirer of Grace Harlowe can afford to miss. The End * * * * * HENRY ALTEMUS COMPANY'S CATALOGUE OF The Best and Least Expensive Books for Real Boys and Girls * * * * * Really good and new stories for boys and girls are not plentiful. Many stories, too, are so highly improbable as to bring a grin of derision to the young reader's face before he has gone far. The name of ALTEMUS is a distinctive brand on the cover of a book, always ensuring the buyer of having a book that is up-to-date and fine throughout. No buyer of an ALTEMUS book is ever disappointed. Many are the claims made as to the inexpensiveness of books. Go into any bookstore and ask for an Altemus book. Compare the price charged you for Altemus books with the price demanded for other juvenile books. You will at once discover that a given outlay of money will buy more of the ALTEMUS books than of those published by other houses. Every dealer in books carries the ALTEMUS books. * * * * * Sold by all booksellers or sent postpaid on receipt of price Henry Altemus Company 507-513 Cherry Street, Philadelphia * * * * * The Motor Boat Club Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK The keynote of these books is manliness. The stories are wonderfully entertaining, and they are at the same time sound and wholesome. 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Trail Fun and Knowledge. 4 THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS IN SUMMER ATHLETICS; Or, Dick & Co. Make Their Fame Secure. Cloth, Illustrated Price, per Volume, 50c. * * * * * High School Boys' Vacation Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK "Give us more Dick Prescott books!" This has been the burden of the cry from young readers of the country over. Almost numberless letters have been received by the publishers, making this eager demand; for Dick Prescott, Dave Darrin, Tom Reade, and the other members of Dick & Co. are the most popular high school boys in the land. Boys will alternately thrill and chuckle when reading these splendid narratives. 1 THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' CANOE CLUB; Or, Dick & Co.'s Rivals on Lake Pleasant. 2 THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS IN SUMMER CAMP; Or, The Dick Prescott Six Training for the Gridley Eleven. 3 THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' FISHING TRIP; Or, Dick & Co. in the Wilderness. 4 THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' TRAINING HIKE; Or, Dick & Co. Making Themselves "Hard as Nails." 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These breezy stories of the American High School Girl take the reader fairly by storm. 1 GRACE HARLOWE'S PLEBE YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, The Merry Doings of the Oakdale Freshman Girls. 2 GRACE HARLOWE'S SOPHOMORE YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, The Record of the Girl Chums in Work and Athletics. 3 GRACE HARLOWE'S JUNIOR YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities. 4 GRACE HARLOWE'S SENIOR YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, The Parting of the Ways. Cloth, Illustrated Price, per Volume, 50c. * * * * * The Automobile Girls Series By LAURA DENT CRANE No girl's library--no family book-case can be considered at all complete unless it contains these sparkling twentieth-century books. 1 THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT NEWPORT; Or, Watching the Summer Parade. 2 THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS IN THE BERKSHIRES; Or, The Ghost of Lost Man's Trail. 3 THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS ALONG THE HUDSON; Or, Fighting Fire in Sleepy Hollow. 4 THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT CHICAGO; Or, Winning Out Against Heavy Odds. 5 THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT PALM BEACH; Or, Proving Their Mettle Under Southern Skies. Cloth, Illustrated Price, per Volume, 50c. 
20474	----	Grace Harlowe's Fourth Year at Overton College By JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A. M. Author of The Grace Harlowe High School Girls Series, Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College, Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College, Grace Harlowe's Third Year at Overton College. PHILADELPHIA HENRY ALTEMUS COMPANY Copyright, 1914 [Illustration: Grace Paused in the Doorway.] CONTENTS I. A Semper Fidelis Luncheon II. The Last Freshman III. An Accident and a Surprise IV. Patience Promises to Stand By V. A Declaration of War VI. A Face to Face Talk VII. When Friends Fall Out VIII. A Leaf from the Past IX. A Thanksgiving Invitation X. Kathleen's Promise XI. Kathleen's Great Story XII. Treachery XIII. The Invitation XIV. A Congenial Sextette XV. A Firelight Council XVI. Elfreda Shows Grace the Way XVII. What the Seniors Thought of the Plan XVIII. The Fairy Godmother's Visit XIX. What Patience Overheard XX. The Mysterious "Peter Rabbit" XXI. Who Will Win the Honor Pin? XXII. Kathleen's Great Moment XXIII. Grace Finds Her Work XXIV. Conclusion LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Grace Paused in the Doorway. Grace Stepped Behind a Tree. They Clustered About the Fireplace. The Four Friends Were Strolling Across the Campus. Grace Harlowe's Fourth Year at Overton College CHAPTER I A SEMPER FIDELIS LUNCHEON "The skies must smile and the sun must shine When Semper Fidelis goes out to dine," sang Arline Thayer joyously as she rearranged her sofa pillows for the eighth time, patting each one energetically before placing it, then stepping back to view the effect. "Aren't you glad every one's here, and things have begun to happen again, Ruth?" she asked blithely. "I hope no one disappoints us. I wish this room were larger. Still, it held eighteen girls one night last year. Don't you remember my Hallowe'en party, and what a time we had squeezing in here?" "It is so good in Mrs. Kane to let us have the dining room with Mary to serve the oysters," said Ruth. "We never could do things properly up here." "I know it. Oysters are such slippery old things, even on the half shell," returned Arline, who was not specially fond of them. "Let me see. The girls will be here at four o'clock. We are to have oysters, soup, a meat course, salad and dessert. That makes five different courses in five different houses. It will be eight o'clock before we reach the dessert. I am glad that is to be served in Grace's room. We always have a good time at Wayne Hall." To the readers of "Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College," "Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College" and "Grace Harlowe's Third Year at Overton College," Grace Harlowe and her various intimate associates have become familiar figures. Those who made her acquaintance, together with that of her three friends, Nora O'Malley, Jessica Bright and Anne Pierson, during her high school days will recall with pleasure the many eventful happenings of these four happy years as set forth in "Grace Harlowe's Plebe Year at High School," "Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School," "Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School" and "Grace Harlowe's Senior Year at High School." The September following the graduation of the four friends from high school had seen their paths diverge widely, for Nora and Jessica had entered an eastern conservatory of music, while Anne and Grace, after due deliberation, had decided upon Overton College. Miriam Nesbit, of Oakdale fame, had entered college with them, and the trio of friends had spent three eventful years at Overton. "It is time we gathered home," grumbled Arline. "I have hardly seen Grace or any of the Semper Fidelis girls this week. They have all been so popular that they haven't given a thought to their neglected little friends." "Let me see," returned Ruth slyly. "How many nights have you stayed quietly at home this week?" "Not one, you rascal," retorted Arline, laughing. "I ought to be the last one to grumble. But in spite of all the rush, I have missed the dear old quartette." "So have I," declared Ruth earnestly. "Twenty minutes to four. They will soon be here." "Yes. I asked Grace to come as early as possible," said Arline. "There, I hear the bell now." Arline whisked out of the room and peered anxiously over the baluster. "Hello, Grace," she called joyously. "Hurry as fast as ever you can. Where are your faithful three?" "I came on ahead," laughed Grace. "I had promised you that I would, and being a person of my word, I didn't wish to disappoint you. When I left Wayne Hall Miriam was playing maid to Elfreda. The new gown she had made for the luncheon didn't arrive until the last minute. So Miriam stayed to help her dress. It is a perfectly darling gown. Just wait until you see Elfreda in it. She hasn't gained an ounce since she went home last spring. She has had a strenuous time all summer to keep her weight down. You must ask her to tell you about it." "I will," promised Arline, with an anticipatory smile. "But where is Anne?" "I left Anne finishing a letter to her mother. She will be here with Miriam and Elfreda. Isn't it splendid to think you and Ruth can be together this year?" Grace ran lightly up the stairs in Arline's wake, and a moment later greeted Ruth with outstretched hands. "Take the seat of honor, Grace," directed Arline, gently propelling her toward her best leather upholstered armchair. "Isn't it obliging of the weather to stay so nice and warm? We don't need hats or coats. You were sensible and didn't wear either. Not having to bother with wraps will save time, too." "I am highly impressed with this house-to-house luncheon," declared Grace. "It was clever in you to suggest it, Arline." "Oh, these progressive luncheons are nothing new," returned Arline quickly. "I have read that they are extremely popular among college and high school girls. I am sure I don't know why I never before proposed that we give one. It is going to be lots of fun, isn't it? There's the bell again. I hope that maid hasn't gone on a vacation. It usually takes her forever." Arline darted out of the room to hang over the baluster once more. This time it was the Emerson twins, and by four o'clock the last member of the club had taken her place beside her sisters in Arline's room. "As we are all here," announced Arline, "we might as well begin. The feast awaits you downstairs in the dining room; that is, a very small part of it. There is one beautiful feature about this luncheon, we are to have plenty of exercise between each course. Are all of you hungry?" There was a lively chorus of affirmatives. "Then choose your partners and come along," ordered the little curly-haired girl. It did not take long to dispose of the oysters, and, headed by Sara and Julia Emerson, the little procession of girls moved on to Ralston House, where the twins were to play hostess and serve the soup. "You can thank your stars and me that you don't have to squeeze into our room and eat your soup from cups instead of Mrs. Bryant's best soup plates," Julia informed her guests as they swarmed up the steps. "Mrs. Bryant couldn't see this luncheon at first. She had no appreciation of what a really important affair it was to be. I had to use all my persuasive powers on her. But I won, and she descended to the kitchen and made the soup herself." "I think we owe Julia a special vote of thanks," declared Miriam Nesbit a little later, as she finished her soup. "This vermicelli soup is the best I ever tasted." "It can't be beaten, can it?" asked Sara Emerson eagerly. "That was why we were so anxious to take the soup course on our shoulders. We knew what was in store for us if we could make Mrs. Bryant see things in our light." "S-h-h, she's coming!" warned Julia. "For goodness' sake, Sara, be careful." Mrs. Bryant, a rather austere person and not in the least like her sister, Mrs. Elwood, who managed Wayne Hall, walked into the dining room at this juncture, apparently in the best of humors. Arline glanced inquiringly at Grace, who nodded slightly, whereupon the dainty president of the Semper Fidelis Club rose and made the matron a pretty little speech of thanks in behalf of the club. Then the luncheon party started on their way again, Mrs. Bryant hospitably seeing them to the door and extending a smiling invitation to come again. "I knew she couldn't resist us," chuckled Sara Emerson, as the girls filed down the walk. "A combination like ours is safe to make its way anywhere. Come on, Marian and Elizabeth, you are the hostesses now. Shall we head for Livingstone Hall?" "No, indeed," smiled Marian. "Bess and I are not so lucky. It is Vinton's for ours. But we can assure you that you won't be disappointed in the layout." One of the features of the luncheon was the fact that no one knew until the moment of serving what the various courses were to be. When it was discovered that Marian and Elizabeth had ordered fried chicken, for which Vinton's was famous, with potatoes au gratin and tiny French peas, there was general rejoicing. It took the better part of an hour to eat these good things, and the guests, feeling that they were on familiar ground, enjoyed themselves hugely. "Oh, dear!" groaned Elfreda, "I know I have gained a pound since I started out this afternoon. I haven't eaten so much at one time for ages. There is still the salad and dessert to come. I can't possibly miss either one of them." "Never mind, Elfreda," soothed Emma Dean; "we won't invite you to the next luncheon, then you can----" "Just try leaving me out and see what happens," retorted Elfreda threateningly. "You may find yourself locked in your room on that self-same day with the key missing." "Be good, both of you," admonished Miriam, "or I'll see that neither of you get any dessert." "Grace and Anne wouldn't be so mean," returned Elfreda with supreme self-assurance. "How could we blast such touching faith?" laughed Anne. "There, what did I tell you?" asked Elfreda, turning triumphant eyes on Emma. "Now, leave me out if you dare." "I don't dare. I don't want to," declared Emma affably. "I was merely trying to be pleasant and helpful. If you were not invited to the spread, naturally you wouldn't eat, and if you didn't eat, then you wouldn't have to worry about that extra pound. It is all very simple." "Very!" agreed Elfreda, with such scathing emphasis that the exchange of words ended in a general giggle at Emma's expense. "Now that you've all finished laughing at me," she declared good-naturedly, "I hereby invite all of you, even Elfreda, to Martell's for the salad, which is my part of the ceremony." "Oh, goody, it's Waldorf!" exclaimed Elfreda delightedly, as, seated about the big corner table at Martell's, perhaps twenty minutes later, they saw the salad brought on. "You knew what we liked, didn't you, Emma?" "I did, in spite of my simple tendencies," murmured Emma. "That was a well merited thrust," laughed Elfreda, laying her hand lightly over her heart. "And now Wayne Hall and our humble apartment await you," proclaimed Grace when the last vestige of salad had disappeared. "Anne and I extend you a pressing invitation to dessert and conversation. Although this is to be a strictly informal session of the club, we may wish to discuss certain club business. The evening is before us. We ought to make good use of it." "And so we shall," returned Emma Dean, as they rose to go. "The affairs of the nation shall be discussed and adjusted to-night." "And the world will be upside down forever after," predicted Elfreda. "Don't croak," reproved Emma. "Who knows what this night may bring forth? It may engender indigestion, or a stern injunction to make less noise on the part of Mrs. Elwood, but whatever the future has in store for us, we shall have had at least one luncheon worth remembering." CHAPTER II THE LAST FRESHMAN It was ten minutes past seven when the club settled down to the frozen custard and delicious cakes that Grace and Anne had provided for them. Then Elfreda, who had taken upon herself the making and serving of the coffee, returned after a brief absence with a percolator of steaming coffee, Miriam following with the sugar and cream. "Isn't it too bad we never thought of doing this before?" said Marian Cummings. "Something had to be left for our senior year," said Anne Pierson. "Do you know, I am anything but joyful at being a senior," announced Elfreda Briggs. "Of course, it is a satisfaction to know that one has weathered the last three years' examinations and is practically on Easy Street as far as studies go, but every now and then comes the awful feeling, 'only a little while and it will all be over'--college, I mean." "'Yet a few days, and thee the all-beholding sun shall see no more.'" quoted Emma Dean lugubriously. "Not quite so bad as that," returned Elfreda with an appreciative grin. "Even we juniors feel more or less that way," said Laura Atkins. "I never had any real fun until I came to Overton. The time has gone so fast I can't believe that it is two years since I locked Grace and Anne out of their room and behaved like a savage. I don't wonder Elfreda named me the Anarchist. I did my best to live up to the name." "Oh, forget about that," murmured Elfreda, looking embarrassed. The members of the club were wholly familiar with the history of Laura Atkins's freshman year and admired her for the matter-of-fact way in which she was wont to discuss her early short-comings. Under the sunny influence of the four girls who had helped her to find herself, she had developed into a gracious and likeable young woman. She and Mildred Taylor were the guests of the club that afternoon. "What is the latest word from erring freshmen? Has any one heard?" asked Grace. Laura's reference to herself had set Grace to thinking of freshmen in general. "We've six at Ralston," groaned Julia Emerson. "The usual variety--neither rich nor poor, brilliant nor dull, amiable nor perverse, goody-goody nor lawless. Just that comfortable, maddeningly commonplace variety of girls who never go to extremes." "Extremes are dangerous," declared Elfreda judicially. "Better be an extremist than nothing at all," grumbled Julia. "For the first time since we came here, there isn't a single freshman at Wayne Hall," announced Miriam. "Are all the rooms taken?" asked Marian Cummings. "All but half of one room," replied Emma Dean. "The illustrious Miss West is alone in her glory. I heard Mrs. Elwood lamenting to-day because that particular half was still vacant." "Some one may take it yet," said Arline Thayer. "This is only the second week of the term. Only yesterday a freshman arrived at Morton House. Girls have been known to drift into Overton a whole month after the beginning of the term." "Did Miss West ask for a single?" questioned Grace of Emma. "No, she doesn't in the least yearn for one. You know she is paying her own way through college. She told Mrs. Elwood that it was all she could do to keep her head above water as it was and couldn't afford to think of a single. Of course, Mrs. Elwood hasn't charged her single rates yet, but if no one else appears she will either have to pay the advanced price or make other arrangements. Mrs. Elwood knows of two girls who have been trying to get into Wayne Hall for a long time, and who will come bag and baggage the moment she says the word." "That is too bad," said Miriam slowly--"for Miss West, I mean." A significant silence fell upon the company of girls. The same thought was in each one's mind. It was Elfreda who finally voiced it. "It looks as though the S. F.'s ought to get busy," she said slangily. "We might lend her the money to make up the difference." "I am afraid that wouldn't do," objected Anne, whose practical experience with poverty had made her wise. "I imagine with her it is a question of being economical. It wouldn't be fair to tempt her to extravagance, for a single would be the height of improvidence, particularly if she had to go in debt for it." "Anne is right," declared Gertrude Wells decidedly. "But to be perfectly frank, I am not in favor of the club taking up Miss West's case. You all know how badly she behaved toward us last year, particularly toward Grace. If we offered her help, no doubt we should be ridiculed for our pains. I think the best thing for us to do is to let her alone." "So do I," echoed Sarah Emerson. Several affirmative murmurs went up from various girls. "Now, see here," began Elfreda Briggs emphatically. "What is the use in our calling ourselves Semper Fidelis and then going back on our principles? When we organized this club, we didn't make any conditions as to who should be helped and who shouldn't, did we? Whoever needed help was to have it. If there is anyway in which we can be of assistance to Miss West, then it is our duty to respond cheerfully." "Hurrah for you, Elfreda!" cried Arline. "You're an honor to the Sempers and your own sweet native land. Of course we aren't going to pick and choose whom we shall help. I think we had better appoint a committee to call on Miss West and find out if we can render her any financial assistance." "I'm in favor of that committee," declared Emma Dean, "only don't ask me to serve on it." "Grace and Arline are the very ones for that stunt," proposed Julia Emerson. "They can do it to perfection." "Please don't ask me," said Grace with sudden earnestness. "I just can't, that's all." Her face flushed, and a distressed look crept into her eyes which her friends were quick to note. "Suppose you and Elfreda call on her, Miriam?" proposed Arline. "You two are very valiant." "Excuse me," said Elfreda so promptly that everyone laughed. "I may look valiant, but to every woman her own fear, you know." "Oh, look, girls!" The sudden exclamation came from Gertrude Wells, who was sitting near the open window. "There's the automobile bus from the station. It's stopping in front of Wayne Hall, too." There was a concerted rush for the two windows. "I wonder who it can be!" cried Emma Dean. "Wouldn't it be funny if it were the greatly desired freshman, Miss West's other half?" The watchers saw the bus door open. Then out of it stepped the tallest girl they had ever seen. "I believe she is seven feet tall," muttered Emma Dean. "I am sure of it." "Nonsense," laughed Miriam. "But she is not far from six. I wish it were daylight, then we could see her face." "I wonder who she can be," mused Arline. "There is only one answer," smiled Miriam Nesbit. "As Emma just stated, she must be Miss West's other half. However, we shall know before long." A moment later they heard the bell ring, then up from the hall came the sound of Mrs. Elwood's voice speaking in surprised but pleased tones. A voice almost masculine in its depth answered. There was a tramp of feet up the stairs and down the hall. In the next instant the door of the end room had opened and closed upon the newcomer. "Girls, you are saved," proclaimed Gertrude Wells dramatically. "We have been wasting our valuable time to-night trying to solve Miss West's problem, while all the time the queen of the giants was hurrying as fast as ever she could to the rescue." There was a faint general laugh at the remark, then Elfreda said severely, "Young women, do you consider making uncomplimentary remarks about new students in the line of true Overton spirit?" "But she did look seven feet tall," persisted Emma Dean. "Think how deceitful appearances sometimes are," reminded Miriam. "Never judge a person by moonlight," added Ruth Denton. "Never judge them at all," smiled Grace. "Let the poor freshman rest in peace. I have a last sweet surprise for you. Name it and you can have it." "Caramels," guessed Julia Emerson. "Marshmallows," said Gertrude Wells. "Oh, I know," cried Arline. "Nut chocolates; the delicious kind that old candy man in Oakdale makes." "Some one must have told you," said Grace, going to the closet and returning with a huge box. "You are all to stay here until the last chocolate is eaten." It was on the ragged edge of half-past ten when the Semper Fidelis Club trooped happily across the campus to their various houses, but, faithful to their duty, the big candy box reposed in Grace's waste basket, quite empty. "I wonder how Kathleen West received her roommate," observed Miriam. She and Elfreda had lingered for a moment in Grace's room after the others had gone. "It is fortunate for her that a belated freshman happened along," was Grace's serious reply. "But most unfortunate for the freshman," added Elfreda. "However, this one looks perfectly capable of fighting her own battles." CHAPTER III AN ACCIDENT AND A SURPRISE "Well, what do you think of her?" inquired Elfreda Briggs the following morning, poking her head in at Grace's door, a quizzical smile on her round face. Grace and Anne had left the breakfast table a few minutes before Elfreda, who had foregone finishing her breakfast and rushed upstairs to hear her friends' opinion of the tall freshman, who had seemed taller than ever as she stalked uncompromisingly into the dining room that morning in Kathleen West's wake. The newspaper girl looked anything but in a happy frame of mind, and after several covert glances in her direction, Grace decided that the new arrival had not been met with open arms on the part of Kathleen. "What do I think of her?" repeated Grace. "A good many things, I should say. What do you think?" "I think she is the most interesting and entertaining person I've seen in years," declared Elfreda exaggeratingly. "Then her entertaining powers do not lie in speech," laughed Anne. "I heard her say three things this morning at the table. They were, 'yes,' 'thank you' and 'I believe so.'" "She didn't talk, that's a fact," admitted Elfreda, "but she looked as though she was keeping up an awful thinking. Does any one know from whence she came, and why?" "I don't know anything about her," said Grace, shaking her head, "but I am sure that you will find out everything worth knowing before night. You will be able to see a great deal, you know." "Don't flatter me," grinned Elfreda. "That's no joke, though," she added hastily. "I'll find out, never fear, and then I'll tell you girls." "What a comfort it is to have the latest news brought to one's door every morning," jeered Anne. "You'll find yourself without that comfort if you are not more respectful," threatened Elfreda. "I'll carry my news to other doors where it will be more highly appreciated." "Your threats fail to impress me," retorted Anne. "You know that you couldn't bear to ignore us." "I know I shall be late to chapel, and that you will be later," replied Elfreda significantly. "Tardiness is unbecoming in a senior. I am sorry to be obliged to remind you of it." "Save your sorrow and come along," called Miriam Nesbit from the doorway. "Aren't you going to chapel this morning, Grace?" "Not this morning," replied Grace, not raising her eyes from the book over which she was poring. "This is psychology morning and I'm very shaky on the lesson. I feel in my bones that I'll be called upon to recite, so please go away, all of you, and don't bother me," she finished with an affectionate smile that did not accord with her blunt words. "Going, going, gone!" flung back Elfreda over her shoulder as she left the room, followed by Miriam and Anne. Grace glanced anxiously at the clock, then concentrated her mind anew upon her reading. The sound of hurried feet on the stairs and through the halls, accompanied by an occasional murmur of voices as the students left Wayne Hall, was borne to her ears as she read and tried to familiarize herself with the main points of the lesson. Gradually the house settled down to quiet, and Grace, becoming thoroughly interested in her work, lost all track of time. The sound of a terrific crash, apparently just outside the half-opened door, brought her to her feet in alarm. "What was that?" she exclaimed. Stepping to the door she looked up and down the hall. From the room at the end, the door of which was ajar, came a jingling sound as of dishes being piled together. For a moment Grace hesitated, then walked toward the sound. At the doorway she paused again; then the sight that met her eyes caused her to spring forward with an impulsive, "What a dreadful smash! Do let me help you." The extremely tall young woman who sat on the edge of her bed surveying the wreck of her washbowl, pitcher and every other piece of china that five minutes before had reposed confidently on the top of her washstand regarded Grace ruefully. There was a twinkle in her eyes, however, that belied her regret. "It did make considerable noise, I imagine," she said crisply. "Strange the rest of the students here haven't appeared on the scene." Grace involuntarily retreated a step or two, her face flushing. She could not endure the idea of being thought an intruder. "Don't go," said the tall young woman, in the same crisp tone. "I didn't mean that you were an intruder. I only wonder that no one else came. The wreck of the Hesperus wasn't serious compared with this," she said dryly, indicating the littered floor. "I tried to move my wash stand. It stuck. Then all of a sudden it gave way and I fell back, dragging it with me. I had hold of one end of it with both hands, and I was stronger than I thought, for I just missed sitting on the floor and receiving all that china in my lap. I was horrified for a second, but all of a sudden the funny side of it struck me, and I sat down on my couch and laughed until I cried. I was just wiping my eyes and preparing to pick up the pieces when you came in. Perhaps you thought I was crying over it. Can you imagine me in tears?" she added humorously. "Hardly," said Grace with a frank smile that was reflected on the tall young woman's face. "No, I am not one of the weeping kind," she declared sturdily. "I come of good, old, undaunted New England stock. My name is Patience Eliot and I live just outside Boston. I might as well tell you all about myself in the first place, because I decided at breakfast that I liked you. I know your Christian name because I heard your friends addressing you as "Grace" this morning, but I don't know your surname." "I am Grace Harlowe, at your service," replied Grace lightly, "and it is always gratifying to be liked. I saw you last night when you arrived. I was entertaining a crowd of girls, and, of course, we couldn't resist running to the window when one of the girls happened to see the bus stopping in front of the house." "Were you at the window?" asked Miss Eliot unconcernedly. "I didn't see you. In fact, I wasn't thinking of anything but getting into my room and to bed. I had been on the train long enough to become thoroughly tired of it. It was two hours late, too. We should have arrived at Overton at half-past seven, but it was half-past nine when the train pulled into the Overton station." "You must have been very tired," sympathized Grace. "I hope you rested well last night. If there is anything I can do for you in the way of showing you to the registrar's office or wherever you may wish to go, I shall be only too glad to do so. My first recitation happens to be at ten o'clock this morning, so I have plenty of time." "My first duty lies before me," returned Miss Eliot grimly, pointing to the floor. "I think you had better direct me to a store where I can replace this. If I ask Mrs. Elwood to set a price on it, she will cheat herself." "Why, how did you know that?" asked Grace in surprise. "You only saw her for a few minutes last night." "That was long enough to discover several things concerning her greatly to her credit," was the calm answer. "However, as you have been so kind as to offer to direct me, I think I will ask you to take me to the registrar's office. She has been expecting me ever since college opened. I imagine she has given me up by this time." Stepping over the wreck of broken china to the closet, she took her hat from its hook on the inner side of the door, and, putting it on without glancing into the mirror, announced herself in readiness to depart. "I'll lock the door on this wreck and have it removed when I return," she said. The registrar was writing busily, her head bent intently over her work, when Grace led the way into her office. "Good morning, Miss Sheldon," she began. "This is Miss Eliot of the----" Grace was about to say freshman class when the registrar rose and came toward them with outstretched hand. "My dear Patience!" she exclaimed cordially, "I am so glad you arrived at last. How is your father?" "Much better, thank you," replied the tall girl. "We still have two nurses, but I think he is out of danger now. I hated to leave him, but he was so worried because I had missed the first two weeks of college, that he insisted I should come on here at once. I arrived last night and went directly to Holland House, but the matron there thought I had given up coming, and the room I engaged by letter had been given to some one else only yesterday morning. She directed me to Wayne Hall, where, by the merest luck, I managed to secure half a room." During this flow of explanations, delivered in Miss Eliot's crisp, business-like tones, Grace had listened in open amazement. This tall freshman's manner of addressing Miss Sheldon, the dignified registrar, betokened long acquaintance, while the registrar looked as delighted as though she had found a long-lost relative. "I see you have fallen into good hands," said the registrar, a pleasant smile lighting her rather austere face as she glanced at Grace. "I am quite sure of that," responded Miss Eliot heartily. "I also brought disaster upon myself." An account of the morning's accident followed. "I believe you were born to disaster, Patience Eliot," laughed Miss Sheldon. "I shouldn't be at all surprised," was the dry response. "Miss Harlowe, I have known Miss Eliot since she was a little girl," explained Miss Sheldon. "I am pleased to know that she is to live at Wayne Hall. I am sure she will be happy there. I understand that the Wayne Hall girls make a very congenial household." "We try to," said Grace with a frank smile. "My three friends and I have never lived in any other house since our freshman days. Perhaps Miss Eliot will find her freshman year there as delightful as we found ours." "My freshman year!" exclaimed Miss Eliot in evident surprise. "Yes," returned Grace rather blankly. "Aren't you a freshman? I don't know why I thought so, but I supposed, of course, that----" She paused irresolutely. Miss Sheldon and the tall girl exchanged openly smiling glances, then the latter turned toward Grace almost apologetically. "I am a freshman in one sense," she said. "I have never before been to college, but as far as work goes I studied with my father and was lucky enough to pass up the freshman year. I ran down here last June to talk things over and find where I stood. I'm a sophomore, if you please." Grace burst into merry laughter. "Won't the girls be surprised!" she exclaimed. "We all thought you were a freshman." "I hadn't stopped to think of what any one else thought of me," said Patience, "or I might have enlightened the girls at the breakfast table as to my superior sophomore estate. They'll find out soon enough. I have a great mind to let them stumble upon the truth gradually." "Oh, do," begged Grace gleefully. "It will be great fun to let matters take their own course." Miss Sheldon smiled indulgently, but made no comment. She was versed in the ways of college girls. She, too, had been a student at Overton. "I should like to stay longer, Miss Sheldon, but I know you are very busy." Patience rose at last to go, Grace following her example. "Now that I have come to headquarters, been identified, had my thumb marks registered and become a unit in this great and glorious organization," went on the tall girl calmly, "I shall feel free to go forth and replace Mrs. Elwood's demolished china. I should like to put the new set on the washstand before I tell her of the accident. Good-bye, Miss Sheldon." She held out her hand. "May I come to see you soon?" "You know you will always be welcome, my dear." "I wish you wouldn't tell even your roommate that I am a sophomore," said Patience Eliot as they left the campus and turned into College Street. "I won't," promised Grace. "I'll be a positive clam. But what about your roommate? She will be sure to find out first, and then----" Remembering Patience Eliot's roommate Grace broke off suddenly. "And then what?" asked the tall girl with disconcerting directness. "Nothing," murmured Grace. "Then we don't need to become alarmed, do we?" was the next question. "No, not in the least," said Grace, smiling faintly. She was trying to decide whether or not she ought even to intimate to the tall, matter-of-fact girl, whom she already liked, that Kathleen West was likely to prove a disappointment in the way of a roommate. But the decision was not left to her, for Patience Eliot said with calm amusement in her tones: "I have a better idea of what you are thinking than you know. All I have to say is, don't waste a minute worrying over me. Patience Eliot will take care of herself regardless of who her roommate may be." CHAPTER IV PATIENCE PROMISES TO STAND BY For the next three days Patience Eliot passed successfully for a freshman. Then came the sudden dismaying rumor that she was registered in the sophomore theme class. A little later it was announced positively that she had passed up freshman French. The truth suddenly burst upon certain members of the sophomore class who had selected Miss Eliot as a splendid subject for sophomore grinds, when, on the occasion of their first class meeting, she walked quietly into the class room where it was to be held, and took her place with a cheerful, matter-of-course air that was very disturbing to various abashed sophomores who had planned mischief. Far from being angry, the astonished sophomores treated the New England girl's mild deception as a joke, and by it she sprang into instant popularity with her class. There were a few disgruntled students who criticized her, but these were so far in the minority that they counted for little. Kathleen West was among this minority. On the evening when the girl from New England had been shown into the room at the end of the hall, Kathleen had conceived a strong dislike for this calm-faced, independent young woman, whose quiet self-assurance nettled her, and mentally decided that she belonged to the preaching, narrow-minded class of girls who made life a burden for those who did not live up to a certain impossible standard. Patience Eliot had been even less favorably impressed with the newspaper girl. "She has a frightful temper," had been her mental observation, "and looks the reverse of agreeable." Aside from a brief exchange of conversation, silence had reigned in the room, and remembering the happy faces of the girls she had seen at the breakfast table that morning, Patience had felt not wholly pleased with her new quarters and not a little lonely. The incident of the broken china had been fortunate in that it had brought about a friendly, informal meeting between Grace and herself. After that everything had glided smoothly along. Patience and Grace received an invitation to take dinner with Miss Sheldon the following Sunday, and this occasion served to strengthen the New England girl's favorable impression of Grace to such an extent that by the end of the week the knot of friendship between them had been firmly tied. From the moment of Kathleen West's discovery that her roommate was fast becoming friendly with the very girls she affected to despise, she adopted an aggressive manner toward the New England girl which the latter was quick to perceive and tactfully ignore. Patience had an unusually keen insight into character, and she had made up her mind not to get beyond the point of exchanging common civilities with the disgruntled young woman who seemed determined to go through college with her eyes tightly closed to her own interests. That the newspaper girl possessed a fondness for study and never neglected her lessons was a point in her favor, in Patience's eyes. As the daughter of a well-known man of letters she had inherited her father's love of study and an appreciation of that same love in others. She frequently smiled at the clever, caustic remarks the strange, moody girl was wont to make about everything and everybody, and occasionally she surprised even Kathleen herself by her ready appreciation of the themes the latter wrote. It was several weeks before the two young women even became accustomed to each other. During that time Kathleen learned that Patience was proof against her aggressiveness, and not half so narrow-minded as she had thought; while Patience discovered, to her dismay, that in spite of Kathleen's undoubted wit and brilliancy, she disliked her rather more, if anything, than on first acquaintance. "I feel quite conscience-stricken over it," she confided to Grace one afternoon as they started down College Street for a short walk before dinner. "I wouldn't tell any one else, Grace, but I simply can't like Miss West. I've tried, and I can't. I am equally sure she doesn't like me. Imagine us sharing the intimacy of one room, and at the same time disliking each other cordially. I suppose there isn't the slightest chance for me to make a change this year. Besides, I don't wish to leave Wayne Hall." "Oh, you mustn't think of leaving Wayne Hall!" exclaimed Grace in dismay. "I am so sorry about Miss West. She is a peculiar girl. None of the girls here pretend to understand her. When first she came here as a freshman she was friendly enough with us. Then something occurred for which we were not to blame, or rather, we did not know that Miss West considered us at fault," corrected Grace conscientiously. "At any rate, she suddenly began to avoid us. For a long time we didn't know the reason." Grace paused for an instant. "By the time we found out, it was too late. Other things had happened. I can't really tell you much about that part of it," she added, reddening, "but in fairness to myself and my friends I will say that we were not to blame for what followed. There, that isn't very definite, is it? But I know you won't ask any questions." "Not one," returned Patience gravely. "I knew, of course, that relations between you two were strained, but hadn't the slightest idea of the cause of it all. I believe I understand something of the situation now." They tramped along in silence for a time. Grace was thinking almost resentfully that even in her senior year she seemed unable to free herself from a sense of responsibility toward Kathleen West. Her great affection for Mabel Ashe had undoubtedly been at the bottom of it, but, deep in her heart, Grace knew that had there been no Mabel to pave the way for Kathleen, she would have done whatever lay in her power to help this strange girl, who had no conception of, and was not likely ever to imbibe, that intangible and yet wholly necessary principle, college spirit. She wondered a little sadly why Mabel Ashe had not written her. Could it be possible that Mabel had heard unkind, untruthful tales of her from the newspaper girl? Grace impatiently accused herself of being suspicious and tried to shake off the impression. While she was pursuing this uncomfortable train of thought, Patience Eliot was covertly watching her companion's face. The expression she saw there evidently did not please her, and with a slightly determined set of her lips and a gleam of sudden purpose in her frank eyes, she promised herself that, beginning that very day, she would try to study Kathleen from an entirely different standpoint than heretofore. Laying her hand on Grace's shoulder she said warmly: "Don't worry, Grace. I will take back what I said about leaving Wayne Hall. I'm going to stay there until the last day of my sophomore year, at least. And as long as I stay I shall no doubt go on rooming with Miss West. There, does that make you feel better?" "It is positively noble in you to say that, Patience," responded Grace gratefully. "I know you are bound to be put to endless personal inconvenience on account of it. I feel peculiarly responsible for Miss West, because I promised Mabel Ashe, who knows her, that I would help her to like college. I have told you all about Mabel before. Next to Anne and Miriam, Mabel was my best friend here at Overton. I can't begin to tell you how I missed her last year. When Miss West first came to Overton I thought it would be perfectly splendid to have a real newspaper reporter with us, and because she was Mabel's friend I felt doubly sure of liking her. "Mabel had sent me a telegram asking me to go to the station to meet her. Anne and I didn't allow any grass to grow under our feet. We rushed off post haste to the station. Confidentially, we were dreadfully disappointed in her. She was not in the least the sort of girl that I had expected to meet. I suppose I entertained an almost exaggerated idea of what a newspaper woman should be. I've always enjoyed reading stories about clever women who covered important assignments and made good on newspapers. You know the kind of stories I mean." Patience nodded understandingly. "Real people are never like people in books," she commented. "Usually the real folks do far more startling things than the book people ever thought of doing." "I know it," agreed Grace, with a rueful smile. "Suppose I say what you just said happens to apply to this case, and leave the rest to your imagination." "Very neatly put," was Patience's grim answer. "My imagination is quite equal to the strain. As her roommate, I can draw upon fact rather than imagination." "Yet I have a curious feeling that you are going to succeed where we have failed. You are so strong and capable and----" Grace's earnest eyes looked their confidence in Patience, as she groped for the word that would describe her friend. "I can't think of the right word now, but you understand me. What I mean is that once you had made up your mind to do something, you'd do it or die." "'Tis the blood of my Revolutionary ancestors that spurs me on to deeds of might," declaimed Patience. "Don't give up the ship--girl, I mean," she finished humorously. "That looks like Miss West just ahead of us!" exclaimed Grace. "She came from that house at the end of the row. A crowd of freshmen live there and one of them seems to be a particular friend of hers." "You mean Miss Rawle?" replied Patience. "I have named her my daily affliction. She haunts Wayne Hall with a persistency worthy of a better cause. She adores Miss West, and tells me all about it while she is waiting for Kathleen, who, I suspect, runs away from her more than once. She refers to little Miss Rawle as 'my crush,' but her tone is unpleasantly sarcastic. Miss Rawle honestly admires Miss West and seems to have a great deal of faith in her ability to write. Sometimes Kathleen is the soul of hospitality. At other times she barely responds to Miss Rawle's timid remarks. When she behaves in that fashion I feel tempted to give her a good shaking. More than once I have seen Miss Rawle say good night when she looked ready to cry." "I wish I knew how to get hold of Kathleen," said Grace, looking troubled. "It is simply a case of good material going to waste, isn't it?" Patience shrugged her square shoulders. "I had a glimmer of hope that, once she and I became accustomed to each other, we might at least dwell together in peace. So far peace has been maintained by great effort on my part. How much longer it will endure is a question." At the door of Wayne Hall Grace paused irresolutely. "Oh, dear!" she exclaimed, "I forgot to stop at the stationer's, and I need a lot of little things, too. I must go back and get them. Will you come with me, Patience?" Patience shook her head. "I want to read for a few minutes before dinner. It is almost the only time I have to read for pleasure. You won't care if I go on upstairs, will you, Grace?" "Of course not. I wish I didn't have to go. I'll see you at dinner." Grace hurried down the walk on her errand, while Patience went on into the house and to her room. CHAPTER V A DECLARATION OF WAR The October twilight had fallen before the two girls finished their walk. When Patience opened her door she did not at first glance see the huddled figure crouched close to the window. A sound, half sob, half sigh, caused her to cross the room in an instant. "Who are you, and what is the trouble?" were her blunt questions. The girl burrowed her face in her arm and made no answer. "Get up!" commanded Patience, an imperative note in her voice that caused the girl to half struggle to her feet, then sink sobbing to her old position. "This won't do at all," remonstrated Patience. "You mustn't sit here. Stop crying instantly." She purposely made her voice coldly unsympathetic with a view toward summoning the weeper's pride to her aid. It had the desired effect. The girl rose from the floor and stumbled toward the door, her head still hidden on her arm. With a cry of, "Why, it is Miss Rawle!" Patience sprang forward and caught the girl by the hand. "You poor child! What has happened to you to make you cry so?" "Please don't sympathize with me, Miss Eliot, or I'll break down and cry again. It isn't anything in particular. I'm just a silly goose, that's all. Miss West promised to be here this afternoon, and I've been waiting for her ever since half-past four. I suppose she forgot all about it." Miss Rawle made a valiant attempt to smile. "Please tell her I was here, and--and was very sorry I didn't see her." Her lip quivered like that of a grieved child. Patience turned on the light, then went over to where Miss Rawle stood. "Do you wish me to give you a piece of good advice?" she asked with abrupt frankness, placing her hand on the girl's shoulder. "Yes," responded Miss Rawle in a halfhearted manner. "Then don't leave any word for Miss West, and don't put yourself within speaking distance of her for at least a week." "But--I can't do that. She wouldn't understand----" "All the better for you," cut in Patience's crisp voice. "You are very fond of Miss West, aren't you?" Miss Rawle nodded. "She is so bright and clever and says such smart things, and can write. I adore cleverness. I'm not a bit clever. I work dreadfully hard to keep up in my classes. But Kathleen is actually brilliant, and, besides, she took me to the sophomore reception." The tall girl listened gravely to this enthusiastic tribute to her captious roommate. "Very good reasons," she agreed. "Still, I wish you would try to do what I just suggested. Miss West is like a great many other clever people, she doesn't appreciate what is easily won." A deep flush overspread Miss Rawle's face. An angry light leaped into her blue eyes. Then, meeting Patience's calm glance, she said slowly, "Do you mean that I force myself upon her?" "In a measure, yes," was the cool reply. "You are very fond of her and she knows it, consequently she doesn't value your friendship half as highly as though she weren't sure of it. You must meet her on her own ground, and make her realize that you are of as much importance in the world as she. It may be hard at first, but it will be best for both of you. Miss West stands in need of a friend, and I am sure you would be loyal to her." "How nice in you to say so," returned Miss Rawle, brightening. "I thought I was angry with you for saying what you did about my forcing myself upon Kathleen, but I'm not. I am going straight home, now, and I'll do as you say. Would you mind if I were to come and see you some time, and won't you take luncheon with me some day at Vinton's?" Patience smilingly acquiesced to both eager requests, and little Miss Rawle descended the steps of Wayne Hall and set off for Livingston Hall, where she lived, looking anything but sorrowful. "I'll try her way," she planned as she sped along through the soft fall darkness. "It is worth trying. But I wonder what made her say that Kathleen stood in need of a friend." After Miss Rawle had departed, armed and equipped with her newly-born independence, Patience smiled whimsically to herself as she brushed her long, fair hair, rebraided it and wound it about her head. It was a coiffure she had recently adopted at Elfreda's suggestion, and it went far toward softening the severe outline of her face. "I didn't come to college to play mentor to any one," she said, half aloud, "nor to give advice, for that matter. Perhaps I should not have told Miss Rawle to stay away from Kathleen. It isn't really any of my business. Wouldn't she be angry if she knew? Shall I tell her? No, I don't believe I will. If, during a season of adoration, Miss Rawle is indiscreet enough to tell her, then that is a different matter. But I don't believe she will." Patience had just finished doing her hair when the object of her monologue appeared in the door and after a quick survey of the room stepped inside. "Was Miss Rawle here?" she asked abruptly. "Yes," answered Patience, noncommittally. "I'm glad I wasn't. She is such a frightful bore. What did she say?" "She asked me to tell you she was here and was very sorry she missed you." "I am very glad I missed her," declared Kathleen, with a shrug. "Deliver me from 'crushes' of her sort, at least. There are several girls in the freshman class who look rather interesting, but they are evidently not anxious to know me," she added, her face darkening. "Whose fault is it?" asked Patience pointedly. "Not mine," retorted Kathleen with asperity. Then, turning upon Patience, she said in a voice shaking with sudden anger: "What do you mean by asking me such a question? I did not realize the insult it contained or I wouldn't have answered you." "I did not intend to be insulting," said Patience, "but candidly I think you are to blame for whatever attitude the girls here maintain toward you. Then, again, you do not value your friends. For instance, there is little Miss Rawle who is really fond of you. Yet you are continually running away from her. If I were Miss Rawle I would let you severely alone; you don't deserve her friendship. You don't and can't appreciate it." Kathleen stared at Patience in angry amazement. No one had ever before spoken to her quite so plainly. Then she found her voice. "I think you are not only insulting, but impertinent and meddlesome as well. I suppose Miss Rawle complained to you because I didn't keep my engagement with her and you thought it your duty to take me to task for it. Understand, once and for all, you are not to interfere in my affairs. I shall answer to no one for my actions. I did not choose you for a roommate. You are the last girl I would choose. I won't stand being criticized and lectured at every turn. Save your criticisms for those who are silly enough to take them seriously, but please don't imagine for an instant that what you may think or say carries the slightest weight with me." Before Patience could frame a reply the newspaper girl had rushed from the room, slamming the door with a vehemence that fairly shook the walls. She did not return to the room until after dinner, and then only long enough to slip into her coat and hat. During that brief moment she neither spoke to nor noticed Patience, who went quietly on with her studying as though nothing had happened. Kathleen's outburst had made no impression upon this calm-faced girl, but Patience's all too truthful words had sunk deeper into the newspaper girl's mind than she cared to admit. CHAPTER VI A FACE TO FACE TALK For a week at least Alice Rawle stayed religiously away from Wayne Hall and her idol, during which time Kathleen went serenely about her business, apparently undisturbed by the lull in the attentions of her one "crush." Then a certain sharp-eyed sophomore noted the fact and, happening to run across the newspaper girl in the gymnasium one afternoon, remarked laughingly, "I hear your little friend, Miss Rawle, has transferred her allegiance to Miss Eliot." "What utter nonsense," declared Kathleen. Yet she frowned her displeasure at the intimation, and immediately held Patience responsible for Miss Rawle's deflection. She decided to look into the matter that very afternoon and found time to stop and see Alice on her way home from her class. She rang the bell at Livingston Hall a little before five o'clock, only to find that Miss Rawle had not yet come in. The newspaper girl turned her steps toward Wayne Hall, feeling slightly disappointed and vexed. Arrived at the Hall, she slipped upstairs with the cat-like quiet and ease that always characterized her movements. At the door of her room she paused for a moment, listening to the sound of voices that came from within. Then, with a vehement exclamation, she flung wide the door and darted into the room. "Whatever you have to say of me you can say in my presence," she stormed. "Do you hear? I said, 'In my presence,'" she repeated, her voice rising. The two astonished occupants of the room regarded the angry girl in silent astonishment. Then the tension of the moment relaxed, and Alice Rawle found her voice. "You are right," she said to Kathleen, with a scornful little gesture. "We were talking of you. Evidently you heard what we said. I am glad you did. Until this moment I liked you better than any other girl in Overton. If you had come sooner, you would have heard me say so. But now I think you are unjust and contemptible and I shall never speak to you again." Turning to Patience, who had stood impassive during this outburst, she said with sudden penitence: "I'm sorry I lost my temper. I will come again to see you at some other time. Good-bye." As the door closed on Alice, Kathleen confronted Patience with blazing eyes. "It is all your fault," she accused wildly. "I hate you! You are one of the superior, narrow-minded sort of girls who will excuse nothing. You imagine yourself to be perfect, but you can always discover faults in others. You don't like me. I know it. I have those dear friends of yours to thank for it, too. I know that Miss Harlowe has taken particular pains to strengthen your first impression of me, which wasn't favorable. It is very unfortunate that we are obliged to room together. I suppose it is useless to ask you to mind your own business and let me alone." Kathleen walked moodily to the window and stood looking out, her favorite attitude when greatly disturbed in spirit. Crossing swiftly to where the newspaper girl stood, Patience laid two firm hands on Kathleen's shoulders. She whirled at the touch, her eyes flashing. "That's right," commented Patience. "I want you to look at me. The time has come for you and me to have an understanding. I've been putting off the evil day, and there have been times when I have even dreamed that we might dispense with it altogether. But now we must face it. I am going to tell you exactly what I think of you and why I think it, and you are going to perform the same kind office for me. Will you please begin?" Kathleen's face set in sullen lines. "You know what I think of you," she muttered. "I just finished telling you. I told you last week, too." "So you did," smiled Patience, "but surely you must think other uncomplimentary things of me." "Will you kindly take your hands off my shoulders and attend to your own affairs?" Kathleen's voice choked with renewed anger. Patience's hands dropped to her sides. "Very well. If you haven't anything further to say on the subject of my short-comings, I'll proceed to yours," was her brisk declaration. "I won't listen to you," cried Kathleen passionately. "I won't stay here and allow you to insult me." She sprang toward the door, but Patience, divining her intention, turned the key in the lock and calmly pocketed it. "Don't be a goose," she advised. "You are too clever to be so childish. You are deliberately trying to shut yourself out of all the pleasant part of college by going about with a grievance on your shoulder. If you weren't so clever I shouldn't take the trouble to say what I think. Why, you could be one of the foremost girls in the sophomore class if you wished." "I haven't seen any particular indication of admiration on the part of my class," sneered Kathleen. "You haven't given your class cause to admire you, have you?" asked Patience imperturbably. Sheer inability to reply to this unwelcome assertion held Kathleen silent. "Please don't misunderstand me," went on Patience. "I know I have no right to criticize you, but as your roommate, I feel a certain interest in your welfare." "Very kind in you, I am sure," muttered Kathleen sarcastically. Unmindful of the sarcasm, Patience continued: "I believe your chief trouble lies in the fact that newspaper standards are so different from those of a college. On a newspaper it is a case of get the story and no questions asked. It isn't honor that counts. It is shrewdness, determination, dogged persistence, hardness of head, and deafness to personal appeal that wins the day." A curious light leaped into the other girl's eyes. "How do you happen to know so much about what counts on a newspaper?" she questioned sharply. "Because my father edited one for years. All the newspaper folks know James Merton Eliot. You must have heard of him," replied Patience with grim satisfaction. "You don't mean it! I never dreamed you could be his daughter," gasped Kathleen, regarding her tall roommate with positive awe. Then she said, almost humbly: "Say what you like to me. I'll listen to it, no matter how much it hurts." "But I don't wish to hurt you," remonstrated Patience, "nor to preach. I do wish you to know, however, that I am quite familiar with the inside workings of a newspaper. I have haunted Father's office since I was a little girl. I was bitterly resentful of being packed off to a preparatory school when I yearned to be a reporter. Father didn't resign his editorship of a Boston paper until last year. He overworked and has been very ill since then. That is the reason I was not here when college opened. I waited until I was sure he was really convalescent. Had my affairs shaped themselves differently, you would not now be obliged to endure me as a roommate." Kathleen continued to survey Patience with wondering eyes. It was simply incredible that this brusque, matter-of-fact young woman whom she had held in secret contempt should be the daughter of a man whose name was known and honored throughout the newspaper world. Sheer astonishment tied her tongue. "I would have told you in the beginning," continued Patience, "but I did not wish to travel on my father's passport. When I saw what an unfavorable impression I had made on you I was tempted to tell you. It would at least have given me a certain prestige in your eyes. Then I decided never to tell you. But to-day it seemed the only way. None of the girls know it. Miss Sheldon and Miss Wilder know. They are personal friends of Father's." "If I had only known when first you came to Wayne Hall," was Kathleen's regretful cry. "But I didn't wish you to know," returned Patience. "I wished you to like me for myself, and you wouldn't. You thought me pedantic and narrow-minded, and set me down as a typical New England woman of the grim, uncompromising type, who boasts of her Puritan ancestry, and goes through life ungracious and forbidding. I don't believe I am pedantic or narrow-minded or small-souled, but I have plenty of other faults, as you'll learn before the year is over. I meant what I said about your standing in your own light. You'll have to learn the difference between college and newspaper standards, too." Kathleen's face reddened. She understood all that the sharp criticism implied. "I know I haven't lived up to----" she began. Patience shook her head vigorously. "Don't tell me," she said. "Just decide that hereafter you are going to cultivate Overton as your Alma Mater for all you're worth. You'll find you can adapt Overton standards to your paper more successfully than you can adapt newspaper tactics here. At least it will do no harm to try out my suggestion and see how far it will carry you." "I will try," responded Kathleen with a suddenness that surprised even herself. "Only," her eyes grew resentful, "you mustn't expect me to be an angel all in a twinkling, or even like certain girls you and I know. I can't, and that settles it." "I shall have no expectations in the matter," smiled Patience. "Your likes and dislikes concern no one save yourself. Please forgive me for locking the door and speaking so candidly." Patience stepped to the door and unlocked it. Kathleen took an uncertain step forward, wavered, then, advancing almost timidly, held out her hand. "Will you shake hands?" she asked. "I am glad you did it, and I am going to be different--if I can," she added moodily. "Be fair to yourself and give the clever, capable Kathleen West a chance," was the New England girl's advice. "This little talk of ours has served to clear the atmosphere of this room. Let us be friends and keep it clear." "I will try," Kathleen repeated, but Patience was obliged to confess to herself that she had very little faith in the newspaper girl's promise. She felt that the fact that James Merton Eliot was her father had made far more impression upon Kathleen than had her little lecture on standards. CHAPTER VII WHEN FRIENDS FALL OUT "What has happened to the Semper Fidelis Club? Did such a worthy organization ever exist, or did I merely dream?" inquired Arline Thayer, walking suddenly into the living room at Wayne Hall one evening, where Grace sat idly turning the pages of a magazine, at the same time trying to decide the best possible way of spending her evening. "Oh, Arline!" she exclaimed. "I am so glad you came. You are just in time. I was trying to decide what I had better do this evening. For a wonder, I haven't a line of studying to worry me. But there are so many other things I ought and wish to do. My correspondence is fast going to rack and ruin, and I owe at least a dozen calls, the drop-in-in-the-evening kind. Anne wants me to go for a walk, and Elfreda and Miriam are determined I shall go to see 'Les Miserables' at the motion picture theatre on Main Street. They saw 'The Taming of the Shrew' one evening last week, and came home ardent moving picture fans." "I saw it, too," replied Arline. "It was wonderfully well acted, and the photography and arrangement of the scenes were excellent. Suppose we gather the club in, and go to see 'Les Miserables' in a body?" "I could please the populace and myself at the same time by taking your advice, couldn't I?" Grace cast a laughing glance toward Arline. "Of course you could," urged Arline. "Don't stand upon the order of your going, but go at once and tell Elfreda and Miriam what we propose doing. Anne can take her walk some other time, and your letters can languish unanswered a little longer. I'm going to hurry back to Morton House for Ruth and Gertrude. We will pick up the Emerson twins on our way here, and also Elizabeth Wade and Marian. You can ask Emma and the others." "What about Patience?" asked Grace. "By all means ask her. We want her in the club, too. The only objection is that she will be the thirteenth member. That is the reason I haven't proposed her name before this. We shall be obliged to ask some one else to make fourteen." "Arline," Grace's tone caused her friend to eye her sharply, "do you suppose we ought to ask Kathleen West to join our club?" "No." Arline's blue eyes grew resentful. Her "no" was coldly incisive. "If she is asked to join the club, I shall immediately resign." Grace looked her surprise at this uncompromising statement. She had not reckoned on Arline's opposition to an idea which had been steadily forcing itself upon her since the beginning of her senior year. Ever since the last days of her junior year, when Alberta Wicks had made plain what seemed obscure in the case of Kathleen West, Grace had experienced a generous desire to recompense the newspaper girl for the fancied slight she had received at their hands. Toward Grace and her three friends Kathleen still preserved the same antagonistic attitude. So far Grace had been unable to discover any way in which at least a semblance of friendly relations might be established. The idea of asking Kathleen to join the club had suddenly occurred to her, and in her usual impetuous fashion she had given voice to it. Arline's sharp "no" was in the nature of a dash of cold water to impulsive Grace, and she now regarded her friend with troubled eyes. "Why are you so bitter against Kathleen?" she asked. "You have no personal grievance against her, have you?" "You know perfectly well that she tried to prevent the club from giving the bazaar, and you know of other contemptible things she has done. A girl who would work directly against Semper Fidelis on the outside, wouldn't make a particularly desirable member. At least that is my opinion." Arline compressed her lips, looking very dignified. "I didn't dream you felt so opposed to her," said Grace quietly. "Still, it will do no particular hurt to ask her to go with us to-night. I hate to go to her room to invite Patience and leave her out. Besides, I think Patience would wish her to go. Confidentially, Arline, she and Patience had some sort of understanding the other day and now they appear to be almost friends." "I'm sorry, Grace, but I won't go to-night if you invite Miss West. I am willing to do almost anything else to please you, but I simply can't endure her, and I don't intend to have my evening spoiled. I should prefer not to go. After all, I don't know that it matters much whether I go or not." With a gesture of superb indifference Arline rose to depart. Grace was at her side in an instant. "Daffydowndilly Thayer, you know you care," she smiled, putting her finger under Arline's chin. "You are not half as hard-hearted as you would have me think." Arline drew away from her with a pettish little shrug. "You can't make me feel differently about her, Grace. Please don't try. If she goes to-night, I shan't. You may choose between us. If you are afraid of offending her by asking Patience to go and leaving her out, then I will invite Patience to go." "I am not afraid to ask Patience to go with us in Miss West's presence," was Grace's proud response, "although I believe it would be kinder not to ask either of them as long as they appear to be friends. Patience wouldn't feel hurt or slighted, and that would make the party strictly Semper Fidelis." Grace spoke evenly, although there was a note of constraint in her voice. "But, please, don't misinterpret my feeling in the matter as one of fear." Arline made no answer, and the two girls left the living room in silence. "I'll see you in half an hour," was Arline's sole comment. "Shall we meet here?" asked Grace. "It is nearer the theatre and quite central." "Very well." Arline walked to the hall door, her golden head held very high. Grace took a half step toward her, hesitated, then turned and walked quietly up the stairs to carry the invitation to the Semper Fidelis girls. She stopped first at the door of Emma Dean's room. Emma answered her knock with a cheerful "Come in." "As a loyal member of Semper Fidelis it is your duty to turn out with your sisters and attend a motion picture show," declaimed Grace from the threshold. "No urging is necessary," responded Emma, rising from her chair and going to the closet for her wraps. "I am nothing if not loyal, and I adore picture shows." "Meet me in the living room in five minutes, then. I must see Patience," returned Grace, but she could not help hoping as she walked down the hall that she would find Patience alone. CHAPTER VIII A LEAF FROM THE PAST At Patience's door she paused. It stood partly open, and peeping in she saw that her friend was alone. Rapping softly, she announced with a laugh, "The Honorable Grace Harlowe." "Enter without further ceremony," was the quick reply. "To what do I owe my good fortune?" "To the absence of your roommate," answered Grace dryly. "Where is she?" "At the library. She left the house directly after dinner to look up a number of references. She is infinitely more industrious than I." "The Semper Fidelis crowd are going down to that new motion picture theatre to see 'Les Miserables.' We want you to go with us," invited Grace, looking relieved at having been able to deliver the invitation so easily. "Let me think. Is there any reason why I can't go? I have a hazy recollection of having something else on hand to-night, but I can't remember what it is." "Is it anything about lessons?" asked Grace. "No." Patience glanced perplexedly about her. "I can't recall it. It isn't anything of importance or I certainly would have no difficulty in remembering it. Perhaps it will come to me suddenly." "I must make the round of the house and ask the other girls. Be ready and downstairs, within the next fifteen minutes." By the time Grace had collected the Semper Fidelis girls of Wayne Hall, Arline had returned with the other members of the club, and the party set out for the theatre. Grace walked with Anne and Patience, who, unable to remember any other engagement, had dismissed the disturbing thought from her mind and prepared to enjoy her evening. At the entrance of the theatre, the party halted for a moment while Arline bought the tickets. Grace looked interestedly about her. Even in quiet, staid old Overton she derived an active pleasure from scanning the faces of the passersby. She tried to read their thoughts from their expressions, and her habit of observation had on more than one occasion proved of value to her. "All right," called Arline, holding up the tickets. "Come on." Grace turned her eyes toward Arline, then some unaccountable influence caused her to turn her head and glance again in the direction of the street. A roughly-dressed man had stopped on the sidewalk directly in front of the theatre to stare at one of the gayly colored lithographs. Grace stopped short, seized with a peculiar feeling of apprehension. Why was the face of this man so familiar to her? Surely she had seen it somewhere under decidedly unpleasant circumstances. Was it at Overton she had seen him? No, it was further back than that. During the first part of Hugo's famous novel, which had been filmed to perfection, Grace was obsessed with the question: "Where have I seen him?" The stranger's face haunted her. It was a low-browed, sullen face. She could not keep her mind on the story that was being unfolded on the screen. She watched the ill-fated Jean Valjean being led off to prison for stealing a loaf of bread almost without seeing him. It was not until the scene where, bruised in spirit and prison-warped, Jean steals the good priest's candlesticks and makes off with them, that full remembrance came to Grace. Now she knew why that face was strangely familiar. The man she had seen was none other than "Larry, the Locksmith." In her mind's eye Grace saw him sitting in the court room with humped shoulders, his eyes bent fiercely upon her, as she related what she had seen with her face pressed close to the window pane of the haunted house. It had all happened during her senior year at high school. To Grace it seemed but yesterday since she had given the testimony that sent Henry Hammond's accomplice to prison for a term of seven years in the state penitentiary. Seven years! It had been only four years since that memorable occasion. Perhaps the man had been released earlier for good behavior, or perhaps--Grace's heart beat a trifle faster--he had escaped. She paid but scant attention to the rest of the performance, and when Jean had died in the arms of his devoted foster daughter, the lights had appeared, and the crowd began filing out of the theatre, she scanned it eagerly. There was no sign of the disturbing face of "Larry, the Locksmith." The little company of girls made their way to the street, discussing the merits of the various actors who had portrayed so admirably the roles assigned to them. Arline, feeling rather ashamed of her brusque refusal to countenance Kathleen West as a possible member of the club, slipped her arm through Grace's, saying contritely, "I am awfully sorry I was so cross, Grace." Grace, whose mind was still fully occupied with the thought of the man she had good reason to recognize, did not answer. Arline glanced reproachfully at her, then withdrew her arm from Grace's with an offended suddenness that caused Grace to cry apologetically: "Please pardon me, Arline. What did you say?" Arline, however, was now thoroughly incensed. She had apologized, and Grace had not even taken the trouble to listen. Without answering, save by an angry flash of her blue eyes, she walked on rapidly, overtaking the Emerson twins, who were heading the little procession. Grace sprang impulsively forward. Then, as Arline slipped between the twins, laughingly taking hold of an arm of each, Grace fell back, deciding that she would say nothing. She would write Arline a note that very night. True to her resolve, the note was written and sent. At the end of a week she had received no answer. Later she was greeted with a cold "good afternoon" and a stiff little bow when she chanced to encounter Arline on the campus. Remembering Arline's stubborn stand in regard to Ruth during their sophomore year, Grace knew the dainty little girl's resentment to be very real and lasting. She was also reasonably sure that not even Ruth was aware of their estrangement. She wished she had not seen that disturbing face. She wondered if she had been mistaken. No doubt there were men in the world who bore a strong resemblance to "Larry, the Locksmith." She blamed herself entirely for Arline's withdrawal of friendship. If she had only heard and accepted the apology! It was humiliating indeed to make an earnest apology to unhearing ears. "It serves you right, Grace Harlowe," she reflected, coming into the living room late one afternoon. "I'm not sorry for you. I hope Arline won't be too haughty at the club meeting to-morrow. It is such a shame. I wanted to propose the 'Famous Fiction' dance as a Semper Fidelis merry-making this year, and I can never talk enthusiastically of it knowing she disapproves. Of course, I'll pretend I don't care, but it hurts, just the same." With a sigh Grace reached for the evening paper which lay on the library table. She glanced over the headlines without any special interest until a single sentence in large black type caused her to stare, then give voice to a surprised, "I knew it!" The headline read, "Larry, the Locksmith, Still at Large." Grace sat down heavily in the nearest chair, the newspaper still clutched in one hand. She had not been mistaken. The man for whom the authorities were searching was the man she had seen in front of the moving picture theatre. It was evident that he had very little fear of being recognized in Overton, or he would not have risked appearing in the streets of the college town. "He must have friends here, who are sheltering him," sprang into her mind, "or he may be passing through the town. The question is, ought I to make my discovery known to the police?" "Here you are!" called a familiar voice, "I've been looking for you." Patience Eliot entered the living room, and seated herself opposite Grace. "Do you remember my saying when you asked me to go to the theater that I had a faint recollection of having another engagement last night?" Grace nodded. "My faint recollection was perfectly correct. I had promised to go for a walk with Kathleen, and consequently she wouldn't speak to me when I came in last night. She wouldn't accept my humble apologies. Just when I thought I was making a little progress with her, too. I am the most unfortunate mortal," sighed Patience. "I know she imagines I did it purposely." Patience's recital of her woes brought back the subject of Arline's displeasure to Grace's mind, and when, a little later, the two girls went upstairs arm in arm, the important question of whether or not to inform the Overton police of her discovery had slipped, for the time being, from Grace's mind. CHAPTER IX A THANKSGIVING INVITATION "At last!" exclaimed Grace triumphantly, as she extracted a letter from the Wayne Hall bulletin board addressed to her in Mabel Ashe's unmistakable handwriting. "Oh, I am so glad! I thought she had forgotten me." "Or had been persuaded to forget you," put in Elfreda Briggs, who had come downstairs to breakfast directly behind Grace. Grace looked frankly amazed. "How did you know?" "How do I find out everything I know?" demanded Elfreda. "Don't you suppose I noticed that you were worried about not hearing from Mabel? I could see you thought some one had made mischief." "Elfreda Briggs, will you please tell me your exact method of deduction!" exclaimed Grace in a half vexed tone. "Your ability for 'seeing things' is positively uncanny." "There was nothing very uncanny about seeing you look ready to cry every time Mabel's name was mentioned," retorted Elfreda. "We all knew that you hadn't received a letter from her. Put two and two together, what is the result? Ask me something harder. That's easy." "I make my bow to you, most observing of all observers," laughed Grace. "I have been worried over not receiving a letter from Mabel, but I hadn't breathed it to any one. Come into the living room before breakfast. No; let us have breakfast first. It is early yet and we shall have time to read the letter afterward in my room. Then Anne and Miriam can hear it, too. Here they come, the slow pokes." "A dillar, a dollar, a ten-o'clock scholar, Oh, why did you come so soon?" chanted Elfreda as Anne, followed by Miriam, appeared at the head of the stairs. "A ten-minutes-to-eight-o'clock scholar," calmly corrected Miriam. "We are early, but you and Grace are distressingly early. I suppose you found the fabled worm." "Here it is." Grace held up the letter. "If you are pleasant and respectful to us during breakfast, I will invite you to my room to hear it read." "Your half of the room," reminded Anne, with emphasis. "I beg your pardon, my half of the room," corrected Grace. "I might lease your half for the occasion, then I could turn you out if you proved a disturbing factor." "But I could refuse to lease my half," declared Anne. "Then I should be obliged to turn you out, at any rate. I am much stronger than you." "It sounds like a discussion between the March Hare and the Mad Hatter, doesn't it?" commented Elfreda. "It has a true Alice in Wonderland tang," agreed Miriam solemnly. "In the meantime I am growing hungrier. On to breakfast!" After breakfast, the quartette lost no time in going upstairs to Grace's room to listen to Mabel's letter. Grace opened it, glanced hastily over the first page, then read: "MY DEAR GRACE:-- "Your faith in me as a correspondent must be shattered by this time. I've intended to write, but my days and nights, too, have been so crowded with work that I have almost forgotten that I am entitled to a little recreation. I'll try not to let it happen again, Grace, dear. I hoped to be able to run down for Thanksgiving, but I am afraid it won't be possible. "I am doing the clubs now, and there will be so much to write about them during Thanksgiving week that I am afraid I shall have to stay in town all week. Next week the opera begins, and, oh, joy! I am to help write it--along with my club duties. I went to almost every performance last year and loved them all. Why couldn't you girls make up a party and spend Thanksgiving with me? Isn't that a brilliant idea? I might succeed in getting a day off. "You might ask Miss West to come with you. Last summer I asked her all about you but could get no particular information regarding you. I saw very little of her during the summer, as she was given a number of important assignments and covered them splendidly. I am sorry to say she is not well liked among the other reporters. They say she is too hard and merciless and that she is terribly unfeeling. Of course, you would hardly see that side of her. I should imagine she must have quite a reputation at Overton by this time, she writes so well. Remember me to her when you see her and deliver my invitation. "I must stop instantly or lose my train home. Let me hear from you about Thanksgiving. Love to you and Elfreda, Miriam and Anne. "Yours, as ever, "MABEL. "P. S.--I saw Frances last week. She is engaged to be married. More about her when I see you." "Doesn't it sound exactly as she talks?" smiled Anne. "I like the Thanksgiving idea," declared Elfreda. "Of course, we'll go," said Grace, looking questioningly at her friends. "Of course," repeated Miriam. "But what of Miss West?" "We might ask Patience to break the news to her," proposed Anne. "She would be doubly angry with us and say we were afraid of her," said Elfreda. "I'll tell her if you want me to. Nothing she can say will injure my castiron feelings." "Why not put off the evil day? It is still three weeks until Thanksgiving. We can give her two weeks' notice, as they do in theatrical companies," laughed Anne. "Something might happen in the meantime to make us her bosom friends." Elfreda giggled derisively. "I'd like to see it happen, then. We could all pursue our favorite phantoms in peace for the rest of our senior year. She is the only disturber left. Mabel says she imagines Kathleen must have quite a reputation at Overton by this time. She has. There isn't a doubt of it." "Elfreda, be good," admonished Grace, laughing a little. "Be good, bad child, and let who will be naughty," paraphrased Elfreda in a piping, affected voice. "That sounded exactly like Hippy, didn't it?" said Miriam. Grace and Anne nodded. "We ought to call her Hippy the Second," suggested Anne. "Good gracious!" gasped Elfreda, pointing a warning finger at the mission clock on the wall. "Half-past eight, and here I sit gayly loitering as though I had nothing else to do. How about chapel this morning? I know you are going, Miriam. How about you, Grace and Anne?" "I am," said Anne. "Run along and get your wraps. I'll meet you downstairs." After the three girls had gone off to chapel Grace pulled her favorite chair over to the window and sat down to think things over. First of all came the disturbing problem of the newspaper girl and Mabel's invitation. From the tone of the letter it was evident that Mabel knew nothing of the real state of affairs. Kathleen had maintained a discreet silence. Grace felt dimly that the hard, self-centered girl had taken at least one step in the right direction. She had gone from her freshman year to her paper without telling tales. "I wish she'd hurry and take a whole lot more," Grace reflected moodily, as she tried to decide whether to write Mabel, asking her to send Kathleen a separate invitation, or to take matters into her own hands and deliver the invitation in person. "I know she won't go if we ask her. I can't settle that to-day. I shall have to see Patience first. She may be able to suggest something." Grace passed on to the next worry, which was over her misunderstanding with Arline. It was so extremely unfortunate that it should have happened just when they had begun to talk of the Semper Fidelis fancy dress party. She could not carry out her ideas successfully without Arline's co-operation and help. After changing her mind several times, Grace decided to go to Morton House and see Arline. "It really isn't my place," she ruminated, "but I can't bear to have Arline angry with me." Last of all, Grace was troubled over the notice she had read in the paper concerning "Larry, the Locksmith." She was certain that the man she had seen in front of the moving picture theatre on the evening of their little theatre party was none other than the robber in whose capture she had been instrumental during her senior year at high school. Should she notify the Overton authorities of her discovery? Perhaps by this time the thief was many miles from Overton. Grace disliked the idea of figuring even privately in the affair. Yet was it right to withhold her knowledge? She could not determine on any particular course of action, and with an impatient sigh at her own lack of decision in the matter she rose from her chair and prepared to go to her first class in anything but a cheerful frame of mind. CHAPTER X KATHLEEN'S PROMISE "Not in, Miss," was the disappointing information Grace received from the maid who answered the door at Morton House. "Did she leave word when she would return?" questioned Grace. "She did not, Miss. She went out with Miss Denton, and didn't say nothin', Miss," was the discouraging reply. "An' will I tell her you was askin' for her, Miss?" "No; I may come again this evening." Grace walked slowly down the steps and across the campus. She was not at all sure that she would repeat her call. Dear as was Arline to her, the inevitable reaction had set in. Now Grace's pride whispered to her that there was no real reason why she should humble herself to her too-easily-offended friend. It was Arline, not she, who was in the wrong, she mused resentfully. She was rather glad, after all, that Arline had not been at home. Glancing undecidedly toward Wayne Hall, then at her watch, Grace set off in the opposite direction at a rapid walk. It was five o'clock. She would have time to do a little shopping in the Overton stores before they closed. She hurried toward the nearest dry goods store, so intent upon reaching there that she paid little or no attention to the people she passed in the street. Shopping at this late hour proved a comparatively easy matter. Here and there a belated customer might be seen wandering from counter to counter, but the day's business was practically finished and the saleswomen were busily counting their sales or conversing with their nearest neighbors in low tones. It was ten minutes to six when Grace, inwardly congratulating herself on having been able to do so much shopping in so short a space of time, hurried to the ribbon counter. Blue velvet ribbon was the last item on her list. Then she could go home feeling that her hour had been well spent. "We're out of that shade of blue velvet ribbon," said the saleswoman, glancing at the sample Grace held out to her. "Everybody's been buying it. It's on order. Have it in next week." Grace left the store almost on the run and hurried into a shop farther down the street, only to meet with the same disappointing reply. Three blocks farther on was the "French Shop." Grace was sure of finding it there, but was equally sure it would be infinitely more expensive. Still, she only needed a yard and a half. She was about to enter the shop, when the stocky figure of a man just ahead of her sent a sudden thrill of apprehension through her. There was something unpleasantly familiar about the round shoulders and slouching walk. Forgetting her errand, Grace began following him, keeping not more than twenty feet behind him. As he neared the first cross street the man glanced furtively about him, then, turning into the intersecting street, hurried on, almost at a run. Grace, bent only on seeing the stranger's face, unhesitatingly dogged his footsteps. It was now after six o 'clock and growing darker with every moment. Block after block they went, but now Grace kept a distance of a hundred feet or more between herself and the man she was following. She observed rather anxiously that they were nearing the end of Main Street, where the houses were fewer and farther apart. All at once her quarry stopped short and peered sharply about him through the gathering twilight. Grace strolled on at a leisurely pace, though her heart beat violently. Suppose instead of going on he were to turn and walk toward her. Grace trembled a little. She was drawing altogether too near to him to suit her. She was now positive that he was "Larry, the Locksmith." Suddenly the man left the sidewalk and started across a field used in the summer by the small boys of Overton as a playground. This ended the pursuit as far as Grace was concerned. Stepping behind a tree at the edge of the field she strained her eyes to watch the hulking figure as it moved swiftly on. Then she gave a little exclamation of surprise and triumph. The man was hurrying up the steps of a dingy little house that stood at the end of a row of similar houses which bounded the side of the field directly opposite where she stood. Again consulting her watch, she hesitated. It was almost seven o'clock, and she was at least a mile from Wayne Hall. Anne would wonder at her absence, for she had left no word regarding her call upon Arline. She would be more than likely to miss her dinner. Mrs. Elwood's dinner hour was from half-past five until seven o'clock. She rigidly refused to serve meals to those who came later. [Illustration: Grace Stepped Behind a Tree.] "I can't possibly make it," mused Grace. "I'll run into Vinton's for dinner. All this comes of playing sleuth." She laughed softly at her own remark, then her face grew grave. "What shall I do?" she thought. "It is my duty to tell the authorities, but I promised Father after the class money was found that I'd never meddle in any such affair again. Yet here I am, on the outskirts of Overton, trailing an escaped convict as though my bread and butter depended upon it. If I could only turn over this affair to some one else, and let him do the rest, I'd be perfectly satisfied." On the way to Vinton's, Grace reluctantly decided to go in person to the police station and report her discovery to the Chief of Police. "It is only right," she argued. "I will simply tell them the facts and ask them to keep my part in the affair a secret. Then I'll write Father and tell him about it. Perhaps I ought to write him first. But if I wait for his answer it may be too late. I'll go and report my news as soon as I have had my dinner." Grace did not enjoy her solitary meal. To her, the chief charm of a dinner at Vinton's consisted in eating it with her friends. The smart little restaurant seemed unusually quiet. There were not more than half a dozen persons dining there and only two of the half dozen were Overton girls. It was less than a week until Thanksgiving. It looked as though the girls were practicing economy. This accounted for the slim patronage. Grace ate her dinner with one eye on the door, vainly hoping for the entrance of some one she knew. But no one of her friends appeared, and without waiting for dessert she asked the waitress for her check and left the restaurant to go on her disagreeable errand. It was not a long walk to the police station, and Grace resolved to go there with all possible speed. She wished to be able to dismiss the affair from her mind at the earliest moment. She had reached the cross street on which the station house was situated and was about to turn into it when she almost collided with a young woman who gave a smothered exclamation of annoyance and hurried on. As they came together directly under the rays of the arc light, they could scarcely help recognizing each other. "I beg your pardon," called Grace after the hurrying figure. Then with a sudden flash of inspiration she called, "Miss West, please wait a minute." The figure halted, and in the next second Grace confronted the coldly inquiring eyes of the newspaper girl. "Would you like a real news item for your paper?" she asked impulsively. Kathleen regarded her with an expression of mingled incredulity and contempt which changed to one of lively displeasure. "Do you believe that I would accept anything from you?" she asked tensely. "I never thought of that," returned Grace, her color rising. "I was thinking only of the story. Suppose for once we put aside everything personal. I have something to tell you that cannot fail to be of interest to you. Will you forget that I am Grace Harlowe and listen to me?" Grace's earnestness impressed Kathleen against her will. She hesitated briefly, then said in a low voice, "I will listen to you." Grace began with the story of the bazaar given on the Thanksgiving afternoon and evening of her senior year in high school. She related briefly the theft of the strong box containing the bazaar money, the unsuccessful attempts of the police to apprehend the thief, the finding of the money by her and Eleanor Savelli and the capture of the thief by the Oakdale police in the haunted house. Kathleen listened to Grace's rapidly told narrative with growing interest. When she came to the trial of the thief and his recognition by the officers as "Larry, the Locksmith," Kathleen interrupted excitedly: "Why, that's the man who has escaped from prison. The police of all the large cities have been ordered to watch for him. He is an exceptionally clever criminal who has always escaped until that time in Oakdale. And to think it was you who were responsible for his capture! I remember the affair. It was my first year on the paper. One of our reporters was sent on to interview this Larry. He laid his capture to the fact of his having been foolish enough to waste his time in a small town." The newspaper girl had now become eager and animated. Her black eyes gleamed with excitement. "Did you know he had escaped?" she asked. "Yes," replied Grace. "That is the part I am going to tell you. He is here in Overton. I saw him to-night." "You saw him?" questioned Kathleen, her eyes wide with astonishment. Grace nodded. "To-night and one evening last week, too. I wasn't sure then. But to-night I knew him. I followed him to a house on the outskirts of Overton. Then I came back to notify the police. I was on my way to the station when I met you. Don't you imagine it will make a good newspaper story if the police capture him?" "Great!" exclaimed Kathleen. "Then come with me to the station house while I make my report. The officers will surely visit the house where he is hiding at once. If they do, you can telegraph your story to-night in time for the first edition in the morning." Grace had started toward the station house while she was speaking. Kathleen kept close at her side. "Wait a moment," said Grace, as they ascended the stone steps of the station house. "I almost forgot to tell you. You may use the Oakdale part of the story as you heard it at the time it happened, but my name must not be used in your write-up. I shall, of course, tell the chief the whole story in confidence. Nor do I wish my name used in the story of the man's apprehension, provided he is captured. It ought to make a good story in itself without any reference to me. I wish you to give the chief the first information, then you can truthfully say that you did so when you write it." "But it won't sound half so exciting as it would with you in it," protested Kathleen. "I need all the data concerning you to make a big story of it." "I am sorry," declared Grace, "but I promised Father never to become involved in any such affair again. He and Mother would be dreadfully displeased if my name appeared in the newspapers in connection with anything of that sort." "But I shall use my name," argued Kathleen. "It will be a great help to me in my profession." "That is different. If I were interested in newspaper work I shouldn't care, either. I must ask you on your honor not to use my name." "Very well," answered Kathleen slowly, a curious light leaping into her eyes. "Thank you," replied Grace, with a friendly smile. "Remember, you are to be the first to tell the news." CHAPTER XI KATHLEEN'S GREAT STORY The inside of the Overton police station closely resembled that of Oakdale. There was the same style of high desk, the same row of chairs against the wall. Grace hoped the chief would be as easy to approach as was her old friend, Chief Burroughs, at home. There was but one man to be seen, an officer, who sat writing at a small table in one corner of the room. Kathleen pointed to a half-open door leading into an inner room on which appeared the word "Private." Grace nodded: then, confidently approaching the officer, asked if the Chief of Police were in. For answer the officer simply motioned with one hand toward the half-open door and went on with his writing. Chief of Police Ellis glanced up in surprise to see two strange young women standing in the door of his private office. "Are you the Chief of Police, and may we come into your office for a moment?" questioned Grace politely. "Come in, by all means," responded the chief heartily. He was a kindly, middle-age man, whose voice and manner invited confidence. "What can I do for you, young ladies?" Grace turned to Kathleen, who at once poured forth the story of the appearance of "Larry, the Locksmith" in Overton, of his recognition and of how he had been traced to his hiding place. At first Chief Ellis had looked incredulous over Kathleen's strange statement. "How can you be sure he is the man if you have never seen him?" he asked shrewdly. "We can't afford to arrest the wrong man, you know." Kathleen looked appealingly at Grace. "You have a daughter in the freshman class, haven't you, Chief!" asked Grace, coming to the newspaper girl's rescue. "Yes," smiled the chief. "I thought you were Overton girls." "I am Miss Harlowe of the senior class. This is Miss West, a sophomore. You would not wish your daughter's name to be used in police court news, would you?" Chief Ellis made an emphatic gesture of negation. "No!" he answered. "Then I am sure you will keep secret what I am about to tell you." Grace then explained the situation, beginning with the theft of the class money in Oakdale and ending with her trailing of the thief to his hiding place. "Well, I declare!" exclaimed the chief. "This is a most remarkable story. However, I am willing to proceed on the strength of it. I'll have three men on the way to capture 'Larry' within the next fifteen minutes. You young ladies had better go home. You can call me on the telephone every half hour until the men come in. I'll keep you posted. If they get him at once, you can get word to your paper to-night," he assured Kathleen. "You must be a pretty smart girl to be going to college and holding a newspaper job at the same time." Instead of going to Wayne Hall to await word from the chief, the two girls first made arrangements with the telegraph operator at the depot office to wire the story. Kathleen also sent a telegram to her paper. Then they had begun their anxious vigil in the drug store on the corner above the station. An hour later their watch ended. The three officers returned with a snarling, raging prisoner securely handcuffed to one of their number. "They've captured him!" cried Kathleen, "and now my work begins in earnest." While they had been waiting the newspaper girl had employed the time in writing rapidly in a note book she carried. Grace would have liked to see what she wrote, but now that the first excitement had passed she felt the old constraint rising between them like a wall. "Do you care if I don't wait for you in the telegraph office?" asked Grace. "I'll go as far as the door with you. Then I think I had better go on to the Hall. Anne will be worried about me." Kathleen assented to her plan with a look of immeasurable relief which Grace was not slow to observe, but misconstrued entirely. "I suppose she doesn't wish to be bothered while she sends in her story," was Grace's thought as they left the drug store. "Good night. I thank you for helping me," said Kathleen in a perfunctory tone as she turned to go into the office. "It is going to be a great story." "You are very welcome," responded Grace. "Good night, and good luck to you." Three anxious-faced girls were waiting for Grace in her room, and as she opened the door they pounced upon her in a body. "Grace, Grace, you naughty girl, where have you been?" cried Anne. "I am sure my hair has turned gray watching for you." "Yes, give an account of yourself," commanded Elfreda. "Have you no respect for our feelings?" "Did you imagine no one would miss you?" was Miriam's question. "I will answer your questions in order," laughed Grace. "I've been out on important business, I have the deepest respect for your feelings, and I know that my friends always miss me." "Spoken like a soldier and a gentleman," commended Elfreda. "Which is quite remarkable, considering the fact that I am neither," retorted Grace. "Grace, what on earth have you been doing?" Anne's face grew sober. There was a subdued excitement in her friend's manner that had not escaped her notice. "Anne, I cannot tell a lie," returned Grace lightly. "I've been to the police station." The three girls stared at Grace in amazement. "Let me see," mumbled Elfreda. "Have I transgressed the law lately, or had any arguments with Grace? This looks suspicious." "Don't tease me, and promise you will never tell any one what I'm about to say. Hold up your right hands, all of you." Three right hands were promptly raised. "Now, I'll tell you about it," declared Grace, "and please bear in mind, before I begin, that venerable old saw about truth being stranger than fiction." "I knew something startling had happened," declared Anne, when Grace had concluded. "I read it in your face." "Oh, why wasn't I with you?" was Elfreda's regretful cry. "I have always longed to be concerned in a real melodrama." Miriam, alone, made no comment. She regarded Grace with an intent gaze that made the latter ask quickly: "What is the matter, Miriam? Don't you approve of my evening's work? I know Father and Mother won't. I must write them to-morrow. Still, I could hardly have done otherwise." "Of course you couldn't," assured Miriam. "I don't disapprove of what you did. You behaved in true Grace Harlowe fashion." "Then what made you look at me so strangely?" persisted Grace. "If I looked at you strangely, then I beg your pardon," smiled Miriam. "It shall not happen again." Grace smiled faintly, yet her intuition told her that Miriam had purposely turned her question aside. No account of the recapture of "Larry, the Locksmith" appeared in the morning paper. But in the evening paper a full account was published. Grace had waited apprehensively for the evening edition, which was usually out by four o 'clock in the afternoon. She purchased a paper of the boy who stationed himself daily at the southeast corner of the campus, but purposely delayed opening it until she reached her room. Then almost fearfully she unfolded it, with her three friends looking over her shoulder. The article began with the flaring headline, "A Desperate Criminal Recaptured." Grace glanced rapidly down the column, then gave an audible murmur of relief. "We aren't mentioned. I shall always have a superlatively good opinion of Chief Ellis. He kept his word to me absolutely. Now I shan't mind writing Father." "If I had done what you did, I'd insist upon having my name in extra large type, and a portrait and biographical sketch of myself as well," was Elfreda's modest declaration. "No, you wouldn't, and you know it," contradicted Grace. "Well, I might not go as far as the portrait, but I should certainly have the biographical sketch." "I am going to entertain to-night in honor of Grace," announced Miriam. "Shall I invite some of the other girls, or shall we four celebrate in solitary state?" "Don't invite any outsiders this time," said Elfreda. "Then we'll be free to talk over our visit to Mabel and anything else we choose." "There is one person who really ought to be invited," broke in Grace, with conviction. "I mean Kathleen West. Then we can deliver Mabel's invitation to her. I have an idea that she won't refuse to go to New York with us. I hope she will be different from now on. It would be simply splendid to glide peacefully through the rest of one's senior year without a single hitch, wouldn't it?" "Have you seen her since last night?" asked Anne. Grace shook her head. "I knocked on her door at noon, but neither she nor Patience was in. I saw Patience afterward, and she said Kathleen had hurried through her luncheon and gone. I don't think Patience knew anything about last night. If she had known, she would have mentioned it. I will try to see Kathleen before dinner." "You will have to hurry if you do. It is almost time for the dinner bell now," said Elfreda. "You might ask Patience, too." "All right, I'll go at once. Wait for me. I'll be back in a minute. Then we can go down to dinner together." Grace knocked lightly upon the door of the end room. It was opened by Kathleen herself. "Good evening. Won't you come in?" Kathleen's voice was as cold and unfriendly as it had formerly been. "Good evening." Somewhat puzzled at Kathleen's return to her old, cavalier manner, Grace hardly knew how to proceed. "Did you see today's paper?" she asked, by way of beginning. "Which paper?" was the brusque inquiry. "Why, the 'Evening Journal,' of course." "Oh!" Kathleen's tense expression relaxed a trifle. "Yes, I saw it." "I am so glad Chief Ellis kept his word. I hope you were on time with your New York story." "Thank you. It went through nicely!" Kathleen answered in a low tone. "I just stopped for a moment to ask you to come to a little jollification in Miriam's room to-night. We want Patience, too." "Miss Eliot went to Westbrook this afternoon. She will not return until to-morrow morning. As for me, I thank you, but it will be impossible for me to come. I have another engagement." "I am sorry," returned Grace. "Perhaps, under the circumstances, I had better deliver another invitation I have for you at once. I recently received a letter from Miss Ashe inviting us to spend Thanksgiving at her home in New York. She wished me to extend her invitation to you, also. Mabel does not know----" began Grace. Then her face reddened and she ceased abruptly. Kathleen, understanding the flush, said dryly: "Miss Ashe is very kind to think of me. However, it is out of the question for me to accept her invitation. I will write her to-night. It is strange she did not write me, too." "She has been extremely busy," retorted Grace, her face flushing a still deeper red at Kathleen's rudeness. "She invited Miriam, Elfreda and Anne the same way." "That has nothing to do with me," declared Kathleen. "If you will be so kind, you might say in your letter to her that I will write her within a few days." She kept her face half averted, her eyes refusing to meet Grace's. "Very well." Grace felt her anger rising. She turned from the door, which closed almost in her face, and went back to her room hurt and indignant. "Refused and trampled upon as well," declared Elfreda after one glance at Grace's stormy eyes. "Never mind, Grace. I wouldn't let a little thing like that worry me. I wouldn't even think about it." Grace gave a short laugh. "Of course 'you could see,'" she mimicked. "I'd be blind if I couldn't," grinned Elfreda. "The look in your eyes tells the story." "You are right, as usual. She has frozen again. She is icier than ever." "Where's Patience?" asked Anne. "Gone to Westbrook. Won't be back until to-morrow. If she were here she might prevail upon Kathleen to behave reasonably." "We four have been known to enjoy ourselves together without adding to our number," observed Elfreda in a dry tone. "I think I could live without her." Grace brightened. "Oh, wise and superwise Elfreda, in your words lurk the essence of truth. We four will have one of our own special brand of good times to-night. See, I throw all my cares to the winds." Grace waved her arms as though to cast Care from her. "I have tried to solve the mystery of the mysterious Kathleen and it is beyond me. I hoped after last night that she would be different from then on, but to-day she is more provoking than ever. I shall say nothing of her in my letter to Mabel, except that I delivered the invitation, but when we go to Mabel's for Thanksgiving if she asks for an explanation of certain things I shall not hesitate to give it." "That is the way I like to hear you talk," approved Elfreda. "I don't mean the 'wise and superwise Elfreda' part. I'm not so conceited, I hope. But it is high time you let that Kathleen West meander along to suit her own tricky little self. She hasn't an iota of Overton spirit nor a shred of conscience, and instead of appreciating your kind offices she is far more likely to repay you by dragging you into something unpleasant. I could see by Miriam's expression when you told us about the capture of that man that she thought you had trusted Kathleen too far, too." "I confess I was thinking that very thing," laughed Miriam, "but how Elfreda guessed it is more than I can see." "But the man has been captured, the story has appeared in the Overton paper and Kathleen has kept her word about not mentioning me in connection with the affair," protested Grace. "Nothing unpleasant can possibly happen now." But Grace was destined to realize before many hours passed that she had been over-confident. CHAPTER XII TREACHERY The morning after the party in Miriam's room Grace lingered in the living room at Wayne Hall long enough to dash off her letter of acceptance of Mabel Ashe's invitation for Thanksgiving. She was on the point of slipping it into the envelope when the loud ringing of the door bell caused her to start. A moment later she heard the maid say: "Miss Harlowe? I'll see if she's in her room." "Here I am," called Grace, stepping into the hall. "Oh, I see. A special delivery letter for me from Mabel." Grace signed the postman's book, then, closing the hall door, hurried into the living room to read her letter. Opening it, she drew out not only the letter but a folded newspaper clipping as well. The clipping fluttered to the floor. Grace stooped mechanically to pick it up, her eyes on the open letter. A mystified expression crept into her face as she read that gradually changed to one of consternation. With a sharp cry of dismay, she let the letter fall from her hands, while she fumbled with the clipping in a nervous effort to unfold it. One glance at the headline that confronted her and Grace's gray eyes grew black with anger. "How dared she do it! How could she be so contemptible!" Snatching the letter from the table Grace dashed up the stairs to her room. Tears of rage glistened in her eyes. She stood in the middle of the floor with set teeth, closing and unclosing her fingers in an effort to regain her self-control. "I won't cry over it. I won't. I won't," she kept repeating to herself. "She isn't worth my tears. But Father and Mother will be so hurt and displeased. I ought never to have tried to help her. I might have known she wouldn't play fairly." Grace flung herself into a chair and again began a perusal of the disturbing clipping. "Pretty Senior Plays Sleuth," she read. "Larry, the Locksmith, Captured." A tide of crimson swept over her face as she read further. "Overton College Girl Tracks Dangerous Criminal to His Lair. If Miss Grace Harlowe, a senior at Overton College, had not been possessed of a remarkably good memory for faces, Lawrence Baines, known to the underworld as 'Larry, the Locksmith,' would undoubtedly be at large to-day. Miss Harlowe, whose home is in Oakdale----" With a despairing groan, Grace dashed the clipping to the floor, and springing to her feet began walking nervously up and down the room. She had not dreamed that Kathleen could find it in her heart to behave so despicably. She had shamefully abused the confidence that Grace had reposed in her for what seemed in Grace's eyes to be an infinitesimally small gain. Her cheeks burned as she thought of the thousands of people who had seen her name blazoned at the head of a column of police court news. Her father always bought the very paper in which it stood on his way to the office in the morning. He had, of course, seen it. He now knew that she had broken her word. A sob rose to her lips, then she threw back her head with an air of resolution and, hastily drawing her chair in front of the table, seized her fountain pen, and opening it with an energy that left several ink spots on her white silk blouse, began a letter to her father. For an hour she continued to write steadily, covering sheet after sheet of paper. At last she signed her name, and with a mournful sigh folded her letter, slipping it into the envelope without reading it. Putting on her wraps, she left the house and hurried to the post office, where she sent her letter by special delivery. But another task still lay before her. Grace's fine face hardened. It was not a pleasant task, but it would have to be done. She hoped the newspaper girl would be in her room, and she hoped Patience had not yet returned from Westbrook. Grace rang the bell at Wayne Hall with more zeal than was strictly necessary, thereby exciting a scowl from the maid who answered the door. She peeped into the living room, but Kathleen was not among the girls there. At the head of the stairs she halted. The door of Kathleen's room was closed. "Is she at home, or not?" Grace paused before the door and rapped sharply. There was a moment of silence, then a quick, light step sounded inside and the door was opened by Kathleen herself. Her usually pale face became flooded with color as she met the steady light of Grace's scornful eyes. Rallying all her forces, she returned the disconcerting gaze with one of defiant bravado. "Oh, good afternoon," she said, setting her lips in a straight line, a veritable danger signal. Without stopping to choose her words, Grace cried out: "How could you do it? You knew I wished no mention to be made of my name. You promised not to use it." Kathleen eyed her with a contemptuous smile. "My dear Miss Harlowe, you must be very obtuse to imagine even for an instant that I would spoil a good story by writing only what you gave me permission to write. What do you know of the requirements of my paper, or of the style in which a story should be written? The story was too good to let pass. I knew, though, that you would never consent to allowing me to use your name. So I said 'Very well,' and used it. 'Very well' can hardly be construed as a promise." The smiling insolence of the other girl's manner was almost too much for Grace's self-control. Twice she essayed to speak, but the words would not come. When she did find her voice she was dimly surprised at its tense evenness. "Miss West, I made clear to you in the beginning my reason for not wishing you to use my name in connection with what occurred in Oakdale or in any other story you might write. I gave you the news I had stumbled upon willingly. Why could you not have written a clever, interesting story without betraying my confidence?" "Don't attempt to take me to task for not living up to some ridiculous standard of yours," returned Kathleen savagely. "If you did not wish to see yourself in print, you were extremely silly to tell your tale to a representative of the press. To gather news for my paper is my business. Do you understand? I shall use whatever information comes my way, unless some good reason arises for not using it." "As in the case of your Christmas story last year, which you decided at the last moment not to send," supplemented Grace with quiet contempt. Kathleen did not reply. Grace's remark had struck home. She had not forgotten her treacherous attempt to spoil Arline's and Grace's Christmas plans of the year before. "Even in the face of last year I did not believe you capable of such treachery," continued Grace, her youthful voice very stern. "I am in a measure to blame for having trusted you. I should have known better." The newspaper girl winced at this thrust, but said nothing. "And to think," Grace went on bitterly, "that I broke my promise to my father for a girl so devoid of loyalty and honor that she could not understand the first principle of fair play!" Grace's bitter denunciation aroused fully the other girl's deep-seated resentment against her. "Leave this room," she cried out, her voice rising, her eyes snapping with rage. "Don't ever come here again. This room belongs to me----" "And also to me," said a quiet voice from the doorway. "What seems to be the trouble here?" Patience Eliot walked into the room, traveling bag in hand. She surveyed the two girls with considerable curiosity. Without answering, Kathleen turned abruptly and walked to the window, her favorite method of showing her utter contempt of a situation. Patience bent an inquiring gaze on Grace, whose eyes met hers unflinchingly. "Pardon me, Patience, if I don't answer your question," returned Grace. "Perhaps Miss West will answer you after I am gone. This much I may say. She has ordered me not to come again to this room. Therefore, although I am very fond of you, I feel that it won't be right for me to come here to see you. Will you come into our room as often as you can and forgive me for staying away from yours?" Without waiting for an answer, Grace slipped from the room, leaving Patience to stare speculatively after her, then at the tense little figure in the window. Before she had time to address Kathleen, the latter wheeled about, sneering and defiant. "If you are so anxious to know what the trouble is go and ask your dear friend, Miss Harlowe. She will tell you quickly enough behind my back. Oh, I despise a hypocrite!" "I cannot allow you to call Grace Harlowe a hypocrite," said Patience evenly, though her blue eyes flashed. "Whatever has happened I am quite sure is not Grace's fault." "Then it must be mine," was Kathleen's contemptuous retort. "Why don't you speak plainly and say what you mean?" "Very well, I will speak plainly," declared Patience. "I am sure you must have insulted Grace deeply or she would not refuse to come to my room again. I am not going to ask you to tell me what has happened, and I know that I shall not hear it from Grace unless I insist on knowing the truth. The very fact that you are at fault will be sufficient to tie Grace's tongue. However, I shall ask Grace to tell me, as her refusal to come to this room again, is my affair, too." "Your faith in Miss Harlowe is touching," sneered the newspaper girl. "I only wish I had the same faith in you," returned Patience gravely. And Kathleen could think of no answer to Patience's significant words. CHAPTER XIII THE INVITATION Neither Grace nor Kathleen went to their classes that morning. Feeling reasonably certain that the newspaper girl was in the wrong, Patience made no further effort toward discovering the nature of the quarrel. She unpacked her bag, putting away its contents in her usual methodical manner without so much as a glance in Kathleen's direction. Then, taking her note book, she went quietly out to her class in English, leaving her roommate still standing at the window, her very back expressing defiant animosity. Once in her room, Grace reread Mabel Ashe's note. She now understood its import. "MY DEAR GRACE:-- "Words cannot tell you how sorry I am for what has occurred. I did not know until it was too late. The edition had gone to press. I am afraid I couldn't have helped much, for the powers that be were delighted with the story, and that little traitor, Kathleen West, scored a triumph. Knowing you as I do, I am sure you never gave her permission to publish that story. "Of course, you were simply a great heroine in it, but having heard the Oakdale part of the tale from you, and knowing of your promise to your father, it is plain to be seen that she took advantage of you in some way. If you haven't already delivered my invitation to her, then don't do so. I feel deeply resentful toward her. You can tell me the whole thing when you are with me. I shall expect you and the girls on Wednesday evening on the train that leaves Overton between two and three o'clock in the afternoon. You know the one I mean. I'll look it up in the time table before Wednesday. "If you happen to know one extra-delightful girl who has no Thanksgiving plans ask her to come, too. Frances can't arrange to be with us, so we need one more girl to do away with the problem of the 'lonely fifth.' Three pairs are much nicer than two and a half. The half always seems out of things. Of course, I am proceeding in the belief that K. W. won't come now, even if you have invited her. If she has a shred of delicacy in her cheeky little composition, she will stay away. "I must stop now and rush off on the trail of a much-feted debutante of whose engagement I have heard canny rumors. Until Wednesday. "MABEL." "What a darling Mabel is," said Grace half aloud. "I wonder who I had better invite." Arline's pretty, wilful face rose before her. She would have liked to ask Arline, but that was out of the question. There was Ruth, but Ruth and Arline were too closely associated to be separated. Suddenly she remembered Patience. "The very girl!" she exclaimed. "I'll go and ask her now. Oh, no, I can't. I said I wouldn't go into her room again. Never mind, I will see her at luncheon." Grace made it a point to be the first girl in the dining room at luncheon, and when Patience appeared beckoned her to the seat beside her. "Sit here," she invited. "Emma won't be in. She is going to Morton House for luncheon; she told me so." Patience slipped into the vacant seat. "I would like to have a talk with you after luncheon," she said in a guarded voice. "Then come into my room," returned Grace softly. During the progress of the meal Kathleen West appeared, silent and morose. She nodded slightly to several girls, favored Grace and Patience with an unspeakably insolent glance, then turned her undivided attention to her luncheon. "Why won't you tell me what happened?" was Patience's abrupt question when Grace had beckoned her into her room and closed the door. "She is my roommate, you see, and unless you enlighten me as to the nature of her crime I shall not know just how to proceed with her." "I don't like to tell tales," demurred Grace. "Still, I believe I am justified in repeating the story to you, Patience. You have no illusions regarding Kathleen." "None whatever," smiled Patience, but a disapproving frown wrinkled her forehead at the recital of Kathleen's treachery. "It was abominable in her," she said when Grace had finished. "And I had begun to assure myself that she was improving daily, too." "She came out of her shell so beautifully the night we went to the station house," sighed Grace. "I never dreamed she was planning mischief. However, I have something to ask you. Here, read this letter; then I'll talk." She tendered Mabel's letter to her friend. Patience held out her hand for it, then glanced rapidly through it. "This is from the much-worshipped Miss Ashe, isn't it?" "Yes. We four are going to spend Thanksgiving with her, and, Patience, I should like to have you go with us. Won't you please be the 'extra-delightful girl' and say you'll go?" "Why--why!" Patience, usually cool and unemotional, colored with pleasure. "Are you sure you really want me? I should be delighted to go. It is very sweet in you to ask me, Grace." "Not in the least. It's very jolly in you to accept so promptly. There is now only one hitch in the programme. I have already delivered Mabel's invitation to Kathleen." "She won't go," predicted Patience. "She may be lawless, but she is too wise to make any such mistake." * * * * * Patience's prediction, however, seemed destined not to carry far. To the amazement of the five young women who waited on the station platform for the coming of the New York train on Wednesday afternoon, the newspaper girl, suit case in hand, walked serenely into view just as the train was heard whistling around a bend half a mile below the station. "She is actually going to inflict herself upon us," muttered Elfreda in disgust. Grace had briefly explained the situation to her three friends. Just then Kathleen's eyes came to rest on the little group. A flash of surprised anger flitted across her moody face as she espied Patience, then, with an eloquent shrug of her shoulders, she marched off toward the other end of the train. "My doom is sealed," remarked Patience dryly. "Nothing can put our shattered acquaintance together again." "I knew she wouldn't go with us even for spite," declared Grace wearily. "Now, suppose we dismiss her from our minds. I, for one, wish to enjoy our Thanksgiving vacation with Mabel. I may as well tell you that I am still very angry with Miss West, and for the first time in my life I know what it means to be unforgiving." Grace spoke with bitterness. In her letter to her father she had asked him to telegraph her that he forgave her. She had lingered at Wayne Hall until the last moment, but had received no word from him. Now she would not know until she returned from New York. To be sure, she would try to dismiss the whole thing from her mind, but at times it rose before her like a dark shadow, shutting out for the moment the pleasure of her holiday, and causing her to feel gloomy and depressed. During the journey to New York nothing was seen of Kathleen, who had taken good care not to enter the same car in which the five girls had secured seats. Grace saw her again for an instant when, at the end of the journey, the throng of passengers surged toward the iron gates that separated them from the friends who stood anxiously awaiting their arrival. Elfreda's keen eyes were the first to catch sight of Mabel. "There she is, girls! Doesn't she look beautiful?" Mabel Ashe's charming face smiled an eager welcome as she hurried forward with both hands outstretched to greet the travelers. "You dear things!" she cried; "I began to believe I should never see any of you again. Hurry right along. Our car is waiting and we are going to break all the speed laws and be home in time for dinner." "Wait a moment," laughed Grace. "This is the 'extra-delightful girl.'" Grace introduced Patience to Mabel. A long, searching glance passed between the two young women, then their hands met in a strong clasp that betokened mutual liking. "I am sure we shall be friends," declared Mabel. "No surer than I am," smiled Patience. "I have heard so much about you." "Grace wrote me about you, too," returned Mabel warmly. "I am so pleased that you could come. This way to the car, everyone." She led them through the station to where numerous automobiles were drawn up to the sidewalk. "There is our car." She pointed to a roomy dark blue car. "Hop in," she directed. "The sooner we reach home the longer we'll have to talk. I am not going to the office again until the afternoon following Thanksgiving. I begged so hard I was allowed a vacation for once." In what seemed to Grace an incredibly brief space of time, the distance between the station and the Ashes' winter home far out on Riverside Drive was covered. The five guests could not help feeling a trifle impressed at sight of the great stone house which Mabel called home. During her college days it was Mabel's lovable personality that had enshrined her so deeply in the hearts of the students at Overton. The knowledge that her father was a millionaire carried little weight. This thought occurred to Grace as they filed through the massive door of the vestibule and into the beautiful hall furnished in English fashion. A back log glowed ruddily in the big open fireplace, and the flickering flames crackled a welcome. "I wouldn't allow James to turn on the lights. I wished you to see the hall just as it is. I love it when the shadows begin to gather, and only the firelight glows and gleams! Those andirons are very old. They belonged to one of my ancestors. There are a lot of old things in the garret. What garret is not full of antiques?" "Ours," returned Elfreda promptly. "We belong to that despised class, 'nouveau riche,' therefore we are extremely short on noted ancestors and relics and things." "There is nothing like perfect frankness, is there?" laughed Patience. "Never mind, Elfreda, it isn't ancestors that count." "It is dinner that counts, or ought to count, just now. I am going to whisk you upstairs to your rooms, and give you ten minutes for repairs, then, 'down to dinner you must go, you must go,'" chanted Mabel, winding her arm about Grace's waist and drawing her toward the stairway. "Follow us and you won't be sorry. We have a lift if two flights of stairs dismay you." "Lead on," commanded Miriam. "Which will you choose, to room together or alone?" "Together!" was the united response. "Wait a moment," said Anne. "I wish to ask you, Mabel, if you would object to rooming with Grace. I have roomed with her so long that I feel as though I"--with a mischievous glance at Grace's amazed face, Anne finished in a deliberate tone--"were very selfish. So I thought perhaps you would appreciate an opportunity to have her to yourself, too." "Oh!" ejaculated Elfreda. "I thought you were going to say you were tired of Grace." "So did I." A smile gave place to the peculiar expression on Grace's face. "I might have known better, though." "That is generous in you, Anne," declared Mabel "As hostess I wouldn't have been so selfish as to propose it, but----" "Anne, if you really don't care, I would like to room with Mabel," interposed Grace. "I have so much to tell her that the rest of you have already heard. We can have lengthy midnight confabs without disturbing any one but ourselves." "Then, that settles it. Room together you shall," averred Anne. "There is no use in breaking up the Nesbit-Briggs Association. Patience, will you accept me for a roommate?" Patience bowed exaggeratedly and offered her arm to Anne. "Come on, Grace, we'll lead the way," proposed Mabel. "I am so anxious for you to meet Father. I expect him home at any moment." Tucking her arm in Grace's, she led the party up the stairs and, pausing before a half-open door, said hospitably: "Welcome all over again, children. This room is for Elfreda and Miriam. Enter and make yourselves comfy. You and Anne are to have the next one, Patience. My quarters are at the end of the hall. I am going to see Grace safely there, then I'll send my maid to you. She will be delighted to be of service to some one. I have needed her very little since I turned newspaper woman, and she spends the greater part of her time lamenting over the fact. Oh, I forgot to tell you, don't trouble to dress for dinner to-night. We shall be strictly informal. I have ordered an early dinner. We will dress afterward. Father is going to take us to the theatre." The mere mention of Mabel's father brought to Grace's mind that which she had been making a determined effort to forget, her father's displeasure. Her face clouded with pain and resentment as she thought of the girl whose treachery had brought about the first misunderstanding of her life between her and her father. "If Father had only written me a line or sent me a telegram," she thought sadly, winking back the tears that threatened to fall. "I must not let Mabel imagine for a minute that I am anything but happy for to-night, at least. If she knew how dreadfully I felt about Father it would partly spoil her pleasure this evening. I'll try to act as though nothing unpleasant had happened," decided Grace as she followed Mabel into what she had termed her "quarters." Grace could not refrain from giving a soft exclamation of delight as she gazed admiringly about the beautiful room into which she was ushered. "This is my own particular hanging-out place," laughed Mabel "When I am at home, which is seldom, I spend most of my time in here. See my desk! I'll tell you a secret, Grace. I am writing a novel. It's more than half done, too. I haven't told any one else, not even Father. My greatest trouble is not having the time to work on it. My newspaper work keeps me busy, early and late, but I can't complain, because I am gaining all sorts of valuable experience." Mabel talked on about her work, and as Grace watched the sparkling, animated face of her lovely friend she felt very sure that Mabel Ashe, at least, would never sacrifice a friend in the interest of her paper. CHAPTER XIV A CONGENIAL SEXTETTE As the five girls, escorted by Mabel, descended the broad stairs to the hall, a tall, rather stern-faced man, whose dark hair had just a sprinkling of gray at the temples, came forward from one end of the room to meet them. Mabel made a joyful little rush toward him, holding his hand in both her own. "I knew you wouldn't disappoint me. Girls, this is my father. Father, let me introduce you to the nicest girls in Overton." Robert Ashe's sombre eyes smiled a kindly welcome as he looked into the radiant young faces of his daughter's guests. As each girl was presented to him he shook hands with her in a hearty, whole-souled way that completely dispelled any feeling of constraint on her part. "Father, you may take Elfreda in to dinner to-night. To-morrow it will be some one else's turn. I hope you will be here to enough meals to go the round." "So do I," laughed Mr. Ashe, the stern look on his face disappearing, his brown eyes looking almost boyish. Dinner proved a merry meal. The usually quiet room rang with the gay laughter of the happy girls, who had planned to enjoy every hour of their holiday. When dinner was over, Mr. Ashe ceremoniously invited them to be his guests at a theatre party that night. "We'll have to make one evening dress do duty while we are here, Mabel. We had room in our suit cases for only one, and didn't want to bring trunks," explained Grace, as they lingered in the hall to talk for a moment before going to their rooms to dress. "Never mind, if you run out of gowns you can wear mine," offered Mabel. "That is, you and Miriam can. I'm not so sure of Anne and Elfreda and Patience." * * * * * The play Mr. Ashe had selected for his guests' entertainment was one whose strong element of human interest had early carried it into favor with the New York audience that nightly crowded the theatre in which it was being presented. The star, a young woman of exceptional talent, almost a great artist, had by her remarkable portrayal of the leading role sprung from obscurity to fame in a single night. "I am so glad we are going to see her!" exclaimed Anne, when Mabel had announced her father's choice of play for them. "Miss Southard wrote me about her. She played small parts in Mr. Southard's company two years ago. He prophesied that she would some day be heard from." "Isn't it a pity the Southards aren't here this winter?" sighed Grace. "Mr. Southard was not anxious to go to England, but he could not help himself. It's one of the vicissitudes of an actor's life, isn't it, Anne?" Anne nodded gravely. "It is pleasant to travel about and see what the rest of the world is doing, but it is hard to leave home, too." "Still, you are thinking of doing it when your senior days are over, you bad child," interposed Grace slyly. "I warn you, you will meet with strenuous opposition." "From you?" asked Anne, a little flush creeping into her pale face. "No, not from me," retorted Grace with significant emphasis. "Don't tease Anne," laughed Mabel. "Let Genius do as it chooses." "If you mean me, I choose to go and dress this instant. Come on, Patience. We will hurry our dressing and be downstairs first. Then we can monopolize Mr. Ashe." "Oh, no, you won't," contradicted Elfreda. "I have reserved that privilege for myself." "We are ready," exulted Anne outside Elfreda's door half an hour later. "What did I tell you?" "So am I," replied Elfreda, opening the door. "And so is Miriam." Elfreda was looking particularly handsome in her evening gown of golden brown messaline, trimmed with dull gold embroidery. By constant training and self-denial she had reduced her weight to one hundred and thirty-five pounds and could not be truthfully called stout. Her fair hair was piled high upon her head, and one dull gold butterfly gleamed in its wavy meshes. Miriam's gown was in her favorite apricot shade of crepe de chine and brought out fully the beauty of her black hair and eyes and her exquisite coloring. Mabel had chosen black silk net over delft blue, while Patience wore a gray chiffon frock over gray silk with touches of old rose, a frock exactly suited to her calm, high-bred type of face. Anne's dainty white crepe de chine frock made her look anything but a theatrical star. Grace, however, had for once departed from her favorite blue and wore a white chiffon gown whose exquisitely simple lines made the most of her slender, supple figure. The charm of early sixteen radiated from her youthful person, and she looked no older than when she had led the freshman basketball team on to victory in Oakdale High School. "Grace can't grow up in spite of her long skirts and done-up hair," smiled Miriam. "That is precisely what I was thinking," agreed Anne. "Is she sixteen or twenty-three?" "Aren't you pleased with us, Father, and won't you feel inordinately proud of your theatre party?" called Mabel from the stairway as they descended to the hall, where Mr. Ashe stood looking reflectively into the fire as he waited for his charges. "Mere words fail to express my admiration," he laughed, bowing to the sextette of pretty girls, who smilingly nodded their appreciation of his speech. "Isn't he a perfect angel?" asked Mabel, sidling up to him and slipping within the circle of his arm. "I don't see how I ever had the heart to go to college and leave him." "She has no compunction about rushing off to work on a newspaper, day after day, and leaving me daughterless," complained Mr. Ashe lightly. Yet a shadow so slight as to be hardly noticeable crossed his face, which no one save the lynx-eyed Elfreda saw, who made mental note of it. "He doesn't want her to work," was her shrewd conclusion. "But I am here to-night," protested Mabel, catching his hand in hers almost appealingly, "and I'm going to be at home for a whole day and evening. Will you forswear business and help me entertain the girls to-morrow?" "I promise to devote myself heart and soul to their cause," said Mr. Ashe solemnly, raising his hand. "Only you must allow me to go down to the office for a little while in the morning." "Very well. Remember, all telegrams and telephone messages are to be tabooed after you leave there." "Granted. What about all newspaper assignments?" "Turn about is fair play," returned Mabel, flushing. "They can keep the telephone messages and telegrams company." CHAPTER XV A FIRELIGHT COUNCIL It was well after midnight when the theatre party returned to Mabel's home, rather sleepy, but delighted with their glimpse of pleasure-loving New York by night. After the theatre they were invited to be Mr. Ashe's guests at supper, and were promptly whisked away in their motor car to one of New York's particularly exclusive hotels, where a delicious little supper was served to them in one of the hotel's private dining rooms. Half-past eight o'clock Thanksgiving morning found the six girls downstairs and seated at the breakfast table. Mr. Ashe, who made it an ironclad rule always to be in his office at half-past eight o'clock, even on holidays, had time for only a hasty good morning all around before his man announced that his car was at the door. "Remember, Mab, you are to bring the girls down to my office after Thanksgiving services this morning," he called back as he paused on the threshold of the dining room. "I'll remember, General," called Mabel, with a military salute. "Oh, are we going to church this morning?" asked Elfreda quickly. "Yes. There is to be a short but beautiful service in the church Father and I attend. You will hear some wonderful music, too." "We went to church here in New York City on Thanksgiving Day, three years ago," said Grace. "Anne, Miriam and I were visiting the Southards. We went to a church whose minister had at one time been an actor." "Oh, yes, I know that church, and I have met the minister. I interviewed him last fall and then wrote a story about him for the paper. He is a fine man. I wish I knew Everett Southard and his sister." "You shall know them as soon as they return from England," promised Anne. "I am sure they will be pleased to know you." "I hope so," returned Mabel. "It was a great honor for Mr. Southard to have such a flattering offer from that great English manager, wasn't it?" "Did you know that Anne could have gone with them if she had been willing to put off her graduation for another year?" asked Miriam. "I didn't know it, but I'm not surprised," responded Mabel. "Neither fame nor honor would tempt you to allow your chums to finish the race without you. Isn't that true, Anne?" "True as can be," affirmed Anne. "I owe my greatest happiness to them. I couldn't desert them if I were asked to star in the whole Shakesperian repertoire." Her brown eyes looked tender loyalty at her three friends as she made this assertion. "We couldn't get along without Anne," declared Miriam. "She is our balance wheel. She doesn't say much, but whatever she says counts." "How ridiculous!" scoffed Anne. "These self-reliant persons don't need a balance wheel, Mabel." "Some of us do," observed Grace, an expression of pain in her fine eyes. "You don't," contradicted Elfreda pointedly. Mabel eyed the two girls reflectively. "I'm a mind reader," she announced. "I understand both of you. After church this morning I am going to call a general welfare meeting in the library. Our universe needs regulating." She smiled gayly upon her guests, yet there was a hint of purpose in her tone as she added: "At least we can exchange valuable information and get down to cause and effect." After breakfast, a great scurrying to get ready for church ensued, and an hour later their big, faithful motor carried them off to the Thanksgiving service. "It doesn't seem a bit like Thanksgiving," commented Miriam, as they sped down Riverside Drive. "More like Indian summer," observed Patience. The day was glorious with sunshine. There was hardly a suspicion of frost in the air and the snowy setting considered so essential to a successful Thanksgiving Day was entirely absent. "We never have this kind of Thanksgiving weather in Oakdale, do we, Grace?" asked Miriam. "Neither do we in Fairview," put in Elfreda. "I can recall only one Thanksgiving that wasn't snowy, and I can remember that because I behaved so outrageously. I was a young barbarian of eight, who screamed and kicked my way to whatever I wanted. Two days before Thanksgiving Pa brought me home a sled. It was red with a white deer painted on it and underneath the deer was the word 'Fleet,' printed in big white letters. I knew that with such a name it could hardly help being the best sled in Fairview. The night before Thanksgiving the rain came down in torrents and the next morning there wasn't a square inch of snow for miles around on which to try out my beloved sled. "It was a bitter morning for me, and I proceeded to wreak my displeasure upon my family. I behaved like a savage all day and ended by being locked in Ma's room with my Thanksgiving dinner on a tray, minus dessert. I got even that night, though, for Ma had invited our minister and his wife to dinner. I waited until I had had my dinner and they had finished, too, and were sitting in the parlor. Then I began screaming down a register, which was right over them, my very candid opinion of them and of Thanksgiving Day in general. "It was funny, wasn't it?" she chuckled in answer to the burst of laughter that greeted her recital. "But it was dreadful for poor Ma. The minister's wife never forgave me for it. She always referred to me behind my back as that 'terrible Briggs child.'" "Another reminiscence for 'The Adventures of Elfreda,'" said Miriam. "Elfreda is going to write a book of her early adventures and misadventures," explained Grace to Patience. "Did we ever tell you about it?" "No; but in the event of its publication I speak now for an autographed copy," returned Patience, with twinkling eyes. "I'll have one done up for you in crushed Levant," was Elfreda's prompt offer. "This is our church," proclaimed Mabel. The car found a place for itself in the long line of automobiles drawn up at the curb, and, alighting from it, the party made their way sedately up the broad stone walk to the main entrance of the stately, gray stone edifice. During the beautiful Thanksgiving service Grace's thoughts would drift into the same painful channel that she had inwardly vowed to avoid. The sweetness of the music made her think of home, and the earnest words of the minister sank deep into her heart. She, who had so much to thank her father and mother for, had carelessly allowed the name of Harlowe to be dragged into the limelight of police court news. She was unworthy of her parents' confidence. That she was unjustly severe in her self-arraignment did not occur to Grace. It was her first experience with real remorse and, as is usually the case, she did not allow herself the luxury of extenuating circumstances. When she bowed her head during the concluding prayer her eyes were full of tears and it was only by desperate effort that she managed to wink them back. "Father wants to see us now, you know," Mabel reminded her guests, as they took their places once more in the automobile. "To Father's office," she directed the chauffeur, and the car with its freight of happy girls glided down the avenue toward the section of the city in which Mr. Ashe's office was situated. "Of course, Father's employees don't work to-day," explained Mabel as they rolled along. "His private secretary is with him, but his offices are closed. He wishes us to take luncheon with him, then we are to go for a drive through Central Park. You've taken that drive before, I suppose, but it is such a beautiful day and all New York will be in evidence. I thought you would enjoy seeing the world and his wife out for a holiday." "We have hardly seen enough of Central Park to grow tired of it," smiled Grace. "Anne is a seasoned New Yorker and so is Elfreda, but Miriam and I never stayed here for any length of time. Patience will have to answer for herself." "My knowledge of the metropolis is vague, and my experience here has consisted largely in being rushed from the depot to the hotel, and from the hotel to the depot. So you can readily see that Central Park is in the nature of an innovation, to me," responded Patience. Luncheon was eaten in a restaurant whose extreme exclusiveness made it an especially desirable place for Mr. Ashe to entertain his daughter and her guests. The drive through Central Park came next, and it was after four o'clock before they turned into Riverside Drive for home. "Please come down to the library as soon as you take off your wraps," directed Mabel. "The time for the council has arrived." "Only Campfire girls have councils," retorted Miriam. "What do you know about Campfire girls?" demanded Mabel. "A whole lot," put in Grace. "We met five girls last summer who had just been on a trip through the White Mountains. They called themselves the 'Meadow-Brook Girls,' but they were real Campfire girls. They had spent a summer in camp and had won whole strings of beads for their achievements." "They spent a day or two in Oakdale," explained Miriam. "One of them, a funny little girl who lisped, was a cousin of Hippy Wingate. Her name was Grace Thompson, but her three chums called her Tommy. They had a guardian with them, too, a Miss Elting." "I liked the tall one, Miss Burrell, best," continued Grace, "but they were all interesting. The girl who owned the car was a Miss McCarthy, a true Irish colleen and awfully witty. She and Nora O'Malley swore friendship on sight. Then there was a stout girl whose nickname was 'Buster,' and a quiet, brown-eyed girl named Hazel Holland. They write to me occasionally and they are all going to Overton when they have finished high school." "Why did they call themselves the 'Meadow-Brook Girls'?" "Oh, that was the name of their home town." "What good times they must have had," commented Mabel. "They did, and all sorts of hairbreadth escapes as well. They won ever so many honor beads for bravery and prompt action in time of danger. But to return to the subject of our council. Don't you think we had better put our wraps away and convene? That's what councils do, isn't it?" "Convene is correct," Elfreda assured her gravely. "Allow me to head the procession upstairs. The sooner we go up the sooner we shall come down." A little later they clustered about the cheerful open fireplace in the library. Mabel, who was seated on a stool at one side of the fire, reached forward for the poker and prodded the half-burnt log energetically. The others watched her in silence until she laid down the poker with a suddenness that caused them all to start, and turning about said almost brusquely: "I wish you girls to tell me frankly everything about Kathleen West. Until that 'Larry, the Locksmith' story came out I hadn't the slightest idea that there was anything save the pleasantest relations between her and Grace. That story set me to thinking. I knew something was wrong, for Grace had told me the Oakdale part of it in strict confidence. When I received a cold little note from Miss West declining my invitation, I was sure of it. Whatever it is, I feel responsible, for I asked you to look out for Miss West in the first place. Won't you please tell me all about it?" [Illustration: They Clustered About the Fireplace.] Mabel's frank appeal was irresistible. "I am sure it would be better to tell Mabel everything from the beginning," said Anne in a decided tone. "I agree with Anne," came from Miriam. "Of course she ought to know it," declared Elfreda. "Didn't I say so last year?" "Last year!" exclaimed Mabel. "How long has this unpleasant state of affairs been going on?" "Ever since the early part of our junior year," admitted Grace. "I disliked to write you of it. We thought she would change. We did everything we could to please her, but she is not in the least like any other girl I have ever known. Ask Patience about her. She rooms with Miss West." "Do you?" Mabel turned her amazed glance upon Patience. "And not one of you said a word to me of it." "We thought it better not to mention Miss West," said Grace slowly. "You can readily understand our attitude, Mabel. I feel as though I ought to tell you that she came to New York on the same train with us. She was in the car ahead of ours." "Then I shall surely see her before she goes back to Overton. I suppose she came down purposely to be patted on the back for her big story. Now begin the terrible tale of how it all happened." Grace began with their meeting of Kathleen West at the Overton station and of their ready acceptance of the newspaper girl for Mabel's sake. When she told of Kathleen's sudden avoidance of her and the other members of the Semper Fidelis Club, and of her subsequent intimacy with Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton, Mabel exclaimed impatiently: "Those girls again! They were born trouble-makers, weren't they?" "But they turned out beautifully," defended Grace, "only I haven't reached that part of my story yet. It is really a very nice part, only so many disagreeable things happened before it." "I shall never notice Kathleen West again!" was Mabel's indignant cry when Grace had finished the account of Kathleen's attempt to spoil Arline's unselfish Christmas plan. "You mustn't say that." Grace grew very earnest. "That was just the reason I didn't wish you to know. I can't bear to be a tale-bearer, but still I believe it is your right to know the facts. You are one of us, and we have no secrets from one another, yet I don't like to say any thing that will lower her in your estimation. She may have been a true friend to you." "Don't worry about that part of it, Grace. You aren't a tale-bearer." Mabel reached forward to pat Grace's hand. "If only you had told me long ago." Grace continued her narrative, ending with Kathleen's final attempt to be revenged on the Semper Fidelis Club, and the clever way in which she had been brought to book by none other than Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton. "What a little villain she is, and how splendidly Alberta and Mary turned out," interposed Mabel. "She was far too clever to give me the faintest inkling of the truth. I used to wonder why she was always so noncommittal about things at Overton. I laid it to her peculiar temperament, never suspecting that she had good reason for refusing to discuss her college life. I had an idea her cleverness would pave the way to great things for her at Overton. I supposed her to be very popular." "Wait until I finish my discourse," smiled Grace, "then you shall hear what Patience, the All Wise, thinks of her." She went over rather hurriedly her recognition of "Larry, the Locksmith" in the streets of Overton, of how she had trailed him within sight of his hiding place, and of her tardy remembrance of her promise to her father. "I was uncertain what to do, when I happened to catch sight of Miss West," continued Grace. "An evil genius must have prompted me to take her into my confidence. But it was a good story, and Patience had told me only a day or two before that Miss West had been mourning over her lack of news for her paper. She made what I believed to be a promise to leave out the Oakdale part of the story and not to use my name within it. Not a line of the Oakdale part of the story appeared in the Overton papers. The chief of police kept his word, at any rate. "I never dreamed of her treachery until I received your letter and the clipping. I know Father and Mother have read it. Father always buys that paper. I haven't heard a word from home since then." Grace's voice faltered. "You poor, dear child!" cried Mabel, springing from her stool and going over to Grace. "Don't sympathize with me, Mabel, or I shall cry." Grace raised her head smilingly, but her gray eyes were full of tears. "I've vowed eternal vengeance," proclaimed Elfreda savagely. She could not endure the thought that Grace should be made so unhappy. "It is my own fault." Grace had regained her composure. "Perhaps some day I'll learn not to dive into things head first. I am sure I have displeased and hurt Father, or he would have written me before this." "I think Miss West has behaved abominably, and I hope you will forgive me for having asked you to help her. If she is still in the office on Saturday I shall not hesitate to take her to task for her double-dealing." "I am quite frank in saying that you may tell her whatever you choose." Grace's voice sounded very hard. "Grace Harlowe, what has come over you?" exclaimed Elfreda. "You usually preach moderation, but now you are as vindictive and resentful as an Indian." "Not quite," retorted Grace, half smiling. "I am merely what one might term 'deeply incensed.' It isn't a dangerous state, but it usually lasts a long time. Now, I've said the very last word of my say. It is your time to talk, Patience." "I haven't much to say," began Patience, "except that Miss West is naturally rather hard and self-centered and her work as a reporter has accentuated it. Her ambition blinds her sense of honor. I suppose she has one, although I have occasionally doubted it." "Don't you approve of newspaper work for women?" asked Mabel quickly. "I ought to." The words slipped out unawares. "That is--I----" "I know why!" cried Elfreda, wagging her head in triumph. "Because she is an editor's daughter and knows that a newspaper could not run successfully without women. James Merton Eliot, the well-known newspaper editor, is her father." Exclamations of surprise greeted this announcement. To Miriam, Anne and Mabel this was news indeed, but the astonishment of Patience arose from a far different cause. "How did you know it?" Patience asked Elfreda in open amazement. "Oh, I heard you explaining to Grace at luncheon one day just how the Sunday section of a newspaper was put together. I could see you knew what you were talking about, and made up my mind then that you didn't get your information from Miss West. Then you dropped a letter one day when we were crossing the campus addressed to James Merton Eliot, The Elms, South Framingham, Massachusetts. I picked it up and handed it to you, but I couldn't help seeing the address. I didn't think anything of it until I happened to read an article in a magazine on noted men of affairs, and found the same name staring me in the face. For a long time I couldn't think of why that particular name seemed familiar. Then I remembered. Still, I had never heard you say a word about your father's business. One night I asked you about him and you didn't give me any satisfaction. I could see that you didn't want to answer, so I didn't say another word, but I kept on wondering. What are you all laughing at?" she demanded, darting a suspicious glance about the circle of smiling faces. "Elfreda, you are a wonder! I make my bow to you." Patience rose and, walking over to where Elfreda sat, bowed low before her. Elfreda's plump hand was raised in protest, but there was curiosity written on every feature. "What made you keep it a secret?" "I have designs on an editorial position on the 'College Herald' next year. But I want to win my literary spurs through my own efforts. I don't believe in reflected glory." Patience's earnestness was convincing. "Neither do I," agreed Mabel heartily. "You won't object if the editor of our paper knows, though, will you? He is an old friend of Father's. I am sure he will never forgive me if I don't introduce you to him. I am going to take you girls to the office with me on Saturday. But to go back to the object of our council, what are we to do in the case of Miss West?" "Nothing." Grace spoke decisively. "Oh, yes, we must do something, Grace dear," admonished Patience. "We mustn't give her up in this fashion." "Then, suggest something," retorted Grace with an impatient frown. "I will before long," promised Patience. "I can't think of a single thing now, but the inspiration will come. Will you all agree to help if I think of something startlingly worth while?" "I'll consider the matter," was Mabel's dry comment. The other girls answered in the affirmative, but without enthusiasm. Grace's almost hostile attitude toward Kathleen had had a potent effect upon them. Patience, feeling their acquiescence to be perfunctory, said no more on the subject. There was a perceptible lull in the conversation, then Mabel proposed that Miriam play for them, and the council broke up with alacrity and strolled off to the music room. "It's time to dress for dinner. Father will be here soon," announced Mabel. "To-night we are to have a little dance. I have been keeping it as a surprise for you. We have a perfectly darling ballroom in the house and I have invited a number of my friends to meet you." Mabel's announcement was received with exclamations of delight. What girl does not welcome the very idea of a real dance to the notes of a real orchestra? The Overton girls went upstairs to dress for the coming dance, and for the time being their self-imposed problem of the newspaper girl was forgotten. CHAPTER XVI ELFREDA SHOWS GRACE THE WAY Mabel's dance was an occasion long to be discussed and remembered, and the remaining two days of the girls' Thanksgiving vacation were so crowded with the amusements she had planned for them that the moments flitted by on wings. Their visit to the offices of the great newspaper on whose staff both Mabel Ashe and Kathleen West were enrolled was a red-letter event. They had penetrated even to the fastnesses of the local room and art department, and were duly impressed with all they saw. In the local room they had caught a brief glimpse of Kathleen West. She was seated at a desk at the lower end of the long room, writing industriously. So intent was she upon her work, that, either by accident or design, she failed to see the little group of sight-seers, who stood watching the rows of clicking typewriters, operated by the reporters of the various departments who were preparing copy for the composing room. At the moment Grace had spied the newspaper girl hard at work a wave of admiration had swept over her for this strange young woman who had treated her so badly. In spite of Kathleen's lack of principle, she had the will to work, and she had already achieved much in her chosen field. If only she had been like Ruth. Then the memory of Grace's own grievance drove away the kinder thought. As they were on the point of leaving the local room their eyes had chanced to meet, and Grace's flashed with an unmistakable contempt that caused Kathleen to color and turn her head. On Sunday morning the dreaded good-byes were said and Mr. Ashe and Mabel saw their guests safely aboard the train for Overton. It was late Sunday afternoon when, tired and luggage laden, the five girls climbed into the automobile bus at the Overton station, and were straightway conveyed to Wayne Hall. Kathleen West had not returned on the same train with them, nor did she appear until late the following afternoon. That she might be reprimanded for overstaying her vacation either did not occur to her, or else the possibility held no terror for her. The instant the door of Wayne Hall closed behind her Grace darted to the house bulletin board. In it was a letter for Anne, one for Elfreda and two for herself. She choked back a sob as she saw that one of the envelopes bore her father's handwriting, the other that of Arline Thayer. "Don't wait for me, Grace. Go on upstairs and read your letters. I must see Mrs. Elwood about that package I expected by express." Setting down her suit case, Anne hurried down the hall. Always thoughtful for others, she now determined that Grace should be alone when she opened her father's letter. With a grateful glance after Anne's retreating figure and a "see you later" to Miriam, Elfreda and Patience, who had stopped at the living room door to talk with Laura Atkins and Mildred Taylor, Grace went to her room. With trembling fingers she tore open the envelope, glancing through the first page of the letter. Then, with a little choking cry of relief, she sank into a chair and began to cry softly. It was at least fifteen minutes before Anne appeared in the room, and during that time Grace had wiped away her tears and calmed herself to the point of finishing her father's letter. She looked up smilingly as Anne entered, although her eyes were red. "It is all right, Anne! Father is the most forgiving man! Just listen to what he says:" "MY DEAR GRACE:-- "There is no use in scolding you. I know that your intentions were good, above reproach, no doubt, but how many times have I cautioned you to go slowly? I received your letter, but, deciding you deserved a certain amount of punishment for your rashness, purposely delayed answering you. Your fame has traveled the length and breadth of Oakdale, however, as I am not the only man in town who reads the New York papers. In the light of your early police court career I might say that this last bit of sleuthing merely adds to your reputation in Oakdale as an apostle of justice. I forgive you, of course, and do not blame you very severely. You were rather shabbily dealt with, but still you must consider that if you had kept your promise to me this annoying episode would never have taken place. "Considering your legitimate claim to senior dignity, I am not going to lecture you any further. I am sure you will be more careful another time. We missed our little girl more than I can say on Thanksgiving Day. Your mother and I, who, you will remember, were elected honorary members of the Phi Sigma Tau the summer we went to Europe with that illustrious organization, carried out to the best of our ability your old plan of making some one else happy on Thanksgiving Day. With the help of Miss Thompson, who is a frequent visitor at our house, we managed to find several high school girls who needed cheering up. We invited them to Thanksgiving dinner and had a little dance in the evening. Your mother will write in a day or two and give you full particulars. "I hope you enjoyed your trip to New York. I feel rather guilty, now, because I didn't answer your letter at once. We will have one of our good old talks when you come home for the Christmas holidays. Then you may scold me, if you think I deserve it. "Your mother and I are well, and are looking forward to your home-coming next month. So is half the town, for that matter. Your friends never forget to ask for you, and every day brings its, 'Is Grace coming home for the holidays?' God bless you, my dear child, and bring you safe home to us for Christmas. That is the gift we most desire. With our dearest love, "FATHER." Grace's eyes were misty as she looked up from her letter. "Isn't he just too splendid for words, Anne?" Anne nodded, then, slipping her arm about Grace's neck, she leaned over and kissed her friend's cheek. "I am so glad everything is all right." "You knew better than any one else how dreadful it was for me," returned Grace, looking up affectionately at her friend. "We all know," answered Anne. "I think Elfreda took it even more deeply to heart than we did. She is the soul of loyalty and resents an injury to one of us as much as though it were her own grievance." "In one way it seems a long time since J. Elfreda Briggs established herself in my seat on the train, yet in another it seems but yesterday," mused Grace. "Can you realize, Anne, that we are almost at the end of our college days?" "I never allow myself to think of it," confessed Anne. "I've been so happy at Overton I'd like to stay here forever." "Give up the stage, and apply for a place on the faculty," suggested Grace with apparent earnestness. "You rascal! You know I couldn't do that even for the sake of being at Overton. I am wedded to my art," proclaimed Anne dramatically. "Some day you will obtain a divorce from your art and marry a mere man, though," predicted Grace. The color suffused Anne's white face. Her brown eyes grew troubled. "I don't know whether I shall or not," she murmured. "Anne, would you leave the stage, give up your work, if--if--" Grace paused. "If David asked me to marry him?" Anne finished the question calmly. "I don't know, Grace. I've asked myself that question so many times that I am tired of trying to answer it. In fact, I've lately decided to let matters drift and see what happens. Although there has never been a word of sentiment exchanged between us, I am reasonably sure that David loves me, and I am very fond of him," confessed Anne. "In some respects I feel years older than you girls. I believe it is due to my stage experience; I have played so many different parts, some of them emotional roles which have to do with love and renunciation." Anne's musical voice trembled slightly on the last word. "I am sure David loves you with all his heart," was Grace's honest reply. "Now that he has been graduated from college and has gone into business for himself, I am afraid you will be called upon to decide before long." "I am afraid so," sighed Anne. "I wish life weren't quite so complicated." "I hope the rest of our senior year will be free from complications." Grace spoke with grim emphasis. "Why, I forgot to open this letter!" she exclaimed, snatching the unopened letter from the table and tearing at the end of it. The letter proved to be a penitent little note from Arline asking Grace to forgive her, and prove her forgiveness by taking dinner with her the following evening at Vinton's. Grace felt a thrill of happiness swell within her as she read the note. Her brief estrangement from Arline had been another of her secret griefs. "I'm going to take dinner with Arline to-morrow night," she announced to Anne. "You'd better hurry if you care to take dinner with us," called Elfreda from the doorway, in which she had paused just in time to hear Grace's last remark. "It isn't dinner," corrected Anne. "It is supper on Sunday, and never very good, either." "We never have Sunday dinner in the middle of the day at home," commented Elfreda. "When you are at Wayne Hall do as the Wayne Hallites do," quoted Miriam, who had followed Elfreda into the room. "Where is Patience?" inquired Grace. "Enjoying the solitude of her room before the disturber arrives," volunteered Elfreda. "She'll be along presently." Despite the fact that they had had dinner on the train, the four girls decided that they were hungry, and on going downstairs to the dining room where Mrs. Elwood had prepared an unusually good supper, proved it, to their own and Mrs. Elwood's satisfaction. There were only three girls in the dining room when they took their places, as the majority of the "Wayne Hallites" were spending the afternoon and evening of their last day's vacation with friends. Patience joined them as they were finishing their dessert, and it was laughingly decided to entertain her while she ate, and afterward go for a walk. "What style of entertainment do you prefer?" asked Elfreda, with a deferential air. "Shall I give you an imitation of Kathleen West's return?" "No, thank you. The reality will be sufficient," was Patience's dry retort. "I prefer a more pleasant variety of entertainment." The ringing of the door bell caused those in the dining room to glance expectantly through the doorway into the hall. They heard the maid's voice, then a cry of "At last!" and Emma Dean fairly charged into their midst. "I never was so glad to see any one in all my life," she cried, with a joyful wave of her hand. "How I have missed you while you have been gallivanting about New York without giving the friend of your freshman days a thought. You might have sent me a postcard, you know." "'Gallivanting' is not the word with which to describe our triumphal march around New York," objected Elfreda. "It's a very good word," defended Emma. "It means to roam about for pleasure without any definite plan. It says so in the dictionary." "Every day adds to our store of knowledge," jeered Elfreda. "As I am at present overjoyed to see you, I'll try hard not to squabble with you." Emma turned her back squarely upon Elfreda and addressed Anne. "I heard something while you were gone that will interest you, Anne. The senior class are talking of presenting a play. If we do, you will star in it, of course." "I can't, Emma," returned Anne regretfully. "My professional experience prevents me from taking part in college plays. If Semper Fidelis, or some of the girls, were to put on a play for our own amusement, then I could take part, but in regular college plays professionals are barred here at Overton. It is practically the same rule that applies to college sports." "Oh, that is too bad! But it wouldn't hinder you from writing one, would it?" "I couldn't write a play. I used to hope that I might some day become a writer. But I know now that it isn't in me." "But many actors and actresses have been writers, too," put in Elfreda. "I know it. Still, the most successful plays have been written by men and women outside the profession," argued Anne. "I wish I could write, but I know my limitations and they stop this side of authorship. But why did you ask me if I could write a play, Emma?" "Marian Cummings gave a spread the other night to all the seniors on the campus who weren't lucky enough to get away from Overton for Thanksgiving. We were talking about what the senior class might do in the way of stunts, and some one proposed that we ought to give a play after midyears. You know our class has never done anything of the sort since we entered college. Naturally, we were all in favor of the idea. We all agreed that we wanted something besides Shakespeare for a change, but no one could suggest anything else. We wanted something really representative, and the majority of these plays for amateurs are rather trivial. Finally, Sara Emerson suggested that the play be written by a member of the senior class. There was a general protest, and Elizabeth Wade asked Sara if she would mind writing it. Rather unkind in her, wasn't it?" asked Emma, with a reminiscent chuckle. Her friends laughed with her. The mere idea of frivolous little Sara Emerson as a playwright was distinctly amusing. "Sara didn't mind our laughing. She and Julia giggled over it, too. Then Marian Cummings suddenly thought of a splendid plan." Emma paused in order to impress her hearers. "For goodness' sake, go on, Emma," begged Miriam. "Don't ask us to guess the plan, either." "I'm not going to ask you to guess it. I stopped talking merely to allow my words to sink deeply into your minds. Marian wants to make it an honor competition affair." "What's an 'honor competition affair'?" asked Elfreda. "I'm surprised at your question. I should think you 'could see' the meaning from the words themselves," teased Emma. "You see almost everything." "I'll be revenged on you for that thrust," threatened Elfreda, joining in the laughter that greeted Emma's remark. "Do you mean that any member of the senior class may compete, not for a money prize, but for the honor alone?" asked Grace. "That is precisely my meaning," said Emma. "We thought we would have an honor pin made, something worthy of the girl who wins. The class will give her a supper and drink her down, and there will be various demonstrations and jollifications for her especial benefit." "Why not give the four classes a chance, and make it a competition worth remembering?" proposed Elfreda, a peculiar expression in her shrewd eyes. "I mean that the cast would be chosen from the senior class, but the author might be any girl in college." No one answered for a moment. "I don't believe," began Emma doubtfully, "that we----What do you say, Grace? Of course, we shall be obliged to call a special class meeting, but we can decide now just how to word our proposal. Whatever you decide will suit us." Grace's glance had remained fixed upon Elfreda as though trying to read her thoughts. What did Elfreda have in mind! Then it dawned upon Grace with unpleasant force. "She wants Kathleen West to have a chance to compete." Then, "If I say I think we ought to keep the contest in the senior class, the girls will agree with me. This is my chance. She would dearly love to enter a contest of this kind. Very well. I'll see that she doesn't enter it." For the first time in her life Grace's resentment blinded her sense of fairness. Her lips tightened unpleasantly. "I say that we ought to----" But Grace did not finish her sentence. Swift and overwhelming came the conviction that here perhaps lay the means by which Kathleen might come into a knowledge of the real Overton spirit. In writing the play, for Grace felt certain that the newspaper girl would enter the lists, she might gain what her classmates had been powerless to give her. Grace's face grew hot with shame at her own unworthiness of spirit. "Why don't you finish?" asked Emma Dean with good-natured impatience. "What ought we to do? We shall never know unless you speak and tell us." The steady light in Grace Harlowe's gray eyes deepened. Her moment of temptation had passed. Her love of fair play had conquered. "Include the whole college, by all means. Let us make it an Overton rather than a class affair, and let us call a meeting of the senior class to-morrow afternoon," she said. "Let us settle it as soon as possible." "I'll write a notice the moment I finish my supper," declared Emma. "Come upstairs to my room, all of you, and watch me write it. I can always write better if I have an audience; provided it is a kindly, uncritical audience," she added, casting a significant glance toward Elfreda, who beamed on Emma as one who has received a compliment. As they were leaving the dining room a little later, Grace felt a plump hand catch one of hers. She turned to find Elfreda's gaze bent earnestly upon her. There was a significant question in the other girl's eyes. Grace pressed the hand and said in a whisper: "I understood, Elfreda. Thank you for showing me the way." CHAPTER XVII WHAT THE SENIORS THOUGHT OF THE PLAN "I can't forgive myself for being so disagreeable," was Arline Thayer's regretful cry. Grace had met Arline half an hour earlier than the time appointed for the senior class meeting the following afternoon and the two girls had hurried to the room in Overton Hall, where the meeting was to be held, for the express purpose of having a confidential chat before the others should arrive. "Don't think of it again, Daffydowndilly." Grace regarded Arline with affectionate eyes. She was glad almost to the point of tears that the cloud between her and the dainty little girl had been lifted. "Oh, but I must think of it this once, Grace," persisted Arline. "I haven't told you yet how truly sorry I am for behaving so badly toward you. But I was so angry with you for troubling yourself about that horrid Kathleen West. But first let me ask: Did you see that New York newspaper story? Father sent me a copy of the paper. I showed it to Ruth, but didn't tell any one else. It is known here, though." "Yes, I knew of it the day after it was published," answered Grace soberly. "Mabel sent me a marked copy. I am sorry my name was used. It was a surprise to me." Arline's eyebrows lifted. "A surprise!" she exclaimed with fine sarcasm. "I think I can understand just how pleased you felt over that surprise. I am not going to allow a certain person to come between our friendship again, but I can't help saying that if ever you speak to her again, you will be doing yourself a great injustice." "Would it surprise you to hear me say that I am inclined to endorse what you have just said?" questioned Grace. "What I tried to do for her was done largely to please Mabel Ashe. Mabel has released me from my promise. I seldom take violent dislikes to persons I meet, but, to tell the plain truth, I have never liked Miss West, although I have admired her ability and perseverance. In fact, I have never met any one I disliked so much," confessed Grace. "I don't know what has come over me, but I simply can't endure the thought of her, let alone forgiving her." "I don't blame you. I hope you will continue to take that stand. You won't, though. If you knew, to-morrow, of something that would be to her advantage to know, you wouldn't hesitate to tell her." Grace looked rather confused. Arline's chance shot had gone home. She had not forgiven Kathleen, yet only yesterday she had paved the way for her to possible honor. "What did you do here on Thanksgiving?" she asked abruptly. "Why didn't you go to New York?" Arline laughed. "I am perfectly willing to change the subject and answer both your questions. Father was in Chicago, so we thought we'd stay here and see what we could do for some of the girls whose good times are limited. We did all sorts of little stunts. Thanksgiving night we gave a party at Morton House and invited every one we could think of, and the next night Ruth and I took our checks, we each received an extra one for Thanksgiving, and gave a moving picture party. We made the man who owns the place reserve the seats, and we saw 'The Merchant of Venice.' It was beautifully done, and every one who saw it was delighted. Then we invited several girls to Morton House for Thanksgiving dinner, too." "I wanted to ask you and Ruth to go to New York with us, but----" "Don't say a word," interrupted Arline, with a penitent little gesture. "It was my fault. I claim the privilege of changing the subject, too. What is the object of this class meeting?" Grace was about to explain, when a murmur of voices in the hall announced that the seniors had begun to gather for the meeting. Within ten minutes every seat in the room was occupied, and Arline Thayer, now president of the senior class, called the meeting to order. "As there is no particular business to be transacted," announced Arline, "what is the pleasure of the class? Will the person or persons responsible for the notice on the bulletin board please rise and enlighten the class as to why we are here?" "Madam President," Emma Dean rose from her seat and addressed the chair, "I wrote the notice. It was the outcome of a session in which a number of the seniors had been discussing ways and means of making 19-- famous in the annals of Overton." Emma proceeded in her clever, humorous fashion to lay before the class the project of a play to be written by a member of one of the four classes and produced and enacted by the seniors. "If we allow any girl in college who wishes to compete for the honor pin we shall have a greater variety of plays from which to choose. It will also be a good opportunity to discover any lights that might otherwise be so securely hidden under bushels of modesty that no one would ever see them. "The rules for the contestants will be very simple. The play must be original. It must consist of not less than three acts, and all manuscripts must be in the hands of the committee appointed by the president of the senior class on the Tuesday before the Easter vacation. The play may be comedy, drama, or tragedy, but it must be representative. The duties of the committee will be to receive the plays. As soon as they have been submitted they are to be turned over to three members of the Overton faculty, provided they are willing to act in the capacity of critics. I should now like an opinion from the class." Emma sat down amid an energetic clapping of hands. To a member, the class was in favor of the proposed contest. One after another the members rose to voice their approval, and when the president called for a rising vote every member was instantly on her feet. "You understand that we shall require permission from the president of the college before we can officially announce the contest," Arline reminded the class. "I will appoint Miss Dean, Miss Harlowe and Miss Wade to call upon the president and obtain his permission. Then the play committee will see to the advertising of the contest." Before the meeting closed, Anne Pierson, Miriam Nesbit, Ruth Denton and Elfreda Briggs were appointed to serve on the play committee and the date of the production of the play was set for the Friday of the fifth week after the Easter vacation. It was also decided that Lecture Hall, which boasted of a stage and several sets of scenery, and would hold a goodly audience, should be used for the occasion. Within the next three days Miss Duncan and Dr. Hepburn, instructors, respectively, in English and Latin, and Dr. Darrow, professor of Oratory and Dramatic Expression, had been interviewed and had consented to act as judges. The moment these preliminaries had been attended to, Gertrude Wells had begun an elaborate poster to hang above the bulletin board in Overton Hall announcing the contest. At the bottom of the poster was fastened a card on which the rules had been painstakingly lettered in black and red. By the end of the week there was scarcely a girl in Overton who had not stopped before the gayly colored poster to read the news that was being discussed long and earnestly throughout the college. Those who had acquired a certain amount of reputation in the matter of themes boldly announced their intention of competing for the honor pin, while there were others whose themes had never been praised, whose ambition to show the judges what they really could do urged them on to enter the lists. Neither Grace, Miriam nor Anne intended to try for the prize. Ruth Denton had confided to Arline that she had an idea for a play which she meant to work out, and Emma Dean boldly proclaimed herself to be deep in the throes of a comedy called "Life at Wayne Hall; or, the Expressman's Surprise." Elfreda, too, had apparently been inspired, and for a week went about chuckling to herself and making mysterious notes in a little black note book she now carried constantly. Grace could not help wondering now and then if Kathleen West would enter the contest. Since the newspaper girl's return from New York she had kept strictly to herself. She spoke to Patience only when absolutely necessary and took not the slightest notice of Miriam, Anne or Elfreda. Patience confided to Grace that Kathleen studied harder than ever, and wrote for at least two hours every night, never forgetting to place her papers carefully in her desk and to lock it securely before going out or to bed. "I believe she is writing a play, but I don't know positively and I wouldn't dream of asking her," had been Patience's comment. As the long intervening days that lay between the students of Overton and "going home for Christmas" dragged by, Grace found herself more impatient to see her father and mother than ever before. "It is on account of that old newspaper trouble," she assured herself. "Father and Mother were so dear and forgiving over it that I can't wait to see them." All her thoughts were now centered on going home. "I never wanted to see Father and Mother so much in all my life as I do this Christmas. Next week seems ages off. I am sure it is seven years instead of seven days until vacation begins." She confided to Anne one evening, as she sat on the floor beside her open trunk: "I'm going to begin packing to-night and do a little each day. It will give me a certain amount of satisfaction and make the time pass more quickly. I wonder why Mother doesn't write? She hasn't sent me my check to go home with yet. I can't go home until it comes, for I have spent every cent of my allowance and my extra check, too, for Christmas presents." "Don't worry over it," advised Anne. "Your father and mother are the most infallible persons I know. You won't be left stranded in Overton and have to walk ties to Oakdale." "If I do, I shall take you with me. As a trouper you ought to be proficient in that exercise," laughed Grace. "As a successful exponent of the dramatic art," began Anne pompously, "I----" "Miss Pierson! Miss Pierson!" Mrs. Elwood's voice was heard in the hall at the foot of the stairs. Anne sprang to the door. "Here I am, Mrs. Elwood," she called, stepping down the hall to the head of the stairs. "Here's a telegram for you. Will you please come downstairs and sign for it?" Anne hurried down the stairs, her heart beating violently. She signed the messenger boy's book, shoved the pencil into his hand and ran back to Grace as fast as her feet would carry her. "It's a telegram, Grace. It's for me. I'm afraid to open it," she cried, dashing into the room. "Open it. I dare not. Oh, if anything has happened to Mother or Mary!" Grace took the envelope Anne held out to her. Her own hands were trembling with apprehension, yet she managed to tear open the envelope and draw out the fateful message. There was the crackling sound of unfolding paper, then Grace cried out in joyful tones: "Anne, you never can guess! It is too good to be true!" Anne sprang to her feet, and darting to where Grace stood, the open telegram in her hands, peered over her shoulder. A moment later she and Grace joined hands and performed a joyful dance about the room. "What on earth is the cause of all this jubilation?" queried Miriam's voice from the doorway. "I knocked, but no one paid any attention to me. It sounded from the outside as though you might be engaged in deadly conflict, so I decided to interfere." The dance ceased and Grace thrust the telegram, which she still held, into Miram's hands. "Read it," she commanded. "Will arrive in Overton 5:30. Meet me. With love. Rose Gray." And, reinforced by Miriam, the dance was begun again with renewed vigor. CHAPTER XVIII THE FAIRY GODMOTHER'S VISIT Three excited young women burst in upon Elfreda, who, seated on the floor before her trunk, hastily deposited a large flat package in the tray and slammed down the lid. "Why didn't you knock!" she grumbled, looking mild displeasure at the intruders. "If you had come five minutes sooner you would have seen your Christmas presents, and I couldn't have stopped you. I'm going to have a 'Busy, Keep Out' sign made to hang on the door until Christmas." "Don't be cross, J. Elfreda Briggs," laughed Grace. "We have something nice to show you." She handed the telegram to Elfreda with: "We want you to go to the station with us this afternoon. The train is due at five-thirty." Elfreda's round face flushed at this mark of thoughtfulness on the part of the girls she adored, and agreed almost shyly to make one of the party. She had never become quite used to the knowledge that these three young women had long since accepted her as one of their number. Consequently an invitation to participate in their personal good times or to share their intimate friends was always a matter of wonder to her. The train was reported to be on time, but the quartette of happy-faced young women who waited impatiently for its arrival from the north that afternoon were agreed that it must be late. It was Anne who, when it rushed into the station, first espied the familiar figure of the snowy-haired old lady who had brought so much sunshine into her life, and her quick eyes also discovered the identity of the tall, broad-shouldered young man who was helping her down the car steps. "Oh, Tom Gray is with her!" she exclaimed in delight. "How nice!" cried Grace, with frank, unembarrassed pleasure. "I never thought that he would come with Mrs. Gray." Her three friends exchanged significant glances. It was quite evident that Grace Harlowe's regard for Tom held nothing of the sentimental. "Here they are! Here are my dear Christmas children!" Mrs. Gray looked no older than when she had welcomed them to her house party eight Christmases before. She spoke in the same sprightly manner, and smiled in the same kindly, gentle fashion that had warmed the heart of Anne Pierson when, poor and unknown, she had placed her hand in Mrs. Gray's at that first eventful freshman tea which was the beginning of happiness for her. Anne's brown eyes filled with tears as she embraced her "fairy godmother" and heard her murmur, "My own dear Anne." "Please give Aunt Rose a chance to catch her breath and turn your attention upon me," was Tom's plaintive plea. "We are terribly, horribly, dreadfully glad to see you!" laughed Grace, shaking Tom's hand in her boyish, energetic fashion. "'Terribly, horribly, dreadfully!'" repeated Tom. "Did you say this was your last year in college?" "Don't be sarcastic," reproved Miriam. "Circumstances alter English. Grace was only trying to convey to you our deep appreciation of your arrival." Tom glanced almost wistfully at Grace, who had turned from him and was devoting her whole attention to Mrs. Gray. "I hope you girls are as glad to see me as I am to see you," he said, his eyes still upon Grace. "Of course we are. How did you happen to think of coming to Overton? Are you going to stay until next Wednesday? If you do, then we can all journey to Oakdale together." "Ask Aunt Rose. I am her faithful bodyguard. I know she intends to stay until to-morrow at least. I hope you can persuade her to remain at Overton until you go home. I am a working man now, you know, and Washington is a long way from here." Tom's ambition to make forestry his life work had been in a measure realized, and with his graduation from college had come the offer of a position in the Department of Forestry at Washington. "Yes, children, dear, I will remain in Overton until your vacation begins if the town boasts of a comfortable hotel where I can not only demand, but receive, good service." "The 'Tourraine' is the very hotel for you, Mrs. Gray," said Grace. "We stayed there for a day or two when we first came to Overton. The service is excellent." "Then see to my luggage, Tom, and find me a cab or an automobile. The sooner I am settled the sooner I can hear what my girls have been doing. I have heard very nice things of you, my dear," she said to Elfreda, who, having shaken hands with Mrs. Gray, stood at the outer edge of the little group, looking on with shining eyes. "She looks like a piece of Dresden china," was Elfreda's remarkable statement to Miriam as the little company, headed by Grace and Tom, made its way to the other side of the station in search of an automobile. "You funny girl," Miriam laughed softly, "what an idea!" "But she does," persisted Elfreda in a low tone. "She's white and pink and fine and--and--fragile. She's dainty and exquisite, and there's a kind of rare china look about her that----" "I am going to tell her you said she looked like a piece of Dresden china," interposed Miriam. "Mrs. Gray----" "If you do, Miriam Nesbit, you'll be sorry," warned Elfreda, clutching Miriam's arm. "What is it, my dear?" answered the old lady. They had come to a halt at the end of the platform and were waiting for Tom to secure a car. Elfreda surveyed Miriam with a threatening glare. "Elfreda says that you"--she darted a mischievous glance at her friend--"look just as she imagined you would." Elfreda's expression was a mixture of surprise and relief. "Then you are not disappointed in me," smiled the old lady. "I should say not!" was the quick response. "I only hope you will adopt me some day as one of your children." "That is very sweet in you, my child," declared Mrs. Gray. "I hereby adopt you on the spot. Ah, here is our car. I think we are more than ready for it." "Now that you've been adopted," muttered Miriam in Elfreda's ear, "I won't betray you." "Thank you for nothing," flung back Elfreda. "Tell the chauffeur to drive past Overton College," Grace had requested Tom, and Mrs. Gray had exclaimed in admiration of stately Overton Hall, standing like a sentinel in the midst of the wide campus. The chapel, the library, Greek Hall, Science Hall, in fact, each one of the smaller, but equally ornamental, buildings were duly pointed out and commented upon. Mrs. Gray insisted that they should be her guests at dinner at the "Tourraine," and after dinner they repaired to the cozy sitting room in her suite of rooms for a long, confidential chat, which lasted until after ten o'clock. "Hurry, girls," urged Grace, as they set out for Wayne Hall, after repeated promises to call the next morning and prolonged good nights, "we may be locked out. That has never happened to me since I came to college." "That is better than being locked in," reminded Elfreda grimly. "You mean the night of the ghost party, don't you?" asked Miriam, referring to an incident that had occurred in Elfreda's freshman year. "I do, indeed, mean the ghost party," retorted Elfreda with grim emphasis. "I still have a remarkably clear recollection of it." "What a lot of things have happened since then," said Anne, half musingly. "Only a little while and our college life will be over," sighed Miriam. "And our real life begun," was Grace's hopeful reminder. "After all, college is just a preparation for the time when we must stand upon our own ground and assume the complete responsibility of our own lives." "You girls give me the blues," grumbled Elfreda. "I don't want to think about my 'real life' or any other solemn old subject. There's a time to reflect, but this isn't the time. I'd rather save all my harrowing reflections until just before commencement. Then we might give a misery party and invite our friends to glower and gloom with us." "That's a good idea!" exclaimed Grace. "We could all be miserable together." "If we all met together for the express purpose of being miserable, you can make up your mind that the party itself would defeat its object," laughed Anne. "But just at present we had better be gay and gleeful. We must plan something for Mrs. Gray's entertainment," suggested Miriam. "It is our lawful senior duty to see that she enjoys her visit to Overton." "She wishes to meet Dr. Morton and Miss Wilder and Miss Duncan, too," said Anne. "She mentioned it twice this evening. We must give a dinner in honor of her at Vinton's, and a luncheon at Martell's. Then we ought to drive out to Guest House for supper. Of course, we must give one spread in either our room or Miriam's and do stunts." "Why not give the Wonderland Circus just for her?" proposed Elfreda. "Miss Wilder will let us have the gymnasium for the evening, and by making it strictly a senior class affair there will be no hurt feelings on the part of the other classes. Nearly all the performers are seniors, too. We can serve refreshments, have a dance afterward, and Mrs. Gray will have a splendid opportunity to see 19-- together. How is that for a stunt?" Elfreda's plan was received with acclamation, and by the time they reached Wayne Hall each girl had been assigned her part in the week's programme. "We mustn't forget our Christmas girls," reminded Anne, as they lingered for a brief moment in the upstairs hall. "I am glad you mentioned them," replied Grace. "I must see Arline to-morrow." The first week of December had dragged, but the next two weeks raced by on winged feet, and the two days before college closed for the holidays were crowded to the brim with last duties and pleasures. Mrs. Gray won the united regard of the Semper Fidelis Club, who immediately enlisted themselves in her service. The genial, light-hearted old lady entered into the life of the college with an enthusiasm that caused her at once to be declared an honorary member of Semper Fidelis. She was the guest of honor at luncheons and dinners, at which she was toasted and sung to with a fervor that left no doubt in her mind as to her standing with Grace's classmates. The Wonderland Circus had been saved as the crowning event of her visit, and invitations had been sent to Mr. Thomas Redfield, the benefactor of Semper Fidelis Club, Dr. Morton, Miss Wilder and the various members of the faculty to be present at the Circus. Never had the immortal animals been in better form. Round after round of applause greeted the conclusion of their famous Wonderland song. The demonstration continued until Alice stepped forward and made a funny little speech, in which she introduced the animals, who skipped, waddled or shuffled forward according to each one's conception of what its own peculiar gait should be. Emma Dean, who had not taken part in the Circus, appeared in her ridiculous Sphinx costume, and, after a monologue that elicited constant laughter, added to her ability as a fun maker by the weirdly funny dance that she had intended to give at the bazaar, and which she was obliged to repeat before her audience was satisfied. A reception followed, and delicious buffet refreshments were served by the seniors in one corner of the big gymnasium, which had been roped off with the senior colors and made as attractive as senior hands could make it. Mrs. Gray was in her element and held court like a veritable queen. Before the evening was over the senior class, to a member, had vowed eternal allegiance to her. Dr. Morton, Miss Wilder and Mr. Redfield, too, apparently succumbed to her spell, for toward the close of the evening they formed an interesting group about her, and, at the end of a lengthy confab, shook her hand with an earnestness which seemed almost to indicate a promise of loyalty. To Grace, Anne and Miriam Mrs. Gray's long conversation with the faculty was merely a further proof of her ability to make friends, but the watchful Elfreda regarded the matter from a different viewpoint. "I wonder what Mrs. Gray was talking about to Professor Morton, Miss Wilder and our fairy godfather?" she remarked in a speculative tone to Miriam as they prepared for sleep late that night. "Fairy godfather is a good name for Mr. Redfield, isn't it?" she laughed. "Certainly it is," returned Miriam. "I always bestow appropriate names upon people. Isn't he the fairy godfather of Semper Fidelis and didn't I give him that name after he sent us the first check?" "He is," admitted Elfreda, "and you did." "What is on your mind now?" asked Miriam. "What do you find so mysterious in the fact that Mrs. Gray held discourse with the powers that be?" "You can make fun of me if you like," said Elfreda, smiling a little, "but I know what I saw with my own eyes. There is a conspiracy on foot among those persons. It's a delightful conspiracy, of course, but mark my words, they are planning something, and some day when the whole thing comes to light you'll say, 'You were right, J. Elfreda,' see if you won't." "I will say it now if you wish me to," laughed Miriam, "merely to show you that I have faith in your marvelous powers of observation." "Thank you," returned Elfreda. "There is nothing like being appreciated. But under the circumstances I am afraid I can't pursue my usual methods of investigation. If Mrs. Gray is planning something delightful, you may be sure it is for her Christmas children, and J. Elfreda Briggs will not be the one to pry into the surprise." CHAPTER XIX WHAT PATIENCE OVERHEARD "Oh, Overton, our voices clear Ring out in reverent praise to-day, To thee, our Mother, loved and dear Who guides us on our college way," sang Grace softly as she walked about her room putting away the various articles of wearing apparel she had taken from her trunk. The Christmas vacation had come and gone like a glad, happy dream, and with a hundred pleasant memories of home to sweeten the days that lay between her and Easter, Grace cheerfully unpacked her belongings, humming as she worked the song of Overton that she loved best. A light knock on the door, accompanied by, "May I come in?" hushed the song on Grace's lips. "I should say so," she called, recognizing Patience Eliot's voice. "Enter and give an account of yourself. I've hardly seen you since I came back." "I have had more or less unpacking to do, too," said Patience, with a comprehensive glance about the room. "Also deep in my soul lurks the fear of the fateful midyear with its burden of exams. I am conducting a general review every night for the benefit of Patience Eliot, but it is rather up-hill work. I envy you high and mighty seniors, whose days and nights of anxiety are past." "I don't believe you are half as much worried as you pretend. Patience Eliot is far too valiant to be downed by a mere examination." "It is all very well to talk," grumbled Patience, "but you know just how footless mere talk is. I'm not at all sure that I shall not flunk." "You won't, so don't try to make me believe you will," assured Grace, "and you are going to forget your books and have dinner with me at Vinton's to-morrow night, too." "Am I?" asked Patience. "Let me see. Oh, yes, I am. It is on Wednesday evening that the great event takes place." "What great event?" asked Grace with unthinking curiosity. "I beg your pardon, Patience, I didn't mean to----" Patience dismissed Grace's attempt to apologize with a wave of her hand. "Oh, that is all right. It is what I came here to tell you. You may believe it or not, but Kathleen West has actually invited me to go to that illustrated lecture on 'Mexico' at the Overton theatre on Wednesday evening." "And you are going?" Grace could not keep a slight constraint from her tone. Her resentment against the newspaper girl still lived. Despite the long, intimate talk she had with her father, she could not quite forget that Kathleen had been partly responsible for the unhappy hours she had spent before going home to Oakdale. "Yes," Patience replied. There was a note of finality in her voice. "I believe it is best, Grace. In fact, I am sure it is." Grace stood staring moodily at Patience. A struggle against her own personal feelings was going on within her. Suddenly her face cleared, and with a little, rueful smile she held out her hand to the other girl. "I'm truly glad you are going with her, Patience. I thought I wasn't, but I am. I can't imagine why I don't outgrow my resentment against that girl. I don't understand myself lately." "I knew you would agree with me." Patience still held Grace's hand in hers. "Now that the ice has been broken--you know you asked us not to mention Kathleen to you--I can say something I've wanted to tell you for a week. There has been a slight change for the better in Kathleen since Christmas. I don't know what has brought it about, but she is less hard and bitter than she used to be. She is terribly blue, though, and the other day I came into the room and found her crying. Just imagine Kathleen West in tears if you can. She wiped them away post haste and I pretended I hadn't noticed that she was crying. One can't sympathize with her, you know. She wouldn't like it. She prides herself on her stoicism." "I wonder what happened," mused Grace. "She has been writing every evening on her play," continued Patience, "until last night. I was hard at work on my Horace, when suddenly she said, 'Oh, what's the use?' and began tearing up everything she'd written. 'I could see,' to quote Elfreda, that she was in one of her black moods, so I never said a word. I think her conscience is troubling her. Perhaps one of these days she will find herself and surprise all of us." "I hope so," said Grace without enthusiasm. "By the way, I meant to tell you of Arline's and my plan. We are going to propose that the Semper Fidelis girls give a 'Famous Fiction' masquerade and invite the college. We won't try to make any money this time. Later on we will give a concert. This dance will be just a college frolic, but it will be fun to dress up and mask. There will be plenty of girls who won't attend the affair, but there will be a great many who will come. The gymnasium is large enough to accommodate a crowd. We'll have dancing, of course, and Semper Fidelis is going to pay for the orchestra out of their own pockets. There won't be any real refreshments, just lemonade and fancy crackers. The real fun will lie in the costumes. Every one who attends must be dressed to carry out the title of some work of fiction, either standard or 'best sellers.'" "What a jolly idea," smiled Patience. "I know already what I shall choose." "Good!" exclaimed Grace. "Put on your wraps and go with me to Arline's. I feel as though I must discuss it with her to-night." Within the next five minutes Grace and Patience were crossing the campus to Morton House. "I was just getting ready to go to Wayne Hall," declared Arline, as they marched into her room in obedience to her rather impatient "Come in." "And didn't care to be bothered with visitors," added Patience. "I thought it was a freshman on the next floor who demands admittance at regular hour intervals. She has the 'crush' habit to distraction. She's a nice girl," added Arline, generously, "even though she bores me frightfully at times, and I wouldn't for anything hurt her feelings. I am glad you came. I was just thinking of making you a call. I want to talk over our Famous Fiction dance." "Why, that is what brought us here!" cried Grace. "We decided that there was no time like the present for talking it over." "Then, being of the same mind, we shall no doubt accomplish wonders," laughed Arline. "When shall we give it?" "The sooner, the better," advised Patience. "That is, if you expect the freshmen and sophomores to turn out to it. Midyear examinations are only three weeks off, and by the last of next week every one will be so desperately devoted to reviewing back lessons that the idea of a masquerade won't create an iota of enthusiasm." "Patience is as level-headed as ever," agreed Grace. "Why not have the masquerade next Monday evening? That will give us a week to decide on our costumes and order our masks. Suppose we ask that poor old woman who keeps the little shop just beyond the campus to order our masks? I'll post a notice on the bulletin board as soon as we have secured Miss Wilder's permission to give the masquerade to the effect that masks can be bought at her shop. She is safe in ordering three hundred at least, and it will mean a small profit to her." "Grace is always thinking of helping the needy and the downtrodden," declared Arline. "You are a really truly philanthropist, Grace, and you ought to be a fixture at Overton." "Please don't, Arline," protested Grace, frowning a little. "I'm not a bit more interested in helping others than are you or Patience. I was just thinking to-day that I had really been selfish. It doesn't seem fair that I should have had such good times when so many girls here have nothing but hard work and worry over money matters." "Who organized Semper Fidelis and who was the first person to think of our Christmas girls?" demanded Arline. "You are the president of the Sempers and you collected almost all the presents for our first Santa Claus venture," evaded Grace. "Let each be wise and wear the prize, Let each divide the crown, The deeds of Harlowe and of Thayer, Are equal in renown. Stop arguing and get to work, For that is why we're here, Don't waste your time in idle words, The dinner hour is near," improvised Patience. Both girls looked their surprise at this outburst. "Thank you for your poetic counsel, Patience," said Grace. "Suppose we write down the things to be done in connection with giving the dance." "Here you are." Arline opened her desk and motioned Grace to the chair before it. "We'll suggest, and you can write." By the time the girls had finished their plans for the masquerade it was half-past six. "Stay here for dinner," invited Arline. Grace shook her head. "Thank you, but I have studying to do and letters to write to-night. If I stay here for dinner, I'll reach Wayne Hall at twenty-nine minutes after ten. I know my failings." "Same here," said Patience. "I am not to be trusted, either. Thank you for the invitation; it is a great temptation. Let us go, Grace, before we succumb to the artful blandishments of this blonde young person and stay in spite of ourselves." "Come over to-morrow night, Arline," called Grace as they went down the steps of Morton House. Arline had accompanied them to the door. "Bring Ruth with you. Tell her I am sorry I didn't see her to-night." "I'll see you later, Patience," said Grace as they separated at the head of the stairs. Patience walked slowly down the hall to her room. The door stood slightly ajar and the room was in darkness, but the sound of a familiar voice caused Patience to halt abruptly. "I could see," said the voice of Elfreda Briggs, "that something worried you. I know just how sorry you feel, because I went through the same thing myself. But if you could make up your mind to go to her and tell her that----" "Oh, I couldn't do that." It was Kathleen's voice that interrupted the speaker. "I am sure she must hate me. I never believed that I should care, but I do. If only I could do something to show her that at last I understand what college spirit means." "Do you really mean that?" There was a note of excitement in Elfreda's voice. "Because, if you do, I have the most splendid idea, and the beauty of it is that you are the only one who can carry it out. Will you----" But Patience, realizing with a start that she was eavesdropping, waited to hear no more. Turning about she stepped noiselessly along the hall and down the stairs. Entering the living room she found Emma Dean entertaining three girls who were laughing immoderately. "Hello, Patience!" called Emma. "Come in and listen to my tale of woe. Where was I? Oh, yes, the minute I stepped off the car I realized that I had left my silk umbrella in it. The car started about five seconds before I did. It was a beautiful race. I passed a fat policeman on the corner, and waved my hand reassuringly at him merely to show that I was not fleeing from Justice. Talk about fast running! I actually surprised myself. I caught up with the car just as it was turning that curve on High Street, and floundered into it, puffing like a steam engine. I made one dash past the conductor, reached the seat where my cherished umbrella still reposed and captured it. The conductor must have thought me hopelessly demented, for I dashed out as the car stopped at the next corner without having paid a cent of carfare or offered a sign of an explanation. "When I passed the corner where the fat policeman stood, he looked at me with respectful admiration, and said: 'You got that car, lady, didn't you?' and I proudly acknowledged that I did. I was only sorry that there weren't more persons about to appreciate Emma Dean's Two Block Dash." Patience joined in the laughter that had accompanied Emma's narrative. "How are you getting on with your play, Emma?" she asked. "I still have the title," returned Emma blandly, "but I can't decide upon my characters. There are so many shining lights at Wayne Hall. You know my play is entitled "Life at Wayne Hall; Or, the Expressman's Surprise." The only character I've actually decided upon is the expressman. I am obliged to have him because he is in the sub-title. I decided long ago on my opening speech, however. The expressman opens the play by saying, 'I can't wait all day, lady.' Isn't that realistic? So true to life!" "In the face of such an offering, Emma, I am satisfied that it would be sheer folly for any of us to enter the lists," assured Patience. "Of course, I don't wish to discourage any of you," deprecated Emma with the droll little smile for which she was noted. "But to give Emma Dean and her wonderful ability as a playwright a rest, what is new?" "We are talking of giving a masquerade," volunteered Patience. "Who is included in 'we'?" asked Laura Atkins. "Grace, Arline and I were talking it over to-day. We thought of giving a Famous Fiction masquerade." "What is a Famous Fiction masquerade?" asked Emma curiously. Whereupon Patience entered into an explanation of the proposed gayety while the girls listened with willing ears. While they were discussing it, Elfreda Briggs appeared in the doorway and Patience knew that she could now return to her room without running the risk of interrupting a heart-to-heart talk. But she smiled to herself as she thought that while she had been casting about for some way to help Kathleen, Elfreda had found it. CHAPTER XX THE MYSTERIOUS "PETER RABBIT" The gymnasium had, perhaps, never held a more motley crowd of revelers than on the night of the Famous Fiction masquerade. The faculty, who had been particularly interested in the idea of the masquerade, declared that for originality it was in line with 19--'s usual efforts. They occupied seats in the gallery and amused themselves with trying to guess the identity of the various maskers and the books or famous book characters which they represented. It had been decided that as so many of the famous book titles did not lend themselves to impersonation, famous characters in fiction might also be impersonated. Therefore, when the longed-for night came round, heroes and heroines, with whose adventures and doings the book-lover's world is familiar, walked about, arm in arm, collected in little groups, or danced gayly together to the music of the eight-piece Overton orchestra, whose members appeared to appreciate the humor of the occasion as keenly as did the faculty. It was an inspiring sight to watch "Hamlet" parading calmly about the gymnasium with "Beverly of Graustark," or to watch "Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch" waltz merrily off with "Rip Van Winkle." Every one immediately recognized "The Bow of Orange Ribbon" and "Robinson Crusoe." Meek little Oliver Twist, with his big porridge bowl decorated by a wide white band bearing the legend, "I want some more," was also easy to guess. So were "Evangeline," "Carmen," "The Little Lame Prince," "Ivanhoe," "Janice Meredith," and scores of other book ladies and gentlemen. There were a few masqueraders, however, whose fictitious identity was shrouded in mystery. No one could fathom the significance of a certain tall figure, dressed in rags, who stopped short in her tracks at frequent intervals, and, producing a needle and thread, sewed industriously at her tattered garments. A black-robed sister of charity, accompanied by a strange figure who wore a shapeless garment painted in dull gray squares to represent stone, and wearing a narrow leather belt about its waist from which was suspended on either side two small andirons, were also sources of speculative curiosity. So was a young woman in white with a towering headdress composed of a combination of the Stars and Stripes and the flag of France. And no one had the remotest idea concerning the eight white figures who marched four abreast and would not condescend to break ranks even to dance. "Sherlock Holmes" was there with his violin tucked under one arm and a volume of his memoirs under the other. He evinced a strong preference for the society of "Joan of Arc," while "Sarah Crewe," "Little Lord Fauntleroy," and "Rebecca of Sunnybrook" traveled about together, a seemingly contented trio. "The Three Musketeers" were gorgeous to behold in their square-cut costumes, high boots and wide feathered hats, but the sensation of the evening was "Peter Rabbit," who came to the dance attired in his little blue, brass-buttoned jacket, brown khaki pantaloons and what seemed to be the identical shoes he lost in Mr. McGregor's garden. His mask was a cunning rabbit's head that was drawn down and fastened at the neck by a funny soft tie. Who "Peter Rabbit" was and where he had managed to lay hands on his costume was a matter for discussion that night. The suspense of not knowing who was who ended with the unmasking after the eighth dance, and amid exclamations and little shrieks of laughter the masqueraders stood face to face. "Elfreda Briggs! I might have known you would," laughed Arline Thayer, shaking hands with "Sherlock Holmes," while Miriam Nesbit thankfully lifted "Joan of Arc's" helmet and took off her mask. "You're a perfectly darling 'Fauntleroy,'" admired Elfreda. "I suppose Ruth was 'Sara Crewe.'" "Yes," returned Arline Thayer. "Here come those eight white figures!" she exclaimed. "Why, it is Miss Barlowe and her crowd. I don't know yet what they were representing." "The 'White Company,' of course," declared Elfreda. "There would be no satisfaction in being 'Sherlock Holmes' if I couldn't solve all these puzzles." "Then live up to your reputation and tell me what famous work of fiction this approaching rag-bag represents," laughed Miriam. "My powers of deduction were strong enough to pierce the identity of that bundle of rags," grinned Elfreda. "I knew Emma Dean by her walk, but I don't know what she represents. Who and what are you, Emma?" she hailed. "'Never too Late to Mend,'" chanted Emma, flourishing a large darning needle and attacking her rags anew. A shout arose from the little circle of girls who had formed about her. "There is another still harder to guess than mine. Over there," pointed Emma. "Look, girls!" "What is it?" chorused half a dozen voices. "Well, I never! If it isn't Grace and Patience!" There was a concerted rush toward the two girls. "What in the name of common sense is this illustrious combination?" asked Emma. "Why didn't you choose something a little harder." "We are easy enough to guess," returned Patience loftily. "That is, if you are familiar with standard fiction." "I'm not. I never was," declared Emma. "Tell us instanter!" "Allow me to introduce you to the 'Cloister.'" Patience bowed low. "And the 'Hearth.'" Grace saluted the company with a loud jingling of her andirons. "Oh," groaned Elfreda. "No wonder my powers of deduction failed. Who could guess that Grace was representing a hearth? She looks more like a section of a garden wall or the stone foundation for a new house, or----" "If my costume looks as stony as that, then I do look like a hearth, and either your eyesight or your imagination is defective," declared Grace in triumph. "Certainly, you resemble a hearth," agreed Emma Dean. "Now tell me how you like my costume. It took me hours to reduce my wearing apparel to its present picturesque state. All you girls are screaming successes. But who is 'Peter Rabbit'?" "I don't know, but I'm going to find out," declared Elfreda. "He, or rather she, carried a package of little cards with a cunning rabbit's head and the name 'Peter Rabbit' on them. I have one here." "So have I," came from every member of the group. "Let us find the famous Peter, then offer our congratulations," proposed Patience, with a searching glance at the company. But the "famous Peter" was not to be found among the throng of gayly attired girls, and there was no little comment among them at his sudden and complete disappearance. "I wonder what became of 'Peter Rabbit'?" remarked Anne, when, later in the evening, a number of Semper Fidelis girls gathered in one corner of the room to hold an informal session and compare notes. "Who is 'Peter Rabbit'; or, the Mystery of the 'Blue Jacket'?" declaimed Emma Dean. "Even Sherlock is all at sea, aren't you, Brother Holmes?" Emma Dean laid her hand familiarly on the great investigator's shoulder. "Don't be too sure that I'm all at sea. I have a theory." Elfreda put on a preternaturally wise expression. "We'll hear it at once," returned Emma briskly. "Not to-night. I have other weightier problems on my mind. I have been asked to solve the campus mystery." "Campus mystery!" exclaimed several voices. "What is it?" "Walk to the extreme northern end of the campus, then go east one hundred and fifty paces and you will come face to face with the problem," was Elfreda's mystifying answer. "Oh, I know what you mean," cried Sara Emerson. "The ground has been broken there for some kind of building. We noticed it day before yesterday." "Right, my child," commended Elfreda patronizingly, "and therein lies the mystery. I have prowled about the vicinity at odd moments ever since the men began working there, but even my powers of penetration have failed." "Since your curiosity has reached such a height, why don't you ask Miss Wilder to tell you the whys and wherefores of this startling affair?" teased Emma Dean. "I never realized until now what a mysterious process digging a cellar is." "It isn't the process that's mysterious, it is the object of the process," declared Elfreda, with great dignity. "Not everyone 'can see' either," interposed Emma innocently. "The Briggs-Dean rapid-fire conversation team in an entirely new line of specialties," proclaimed Sara Emerson. "Secure front seats for the performance." "There isn't going to be any performance," flung back Emma. "This is merely a friendly chat, but it ends here and now. I don't propose to court publicity. Come on, Sherlock, let us hie us to the lemonade bowl away from this madding crowd." Sherlock offered his free arm--his memoirs were securely tucked under the other--and strolled nonchalantly toward the punch bowl, looking as though he were towing an animated rag-bag. "Doesn't Emma Dean look too ridiculous for words?" laughed Arline Thayer to Grace. "'Never too late to mend,'" quoted Grace. "I wonder how she ever happened to hit upon the idea. She is a delightful girl, isn't she?" "Emma Dean? One of the nicest girls at Overton." Arline spoke with enthusiasm. "When I came to Morton House as a freshman, Emma was there, too. I had the most appalling case of the blues, for I didn't for one moment believe that I should ever like college. Emma had the next room to mine. She was so cheerful and said such funny things that I forgot all about my blues." "I never knew she had lived at Morton House," said Grace in surprise. "She was there just two weeks," continued Arline. "Then a freshman, who was an old friend of the Dean family, wanted Emma to room with her at Wayne Hall, and so she left Morton House and has been at the Hall ever since." "Your loss was our gain," replied Grace. "We couldn't do without Emma at Wayne Hall. She and Elfreda are the life of the house." Arline smiled to herself. Elfreda and Emma might fill their own particular niches in Wayne Hall, but there was only one Grace Harlowe. "How I shall miss you, Grace," she said with sudden irrelevance to the subject of Emma. "I shall miss you more than any other girl in college, except Ruth, when I go to New York for good and all." "I forbid you to mention the subject," cried Grace, her fine face clouding. "We mustn't even think of it. Oh, listen, Arline! The orchestra has begun that Strauss waltz I like so well. I'm going to put these clumsy old andirons over in the corner; then we'll dance and forget that we are seniors and must pay the penalty." It was almost twelve o'clock when the Famous Fiction dance came to a triumphant end, and the illustrious book heroes and heroines wended their midnight way toward their various houses and boarding places. The Wayne Hall girls marched across the campus, Emma Dean parading ahead with outspread arms, her rags flapping about her, giving her the appearance of a scarecrow which had just emerged from a farmer's cornfield. "There it is! There lies the mystery!" cried Elfreda, pointing toward the northern end of the campus, where considerable headway had been made in digging what appeared to be the cellar of a house. "But Sherlock will unravel the tangled skein!" "Don't be so noisy!" cautioned Miriam Nesbit. "The real Sherlock wasn't." "To-morrow will tell the tale," went on Elfreda unabashed, but in a slightly lower key. "First, I shall spy upon the workmen, then I shall collect samples of campus soil and spend the rest of the day deducing." "I hope you won't overwork," was Emma's solicitous comment. "While you are about it you might deduce the identity of 'Peter Rabbit.' I confess I am curious to know who wore Peter's blue jacket and why she disappeared so suddenly." "So am I," declared Grace. "We must try to find out, too." As the merry little party tramped upstairs to their rooms, Grace felt a hand on her shoulder. "Do you really want to know who 'Peter Rabbit' was?" whispered Elfreda. "Yes," breathed Grace. "Then don't tell the girls. It was Kathleen." "Why didn't she unmask with the rest of us?" demanded Grace, as they reached the head of the stairs. "Why didn't she?" repeated Elfreda. "I'll tell you why. She didn't wish any of us to know who she was. Can't you see? She wanted to be one of the crowd and she was afraid the girls wouldn't take kindly to her. She is beginning to feel that she would like to be liked, and," Elfreda raised one hand, her index finger pointing upward, "'There is hope.'" CHAPTER XXI WHO WILL WIN THE HONOR PIN? After the Famous Fiction masquerade a noticeable lull in social activities at Overton ensued. Except for basketball, which always flourished between midyear and Easter, little occurred to break the studious wave that swept over the college. There was one topic, however, that furnished food for endless discussion, and that was the senior play contest. In the beginning a goodly number of girls had entered the lists, imagining that to write a play was an extremely simple matter. After two or three feeble attempts at writing, the majority of them had given up in disgust, and from all that could be learned there were less than twenty contestants who had persevered. The decision of the judges was to be reserved until after the beginning of the spring term, but the contest closed the Tuesday before the Easter holiday began, and it had been stipulated in the rules that all manuscripts must be in the hands of the judges on, or previous to, that time. As far as was known, no one from Wayne Hall, save Kathleen West and Elfreda, had entered the contest, and even Patience Eliot was not sure that Kathleen had finished and submitted her play. Several times Patience endeavored adroitly to lead up to the subject, but Kathleen invariably turned the conversation into other channels. "Patience can't find out whether or not Kathleen West entered the contest," observed Grace. A week had passed since the beginning of the spring term, and Miriam, Elfreda, Grace and Anne were strolling across the campus enjoying the tender beauty of a late April day. [Illustration: The Four Friends Were Strolling Across the Campus.] "I imagine she did," said Miriam. "I have an idea she is likely to win, too. I can appreciate her ability if I can't wax enthusiastic over her disposition." "I am so tired of being asked what my play was about," declared Anne. "Everyone seems to take it for granted that I wrote one. I only wish I were clever enough to write a play or even a sketch." "The announcement is to be made to-morrow isn't it?" asked Miriam. Grace nodded. "Miss Duncan told me yesterday that there had been only fourteen manuscripts handed in. She said at least five of them were really clever. She and the other judges were to meet last night to talk over the matter and make their final decision. It is to be announced at five o'clock to-morrow afternoon in the gymnasium. Didn't you see the notice on the big bulletin board this morning?" "The girl who wins will stand a chance of having her head completely turned," said Miriam. "If she is a senior, her class will bankrupt themselves entertaining her, and if she belongs to one of the other classes, her own class will probably prostrate themselves at her feet in a body, not to mention the general adulation that is bound to come to the winner." "Then I hope I win," was Elfreda's calm statement. "I know I won't, because my play was a comedy, and, besides, I know some one else whose idea for a play was a hundred times better than mine." "Who is it?" The question came simultaneously from Miriam and Grace. Elfreda shook her head. "I won't say. The person made me promise I wouldn't tell." "Then we aren't curious to know," said Grace promptly. "Forget that we asked you." "Oh, that's all right," assured Elfreda. "You'll know soon enough if she wins the honor." "What are the latest developments in the campus mystery, Professor Holmes?" laughed Grace. "There aren't any," responded Elfreda, shrugging her shoulders. "I found what I supposed to be a clue, and, careful investigator that I am, ran it down, but it led to nothing. However, I haven't given up. I'll solve the problem yet. The noble name of Briggs shall never be associated with failure." "Any time before commencement, Elfreda," jeered Miriam. "You might keep it as a parting surprise. We shall need something to help bolster up our courage on that last day when the air is rent with good-byes." "That isn't a bad idea," commented Elfreda. "Perhaps I will. I wish to-morrow were here. I am more anxious to know who won the honor prize than I am to discover who is responsible for our mysterious campus house." "What are you girls going to do this evening?" asked Grace, as they reached Wayne Hall and seated themselves on the veranda for a few minutes' further chat before going upstairs to get ready for dinner. "I am going to see Ruth and Arline to-night," announced Anne. "Will you girls go with me?" "I can't," said Miriam regretfully. "I have letters to write." "I'll go," agreed Grace. Elfreda alone was silent. "And what has J. Elfreda Briggs on her mind?" questioned Anne. "I can't go. I have another little investigation to pursue," said Elfreda pompously. "If it turns out well, I may have something to tell you girls." But that night, when the four chums gathered in Grace's room for a brief social session before retiring, Elfreda shook her head soberly when reminded of her partial promise. "I am sorry, but I didn't say positively that I'd tell you." "Then it didn't turn out well?" from Miriam. "No," replied Elfreda shortly, "it didn't." Three pairs of eyes were fixed inquiringly upon Elfreda. "I didn't promise to tell you anything, you know," she reminded bluntly. "We are well aware of that fact, my dear Miss Briggs," laughed Miriam, "but we would appreciate your confidence, and having aroused our curiosity you ought to do something to satisfy it." "All right, I'll tell you," decided Elfreda. "I purposely waylaid Kathleen West as she was going out of the house to-night and walked as far as the library with her. I could see she wasn't yearning for my company, but I wanted to tell her that I knew she was 'Peter Rabbit' at the dance. Well, I told her," continued Elfreda grimly, "but I had hard work doing it. She talked about everything under the sun and wouldn't give me a chance to say a word. And how she did walk! But I kept up with her. I could see she wanted to get away from me. I told her just as we reached the library steps." Elfreda paused. "Well, what did she say?" asked Grace almost impatiently. "She said 'good night' and ran up the library steps like a flash. I don't know whether she was angry or not. I can't see why she should be." "Here is something at last that Elfreda can't see," murmured Miriam. "I can see that it will be a long time before I tell you girls anything again," retorted Elfreda, but her smiling face belied her brusque words. CHAPTER XXII KATHLEEN'S GREAT MOMENT By five o'clock the following afternoon the greater part of the students of Overton College had assembled in the gymnasium to learn who had won the honor pin. Every pair of eyes was fixed upon Dr. Hepburn as he rose from his seat on the platform and faced the gathering of expectant students who were eagerly awaiting his announcement. "It is with the sincerest pleasure that I rise, this afternoon, to announce that, after due consideration, the judges appointed by the senior class play committee to pass judgment upon the plays submitted have decided in favor of the morality play submitted by Miss Kathleen West, entitled 'Loyalheart; Her Four Years' Pilgrimage.' It is, perhaps, the most notable manuscript of its kind that has come within the notice of any member of the committee during a period covering a number of years," continued Dr. Hepburn, "and Miss West is to be congratulated on the merit of her remarkable literary effort. I have also been requested to say that, in the opinion of the judges, the comedy entitled 'A Quiet Vacation,' by Miss J. Elfreda Briggs, was the second choice of the committee." For an instant after Dr. Hepburn ceased speaking a deep stillness pervaded the gymnasium, then from all sides rose cries of "Kathleen West! Elfreda Briggs! Speech! speech!" Dr. Hepburn raised his hand for silence, and when quiet had been restored he said, "If Miss Briggs and Miss West are present, will they kindly come to the platform?" Already Elfreda's three friends were urging her forward. From far back in the gymnasium a little figure was seen to separate itself from its fellows and come hesitatingly forward. When Kathleen West reached the platform and faced her audience she eyed them composedly, although her face grew very white; then she began speaking in a clear, resonant voice: "I thank you for the honor you have conferred upon me," she said, bowing to the committee, "and to you," she bowed to her audience, "for your tribute of appreciation. I should like to say that in creating the character of 'Loyalheart' I have not drawn upon my fancy, and I know that the many lovable qualities with which I have endowed my heroine are to be found in the girl who served as my inspiration. I refer to Miss Grace Harlowe, of the senior class, whom I consider the ideal Overton girl." Kathleen's voice trembled slightly on the last sentence. Then she walked quickly down the aisle, accompanied by a burst of applause that made the great room ring. Grace had listened to Kathleen's little speech with unbelieving ears. Could this be the antagonistic Kathleen West of a few weeks ago? What had wrought this marvelous and unlooked-for change? That Elfreda had won second honors had been forgotten. The attention of the students were focused on Kathleen. Now repeated calls for "Harlowe! Grace Harlowe!" sounded. Emma Dean and Arline escorted her to the platform. "I thank Miss West for the honor she has done me, and I thank all of you," she said with a sweet seriousness that went straight to her hearers' hearts. "Although I am afraid I can't lay claim to the splendid qualities Miss West has attributed to me, the knowledge that she has thought me worthy is doubly dear." Then Grace hurried to her place very near to tears, while Miriam affectionately pressed her arm on one side and Anne, on the other, slipped her hand into that of her friend, and thus the three listened to Elfreda's speech. "That's about the most satisfactory general meeting I ever attended," remarked Emma Dean in Miriam's ear as they stepped outside to the campus, where groups of girls had halted with a view to hailing their respective friends as they passed. "I was never more astonished in my life," returned Miriam, in guarded tones. "As for Elfreda, she can't believe that she won second honors. She insists there must have been a mistake." "It was a general all-around surprise, I believe," confided Emma. "I never dreamed that Kathleen West entertained any such feeling for Grace, and I don't imagine any one else did, either. When is the honor prize to be presented to her?" "On the night of the play. Now that it is all settled, the play committee had better bestir themselves." "You are on the play committee, aren't you?" asked Emma innocently. "You needn't remind me of it," laughed Miriam. "I hadn't forgotten it, and it is plain to be seen that you hadn't. Elfreda, Anne and Ruth Denton are on it, too. Here comes Elfreda, surrounded by an admiring throng. Genius will out. I knew she would do something extraordinarily clever before she wound up her college career." "We can't find Kathleen West!" exclaimed Elfreda. "She slipped out of the gymnasium so quietly that no one realized she had gone. We are going over to Wayne Hall after her." "Where is Grace?" asked Miriam irrelevantly. Elfreda made a quick, comprehensive survey of the various groups of girls. "Why, I don't see her. She was here----" Something in Miriam's expression caused her to eye her roommate sharply. Miriam shook her head almost imperceptibly. "That's so," returned Elfreda in a low tone. "You never forget anything, do you, Miriam? I will tell the girls to postpone rushing Kathleen until to-night." Turning to the crowd of girls, who had been too busy talking to notice what had passed between her and Miriam, Elfreda said easily: "Suppose we wait until this evening after dinner, girls. Meet me at the corner below Wayne Hall at half-past seven o'clock and we will call on Kathleen and Grace. Miriam will engage to keep them in the house and we'll have ice cream and cake afterward." Elfreda's suggestion was well received, and solemnly winking at Miriam, she pursued her triumphal journey across the campus, quite surrounded by her admiring bodyguard. But while her friends were discussing the outcome of the play, Kathleen West, J. Elfreda and Grace, the last named young woman was speeding across the campus toward Wayne Hall. As she was about to return to her place among her friends, after making her speech, her alert eyes had seen a small, familiar figure edge toward the side door of the gymnasium, then disappear. Grace surmised that Kathleen had gone directly to Wayne Hall, and without hesitating she hurried after her. But another person had also marked Kathleen's flight, for as Grace ran up the steps of the hall she heard a rush of footsteps behind her, and, turning her head to see who was following her, stopped short, exclaiming, "I might have known that you would be the first to go to her, Patience!" "That is just what I was thinking of you," smiled Patience. "But you must go first. Wasn't it the most astounding announcement you ever heard. I am not surprised at her winning the honor pin. It is her change of heart that astonishes me. I realized that she had improved, but I never heard of anything like this. I suspect Elfreda Briggs knows more about this miracle than she will admit. I overheard her talking to Kathleen one night. I didn't mean to listen. I was just about to enter the room when I heard something Elfreda said and hurried off as fast as I could go." "I think Elfreda had a hand in it, too," said Grace, with shining eyes. "What a glorious success she has made of her four years. Now, one of us must go to Kathleen." "You go," insisted Patience. "I'll drop in later." Grace went into the house and upstairs, hardly knowing what to do or say. She knocked gently on Kathleen's door, then at sound of a muffled "Come," turned the knob and stepped inside. Kathleen had thrown herself face downward upon her couch, her face buried in the cushions. Without raising her head, she faltered, "Is it you, Grace?" "Yes," answered Grace softly, as she approached the couch on which Kathleen lay. "I knew you would come--you and Patience." "Patience is downstairs," returned Grace. "She will be here soon." Kathleen raised herself to a sitting posture. Her eyes were very bright. There was no sign of tears in them. "Grace, can you ever forgive me for all the trouble I have caused you?" she asked solemnly. "Of course I can, Kathleen," replied Grace, slipping down on the couch beside Kathleen and placing her arm about the slender shoulders of the newspaper girl. "You are not the only one at fault. I blame myself for a great many things that happened. If we had only known that you wished to be in the circus. We never thought of slighting you, Kathleen." "I know it now," rejoined Kathleen sadly, "but I was furious with you at the time. Then, too, I had made up my mind not to like you. I thought you priggish and narrow-minded. I didn't understand college in the least. I was ready to ride over every Overton tradition for the sake of having my own way. Patience was the first to show me where I stood, and I tried to see matters from her standpoint. Then came the temptation to publish that 'Larry, the Locksmith' story, and you know the rest. "Elfreda Briggs was the one who brought me to my first realization of college spirit. She had been watching me all year and discovered that I was unhappy. She marched into my room one night and found me crying. When she left me I was happier than I had been for months. She had shown me the way to atone for some of the mischief I had made. It was she who gave me the idea for the play. I had begun a play, then had destroyed it, resolving to have nothing more to do with the contest. After Elfreda and I had our talk I began again and I wrote 'Loyalheart.' After the Famous Fiction Dance Elfreda came to me again. She was determined to help me." Grace's face grew radiant when Kathleen told of Elfreda's part in the affair. A great wave of love and tenderness for the one-time stout girl, who had begun her college life at such a disadvantage, swept over her. "Dear old J. Elfreda," she murmured. "What a wonder she is!" "But there is one thing I haven't yet told you," said Kathleen. "You are to create the role of 'Loyalheart' in my play. You mustn't refuse. It was written for you, and no one else could possibly play it. Elfreda is going to arrange that part of it with the play committee. Please don't refuse. If you only knew how much it means to me." Kathleen's eyes were fixed appealingly upon Grace. "I won't refuse," was Grace's gentle answer. "I'll do it just to please you and to cement our life-long friendship." The two girls had risen now, and stood facing each other. Then their hands met in a silent pledge of friendship that was to prove faithful to the end. * * * * * Loyalheart stepped into life on the fifth Friday evening after Easter and for two hours and a half her adoring audience of Overton students hung on her slightest word or gesture. From the moment in which Loyalheart left Haven Home on her Four Years' Pilgrimage she ceased to exist as Grace Harlowe, merging her personality entirely in that of the beautiful allegorical character she was portraying. The play itself was in four acts, each representing one of the four college years. Written in the form of an allegory, it partook of the nature of a morality play and told the story of Loyalheart's eventful pilgrimage through the Land of College, accompanied by her faithful friends, Honor, Forbearance, Silence and Good Humor. Her heroic efforts to keep her four friends with her in spite of the plots of Snobbery, Gossip, Jealousy, Frivolity and Treachery, and her readiness to extend a helping hand to Diffidence, Poverty and Misunderstood, result in the creation of an illusive being known to her only as the Spirit, a white-robed apparition which visits her more frequently as she approaches the end of her pilgrimage. At the termination of Senior Lane, which is separated from the Highway of Life by the Gate of Commencement, the Spirit, clothed in glittering raiment, appears to Loyalheart, and she learns that in helping others and clinging to her ideals she has fostered and nurtured to radiant growth none other than the fabled College Spirit which she has ardently striven to recognize and possess. Greatly to her delight, Emma Dean had been asked to play the part of the Spirit, and exhibited real histrionic ability in the role. As Loyalheart, Grace, who, day after day, had been painstakingly coached by Anne, left nothing to be desired in her portrayal of the role assigned to her. Ruth Denton, Gertrude Wells, and Miriam Nesbit, respectively, enacted the roles of Honor, Forbearance and Silence, while Elfreda insisted on playing Good Humor, and was greeted with appreciative laughter whenever she appeared. The play was written in blank verse, and many of the passages were extremely beautiful. Loyalheart's farewell to Haven Home and the revelation of the Spirit to Loyalheart at the Highway of Life were particularly worthy of note. The speeches of Good Humor scintillated with wit, and the unpleasant characters in the play were peculiarly true to life. Grace took half a dozen curtain calls, and Kathleen West was also summoned before the curtain and publicly presented with the honor pin by President Morton. It was an evening long to be remembered, and the story of Loyalheart and her pilgrimage was destined to remain in the minds of the Overton girls for many a day. It was after eleven o 'clock when a very tired Loyalheart went forth on a pilgrimage to Wayne Hall, accompanied by her equally loyal supporters, who were proudly bearing numerous floral offerings which had been handed to Grace over the footlights. "I am so tired," she sighed, "but so happy. It was a beautiful play, wasn't it?" "And you were the nicest part of it," said Anne fondly. "Your portrayal of Loyalheart was wonderful." "And so was your coaching," retorted Grace, promptly. "It is far from early," remarked Elfreda in a suggestive tone, as they halted for a moment at the head of the stairs, "but we are all here, and I know how to make fruit punch. In fact, I got the stuff ready, thinking that it might be useful!" "We will be in your room within the next ten minutes," said Grace decisively. "Such hospitality is not met with every day." True to her word, ten minutes later she and Anne were seated on the foot of Elfreda's bed, kimono clad and smiling, while Elfreda labored with the fruit punch. Kathleen West and Patience Eliot, who had also been invited to the punch party, were seated on cushions on the floor. Suddenly the soft tinkle of a mandolin sounded under the window, then a chorus of fresh young voices sang softly: "Come, tune your lyre to Kathleen West, Of all the plays hers is the best; Long may she shine, long may she wave, Her shrine we deck with garlands brave; May Fortune bring her world renown-- To Kathleen West, girls, drink her down." "How perfectly sweet in them!" exclaimed Kathleen, her color rising. "Hush!" Miriam held up her finger. "Dear Loyalheart, we sing to you, O girl so brave and sweet and true, May life to you be wondrous kind, And may you all its treasures find; May skies ne'er threaten you, nor frown-- To Loyalheart, girls, drink her down." Owing to the lateness of the play no one at Wayne Hall had had time to retire, and, hearing the music, the girls had with one accord hurried to the windows. "Come on up, Gertrude," called Grace into the soft darkness. "I know your voice. How on earth did you get out of your costume, go home for your mandolin and manage to land under Miriam's and Elfreda's window, all within half an hour?" "That's easy. We brought our instruments of torture with us to the play, and Elfreda agreed to have you girls in her room at the time appointed." "There is fruit punch enough to go round, and dozens of cakes," observed an ingratiating voice over Grace's shoulder. "We had several more verses to sing, and one for you, Elfreda. If you will ask Mrs. Elwood's permission, we will come up, sing them and incidentally sample the punch and the cakes," stipulated Gertrude. There were seven girls in the party of serenaders--Gertrude, Arline, Ruth Denton, the Emerson twins, Elizabeth Wade and Marian Cummings. When the last cake had disappeared and the punch was almost gone, the serenading party sang the rest of their verses and departed gayly, yet in spite of their gayety there lurked in each heart the shadow of the parting that was to come all too soon. CHAPTER XXIII GRACE FINDS HER WORK Commencement day dawned smilingly, as though anxious to contribute to the happiness of the four chums by putting on its most sunshiny face. A cool breeze swept across the campus, and, according to J. Elfreda Briggs, one didn't really mind being graduated on such a day. The hotels of Overton were well filled with friends and relatives of the graduates. The Southards, Mrs. Gray, Mrs. Pierson and her daughter Mary, together with Mrs. Allison, Mabel and the remainder of the Eight Originals Plus Two had been staying at the "Tourraine" for the past two days. Elfreda's father and mother had also arrived and were staying at the "Wilton," an old-fashioned hotel near the campus. The four chums found it somewhat of a problem to divide their time equally among their classmates, friends and families. During those last days their opportunities for confidential talks came only at the end of the evening, when, having bade a round of affectionate good-nights, they spent a few moments in either Grace's or Miriam's room before retiring. "I feel at least a hundred years old to-day," announced J. Elfreda Briggs, as she stood arranging her hair before the mirror preparatory to putting on her cap and gown. "Yes, you look quite like some grand old ruin," observed Miriam soberly, as she unearthed her slippers from the depths of her closet and hunted vainly about for a shoe horn. Elfreda laid her comb on the dressing table, grinned her appreciation of this pleasantry, then, giving her smoothly coiffed hair a last pat, reached for her cap. "I am so glad I can wear black without looking like a funeral procession," she observed. "Hurry, girls," sounded Grace's clear tones outside their door. "It is time we were on our way." "Coming," called Miriam, springing from the edge of the bed, where she had sat to put on her slippers, and hastily adjusting her cap. In the next instant the four friends accompanied by Emma Dean were hurrying across the campus to the gymnasium, where the senior class were to meet, then proceed in a body to the chapel, where the commencement exercises were to be held. The little procession of seniors walked two by two to the chapel, and to Grace, who walked with Anne, it seemed the most wonderful moment of her life. She marked the calm, almost exalted expression which Anne wore. Elfreda and Miriam, looking very stately in their black gowns, were just ahead of her and Anne, while Arline and Ruth Denton were directly behind them. As they walked sedately down the aisle of the chapel to the places reserved for them, Grace's eyes searched the rows of seats for her father and mother, whom she spied when almost opposite them. Just as she passed their row she managed to send one tender little glance to them, which caused their faces to glow with pride as their fond eyes followed the straight, supple figure of their daughter who had so amply fulfilled their expectations. The exercises, while impressive to the friends of the graduates, were doubly so to the graduates themselves, who were deeply conscious of the fact that their diplomas were their passports into the real world of work and endeavor that was now about to open before them. At the conclusion of the exercises the usual gifts and endowments to the college were announced. Among them was Thomas Redfield's annual gift to the Semper Fidelis Club, which brought forth a quick tribute of applause from the seniors, which was seconded by the entire assemblage. "And lastly allow me to mention the latest and one of the most acceptable gifts ever bestowed upon the college," stated President Morton. Grace bowed her head. She had reached the very end of Senior Lane. A few moments and her college life would be over. She had finished her course. She had kept faith with herself, and now there remained the wide world and her work, whatever that might be. Her reflections were brought to an abrupt end by what President Morton was saying. She raised her head in sudden amazement. "I refer to the newly completed house at the northern end of the campus," she heard, "presented to Overton and endowed by Mrs. Rose Gray as a mark of appreciation of her young friends, Grace Harlowe, Miriam Nesbit and Anne Pierson. It is Mrs. Gray's wish that her gift to Overton College shall be known henceforth and forever as 'Harlowe House.'" Absolute silence reigned for an instant after this announcement, then the quiet chapel echoed with the applause of the enthusiastic assemblage. President Morton waited until he could make himself heard, then went on to explain more fully that Harlowe House was to be dedicated to the use of those girls who were making a struggle to acquire a college education. Then there was more applause, and Mrs. Gray was asked to address the graduates. "And to think," said Grace, as, a little later, she stood with Miriam, Anne and Elfreda outside the chapel, surrounded by those she loved, "that I know at last what my work is going to be." "But we don't know," reminded her father, almost wistfully. "There is only one thing for me to do," laughed Grace, her eyes shining, "and that is----" "Oh, I know," interposed Elfreda, "you're coming back to the campus to look after Harlowe House." "You could see that, couldn't you, Elfreda?" laughed Miriam. "How did you guess it?" asked Grace. "Yes, I should like to come back if Father and Mother can spare me." "The rest of her friends don't count," commented Hippy Wingate. "You know they do, Hippy," smiled Grace. "I must have the permission and good will of all of them if my work is to be a success." "You have your mother's and my full consent, Grace," said her father loyally. Grace made a little movement toward her parents, slipping in between them and catching a hand of each. "There is only one thing I can say, and I've said it hundreds of times before, You are the dearest father and mother a girl ever had." * * * * * It was rather a silent quartette that gathered for the last time in Grace's room that night. Emma Dean had left Overton on the evening train. So had Patience Eliot, Kathleen West and Laura Atkins. The sophomores of Wayne Hall had departed before commencement, and to-night the house was very quiet. "And to-morrow is another day," observed Elfreda. "So it is, my child," agreed Miriam, "but we shall spend it on the train." "Do you remember one day, ages ago, when Elfreda Briggs deposited her suit case on Grace Harlowe's feet and made herself comfortable. Wasn't I a vandal?" "Think what we all might have missed if we hadn't acquired a proprietary interest in Elfreda that day." "And now you can't lose me. There, that is the first slang I've used for months, and on commencement day, too." "Never mind, Elfreda. It is forcible at least. But we don't wish to lose you. You must keep your promise and come to Oakdale this summer." "I will," promised Elfreda; "and now suppose we have one last sad tea party." It was almost midnight before Miriam and Elfreda went softly down the oppressively quiet hall to their room. "Are you happy, Anne?" asked Grace, slipping her arm about her friend and drawing her to the window where, dark against the moonlit sky, rose the tower of Overton Hall. "Almost too happy for words, and yet I dread leaving Overton." "You must come back next year and visit me. I do hope I shall make a good house mother. Do you know, Anne, in my mind I've already picked out a motto to hang over my door. It is, 'Blessed are they that have found their work.'" CHAPTER XXIV CONCLUSION The full moon shone down with his broadest smile on the group of young people who occupied Mrs. Gray's roomy, old-fashioned veranda. "We're here because we're here," caroled Hippy Wingate, balancing himself on the edge of the porch rail, both arms outspread to show how successfully he could sit on the narrow railing without support. "You won't be 'here' very long," cautioned Miriam Nesbit. "You are likely to land in that rose bush just below you. It's a very thorny one, too. I know, because I tried to pull a rose from it only a little while ago. Remember, I have warned you." "Don't worry over me, Miriam," declared Hippy airily, pretending to lose his balance and recovering himself with an exaggerated jerk. "Oh, I am not worrying," retorted Miriam. "If _you_ fall backward into that rose bush it won't hurt _me_." "Did I say it would, my child?" asked Hippy serenely. "Don't answer him, Miriam," advised Nora. "He is like Tennyson's 'Brooklet,' he goes on forever." "How peaceful and quiet it was in Oakdale until yesterday," was Hippy's sorrowful comment. "'Gone are the days when my heart was light and gay,' etc." "It will be not merely a case of bygone days, but bygone Hippy as well," threatened David. "Reddy and I intend to defend our friends against your personal attacks." "I wasn't personal," beamed Hippy. "I didn't say anything about any one. I merely observed that since yesterday Oakdale had become a howling wilderness----" Hippy did not stop to finish his speech, but, nimbly dodging David and Reddy Brooks, who rose from the porch, determination written on their faces, bounded down the steps and disappeared around the corner of the house. "He is the same Hippy who made life merry for us eight years ago when we were high school freshmen," smiled Grace. "He hasn't changed in the least." "None of my Christmas children have changed," was Mrs. Gray's fond retort. "Neither has our fairy godmother," reminded Anne. "I never feel grown up or responsible when we all gather home," said Jessica. "And yet Tom is on his first vacation from work, David and Reddy are rising young business men, and Hippy is studying law," reminded Grace. "Yes, but I don't like it," remarked a plaintive voice, as a fat face appeared around the corner of the porch. "I want to be a brakeman." It was impossible not to laugh at Hippy, and, encouraged by the merriment, he cautiously climbed the steps of the porch and returned to his precarious perch upon the railing. "I want to be a brakeman, And with the brakemen stay, I'd ride upon the choo-choo cars Through all the livelong day," he warbled, rocking backward and forward in time to his song. "Why don't you go down to the railroad yard and put in your application, then?" was Reddy's stolid advice. "If I intended to be a brakeman I wouldn't study law." "Alas! I am obliged to obey the wishes of my cruel parents," whined Hippy. "I am seriously contemplating wrapping a few little things in a handkerchief and leaving home forever. I remember once when I was very young and unsophisticated I decided upon this step. I was deeply incensed with Father because he had punished me for playing truant from school. I went upstairs to my room and packed three neckties, a boxing glove, two books, a baseball and a picture of myself in baseball clothes in a suit case. I carried the bat, and as a last precaution I took a toy pistol and my bank, which boasted of sixty-four cents. I started at about eight o'clock in the evening and went as far as the summer house at the lower end of our grounds. I sat down to rest, went to sleep and woke up about two o'clock in the morning. Then I discovered that I was afraid of the dark and didn't dare go even as far as the house. I crept into the summer house and stayed there until morning; then I went home, suit case and all. I managed to get into the house before any one else was up, but I decided there were worse places than home. However, if the brakeman aspiration proves too strong I may be obliged to leave home again. After all, it may be my vocation." "Hippy Wingate, when will you be sensible?" asked Nora O'Malley. "Never, I am afraid. You see, my associations tend to make me foolish. Birds of a feather, you know, and when one's intimate friends----" Hippy paused. "You understand I don't like to say that you in particular are responsible, but----" "I'll never forgive you for that," declared Nora. "Then that means that our engagement----" Hippy was not allowed to finish. A shout went up from the others, and he and Nora were surrounded. "Hippy, how could you?" The pink in Nora's cheeks deepened, but she did not deny his statement. "Nora, come here," commanded Mrs. Gray. Nora obeyed with a shyness entirely foreign to her. Putting her finger under Nora's rounded chin, Mrs. Gray looked smilingly into the piquant face. Then she drew the girl within her circling arm and kissed her. Grace, Miriam, Anne and Jessica followed suit. "Now it is your turn, Jessica and Reddy," said Nora pointedly. Jessica's pale face grew scarlet. She looked appealingly toward Reddy, who sat beside her, then they rose and, taking her hand in his, Reddy said with a world of affection in his voice, "Jessica has promised to marry me in the fall." Jessica and Reddy were immediately surrounded. "Will surprises never cease?" exclaimed Grace, regarding her betrothed friends with loving eyes. "Now I begin to believe that we have really grown up." "_You_ haven't," retorted Tom Gray in a low tone which Grace alone heard. "Give me a year or two in which to do my work, and perhaps I will," said Grace softly. "Do you really mean that, Grace?" asked Tom eagerly. "I think I do, Tom," hesitated Grace, "but I can't promise you what you wish, yet." "By the low, significant tones over in Grace's corner I imagine another engagement is about to be announced," remarked Hippy, grinning broadly. All eyes were immediately turned upon Grace and Tom. Grace met their gaze with a shake of her head. "No," she said, "Tom and I are not even engaged. I must be free to go back to Overton next year to do my work there. I must look after my house for one year at least." Tom's face clouded, but he said no more. David, too, was strangely silent. Anne had accepted an engagement to tour America with Everett Southard in Shakespearean roles the next season. Miss Southard was to accompany them on the tour. Still, David had the satisfaction of knowing that Anne loved him and that some day she would be his wife, although, like Grace, she would neither bind herself by a promise nor allow him to place his ring upon her finger. A little silence followed the announcement of the engagement of part of Mrs. Gray's Christmas children. Hippy had resumed his position on the railing, while Nora had slipped to the seat beside Grace, her hand in that of her friend. The little company of young people realized, to a person, that for them life was taking on a strange and earnest meaning, while Mrs. Gray, in spite of this garland of youth with which she delighted to beautify her latter days, felt very, very old. Suddenly the silence was rudely broken. Hippy, who was more embarrassed than he cared to indicate, leaned too far back and lost his balance. There was a horrified gasp, a pair of stout legs waved in the air, and Theophilus Hippopotamus Wingate, as he invariably styled himself, fulfilled Miriam's prediction to the letter, and crashed ignominiously into the prickly arms of the big rose bush. "There is no use in trying to be retrospective while Hippy is with us," declared Mrs. Gray when their mirth had subsided and Hippy had clambered to his feet. A long scratch ornamented one fat cheek and his hands showed the result of his fall among thorns. But his smile was as wide as ever. "Poor Hippy," sympathized Miriam. "I'm so sorry." "Then stop laughing," retorted Hippy. "Yes, I'm sorry--for the rosebush," jeered Reddy. Those who have learned to look upon Grace Harlowe and her companions as friends of old standing will meet her again in the near future. In "Grace Harlowe's Return to Overton Campus" they will find her at Harlowe House and learn just how successfully she carried on her chosen work. THE END. * * * * * HENRY ALTEMUS COMPANY'S Best and Least Expensive Books for Boys and Girls The Motor Boat Club Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK The keynote of these books is manliness. The stories are wonderfully entertaining, and they are at the same time sound and wholesome. No boy will willingly lay down an unfinished book in this series. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB OF THE KENNEBEC; Or, The Secret of Smugglers' Island. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB AT NANTUCKET; Or, The Mystery of the Dunstan Heir. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB OFF LONG ISLAND; Or, A Daring Marine Game at Racing Speed. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB AND THE WIRELESS; Or, The Dot, Dash and Dare Cruise. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB IN FLORIDA; Or, Laying the Ghost of Alligator Swamp. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB AT THE GOLDEN GATE; Or, A Thrilling Capture in the Great Fog. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB ON THE GREAT LAKES; Or, The Flying Dutchman of the Big Fresh Water. Battleship Boys Series By FRANK GEE PATCHIN These stories throb with, the life of young Americans on today's huge drab Dreadnaughts. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS AT SEA; Or, Two Apprentices in Uncle Sam's Navy. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS' FIRST STEP UPWARD; Or, Winning Their Grades as Petty Officers. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS IN FOREIGN SERVICE; Or, Earning New Ratings in European Seas. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS IN THE TROPICS; Or, Upholding the American Flag in a Honduras Revolution. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS IN THE WARDROOM; Or, Winning their Commissions as Line Officers. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS WITH THE ADRIATIC CHASERS; Or, Blocking the Path of the Undersea Raiders. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS' SKY PATROL; Or, Fighting the Hun from above the Clouds. The Range and Grange Hustlers By FRANK GEE PATCHIN Have you any idea of the excitements, the glories of life or great ranches in the West? Any bright boy will "devour" the books of this series, once he has made a start with the first volume. THE RANGE AND GRANGE HUSTLERS ON THE RANCH; Or, The Boy Shepherds of the Great Divide. THE RANGE AND GRANGE HUSTLERS' GREATEST ROUND-UP; Or, Pitting Their Wits Against a Packers' Combine. THE RANGE AND GRANGE HUSTLERS ON THE PLAINS; Or, Following the Steam Plows Across the Prairie. THE RANGE AND GRANGE HUSTLERS AT CHICAGO; Or, The Conspiracy of the Wheat Pit. Submarine Boys Series By VICTOR G. DURHAM THE SUBMARINE BOYS ON DUTY; Or, Life on a Diving Torpedo Boat. THE SUBMARINE BOYS' TRIAL TRIP; Or, "Making Good" as Young Experts. THE SUBMARINE BOYS AND THE MIDDIES; Or, The Prize Detail at Annapolis. THE SUBMARINE BOYS AND THE SPIES; Or, Dodging the Sharks of the Deep. THE SUBMARINE BOYS' LIGHTNING CRUISE; Or, The Young Kings of the Deep. THE SUBMARINE BOYS FOR THE FLAG; Or, Deeding Their Lives to Uncle Sam. THE SUBMARINE BOYS AND THE SMUGGLERS; Or, Breaking Up the New Jersey Customs Frauds. Grace Harlowe Overseas Series GRACE HARLOWE OVERSEAS. GRACE HARLOWE WITH THE RED CROSS IN FRANCE. GRACE HARLOWE WITH THE MARINES AT CHATEAU THIERRY. GRACE HARLOWE WITH THE AMERICAN ARMY IN THE ARGONNE. The College Girls Series By JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A.M. GRACE HARLOWE'S FIRST YEAR AT OVERTON COLLEGE. GRACE HARLOWE'S SECOND YEAR AT OVERTON COLLEGE. GRACE HARLOWE'S THIRD YEAR AT OVERTON COLLEGE. GRACE HARLOWE'S FOURTH YEAR AT OVERTON COLLEGE. GRACE HARLOWE'S RETURN TO OVERTON CAMPUS. GRACE HARLOWE'S PROBLEM. GRACE HARLOWE'S GOLDEN SUMMER. Pony Rider Boys Series By FRANK GEE PATCHIN These tales may be aptly described the best books for boys and girls. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN THE ROCKIES; Or, The Secret of the Lost Claim. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN TEXAS; Or, The Veiled Riddle of the Plains. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN MONTANA; Or, The Mystery of the Old Custer Trail. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN THE OZARKS; Or, The Secret of Ruby Mountain. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN THE ALKALI; Or, Finding a Key to the Desert Maze. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN NEW MEXICO; Or, The End of the Silver Trail. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN THE GRAND CANYON; Or, The Mystery of Bright Angel Gulch. The Boys of Steel Series By JAMES R. MEARS Each book presents vivid picture of this great industry. Each story is full of adventure and fascination. THE IRON BOYS IN THE MINES; Or, Starting at the Bottom of the Shaft. THE IRON BOYS AS FOREMEN; Or, Heading the Diamond Drill Shift. THE IRON BOYS ON THE ORE BOATS; Or, Roughing It on the Great Lakes. THE IRON BOYS IN THE STEEL MILLS; Or, Beginning Anew in the Cinder Pits. The Madge Morton Books By AMY D. V. CHALMERS MADGE MORTON-CAPTAIN OF THE MERRY MAID. MADGE MORTON'S SECRET. MADGE MORTON'S TRUST. MADGE MORTON'S VICTORY. West Point Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK The principal characters in these narratives are manly, young Americans whose doings will inspire all boy readers. DICK PRESCOTT'S FIRST YEAR AT WEST POINT; Or, Two Chums in the Cadet Gray. DICK PRESCOTT'S SECOND YEAR AT WEST POINT; Or, Finding the Glory of the Soldier's Life. DICK PRESCOTT'S THIRD YEAR AT WEST POINT; Or, Standing Firm for Flag and Honor. DICK PRESCOTT'S FOURTH YEAR AT WEST POINT; Or, Ready to Drop the Gray for Shoulder Straps. Annapolis Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK The Spirit of the new Navy is delightfully and truthfully depicted in these volumes. DAVE DARRIN'S FIRST YEAR AT ANNAPOLIS; Or, Two Plebe Midshipmen at the U. S. Naval Academy. DAVE DARRIN'S SECOND YEAR AT ANNAPOLIS; Or, Two Midshipmen as Naval Academy "Youngsters." DAVE DARRIN'S THIRD YEAR AT ANNAPOLIS; Or, Leaders of the Second Class Midshipmen. DAVE DARRIN'S FOURTH YEAR AT ANNAPOLIS; Or, Headed for Graduation and the Big Cruise. The Young Engineers Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK The heroes of these stories are known to readers of the High School Boys Series. In this new series Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton prove worthy of all the traditions of Dick & Co. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN COLORADO; Or, At Railroad Building in Earnest. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN ARIZONA; Or, Laying Tracks on the "Man-Killer" Quicksand. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN NEVADA; Or, Seeking Fortune on the Turn of a Pick. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN MEXICO; Or, Fighting the Mine Swindlers. Boys of the Army Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK These books breathe the life and spirit of the United States Army of to-day, and the life, just as it is, is described by a master pen. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS IN THE RANKS; Or, Two Recruits in the United States Army. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS ON FIELD DUTY; Or, Winning Corporal's Chevrons. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS AS SERGEANTS; Or, Handling Their First Real Commands. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS IN THE PHILIPPINES; Or, Following the Flag Against the Moros. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS AS LIEUTENANTS; Or, Serving Old Glory as Line Officers. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS WITH PERSHING; Or, Dick Prescott at Grips with the Boche. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS SMASH THE GERMANS; Or, Winding Up the Great War. Dave Darrin Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK DAVE DARRIN AT VERA CRUZ; Or, Fighting With the U. S. Navy in Mexico. DAVE DARRIN ON MEDITERRANEAN SERVICE. DAVE DARRIN'S SOUTH AMERICAN CRUISE. DAVE DARRIN ON THE ASIATIC STATION. DAVE DARRIN AND THE GERMAN SUBMARINES. DAVE DARRIN AFTER THE MINE LAYERS; Or, Hitting the Enemy a Hard Naval Blow. The Meadow-Brook Girls Series By JANET ALDRIDGE THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS UNDER CANVAS. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS ACROSS COUNTRY. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS AFLOAT. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS IN THE HILLS. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS BY THE SEA. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS ON THE TENNIS COURTS. High School Boys Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK In this series of bright, crisp books a new note has been struck. Boys of every age under sixty will be interested in these fascinating volumes. THE HIGH SCHOOL FRESHMEN; Or, Dick & Co.'s First Year Pranks and Sports. THE HIGH SCHOOL PITCHER; Or, Dick & Co. on the Gridley Diamond. THE HIGH SCHOOL LEFT END; Or, Dick & Co. Grilling on the Football Gridiron. THE HIGH SCHOOL CAPTAIN OF THE TEAM; Or, Dick & Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard. Grammar School Boys Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK This series of stories, based on the actual doings of grammar School boys, comes near to the heart of the average American boy. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS OF GRIDLEY; Or, Dick & Co. Start Things Moving. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS SNOWBOUND; Or, Dick & Co. at Winter Sports. THE, GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS IN THE WOODS; Or, Dick & Co. Trail Fun and Knowledge. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS IN SUMMER ATHLETICS; Or, Dick & Co. Make Their Fame Secure. High School Boys' Vacation Series By H. IRVING HANCOCK "Give us more Dick Prescott books!" This has been the burden of the cry from young readers of the country over. Almost numberless letters have been received by the publishers, making this eager demand; for Dick Prescott, Dave Darrin, Tom Reade, and the other members of Dick & Co. are the most popular high school boys in the land. Boys will alternately thrill and chuckle when reading these splendid narratives. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' CANOE CLUB; Or, Dick & Co.'s Rivals on Lake Pleasant. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS IN SUMMER CAMP; Or, The Dick Prescott Six Training for the Gridley Eleven. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' FISHING TRIP; Or, Dick & Co. in the Wilderness. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' TRAINING HIKE; Or, Dick & Co. Making Themselves "Hard as Nails." The Circus Boys Series By EDGAR B. P. DARLINGTON Mr. Darlington's books breathe forth every phase of an intensely interesting and exciting life. THE CIRCUS BOYS ON THE FLYING RINGS; Or, Making the Start in the Sawdust Life. THE CIRCUS BOYS ACROSS THE CONTINENT; Or, Winning New Laurels on the Tanbark. THE CIRCUS BOYS IN DIXIE LAND; Or, Winning the Plaudits of the Sunny South. THE CIRCUS BOYS ON THE MISSISSIPPI; Or, Afloat with the Big Show on the Big River. The High School Girls Series By JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A. M. These breezy stories of the American High School Girl take the reader fairly by storm. GRACE HARLOWE'S PLEBE YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, The Merry Doings of the Oakdale Freshman Girls. GRACE HARLOWE'S SOPHOMORE YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, The Record of the Girl Chums in Work and Athletics. GRACE HARLOWE'S JUNIOR YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities. GRACE HARLOWE'S SENIOR YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; Or, The Parting of the Ways. The Automobile Girls Series By LAURA DENT CRANE No girl's library--no family book-case can be considered at all complete unless it contains these sparkling twentieth-century books. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT NEWPORT; Or, Watching the Summer Parade. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS IN THE BERKSHIRES; Or, The Ghost of Lost Man's Trail. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS ALONG THE HUDSON; Or, Fighting Fire in Sleepy Hollow. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT CHICAGO; Or, Winning Out Against Heavy Odds. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT PALM BEACH; Or, Proving Their Mettle Under Southern Skies. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT WASHINGTON; Or, Checkmating the Plots of Foreign Spies. 
31387	----	Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 31387-h.htm or 31387-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/31387/31387-h/31387-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/31387/31387-h.zip) BETTY WALES FRESHMAN by MARGARET WARDE Author of Betty Wales, Sophomore Betty Wales, Junior Betty Wales, Senior Betty Wales, B. A. Betty Wales & Co. Betty Wales on the Campus Betty Wales Decides [Illustration: "I'M IN A DREADFUL FIX"] The Penn Publishing Company Philadelphia 1921 Copyright 1904 by The Penn Publishing Company Betty Wales, Freshman Contents I First Impressions 7 II Beginnings 21 III Dancing Lessons and a Class-Meeting 35 IV Whose Photograph? 50 V Up Hill--and Down 63 VI Letters Home 80 VII A Dramatic Chapter 95 VIII After the Play 112 IX Paying the Piper 128 X A Rumor 146 XI Mid-years and a Dust-Pan 166 XII A Triumph for Democracy 185 XIII Saint Valentine's Assistants 208 XIV A Beginning and a Sequel 233 XV At the Great Game 255 XVI A Chance to Help 279 XVII An Ounce of Prevention 299 XVIII Into Paradise--and Out 321 XIX A Last Chance 337 XX Loose Threads 355 BETTY WALES CHAPTER I FIRST IMPRESSIONS "Oh, dear, what if she shouldn't meet me!" sighed Betty Wales for the hundredth time at least, as she gathered up her bags and umbrella, and followed the crowd of noisy, chattering girls off the train. "So long, Mary. See you to-morrow." "Get a carriage, Nellie, that's a dear. You're so little you can always break through the crowd." "Hello, Susanna! Did you get on the campus too?" "Thanks awfully, but I can't to-night. My freshman cousin's up, you know, and homesick and----" "Oh, girls, isn't it fun to be back?" It all sounded so jolly and familiar. Weren't any of them freshmen? Did they guess that she was a freshman "and homesick"? Betty straightened proudly and resolved that they should not. If only the registrar had got father's telegram. As she stood hesitating on the station platform, amazed at the wilderness of trunks and certain that no one could possibly find her until that shouting, rushing mob in front of her had dispersed, a pretty girl in immaculate white duck hurried up to her. "Pardon me," she said, reaching out a hand for Betty's golf clubs, "but aren't you a stranger here? Could I help you, perhaps, about getting your luggage up?" Betty looked at her doubtfully. "I don't know," she said. "Yes, I'm going to enter college, and my elder sister couldn't get here until a later train. But father telegraphed the registrar to meet me. Do you know her? Could you point her out?" The pretty girl's lips curved into the faint suggestion of a smile. "Yes," she said, "I know her--only too well for my peace of mind occasionally. But I'm afraid she hasn't come to meet you. You see she's very busy these first days--there are a great many of you freshman, all wanting different things. So she sends us down instead." "Oh, I see." Betty's face brightened. "Then if you would tell me how to get to Mrs. Chapin's on Meriden Place." "Mrs. Chapin's!" exclaimed the pretty girl. "That's easy. Most of you want such outlandish streets. But that's close to the campus, where I'm going myself. My time is just up, I'm happy to say. Give me your checks and your house number, and then we'll take a car, unless you wouldn't mind walking. It's not far." On the way to Mrs. Chapin's Betty learned that her new friend's name was Dorothy King, that she was a junior and roomed in the Hilton House, that she went in for science, but was fond of music and was a member of the Glee Club; that she was back a day early for the express purpose of meeting freshmen at the trains. In return Betty explained how she had been obliged at the last moment to come east alone; how sister Nan, who was nine years older than she and five years out of college, was coming down from a house party at Kittery Point, but couldn't get in till eight that night; and father had insisted that Betty be sure to arrive by daylight. "Wales--Wales----" repeated the pretty junior. "Why, your sister must have been the clever Miss Wales in '9-, the one who wrote so well and all. She is? How fine! I'm sorry, but I leave you here. Mrs. Chapin's is that big yellow house, the second on the left side--yes. I know you'll like it there. And Miss Wales, you mustn't mind if the sophomores get hold of that joke about your asking the registrar to meet you. I won't tell, but it will be sure to leak out somehow. You see it's really awfully funny. The registrar is almost as important as the president, and a lot more dignified and unapproachable, until you get to know her. She'll think it too good to keep, and the sophomores will be sure to get hold of it and put it in the book of grinds for their reception--souvenirs they give you, you know. Now good-bye. May I call later? Thank you so much. Good-bye." Betty was blushing hotly as she climbed Mrs. Chapin's steps. But her chagrin at having proved herself so "verdant" a freshman was tempered with elation at the junior's cordiality. "Nan said I wasn't to run into friendships," she reflected. "But she must be nice. She knows the Clays. Oh, I hope she won't forget to come!" Betty Wales had come to college without any particular enthusiasm for it, though she was naturally an enthusiastic person. She loved Nan dearly, but didn't approve of her scheme of life, and wasn't at all prepared to like college just because Nan had. Being so much younger than her sister, she had never visited her at Harding, but she had met a good many of her friends; and comparing their stories of life at Harding with the experiences of one or two of her own mates who were at the boarding-school, she had decided that of two evils she should prefer college, because there seemed to be more freedom and variety about it. Being of a philosophical turn of mind, she was now determined to enjoy herself, if possible. She pinned her faith to a remark that her favorite among all Nan's friends had made to her that summer. "Oh, you'll like college, Betty," she had said. "Not just as Nan or I did, of course. Every girl has her own reasons for liking college--but every nice girl likes it." Betty decided that she had already found two of her reasons: the pretty Miss King and Mrs. Chapin's piazza, which was exceedingly attractive for a boarding-house. A girl was lounging in a hammock behind the vines, and another in a big piazza chair was reading aloud to her. "They must be old girls," thought Betty, "to seem so much at home." Then she remembered that Mrs. Chapin had said hers would probably be an "all freshman house," and decided that they were friends from the same town. Mrs. Chapin presently appeared, to show Betty to her room and explain that her roommate would not arrive till the next morning. Betty dressed and then sat down to study for her French examination, which came next day; but before she had finished deciding which couch she preferred or where they could possibly put two desks and a tea-table, the bell rang for dinner. This bid fair to be a silent and dismal meal. All the girls had come except Betty's roommate, and most of them, being freshmen, were in the depths of examinations and homesickness. But there was one shining exception, a very lively sophomore, who had waited till the last moment hoping to get an assignment on the campus, and then had come to Mrs. Chapin's in the place of a freshman who had failed in her examinations. "She had six, poor thing!" explained the sophomore to Betty, who sat beside her. "And just think! She'd had a riding horse and a mahogany desk with a secret drawer sent on from home. Wish I could inherit them along with her room. Now, my name is Mary Brooks. Tell me yours, and I'll ask the girl on the other side and introduce you; and that will start the ball rolling." These energetic measures succeeded much better than Mrs. Chapin's somewhat perfunctory remarks about the dry weather, and the whole table was soon talking busily. The two piazza girls proved to be sisters, Mary and Adelaide Rich, from Haddam, Connecticut. Betty decided that they were rather stupid and too inclined to stick together to be much fun. A tall, homely girl at the end of the table created a laugh by introducing herself as Miss Katherine Kittredge of Kankakee. "The state is Illinois," she added, "but that spoils the alliteration." "The what?" whispered Betty to the sophomore. But Miss Brooks only laughed and said, "Wait till you've finished freshman English." Betty's other neighbor was a pale, quiet little girl, with short hair and a drawl. Betty couldn't decide whether she meant to be "snippy" or was only shy and offish. After she had said that her name was Roberta Lewis and her home Philadelphia, Betty inquired politely whether she expected to like college. "I expect to detest it," replied Miss Lewis slowly and distinctly, and spoke not another word during dinner. But though she ate busily and kept her eyes on her plate, Betty was sure that she heard all that was said, and would have liked to join in, only she didn't know how. The one really beautiful girl at the table was Miss Eleanor Watson. Her complexion was the daintiest pink and white, her black hair waved softly under the big hat which she had not stopped to take off, and her hazel eyes were plaintive one moment and sparkling the next, as her mood changed. She talked a good deal and very well, and it was hard to realize that she was only sixteen and a freshman. She had fitted for college at a big preparatory school in the east, and so, although she happened to be the only Denver girl in college, she had a great many friends in the upper classes and appeared to know quite as much about college customs as Miss Brooks. All this impressed Betty, who admired beauty and pretty clothes immensely. She resolved to have Eleanor Watson for a friend if she could, and was pleased when Miss Watson inquired how many examinations she had, and suggested that they would probably be in the same divisions, since their names both began with W. The remaining girl at Mrs. Chapin's table was not particularly striking. She had a great mass of golden brown hair, which she wore coiled loosely in her neck. Her keen grey eyes looked the world straight in the face, and her turned-up nose and the dimple in her chin gave her a merry, cheerful air. She did not talk much, and not at all about herself, but she gave the impression of being a thoroughly nice, bright, capable girl. Her name was Rachel Morrison. After dinner Betty was starting up-stairs when Mary Brooks called her back. "Won't you walk over to the campus with me, little girl?" she asked. "I have one or two errands. Oh no, you don't need a hat. You never do here." So they wandered off bareheaded in the moonlight, which made the elm-shaded streets look prettier than ever. On the dusky campus girls strolled about in devoted pairs and sociable quartettes. On the piazza of one of the dwelling-houses somebody was singing a fascinating little Scotch ballad with a tinkling mandolin accompaniment. "Must be Dorothy King," said the sophomore. "I thought she wouldn't come till eight. Most people don't." "Oh!" exclaimed Betty, "I know her!" And she related her adventure at the station. "That's so," said Miss Brooks. "I'd forgotten. She's awfully popular, you know, and very prominent,--belongs to no end of societies. But whatever the Young Women's Christian Association wants of her she does. You know they appoint girls to meet freshmen and help them find boarding-places and so on. She's evidently on that committee. Let's stop and say hello to her." Betty, hanging behind, was amazed to see the commotion caused by Miss Brooks's arrival. The song stopped abruptly, the mandolin slammed to the floor, and performers and audience fell as one woman upon the newcomer. "Why, Mary Brooks! When did you come?" "Did you get a room, honey?" "Oh, Mary, where did you put on that lovely tan?" "Mary, is Sarah coming back, do you know?" "Hush up, girls, and let her tell us!" It was like the station, only more so, and oh, it was nice--if you were in it. Mary answered some of their questions and then looked around for Betty. "I've lost a freshman," she said, "Here, Miss Wales, come up and sit on the railing. She knows you, Dottie, and she wants to hear you sing. These others are some of the Hilton House, Miss Wales. Please consider yourselves introduced. Now, Dottie." So the little Scotch ballad began again. Presently some one else came up, there were more effusive greetings, and then another song or two, after which Miss King and "some of the Hilton House" declared that they simply must go and unpack. Betty, suddenly remembering her trunk and her sister, decided to let Miss Brooks do her other "errands" alone, and found her way back to Mrs. Chapin's. Sure enough, Nan was sitting on the piazza. "Hello, little sister," she called gaily as Betty hurried up the walk. "Don't say you're sorry to be late. It's the worst possible thing for little freshmen to mope round waiting for people, and I'm glad you had the sense not to. Your trunk's come, but if you're not too tired let's go up and see Ethel Hale before we unpack it." Ethel Hale had spent a whole summer with Nan, and Betty beat her at tennis and called her Ethel, and she called Betty little sister, just as Nan did. But here she was a member of the faculty. "I shall never dare come near her after you leave," said Betty. Just as she said it the door of the room opened--Nan had explained that it was a freshman trick to ring front door-bells--and Ethel rushed out and dragged them in. "Miss Blaine and Miss Mills are here," she said. Betty gathered from the subsequent conversation that Miss Blaine and Miss Mills were also members of the faculty; and they were. But they had just come in from a horseback ride, and they sat in rather disheveled attitudes, eating taffy out of a paper bag, and their conversation was very amusing and perfectly intelligible, even to a freshman who had still an examination to pass. "I didn't suppose the faculty ever acted like that. Why, they're just like other people," declared Betty, as she tumbled into bed a little later. "They're exactly like other people," returned Nan sagely, from the closet where she was hanging up skirts. "Just remember that and you'll have a lot nicer time with them." So ended Betty's first day at college. Nan finished unpacking, and then sat for a long time by the window. Betty loved Nan, but Nan in return worshiped Betty. They might call her the clever Miss Wales if they liked; she would gladly have given all her vaunted brains for the fascinating little ways that made Betty friends so quickly and for the power to take life in Betty's free-and-easy fashion. "Oh, I hope she'll like it!" she thought. "I hope she'll be popular with the girls. I don't want her to have to work so hard for all she gets. I wouldn't exchange my course for hers, but I want hers to be the other kind." Betty was sound asleep. CHAPTER II BEGINNINGS The next morning it poured. "Of course," said Eleanor Watson impressively at breakfast. "It always does the first day of college. They call it the freshman rain." "Let's all go down to chapel together," suggested Rachel Morrison. "You're going to order carriages, of course?" inquired Roberta Lewis stiffly. "Hurrah! Another joke for the grind-book," shrieked Mary Brooks. Then she noticed Roberta's expression of abject terror. "Never mind, Miss Lewis," she said kindly. "It's really an honor to be in the grind-book, but I promise not to tell if you'd rather I wouldn't. Won't you show that you forgive me by coming down to college under my umbrella?" "She can't. She's coming with me," answered Nan promptly. "I demand the right to first choice." "Very well, I yield," said Mary, "because when you go my sovereignty will be undisputed. You'll have to hurry, children." So the little procession of rain-coats flapping out from under dripping umbrellas started briskly off to join the longer procession that was converging from every direction toward College Hall. Roberta and Nan were ahead under one umbrella, chatting like old friends. "I suppose she doesn't think we're worth talking to," said Rachel Morrison, who came next with Betty. "Probably she's one of the kind that's always been around with grown people and isn't used to girls," suggested Betty. "Perhaps," agreed Rachel. "Anyhow, I can't get a word out of her. She just sits by her window and reads magazines and looks bored to death when Katherine or I go in to speak to her. Isn't Katherine jolly? I'm so glad I don't room alone." "Are you?" asked Betty. "I can tell better after my roommate comes. Her name sounds quite nice. It's Helen Chase Adams, and she lives somewhere up in New Hampshire. Did you ever see so many girls?" There seemed to be no end to them. They jostled one another good-naturedly in the narrow halls, swarmed, chattering, up the stairs, and filled the chapel to overflowing. It was very exciting to see the whole college together. Even Roberta Lewis condescended to look interested when Mary Brooks showed her the faculty rows, and pointed out the college beauty, the captain of the sophomore basket-ball team, and other local celebrities. "That's evidently a freshman," declared Eleanor Watson, who was in the row behind with Katherine and the Riches. "Doesn't she look lost and unhappy?" And she pointed out a tall, near-sighted girl who was stalking dejectedly down the middle aisle. A vivacious little brunette was sitting next Eleanor. "Pardon me," she said sweetly, "but did you mean the girl who's gone around to the side and is now being received with open arms by most of the faculty? She's a senior, the brightest girl in the class, we think, and she's sad because she's lost her trunk and broken her glasses. You're a freshman, I judge?" "Thank you, yes," gasped Eleanor with as much dignity as she could muster, and resolved to keep her guesses to herself in future. The chapel service was short but very beautiful. The president's kindly welcome to the entering class, "which bids fair to be the largest in the history of the institution," completely upset the composure of some of the aforesaid class, and a good many moist handkerchiefs grew moister, and red eyes redder during the prayer. But on the whole the class of 190- conducted itself with commendable propriety and discretion on this its first official appearance in the college world. "I'm glad I don't have that French exam.," said Katherine, as she and Betty picked out their umbrellas from a great, moist heap in the corner of the hall. "Come down with me and have a soda." Betty shook her head. "I can't. Nan asked me to go with her and Eth--I mean Miss Hale, but I simply must study." And she hurried off to begin. At the entrance to the campus Eleanor Watson overtook her. "Let's go home and study together," she proposed. "I can't see why they left this French till so late in the week, when everybody has it. What did you come to college for?" she asked abruptly. Betty thought a minute. "Why, for the fun of it, I guess," she said. "So did I. I think we've stumbled into a pretty serious-minded crowd at Mrs. Chapin's, don't you?" "I like Miss Morrison awfully well," objected Betty, "and I shouldn't call Katherine Kittredge of Kankakee serious-minded, but----" "Oh, perhaps not," interrupted Eleanor. "Anyhow I know a lot of fine girls outside, and you must meet them. It's very important to have a lot of friends up here. If you want to amount to anything, you can't just stick with the girls in your own house." "Oh, no," said Betty meekly, awed by the display of worldly wisdom. "It will be lovely to meet your friends. Let's study on the piazza. I'll get my books." "Wait a minute," said Eleanor quickly. "I want to tell you something. I have at least two conditions already, and if I don't pass this French I don't suppose I can possibly stay." "But you don't act frightened a bit," protested Betty in awestruck tones. "I am," returned Eleanor in a queer, husky voice. "I could never show my face again if I failed." She brushed the tears out of her eyes. "Now go and get your books," she said calmly, "and don't ever mention the subject again. I had to tell somebody." Betty was back in a moment, looking as if she had seen a ghost. "She's come," she gasped, "and she's crying like everything." "Who?" inquired Eleanor coolly. "My roommate--Helen Chase Adams." "What did you do?" "I didn't say a word--just grabbed up my books and ran. Let's study till Nan comes and then she'll settle it." It was almost one o'clock before Nan appeared. She tossed a box of candy to the weary students, and gave a lively account of her morning, which had included a second breakfast, three strawberry-ices, a walk to the bridge, half a dozen calls on the campus, and a plunge in the swimming-tank. "I didn't dream I knew so many people here," she said. "But now I've seen them all and they've promised to call on you, Betty, and I must go to-night." "Not unless she stops crying," said Betty firmly, and told her story. "Go up and ask her to come down-town with us and have a lunch at Holmes's," suggested Nan. "Oh you come too," begged Betty, and Nan, amused at the distress of her usually self-reliant sister, obediently led the way up-stairs. "Come in," called a tremulous voice. Helen Chase Adams had stopped crying, at least temporarily, and was sitting in a pale and forlorn heap on one of the beds. She jumped up when she saw her visitors. "I thought it was the man with my trunk," she said. "Is one of you my roommate? Which one?" "What a nice speech, Miss Adams!" said Nan heartily. "I've been hoping ever since I came that somebody would take me for a freshman. But this is Betty, who's to room with you. Now will you come down-town to lunch with us?" Betty was very quiet on the way down-town. Her roommate was a bitter disappointment. She had imagined a pretty girl like Eleanor Watson, or a jolly one like Katherine and Rachel; and here was this homely little thing with an awkward walk, a piping voice, and short skirts. "She'll just spoil everything," thought Betty resentfully, "and it's a mean, hateful shame." Over the creamed chicken, which Nan ordered because it was Holmes's "specialty," just as strawberry-ice was Cuyler's, the situation began to look a little more cheerful. Helen Chase Adams would certainly be an obliging roommate. "Oh, I wouldn't think of touching the room till you get back from your French," she said eagerly. "Won't it be fun to fix it? Have you a lot of pretty things? I haven't much, I'm afraid. Oh, no, I don't care a bit which bed I have." Her shy, appealing manner and her evident desire to please would have disarmed a far more critical person than Betty, who, in spite of her love of "fine feathers" and a sort of superficial snobbishness, was at heart absolutely unworldly, and who took a naive interest in all badly dressed people because it was such fun to "plan them over." She applied this process immediately to her roommate. "Her hat's on crooked," she reflected, "and her pug's in just the wrong place. Her shirt-waist needs pulling down in front and she sticks her head out when she talks. Otherwise she'd be rather cute. I hope she's the kind that will take suggestions without getting mad." And she hurried off to her French in a very amiable frame of mind. Helen Chase Adams thanked Nan shyly for the luncheon, escaped from the terrors of a tête-à-tête with an unfamiliar grown-up on the plea of having to unpack, and curled up on the couch that Betty had not chosen, to think it over. The day had been full of surprises, but Betty was the culmination. Why had she come to college? She was distinctly pretty, she dressed well, and evidently liked what pretty girls call "a good time." In Helen Chase Adams's limited experience all pretty girls were stupid. The idea of seeing crowds of them in the college chapel, much less of rooming with one, had never entered her head. A college was a place for students. Would Miss Wales pass her examination? Would she learn her lessons? What would it be like to live with her day in and day out? Helen could not imagine--but she did not feel in the least like crying. Just as the dinner-bell rang, Betty appeared, looking rather tired and pale. "Nan's gone," she announced. "She found she couldn't make connections except by leaving at half past five, so she met me down at the college. And just at the last minute she gave me the money to buy a chafing-dish. Wasn't that lovely? I know I should have cried and made a goose of myself, but after tha--I beg your pardon--I haven't any sense." She stopped in confusion. But Helen only laughed. "Go on," she said. "I don't mind now. I don't believe I'm going to be homesick any more, and if I am I'll do my best not to cry." How the rest of that first week flew! Next day the freshman class list was read, and fortunately it included all the girls at Mrs. Chapin's. Then there were electives to choose, complicated schedules to see through, first recitations to find, books to buy or rent, rooms to arrange, and all sorts of bewildering odds and ends to attend to. Saturday came before any one was ready for it, bringing in its wake the freshman frolic, a jolly, informal dance in the gymnasium, at which the whole college appears, tagged with its name, and tries to get accustomed to the size of the entering class, preparatory to becoming acquainted with parts of it later on. To Betty's great delight Dorothy King met her in the hall of the Administration Building the day before and asked permission to take her to the frolic. At the gymnasium Miss King turned her over to a bewildering succession of partners, who asked her the stereotyped questions about liking college, having a pleasant boarding-place, and so on, tried more or less effectively to lead her through the crowd to the rather erratic music of one piano, and assured her that the freshman frolic was not at all like the other college dances. They all seemed very pleasant, but Betty felt sure she should never know them again. Nevertheless she enjoyed it all immensely and was almost sorry when the frolic was over and they adjourned to Dorothy's pretty single room in the Hilton House, where a few other upper-class girls had been invited to bring their freshmen for refreshments. "Wasn't it fun?" said Betty to a fluffy-haired, dainty little girl who sat next her on Dorothy's couch. "I don't think I should call it exactly fun," said the girl critically. "Oh, I like meeting new people, and getting into a crowd of girls, and trying to dance with them," explained Betty. "Yes, I liked it too," said the girl. She had an odd trick of lingering over the word she wished to distinguish. "I liked it because it was so queer. Everything's queer here, particularly roommates. Do you have one?" Betty nodded. "Well, mine never made up her bed in her life before, and first she thought she couldn't, but her mother told her to take hold and see what a Madison could do with a bed--they're awfully proud of their old family--so she did; but it looks dreadfully messy yet, and it makes her late for chapel every single morning. Is yours anything like that?" Betty laughed. "Oh, no," she said. "She's very orderly. Won't you come and see us?" The little freshman promised. By that time the "plowed field" was ready--an obliging friend had stayed at home from the frolic to give it an early start--and they ate the creamy brown squares of candy with a marshmallow stuffed into each, and praised the cook and her wares until a bell rang and everybody jumped up and began saying good-bye at once except Betty, who had to be enlightened by the campus girls as to the dire meaning of the twenty-minutes-to-ten bell. "Don't you keep the ten o'clock rule?" asked the fluffy-haired freshman curiously. "Oh, yes," said Betty. "Why, we couldn't come to college if we didn't, could we?" And she wondered why some of the girls laughed. "I've had a beautiful time," she said, when Miss King, who had come part way home with her, explained that she must turn back. "I hope that when I'm a junior I can do half as much for some little freshman as you have for me." "That's a nice way to put it, Miss Wales," said Dorothy. "But don't wait till you're a junior to begin." As Betty ran home, she reflected that she had not seen Helen dancing that evening. "Oh, Helen," she called, as she dashed into the room, "wasn't it fun? How many minutes before our light goes out? Do you know how to dance?" Helen hesitated. "I--well--I know how, but I can't do it in a crowd. It's ten minutes of ten." "Teach you before the sophomore reception," said Betty laconically, throwing a slipper into the closet with one hand and pulling out hairpins with the other. "What a pity that to-morrow's Sunday. We shall have to wait a whole day to begin." CHAPTER III DANCING LESSONS AND A CLASS-MEETING The next morning Helen had gone for a walk with Katherine, and Betty was dressing for church, when Eleanor Watson knocked at the door. She looked prettier than ever in her long silk kimono, with its ruffles of soft lace and the great knot of pink ribbon at her throat. "So you're going to church too," she said, dropping down among Betty's pillows. "I was hoping you'd stay and talk to me. Did you enjoy your frolic?" "Yes, didn't you?" inquired Betty. "I didn't go," returned Eleanor shortly. "Oh, why not?" asked Betty so seriously that Eleanor laughed. "Because the girl who asked me first was ill; and I wouldn't tag along with the little Brooks and the Riches and your fascinating roommate. Now don't say 'why not?' again, or I may hurt your feelings. Do you really like Miss Brooks?" Betty hesitated. As a matter of fact she liked Mary Brooks very much, but she also admired Eleanor Watson and coveted her approval. "I like her well enough," she said slowly, and disappeared into the closet to get something she did not want and change the subject. Eleanor laughed. "You're so polite," she said. "I wish I were. That is, I wish I could make people think I was, without my taking the trouble. Don't go to church." "Helen and Katherine are coming back for me. You'd better go with us," urged Betty. "Now that Kankakee person----" began Eleanor. The door opened suddenly and Katherine and Helen came in. Katherine, who had heard Eleanor's last remark, flushed but said nothing. Eleanor rose deliberately, smoothed the pillows she had been lying on, and walked slowly off, remarking over her shoulder, "In common politeness, knock before you come in." "Or you may hear what I think of you," added Katherine wickedly, as Eleanor shut the door. Helen looked perplexed. "Should I, Betty?" she asked, "when it's my own room." "It's nicer," said Betty. "Nan and I do. How do you like our room, Katherine?" "It's a beaut," said Katherine, taking the hint promptly. "I don't see how you ever fixed your desks and couches, and left so much space in the middle. Our room is like the aisle in a Chicago theatre. That Japanese screen is a peach and the water-color over your desk is another. Did you buy back the chafing-dish?" Betty laughed. She had amused the house by getting up before breakfast on the day after Nan left, in her haste to buy a chafing-dish. In the afternoon Rachel had suggested that a teakettle was really more essential to a college establishment, and they had gone down together to change it. But then had come Miss King's invitation to eat "plowed field" after the frolic; and the chafing-dish, appearing once more the be-all and end-all of existence, had finally replaced the teakettle. "But we're going to have both," ventured Helen shyly. "Oh yes," broke in Betty. "Isn't it fine of Helen to get it and make our tea-table so complete?" As a matter of fact Betty much preferred that the tea-table should be all her own; but Helen was so delighted with the idea of having a part in it, and so sure that she wanted a teakettle more than pillows for her couch, that Betty resolved not to mind the bare-looking bed, which marred the cozy effect of the room, and above all never to let Helen guess how she felt about the tea-table. "But next year you better believe I'm hoping for a single room," she confided to the little green lizard who sat on her inkstand and ogled her while she worked. When church was over Katherine proposed a stroll around the campus before dinner. "I haven't found my bearings at all yet," she said. "Now which building is which?" Betty pointed out the Hilton House proudly. "That's all I know," she said, "except these up here in front of course--the Main Building and Chapel, and Science and Music Halls." "We know the gymnasium," suggested Helen, "and the Belden House, where we bought our screen, is one of the four in that row." They found the Belden House, and picked out the Westcott by its name-plate, which, being new and shiny, was easy to read from a distance. Then Helen made a discovery. "Girls, there's water down there," she cried. Sure enough, behind the back fence and across a road was a pretty pond, with wooded banks and an island, which hid its further side from view. "That must be the place they call Paradise," said Betty. "I've heard Nan speak of it. I thought it was this," and she pointed to a slimy pool about four yards across, below them on the back campus. "That's the only pond I'd noticed." "Oh, no," declared Katherine. "I've heard my scientific roommate speak of that. It's called the Frog Pond and 'of it more anon,' as my already beloved Latin teacher occasionally remarks. To speak plainly, she has promised to let me help her catch her first frog." They walked home through the apple orchard that occupied one corner of the back campus. "It's not a very big campus, and not a bit dignified or imposing, but I like it," said Betty, as they came out on to the main drive again, and started toward the gateway. "Nice and cozy to live with every day," added Katherine. Helen was too busy comparing the red-brick, homely reality with the shaded marble cloisters of her dreams, to say what she thought. Betty's dancing class was a great success. With characteristic energy she organized it Monday morning. It appeared that while all the Chapin house girls could dance except Helen and Adelaide Rich, none of them could "lead" but Eleanor. "And Miss King's friends said we freshmen ought to learn before the sophomore reception, particularly the tall ones; and most of us are tall," explained Betty. "That's all right," interposed Eleanor, "but take my advice and don't learn. If you can't lead, the other girl always will; and the men say it ruins a girl's dancing." "Who cares?" demanded Katherine boldly. "Imagine Betty or Miss Brooks trying to see over me and pull me around! I want to learn, for one--men or no men." "So do I," said Rachel and Mary Rich together. "And I," drawled Roberta languidly. "Oh well, if you're all set upon it, I'll play for you," said Eleanor graciously. She was secretly ashamed of the speech that Katherine had overheard the day before and bitterly regretted having antagonized the girls in the house, when she had meant only to keep them--all but Betty--at a respectful distance. She liked most of them personally, but she wished her friends to be of another type--girls from large schools like her own, who would have influence and a following from the first; girls with the qualities of leadership, who could control votes in class-meetings and push their little set to first place in all the organized activities of the college. Eleanor had said that she came to college for "fun," but "fun" to her meant power and prominence. She was a born politician, with a keen love of manoeuvring and considerable tact and insight when she chose to exercise it. But inexperience and the ease with which she had "run" boarding-school affairs had made her over-confident. She saw now that she had indulged her fondness for sarcasm too far, and was ready to do a good deal to win back the admiration which she was sure the Chapin house girls had felt for her at first. She was particularly anxious to do this, as the freshman class-meeting was only a week off, and she wanted the votes of the house for the Hill School candidate for class-president. So three evenings that week, in spite of her distaste for minor parts and bad pianos, she meekly drummed out waltzes and two-steps on Mrs. Chapin's rickety instrument for a long half hour after dinner, while Betty and Roberta--who danced beautifully and showed an unexpected aptitude in imparting her accomplishment--acted as head-masters, and the rest of the girls furnished the novices with the necessary variety of partners, practiced "leading," and incidentally got better acquainted. On Friday evening, as they sat in the parlor resting and discussing the progress of their pupils and the appalling length of the Livy lesson for the next day, Eleanor broached the subject of the class-meeting. "You know it's to-morrow at two," she said. "Aren't you excited?" "It will be fun to see our class together," said Rachel. Nobody else seemed to take much interest in the subject. "Well, of course," pursued Eleanor, "I'm particularly anxious about it because a dear friend of mine is going to be proposed for class president--Jean Eastman--you know her, Betty." "Oh yes," cried Betty, enthusiastically. "She's that tall, dark girl who was with you yesterday at Cuyler's. She seemed lovely." Eleanor nodded and got up from the piano stool. "I must go to work," she said, smiling cordially round the little group. "Tell them what a good president Jean will make, Betty. And don't one of you forget to come." "She can be very nice when she wants to," said Katherine bluntly when Eleanor was well out of hearing. "I think she's trying to make up for Sunday," said Betty. "Let's all vote for her friend." The first class-meeting of 190- passed off with unwonted smoothness. The class before had forgotten that it is considered necessary for a corporate body to have a constitution; and the class before that had made itself famous by suggesting the addition of the "Woman's Home Monthly" to the magazines in the college reading-room. 190- avoided these and other absurdities. A constitution mysteriously appeared, drawn up in good and regular form, and was read and promptly adopted. Then Eleanor Watson nominated Jean Eastman for president. After she and the other nominees had stood in a blushing row on the platform to be inspected by their class, the voting began. Miss Eastman was declared elected on the first ballot, with exactly four votes more than the number necessary for a choice. "I hope she'll remember that we did that," Katherine Kittredge leaned forward to say to Betty, who sat in the row ahead of her with the fluffy-haired freshman from the Hilton and her "queer" roommate. That night there was a supper in Jean's honor at Holmes's, so Eleanor did not appear at Mrs. Chapin's dinner-table to be duly impressed with a sense of her obligations. "How did you like the class-meeting?" inquired Rachel, who had been for a long walk with a girl from her home town, and so had not seen the others. "I thought it was all right myself," said Adelaide Rich, "but I walked home with a girl named Alford who was dreadfully disgusted. She said it was all cut and dried, and wanted to know who asked Eleanor Watson to write us a constitution. She said she hoped that hereafter we wouldn't sit around tamely and be run by any clique." "Well, somebody must run us," said Betty consolingly. "Those girls know one another and the rest of us don't know any one well. I think it will all work around in time. They will have their turns first, that's all." "Perhaps," admitted Adelaide doubtfully. Her pessimistic acquaintance had obtained a strong hold on her. "And the next thing is the sophomore reception," said Rachel. "And Mountain Day right after that," added Betty. "What?" asked Helen and Roberta together. "Is it possible that you don't know about Mountain Day, children?" asked Mary Brooks soberly. "Well, you've heard about the physical tests for the army and navy, haven't you? This is like those. If you pass your entrance examinations you are allowed a few weeks to recuperate, and then if you can climb the required mountain you can stay on in college." "How very interesting!" drawled Roberta, who had some idea now how to take Mary's jibes. "Now, Betty, please tell us about it." Betty explained that the day after the sophomore reception was a holiday, and that most of the girls seized the opportunity to take an all-day walk or drive into the country around Harding. "Let's all ask our junior and senior friends about the nicest places to go," said Rachel, emphasizing "junior and senior" and looking at Mary. "Then we can make our plans, and engage a carriage if we want one. I should think there might be quite a rush." "You should, should you?" jeered Mary. "My dear, every horse that can stand alone and every respectable vehicle was engaged weeks ago." "No one has engaged our lower appendages," returned Katherine. "So if worse comes to worst, we are quite independent of liveries. Which of us are you going to take to the sophomore reception?" "Roberta, of course," said Mary. "Didn't you know that Roberta and I have a crush on each other? A crush, my dears, in case you are wanting to know, is a warm and adoring friendship. Sorry, but I'm going out this evening." "Has she really asked you, Roberta?" asked Betty. "Yes," said Roberta. "How nice! I'm going with a sophomore whose sister is a friend of Nan's." "And Hester Gulick is going to take me--she's my friend from home," volunteered Rachel. "I was asked to-day," added Helen. "After the class-meeting an awfully nice girl, a junior, came up here. She said there were so many of us that some of the juniors were going to help take us. Isn't it nice of them?" Nobody spoke for a moment; then Katherine went on gaily. "And we other three have not yet been called and chosen, but I happen to know that it's because so many people want us, and nobody will give up. So don't the rest of you indulge in any crowing." "By the way, Betty," said Rachel Morrison, "will you take some more dancing pupils? I was telling two girls who board down the street about our class and they said they wanted to learn before the reception and would much rather come here than go to that big class that two seniors have in the gym. But as they don't know you, they would insist on paying, just as they would at the other class." Betty looked doubtfully at Roberta. "Shall we?" she said. "I don't mind," answered Roberta, "if only you all promise not to tell my father. He wouldn't understand. Do you suppose Miss Watson would play?" "If not, I will," said Mary Rich. "And we could use the money for a house spread," added Betty, "since we all help to earn it." "And christen the chafing-dish," put in Katherine. "Good. Then I'll tell them--Mondays, Tuesdays and Fridays," said Rachel; and the dinner-table dissolved. CHAPTER IV WHOSE PHOTOGRAPH? The dancing class went briskly on; so did the Livy class and the geometry, the English 1, the French required and the history elective. The freshmen were getting acquainted with one another now, and seldom confused their classmates with seniors or youthful members of the faculty. They no longer attempted to go out of chapel ahead of the seniors, or invaded the president's house in their frantic search for Science Hall or the Art Gallery. For October was fast wearing away. The hills about Harding showed flaming patches of scarlet, and it was time for the sophomore reception and Mountain Day. Betty was very much excited about the reception, but she felt also that a load would slip off her shoulders when it was over. She was anxious about the progress of the dancing pupils, who had increased to five, besides Helen and Adelaide, and for whom she felt a personal responsibility, because the Chapin house girls persisted in calling the class hers. And what would father say if they didn't get their money's worth? Then there was Helen's dress for the reception, which she was sure was a fright, but couldn't get up the courage to inquire about. And last and worst of all was the mysterious grind-book and Dorothy King's warning about father's telegram to the registrar. She had never mentioned the incident to anybody, but from certain annoying remarks that Mary Brooks let fall she was sure that Mary knew all about it and that the sophomores were planning to make telling use of it. "How's your friend the registrar?" Mary would inquire solemnly every few days. And if Betty refused to answer she would say slyly, "Who met you at the station, did you tell me? Oh, only Dottie King?" until Betty almost decided to stop her by telling the whole story. Two days before the reception she took Rachel and Katherine into her confidence about Helen's dress. "You see if I could only look at it, maybe I could show her how to fix it up," she explained, "but I'm afraid to ask. I'm pretty sure she's sensitive about her looks and her clothes. I should want to be told if I was such a fright, but maybe she's happier without knowing." "She can't help knowing if she stays here long," said Rachel. "Why don't you get out your dress, and then perhaps she'll show hers," suggested Katherine. "I could do that," assented Betty doubtfully. "I could find a place to mend, I guess. Chiffon tears so easily." "Good idea," said Rachel heartily. "Try that, and then if she doesn't bite you'd better let things take their course. But it is too bad to have her go looking like a frump, after all the trouble we've taken with her dancing." Betty went back to her room, sat down at her desk and began again at her Livy. "For I might as well finish this first," she thought; and it was half an hour before she shut the scarlet-covered book with a slam and announced somewhat ostentatiously that she had finished her Latin lesson. "And now I must mend my dress for the reception," she went on consciously. "Mother is always cautioning me not to wait till the last minute to fix things." "Did you look up all the constructions in the Livy?" asked Helen. Betty was so annoyingly quick about everything. "No," returned Betty cheerfully from the closet, where she was rummaging for her dress. "I shall guess at those. Why don't you try it? Oh, dear! This is dreadfully mussed," and she appeared in the closet door with a fluffy white skirt over her arm. "How pretty!" exclaimed Helen, deserting her Livy to examine it. "Is it long?" "Um-um," said Betty taking a pin out of her mouth and hunting frantically for a microscopic rip. "Yes, it's long, and it has a train. My brother Will persuaded mother to let me have one. Wasn't he a brick?" "Yes," said Helen shortly, going back to her desk and opening her book again. Presently she hitched her chair around to face Betty. "Mine's awfully short," she said. "Is it?" asked Betty politely. There was a pause. Then, "Would you care to see it?" asked Helen. Betty winked at the green lizard. "Yes indeed," she said cordially. "Why don't you try it on to be sure it's all right? I'm going to put on mine in just a minute." She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the dress. It was a simple white muslin. The sleeves were queer, the neck too high to be low and too low to be high, and the skirt ridiculously short. "But it might have been a lot worse," reflected Betty. "If she'll only fix it!" "Wait a minute," she said after she had duly admired it. "I'll put mine on, and we'll see how we both look dressed up." "You look like a regular princess out of a story-book," said Helen solemnly, when Betty turned to her for inspection. Betty laughed. "Oh, wait till to-morrow night," she said. "My hair's all mussed now. I wonder how you'd look with your hair low, Helen." Helen flushed and bit her lip. "I shan't look anyhow in this horrid short dress," she said. "Then why don't you make it longer, and lower in the neck?" inquired Betty impatiently. Helen was as conscientiously slow about making up her mind as she was about learning her Livy. "It's hemmed, isn't it? Anyhow you could piece it under the ruffle." "Do you suppose mamma would care?" said Helen dubiously. "Anyway I don't believe I have time--only till to-morrow night." "Oh I'll show you how," Betty broke in eagerly. "And if your mother should object you could put it back, you know. You begin ripping out the hem, and then we'll hang it." Helen Chase Adams proved to be a pains-taking and extremely slow sewer. Besides, she insisted on taking time off to learn her history and geometry, instead of "risking" them as Betty did and urged her to do. The result was that Betty had to refuse Mary Brooks's invitation to "come down to the gym and dance the wax into that blooming floor" the next afternoon, and was tired and cross by the time she had done Helen's hair low, hooked her into the transformed dress, and finished her own toilette. She had never thought to ask the name of Helen's junior, and was surprised and pleased when Dorothy King appeared at their door. Dorothy's amazement was undisguised. "You'll have to be costumer for our house plays next year, Miss Wales," she said, while Betty blushed and contradicted all Helen's explanations. "You're coming on the campus, of course." "So virtue isn't its only reward after all," said Eleanor Watson, who had come in just in time to hear Miss King's remark. "Helen Chase Adams isn't exactly a vision of loveliness yet. She won't be mistaken for the college beauty, but she's vastly improved. I only wish anybody cared to take as much trouble for me." "Oh, Eleanor!" said Betty reproachfully. "As if any one could improve you!" Eleanor's evening dress was a pale yellow satin that brought out the brown lights in her hair and eyes and the gleaming whiteness of her shoulders. There were violets in her hair, which was piled high on her head, and more violets at her waist; and as she stood full in the light, smiling at Betty's earnestness, Betty was sure she had never seen any one half so lovely. "But I wish you wouldn't be so sarcastic over Helen," she went on stoutly. "She can't help being such a freak." Eleanor yawned. "I was born sarcastic," she said. "I wish Lil Day would hurry. Did you happen to notice that I cut three classes straight this morning?" "No," said Betty aghast. "Oh, Eleanor, how dare you when--" She stopped suddenly, remembering that Eleanor had asked her not to speak of the entrance conditions. "When I have so much to make up already, you mean," Eleanor went on complacently. "Oh, I shall manage somehow. Here they come." A few moments later the freshman and sophomore classes, with a sprinkling of juniors to make the numbers even, were gathered _en masse_ in the big gymnasium. All the afternoon loyal sophomores had toiled thither from the various campus houses, lugging palms, screens, portières and pillows. Inside another contingent had arranged these contributions, festooned the running-track with red and green bunting, risked their lives to fasten Japanese lanterns to the cross-beams, and disguised the apparatus against the walls with great branches of spruce and cedar, which still other merry, wind-blown damsels, driving a long-suffering horse, had deposited at intervals near the back door. By five o'clock it was finished and everybody, having assured everybody else that the gym never looked so well before, had gone home to dress for the evening. Now the lights softened what Mary Brooks called the "hidjous" greens of the freshman bunting, a band played sweet music behind the palms, and pretty girls in pretty gowns sat in couples on the divans that lined the walls, or waited in line to speak to the receiving party. This consisted of Jean Eastman and the sophomore president, who stood in front of the fireplace, where a line of ropes intended to be used in gym practice had been looped back and made the best sort of foundation for a green canopy over their heads. Ten of the prettiest sophomores acted as ushers, and four popular and much envied seniors presided at the frappé bowls in the four corners of the room. "There's not much excitement about a manless dance, but it's a fascinating thing to watch," said Eleanor to her partner, as they stood in the running-track looking down at the dancers. "I'm afraid you're blasé, Miss Watson," returned the sophomore. "Only seniors are allowed to dislike girl dances." Eleanor laughed. "Well, I seem to be the only heretic present," she said. "They're certainly having a good time down there." They certainly were. The novelty of the occasion appealed to the freshmen, and the more sophisticated sophomores were bound to make a reputation as gallant beaux. So although only half the freshman could dance at once and even then the floor was dreadfully crowded, and in spite of the fact that the only refreshment was the rather watery frappé which gave out early in the evening, 190-'s reception to 190- was voted a great success. At nine o'clock the sophomore ushers began arranging the couples in a long line leading to the grind table, and Betty knew that her hour had come. The orchestra played a march, and as the girls walked past the table the sophomore officers presented each freshman with a small booklet bound in the freshman green, on the front cover of which, in letters of sophomore scarlet, was the cryptic legend: "Puzzle--name the girl." This was explained, however, by the inside, where appeared a small and rather cloudy blue-print, showing the back view of a girl in shirt-waist and short skirt, with a pile of books under her arm, and the inevitable "tam" on her head. On the opposite page was a facsimile telegraph blank, filled out to the registrar, "Please meet my dear young daughter, who will arrive on Thursday by the 6:15, and oblige, "Thomas ----." Everybody laughed, pushed her neighbors around for a back view, and asked the sophomores if the telegram had truly been sent, and if this was the real girl's picture. So no one noticed Betty's blushes except Mary Brooks, upon whom she vowed eternal vengeance. For she remembered how one afternoon the week before, she and Mary had started from the house together, and Mary, who said she was taking her camera down-town for a new film, had dropped behind on some pretext. Betty had been sure she heard the camera click, but Mary had grinned and told her not to be so vain of her back. However, nobody recognized the picture. The few sophomores who knew anything about it were pledged to secrecy, as the grinds were never allowed to become too personal, and the freshmen treated the telegram as an amusing myth. In a few minutes every one was dancing again, and only too soon it was ten o'clock. "Wasn't it fun?" said Betty enthusiastically, as she and Helen undressed. "Oh yes," agreed Helen. "I never had such a good time in my life. But, do you know, Miss Watson says she was bored, and Roberta thought it was tiresome and the grind-book silly and impossible." "Truth is stranger than fiction sometimes," said Betty sagely, smothering a laugh in the pillows. She was asleep in five minutes, but Helen lay for a long while thinking over the exciting events of the evening. How she had dreaded it! At home she hated dances and never went if she could help it, because she was such a wall-flower. She had been afraid it would be the same here, but it wasn't. What a lovely time she had had! She could dance so well now, and Miss King's friends were so nice, and college was such a beautiful place, though it was so different from what she had expected. Across the hall Roberta had lighted her student lamp and was sitting up to write an appreciative and very clever account of the evening to her cousin, who was reporter on a Boston paper and had made her promise to send him an occasional college item. And Eleanor, still in the yellow satin, sat at her desk scribbling aimlessly on a pad of paper or staring at a clean sheet, which began, "My dear father." She had meant to write him that she was tired of college and wanted to come home at once; but somehow she couldn't begin. For she thought, "I can see him raise his eyebrows and smile and say, 'so you want to throw up the sponge, do you? I was under the impression that you had promised to stay out the year,' as he did to the private secretary who wouldn't sit up with him till three in the morning to write letters." Finally she tore up "My dear father," and went to bed in the dark. CHAPTER V UP HILL--AND DOWN The next day was just the sort that everybody had been hoping for on Mountain Day,--crisp and clear and cool, with the inspiriting tang in the air, the delicious warmth in the sunshine, and the soft haze over the hills, that belong to nothing but a New England October at its best. The Chapin house breakfast-table was unusually lively, for each girl wanted to tell what she thought about the reception and how she was going to spend Mountain Day; and nobody seemed anxious to listen to anybody's else story. "Sh--sh," demanded Mary Brooks at last. "Now children, you've talked long enough. Run and get your lunch boxes and begin making your sandwiches. Mrs. Chapin wants us to finish by ten o'clock." "Ten o'clock!" repeated Katherine. "Well, I should hope so. Our horse is ordered for nine." "Going to be gone all day?" inquired Mary sweetly. "Of course," answered Katherine with dignity. "Well, don't kill the poor beast," called Mary as she ran up-stairs for her box. Mary was going off in a barge with the sophomore decorating committee, who wanted a good chance to congratulate and condole with one another over their Herculean labors and ultimate triumph of the day before. The Rich sisters had decided to spend the holiday with an aunt who lived twenty miles down the river; Eleanor had promised early in the fall to go out with a party of horseback riders; and Helen, whose pocketbook had been prematurely flattened to buy her teakettle, had decided to accept the invitation of a girl in her geometry division to join an economical walking party. This left Rachel, Katherine, Roberta and Betty, who had hired a horse and two-seated trap for the day, invited Alice Waite, Betty's little friend from the Hilton House, to join them, and were going to drive "over the notch." "I haven't the least idea what a notch is like," said Katherine. "We don't have such things where I come from. But it sounds interesting." "Doesn't it?" assented Rachel absently, counting the ham sandwiches. "Do you suppose the hills are very steep, Betty?" "Oh, I guess not. Anyhow Katherine and I told the man we were going there and wanted a sure-footed horse." "Who's going to drive?" asked Roberta. "Why, you, of course," said Katherine quickly. "You said you were used to driving." "Oh, yes, I am," conceded Roberta hastily and wondered if she would better tell them any more. It was true that she was used to horses, but she had never conquered her fear of them, and they always found her out. It was a standing joke in the Lewis family that the steadiest horse put on airs and pranced for Roberta. Even old Tom, that her little cousins drove out alone--Roberta blushed as she remembered her experience with old Tom. But if the girls were depending on her--"Betty drives too," she said aloud. "She and I can take turns. Are you sure we have enough gingersnaps?" Everybody laughed, for Roberta's fondness for gingersnaps had become proverbial. "Half a box apiece," said Rachel, "and it is understood that you are to have all you want even if the rest of us don't get any." When the horse arrived Roberta's last fear vanished. He was meekness personified. His head drooped sadly and his eyes were half shut. His fuzzy nose and large feet bespoke docile endurance, while the heavy trap to which he was harnessed would certainly discourage all latent tendencies to undue speed. Alice Waite, Rachel and Katherine climbed in behind, Betty and Roberta took the front seat, and they started at a jog trot down Meriden Place. "Shall we go through Main Street?" asked Roberta. "He might be afraid of the electric cars." "Afraid of nothing," said Betty decidedly. "Besides, Alice wants to stop at the grocery." The "beastie," as Katherine called him, stood like a statue before Mr. Phelps's grocery and never so much as moved an eyelash when three trolley cars dashed by him in quick succession. "What did you get?" asked Katherine, when Alice came out laden with bundles. "Olives----" "Good! We forgot those." "And bananas----" "The very thing! We have grapes." "And wafers and gingersnaps----" Everybody laughed riotously. "What's the matter now?" inquired Alice, looking a little offended. Rachel explained. "Well, if you have enough for the lunch," said Alice, "let's keep these out to eat when we feel hungry." And the box was accordingly stuffed between Betty and Roberta for safe keeping. Down on the meadow road it was very warm. By the time they reached the ferry, the "beastie's" thick coat was dripping wet and he breathed hard. "Ben drivin' pretty fast, hain't you?" asked the ferryman, patting the horse's hairy nose. "I should think not," said Katherine indignantly. "Why, he walked most of the way." "Wall, remember that there trap's very heavy," said the ferryman solemnly, as he shoved off. Beyond the river the hills began. The "beastie" trailed slowly up them. Several times Roberta pulled him out to the side of the road to let more ambitious animals pass him. "Do you suppose he's really tired?" she whispered to Betty, as they approached a particularly steep pitch. "He might back down." "Girls," said Betty hastily, "I'm sick of sitting still, so I'm going to walk up this next hill. Any of you want to come?" Relieved of his four passengers the horse still hung his head and lifted each clumsy foot with an effort. "Oh, Roberta, there's a watering trough up here," called Betty from the top of the hill. "I'm sure that'll revive him." By their united efforts they got the "beastie" up to the trough, which was most inconveniently located on a steep bank beside the road; and while Betty and Alice kept the back wheels of the trap level, Katherine unfastened the check-rein. To her horror, as the check dropped the bits came out of the horse's mouth. "How funny," said Alice, "just like everything up here. Did you ever see a harness like that, Betty?" Betty left her post at the hind wheel and came around to investigate. "Why he has two bits," she said. "Of course he couldn't go, poor creature. And see how thirsty he is!" "Well, he's drunk enough now," said Roberta, "and you'll have to put the extra bits in again--that is, if you can. He'd trail his nose on the ground if he wasn't checked." The "beastie" stood submissively while the bits were replaced and the check fastened. Then he chewed a handful of clover with avidity and went on again as dejectedly as ever. Presently they reached a long, level stretch of road and stopped in the shade of a big pine-tree for a consultation. "Do you suppose this is the top?" asked Rachel. Just then a merry tally-ho party of freshmen, tooting horns and singing, drew up beside them. "Is this the top of the notch?" asked Betty, waving her hand to some girls she knew. "No, it's three miles further on," they called back. "Hurrah for 190-!" "Well?" said Betty, who felt in no mood for cheering. "Let's go back to that pretty grove two hills down and tie this apology for a horse to the fence and spend the rest of the day there," suggested Katherine. Everybody agreed to this, and Roberta backed her steed round with a flourish. "Now let's each have a gingersnap before we start down," she said. So the box was opened and passed. Roberta gathered the reins in one hand, clucked to the horse, and put her gingersnap into her mouth for the first bite. But she never got it, for without the slightest provocation the "beastie" gave a sudden spring forward, flopped his long tail over the reins, and started at a gallop down the road. Betty clung to the dashboard with one hand and tried to pluck off the obstructing tail with the other. Roberta, with the gingersnap still in her mouth, tugged desperately at the lines, and the back seat yelled "Whoa!" lustily, until Betty, having rearranged the tail and regained her seat, advised them to help pull instead. They had long since left the little grove behind, had dashed past half a dozen carriages, and were down on the level road near the ferry, when the "beastie" stopped as suddenly as he had started. Roberta deliberately removed the gingersnap from her mouth, handed the reins to Betty to avoid further interruption, and began to eat, while the rest of the party indulged in unseemly laughter at her expense. "We've found out what that extra bit was for," said Rachel when the mirth had subsided, "and we can advise the liveryman that it doesn't work. But what are we going to do now?" "Murder the liveryman," suggested Katherine. "But the horse is sure-footed; he didn't lie," objected Alice so seriously that everybody burst out laughing again. "He told the truth, but not the whole truth," said Rachel. "Next time we'll ask how many bits the horse has to wear and how it takes to hills. Now what can we do?" "We can't go back to the woods, that's sure," said Katherine. "And it's too hot to stay down here. Let's go home and get rid of this sure-footed incubus, and then we can decide what to do next." The ferryman greeted them cheerfully. "Back so soon?" he said. "Had your dinner?" "Of course not," replied Katherine severely. "It's only twelve o'clock. We're just out for a morning drive. Do you remember saying that this horse was tired? Well, he brought us down the hills at about a mile a minute." "Is that so!" declared the ferryman with a chuckle. "Scairt, were you? Why didn't you git them young Winsted fellers, that jest started up, to rescue yer? Might a ben quite a story." "We didn't need rescuing, thank you," said Katherine. "Did you see any men?" she whispered to Betty. Betty nodded. "Four, driving a span. They were awfully amused. Miss King was in another of the carriages," she added sadly. Then she caught sight of Roberta and began to laugh again. "You were so funny with that cookie in your mouth," she said. "Were you dreadfully frightened?" "No," said Roberta, with a guilty blush. "I always expect something to happen. Horses are such uncertain creatures." They drove back through the meadows at a moderate pace, deposited the horse and a certified opinion of him with an apologetic liveryman, and carried their lunch down to Paradise. "For it's as pretty as any place and near, and we're all hungry," Alice said. Paradise was deserted, for the girls had preferred to range further afield on Mountain Day. So the five freshmen chose two boats, rowed up stream without misadventure, spread out their luncheon on a grassy knoll, and ate, talked, and read till dinner time. As they crossed the campus, they met parties of dusty, disheveled pedestrians, laden with purple asters and autumn branches. A barge stopped at the gateway to deposit the campus contingent of the sophomore decorating committee, and in front of the various dwelling-houses empty buckboards, surreys and express wagons, waiting to be called for, showed that the holiday was over. "I don't think our first Mountain Day has been so bad after all, in spite of that dreadful horse," said Rachel. "So much pleasant variety about it," added Katherine. "Let's not tell about the runaway," said Alice who hated to be teased. "But Miss King saw us," expostulated Betty, "and you can trust Mary Brooks to know all about it." When Mary, who was late in dressing, entered the dining-room, she gave a theatrical cry of joy. "I'm so glad you're all safe," she said. "And how about that cookie, Roberta?" "I'm sorry, but it's gone. They're all gone," said Roberta coolly. "Now you might as well tell us how you knew." "Knew!" repeated Mary scornfully. "The whole college knows by this time. We were lunching on the notch road, near the top, when four Winsted men came up, and asked if they might join us. They knew most of us. So we said yes, if they'd brought any candy, and they told us a strange story about five girls--very young girls, they said," interpolated Mary emphatically, "that they'd seen dashing down the notch. One was trying to eat a cookie, and another was pulling the horse's tail, and the rest were screaming at the top of their lungs, so naturally the horse was frightened to death. Pretty soon three carriage loads of juniors came along and they confirmed the awful news and gave us the names of the victims, and you can imagine how I felt. The men want to meet you, but I told them they couldn't because of course you'd be drowned in the river." "I hope you'll relieve their minds the next time they come to see you," said Katherine. "Are they the youths who monopolize our piazza every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon?" "Two of them help occasionally." Katherine winked meaningly at the rest of the Mountain Day party. "We'll be there," she said, "though it goes against my conscience to receive calls from such untruthful young gentlemen." The next Saturday afternoon Betty and Katherine established themselves ostentatiously on the front piazza to await the arrival of Mary's callers, Rachel had gone to play basket-ball, and Roberta had refused to conspire against Mary's peace of mind, particularly since the plot might involve having to talk to a man. Promptly at three o'clock two gentlemen arrived. "Miss Brooks is that sorry, but she had to go out," announced the maid in tones plainly audible to the two eavesdroppers. "Would you please to come back at four?" Katherine and Betty exchanged disappointed glances. "Checked again. She's too much for us," murmured Katherine. "Shall we wait?" "And is Miss Wales in--Miss Betty Wales?" pursued the spokesman, after a slight pause. The maid looked severely at the occupants of the piazza. "Yes, sor, you can see that yoursilf," she said and abruptly withdrew. The man laughed and came quickly toward Betty, who had risen to meet him. "I'm John Parsons," he said. "I roomed with your brother at Andover. He told me you were here and asked me to call. Didn't he write to you too? Miss Brooks promised to present me, but as she isn't in----" "Oh, yes, Will wrote, and I'm very glad to meet you, Mr. Parsons," Betty broke in. "Only I didn't know you were--I mean I didn't know that Miss Brooks's caller was you. Miss Kittredge, Mr. Parsons. Wasn't your friend going to wait?" "Bob," called Mr. Parsons after the retreating figure of his companion, "come back and hear about the runaway. You're wanted." It was fully half-past four when Messrs. Parsons and Hughes, remembering that they had another engagement, left their escorts by request at the gymnasium and returned from a pleasant walk through Paradise and the campus to Meriden Place, where a rather frigid reception awaited them. Betty and Katherine, having watched the finish of the basket-ball game, followed them, and spent the time before dinner in painting a poster which they hung conspicuously on Mary's door. On it a green dragon, recently adopted as freshman class animal, charged the sophomores' purple cow and waved a long and very curly tail in triumph. Underneath was written in large letters, "Quits. Who is going to the Kappa Phi dance at Winsted?" "I'm dreadfully afraid mother won't let me go though," said Betty as they hammered in the pins with Helen's paper-weight. "And anyhow it's not for three whole weeks." When the drawing was securely fastened, Betty surveyed it doubtfully. "I wonder if we'd better take it down," she said at last. "I don't believe it's very dignified. I'm afraid I oughtn't to have asked Mr. Parsons to call his friend back, but I did so want to meet both of them and crow over Mary. And it was they who suggested the walk. Katherine, do you mind if we take this down?" "Why, no, if you don't want to leave it," said Katherine looking puzzled. "I'm afraid Mr. Hughes didn't have a very good time. Men aren't my long suit. But otherwise I think we did this up brown." Just then Eleanor came up, and Katherine gave her an enthusiastic account of the afternoon's adventure. Betty was silent. Presently she asked, "Girls, what is a back row reputation?" "I don't know. Why?" asked Eleanor. "Well, you know I stopped at the college, Katherine, to get my history paper back. Miss Ellis looked hard at me when I went in and stammered out what I wanted. She hunted up the paper and gave it to me and then she said, 'With which division do you recite, Miss Wales?' I told her at ten, and she looked at me hard again and said, 'You have been present in class twelve times and I've never noticed you. Don't acquire a back row reputation, Miss Wales. Good-day,' and I can tell you I backed out in a hurry." "I suppose she means that we sit on the back rows when we don't know the lesson," said Helen who had joined the group. "I see," said Betty. "And do you suppose the faculty notice such things as that and comment on them to one another?" "Of course," said Eleanor wisely. "They size us up right off. So does our class, and the upper class girls." "Gracious!" said Betty. "I wish I hadn't promised to go to a spread on the campus to-night. I wish---- What a nuisance so many reputations are!" And she crumpled the purple cow and the green dragon into a shapeless wad and threw it at Rachel, who was coming up-stairs swinging her gym shoes by their strings. CHAPTER VI LETTERS HOME Betty was cross and "just a tiny speck homesick," so she confided to the green lizard. Nothing interesting had happened since she could remember, and it had rained steadily for four days. Mr. Parsons, who played right tackle on the Winsted team, had written that he was laid up with a lame shoulder, which, greatly to his regret, would prevent his taking Betty to his fraternity dance. Helen was toiling on a "lit." paper with a zealous industry which got her up at distressingly early hours in the morning, and was "enough to mad a saint," according to her exasperated roommate, whose own brief effusion on the same subject had been hastily composed in one evening and lay neatly copied in her desk, ready to be handed in at the proper time. Moreover, "gym" had begun and Betty had had the misfortune to be assigned to a class that came right in the middle of the afternoon. "It's a shame," she grumbled, fishing out her fountain pen which had fallen off her desk and rolled under the bureau. "I shall change my lit. to afternoon--that's only two afternoons spoiled instead of four--and then tell Miss Andrews that I have a conflict. Haven't you finished that everlasting paper?" "No," said Helen meekly. "I'm sorry that I'm so slow. I'll go out if you want to have the girls in here." "Oh no," called Betty savagely, dashing out into the hall. Eleanor's door was ornamented with a large sign which read, "Busy. Don't disturb." But the door was half-way open, and in the dusky room, lighted, as Eleanor liked to have it, by candles in old-fashioned brass sticks, Eleanor sat on a pile of cushions in the corner, strumming softly on her guitar. "Come in," she called. "I put that up in case I wanted to study later. Finished your lit. paper?" Betty nodded. "It's awfully short." "I'm going to do mine to-night--that and a little matter of Livy and French and--let me see--Bible--no, elocution." "Can you?" asked Betty admiringly. "I'm not sure till I've tried. I've been meditating asking your roommate to do the paper. Would you?" "No," said Betty so emphatically that Eleanor stopped playing and looked at her curiously. "Why not? Do you think it's wrong to exchange her industry for my dollars?" Betty considered. She still admired Eleanor, but she had learned her limitations. Her beauty wove a spell about all that she did, and she was very clever and phenomenally quick when she cared to apply herself. But she cared so seldom, roused herself only when she could gain prestige, when there was something to manipulate, to manage. And apparently she was not even to be trusted. Still, what was the use of quarreling with her about honor and fair play? To Betty in her present mood it seemed a mere waste of time and energy. "Well, for one reason," she said at last, "Helen hasn't her own paper done yet, and for another I don't think she writes as well as you probably do;" and she rose to go. "That was a joke, Bettina," Eleanor called after her. "I am truly going to work now--this very instant. Come back at ten and have black coffee with me." Betty went on without answering to Rachel's room. "Come in," chorused three cheerful voices. "No, go get your lit. paper first. We're reading choice selections," added Katherine. "She means she is," corrected Rachel, handing Betty a pillow. "You look cross, Betty." "I am," said Betty savagely, recounting a few of her woes. "What can we do? I came to be amused." "In a Miracle play of this type----" began Katherine, and stopped to dodge a pillow. "But it is amusing, Betty." "I'm afraid it will amuse Miss Mills, if the rest is anything like what you read," said Rachel with a reminiscent smile. "What are you doing, Roberta?" "Writing home," drawled Roberta, without looking up from her paper. "Well, you needn't shake your fountain pen over me, if you are," said Katherine. "I also owe my honored parents a letter, but I've about made up my mind never to write to them again. Listen to this, will you." She rummaged in her desk for a minute. "Here it is. "'My dear daughter'--he only begins that way when he's fussed. I always know how he's feeling when I see whether it's 'daughter' or 'K.' 'My dear daughter:--Your interesting letter of the 12th inst. was received and I enclose a check, which I hope will last for some weeks.' ("I'm sorry to say it's nearly gone already," interpolated Katherine.) "'Your mother and I enjoyed the account of the dance you attended in the gymnasium, of the candy pull which Mrs. Chapin so kindly arranged for her roomers, and the game of hockey that ended so disastrously for one of your friends. We are glad that you attended the Morality play of "Everyman," though we are at a loss to know what you mean by the "peanut gallery." However it occurs to us that with your afternoon gymnasium class, your recitations, which, as I understand it, fully engage your mornings, and all these diversions in one week, you could have spent but little time in the study of your lessons. Do not forget that these years should be devoted to a serious preparation for the multifarious duties of life, and do not neglect the rich opportunities which I am proud to be able to give you. The Wetherbees have----' Oh well, the rest of it is just Kankakee news," said Katherine, folding the letter and putting it back in her desk. "But isn't that first bit lovely? Why, I racked my brain till it ached, positively ached, thinking of interesting things to say in that letter, and now because I didn't mention that I'd worked three solid hours on my German every day that week and stood in line at the library for an hour to get hold of Bryce's American Commonwealth, I receive this pathetic appeal to my better self." "How poetic you're getting," laughed Betty. "Do you know it's awfully funny, but I got a letter something like that too. Only mine was from Nan, and it just said she hoped I was remembering to avoid low grades and conditions, as they were a great bother. She said she wanted me to have a good time, but as there would be even more to do when I got on the campus, I ought not to fall into the habit of neglecting my work this year." "Mine was from Aunt Susan," chimed in Rachel. "She said she didn't see when I could do any studying except late at night, and she hoped I wasn't being so foolish as to undermine my health and ruin my complexion for the sake of a few girlish pleasures. Isn't that nice--girlish pleasures? She put in a five dollar bill, though I couldn't see why she should, considering her sentiments." Roberta put the cap on to her fountain pen and propped it carefully against an adjacent pillow. "I've just answered mine," she said, sorting the sheets in her lap with a satisfied smile. "Did you get one, too? What did you say?" demanded Betty. "The whole truth," replied Roberta languidly. "It took eight pages and I hope he'll enjoy it." "I say," cried Katherine excitedly. "That's a great idea. Let's try it." "And read them to one another afterward," added Rachel. "They might be more entertaining than your lit. paper." "May I borrow some paper?" asked Betty. "I'm hoping Helen will finish to-night if I let her alone." Roberta helped herself to a book from the shelves and an apple from the table, and the rest settled themselves to their epistolary labors. Except for the scratching of Betty's pen, and an occasional exclamation of pleasure or perplexity from one of the scribes, the room was perfectly still. Betty had just asked for an envelope and Katherine was numbering her pages when Mary Brooks knocked at the door. "What on earth are you girls doing?" she inquired blandly, selecting the biggest apple in the dish and appropriating the Morris chair, which Katherine had temporarily vacated. "I haven't heard a sound in here since nine o'clock. I began to think that Helen had come in and blown out the gas again by mistake and you were all asphyxiated." Everybody laughed at the remembrance of a recent occasion when Helen had absent-mindedly blown out the gas while Betty was saying her prayers. "It wasn't so funny at the time," said Betty ruefully. "Suppose she'd gone to sleep without remembering. We've been writing home, Mary," she said, turning to the newcomer, "and now we're going to read the letters, and we've got to hurry, for it's almost ten. Roberta, you begin." "Oh no," said Roberta, looking distressed. "I wish somebody would tell me what this is all about first," put in Mary. Rachel explained, while Katherine and Betty persuaded Roberta to read her letter. "It isn't fair," she protested, "when I wrote a real letter and you others were just doing it for fun." "Go on, Roberta!" commanded Mary, and Roberta in sheer desperation seized her letter and began to read. "DEAR PAPA:--I have been studying hard all the evening and it is now nearly bedtime, but I can at least begin a letter to you. To-day has been the fourth rainy day in succession and we have thoroughly appreciated the splendid opportunity for uninterrupted work. Yesterday morning--I think enough has happened in these two days to fill my letter--I was up at seven as usual. I stuck a selection from Browning into my mirror, as it was the basis of our elocution lesson, and nearly learned it while I dressed. Before chapel I completed my geometry preparation. This was fortunate, as I was called on to recite, the sixth proposition in book third being my assignment. The next hour I had no recitation, so I went to the library to do some reference work for my English class. Ten girls were already waiting for the same volume of the Century Dictionary that I wanted, so I couldn't get hold of it till nearly the end of the hour. I spent the intervening time on the Browning. I had Livy the next hour and was called on to translate. As I had spent several hours on the lesson the day before, I could do so. After the elocution recitation I went home to lunch. At quarter before two I began studying my history. At quarter before four I started for the gymnasium. At five I went to a tea which one of the girls was giving for her mother, so I felt obliged to go. I stayed only half an hour and cannot remember how I spent the half hour till dinner, so I presume it was wasted. I am afraid I am too much given to describing such unimportant pauses in the day's occupation and magnifying their length and the frivolous pleasure which we thoughtlessly derive from them. "In the evening---- Oh it all goes on like that," cried Roberta. "Just dull and stuffy and true to the facts. Some one else read." "It's convincing," chuckled Mary. "Now Katherine." Katherine's letter was an absurd mixture of sense and nonsense, in which she proved that she studied at least twelve hours out of the twenty-four. Rachel's was a sensible explanation of just how much time, or rather how little, a spread, a dance or a basket-ball game takes. "That's what they don't understand," she said, "and they don't know either how fast we can go from one thing to another up here. Why, energy is in the air!" Betty's letter, like her literature paper, was extremely short. "I couldn't think of much to say, if I told the truth," she explained, blushing. "I don't suppose I do study as much as I ought." Mary had listened with an air of respectful attention to all the letters. When the last one was finished she rose hastily. "I must go back," she said. "I have a theme to write. I only dropped in to ask if that famous spread wasn't coming off soon." "Oh, yes," said Betty. "Let's have it next week Wednesday. Is anything else going on then? I'll ask Eleanor and you see the Riches and Helen." A few days later Mary appeared at the lunch table fairly bursting with importance. "Well," she said, beaming around the table. "What do you suppose has happened now? Really, Mrs. Chapin, you ought to be proud of us. We began to be famous before college opened----" "What?" interrupted Eleanor. "Is it possible you didn't know that?" inquired Mary. "Well, it's true nevertheless. And we were the heroines of Mountain Day, and now we're famous again." "How?" demanded the table in a chorus. Mary smiled enigmatically. "This time it is a literary sensation," she said. "Is it Helen's paper?" hazarded Betty. "Mine, of course," said Katherine. "Strange Miss Mills didn't mention it this morning when I met her at Cuyler's." Mary waited until it was quiet again. "If you've quite finished guessing," she said, "I'll tell you. You remember the evening when I found four of you in Rachel and Katherine's room writing deceitful letters to your fond parents. Well, I had been racking my brains for weeks for a pleasing and original theme subject. You know you are supposed to spend two hours a week on this theme course, and I had spent two hours for four weeks in just thinking what to write. I'm not sure whether that counts at all and I didn't like to ask--it would have been so conspicuous. So I was in despair when I chanced upon your happy gathering and was saved. Miss Raymond read it in class to-day," concluded Mary triumphantly. "You didn't put us into it--our letters!" gasped Roberta. "Indeed I did," said Mary. "I put them all in, as nearly as I could remember them, and Miss Raymond read it in class, and made all sorts of clever comments about college customs and ideals and so on. I felt guilty, because I never had anything read before, and of course I didn't exactly write this because the letters were the main part of it. So after class I waited for Miss Raymond and explained how it was. She laughed and said that she was glad I had an eye for good material and that she supposed all authors made more or less use of their acquaintance, and when I went off she actually asked me to come and see her. My junior friends are hoping it will pull me into a society and I'm hoping it will avert a condition." "Where is the theme?" asked Eleanor. "Won't you read it to us?" "It's--why, I forgot the very best part of the whole story. Sallie Hill has it for the 'Argus.' She's the literary editor, you know, and she wants it for the next number. So you see you are famous. "Why don't some of you elect this work?" asked Mary, when the excitement had somewhat subsided. "It's open to freshmen, and it's really great fun." "I thought you said that you spent eight hours and were in despair----" began Eleanor. "So I was," said Mary. "I declare I'd forgotten that. Well, anyhow I'm sure I shan't have any trouble now. I think I've learned how to go at it. Why, do you know, girls, I have an idea already. Not for a theme--something else. It concerns all of you--or most of you anyway." "I should think you'd made enough use of us for the present," said Betty. "Why don't you try to make a few sophomores famous?" "Oh it doesn't concern you that way. You are to---- Oh wait till I get it started," said Mary vaguely; and absolutely refused to be more explicit. CHAPTER VII A DRAMATIC CHAPTER The Chapin house girls decided not to spend the proceeds of the dancing class for an elaborate supper, as they had first intended, but to turn their "spread" into the common college type, where "plowed field" and chocolate made with condensed milk and boiling water are the chief refreshments, and light-hearted sociability ensures a good time for everybody. "But do let's have tea too," Betty had proposed. "I hate the chocolate that the girls make, and I don't believe tea keeps many of us awake. Did I tell you that mother sent a big box of cheese crackers?" The spread was to be in Betty's room, partly because she owned the only chafing-dish in the house, and partly because eighteen girls--the nine hostesses and the one guest asked by each--could get into it without uncomfortable crowding. Eleanor had lent her pile of floor cushions and her beloved candlesticks for the occasion, everybody had contributed cups and saucers. Betty and Helen had spent the afternoon "fixing up," and the room wore a very festive air when the girls dropped in after dinner to see if the preparations were complete. "I think we ought to start the fudge before they come," said Betty, remembering the procedure at Miss King's party. "Oh, no," protested Eleanor. "Half-past eight is early enough. Why, most of the fun of a spread is mixing the things together and taking turns tasting and stirring." "It would be awkward to finish eating too early, when that's the only entertainment," suggested Rachel. "Or the candy might give out before ten," added Mary Rich. The majority ruled, and as some of the girls were late, and one had some very amusing blue-prints to exhibit, it was considerably after half-past eight before the fudge was started. At first it furnished plenty of excitement. Betty, who had been appointed chief fudge-maker, left it for a moment, and it took the opportunity to boil over. When it had settled down after this exploit, it refused to do anything but simmer. No amount of alcohol or of vigorous and persistent stirring had any effect upon it, and Betty was in despair. But Eleanor, who happened to be in a gracious mood, came gallantly to the rescue. She quietly disappeared and returned in a moment, transformed into a gypsy street singer. She had pulled down her black hair and twisted a gay scarf around it. Over her shirt-waist she wore a little velvet jacket; and a short black skirt, a big red sash, an armful of bangles and bracelets, and the guitar hung over her shoulder, completed her disguise. "Sing a lil'?" she asked, smiling persuasively and kissing her hand to the party. Then she sat down on the pile of cushions and played and sang, first a quaint little folk-song suited to her part, and then one or two dashing popular airs, until the unaccommodating fudge was quite forgotten, except by Betty, who stirred and frowned, and examined the flame and tested the thickness of the rich brown liquid, quite unnoticed. Eleanor had just shrugged her shoulders and announced, "I no more sing, now," when somebody else knocked on the door, or rather pushed it open, and a grotesque figure slouched in. At least half of it was head, black and awful, with gruesome green features. Short, unjointed arms came out of its waist, with green claws dangling where the hands should have been; and below its short skirt flapped the tails of a swallow-tail coat. The girls were too much astonished to speak, as the creature advanced silently into the room, and without a word began dancing something that, as Katherine expressed it afterward, was a cross between a double-shuffle and a skirt-dance. When it had succeeded in reducing its audience to a state of abject and tearful mirth, the creature stopped suddenly, announced, "You've seen the Jabberwock," in sepulchral tones, and flopped on to the end of a couch, saying breathlessly, "Mary Brooks, please help me out of this. I'm suffocating." "How did you do it, Miss Lewis?" inquired the stately senior, who was Mary's guest, wiping her eyes and gasping for breath as she spoke. "It's perfectly simple," drawled Roberta indifferently. "The head is my black silk petticoat. I painted on the features, because the children like to have me do it at home, and it's convenient to be ready. The arms are a broom-handle, stuck through the sleeves of this old coat, which is buttoned around my waist." "And now you're going to do the Bandersnatch, aren't you?" inquired the senior craftily, perceiving that the other side of the petticoat was decorated with curious red spots. "I--how did you--oh, no," said Roberta, blushing furiously, and stuffing the telltale petticoat under a convenient pillow. "I don't know why I brought the things for this. I never meant to do it up here. I--I hope you weren't bored. I just happened to think of it, and Eleanor couldn't sing forever, and that fudge----" "That fudge won't cook," broke in Betty in tragic tones. "It doesn't thicken at all, and it's half-past nine this minute. What shall I do?" Everybody crowded around the chafing-dish, giving advice and suggesting unfailing remedies. But none of them worked. "And there's nothing else but tea and chocolate," wailed Adelaide. "But you can all have both," said Betty bravely, "and you've forgotten the crackers, Adelaide. I'll pass them while you and Katherine go for more cups." "And you can send the fudge round to-morrow," suggested Mary Brooks consolingly. "It's quite the thing, you know. Don't imagine that your chafing-dish is the only one that's too slow for the ten-o'clock rule." Betty insisted upon sitting up to finish the fudge, but she ended by getting up before breakfast the next morning to cook it on Mrs. Chapin's stove. "Nobody seemed to care much about its being so slow, except me," she said to Helen, as they did it up in neat little bundles to be handed to the guests of the evening at chapel. "Weren't Eleanor and Roberta fine?" "Yes," agreed Helen enthusiastically. "But isn't it queer that Roberta won't let us praise her? She seems to be ashamed of being able to be so funny." Betty laughed. "That's Roberta," she said. "It will be months before she'll do it again, I'm afraid. I suppose she felt last night as if she had to do what she could for the honor of the house, so she came out of her shell." "She told Rachel that she did it on your account. She said you looked as if you wanted to cry." Betty flushed prettily. "How nice of her! I did want to cry. I felt as if I was to blame about the fudge. I wish I had a nice stunt like that of Eleanor's to come to people's rescue with." "Were those what you call stunts?" inquired Helen earnestly. "I didn't know what they were, but they were fine." "Why, Helen Chase Adams, do you mean that you've been in college two months and don't know what a stunt is----" began Betty, and stopped, blushing furiously and fearing that she had hurt Helen's feelings. For the reason why she did not know about stunts was obvious. Helen took it very simply. "You know I'm not asked to things outside," she said, "and I don't seem to be around when the girls do things here. So why should I know?" "No reason at all," said Betty decidedly. "They are just silly little parlor tricks anyway--most of them--not worth wasting time over. Do you know Miss Willis told us in English class that a great deal of slang originated in college, and she gave 'stunt' as an example. She said it had been used here ever so long and only a few years outside, in quite a different meaning. Isn't that queer?" "Yes," said Helen indifferently. "She told my division too, but she didn't say what it meant here. I suppose she thought we'd all know." Betty, stealing a glance at her, saw her wink back the tears. "She does care about the fun," thought Betty. "She cares as much as Rachel or I, or Eleanor even. And she is left out. It isn't a bit fair, but what's to be done about it?" Being young and very happy herself, she speedily forgot all about the knotty problem of the unequal distribution of this world's goods, whether they be potatoes or fudge parties. Occasionally she remembered again, and gave Helen a helping hand, as she had done several times already. But college is much like the bigger world outside. The fittest survive on their own merits, and these must be obvious and well advertised, or they are in great danger of being overlooked. And it is safer in the long run to do one's own advertising and to begin early. Eleanor understood this, but she forgot or ignored the other rules of the game. Betty practiced it unconsciously, which is the proper method. Helen never mastered its application and succeeded in spite of it. * * * * * Several evenings after that one on which the fudge had refused to cook, Alice Waite was trying to learn her history lesson, and her "queer" roommate, who loved to get into her bed as well as she hated to make it, was trying to go to sleep--an operation rendered difficult by the fact that the girl next door was cracking butternuts with a marble paper-weight--when there was a soft tap on the door. "Don't answer," begged the sleepy roommate. "May be important," objected Alice, "but I won't let her stay. Come in!" The door opened and a young gentleman in correct evening dress, with an ulster folded neatly over his arm, entered the room and gazed, smiling and silent, about him. He was under average height, slightly built, and had a boyish, pleasant face that fitted ill with his apparent occupation as house-breaker and disturber of damsels. The roommate, who had sat up in bed with the intention of repelling whatever intruder threatened her rest, gave a shriek of mingled terror and indignation and disappeared under the bedclothes. Alice rose, with as much dignity as the three heavy volumes which she held in her lap, and which had to be untangled from her kimono, would permit. She moved the screen around her now hysterical roommate and turned fiercely upon the young gentleman. "How dare you!" she demanded sternly. "Go!" And she stamped her foot somewhat ineffectively, since she had on her worsted bedroom slippers. At this the young gentleman's smile broke into an unmistakably feminine giggle. "Oh, you are so lovely!" he gurgled. "Don't cry, Miss Madison. It's not a real man. It's only I--Betty Wales." "Betty!" gasped Alice. "Betty Wales, what are you doing? Is it really you?" "Of course," said Betty calmly, pulling off her wig by way of further evidence, and sitting down with careful regard for her coattails in the nearest chair. "I hope," she added, "that I haven't really worried Miss Madison. Take the screen away, Alice, and see what she's doing." "Oh, I'm all right now, thank you," said Miss Madison, pushing back the screen herself. "But you gave me an awful fright. What are you doing?" "Why, we're going to give a play at our house Saturday," explained Betty, "and to-night was a dress rehearsal. I wanted to bring Alice a ticket, and I thought it would be fun to come in these clothes and frighten her; so I put on a skirt and a rain-coat and came along. I left my skirt in your entrance-way. Get it for me please, Alice, and I'll put it on before I send any one else into hysterics." "Oh, not yet," begged Miss Madison. "I want to look at you. Please stand up and turn around, so I can have a back view." Betty readjusted her wig and stood up for inspection. "What's the play?" asked Alice. Betty considered. "It's a secret, but I'll tell you to pay for giving you both such a scare. It's 'Sherlock Holmes.' Mary Brooks saw the real play in New York, and she wrote this, something like the real one, but different so we could do it. She could think up the plot beautifully but she wasn't good at conversation, so Katherine helped her, and it's fine." "Is there a robbery?" inquired Alice. "Oh, yes, diamonds." "And a murder?" "Well, a supposed murder. The audience thinks it is, but it isn't really. And there's a pretend fire too, just as there is in the real play." "And who are you?" "I'm the villain," said Betty. "I'm to have curling black mustaches and a fierce frown, and then you'd know without asking." "I should think they'd have wanted you for the heroine," said Alice, who admired Betty immensely. "Oh, no," demurred the villain. "Eleanor is leading lady, of course. She has three different costumes, and she looks like a queen in every one of them. Katherine is going to be Sherlock Holmes, and Adelaide Rich is Dr. Watson and--oh, I mustn't tell you any more, or Alice won't enjoy it Saturday." "We had a little play here," said Miss Madison, "but it was tame beside this. Where did you get all the men's costumes?" "Rented them, and the wigs and mustaches and pistols," and Betty explained about the dancing-school money which the house had voted to Roberta's project instead of to the spread. "I wish I could act," said Alice. "I should love to be a man. But my mother wouldn't let me, so it's just as well that I'm a perfect stick at it." "Roberta's father wouldn't let her either," said Betty, "but mother didn't mind, as long as it's only before a few girls. I presume she wouldn't like my coming over here and frightening you. But I honestly didn't think you'd be deceived." "I'm so glad you came," said Miss Madison lying back luxuriously among her pillows. "Does the story of the play take place in the evening?" "Yes, all of it. I'm dressed for the theatre, but I'm detained by the robbery." "Then I have something I want to lend you. Alice, open the washstand drawer, please--no, the middle one--in that flat green box. Thank you. Your hat, sir villain," she went on, snapping open an opera hat and handing it to Betty with a flourish. "How perfectly lovely!" exclaimed Betty. "But how in the world did you happen to have it?" "Why, I stayed with my cousins for two weeks just before I came up here, and I found it in their guest-chamber bureau. It wasn't Cousin Tom's nor Uncle Dick's, and they didn't know whose it was; so they gave it to me, because I liked to play with it. Should you really like to use it?" "Like it!" repeated Betty, shutting the hat and opening it again with a low bow. "Why it will be the cream of the whole performance. It would make the play go just of itself," and she put it on and studied the effect attentively in the mirror. "It's rather large," said Alice. "If I were you, I'd just carry it." "It is big," admitted Betty regretfully, "or at least it makes me look very small. But I can snap it a lot, and then put it on as I exit. Miss Madison, you'll come to the play of course. I hadn't but one ticket left, but after lending us this you're a privileged person." "I hoped you'd ask me," said Miss Madison gratefully. "The play does sound so exciting. But that wasn't why I offered you the hat." "Of course not, and it's only one reason why you are coming," said Betty tactfully. "Now Alice, you must bring in my skirt. I have to walk so slowly in all these things, and it must be almost ten." When Sir Archibald Ames, villain, had been transformed into a demure little maiden with rumpled hair and a high, stiff collar showing above her rain-coat, Betty took her departure. A wave of literary and dramatic enthusiasm had inundated the Chapin house. The girls were constantly suggesting theme topics to one another--which unfortunately no one but Mary Brooks could use, at least until the next semester; for in the regular freshman English classes, subjects were always assigned. And they were planning theatre parties galore, to see Jefferson, Maude Adams, and half a dozen others if they came to Harding. Betty, who had a happy faculty of keeping her head just above such passing waves, smiled to herself as she hurried across the dark campus. "Next week, when our play is over it will be something else," she thought. Rachel was already interested in basket-ball and had prospects of being chosen for the freshman class team. Eleanor had been practicing hard on her guitar, hoping to "make" the mandolin club; and was dreadfully disappointed at finding that according to a new rule freshmen were ineligible and that her entrance conditions would have excluded her in any case. "So many things to do," sighed Betty, who had given up a hockey game that afternoon to study history. "I suppose we've got to choose," she added philosophically. "But I choose to be an all-around girl, like Dorothy King. I can't sing though. I wonder what my one talent is. "Helen," she said, as she opened her door, "have you noticed that all college girls have one particular talent? I wonder what ours will turn out to be. See what I have for the play." Helen, who looked tired and heavy-eyed, inspected the opera hat listlessly. "I think your talent is getting the things you want," she said, "and I guess I haven't any. It's quarter of ten." CHAPTER VIII AFTER THE PLAY "Sherlock Holmes" was quite as exciting as Miss Madison had anticipated. Most college plays, except the elaborate ones given in the gymnasium, which are carefully learned, costumed and rehearsed, and supervised by a committee from the faculty--are amusing little farces in one or two short scenes. "Sherlock Holmes," on the other hand, was a four act, blood-curdling melodrama, with three different stage settings, an abundance of pistol shots, a flash-light fire, shrieks and a fainting fit on the part of the heroine, the raiding of a robbers' den in the dénouement, and "a lot more excitement all through than there is in Mr. Gillette's play," as Mary modestly informed her caste. It was necessarily cruder, as it was far more ambitious, than the commoner sort of amateur play; but the audience, whether little freshmen who had seen few similar performances, or upper class girls who had seen a great many and so fully appreciated the novelty of this one, were wildly enthusiastic. Every actress, down to Helen, who made a very stiff and stilted "Buttons," and Rachel and Mary Rich who appeared in the robbers' den scene as Betty's female accomplices, and in the heroine's drawing-room as her wicked mother and her stupid maid respectively, was rapturously received; and Dr. Holmes and Sir Archibald, whose hat was decidedly the hit of the evening, were forced to come before the curtain. Finally, in response to repeated shouts for "author," Mary Brooks appeared, flushed and panting from her vigorous exertions as prompter, stage manager, and assistant dresser, and informed the audience that owing to the kindness of Mrs. Chapin there was lemon-ice in the dining-room, and would every one please go out there, so that this awful mess,--with a comprehensive wave of her hand toward the ruins of the robbers' den piled on top of the heroine's drawing-room furniture, which in turn had been a rearrangment of Dr. Holmes's study,--could be cleared up, and they could dance there later? At this the audience again applauded, sighed to think that the play was over, and then joyfully adjourned to the dining-room to eat Mrs. Chapin's ice and examine the actors at close range. All these speedily appeared, except Helen, who had crept up-stairs quite unnoticed the moment her part was finished, and Eleanor, who, hunting up Betty, explained that she had a dreadful headache and begged Betty to look after her guests and not for anything to let them come up-stairs to find her. Betty, who was busily washing off her "fierce frown" at the time, sputtered a promise through the mixture of soap, water and vaseline she was using, delivered the message, assured herself that the guests were enjoying themselves, and forgot all about Eleanor until half-past nine when every one had gone and she came up to her room to find Helen in bed and apparently fast asleep, with her face hidden in the pillows. "How queer," she thought. "She's had the blues for a week, but I thought she was all right this evening." Then, as her conjectures about Helen suggested Eleanor's headache, she tiptoed out to see if she could do anything for the prostrate heroine. Eleanor's transom was dark and her door evidently locked, for it would not yield when Betty, anxious at getting no answer to her knocks, tried to open it. But when she called softly, "Eleanor, are you there? Can I do anything?" Eleanor answered crossly, "Please go away. I'm better, but I want to be let alone." So, murmuring an apology, Betty went back to her own room, and as Helen seemed to be sound asleep, she saw no reason for making a nuisance of herself a second time, but considerately undressed in the dark and crept into bed as softly as possible. If she had turned on her light, she would have discovered two telltale bits of evidence, for Helen had left a very moist handkerchief on her desk and another rolled into a damp, vindictive little wad on the chiffonier. It was not because she knew she had done her part badly that she had gone sobbing to bed, while the others ate lemon-ice and danced merrily down-stairs. Billy was a hard part; Mary Brooks had said so herself, and she had only taken it because when Roberta positively refused to act, there was no one else. Helen couldn't act, knew she couldn't, and didn't much care. But not to have any friends in all this big, beautiful college--that was a thing to make any one cry. It was bad enough not to be asked anywhere, but not to have any friends to invite oneself, that was worse--it was dreadful! If she went right off up-stairs perhaps no one would notice; they would think at first that somebody else was looking after her guests while she dressed, and then they would forget all about her and never know the dreadful truth that nobody she had asked to the play would come. When it had first been decided to present "Sherlock Holmes" and the girls had begun giving out their invitations, Helen, who felt more and more keenly her isolation in the college, resolved to see just how the others managed and then do as they did. She heard Rachel say, "I think Christy Mason is a dear. I don't know her much if any, but I'm going to ask her all the same, and perhaps we shall get better acquainted after awhile." That made Helen, who took the speech more literally than it was meant, think of Caroline Barnes. One afternoon she and Betty had been down-town together, and on the way back Miss Barnes overtook them, and came up with them to see Eleanor, who was an old friend of hers. Betty introduced her to Helen and she walked between them up the hill and necessarily included both of them in her conversation. She was a homely girl, with dull, inexpressive features; but she was tall and well-proportioned and strikingly well dressed. Betty had taken an instant dislike to her at the time of their first meeting and greatly to Eleanor's disgust had resisted all her advances. Eleanor had accused her frankly of not liking Caroline. "No," returned Betty with equal frankness, "I don't. I think all your other friends are lovely, but Miss Barnes rubs me the wrong way." Helen knew nothing of all this, and Miss Barnes's lively, slangy conversation and stylish, showy clothes appealed to her unsophisticated taste. When the three parted at the head of the stairs, Miss Barnes turned back to say, "Aren't you coming to see me? You owe me a call, you know." Helen and Betty were standing close together, and though part of the remark applied only to Betty, she looked at them both. Betty said formally, "Thank you, I should like to," and Helen, pleased and eager, chorused, "So should I." Later, in their own room, Betty said with apparent carelessness but with the covert intention of dropping Helen a useful hint, "You aren't going to see Miss Barnes, are you? I'm not." And Helen had flushed again, gave some stammering reply and then had had for the first time an unkind thought about her roommate. Betty wanted to keep all her nice friends to herself. It must be that. Why shouldn't she go to see Miss Barnes? She wasn't asked so often that she could afford to ignore the invitations she did get. And later she added, Why shouldn't she ask Miss Barnes to the play, since Eleanor wasn't going to? So one afternoon Helen, arrayed in her best clothes, went down to call and deliver her invitation. Miss Barnes was out, but her door was open and Helen slipped in, and writing a little note on her card, laid it conspicuously on the shining mahogany desk. That was one invitation. She had given the other to a quiet, brown-eyed girl who sat next her in geometry, not from preference, but because her name came next on the class roll. This girl declined politely, on the plea of another engagement. Next day Miss Barnes brushed unseeingly past her in the hall of the Science Building. The day after that they met at gym. Finally, when almost a week had gone by without a sign from her, Helen inquired timidly if she had found the note. "Oh, are you Miss Adams?" inquired Miss Barnes, staring past her with a weary air. "Thank you very much I'm sure, but I can't come," and she walked off. Any one but Helen Adams would have known that Caroline Barnes and Eleanor Watson had the reputation of being the worst "snobs" in their class, and that Miss Ashby, her neighbor in geometry, boarded with her mother and never went anywhere without her. But Helen knew no college gossip. She offered her invitation to two girls who had been in the dancing-class, read hypocrisy into their hearty regrets that they were going out of town for Sunday, and asked no one else to the play. If she had been less shy and reserved she would have told Rachel or Betty all about her ill-luck, have been laughed at and sympathized with, and then have forgotten all about it. But being Helen Chase Adams, she brooded over her trouble in secret, asked nobody's advice, and grew shyer and more sensitive in consequence, but not a whit less determined to make a place for herself in the college world. She would have attached less significance to Caroline Barnes's rudeness, had she known a little about the causes of Eleanor's headache. Eleanor had gone down to Caroline's on the afternoon of the play, knocked boldly, in spite of a "Don't disturb" sign posted on the door, and found the pretty rooms in great confusion and Caroline wearily overseeing the packing of her books and pictures. Eleanor waited patiently until the men had gone off with three huge boxes, and then insisted upon knowing what Caroline was doing. "Going home," said Caroline sullenly. "Why?" demanded Eleanor. "Public reason--trouble with my eyes; real reason--haven't touched my conditions yet and now I have been warned and told to tutor in three classes. I can't possibly do it all." "Why Caroline Barnes, do you mean you are sent home?" Caroline nodded. "It amounts to that. I was advised to go home now, and work off the entrance conditions and come again next fall. I thought maybe you'd be taking the same train," she added with a nervous laugh. Eleanor turned white. "Nonsense!" she said sharply. "What do you mean?" "Well, you said you hadn't done anything about your conditions, and you've cut and flunked and scraped along much as I have, I fancy." "I'm sorry, Caroline," said Eleanor, ignoring the digression. "I don't know that you care, though. You've said you were bored to death up here." "I--I say a great deal that I don't mean," gulped Caroline. "Good-bye, Eleanor. Shall I see you in New York at Christmas? And don't forget--trouble with my eyes. Oh, the family won't mind. They didn't like my coming up in the first place. I shall go abroad in the spring. Good-bye." Eleanor walked swiftly back through the campus. In the main building she consulted the official bulletin-board with anxious eyes, and fairly tore off a note addressed to "Miss Eleanor Watson, First Class." It had come--a "warning" in Latin. Once back in her own room, Eleanor sat down to consider the situation calmly. But the more she thought about it, the more frightened and ashamed she grew. Thanksgiving was next week, and she had been given only until Christmas to work off her entrance conditions. She had meant to leave them till the last moment, rush through the work with a tutor, and if she needed it get an extension of time by some specious excuse. Had the last minute passed? The Latin warning meant more extra work. There were other things too. She had "cut" classes recklessly--three on the day of the sophomore reception, and four on a Monday morning when she had promised to be back from Boston in time for chapel. Also, she had borrowed Lil Day's last year's literature paper and copied most of it verbatim. She could make a sophistical defence of her morals to Betty Wales, but she understood perfectly what the faculty would think about them. The only question was, how much did they know? When the dinner-bell rang, Eleanor pulled herself together and started down-stairs. "Did you get your note, Miss Watson?" asked Adelaide Rich from the dining-room door. "What note?" demanded Eleanor sharply. "I'm sure I can't describe it. It was on the hall table," said Adelaide, turning away wrathfully. Some people were so grateful if you tried to do them a favor! It was this incident which led Eleanor to hurry off after dinner, and again at the end of the play, bound to escape nerve-racking questions and congratulations. Later, when Betty knocked on her door, her first impulse was to let her in and ask her advice. But a second thought suggested that it was safer to confide in nobody. The next morning she was glad of the second thought, for things looked brighter, and it would have been humiliating indeed to be discovered making a mountain out of a mole-hill. "The trouble with Caroline was that she wasn't willing to work hard," she told herself. "Now I care enough to do anything, and I must make them see it." She devoted her spare hours on Monday morning to "making them see it," with that rare combination of tact and energy that was Eleanor Watson at her best. By noon her fears of being sent home were almost gone, and she was alert and exhilarated as she always was when there were difficulties to be surmounted. "Now that the play is over, I'm going to work hard," Betty announced at lunch, and Eleanor, who was still determined not to confide in anybody, added nonchalantly, "So am I." It was going to be the best of the fun to take in the Chapin house. But the Chapin house was not taken in for long. "What's come over Eleanor Watson?" inquired Katherine, a few days later, as the girls filed out from dinner. "She's working," said Mary Brooks with a grin. "And apparently she thinks work and dessert don't jibe." "I'm afraid it was time," said Rachel. "She's always cutting classes, and that puts a girl behind faster than anything else. I wonder if she could have had a warning in anything." "I think she could----" began Katherine, and then stopped, laughing. "I might as well own up to one in math.," she said. "Well, Miss Watson is going to stay here over Thanksgiving," said Mary Rich. Then plans for the two days' vacation were discussed, and Eleanor's affairs forgotten, much to the relief of Betty Wales, who feared every moment lest she should in some way betray Eleanor's confidence. On the Wednesday after Thanksgiving Eleanor burst in on her merrily, as she was dressing for dinner. "I just wanted to tell you that some of those conditions that worry you so are made up," she said. "I almost wore out my tutor, and I surprised the history department into a compliment, but I'm through. That is, I have only math., and one other little thing." "I don't see how you did it," sighed Betty. "I should never dare to get behind. I have all I want to do with the regular work." Eleanor leaned luxuriously back among the couch cushions. "Yes," she said loftily. "I suppose you haven't the faintest idea what real, downright hard work is, and neither can you appreciate the joys of downright idleness. I shall try that as soon as I've finished the math." "Why?" asked Betty. "Do you like making it up later?" "I shouldn't have to. You know I'm getting a reputation as an earnest, thorough student. That's what the history department called me. A reputation is a wonderful thing to lean back upon. I ought to have gone in for one in September. I was at the Hill School for three years, and I never studied after the first three months. There's everything in making people believe in you from the first." "What's the use in making people believe you're something that you're not?" demanded Betty. "What a question! It saves you the trouble of being that something. If the history department once gets into the habit of thinking me a thorough, earnest student, it won't condition me because I fail in a written recitation or two. It will suppose I had an off day." "But you'd have to do well sometimes." "Oh, yes, occasionally. That's easy." "Not for me," said Betty, "so I shall have to do respectable work all the time. But I shall tell Helen about your idea. She works all the time, and it makes her dull and cross. She must have secured a reputation by this time; and I shall insist upon her leaning back on it for a while and taking more walks." CHAPTER IX PAYING THE PIPER "I feel as if there were about three days between Thanksgiving and Christmas," said Rachel, coming up the stairs, to Betty, who stood in the door of her room half in and half out of her white evening dress. "That leaves one day and a half, then, before vacation," laughed Betty. "I'm sorry to bother you when you're so pressed for time, but could you hook me up? Helen is at the library, and every one else seems to be off somewhere." "Certainly," said Rachel, dropping her armful of bundles on the floor. "I'm only making Christmas presents. Is the Kappa Phi dance coming off at last?" "Yes--another one, that is; and Mr. Parsons asked me, to make up for the one I had to miss. Now, would you hold my coat?" "Betty! Betty Wales! Wait a minute," called somebody just as Betty reached the Main Street corner, and Eleanor Watson appeared, also dressed for the dance. "Why didn't you say you were going to Winsted?" she demanded breathlessly. "Good, here's a car." "Why didn't you say you were going?" demanded Betty in her turn as they scrambled on. "Because I didn't intend to until the last minute. Then I decided that I'd earned a little recreation, so I telegraphed Paul West that I'd come after all. Who is your chaperon?" "Miss Hale." "Well please introduce me when we get down-town, so that I can ask if I may join her party." Ethel Hale received Betty with enthusiasm, and Eleanor with a peculiar smile and a very formal permission to go to Winsted under her escort. As the two were starting off to buy their tickets, she called Betty back. "Aren't you going to sit with me on the way over, little sister?" she asked. "Of course," said Betty, and they settled themselves together a moment later for the short ride. "You never come to see me, Betty," Miss Hale began, when they were seated. "I'm afraid to," confessed Betty sheepishly. "When you're a faculty and I'm only a freshman." "Nonsense," laughed Miss Hale. Then she glanced at Eleanor, who sat several seats in front of them, and changed the subject abruptly. "What sort of girl is Miss Watson?" she asked. Betty laughed. "All sorts, I think," she said. "I never knew any one who could be so nice one minute and so trying the next." "How do you happen to know her well?" pursued Miss Hale seriously. Betty explained. "And you think that on the whole she's worth while?" "I'm afraid I don't understand----" Betty was beginning to feel as if she was taking an examination on Eleanor's characteristics. "You think that on the whole she's more good than bad; and that there's something to her, besides beauty. That's all I want to know. She is lovely, isn't she?" "Yes, indeed," agreed Betty enthusiastically. "But she's very bright too. She's done a lot of extra work lately and so quickly and well. She's very nice to me always, but she dislikes my roommate and she and I are always disagreeing about that or something else. I don't think--you know she wouldn't do a dishonorable thing for the world, but I don't approve of some of her ideas; they don't seem quite fair and square, Ethel." "Um," assented Ethel absently. "I'm glad you could tell me all this, Betty. I shouldn't have asked you, perhaps; it's rather taking advantage of our private friendship. But I really needed to know. Ah, here we are!" As she spoke, the train slowed down and a gay party of Winsted men sprang on to the platform, and jostled one another down the aisles, noisily greeting the girls they knew and each one hunting for his particular guest of the afternoon. They had brought a barge down to take the girls to the college, and in the confusion of crowding into it Betty found herself separated from Ethel. "I wish I'd asked her why she wanted to know all that," she thought, and then she forgot everything but the delicious excitement of actually being on the way to a dance at Winsted. Most of the fraternity house was thrown open to the visitors, and between the dances in the library, which was big enough to make an excellent ball-room also, they wandered through it, finding all sorts of interesting things to admire, and pleasantly retired nooks and corners to rest in. Mr. Parsons was a very attentive host, providing partners in plenty; and Betty, who was passionately fond of dancing and had been to only one "truly grown-up" dance before, was in her element. But every once in awhile she forgot her own pleasure to notice Eleanor and to wonder at her beauty and vivacity. She was easily belle of the ball. She seemed to know all the men, and they crowded eagerly around her, begging for dances and hanging on her every word. Eleanor's usually listless face was radiant. She had a smile and a gay sally for every one; there was never a hint of the studied coldness with which she received any advances from Helen or the Riches, nor of the scornful ennui with which she faced the social life of her own college. "Aren't you glad you came?" said Betty, when they met at the frappé table. "Rather," said Eleanor laconically. "This is life, and I've only existed for months and months. What would the world be like without men and music?" "Goodness! what a wise-sounding remark," laughed Betty. Just then Miss Hale came up in charge of a very young and callow freshman. "Please lend me your fan, Betty," she said. "I was afraid it would look forward for a chaperon to bring one, and I'm desperately warm." Eleanor, who had turned aside to speak to her partner, looked up quickly as Ethel spoke, and meeting Miss Hale's gray eyes she flushed suddenly and moved away. Betty handed Ethel the fan. "I wish----" she began, looking after Eleanor's retreating figure. But as she spoke the music started again and a vivacious youth hurried up and whisked her away before she had time to finish her sentence; and she could not get near Ethel again. "Men do make better partners than girls," she said to Mr. Parsons as they danced the last waltz together. "And I think their rooms are prettier than ours, if these are fair samples. But they can't have any better time at college than we do." "We certainly couldn't get on at all without you girls across the river," Mr. Parsons was saying gallantly, when the music stopped and Eleanor, followed by Mr. West, hurried up to Betty. "Excuse me one moment, Mr. Parsons," she said, as she drew Betty aside. "I've been trying to get at you for ever so long," she went on. "I'm in a dreadful fix. You know I told you I hadn't intended to come here to-day, but I didn't tell you the reason why. The reason was that to-day was the time set for my math. exam, with Miss Mansfield. I tried to get her to change it, but I couldn't, so finally I telephoned her that I was ill. Some one else answered the 'phone for her, saying that she was engaged and, Betty--I'm sure it was Miss Hale." Betty looked at her in blank amazement. "You said you were ill and then came here!" she began. "Oh, Eleanor, how could you! But what makes you think that Miss Hale knows?" "I'm sure I recognized her voice when she asked you for the fan, and then haven't you noticed her distant manner?" said Eleanor gloomily. "Are they friends, do you know?" "They live in the same house." "Then that settles it. You seem to be very chummy with Miss Hale, Betty. You couldn't reconcile it with your tender conscience to say a good word for me, I suppose?" "I--why, what could I say after that dreadful message?" Then she brightened suddenly. "Why, Eleanor, I did. We talked about you all the way over here. Ethel asked questions and I answered them. I told her a lot of nice things," added Betty reassuringly, "though of course I couldn't imagine why she wanted to know. What luck that you hadn't told me sooner!" Eleanor stared at her blankly. "I suppose," she said at last, "that it will serve me right if Miss Hale tells Miss Mansfield that I was here, and Miss Mansfield refuses me another examination; but do you think she will?" Betty glanced at Ethel. She was standing at the other end of the room, talking to two Winsted men, and she looked so young and pretty and so like one of the girls herself that Betty said impulsively, "She couldn't!" Then she remembered how different Ethel had seemed on the train, and that the girls in her classes stood very much in awe of her. "I don't know," she said slowly. "She just hates any sort of cheating. She might think it was her duty to tell. Oh, Eleanor, why did you do it?" Eleanor shrugged her shoulders expressively. Then she turned away with a radiant smile for Mr. West. "I am sorry to have kept you men waiting," she said. "How much more time do we have before the barge comes?" Whatever Miss Hale meant to do, she kept her own counsel, deliberately avoiding intercourse with either Ethel or Betty. She bade the girls a gay good-bye at the station, and went off in state in the carriage they had provided for her. "I suppose it's no use asking if you had a good time," said Betty sympathetically, as she and Eleanor, having decided to go home in comfort, rolled away in another. "I had a lovely time until it flashed over me about that telephone message. After that of course I was worried almost to death, and I would give anything under the sun if I had stayed at home and passed off my math. like a person of sense." "Then why don't you tell Miss Mansfield so?" suggested Betty. "Oh, Betty, I couldn't. But I shan't probably have the chance," she added dryly. "Miss Hale will see her after dinner. I hope she'll tell her that I appeared to be enjoying life." The next morning when Eleanor presented herself at Miss Mansfield's class-room for the geometry lesson, another assistant occupied the desk. "Miss Mansfield is out of town for a few days," she announced. Eleanor gave Betty a despairing glance and tried to fix her attention on the "originals" which the new teacher was explaining. It seemed as if the class would never end. When it did she flew to the desk and inquired if Miss Mansfield would be back to-morrow. "To-morrow? Oh no," said the young assistant pleasantly. "She's in Boston for some days. No, not this week; next, I believe. You are Miss Watson? No, there was no message for you, I think." The next week was a longer and more harassing one than any that Eleanor could remember. She had not been blind to Betty's scorn of her action. Ever since she came to Harding she had noted with astonishment the high code of honor that held sway among the girls. They shirked when they could, assumed knowledge when they had it not, managed somehow to wear the air of leisurely go-as-you-please that Eleanor loved; but they did not cheat, and like Betty they despised those who did. So Eleanor, who a few months before would have boasted of having deceived Miss Mansfield, was now in equal fear lest Miss Hale should betray her and lest some of her mates should find her out. She wanted to ask Lil Day or Annette Gaynor what happened if you cut a special examination; but suppose they should ask why she cared to know? That would put another knot into the "tangled web" of her deception. It would have been some comfort to discuss the possibilities of the situation with Betty, but Eleanor denied herself even that outlet. No use reminding a girl that she despises you! If only Betty would not look so sad and sympathetic and inquiring when they met in the halls, in classes or at table. At other times Eleanor barricaded herself behind a "Don't disturb" sign and studied desperately and to much purpose. And every morning she hoped against hope that Miss Mansfield would hear the geometry class. The suspense lasted through the whole week. Then, just two days before the vacation, Miss Mansfield reappeared and Eleanor asked timidly for an appointment. "Come to-day at two," began Miss Mansfield. "Oh thank you! Thank you so much!" broke in Eleanor and stopped in confusion. But Miss Mansfield only smiled absently. "Most of my belated freshmen don't express such fervent gratitude for my firmness in pushing them through before the vacation. They try to put me off." She had evidently quite forgotten the other appointment. "I shall be so glad to have it over," Eleanor murmured. Miss Mansfield looked after her thoughtfully as she went down the hall. "Perhaps I've misjudged her," she told herself. "When a girl is so pretty, it's hard to take her seriously." She said as much to Ethel Hale when they walked home to lunch together, but Ethel was not at all enthusiastic over Miss Watson's earnestness. "She's very late in working off a condition, I should say," she observed coldly. "Yes, but I've been away, you know," explained Miss Mansfield. "Oh, Ethel, I wish you could meet him. You don't half appreciate how happy I am." Ethel, who had decided after much consideration to let Eleanor's affairs take their course, made a mental observation to the effect that an engagement induces shortness of memory and tenderness of heart. Then she said aloud that she also wished she might meet "him." * * * * * Time flies between Thanksgiving and Christmas, particularly for freshmen who are looking forward to their first vacation at home. It flies faster after they get there, and when they are back at college it rushes on quite as swiftly but rather less merrily toward the fateful "mid-years." None of the Chapin house girls had been home at Thanksgiving time, but they were all going for Christmas, except Eleanor Watson, who intended to spend the vacation with an aunt in New York. They prepared for the flitting in characteristic ways. Rachel, who was very systematic, did all her Christmas shopping, so that she needn't hurry through it at home. Roberta made but one purchase, an illustrated "Alice in Wonderland," for her small cousins, and spent all her spare time in re-reading it herself. Helen, in spite of Betty's suggestions about leaning back on her reputation, studied harder than ever, so that she could go home with a clear conscience, while Katherine was too excited to study at all, and Mary Brooks jeered impartially at both of them. Betty conscientiously returned all her calls and began packing several days ahead, so as to make the time seem shorter. Then just as the expressman was driving off with her trunk, she remembered that she had packed her short skirt at the very bottom. "Thank you ever so much. If he'd got much further I should have had to go home either in this gray bath robe that I have on, or in a white duck suit," she said to Katherine who had gone to rescue the skirt and came back with it over her arm. She and Katherine started west together and Eleanor and Roberta went with them to the nearest junction. The jostling, excited crowd at the station, the "good-byes" and "Merry Christmases," were great fun. Betty, remembering a certain forlorn afternoon in early autumn, laughed happily to herself. "What's the joke?" asked Katherine. "I was thinking how much nicer things like this seem when you're in them," she said, waving her hand to Alice Waite. At the Cleveland station, mother and Will and Nan and the smallest sister were watching eagerly for the returning wanderer. "Why, Betty Wales, you haven't changed one bit," announced the smallest sister in tones of deepest wonder. "Why, I'd have known you anywhere, Betty, if I'd met you on the street." "Three months isn't quite as long as all that," said Betty, hugging the smallest sister, "but I was hoping I looked a little older. Nobody ever mistakes me for a senior, as they do Rachel Morrison. And I ought to look years and years wiser." "Nonsense," said Will with a lordly air. "Now a college girl----" Everybody laughed. "You see we all know your theories about intellectual women," said mother. "So suppose you take up the suit case and escort us home." The next morning a note arrived from Eleanor. "DEAREST BETTY," it ran: "As you always seem to be just around the corner when I get into a box, I want to tell you that I rode down to New York with Miss Hale. She asked me to sit with her and I couldn't well refuse, though I wanted to badly enough. She knew, Betty, but she will never tell. She said she was glad to know me on your account. She asked me how the term had gone with me, and I blushed and stammered and said that I was coming back in a different spirit. She said that college was the finest place in the world for a girl to get acquainted with herself--that cowardice and weakness of purpose and meanness and pettiness stood out so clearly against the background of fineness and squareness; and that four years was long enough to see all sorts of faults in oneself, and change them according to one's new theories. As she said it, it didn't sound a bit like preaching. "I didn't tell her that I was only in college for one year. I sent her a big bunch of violets to-day--she surely couldn't regard it as a bribe now--and after Christmas I'll try to show her that I'm worth while. "Merry Christmas, Betty. "Eleanor." Nan frowned when Betty told her about Eleanor. "But she isn't a nice girl, Betty. Did I meet her?" "Yes, she's the one you thought so pretty--the one with the lovely eyes and hair." "Betty," said Nan soberly, "you don't do things like this?" "I!" Betty flushed indignantly. "Weren't there all kinds of girls when you were in college, Nan? Didn't you ever know people who did 'things like this'?" Nan laughed. "There certainly were," she said. "I'll trust you, Betty. Only don't see too much of Miss Watson, or she'll drag you down, in spite of yourself." "But Ethel's dragging her up," objected Betty. "And I gave her the first boost, by knowing Ethel. Not that I meant to. I never seem to accomplish things when I mean to. You remember Helen Chase Adams?" "With great pleasure. She noticed my youthful appearance." "Well, I've been all this term trying to reform her clothes, but I can't improve her one bit, except when I set to work and do it all myself. I should think you'd be afraid she'd drag me into dowdiness, I have to see so much of her." Nan smiled at the dainty little figure in the big chair. "I don't notice any indications yet," she said. "It took you an hour to dress this morning, exactly as it always does. But you'd better take care. What are you going to do to-day?" "Make your friend Helen Chase Adams a stock for Christmas," announced Betty, jumping up and pulling Nan after her. "And you've got to help, seeing you admire her so much." CHAPTER X A RUMOR After Christmas there were goodies from home to eat and Christmas-gifts to arrange in their new quarters. Betty's piêce de resistance was a gorgeous leather sofa pillow stamped with the head of a ferocious Indian chief. Eleanor had a great brass bowl, which in some mysterious fashion was kept constantly full of fresh roses, a shelf full of new books, and more dresses than her closet would hold. Katherine had a chafing-dish, Rachel a Persian rug, and Roberta an illustrated "Alice in Wonderland" of her own. To Betty's great relief Helen had brought back two small pillows for her couch, all her skirts were lengthened, and the Christmas stock of black silk with its white linen turnovers replaced the clumsy woolen collars that she had worn with her winter shirt-waists. And--she was certainly learning to do her hair more becomingly. There wasn't a very marked improvement to be sure, but if Betty could have watched Helen's patient efforts to turn her vacation to account in the matter of hair-dressing, she would have realized how much the little changes meant, and would have been more hopeful about her pupil's progress. Not until the end of her junior year did Helen Adams reach the point where she could be sure that one's personal appearance is quite as important a matter as one's knowledge of calculus or Kantian philosophies; but, thanks largely to Betty, she was beginning to want to look her best, and that was the first step toward the things that she coveted. The next, and one for which Betty, with her open-hearted, free-and-easy fashion of facing life, was not likely to see the need, must be to break down the barriers that Helen's sensitive shyness had erected between herself and the world around her. The self-confidence that Caroline Barnes had cruelly, if unintentionally wounded, must be restored before Helen could find the place she longed for in the little college world. No one had had any very exciting vacation adventures except Rachel, who was delayed on her way home by a freight wreck and obliged to spend Christmas eve on a windswept siding with only a ham sandwich between her and starvation, and Eleanor, whose vacation had been one mad whirl of metropolitan gaiety. Her young aunt, who sympathized with her niece's distaste for college life, and couldn't imagine why on earth Judge Watson had insisted upon his only daughter's trying it for a year at least, did her utmost to make Eleanor enjoy her visit. So she had dined at the Waldorf, sat in a box at the theatre and the opera, danced and shopped to her heart's content, and had seen all the sights of New York. And at all the festivities Paul West, a friend of the family and also of Eleanor's, was present as Eleanor's special escort and avowed admirer. Naturally she had come back in an ill humor. Between late hours and excitement she was completely worn out. She wanted to be in New York, and failing that she wanted Paul West to come and talk New York to her, and bring her roses for the big brass bowl that she had found in a dingy little shop in the Russian quarter. She threw her good resolutions to the winds, received Miss Hale's thanks for the violets very coldly, and begged Betty to forget the sentimental letter that she had written before Christmas. "But I thought it was a nice letter," said Betty. "Eleanor, why won't you give yourself a chance? Go and see Ethel this afternoon, and--and then set to work to show her what you said you would," she ended lamely. Eleanor only laughed. "Sorry, Betty, but I'm going to Winsted this afternoon. Paul has taken pity on me; there's a sleighing party. I thought perhaps you were invited too." "No, but I'm going skating with Mary and Katherine," said Betty cheerfully, "and then at four Rachel and I are going to do Latin." "Oh, Latin," said Eleanor significantly. "Let me think. Is it two or three weeks to mid-years?" "Two, just." "Well, I suppose I shall have to do a little something then myself," said Eleanor, "but I shan't bother yet awhile. Here comes the sleigh," she added, looking out of the window. "Paul's driving, and your Mr. Parsons has asked Georgie Arnold. What do you think of that?" "I should certainly hope he wouldn't ask the same girl to everything, if that's what you mean," said Betty calmly, helping Eleanor into her new coat. Eleanor shrugged her shoulders. "Good-bye," she said. "For my part, I prefer to be the one and only--while I last," and snatching up her furs she was off. Betty found Mary and Katherine in possession of her room and engaged in an animated discussion about the rules of hockey. "I tell you that when the thing-um-bob is in play," began Katherine. "Not a bit of it," cut in Mary. "Come along, girls," interrupted Betty, fishing her skates from under her couch, and pulling on her "pussy" mittens. "Never mind those rules. You can't play hockey to-day. You promised to skate with me." It was an ideal winter's afternoon, clear, cold and still. The ice on Paradise was smooth and hard, and the little pond was fairly alive with skaters, most of them Harding girls. Betty was a novice, with one weak ankle that had an annoying habit of turning over suddenly and tripping her up; so she was timid about skating alone. But between Mary and Katherine she got on famously, and thoroughly enjoyed the afternoon. At four Mary had a committee meeting, Katherine an engagement to play basket-ball, and Betty had agreed to meet Rachel. So with great reluctance they took off their skates and started up the steep path that led past the boat-house to the back gate of the campus. "Goodness, but I'm stiff," groaned Mary, stopping to rest a minute half way up. "I'd have skated until dinner time though, if it hadn't been for this bothering committee. Never be on committees, children." "Why don't you apply your own rules?" inquired Katherine saucily. "Oh, because I'm a vain peacock like the rest of the world. The class president comes to me and says, 'Now Mary, nobody but you knows every girl in the class. You can find out the sentiments of all sorts and conditions on this matter. And then you have such fine executive ability. I know you hate committees, but----' Of course I feel pleased by her base flattery, and I don't come to my senses until it's too late to escape. Is to-day the sixteenth?" "No, it's Saturday, the twentieth," said Katherine. "Two weeks next Monday to mid-years." "The twentieth!" repeated Mary in tones of alarm. "Then, my psychology paper is due a week from Tuesday. I haven't done a thing to it, and I shall be so busy next week that I can't touch it till Friday or Saturday. How time does fly!" "Don't you even know what you're going to write on or anything that you're going to say?" asked Betty, who always wrote her papers as soon as they were assigned, to get them off her mind, and who longed to know the secret of waiting serenely until the eleventh hour. "Why, I had a plan," answered Mary absently, "but I've waited so long that I hardly know if I can use it." Just then Alice Waite and her roommate came panting up the hill, and Mary, who seldom took much exercise and was very tired, fell back to the rear of the procession. But when the freshmen stopped in front of the Hilton House she trilled and waved her hand to attract their attention. "Oh. Betty, please take my skates home," she said as she limped up to the group. Then she smiled what Roberta had named her "beamish" smile. "I know what you girls are talking about," she said. "Will you give me a supper at Holmes's if I'm right?" "Yes," said Katherine recklessly, "for you couldn't possibly guess. What was it?" "You're wondering about those fifty freshmen," answered Mary promptly. "What freshmen?" demanded the four girls in a chorus, utterly ignoring the lost wager. "Why, those fifty who, according to a perfectly baseless rumor, are going to be sent home after mid-years." "What do you mean?" gasped Betty. "Hadn't you heard?" asked Mary soothingly. "Well, I'm sure it will be all over the college by this afternoon. Now understand, I don't believe it's true. If it were ten or even twenty it might be, but fifty--why, girls, it's preposterous!" "But I don't understand you," said Miss Madison excitedly. She had grown very pale and was hanging on to Katherine's arm. "Do you mean that there is such a story--that fifty freshmen are to be sent home after mid-years?" "Yes," said Mary sadly, "there is, and that's what I meant. I'm sorry that I should have been the one to tell you, but you'd have heard it from some one else, I'm sure. A thing like that is always repeated so. Remember, I assure you I don't believe a word of it. Somebody probably started it on purpose to frighten you little freshmen. If you would take my skates, Betty. I hate to lug them around till dinner time. Now good-bye, and do cheer up." Left to themselves the four freshmen stared blankly at one another. Finally Katherine broke the mournful silence. "Girls," she said solemnly, "it's utter foolishness to worry about this report. Mary didn't believe it herself, and why should we?" "She's not a freshman," suggested Alice gloomily. "There are almost four hundred freshmen. Perhaps the fifty wouldn't be any of us," put in Betty. Miss Madison maintained a despairing silence. "Well," said Katherine at last, "if it is true there's nothing to be done about it now, I suppose; and if it isn't true, why it isn't; so I think I'll go to basket-ball," and she detached Miss Madison and started off. Betty gave a prolonged sigh. "I must go too," she said. "I've promised to study Latin. I presume it isn't any use, but I can't disappoint Rachel. I wish I was a fine student like Rachel. She won't be one of the fifty." Alice, who had been in a brown study, emerged, just as Betty turned away. "Wait a minute," she commanded. "Of course it's awfully queer up here, but still, if they have exams. I don't see the use of cooking it all up beforehand. I mean I don't see the use of exams. if it is all decided." Her two friends brightened perceptibly. "That's a good idea," declared Betty. "Every one says the mid-years are so important. Let's do our best from now on, and perhaps the faculty will change their minds." As she walked home, Betty thought of Eleanor. "She'll be dreadfully worried. I shan't tell her a word about it," she resolved. Then she remembered Mary Brooks's remark. Yes, no doubt some one else would enlighten Eleanor. It was just too bad. But perhaps Mary was right and the story was only a story. It is hard for freshmen on the eve of their mid-year examinations to be perfectly calm and philosophical. The story of the fifty unfortunates ran like wild-fire through the college, and while upper-class girls sniffed at it as absurd and even freshmen, particularly the clever ones, pooh-poohed it in public, it was the cause of many anxious, and some tearful moments. Betty, after her first fright, had accepted the situation with her usual cheerfulness, and so had Alice and Rachel, who could not help knowing that her work was of exceptionally high grade, while Helen irritated her house-mates by affecting an anxiety which, as Katherine put it, "No dig, who gets 'good' on all her written work, can possibly feel." Katherine was worried about her mathematics, in which she had been warned before Thanksgiving, but she confided to Betty that she had counted them up, and without being a bit conceited she really thought there were fifty stupider girls in the class of 19--. Roberta and the Riches, however, were utterly miserable, and Eleanor wrote to Paul West that she was busy--she had written "ill" first, and then torn up the note--and indulged in another frantic fit of industry, even more violent than its predecessors had been. "But I thought you wanted to go home," said Betty curiously one afternoon when Eleanor had come in to borrow a lexicon. "You say you hate it here, and you hate to study. So why do you take so much trouble about staying?" Eleanor straightened proudly. "Haven't you observed yet that I have a bad case of the Watson pride?" she asked. "Do you think I'd ever show my face again if I failed?" "Then why----" began Betty. "Oh, that's the unutterable laziness that I get from my--from the other side of the house," interrupted Eleanor. "It's an uncomfortable combination, I assure you," and taking the book she had come for, she abruptly departed. Betty realized suddenly that in all the year Eleanor had never once spoken of her mother. After that she couldn't help being sorry for Eleanor, but she pitied Miss Madison more. Miss Madison was dull at books and she knew it, and had actually made herself ill with work and worry. Going to see her Hilton House friends on the Friday afternoon after the skating party, Betty found Miss Madison alone and undisguisedly crying. "I know I'm foolish," she apologized. "Most people just laugh at that story, but I notice they study harder since they heard it. And I'm such a stupid." Betty, who hated tears, had a sudden inspiration. "Why don't you ask about it at the registrar's office?" she suggested. "Oh, I couldn't," wailed Miss Madison. "Then I shall," returned Betty. "That is, I shall ask one of the faculty." "Would you dare?" "Yes, indeed. They're human, like other people," said Betty, quoting Nan. "I don't see why some one didn't think of it sooner." That night at dinner Betty announced her plan. The freshmen looked relieved and Mary Brooks showed uncalled-for enthusiasm. "Do go," she urged. "It's high time such an absurd story was shown up at its real value. It's absurd. The way we talk and talk about a report like that, and never dare to ask the faculty if it's true." "Do you take any freshman courses?" inquired Eleanor sarcastically. Mary smiled her "beamish" smile. "No," she said, "but I'm an interested party nevertheless--quite as much so as any of the famous fifty." "Whom shall you ask, Betty?" pursued Katherine, ignoring the digression. "Miss Mansfield. I have her the first hour, and besides, since she's been engaged she's so nice and sympathetic." Next day the geometry class dragged unmercifully for three persons. Eleanor beat a nervous tattoo on the seat-arm, Miss Madison stared fixedly at the clock, and Betty blushed and twisted and wished she could have seen Miss Mansfield before class. The delayed interview was beginning to seem very formidable. But it wasn't, after the first plunge. "What an absurd story!" laughed Miss Mansfield. "Not a word of truth in it, of course. Why I don't believe the girl who started it thought it was true. How long has it been in circulation?" Betty counted the days. "I didn't really believe it," she added shyly. "But you worried," said Miss Mansfield, smiling down at her. "Next time don't be taken in one little bit,--or else come to headquarters sooner." Eleanor and Miss Madison were waiting outside the door when Betty dashed at them with a little squeal of ecstasy. There was a moment of rapturous congratulation; then Miss Madison picked up the note-book she had dropped and held out her hand solemnly to Betty. "You've--why I think you've saved my life," she said, "and now I must go to my next class." "You're a little hero," added Eleanor, catching Betty's arm and rushing her off to a recitation in Science Hall. Roberta received the joyful news more calmly. "We may any of us flunk our mid-years yet," she said. "But we can study for them in peace and comfort," said Adelaide Rich. Mary Brooks asked endless questions at luncheon. Did the girls all accept Miss Mansfield's denial as authoritative? Did it travel as fast as the original story had done? How did people think the rumor had started? "Why, nobody mentioned that," said Rachel in surprise. "How odd that we shouldn't have wondered!" "Shows your sheep-like natures," said Mary, rising abruptly. "Well, now I can finish my psychology paper." "Haven't you worked on it any?" inquired Betty. "Oh, yes, I made an outline and developed some topics last night. But I couldn't finish until to-day. I was so worried about you children." Toward the end of the next week Rachel came in to dinner late and in high spirits. "I've had such a fine walk!" she exclaimed. "Hester Gulick and I went to the bridge, and on the way back we overtook a senior named Janet Andrews. She is such fun. She'd walked down-town with Professor Hinsdale. He teaches psychology, doesn't he? They seem to be very good friends, and he told her such a funny thing about the fifty-freshmen story. How do you suppose it started?" "Oh, please tell us," cried everybody at once. "Why, an awfully clever girl in his sophomore class started it as an experiment, to see how it would take. She told it to some freshmen, saying explicitly that it wasn't true, and they told their friends, and so it went all over the college until last Saturday Betty got Miss Mansfield to deny it. But no one knew how it started until yesterday when Professor Hinsdale looked over a paper in which the girl had written it all up, as a study in the way rumors spread and grow. This one was so big to begin with that it couldn't grow much, though it seems, according to the paper, that some people had added to it that half the freshmen would be conditioned in math." "How awfully funny!" gurgled Betty. Then she jumped almost out of her chair. "Why, Mary Brooks!" she said. Everybody looked at Mary, who blushed guiltily and remarked with great dignity that Professor Hinsdale was an old telltale. But when she had assured herself that the freshmen, with the possible exception of Eleanor, were disposed to regard the psychological experiment which had victimized them with perfect good-nature, and herself with considerable admiration, she condescended to accept congratulations and answer questions. "Seriously, girls," she said at last, "I hope no one got really scared. I wanted to explain when I heard Betty tell how unhappy Miss Madison was, but I really thought Miss Mansfield's denial would cheer her up more and reach her almost as quickly, and at the same time it would help me out so beautifully. It made such a grand conclusion! "You see," she went on, "Professor Hinsdale put the idea into my head when he assigned the subjects away back last month. He said he was giving them out early so we would have time to make original observations. When he mentioned 'Rumor,' he spoke of village gossip, and the faked stories that are circulated on Wall Street to make stocks go up or down, and then of the wild way we girls take up absurd reports. The last suggestion appealed to me, but I couldn't remember anything definite enough, so I decided to invent a rumor. Then I forgot all about it till that Saturday that I went skating, and 'you know the rest,' as our friend Mr. Longfellow aptly remarks. When I get my chef-d'oeuvre back you may have a private view, in return for which I hope you'll encourage your friends not to hate me." "Isn't she fun?" said Betty a little later, when she and Helen were alone together. "Do you know, I think this rumor business has been a good thing. It's made a lot of us work hard, and only seriously frightened three or four." "Yes," said Helen primly. "I think so too. The girls here are inclined to be very frivolous." "Who?" demanded Betty. Helen hesitated. "Oh, the girls as a whole." "That doesn't count," objected Betty. "Give me a name." "Well, Barbara Gordon." "Takes sixteen hours, has her themes read in Mary's class, and in her spare moments paints water colors that are exhibited in Boston," said Betty promptly. "Really?" gasped Helen. "Really," repeated Betty. "Of course she was very well prepared, and so her work here seems easy to her. Next year I hope that you and I won't have to plod along so." Helen said nothing, but she was deeply grateful to Betty for that last sentence. "You and I"--as if there was something in common between them. The other girls set her apart in a class by herself and labeled her "dig." If one was born slow and conscientious and plodding, was there any hope for one,--any place among these pretty girls who worked so easily and idled so gracefully? Helen shut her lips firmly and resolved to keep on hunting. CHAPTER XI MID-YEARS AND A DUST-PAN Viewed in retrospect the tragic experiences of one's freshman year seem often the most insignificant of trifles; but that does not prevent their being at the time momentous as the fate of empires. There are mid-year examinations, for instance; after one has survived them a few times she knows that being "flunked out" is not so common an experience as report represents it to be, and as for "low grades" and "conditions," if one has "cut" or been too often unprepared she deserves and expects them, and if she has done her best and still finds an unwelcome note or two on the official bulletin board, why, she must remember that accidents will happen, and are generally quite endurable when viewed philosophically. But in freshman year one is inexperienced and easily the dupe of mischievous sophomores. Then how is one to prepare for the dreadful ordeal? The distinction is not at all clear between the intelligent review that the faculty recommend and the cramming that they abhor. There is a disconcerting little rhyme on this subject that has been handed down from generation to generation for so long that it has lost most of its form and comeliness; but the point is still sharp. It is about a girl who followed the faculty's advice on the subject of cramming, took her exercise as usual, and went to bed each night at ten o'clock, as all good children should. The last stanza still rhymes, thus: "And so she did not hurry, Nor sit up late to cram, Nor have the blues and worry, But--she failed in her exam." Mary Brooks took pains that all her "young friends," as she called them, should hear of this instructive little poem. "I really thought," said Betty on the first evening of the examination week, "when that hateful rumor was contradicted, that I should never be scared again, but I am." "There's unfortunately nothing rumorous about these exams.," muttered Katherine wrathfully. "The one I had to-day was the real article, all right." "And I have my three worst to-morrow and next day," mourned Betty, "so I've got permission to sit up after ten to-night. Don't all the rest of you want to come in here and work? Then some one else can ask Mrs. Chapin for the other nights." "But we must all attend strictly to business," said Mary Rich, whereat Helen Adams looked relieved. And business was the order of the week. An unwonted stillness reigned over the Chapin house, broken occasionally by wild outbursts of hilarity, which meant that some examination or other was over and had not been so bad after all. Every evening at ten the girls who felt it necessary to sit up later assembled in one room, comfortably attired in kimonos--all except Roberta, who had never been seen without her collar--and armed with formidable piles of books; and presently work began in earnest. There was really no reason, as Rachel observed, why they should not stay in their own rooms, if they were going to sit up at all. This wasn't the campus, where there was a night-watchman to report lights, and Mrs. Chapin was very accommodating about giving permission. "This method benefits her gas bill though," said Katherine, "and therefore keeps her accommodating. Besides, it's much easier to stick to it in a crowd." Eleanor never went through the formality of asking Mrs. Chapin's permission to do anything, and she did not care for the moral support of numbers. She was never sleepy, she said, pointing significantly to her brass samovar, and she could work best alone in her own room. She held aloof, too, from the discussions about the examinations which were the burden of the week's table-talk, only once in a while volunteering a suggestion about the possible answer to an obscure or ambiguous question. Her ideas invariably astonished the other freshmen by their depth and originality, but when any one exclaimed, Eleanor would say, sharply, "Why, it's all in the text-book!" and then relapse into gloomy silence. "I suppose she talks more to her friends outside," suggested Rachel, after an encounter of this sort. "Not on your life," retorted Katherine. "She's one of the kind that keeps herself to herself. She hates us because we have to know as much about her as we do, living here in the house with her. I hope she gets through all right." "She's awfully clever," said Mary Rich admiringly. "She'd never have said that a leviathan was some kind of a church creed, as I did in English." "Yes, she's a clever--blunderer, but she's also a sadly mistaken young person," amended Katherine. It was convenient to have one's examinations scattered evenly through the week with time for study between them, but pleasanter on the whole to be through by Thursday or Friday, with several days of delicious idleness before the new semester began. And as a certain faction of the college always manages to suit its own convenience in such matters, the campus, which is the unfailing index of college sentiment, began to wear a leisurely, holiday air some time before the dreaded week was over. The ground was covered deeply with snow which a sudden thaw and as sudden a freeze had coated with a thick, hard crust. This put a stop to snow-shoeing and delayed the work of clearing the ice off Paradise pond, where there was to be a moonlight carnival on the evening of the holiday that follows mid-year week. But it made splendid coasting. Toboggans, "bobs" and hand sleds appeared mysteriously in various quarters, and the pasture hills north of the town swarmed with Harding girls out for fresh air, exercise and fun. On Friday afternoon an ingenious damsel who had no sled conceived the idea of substituting a dust-pan. So she borrowed one of an obliging chambermaid and went out to the little slope which divides the front from the back campus to try her experiment. In twenty minutes the hill was alive with girls, all the available dust-pans had been pressed into service, and large tin pans were found to do nearly as well. Envious groups of girls who could get neither the one nor the other watched the absurd spectacle from the windows of the nearest campus houses or hurried down-town to buy tinware. Sleds were neglected, toboggans despised; the dust-pan fad had taken possession of the college. Betty, who had the happy faculty of being on hand at interesting moments, was crossing the campus on her way home from the Hilton House. She had taken her last examination, had helped Alice Waite finish up a box of candy, and now had nothing to do until dinner time, so she stopped to watch the novel coasting, and even had one delicious ride herself on Dorothy King's dust-pan. Near the gate she met Mary Brooks and Roberta and asked them if they had been through the campus. "No," said Mary, "we've been having chocolate at Cuyler's." And she dragged her companions back to within sight of the hill. Then she abruptly turned them about and hurried them off in the other direction. "Let's go straight down and buy some dust-pans," she began enthusiastically. "We have just time before dinner, and we can slide all to-morrow afternoon." "Oh, no," demurred Roberta. "I couldn't." Betty laughed at her expression of alarm, and Mary demanded, "Why not?" "Oh, I couldn't," repeated Roberta. "It looks dangerous, and, besides, I have to dress for dinner." "Dangerous nothing!" jeered Mary. "Don't be so everlastingly neat and lady-like, child. What's the use? Well," as Roberta still hung back, "carry my fountain pen home, then, and don't spill it. Come on, Betty," and the two raced off down the hill. Roberta looked after them admiringly, wishing she were not such a "muff" at outdoor sports. The next afternoon Betty and Mary hurried over to the campus directly after luncheon to try their new toys. The crust was still firm and the new sport popular as ever. "You see it's much more exciting than a 'bob,'" a tall senior was explaining to a group of on-lookers. "You can't steer, so you're just as likely to go down backward as frontward; and being so near the ground gives you a lovely creepy sensation." "The point is, it's such a splendid antidote for overstudying. It just satisfies that absolutely idiotic feeling that every one has after mid-years," added an athletic young woman in a gray sweater, as she joined the group with her dust-pan tucked scientifically under her arm. She was Marion Lawrence, sophomore vice-president, and Mary Brooks's best friend. Betty, fearing to be in the way, joined another lone freshman from the Belden House. "Do you suppose you could sit up to study to-night if you had to?" inquired the freshman as they stood waiting their turns to go down. "No, only it seems as if you always could do what you have to," answered Betty, starting off. She decided presently that dust-pan coasting was not so much fun as it looked. Mary Brooks, coming to find her and ask her to join a racing tournament captained by herself and Marion Lawrence, declared noisily that she was having "the time of her gay young life," but Betty after the first coast or two began to think of going home. Perhaps it was because she was so tired. It seemed so much trouble to walk up on the slippery crust and such a long way round by the path. So she refused to enter the tournament. "I'm not going to stay long enough," she explained. "I shall just have two more slides. Then I'm going home to take a nap. That's my best antidote for overstudy." The next coast was nicer. Perhaps the dust-pan had been too new. The Belden House freshman said that hers went better since her roommate had used it and scraped off all the paint in a collision. "I wonder there aren't more collisions," said Betty, preparing for her last slide. Half-way down she discovered that the other freshman and the rest hadn't started--that the hill was almost clear. Then somebody called shrilly, "Look out, Miss Wales." She turned her head back toward the voice, the dust-pan swirled, and she turned back again to find herself slipping rapidly sidewise straight toward a little lady who was walking serenely along the path that cut the coast at right angles. She was a faculty--Betty hadn't the least idea what her name was, but she had noticed her on the "faculty row" at chapel. In an instant more she was certainly going to run into her. Betty dug her heels frantically into the crust. It would not break. "Oh, I beg your pardon, but I can't stop!" she called. At that the little lady, who was walking rapidly with her head bent against the wind, looked up and apparently for the first time noticed the dust-pan coasters. Mirth and confusion overcame her. She stopped an instant to laugh, then started back, then changed her mind and dashed wildly forward, with the inevitable result that she fell in an undignified heap on top of Betty and the dust-pan. The accident took place on the edge of the path where the crust was jagged and icy. Betty, who had gone head-first through it, emerged with a bleeding scratch on one cheek and a stinging, throbbing wrist. Fortunately her companion was not hurt. "Oh, I'm so sorry!" sighed Betty, trying to brush the snow off her victim with one hand. "I do hope you'll forgive me for being so careless." Then she sat down suddenly on the broken crust. "It's only that my wrist hurts a little," she finished abruptly. The girls had gathered around them by this time, sympathizing and lamenting that they had not warned Betty in time. "But we thought of course you saw Miss Ferris," said the tall senior, "and we supposed she was looking out for you." So this was Miss Ferris--the great Miss Ferris. Rachel had sophomore zoology with her and Mary Brooks had said that she was considered the most brilliant woman on the faculty. She was "house-teacher" at the Hilton, and Alice Waite and Miss Madison were always singing her praises. She cut Betty's apologies and the girls' inquiries short. "My dear child, it was all my fault, and you're the one who's hurt. Why didn't you girls stop me sooner--call to me to go round the other way? I was in a hurry and didn't see or hear you up there." Then she sat down on the crust beside Betty. "Forgive me for laughing," she said, "but you did look so exactly like a giant crab sidling along on that ridiculous dust-pan. Have you sprained your wrist? Then you must come straight over to my room and wait for a carriage." Betty's feeble protests were promptly overruled, and supported by Mary Brooks on one side and Miss Ferris on the other she was hurried over to the Hilton House and tucked up in Miss Ferris's Morris chair by her open fire, to await the arrival of the college doctor and a carriage. In spite of her embarrassment at having upset so important a personage, and the sharp pains that went shooting up and down her arm, she was almost sorry when doctor and carriage arrived together. Miss Ferris was even nicer than the girls had said. Somehow she made one feel at home immediately as she bustled about bringing a towel and a lotion for Betty's face, hot water for her wrist, and "butter-thins" spread with delicious strawberry jam to keep her courage up. Before she knew it, Betty was telling her all about her direful experiences during examination week, how frightened she had been, and how sleepy she was now,--"not just now of course"--and how she had been all ready to go home when the spill came. And Miss Ferris nodded knowingly at Mary and laughed her little rippling laugh. "Just like these foolish little freshmen; isn't it?" she said, exactly as if she had been one last year too. And yet there was a suspicion of gray in her hair, and she was a doctor of philosophy and had written the leading article in the learned German magazine that lay on her table. "You must come again, both of you, when I can make tea for you properly," she said as she closed the carriage door. Betty, leaning whitely back on Mary's shoulder, with her arm on Miss Ferris's softest down pillow, smiled happily between the throbs. If she was fated to have sprained her wrist, she was glad that she had met Miss Ferris. Saturday night and Sunday were long and dismal beyond belief. The wrist ached, the cheek smarted, and a bad cold added its quota to Betty's miseries. But she slept late Monday morning, and when she woke felt able to sit up in bed and enjoy her flowers and her notoriety. Just after luncheon the entire Chapin house came in to congratulate and condole with her. "It's too windy to have any fun outdoors," began Rachel consolingly. "Who sent you those violets?" demanded Katherine. "Miss Ferris. Wasn't it dear of her? There was a note with them, too, that said she considered herself still 'deeply in my debt,' because of her carelessness--think of her saying that to me!--and that she hopes I won't hesitate to call on her if she 'can ever be of the slightest assistance.' And Mary, she said for us not to forget that Friday is her day at home." "You are the luckiest thing, Betty Wales," sighed Rachel, who worshiped Miss Ferris from afar. "Now if I'd knocked the august Miss Ferris down," declared Katherine, "I should probably have been expelled forthwith. Whereas you----" She finished the sentence with an expressive little gesture. "Who gave you the rest of this conservatory, Betty?" asked Mary Brooks. "Clara Madison brought the carnations, and Nita Reese, a girl in my geometry division, sent the white roses, and Eleanor the pink ones, and the freshman I was sliding with these lilies-of-the-valley. It's almost worth a sprained wrist to find out how kind people are to you," said Betty gratefully. "Too bad you'll miss to-night," said Mary, "but maybe it will snow." "I don't mind that. The worst thing is my not being able to get my conditions off the bulletin," said Betty, making a wry face. "Goodness! That is a calamity!" said Katherine with mock seriousness. "Nonsense! You've studied," from Rachel. "If you should have any conditions, I'll bring them to you," volunteered Eleanor quietly. Then she looked straight at Rachel and Katherine and smiled pleasantly. "I'm sorry to say that I haven't studied," she said. Betty thanked her, feeling more pleased at the apparent harmony of the household than she had been with all her flowers. It was so difficult to like Eleanor and Rachel and Katherine and Helen, all four, so well, when Rachel and Katherine had good reason for disliking Eleanor, and Helen wouldn't hitch with any of the rest. "Do you know that Prexy had forbidden sliding on dust-pans?" asked Mary Rich in the awkward pause that followed. "Oh, yes," added Mary Brooks, "I forgot to tell you. So it's just as well that I lost mine in the shuffle." "But I'm sorry to have been the one to stop the fun," said Betty sadly. "Oh, it wasn't wholly that. Two other girls banged into each other after we left." "But you're the famous one," added Rachel, "because you knocked over Miss Ferris. She looked so funny and knowing when Prexy announced it in chapel." "I wish I could do something for you too," said Helen timidly, after the rest had drifted out of the room. "Why you have," Betty assured her. "You helped a lot both times the doctor came, and you've stayed out of the room whenever I wanted to sleep, and brought up all my meals, and written home for me." Helen flushed. "That's nothing. I meant something pretty like those," and she pointed to the tableful of flowers, and then going over to it buried her face in the bowl of English violets. Betty watched her for a moment with a vague feeling of pity. "I don't suppose she has ten cents a month to spend on such things," she thought, "and as for having them sent to her----" Then she said aloud, "We certainly don't need any more of those at present. Were you going to the basket-ball game?" "I thought I would, if you didn't want me." "Not a bit, and you're to wear some violets--a nice big bunch. Hand me the bowl, please, and I'll tie them up." Helen gave a little gasp of pleasure. Then her face clouded. "But I couldn't take your violets," she added quickly. Betty laughed and went on tying up the bunch, only making it bigger than she had at first intended. After Helen had gone she cried just a little. "I don't believe she ever had any violets before," she said to the green lizard. "Why, her eyes were like stars--she was positively pretty." More than one person noticed the happy little girl who sat quite alone in the running track, dividing her eager attention between the game and the violets which she wore pinned to her shabby, old-fashioned brown jacket. Meanwhile Betty, propped up among her pillows, was trying to answer Nan's last letter. "You seem to be interested in so many other people's affairs," Nan had written, "that you haven't any time for your own. Don't make the mistake of being a hanger-on." "You see, Nan," wrote Betty, "I am at last a heroine, an interesting invalid, with scars, and five bouquets of flowers on my table. I am sorry that I don't amount to more usually. The trouble is that the other people here are so clever or so something-or-other that I can't help being more interested in them. I'm afraid I am only an average girl, but I do seem to have a lot of friends and Miss Ferris, whom you are always admiring, has asked me to five o'clock tea. Perhaps, some day----" Writing with one's left hand was too laborious, so Betty put the letter in a pigeon-hole of her desk to be finished later. As she slipped the sheets in, Miss Ferris's note dropped out. "I wonder if I shall ever want to ask her anything," thought Betty, as she put it carefully away in the small drawer of her desk that held her dearest treasures. CHAPTER XII A TRIUMPH FOR DEMOCRACY By Wednesday Betty was well enough to go to classes, though she felt very conspicuous with her scratched face and her wrist in a sling. And so when early Wednesday afternoon Eleanor pounced on her and Katherine and demanded why they were not starting to class-meeting, she replied that she at least was not going. "Nor I," said Katherine decidedly. "It's sure to be stupid." "I'm sorry," said Eleanor. "We may need you badly; every one is so busy this week. Perhaps you'll change your minds before two-thirty, and if you do, please bring all the other girls that you can along. You know the notice was marked important." "Evidently all arranged beforehand," sniffed Katherine, as Eleanor departed, explaining that she had promised to be on hand early, ready to drum up a quorum if necessary. Betty looked out at the clear winter sunshine. "I wanted a little walk," she said. "Let's go. If it's long and stupid we can leave; and we ought to be loyal to our class." "All right," agreed Katherine. "I'll go if you will. I should rather like to see what they have on hand this time." "They" meant the Hill-School contingent, who from the initial meeting had continued to run the affairs of the class of 19--. Some of the girls were indignant, and a few openly rebellious, but the majority were either indifferent or satisfied that the Hill clique was as good as any other that might get control in its stead. So the active opposition had been able to accomplish nothing, and Hill's machine, as a cynical sophomore had dubbed it, had elected its candidates for three class officers and the freshman representative on the Students' Commission, while the various class committees were largely made up of Jean Eastman's intimate friends. "I hope that some of the crowd have nicer manners than our dear Eleanor and are better students," Mary Brooks had said to Betty. "Otherwise I'm afraid your ship of state will run into a snag of faculty prejudices some fine day." Betty belonged to the indifferent faction of the class. She was greatly interested in all its activities, and prepared to be proud of its achievements, but she possessed none of the instincts of a wire-puller. So long as the class offices were creditably filled she cared not who held them, and comparing her ignorance of parliamentary procedure with the glib self-confidence of Jean, Eleanor and their friends, she even felt grateful to them for rescuing the class from the pitfalls that beset inexperience. Katherine, on the other hand, was a bitter opponent of what she called "ring rule," and Adelaide Rich, who was the only recruit that they could succeed in adding to their party, had never forgotten the depths of iniquity which her pessimistic acquaintance had revealed in the seemingly innocent and well conducted first meeting, and was prepared to distrust everything, down to the reading of the minutes. The three were vigorously applauded when they appeared in the door of No. 19, the biggest recitation room in the main building and so the one invariably appropriated to freshman assemblies. Katherine whispered to Mary that she had not known Betty was quite so popular as all that; but a girl on the row behind the one in which they found seats explained matters by whispering that three had been the exact number needed to make up a quorum. The secretary's report was hastily read and accepted, and then Miss Eastman stated that the business of the meeting was to elect a class representative for the Washington's Birthday debate. "Some of you know," she continued, "that the Students' Commission has decided to make a humorous debate the main feature of the morning rally. We and the juniors are to take one side, and the senior and sophomore representatives the other. Now I suppose the first thing to decide is how our representative shall be chosen." A buzz of talk spread over the room. "Why didn't they let us know beforehand--give us time to think who we'd have?" inquired the talkative girl on the row behind. The president rapped for order as Kate Denise, her roommate, rose to make a motion. "Madame president, I move that the freshman representative aforesaid be chosen by the chair. Of course," she went on less formally, turning to the girls, "that is by far the quickest way, and Jean knows the girls as a whole so well--much better than any of us, I'm sure. I think that a lot depends on choosing just the right person for our debater, and we ought not to trust to a haphazard election." "Haphazard is good," muttered the loquacious freshman, in tones plainly audible at the front of the room. "Of course that means a great responsibility for me," murmured the president modestly. "Put it to vote," commanded a voice from the front row, which was always occupied by the ruling faction. "And remember, all of you, that if we ballot for representative we don't get out of here till four o'clock." The motion was summarily put to vote, and the ayes had it at once, as the ayes are likely to do unless a matter has been thoroughly discussed. "I name Eleanor Watson, then," said Miss Eastman with suspicious promptness. "Will somebody move to adjourn?" "Well, of all ridiculous appointments!" exclaimed the loquacious girl under cover of the applause and the noise of moving chairs. "Right you are!" responded Katherine, laughing at Adelaide Rich's disgusted expression. But Betty was smiling happily with her eyes on the merry group around Eleanor. "Aren't you glad, girls?" she said. "Won't she do well, and won't the house be proud of her?" "I for one never noticed that she was a single bit humorous," began Mary indignantly. Katherine pinched her arm vigorously. "Don't! What's the use?" she whispered. "Nor I, but I suppose Miss Eastman knows that she can be funny," answered Betty confidently, as she hurried off to congratulate Eleanor. She was invited to the supper to be given at Cuyler's that night in Eleanor's honor, and went home blissfully unconscious that half the class was talking itself hoarse over Jean Eastman's bad taste in appointing a notorious "cutter" and "flunker" to represent them on so important an occasion, just because she happened to be the best dressed and prettiest girl in the Hill crowd. The next afternoon most of the girls were at gym or the library, and Betty, who was still necessarily excused from her daily exercise, was working away on her Latin, when some one knocked imperatively on her door. It was Jean Eastman. "Good-afternoon, Miss Wales," she said hurriedly. "Will you lend me a pencil and paper? Eleanor has such a habit of keeping her desk locked, and I want to leave her a note." She scribbled rapidly for a moment, frowned as she read through what she had written, and looked doubtfully from it to Betty. Then she rose to go. "Will you call her attention to this, please?" she said. "It's very important. And, Miss Wales,--if she should consult you, do advise her to resign quietly and leave it to me to smooth things over." "Resign?" repeated Betty vaguely. "Yes," said Jean. "You see--well, I might as well tell you now, that I've said so much. The faculty object to her taking the debate. Perhaps you know that she's very much in their black books but I didn't. And I never dreamed that they would think it any of their business who was our debater, but I assure you they do. At least half a dozen of them have spoken to me about her poor work and her cutting. They say that she is just as much ineligible for this as she would be for the musical clubs or the basket-ball team. Now what I want is for Eleanor to write a sweet little note of resignation to-night, so that I can appoint some one else bright and early in the morning." Betty's eyes grew big with anxiety. "But won't the girls guess the reason?" she cried. "Think how proud Eleanor is, Miss Eastman. It would hurt her terribly if any one found out that she had been conditioned. You shouldn't have told me--indeed you shouldn't!" Jean laughed carelessly. "Well, you know now, and there's no use crying over spilt milk. I used that argument about the publicity of the affair to the faculty, but it was no go. So the only thing for you to do is to help Eleanor write a nice, convincing note of resignation that I can read at the next meeting, when I announce my second appointment." "But Eleanor won't ask my help," said Betty decidedly, "and, besides, what can she say, after accepting all the congratulations, and having the supper?" Jean laughed again. "I'm afraid you're not a bit ingenious, Miss Wales," she said rising to go, "but fortunately Eleanor is. Good-bye." When Betty handed Eleanor the note she read it through unconcernedly, unconcernedly tore it into bits as she talked, and spent the entire evening, apparently, in perfect contentment and utter idleness, strumming softly on her guitar. The next morning Betty met Jean on the campus. "Did she tell you?" asked Jean. Betty shook her head. "I thought likely she hadn't. Well, what do you suppose? She won't resign. She says that there's no real reason she can give, and that she's now making it a rule to tell the truth; that I'm in a box, not she, and I may climb out of it as best as I can." "Did she really say that?" demanded Betty, a note of pleasure in her voice. "Yes," snapped Jean, "and since you're so extremely cheerful over it, perhaps you can tell me what to do next." Betty stared at her blankly. "I forgot," she said. "The girls mustn't know. We must cover it up somehow." "Exactly," agreed Jean crossly, "but what I want to know is--how." "Why not ask the class to choose its speaker? All the other classes did." Jean looked doubtful. "I know they did. That would make it very awkward for me, but I suppose I might say there had been dissatisfaction--that's true enough,--and we could have it all arranged----Well, when I call a meeting, be sure to come and help us out." The meeting was posted for Saturday, and all the Chapin house girls, except Helen, who never had time for such things, and Eleanor, attended it. Eleanor was expecting a caller, she said. Besides, as she hadn't been to classes in the morning there was no sense in emphasizing the fact by parading through the campus in the afternoon. At the last minute she called Betty back. "Paul may not get over to-day," she said. "Won't you come home right off to tell me about it? I--well, you'll see later why I want to know--if you haven't guessed already." The class of 19-- had an inkling that something unusual was in the wind and had turned out in full force. There was no need of waiting for a quorum this time. After the usual preliminaries Jean Eastman rose and began a halting, nervous little speech. "I have heard," she began, "that is--a great many people in and out of the class have spoken to me about the matter of the Washington's Birthday debate. I mean, about the way in which our debater was appointed. I understand there is a great deal of dissatisfaction--that some of the class say they did not understand which way they were voting, and so on. So I thought you might like to reconsider your vote. I certainly, considering position in the matter, want you to have the chance to do so. Now, can we have this point thoroughly discussed?" Then, as no one rose, "Miss Wales, won't you tell us what you think?" Betty stared helplessly at Jean for a moment and then, assisted by vigorous pushes from Katherine and Rachel, who sat on either side of her, rose hesitatingly to her feet. "Miss Eastman,--I mean, madame president," she began. She stopped for an instant to look at her audience. Apparently the class of 19-- was merely astonished and puzzled by Jean's suggestion; there was no indication that any one--except possibly a few of the Hill girls--had any idea of her motive. "Madame president," repeated Betty, forcing back the lump that had risen in her throat when she realized that the keeping of Eleanor's secret lay largely with her, "Miss Watson is my friend, and I was very much pleased to have her for our representative. But I do feel, and I believe the other girls do, as they come to think it over, that it would have been better to elect our representative. Then we should every one of us have had a direct interest in the result of the debate. Besides, all the other classes elected theirs, and so I think, if Miss Watson is willing----" "Miss Watson is perfectly willing," broke in Jean. "A positive engagement unfortunately prevents her being here to say so, but she authorized me to state that she preferred the elective choice herself, and to tell you to do just as you think best in the matter. She----Go on, Miss Wales." "Oh, that was all," said Betty hastily slipping back into her seat. A group of girls in the farthest corner of the room clapped vigorously. "Nothing cut-and-dried about that," whispered Katherine to Adelaide Rich. "Are there any more remarks?" inquired the president. No one seemed anxious to speak, and she went on rather aimlessly. "Miss Wales has really covered the ground, I think. The other classes all elected their debaters, and I fancy they want us to do the same. As for the faculty--well, I may as well say that they almost insist upon a change." "Good crawl," whispered Katherine, who was quick to put two and two together, to Adelaide Rich, who never got the point of any but the most obvious remarks, and who now looked much perplexed. Meanwhile Betty had been holding whispered consultations with some of the girls around her, and now she rose again. Her "madame president" was so obviously prior to Kate Denise's that when Kate was recognized there was an ominous murmur of discontent and Jean apologized and promptly reversed her decision. "Perhaps I oughtn't to speak twice," said Betty blushing at the commotion she had caused, "but if we are to change our vote, some of us think it would be fun to hold a preliminary debate now, and choose our speaker on her merits. We did that once at school----" "Good stunt," called some one. "I move that Miss Wales as chairman select a committee of arrangements, and that we have a five minute recess while the committee meets." "I move that there be two committees, one for nominating speakers and the other for choosing a subject." "I move that we reconsider our other vote first." The motions were coming in helter-skelter from all quarters, instead of decorously from the front row as usual. The president was trying vainly to restore order and to remember whose motion should have precedence, and to make way somehow for the prearranged nomination, which so far had been entirely crowded out, when three girls in one corner of the room began thumping on their seat-arms and chanting in rhythmic, insistent chorus, "We--want--Emily--Davis. We--want--Emily--Davis. We--want--Emily--Davis." Hardly any one in the room had ever heard of Emily Davis, but the three girls constituted an original and very popular little coterie known individually as Babe, Babbie, and Bob, or collectively as "the three B's." They roomed on the top floor of the Westcott House and were famous in the house for being at the same time prime favorites of the matron and the ringleaders in every plot against her peace of mind, and outside for their unique and diverting methods of recreation. It was they who had successfully gulled Mary Brooks with a rumor as absurd as her own; and accounts of the "spread" they had handed out to the night-watchman in a tin pail, and dangled just out of his reach, in the hope of extracting a promise from that incorruptible worthy not to report their lights, until the string incontinently broke and the ice cream and lobster salad descended as a flood, were reported to have made even the august president of the college laugh. Ergo, if they "wanted" Emily Davis, she must be worth "wanting." So their friends took up the cry, and it quickly spread and gathered volume, until nearly everybody in the room was shouting the same thing. Finally the president stepped forward and made one determined demand for order. "Is Miss Emily Davis present?" she called, when the tumult had slightly subsided. "Yes," shouted the Three and the few others who knew Miss Davis by sight. "Then will she please--why, exactly what is it that you want of her?" questioned the president, a trifle haughtily. "Speech!" chorused the Three. "Will Miss Davis please speak to us?" asked the president. At that a very tall girl who was ineffectually attempting to hide behind little Alice Waite was pulled and pushed to her feet, and amid a sudden silence began the funniest speech that most of the class of 19-- had ever listened to; but it was not so much what she said as her inimitable drawling delivery and her lunging, awkward gestures that brought down the house. When she took her seat again, resolutely ignoring persistent cries of "More!" the class applauded her to the echo and elected her freshman debater by acclamation. It was wonderful what a change those twenty riotous minutes had made in the spirit of the class of 19--. For the first time in its history it was an enthusiastic, single-hearted unit, and to the credit of the Hill girls be it said that no one was more enthusiastic or joined in the applause with greater vigor than they. They had not meant to be autocratic--except three of them; they had simply acted according to their lights, or rather, their leaders' lights. Now they understood how affairs could be conducted at Harding, and during the rest of the course they never entirely forgot or ignored the new method. To Betty's utter astonishment and consternation the lion's share of credit for the sudden triumph of democracy was laid at her door. The group around her after the meeting was almost as large and quite as noisy as the one that was struggling to shake hands with Miss Davis. "Don't! You mustn't. Why, it was the B's who got her, not I," protested Betty vigorously. "No, you began it," said Babe. "You bet you did," declared Bob. "Yes, indeed. We were too scared to speak of her until you proposed something like it," added Babbie in her sweet, lilting treble. "You can't get out of it. You are the real founder of this democracy," ended Christy Mason decidedly. Betty was proud of Christy's approval. It was fun, too, to have the Hill girls crowding around and saying pleasant things to her. "I almost think I'm somebody at last. Won't Nan be pleased!" she reflected as she hurried home to keep her promise to Eleanor. Then she laughed merrily all to herself. "Those silly girls! I really didn't do a thing," she thought. And then she sighed. "I never get a chance to be a bit vain. I wish I could--one little wee bit. I wonder if Mr. West came." It did not occur to Betty as at all significant that Jean Eastman and Kate Denise had not spoken to her after the meeting, until, when she knocked on Eleanor's door, Eleanor came formally to open it. "Jean and Kate are here," she said coldly, "so unless you care to stop----" Jean and Kate nodded silently from the couch where they were eating candy. "Oh, no," said Betty in quick astonishment. "I'll come some other time." "You needn't bother," answered Eleanor rudely. "They've told me all about it," and she shut the door, leaving Betty standing alone in the hall. Betty winked hard to keep back the tears as she hurried to her own room. What could it all mean? She had done her best for Eleanor, and nobody had guessed--they had been too busy laughing at that ridiculous Emily Davis--and now Eleanor treated her like this. And Jean Eastman, too, when she had done exactly what Jean wanted of her. Jean's curtness was even less explainable than Eleanor's, though it mattered less. It was all--queer. Betty smiled faintly as she applied Alice Waite's favorite adjective. Well, there was nothing more to be done until she could see Eleanor after dinner. So she wiped her eyes, smoothed her hair, and went resolutely off to find Roberta, whose heavy shoes--another of Roberta's countless fads--had just clumped past her door. "I'm writing my definitions for to-morrow's English," announced Roberta. "For the one we could choose ourselves I'm going to invent a word and then make up a meaning for it. Isn't that a nice idea?" "Very," said Betty listlessly. Roberta looked at her keenly. "I believe you're homesick," she said. "How funny after such a jubilant afternoon." Betty smiled wearily. "Perhaps I am. Anyway, I wish I were at home." Meanwhile in Eleanor's room an acrimonious discussion was in progress. "The more I think of it," Kate Denise was saying emphatically, "the surer I am that she didn't do a thing against us this afternoon. She isn't to blame for having started a landslide by accident, Jean. Did you see her face when Eleanor turned her down just now? She looked absolutely nonplussed." "Most people do when the lady Eleanor turns and rends them," returned Jean, with a reminiscent smile. "Just the same," continued Kate Denise, "I say you have a lot to thank her for this afternoon, Jean Eastman. She got you out of a tight hole in splendid shape. None of us could have done it without stamping the whole thing a put-up job, and most of the outsiders who could have helped you out, wouldn't have cared to oblige you. It was irritating to see her rallying the multitudes, I'll admit; but I insist that it wasn't her fault. We ought to have managed better." "Say I ought to have managed better and be done with it," muttered Jean crossly. "You certainly ought," retorted Eleanor. "You've made me the laughing-stock of the whole college." "No, Eleanor," broke in Kate Denise pacifically. "Truly, your dignity is intact, thanks to Miss Wales and those absurd B's who followed her lead." "Never mind them. I'm talking about Betty Wales. She was a friend of mine--she was at the supper the other night. Why couldn't she leave it to some one else to object to your appointing me?" "Oh, if that's all you care about," said Jean irritably, "don't blame Miss Wales. The thing had to be done you know. I didn't see that it mattered who did it, and so I--well, I practically asked her. What I'm talking about is her way of going at it--her having pushed herself forward so, and really thrown us out of power by using what I--" Jean caught herself suddenly, remembering that Eleanor did not know about Betty's having been let into the secret. "By using what you told her," finished Kate innocently. "Well, why did you tell her all about it, if you didn't expect--" Eleanor stood up suddenly, her face white with anger. "How dared you," she challenged. "As if it wasn't insulting enough to get me into a scrape like this, and give any one with two eyes a chance to see through your flimsy little excuses, but you have to go round telling people----" "Eleanor, stop," begged Jean. "She was the only one I told. I let it out quite by accident the day I came up here to see you. Not another soul knows it but Kate, and you told her yourself. You'd have told Betty Wales, too,--you know you would--if we hadn't seen you first this afternoon." "Suppose I should," Eleanor retorted hotly. "What I do is my own affair. Please go home." Jean stalked out in silence, but Kate, hesitating between Scylla and Charybdis, lingered to say consolingly, "Cheer up, Eleanor. When you come to think it over, it won't seem so----" "Please go home," repeated Eleanor, and Kate hurried after her roommate. CHAPTER XIII SAINT VALENTINE'S ASSISTANTS If Eleanor had taken Kate's advice and indulged in a little calm reflection, she would have realized how absolutely reasonless was her anger against Betty Wales. Betty had been told of the official objections which made it necessary for Eleanor to be withdrawn from the debate. Her action, then, had been wholly proper and perfectly friendly. But Eleanor was in no mood for reflection. A wild burst of passion held her firmly in its grasp. She hated everybody and everything in Harding--the faculty who had made such a commotion about two little low grades--for Eleanor had come surprisingly near to clearing her record at mid-years,--Jean, who had stupidly brought all this extra annoyance upon her; the class, who were glad to get rid of her, Betty, who--yes, Jean had been right about one thing--Betty, who had taken advantage of a friend's misfortune to curry favor for herself. They were all leagued against her. But--here the Watson pride suddenly asserted itself--they should never know that she cared, never guess that they had hurt her. She deliberately selected the most becoming of her new evening gowns, and in an incredibly short time swept down to dinner, radiantly beautiful in the creamy lace dress, and--outwardly at least--in her sunniest, most charming mood. She insisted that the table should admire her dress, and the pearl pendant which her aunt had just sent her. "I'm wearing it, you see, to celebrate my return to the freedom of private life," she rattled on glibly. "I understand you've found a genius to take my place. I'm delighted that we have one in the class. It's so convenient. Who of you are going to the Burton House dance to-night?" So she led the talk from point to point and from hand to hand. She bantered Mary, deferred to Helen and the Riches, appealed in comradely fashion to Katherine and Rachel. Betty alone she utterly, though quite unostentatiously, ignored; and Betty, too much hurt to make any effort, stood aside and tried to solve the riddle of Eleanor's latest caprice. On the way up-stairs Eleanor spoke to her for the first time. She went up just ahead of her and at the top of the flight she turned and waited. "I understand that you quite ran the class to-day," she said with a flashing smile. "The girls tell me that you're a born orator, as good in your way as the genius in hers." Betty rallied herself for one last effort. "Don't make fun of me, Eleanor. Please let me come in and tell you about it. You don't understand----" "Possibly not," said Eleanor coldly. "But I'm going out now." "Just for a moment!" "But I have to start at once. I'm late already." "Oh, very well," said Betty, and turned away to join Mary and Roberta. Eleanor's mind always worked with lightning rapidity, and while she dressed she had gone over the whole situation and decided exactly how she would meet it; and in the weeks that followed she kept rigidly to the course she had marked out for herself, changing only one detail. At first she had intended to have nothing more to do with Jean, but she saw that a sudden breaking off of their friendship would be remarked upon and wondered at. So she compromised by treating Jean exactly as usual, but seeing her as little as possible. This made it necessary to refuse many of her invitations to college affairs, for wherever she went Jean was likely to go. So she spent much of her leisure time away from Harding; she went to Winsted a great deal, and often ran down to Boston or New York for Sunday, declaring that the trips meant nothing to a Westerner used to the "magnificent distances" of the plains. Naturally she grew more and more out of touch with the college life, more and more scornful of the girls who could be content with the narrow, humdrum routine at Harding. But she concealed her scorn perfectly. And she no longer neglected her work; she attended her classes regularly and managed with a modicum of preparation to recite far better than the average student. Furthermore her work was now scrupulously honest, and she was sensitively alert to the slightest imputation of untruthfulness. She offered no specious explanations for her withdrawal from the debate, and when Mary Brooks innocently inquired "what little yarn" she told the registrar, that she could get away so often, Eleanor fixed her with an unpleasantly penetrative stare and answered with all her old-time hauteur that she did not tell "yarns." "I have a note from my father. So long as I do my work and go to all my classes, they really can't object to my spending my Sundays as he wishes." Betty observed all these changes without being in the least able to reconcile them with Eleanor's new attitude toward herself. Unlike the friendship with Jean, Eleanor's intercourse with her had been inconspicuous, confined mostly to the Chapin house itself. Even the girls there, because Eleanor had stood so aloof from them, had seen little of it, so Eleanor was free to break it off without thinking of public opinion, and she did so ruthlessly. From the day of the class meeting she spoke to Betty only when she must, or, if no one was by, when some taunting remark occurred to her. At first Betty tried her best to think how she could have offended, but she could not discuss the subject with any one else and endless consideration and rejection of hypotheses was fruitless, so after Eleanor had twice refused her an interview that would have settled the matter, she sensibly gave it up. Eleanor would perhaps "come round" in time. Meanwhile it was best to let her alone. But Betty felt that she was having more than her share of trouble; Helen was quite as trying in her way as Eleanor in hers. She had entirely lost her cheerful air and seemed to have grown utterly discouraged with life. "And no wonder, for she studies every minute," Betty told Rachel and Katherine. "I think she feels hurt because the girls don't get to like her better, but how can they when she doesn't give them any chance?" "She's awfully touchy lately," added Katherine. "Poor little thing!" said Rachel. Then the three plunged into an animated discussion of basket-ball, and Rachel and Katherine, who were on a sort of provisional team that included most of the best freshman players and arrogated to itself the name of "The Stars," showed Betty in strictest confidence the new cross-play that "T. Reed" had invented. "T. Reed" seemed to be the basket-ball genius of the freshman class. She was the only girl who was perfectly sure to be on the regular team. It is one of the fine things about college that no matter who of your friends are temporarily lost to you, there is always somebody else to fall back upon, and some new interest to take the place of one that flags. Betty had noticed this and been amused by it early in her course. Sometimes, as she said to Miss Ferris in one of her many long talks with that lady, things change so fast that you really begin to wonder if you can be the same person you were last week. Besides the inter-class basket-ball game, there was the Hilton House play to talk about and look forward to, and the rally; and, nearer still, St. Valentine's day. It was a long time, to be sure, since Betty had been much excited over the last named festival; in her experience only children exchanged valentines. But at Harding it seemed to be different. While the day was still several weeks off she had received three invitations to valentine parties. She consulted Mary Brooks and found that this was not at all unusual. "All the campus houses give them," Mary explained, "and the big ones outside, just as they do for Hallowe'en. They have valentine boxes, you know, and sometimes fancy dress balls." And there the matter would have dropped if Mary had not spent all her monthly allowance three full weeks before she was supposed to have any more. Poverty was Mary's chronic state. Not that Dr. Brooks's checks were small, but his daughter's spending capacity was infinite. "You wait till you're a prominent sophomore," she said when Katherine laughed at her, "and all your friends are making societies, and you just have to provide violets and suppers, in hopes that they'll do as much for you later on. The whole trouble is that father wants me to be on an allowance, instead of writing home for money when I'm out. And no matter how much I say I need, it never lasts out the month." "Why don't you tutor?" suggested Rachel, who got along easily on a third of what Mary spent. "I hope to next year." "Tutor!" repeated Mary with a reminiscent chuckle. "I tried to tutor my cousin this fall in algebra, and the poor thing flunked much worse than before. But anyway the faculty wouldn't give me regular tutoring. I look too well-to-do. Ah! how deceitful are appearances!" sighed Mary, opening her pocketbook, where five copper pennies rattled about forlornly. But the very next day she dashed into Betty's room proclaiming loudly, "I have an idea, and I want you to help me, Betty Wales. You can draw and I'll cut them out and drum up customers, and I guess I can write the verses. We ought to make our ad. to-night." "Our what?" inquired Betty in an absolutely mystified tone. Then Mary explained that she proposed to sell valentines. "Lots of the girls who can't draw buy theirs, not down-town, you know--we don't give that kind here,--but cunning little hand-made ones with pen-and-ink drawings and original verses. Haven't you noticed the signs on the 'For Sale' bulletin?" Betty had not even seen that bulletin board since she and Helen had hunted second-hand screens early in the fall, but the plan sounded very attractive; it would fill up her spare hours, and keep her from worrying over Eleanor, and getting cross at Helen, so she was very willing to help if Mary honestly thought she could draw well enough. "Goodness, yes!" said Mary, rushing off to borrow Roberta's water-color paper and Katherine's rhyming dictionary. So the partnership was formed, a huge red heart covered with hastily decorated samples was stuck up on the "For Sale" bulletin in the gymnasium basement, and, as Betty's cupids were really very charming and her Christy heads quite as good as the average copy, names began to appear in profusion on the order-sheet. Mary had written two sample verses with comparative ease, and in the first flush of confidence she had boldly printed on the sign: "Rhymed grinds for special persons furnished at reasonable rates." But later, when everybody seemed to want that kind, even the valuable aid of the rhyming dictionary did not disprove the adage that poets are born, not made. "I can't--I just can't do them," wailed Mary finally. "Jokes simply will not go into rhyme. What shall we do?" "Get Roberta--she writes beautifully--and Katherine--she told me that she'd like to help," suggested Betty, without looking up from the chubby cupid she was fashioning. So Katherine and Roberta were duly approached and Katherine was added to the firm. Roberta at first said she couldn't, but finally, after exacting strict pledges of secrecy, she produced half a dozen dainty little lyrics, bidding Mary use them if she wished--they were nothing. But no amount of persuasion would induce her to do any more. However, Katherine's genius was nothing if not profuse, and she preferred to do "grinds," so Mary could devote herself to sentimental effusions,--which, so she declared, did not have to have any special point and so were within her powers,--and to the business end of the project. This, in her view, consisted in perching on a centrally located window-seat in the main building, in the intervals between classes, and soliciting orders from all passers-by, to the consequent crowding of the narrow halls and the great annoyance of the serious-minded, who wished to reach their recitations promptly. But from her point of view she was strikingly successful. "I tell you, I never appreciated how easy it is to make money if you only set about it in the right way," she announced proudly one day at luncheon. "By the way, Betty, would you run down after gym to get our old order sheet and put up a new one? I have a special topic in psychology to-morrow, and if Professor Hinsdale really thinks I'm clever I don't want to undeceive him too suddenly." Betty promised, but after gym Rachel asked her to stay and play basket-ball with "The Stars" in the place of an absent member. Naturally she forgot everything else and it was nearly six o'clock when, sauntering home from an impromptu tea-drinking at the Belden House, she remembered the order sheet. It was very dusky in the basement. Betty, plunging down the steps that led directly into the small room where the bulletin board was, almost knocked down a girl who was curled up on the bottom step of the flight. "Goodness! did I hurt you?" she said, a trifle exasperated that any one should want to sit alone in the damp darkness of the basement. There was no answer, and Betty, whose eyes were growing accustomed to the dim light, observed with consternation that her companion was doing her best to stop crying. As has already been remarked, Betty hated tears as a kitten hates rain. Personally she never cried without first locking her door, and she could imagine nothing so humiliating as to be caught, unmistakably weeping, by a stranger. So she turned aside swiftly, peered about in the shadows for the big red heart, changed the order sheet, and was wondering whether she would better hurry out past the girl or wait for her to recover her composure and depart, when the girl took the situation out of her hands by rising and saying in cheery tones, "Good-evening, Miss Wales. Are you going my way?" "I--why it's Emily--I mean Miss--Davis," cried Betty. "Yes, it's Emily Davis, in the blues, the more shame to her, when she ought to be at home getting supper this minute. Wait just a second, please." Miss Davis went over to the signs, jerked down one, and picking up her books from the bottom step announced without the faintest trace of embarrassment, "Now I'm ready." "But are you sure you want me?" inquired Betty timidly. "Bless you, yes," said Miss Davis. "I've wanted to know you for ever so long. I'm sorry you caught me being a goose, though." "And I'm sorry you felt like crying," said Betty shyly. "Why, Miss Davis, I should want to laugh all the time if I'd done what you did the other day. I should be so proud." Miss Davis smiled happily down at her small companion. "I was proud," she said simply. "I only hope I can do as well week after next. But Miss Wales, that was the jam of college life. There's the bread and butter too, you know, and sometimes that's a lot harder to earn than the jam." "Do you mean----" began Betty and stopped, not wanting to risk hurting Miss Davis's feelings. "Yes, I mean that I'm working my way through. I have a scholarship, but there's still my board and clothes and books." "And you do it all?" Miss Davis nodded. "My cousin sends me some clothes." "How do you do it, please?" "Tutor, sort papers and make typewritten copies of things for the faculty, put on dress braids (that's how I met the B's), mend stockings, and wait on table off and on when some one's maid leaves suddenly. We thought it would be cheaper and pleasanter to board ourselves and earn our money in different ways than to take our board in exchange for regular table-waiting; but I don't know. The other way is surer." "You mean you don't find work enough?" Miss Davis nodded. "It takes a good deal," she said apologetically, "and there isn't much tutoring that freshmen can do. After this year it will be easier." "Dear me," gasped Betty. "Don't you get any--any help from home?" "Well, they haven't been able to send any yet, but they hope to later," said Miss Davis brightly. "And does it pay when you have to work so hard for it?" "Oh, yes," answered Miss Davis promptly. "All three of us are sure that it pays." "Three of you live together?" "Yes. Of course there are ever so many others in the college, and I'm sure all of them would say the same thing." "And--I hope I'm not being rude--but do girls--do you advertise things down on that bulletin board? I don't know much about it. I never was there but once till I went to-day on--on an errand for a friend," Betty concluded awkwardly. Perhaps she had been an interloper. Perhaps that bulletin board had not been meant for girls like her. Miss Davis evidently assumed that she had been to leave an order. "You ought to buy more," she said laughingly. "But you want to know what I was there for, don't you? Why yes, we do make a good deal off that bulletin board. One of the girls paints a little and she advertises picture frames--Yale and Harvard and Pennsylvania ones, you know. I sell blue-prints. A senior lends me her films. She has a lot of the faculty and the campus, and they go pretty well. We use the money we make from those things for little extras--ribbons and note-books and desserts for Sunday. We hoped to make quite a bit on valentines----" "Valentines?" repeated Betty sharply. "Yes, but a good many others thought of it too, and we didn't get any orders--not one. Ours weren't so extra pretty and it was foolish of me to be so disappointed, but we'd worked hard getting ready and we did want a little more money so much." They had reached Betty's door by this time, and Miss Davis hurried on, saying it was her turn to get supper and begging Betty to come and see them. "For we're very cozy, I assure you. You mustn't think we have a horrid time just because--you know why." Betty went straight to Mary's room, which, since she had no roommate to object to disorder, had been the chief seat of the valentine industry. "You're a nice one," cried Katherine, "staying off like this when to-day is the eleventh." "Many orders?" inquired Mary. Betty sat down on Mary's couch, ruthlessly sweeping aside a mass of half finished valentines to make room. "Girls, this has got to stop," she announced abruptly. Mary dropped her scissors and Katherine shut the rhyming dictionary with a bang. "What is the trouble?" they asked in chorus. Then Betty told her story, suppressing only Emily's name and mentioning all the details that had made up the point and pathos of it. "And just think!" she said at last. "She's a girl you'd both be proud to know, and she works like that. And we stepped in and took away a chance of--of ribbons and note-books and dessert for Sunday." "May be not; perhaps hers were so homely they wouldn't have sold anyway," suggested Katherine with an attempt at jocoseness. "Don't, please," said Betty wearily. Mary came and sat down beside her on the couch. "Well, what's to be done about it now?" she asked soberly. "I don't know. We can't give them orders because she took her sign down. I thought perhaps--how much have we made?" "Fifteen dollars easily. All right; we'll send it to them." "Of course," chimed in Katherine. "I was only joking. Shall we finish these up?" "Yes indeed," said Mary, "they're all ordered, and the more money the better, n'est ce pas, Betty? But aren't we to know the person's name?" Betty hesitated. "Why--no--that is if you don't mind very much. You see she sort of told me about herself because she had to, so I feel as if I oughtn't to repeat it. Do you mind?" "Not one bit," said Katherine quickly. "And we needn't say anything at all about it, except--don't you think the girls here in the house will have to know that we're going to give away the money?" "Yes," put in Mary, "and we'll make them all give us extra orders." "We will save out a dollar for you to live on till March," said Betty. "Oh no, I shall borrow of you," retorted Mary, and then they all laughed and felt better. On St. Valentine's morning Betty posted a registered valentine. The verse read:-- "There are three of us and three of you, Though only one knows one, So pray accept this little gift And go and have some fun." But if the rhyme went haltingly and was not quite true either, as Betty pointed out, since Adelaide and Alice had contributed to the fund, and the whole house had bought absurd quantities of valentines because it was such a "worthy object" ("just as if I wasn't a worthy object!" sighed Mary), there was nothing the matter with the "little gift," which consisted of three crisp ten dollar bills. "Oh, if they should feel hurt!" thought Betty anxiously, and dodged Emily Davis so successfully that until the day of the rally they did not meet. That week was a tremendously exciting one. To begin with, on the twentieth the members of both the freshman basket-ball teams were announced. Rachel was a "home" on the regular team, and Katherine a guard on the "sub," so the Chapin house fairly bubbled over with pride and pleasure in its double honors. Then on the morning of the twenty-second came the rally with its tumultuous display of class and college loyalty, its songs written especially for the occasion, its shrieks of triumph or derision (which no intrusive reporter should make bold to interpret or describe as "class yells," since such masculine modes of expression are unknown at Harding), and its mock-heroic debate on the vital issue, "Did or did not George Washington cut down that cherry-tree?" Every speaker was clever and amusing, but Emily Davis easily scored the hit of the morning. For whereas most freshmen are frightened and appear to disadvantage on such an occasion, she was perfectly calm and self-possessed, and made her points with exactly the same irresistible gaucherie and daring infusion of local color that had distinguished her performance at the class meeting. Besides, she was a "dark horse"; she did not belong to the leading set in her class, nor to any other set, for that matter, and this fact, together with the novel method of her election made her interesting to her essentially democratic audience. So when the judges--five popular members of the faculty--announced their decision in favor of the negative, otherwise the junior-freshman side of the debate, 19--'s enthusiasm knew no bounds, and led by the delighted B's they carried their speaker twice round the gym on their shoulders--which is an honor likely to be remembered by its recipient for more reasons than one. As the clans were scattering, it suddenly occurred to Betty that, if Emily did not guess anything, it would please her to be congratulated on the excellence of her debate; and if, as was more likely, she had guessed, there was little to be gained by postponing the dreaded interview. She chose a moment when Emily was standing by herself in one corner of the gymnasium. Emily did not wait for her to begin her speech of congratulation. "Oh, Miss Wales," she cried, "I've been to see you six times, and you are never there. It was lovely of you--lovely--but ought we to take it?" "Yes, indeed. It belongs to you; honestly it does. Don't ask me how, for it's too long a story. Just take my word for it." "Well, but----" began Emily doubtfully. At that moment some one called, "Hurrah for 19--!" Betty caught up the cry and seizing Emily's hand rushed her down the hall, toward a group of freshmen. "Make a line and march," cried somebody else, and presently a long line of 19-- girls was winding in noisy lock-step down the hall, threading in and out between groups of upper-class girls and cheering and gaining recruits as it went. "Hurrah for 19--!" cried Betty hoarsely. "Take it for 19--," she whispered to Emily, as the line stopped with a jerk that knocked their heads together. "If you are sure---- Thank you for 19--," Emily whispered back. "Here's to 19--, drink her down! Here's to 19--, drink her down!" As the chorus rose and swelled Betty felt, as she never had before, what it meant to be a college girl at Harding. As Betty was leaving the gymnasium she met Eleanor face to face in the hallway. "Wasn't it fun?" said Betty, shyly. Perhaps, now that the debate was over, Eleanor would be ready to make friends again. "Patronizing the genius, do you mean?" asked Eleanor slowly. "I hope she didn't buy that hideous salmon-pink waist with your money." "Oh, Eleanor, how did you ever find out?" cried Betty, deeply distressed. Only a few of the Chapin house girls knew anything about the disposition of the valentine money, and not even the rest of the firm had been told who had received it. So Betty had thought the secret perfectly safe. "No one told me about your private affairs," returned Eleanor significantly. "I guessed and I congratulate you. The genius will be a useful ally. She will get all the freaks' votes for you, when----" "Eleanor Watson, come on if you're coming," called a voice from the foot of the stairs, and Eleanor marched blithely off, without finishing her sentence. Betty stared after her with unseeing eyes. So that was it! She was to blame because Jean had told her of Eleanor's predicament--told her against her wish. And now she was supposed to be trying to get votes. "Votes for what, I wonder? How perfectly absurd!" said Betty to the brick wall she was facing. But the appropriate smile would not come, for the absurdity had cost her a friend whom she had loved dearly in spite of her faults. CHAPTER XIV A BEGINNING AND A SEQUEL "I shan't be here to dinner Sunday," announced Helen Chase Adams with an odd little thrill of importance in her voice. "Shan't you?" responded her roommate absently. She was trying to decide which dress to wear to the Hilton House play. Her pink organdie was prettiest, but she really ought to save that for the Glee Club concert. And should she ask her cousin Jack Burgess up from Harvard for the concert, or would it be better to invite Mr. Parsons? These absorbing questions left her small attention to bestow on so comparatively commonplace a matter as an invitation out to Sunday dinner. "I thought you might like to have some one in my place," continued Helen, moving the pink organdie waist on to the same chair with the batiste skirt. Betty came to herself with a start. "I beg your pardon. I didn't see that I had taken up all the chairs. I was trying to decide what to wear to the dramatics." "And I was thinking what I'd wear Sunday," said Helen. It was so seldom nowadays that she obtruded her affairs upon any one's notice that Betty glanced at her wonderingly. Her eyes had their starry look, and a smile that she was futilely endeavoring to keep in the background played around the corners of her mouth. "I'm glad she's got over the blues," thought Betty. "Why, where are you going?" she asked aloud. "Oh, only to the Westcott House," answered Helen with an assumption of unconcern. "Would you wear the blue silk waist or the brown dress?" "Well, the Westcott is the swellest house on the campus, you know. When I go there I always put on my very best." "Yes, but which is my best?" Betty considered a moment. "Why, of course they're both pretty," she began with kindly diplomacy, "but dresses are more the thing than waists. Still, the blue is very becoming. But I think--yes, I'm sure I'd wear the brown." "All right. If you change your mind before Sunday you can let me know." "Yes," said Betty briefly. She was examining the batiste skirt to see if it would need pressing for the dramatics. After all, Jack was more fun, and probably Mr. Parsons was invited by this time anyhow--he knew lots of Harding girls. What was the name of Jack's dormitory house? She would ask the Riches; they had a brother in the same one. So she strolled off to find the Riches, and incidentally to get the latest basket-ball news from Rachel and Katherine. At nine o'clock they turned her out; they were in training and supposed to be fast asleep by nine-thirty. When she opened her own door, Helen was still sitting idly in the wicker rocker, looking as if she would be perfectly content to stay there indefinitely with her pleasant thoughts for company. Betty had quite lost interest in Helen lately; she had small patience with people who moped, and besides, between Eleanor and the valentine enterprise, her thoughts had been fully engrossed. But this new mood made her curious. "She acts as if she'd got a crush," she decided. "She's just the kind to have one, and probably her divinity has asked her to dinner, and she can't put her mind on anything else. But who on earth could it be--in the Westcott House?" She was on the point of inquiring, when Helen diverted her attention to something else. "I made a wonderful discovery to-day," she said. "Theresa Reed and T. Reed are the same person." Betty laughed. "They might easily be," she said. "I don't see that it was so wonderful." "Why, I've known Theresa all this year--she was the one that asked me to go off with her house for Mountain Day. She's the best friend I have here, but she never told me that she was specially interested in basket-ball and I never thought--well, I guess I never imagined that a dear friend of mine could be the celebrated T. Reed," laughed Helen happily. "But all sorts of nice things are happening to me lately." "That's good," said Betty. "It seems to be just the opposite with me," and she plunged into her note to Jack, which must be ready for the next morning's post. All that week Helen went about fairly wreathed in smiles. Her shyness seemed to have vanished suddenly. She joined gaily in the basket-ball gossip at the table, came out into the hall to frolic with the rest of the house at ten o'clock, and in general acted as a happy, well-conducted freshman should. The Chapin house brought its amazement over the "dig's" frivolity to Betty, but she had very little to tell them. "All I know is that she's awfully pleased about being a friend of T. Reed's. And oh yes--she's invited out to dinner next Sunday. But of course there must be something else." "Perhaps she's going to have a man up for the concert," suggested Katherine flippantly. "Are you?" inquired Mary Rich, and with that the regeneration of Helen was forgotten in the far more absorbing topic of the Glee Club concert. Sunday came at last. "I'm not going to church, Betty," said Helen shyly. "I want to have plenty of time to get dressed for dinner." "Yes, indeed," said Betty carelessly. She had just received an absurd letter from Jack. He was coming "certain-sure"; he wanted to see her about a very serious matter, he said. "Incidentally" he should be delighted to go to the concert. There was a mysterious postscript too:--"How long since you got so fond of Bob Winchester?" "I never heard of any such person. What do you suppose he means?" Betty asked Mary Brooks as they walked home from church together. Mary had also invited a Harvard man to the concert and Dorothy King had found them both seats, so they were feeling unusually friendly and sympathetic. "I can't imagine. Do let me see his letter," begged Mary. "He must be no end of fun." "He's a worse tease than you," said Betty, knocking on her door. "Come in," called Helen Chase Adams eagerly. "Betty, would you please hook my collar, and would one of you see what time it really is? I don't like to depend too much on my watch." "She'll be at least ten minutes too early," sighed Betty, when Helen had finally departed in a flutter of haste. "And see this room! But I oughtn't to complain," she added, beginning to clear up the dresser. "I'm always leaving it like this myself; but someway I don't expect it of Helen." "Who asked her to dinner to-day?" inquired Mary Brooks. She had been sitting in a retired corner, vastly enjoying the unusual spectacle of Helen Adams in a frenzy of excitement. "Why, I don't know. I never thought to ask," said Betty, straightening the couch pillows. "I only hope she'll have as good a time as she expects." "Poor youngster!" said Mary. "Wish I'd asked Laurie to jolly her up a bit." It is to be presumed that these fears were groundless, since the bell was ringing for five o'clock vespers when Helen came back. Betty was sitting at her desk pretending to write letters, but really trying to decide whether she should say anything to Eleanor apropos of her remarks about Emily Davis, and if so, whether she should do it now. Mary Brooks curled up on Betty's couch, dividing her attention between Jack Burgess's picture and a new magazine. "Had a good time, didn't you?" she remarked sociably when Helen appeared. "Oh, yes," said Helen happily. "You see I don't go out very often. Were you ever at the Westcott House for dinner?" "Once," chuckled Mary. "But I found they didn't have ice-cream, because the matron doesn't approve of buying things on Sunday; so I've turned them down ever since." Helen laughed merrily. "How funny! I never missed it!" There was a becoming flush on her cheeks, a pretty new confidence in her manner. "Helen, who did you say asked you to the Westcott?" inquired Betty. "I didn't say, because you didn't ask me," returned Helen truthfully, "but it was Miss Mills." "Miss Mills!" repeated Mary. "Well, my child, I don't wonder that you were rattled this noon, being invited around by the faculty. Gracious, what a compliment to a young freshman!" "I should think so!" chimed in Betty eagerly. In spite of her embarrassment Helen evidently enjoyed the sensation she was producing. "I thought it was awfully nice," she said. "Why didn't you tell us sooner?" demanded Mary. "Why, child, you must be a bright and shining shark in lit." Helen's happy face clouded suddenly. "I'm not, am I, Betty?" she asked appealingly. Betty laughed. "Why no, since you ask me. No, she isn't, Mary. She sits on the back row with me and we don't either of us say an extra word. It's math, and Latin and Greek that Helen shines in." "Well, are you awfully devoted to Miss Mills?" pursued Mary. "Is that why she asked you?" Helen shook her head. "I like her. She reads beautifully and sometimes she says very interesting things, doesn't she, Betty?" "I hadn't noticed," answered her roommate hastily. "Well, I think she does, but I never told her I thought so. It couldn't be that." "Then why did she ask you?" demanded Mary. "I suppose because she wanted me," said Helen happily. "I can't think of any other reason. Isn't it lovely?" "Yes indeed," agreed Mary. "It's so grand that I'm going off this minute to tell everybody in the house about it. They'll be dreadfully envious," and she left the roommates alone. Helen pulled off her best gloves carefully, and laid them neatly away, then she put up her hat and coat and sat down in her favorite wicker chair. "I guess I left the room in a dreadful muss this noon," she said apologetically. "I guess I acted silly and excited, but you see--I said I hadn't been out often--this is the very first time I've been invited out to a meal since I came to Harding." "Really?" said Betty, thinking guiltily of her own multitude of invitations. "Yes, I hoped you hadn't any of you noticed it. I hate to be pitied. Now you can just like me." "Just like you?" repeated Betty vaguely. "Yes. Don't you see? I'm not left out any more." She hesitated, then went on rapidly. "You see I had a lovely time at first, at the sophomore reception and the frolic and all, but it stopped and--this was a good while coming, and I got discouraged. Wasn't it silly? I--oh, it's all right now. I wouldn't change places with anybody." She began to rock violently. Betty had noticed that Helen rocked when other girls sang or danced jigs. "But I thought--we all thought," began Betty, "that you had decided you preferred to study--that you didn't care for our sort of fun. You haven't seemed to lately." "Not since it came over me why you girls here in the house were nice to me when nobody else was except Theresa," explained Helen with appalling frankness. "You were sorry for me. I thought it out the day after you gave me the violets. Before I came to Harding," she went on, "I did think that college was just to study. It's funny how you change your mind after you get here--how you begin to see that it's a lot bigger than you thought. And it's queer how little you care about doing well in class when you haven't anything else to care about." She gave a little sigh, then got up suddenly. "I almost forgot; I have a message for Adelaide. And by the way, Betty, I saw your Miss Hale; she and somebody else were just going in to see Miss Mills when I left." She had scarcely gone when Mary sauntered back as if by accident. "Well, have you found out?" she asked. "As a student of psychology I'm vastly interested in this situation." "Found out what?" asked Betty unsmilingly. "Why Miss Mills asked her, and why she is so pleased." "I suppose Miss Mills asked her because she was sorry for her," answered Betty slowly, "and Helen is pleased because she doesn't know it. Mary, she's been awfully lonely." "Too bad," commented Mary. Unhappiness always made her feel awkward. "But she says this makes up to her for everything," added Betty. "Oh, I've noticed that life is a pretty even thing in the end," returned Mary, relieved that there was no present call on her sympathies, "but I must confess I don't see how one dinner invitation, even if it is from----" Just then Helen tapped on the door. Down in Miss Mills's room they were discussing much the same point. "It's a shame for you to waste your Sundays over these children," said Miss Hale. Miss Mills stopped her tea-making to dissent. "It isn't wasted if she cared. She was so still that I couldn't be sure, but judging from the length of time she stayed----" "She was smiling all over her face when we met her," interrupted Miss Meredith. "Who is she, anyway?" "Oh, just nobody in particular," laughed Miss Mills, "just a forlorn little freshman named Adams." "But I don't quite see how----" began Miss Hale. "Oh, you wouldn't," said Miss Mills easily. "You were president of your class when you were a freshman. I was nobody in particular, and I know what it's like." "But why not leave it to her friends to hearten her up?" "Apparently she hasn't any, or if she has, they're as out of things as she is." "Well, to the other girls then." "When girls are happy they are cruel," said Miss Mills briefly, "or perhaps they're only careless." Betty, after a week's consideration, put the matter even more specifically. "I tried to make her over because I wanted a different kind of roommate," she said, "and we all let her see that we were sorry for her. Miss Mills made her feel as if----" "She had her dance card full and was splitting her waltzes," supplied Mary, who was just back from an afternoon at Winsted. "Exactly like that," agreed Betty, laughing. "I wish I'd done it," she added wistfully. "You kept her going till her chance came," said Mary. "She owes a lot to you, and she knows it." "Don't," protested Betty, flushing. "I tell you, I was only thinking of myself when I tried to fix her up, and then after a while I got tired of her and let her alone. I was horrid, but she's forgiven me and we're real friends now." "Well, we can't do but so much apiece," said Mary practically. "And I've noticed that 'jam,' as your valentine girl called it, is a mighty hard thing to give to people who really need it." Nevertheless the gift had been managed in Helen's case; she had gotten her start at last. Miss Mills's tactful little attention had furnished her with the hope and courage that she lacked, had given her back the self-confidence that Caroline Barnes had wounded. Whatever the girls might think, she knew she was "somebody" now, and she would go ahead and prove it. She could, too--she no longer doubted her possession of the college girl's one talent that Betty had laughed about. For there was Theresa Reed, her friend down the street. She was homely and awkward, she wore dowdy clothes and wore them badly, she was slow and plodding; but there was one thing that she could do, and the girls admired her for it and had instantly made a place for her. Helen was glad of a second proof that those things did not matter vitally. She set herself happily to work to study T. Reed's methods, and she began to look forward to the freshman-sophomore game as eagerly as did Betty or Katherine. But before the game there was the concert. Jack Burgess, having missed his connections, arrived in Harding exactly twenty-seven minutes before it began. As they drove to the theatre he inquired if Betty had received all three of his telegrams. "Yes," laughed Betty, "but I got the last one first. The other two were evidently delayed. You've kept me guessing, I can tell you." "Glad of that," said Jack cheerfully, as he helped her out of the carriage. "That's what you've kept me doing for just about a month. But I've manfully suppressed my curiosity and concealed the wounds in my bleeding heart until I could make inquiries in person." "What in the world do you mean, Jack?" asked Betty carelessly. Jack was such a tease. Just then they were caught in the crowd that filled the lobby of the theatre, and conversation became impossible as they hurried through it and into the theatre itself. "Checks, please," said a businesslike little usher in pink chiffon, and Jack and Betty followed her down the aisle. The theatre was already nearly full, and it looked like a great flower garden, for the girls all wore light evening gowns, for which the black coats of the men made a most effective background; while the odor of violets and roses from the great bunches that many of the girls carried strengthened the illusion. "Jove, but this is a pretty thing!" murmured Jack, who had never been in Harding before. "Is this all college?" "Yes," said Betty proudly, "except the men, of course. And don't they all look lovely?" "Who--the men?" asked Jack. Then he gave a sudden start. "Bob Winchester, by all that's wonderful!" "Who is he?" said Betty idly. "Another Harvard man? Jack"--with sudden interest, as she recognized the name--"what did you mean by that postscript?" "Good bluff!" said Jack in his most tantalizing drawl. "Jack Burgess, I expect you to talk sense the rest of the time you're here," remonstrated Betty impatiently. "Well, I will on one condition. Tell me why you sent it to him." "Sent what to whom?" demanded Betty. "Oh come," coaxed Jack. "You know what I mean. Why did you send Bob that valentine? It almost crushed me, I can tell you, when I hadn't even heard from you for months." Betty was staring at him blankly, "Why did I send 'Bob' that valentine? Who please tell me is 'Bob'?" "Robert M. Winchester, Harvard, 19--. Eats at my club. Is sitting at the present moment on the other side of the aisle, two rows up and over by the boxes. You'll know him by his pretty blush. He's rattled--he didn't think I'd see him." "Well?" said Betty. "Well?" repeated Jack. "I never saw Mr. Robert M. Winchester before," declared Betty with dignity, "and of course I didn't send him any valentine. What are you driving at, Jack Burgess?" Jack smiled benignly down at her. "But I saw it," he insisted. "Do you think I don't know your handwriting? The verses weren't yours, unless they turn out spring poets amazingly fast up here, but the writing was, except that on the envelope, and the Cupids were. The design was the same as the one on the picture frame you gave me last winter. Beginning to remember?" he inquired with an exasperating chuckle. "No," said Betty severely. Then a light broke over her face. "Oh yes, of course, I made that. Oh Jack Burgess, how perfectly rich!" "Don't think so myself, but Bobbie will. You see I told him that I could put up a good guess who sent him that valentine, and that I'd find out for sure when I came up. But evidently he couldn't wait, so he's made his sister ask him up too, in the hope of happening on the valentine lady, I suppose. Know his sister?" "No," said Betty, who was almost speechless with laughter. "Oh, Jack, listen!" and she told the story of the valentine firm. "Probably his sister bought it and sent it to him," she finished. "Or anyway some girl did. Jack, he's looking this way again. Did you tell him I sent it?" "No," said Jack hastily, "that is--I--well, I only said that the girl I knew up here sent it. He evidently suspects you. See him stare." "Jack, how could you?" "How couldn't I you'd better say," chuckled Jack. "I never heard of this valentine graft. What should I think, please? Never mind; I'll undeceive the poor boy at the intermission. He'll be badly disappointed. You see, he said it was his sister all along, and----" The curtain rolled slowly up, disclosing the Glee Club grouped in a rainbow-tinted semicircle about the leader, and the concert began. At the intermission Jack brought Mr. Winchester and his sister to meet Betty, and there were more explanations and much laughter. Then Jack insisted upon meeting the rest of the firm, so Betty hunted up Mary. Her Harvard man knew the other two slightly, and the story had to be detailed again for his benefit. "I say," he said when he had heard it, "that's what I call enterprise, but you made just one mistake. Next year you must sell your stock to us. Then all of it will be sure to land with the ladies, and your cousin's feelings won't be hurt." "Good idea," agreed Jack, "but let's keep to the living present, as the poets call it. Are you all good for a sleigh ride to-morrow afternoon?" "Ah, do say yes," begged Mr. Winchester, looking straight at Betty. "But your sister said you were going----" "On the sleeper to-morrow night," finished Mr. Winchester promptly. "And may I have the heart-shaped sign?" Betty stopped in Mary's room that night to talk over the exciting events of the evening. "Betty Wales, your cousin is the nicest man I ever met," declared Mary with enthusiasm. Betty laughed. "I shan't tell you what he said about you. It would make you entirely too vain. I'm so sorry that Katherine wasn't there, so she could go to-morrow." "It was too bad," said Mary complacently. "But then you know virtue is said to be its own reward. She'll have to get along with that, but I'm glad we're going to have another one. Those valentines were a lot of work to do for a girl whose very name I don't know." CHAPTER XV AT THE GREAT GAME "Well, I thought I'd seen some excitement before," declared Betty Wales, struggling to settle herself more comfortably on the scant ten square inches of space allotted her by the surging, swaying mass of girls behind. "But I was mistaken. Even the rally was nothing to this. Helen, do you feel as if they'd push you under the railing?" "A little," laughed Helen, "but I don't suppose they could, do you?" "I guess not," said Betty hopefully, "but they might break my spine. They're actually sitting on me, and I haven't room to turn around and see who's doing it. Oh, but isn't it fun!" The day of the great basket-ball game had come at last. A bare two hours more and the freshman team would either be celebrating its victory over the sophomores, or bravely shouldering its defeat; and the college had turned out _en masse_ to witness the struggle. The floor of the gymnasium was cleared, only Miss Andrews, the gym teacher, her assistant line-keepers and the ushers in white duck, with paper hats of green or purple, being allowed on the field of battle. On the little stage at one end of the hall sat the faculty, most of them manifesting their partisanship by the display of class-colors. The more popular supporters of the purple had been furnished with violets by their admirers, while the wearers of the green had American beauty roses--red being the junior color--tied with great bows of green ribbon. The prize exhibit was undoubtedly that of the enterprising young head of the chemistry department, who carried an enormous bunch of vivid green carnations; but the centre of interest was the president of the college, who of course displayed impartially the colors of both sides. He divided interest with a sprightly little lady in a brilliant purple gown, whose arms were so full of violets and daffodils and purple and yellow ribbons that she looked like an animated flower bed. She smiled and nodded at the sophomore gallery from behind their floral tributes; and the freshmen watched her eagerly and wished she had worn the green. But of course she wouldn't; she had nothing but sophomore lit., and all her classes adored her. In the gallery were the students, seniors and sophomores on one side, juniors and freshmen on the other, packed in like sardines. The front row of them sat on the floor, dangling their feet over the edge of the balcony--they had been warned at the gym classes of the day before to look to their soles and their skirt braids. The next row kneeled and peered over the shoulders of the first. The third row stood up and saw what it could. The others stood up and saw nothing, unless they were very tall or had been lucky enough to secure a place on a stray chair or a radiator. The balcony railings and posts were draped with bunting, and in every hand waved banners and streamers, purple and yellow on one side, red and green on the other. In the middle of each side were grouped the best singers of the classes, ready to lead the chorus in the songs which had been written for the occasion to the music of popular tunes. These were supposed to take the place of "yells," and cheers, both proscribed as verging upon the unwomanly. By rule the opposing factions sang in turn, but occasionally, quite by accident, both started at once, with deafening discords that rocked the gallery, and caused the musical head of the German Department to stop her ears in agony. Most of the girls had been standing in line for an hour waiting for the gymnasium doors to open, but a few, like Betty and Helen, had had reserved seat tickets given them by some one on the teams. These admitted their fortunate holders by a back door ahead of the crowd. All the faculty seats were reserved, of course, and the occupants of them were still coming in. As each appeared, he or she was met by a group of ushers and escorted ceremoniously across the floor, amid vigorous hand-clapping from the side whose colors were in evidence, and the singing of a verse of "Balm of Gilead" adapted to the occasion. Most of these had been written beforehand and were now hastily "passed along" from a paper in the hands of the leader. The rhymes were execrable, but that did not matter since almost nobody could understand them; and the main point was to come out strong on the chorus. "Oh, there's Miss Ferris!" cried Betty, "and she's wearing my ro--goodness, she's half covered with roses. Helen, see that lovely green dragon pennant!" "Here's to our Miss Ferris, drink her down!" sang the freshman chorus. "Here's to our Miss Ferris, drink her down! Here's to our Miss Ferris, may she never, never perish! Drink her down, drink her down, drink her down, down, down!" Back by the door there was a sudden commotion, and the sophomore faction broke out into tumultuous applause as a tall and stately gentleman appeared carrying a "shower bouquet" of daffodils with a border and streamers of violets. "Here's to Dr. Hinsdale, he's the finest man within hail! Drink him down, drink him down, drink him down, down, down!" sang the sophomores. "There is a team of great renown," began the freshmen lustily. What did the sophomores mean by clapping so? Ah! Miss Andrews was opening a door. "They're coming!" cried Betty eagerly. "Only the sophomore subs," amended the junior next to her. "So please don't stick your elbow into me." "Excuse me," said Betty hastily. "Oh Helen, there's Katherine!" Through the door at one side of the stage the freshman subs were coming, through the other the sophomores. Out on the floor of the gym they ran, all in their dark blue gym suits with green or purple stripes on the right sleeves, tossing their balls from hand to hand, throwing them into the baskets, bouncing them adroitly out of one another's reach, trying to appear as unconcerned as if a thousand people were not applauding them madly and singing songs about them and wondering which of them would get a chance to play in the great game. In a moment a little whistle blew and the subs found their places on the edge of the stage, where they sat in a restive, eager row, each girl in readiness to take the field the moment she should be needed. The door of the sophomore room opened again and the "real team" ran out. Then the gallery shook indeed! Even the freshmen cheered when the mascot appeared hand in hand with the captain. He was a dashing little Indian brave in full panoply of war-paint, beads, and feathers, with fringed leggins and a real Navajo blanket. When he had finished his grand entry, which consisted of a war-dance, accompanied by ear-splitting war-whoops, he came to himself suddenly to find a thousand people staring at him, and he was somewhat appalled. He could not blush, for Mary Brooks had stained his face and neck a beautiful brick-red, and he lacked the courage to run away. So he waited, forlorn and uncomfortable, while the freshman team rushed in, circling gaily about a diminutive knight in shining silver armor, with a green plume. He marched proudly, but with some difficulty, for his helmet was down and his sword, which was much too long for him, had an unbecoming tendency to trip him up. When his hesitating steps had brought him to the middle of the gymnasium, the knight, apparently perceiving the Indian for the first time, dropped his encumbering sword and rushed at his rival with sudden vehemence and blood-curdling cries. The little Indian stared for a moment in blank amazement, then slipping off his blanket turned tail and ran, reaching the door long before his sophomore supporters could stop him. The knight meanwhile, left in full possession of the field, waited for a moment until the laughter and applause had died away into curiosity. Then, deliberately reaching up one gauntleted hand, he pulled off his helmet, and disclosed the saucy, freckled face of the popular son of a favorite professor. He grinned cheerfully at the stage and the gallery, gallantly faced the junior-freshman side, and waving his green plume aloft yelled, "Hip, hip, hurrah for the freshmen!" at the top of a pair of very strong lungs. Then he raced off to find the seat which had been the price of his performance between two of his devoted admirers on the sub team, while the gallery, regardless of meaningless prohibitions and forgetful of class distinctions, cheered him to the echo. All of a sudden a businesslike air began to pervade the floor of the gymnasium. Somebody picked up the knight's sword and the Indian's blanket, and Miss Andrews took her position under the gallery. The ushers crowded onto the steps of the stage, and the members of the teams, who had gathered around their captains for a last hurried conference, began to find their places. "Oh, I almost wished they'd sing for a while more," sighed Betty. "Do you?" answered Helen absently. She was leaning out over the iron bar of the railing with her eyes glued to the smallest freshman centre. "Why?" "Oh, it makes me feel so thrilled and the songs are so clever and amusing, and the mascots so funny." "Oh, yes," agreed Helen. "The things here are all like that, but I want to see them play." "You mean you want to see her play," corrected Betty merrily. "I don't believe you care for a single other thing but T. Reed. Where is she?" Helen pointed her out proudly. "Oh, what an awfully funny, thin little braid! Isn't she comical in her gym suit, anyway? You wouldn't think she could play at all, would you, she's so small." "But she can," said Helen stoutly. "Don't I know it? I guarded her once--that is, I tried to. She's a perfect wonder. See, there's Rachel up by our basket. Katherine says she's fine too. Helen, they're going to begin." The assistant gym teacher had the whistle now. She blew it shrilly. "Play!" called Miss Andrews, and tossed the ball out over the heads of the waiting centres. A tall sophomore reached up confidently to grab it, but she found her hands empty. T. Reed had jumped at it and batted it off sidewise. Then she had slipped under Cornelia Thompson's famous "perpetual motion" elbow, and was on hand to capture the ball again when it bounced out from under a confused mass of homes and centres who were struggling over it on the freshman line. The freshmen clapped riotously. The sophomores looked at each other. Freshman teams were always rattled, and "muffed" their plays just at first. What did this mean? Oh, well, the homes would miss it. They did, and the sophomores breathed again, but only for a moment. Then T. Reed jumped and the ball went pounding back toward the freshman basket. This time a home got it, passed it successfully to Rachel, and Rachel poised it for an instant and sent it cleanly into the basket. The freshmen were shouting and thumping as if they had never heard that it was unlady-like (and incidentally too great a strain on the crowded gallery) to do so. Miss Andrews blew her whistle. "Either the game will stop or you must be less noisy," she commanded, and amid the ominous silence that followed she threw the ball. This time T. Reed missed her jump, and the tall sophomore got the ball and tossed it unerringly at Captain Marion Lawrence, who was playing home on her team. She bounded it off in an unexpected direction and then passed it to a home nearer the basket, who on the second trial put it in. The sophomores clapped, but the freshmen smiled serenely. Their home had done better, and they had T. Reed! The next ball went off to one side. In the scramble after it two opposing centres grabbed it at once, and each claimed precedence. The game stopped while Miss Andrews and the line-men came up to hear the evidence. There was a breathless moment of indecision. Then Miss Andrews took the ball and tossed up between the two contestants. But neither of them got it. Instead, T. Reed, slipping in between them, jumped for it again, and quick as a flash sent it flying toward the freshman goal. There was another breathless moment. Could Rachel Morrison put it in from that distance? No, it had fallen just short and the sophomore guards were playing it along to the opposite end of the home space, possibly intending to---- Ah! a stalwart sophomore guard, bracing herself for the effort, had tossed it over the heads of the centres straight across the gymnasium, and Marion Lawrence had it and was working toward the basket, meanwhile playing the ball back to a red haired competent-looking girl whose gray eyes twinkled merrily as her thin, nervous hands closed unerringly and vice-like around the big sphere. It was in the basket, and the freshmen's faces fell. "But maybe they've lost something on fouls," suggested Betty hopefully. "And T. Reed is just splendid," added Helen. Everybody was watching the gallant little centre now, but she watched only the ball. Back and forth, up and down the central field she followed it, slipping and sliding between the other players, now bringing the ball down with a phenomenal quick spring, now picking it up from the floor, now catching it on the fly. The sophomore centres were beginning to understand her methods, but it was all they could do to frustrate her; they had no effort left for offensive tactics. Generally because of their superior practice and team play, the sophomores win the inter-class game, and they do it in the first half, when the frightened freshmen, overwhelmed by the terrors of their unaccustomed situation, let the goals mount up so fast that all they can hope to do in the second half is to lighten their defeat. What business had T. Reed to be so cool and collected? If she kept on, there was strong likelihood of a freshman victory. But she was so small, and Cornelia Thompson was guarding her--Cornelia stuck like a burr, and the "perpetual motion" elbow had already circumvented T. Reed more than once. After a long and stubborn battle, the freshmen scored another point. But in the next round the big sophomore guard repeated her splendid 'crossboard play, and again Marion Lawrence caught the ball. Ah! Captain Lawrence is down, sliding heavily along the smooth floor; but in an instant she is up again, brushing the hair out of her eyes with one hand and making a goal with the other. "Time!" calls Miss Andrews. "The goals are three to two, fouls not counted." The line-men gather to compare notes on those. The teams hurry off to their rooms, Captain Lawrence limping badly. The first half is finished. A little shivering sigh of relief swept over the audience. The front row in the gallery struggled to its feet to rest, the back rows sat down suddenly for the same purpose. "Oh, doesn't it feel good to stretch out," said Betty, pulling herself up by the railing and drawing Helen after her. "Aren't you tired to death sitting still?" "Why no, I don't think so," answered Helen vaguely. "It was so splendid that I forgot." "So did I mostly, but I'm remembering good and hard now. I ache all over." She waved her hand gaily to Dorothy King, then caught Mary Brooks's eye across the hall and waved again. "T. Reed is a dandy," she said. "And Rachel was great. They were all great." "How do you suppose they feel now?" asked Helen, a note of awe in her voice. "Tired," returned Betty promptly, "and thirsty, probably, and proud--awfully proud." She turned upon Helen suddenly. "Helen Chase Adams, do you know I might have been down there with the subs. Katherine told me this morning that it was nip and tuck between Marie Austin and me. If I'd tried harder--played an inch better--think of it, Helen, I might have been down there too!" "I couldn't do anything like that," said Helen simply, "but next year I mean to write a song." Betty looked at her solemnly. "You probably will. You're a good hard worker, Helen. Isn't it queer," she went on, "we're not a bit alike, but this game is making us feel the same way. I wonder if the others feel so too. Perhaps it's one reason why they have this game--to wake us all up and make us want to do something worth while." "Betty Wales," called Christy Mason from the floor below. Betty leaned over the railing. "Don't forget that you're coming to dinner to-night. We're going to serenade the team. They'll be dining at the Belden with Miss Andrews." Kate Denise joined her. She had never mentioned the afternoon in Eleanor's room, but she took especial pains to be pleasant to Betty. "Hello, Betty Wales," she called up. "Isn't it fine? Don't you think we'll win? Anyway Miss Andrews says it's the best game she ever saw." "Betty Wales," called Dorothy King from her leader's box, "come to vespers with me to-morrow." Betty met them all with friendly little nods and enthusiastic answers. Then she turned back to Helen. "It's funny, but I'm always interrupted when I'm trying to think," she said. "If there were six of me I think I might be six successful persons. But as it is, I suppose I shall always be just 'that little Betty Wales' and have a splendid time." "That would be enough for most people," said Helen. "Oh, I hope not," said Betty soberly. "I don't amount to anything." She slipped down into her place again. The teams were coming back. "See Laurie limp!" "Their other home--the one with the red hair--looks as fresh as a May morning." "Well, so does T. Reed." "We have a fighting chance yet." Thus the freshman gallery. But the second half opened with the rapid winning of three goals by the sophomores. Cornelia Thompson had evidently made up her mind that nobody so small as T. Reed should get away from her and mar the reputation of her famous "ever moving and ever present" elbow. The other freshman centres were over-matched, and once Marion Lawrence and the red-haired home got the ball between them, a goal was practically a certainty. "Play!" called Miss Andrews for the fourth time. T. Reed's eyes flashed and her lips shut into a narrow determined line. Another freshman centre got the ball and passed it successfully to T. Reed, who gave it a pounding blow toward the freshman basket. A sophomore guard knocked it out of Rachel Morrison's hands, and it rolled on to the stage. There was a wild scuffle and the freshman balcony broke into tumultuous cheering, for a home who had missed all her previous chances had clutched it from under the president's chair and had scored at last. A moment later she did it again. There was a pause while a freshman guard was carried off with a twisted ankle and Katherine Kittredge ran to her place. Then the sophomores scored twice. Then the freshmen did likewise. "Time!" called Miss Andrews sharply. The game was over. "Score!" shrieked the galleries. Then the freshmen bravely began to sing their team song, "There is a team of great renown." They were beaten, of course, but they were proud of that team. "The freshmen score one goal on fouls. Score, six to eight in favor of the purple," announced Miss Andrews after a moment. "And I want to say----" It was unpardonably rude, but they could not help interrupting to cheer. "That I am proud of all the players. It was a splendid game," she finished, when the thoughtful ones had hushed the rest. Then they cheered again. The sophomore team were carrying their captain around the gym on their shoulders; the freshmen, gathered in a brave little group, were winking hard and cheering with the rest. The gallery was emptying itself with incredible rapidity on to the floor. The stage was watching, and wishing--some of it--that it could go down on the floor and shriek and sing and be young and foolish generally. Betty and Helen ran down with the rest. "Helen," whispered Betty on the way, "I don't care what happens, I will, I will, I will make them sing to me some day. Oh Helen, don't you love 19--, and aren't you proud of it and of T. Reed?" At the foot of the stairs they met the three B's. "Come on, come on," cried the three. "We're going to sing to the sophomores," and they seized upon Betty and bore her off to the corner where the freshmen were assembling. Left to herself Helen got into a nook by the door and watched. It was queer how much fun it was to watch, lately. "Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them:"--she had read it in the library that morning and it kept running in her head. Was it selfish and conceited to want to be worth something to her college--to long to do something that would give her a place among the girls? A month ago Theresa had stood with her high up on the bank and watched the current sweep by. Now she was in the stream; even Betty Wales envied her; she had "achieved greatness." Betty wanted to be sung to. Well, no doubt she would be, in spite of the "interruptions"; she was "born great." Helen aspired only to write a song to be sung. That wasn't very much, and she would try hard--Theresa said it was all trying and caring--for she must somehow prove herself worthy of the greatness that had been "thrust upon" her. Betty was in the centre of an excited group of freshmen. Christy Mason was there too; probably they were planning for the serenade. "She won't mind if I go," thought Helen. She would have liked to speak to Theresa, but she had delayed too long; the teams had disappeared. So she slipped out alone. There would be a long, quiet evening for theme work--for Helen had elected Mary's theme course at mid-years, though no one in the Chapin house knew it. Betty did not get home till quarter of ten, and then she went straight off to find Katherine and Rachel. "I came to see if there's anything left of Rachel," she said. "There's a big bump on my forehead," said Rachel, sitting up in bed with a faint smile. "I'm sure of that because it aches." "Poor lady!" Betty turned to Katherine. "You got your chance, didn't you? I felt it in my bones that you would. Wasn't it all splendid?" "Yes indeed," assented the contestants heartily. "It made me feel so energetic," Betty went on eagerly. "Of course I felt proud of you and of 19--, just as I did at the rally, but there was something else, too. You'll see me going at things next term the way T. Reed went at that ball." "You're one of the most energetic persons I know, as it is," said Rachel, smiling at her earnestness. "Yes," said Betty impatiently. "I fly around and make a great commotion, but I fritter away my time, because I forget to keep my eyes on the ball. Why, I haven't done anything this year." Katherine pulled Betty down beside her on the couch. "Child, you've done a lot," she said. "We were just considering all you've done, and wondering why you weren't asked to usher to-day. You've sub-subed a lot and you know so many girls on the team and are such good friends with Jean Eastman." To her consternation Betty felt a hot flush creeping up her neck and over her cheeks. It had been the one consolation in the trouble with Eleanor that none of the Chapin house girls had asked any questions or even appeared to notice that anything was wrong. "Oh, I don't know Miss Eastman much," she said quickly. "And as for substituting on the subs, that was a great privilege. That wasn't anything to make me an usher for." "Well, all the other girls who did it much ushered," persisted Katherine. "Christy Mason and Kate Denise and that little Ruth Ford. And you'd have made such a stunning one." "Goosie!" said Betty, rising abruptly. "I know you girls want to go to bed. We'll talk it all over to-morrow." As she closed the door, Rachel and Katherine exchanged glances. "I told you there was trouble," said Katherine, "and mark my words, Eleanor Watson is at the bottom of it somehow." "Don't let's notice it again, though," answered the considerate Rachel. "She evidently doesn't want to tell us about it." Betty undressed almost in silence. Her exhilaration had left her all at once and her ambition; life looked very complicated and unprofitable. As she went over to turn out the light, she noticed a sheet of paper, much erased and interlined, on Helen's desk. "Have you begun your song already?" she asked. "Oh, no, I wrote a theme," said Helen with what seemed needless embarrassment. But the theme was a little verse called "Happiness." She got it back the next week heavily under-scored in red ink, and with a succinct "Try prose," beneath it; but she was not discouraged. She had had one turn; she could afford to wait patiently for another, which, if you tried long enough and cared hard enough must come at last. CHAPTER XVI A CHANCE TO HELP Eleanor Watson had gotten neither class spirit nor personal ambition from 19--'s "glorious old defeat," as Katherine called it. The Saturday afternoon of the game she had spent, greatly to the disgust of her friends, on the way to New York, whither she went for a Sunday with Caroline Barnes. Caroline's mother had been very ill, and the European trip was indefinitely postponed, but the family were going for a shorter jaunt to Bermuda. Caroline begged Eleanor to join them. "You can come as well as not," she urged. "You know your father would let you--he always does. And we sail the very first day of your vacation too." "But you stay three weeks," objected Eleanor, "and the vacation is only two." "What's the difference? Say you were ill and had to stay over," suggested Caroline promptly. Eleanor's eyes flashed. "Once for all, Cara, please understand that's not my way of doing business nowadays. I should like to go, though, and I imagine my father wouldn't object. I'll write you if I can arrange it." She had quite forgotten her idle promise when, on the following Monday morning, she stood in the registrar's office, waiting to get a record card for chapel attendance in place of one she had lost. The registrar was busy. Eleanor waited while she discussed the pedagogical value of chemistry with a sophomore who had elected it, and now, after a semester and a half of gradually deteriorating work, wished to drop it because the smells made her ill. "Does the fact that we sent you a warning last week make the smells more unendurable?" asked the registrar suggestively, and the sophomore retreated in blushing confusion. Next in line was a nervous little girl who inquired breathlessly if she might go home right away--four days early. Some friends who were traveling south in their private car had telegraphed her to meet them in Albany and go with them to her home in Charleston. "My dear, I'm sorry," began the registrar sympathetically, "but I can't let you go. We're going to be very strict about this vacation. A great many girls went home early at Christmas, and it's no exaggeration to say that a quarter of the college came back late on various trivial excuses. This time we're not going to have that sort of thing. The girls who come back at all must come on time; the only valid excuse at either end of the vacation will be serious illness. I'm sorry." "So am I," said the little girl, with a pathetic quiver in her voice. "I never rode in a private car. But--it's no matter. Thank you, Miss Stuart." Eleanor had listened to the conversation with a curl of her lip for the stupid child who proffered her request in so unconvincing a manner, and an angry resentment against the authorities who should presume to dictate times and seasons. "They ought to have a system of cuts," she thought. "That's the only fair way. Then you can take them when you please, and if you cut over you know it and you do it at your peril. Here everything is in the air; you are never sure where you stand----" "What can I do for you, Miss Watson?" asked the registrar pleasantly. Eleanor got her chapel card and hurried home to telegraph her father for permission to go to Bermuda, and, as she knew exactly what his answer would be, to write Caroline that she might expect her. "You know I always take a dare," she wrote. "My cuts last semester amounted to twice as much as this trip will use up, and if they make a fuss I shall just call their attention to what they let pass last time. Please buy me a steamer-rug, a blue and green plaid one, and meet me at the Forty-second Street station at two on Friday." Betty knew nothing about Eleanor's plans, beyond what she had been able to gather from chance remarks of the other girls; and that was not much, for every time the subject came up she hastened to change it, lest some one should discover that Eleanor had told her nothing, and had scarcely spoken to her indeed for weeks. When Eleanor finally went off, without a sign or a word of good-bye, Betty discovered that she was dreadfully disappointed. She had never thought of the estrangement between them as anything but a temporary affair, that would blow over when Eleanor's mortification over the debate was forgotten. She had felt sure that long before the term ended there would come a chance for a reconciliation, and she had meant to take the chance at any sacrifice of her pride. She was still fond of Eleanor in spite of everything, and she was sorry for her too, for her quick eyes detected signs of growing unhappiness under Eleanor's ready smiles. Besides, she hated "schoolgirl fusses." She wanted to be on good terms with every girl in 19--. She wanted to come back to a spring term unclouded by the necessity for any of the evasions and subterfuges that concealment of the quarrel with Eleanor and Jean Eastman's strange behavior had brought upon her. And now Eleanor was gone; the last chance until after vacation had slipped through her fingers. At home she told Nan all about her troubles, first exacting a solemn pledge of secrecy. "Hateful thing!" said Nan promptly. "Drop her. Don't think about her another minute." "Then you don't think I was to blame?" asked Betty anxiously. "To blame? No, certainly not. To be sure," Nan added truthfully, "you were a little tactless. You knew she didn't know that you were in the secret of her having to resign, and you didn't intend to tell her, so it would have been better for you to let some one else help Miss Eastman out." "But I thought I was helping Eleanor out." "In a way you were. But you see it wouldn't seem so to her. It would look as though you disapproved of her appointment." "But Nan, she knows now that I knew." "Then I suppose she concludes that you took advantage of knowing. You say that it made you quite prominent for a while. You see, dear, when a person isn't quite on the square herself----" But Betty had burst into a storm of tears. "I am to blame," she sobbed. "I am to blame! I knew it, only I couldn't quite see how. Oh, what shall I do? What shall I do?" "Don't cry, dear," said Nan in distress, at the unprecedented sight of Betty in tears. "I tell you, you were not to blame. You were a little unwise perhaps at first, but Miss Watson has refused your apologies and explanations and only laughs at you when you try to talk to her about it. I should drop her at once and forever; but, if you are bound to bring her around, the only way I can think of is to look out for some chance to serve her and so prove your real friendship--though what sort of friend she can be I can't imagine." "Nan, she's just like the girl in the rhyme," said Betty seriously. "'When she was good she was very, very good, And when she was bad she was horrid.' "Eleanor is a perfect dear most of the time. And Nan, there's something queer about her mother. She never speaks of her, and she's been at boarding school for eight years now, though she's not seventeen till May. Think of that!" "It certainly makes her excusable for a good deal," said Nan. "How is my friend Helen Chase Adams coming on?" "Why Nan, she's quite blossomed out. She's really lots of fun now. But I had an awful time with her for a while," and she related the story of Helen's winter of discontent. "I suppose that was my fault too," she finished. "I seem to be a regular blunderer." "You're a dear little sister, all the same," declared Nan. "I say girls, come and play ping-pong," called Will from the hall below, and the interview ended summarily. But the memory of Eleanor Watson seemed fated to pursue Betty through her vacation. A few days later an old friend of Mrs. Wales, who had gone to Denver to live some years before and was east on a round of visits, came in to call. The moment she heard that Betty was at Harding, she inquired for Eleanor. "I'm so glad you know her," she said. "She's quite a protégé of mine and she needs nice friends like you if ever a girl did. Don't mention it about college, Betty, but she's had a very sad life. Her mother was a strange woman--but there's no use going into that. She died when Eleanor was a tiny girl, and Eleanor and her brother Jim have been at boarding schools ever since. In the summers, though, they were always with their father in Denver. They worshiped him, particularly Eleanor, and he has always promised her that when she was through school he would open the old Watson mansion and she should keep house for him and Jim. Then last year a pretty little society girl, only four or five years older than Eleanor, set her cap for the judge and married him. Jim liked her, but Eleanor was heart-broken, and the judge, seeing storms ahead, I suppose, and hoping that Eleanor would get interested and want to finish the course, made her promise to go to Harding for a year. Now don't betray my confidence, Betty, and do make allowances for Eleanor. I hope she'll be willing to stay on at college. It's just what she needs. Besides, she'd be very unhappy at home, and her aunt in New York isn't at all the sort of person for her to live with." So it came about that Betty returned to college more than ever determined to get back upon the old footing with Eleanor, and behold, Eleanor was not there! The Chapin house was much excited over her absence, for tales of the registrar's unprecedented hardness of heart had gone abroad, and almost nobody else had dared to risk the mysterious but awful possibilities that a late return promised. As Betty was still supposed by most of the house to be in Eleanor's confidence, she had to parry question after question as to her whereabouts. To, "Did she tell you that she was coming back late?" she could truthfully answer "No." But the girls only laughed when she insisted that Eleanor must be ill. "She boasts that she's never been ill in her life," said Mary Brooks. And Adelaide Rich always added with great positiveness, "It's exactly like her to stay away on purpose, just to see what will happen." Unfortunately Betty could not deny this, and she was glad enough to drop the argument. She had too many pleasant things to do to care to waste time in profitless discussion. For it was spring term. Nobody but a Harding girl knows exactly what that means. The freshman is very likely to consider the much heralded event only a pretty myth, until having started from home on a cold, bleak day that is springtime only by the calendar, she arrives at Harding to find herself confronted by the genuine article. The sheltered situation of the town undoubtedly has something to do with its early springs, but the attitude of the Harding girl has far more. She knows that spring term is the beautiful crown of the college year, and she is bound that it shall be as long as possible. So she throws caution and her furs to the winds and dons a muslin gown, plans drives and picnics despite April showers, and takes twilight strolls regardless of lurking germs of pneumonia. The grass grows green perforce and the buds swell to meet her wishes, while the sun, finding a creature after his brave, warm heart, does his gallant best for her. "Do what little studying you intend to right away," Mary Brooks advised her freshmen. "Before you know it, it will be too warm to work." "But at present it's too lovely," objected Roberta. "Then join the Athletic Association and trust to luck, but above all join the Athletic Association. I'm on the membership committee." "Can I get into the golf club section this time?" asked Betty, who had been kept on the waiting list all through the fall. "Yes, you just squeeze in, and Christy Mason wants you to play round the course with her to-morrow." "I'm for tennis," said Katherine. "Miss Lawrence and I are going to play as soon as the courts are marked out. By the way, when do the forget-me-nots blossom?" "Has Laurie roped you into that?" asked Mary Brooks scornfully. "Don't jump at conclusions," retorted Katherine. "I didn't have to jump. The wild ones blossom about the middle of May. You'll have to think of something else if you want to make an immediate conquest of your angel. And speaking of angels," added Mary, who was sitting by a window, "Eleanor Watson is coming up the walk." The girls trooped out into the hall to greet Eleanor, who met them all with the carefully restrained cordiality that she had used toward them ever since the break with Betty. Yes, Bermuda had been charming, such skies and seas. Yes, she was just a week late--exactly. No, she had not seen the registrar yet, but she had heard last term that excuses weren't being given away by the dozen. "I met a friend of yours during vacation," began Betty timidly in the first pause. Eleanor turned to her unsmilingly. "Oh yes, Mrs. Payne," she said. "I believe she mentioned it. I saw her last night in New York." Then she picked up her bag and walked toward her room with the remark that late comers mustn't waste time. The next day at luncheon some one inquired again about her excuse. Eleanor shrugged her shoulders. "Oh, that's all right; you needn't be at all anxious. The interview wasn't even amusing. The week is to be counted as unexcused absence--which as far as I can see means nothing whatever." "You may find out differently in June," suggested Mary, nettled by Eleanor's superior air. "Oh, June!" said Eleanor with another shrug. "I'm leaving in June, thank the fates!" "Perhaps you'll change your mind after spring term. Everybody says it's so much nicer," chirped Helen. "Possibly," said Eleanor curtly, "but I really can't give you much encouragement, Miss Adams." Whereat poor Helen subsided meekly, scarcely raising her eyes from her plate through the rest of the meal. "Better caution your friend Eleanor not to air those sentiments of hers about unexcused absences too widely, or she'll get into trouble," said Mary Brooks to Betty on the way up-stairs; but Betty, intent on persuading Roberta to come down-town for an ice, paid no particular attention to the remark, and it was three weeks before she thought of it again. She found Eleanor more unapproachable than ever this term, but remembering Nan's suggestion she resolved to bide her time. Meanwhile there was no reason for not enjoying life to the utmost. Golf, boating, walking, tennis--there were ten ways to spend every spare minute. But golf usually triumphed. Betty played very well, and having made an excellent record in her first game with Christy, she immediately found herself reckoned among the enthusiasts and expected to get into trim for the June tournament. Some three weeks after the beginning of the term she went up to the club house in the late afternoon, intending to practice putting, which was her weak point and come home with Christy and Nita Reese, another golf fiend, who had spent the whole afternoon on the course. But on the club house piazza she found Dorothy King. Dorothy played golf exceedingly well, as she did everything else; but as she explained to Betty, "By junior year all this athletic business gets pretty much crowded out." She still kept her membership in the club, however, and played occasionally, "just to keep her hand in for the summer." She had done six holes this afternoon, all alone, and now she was resting a few moments before going home. She greeted Betty warmly. "I looked for you out on the course," she said, "but your little pals thought you weren't coming up to-day. How's your game?" "Better, thank you," said Betty, "except my putting, and I'm going to practice on that now. Did you know that Christy had asked me to play with her in the inter-class foursomes?" "That's good," said Dorothy cordially. "Do you see much of Eleanor Watson these days?" she added irrelevantly. "Why--no-t much," stammered Betty, blushing in spite of herself. "I see her at meals of course." "I thought you told me once that you were very fond of her." "Yes, I did--I am," said Betty quickly, wondering what in the world Dorothy was driving at. "She was down at the house last night," Dorothy went on, "blustering around about having come back late, saying that she'd shown what a bluff the whole excuse business is, and that now, after she has proved that it's perfectly easy to cut over at the end of a vacation, perhaps some of us timid little creatures will dare to follow her lead. But perhaps you've heard her talking about it." "I heard her say a little about it," admitted Betty, suddenly remembering Mary Brooks's remark. Had the "trouble" that Mary had foreseen anything to do with Dorothy's questions? "She's said a great deal about it in the last two weeks," went on Dorothy. "Last night after she left, her senior friend, Annette Cramer, and I had a long talk about it. We both agreed that somebody ought to speak to her, but I hardly know her, and Annette says that she's tried to talk to her about other things and finds she hasn't a particle of influence with her." Dorothy paused as if expecting some sort of comment or reply, but Betty was silent. "We both thought," said Dorothy at last, "that perhaps if you'd tell her she was acting very silly and doing herself no end of harm she might believe you and stop." "Oh, Miss King, I couldn't," said Betty in consternation. "She wouldn't let me--indeed she wouldn't!" "She told Annette once that she admired you more than any girl in college," urged Dorothy quietly, "so your opinion ought to have some weight with her." "She said that!" gasped Betty in pleased amazement. Then her face fell. "I'm sorry, Miss King, but I'm quite sure she's changed her mind. I couldn't speak to her; but would you tell me please just why any one should--why you care?" "Why, of course, it's not exactly my business," said Dorothy, "except that I'm on the Students' Commission, and so anything that is going wrong is my business. Miss Watson is certainly having a bad influence on the girls she knows in college, and besides, if that sort of talk gets to the ears of the authorities, as it's perfectly certain to do if she keeps on, she will be very severely reprimanded, and possibly asked to leave, as an insubordinate and revolutionary character. The Students' Commission aims to avoid all that sort of thing, when a quiet hint will do it. But Miss Watson seems to be unusually difficult to approach; I'm afraid if you can't help us out, Betty, we shall have to let the matter rest." She gathered up her caddy-bag. "I must get the next car. Don't do it unless you think best. Or if you like ask some one else. Annette and I couldn't think of any one, but you know better who her friends are." She was off across the green meadow. Betty half rose to follow, then sank back into her chair. Dorothy had not asked for an answer; she had dropped the matter, had left it in her hands to manage as she thought fit, appealing to her as a friend of Eleanor's, a girl whom Eleanor admired. "Whom she used to admire," amended Betty with a sigh. But what could she do? A personal appeal was out of the question; it would effect nothing but a widening of the breach between them. Could Kate Denise help? She never came to see Eleanor now. Neither did Jean Eastman--why almost nobody did; all her really intimate friends seemed to have dropped away from her. And yet she must think of some one, for was not this the opportunity she had so coveted? It might be the very last one too, thought Betty. "If anything happened to hurt Eleanor's feelings again, she wouldn't wait till June. She'd go now." She considered girl after girl, but rejected them all for various reasons. "She wouldn't take it from any girl," she decided, and with that decision came an inspiration. Why not ask Ethel Hale? Ethel had tried to help Eleanor before, was interested in her, and understood something of her moody, many-sided temperament. She had put Eleanor in her debt too; she could urge her suggestion on the ground of a return favor. In an instant Betty's mind was made up. She looked ruefully at her dusty shoes and mussed shirt-waist. "I can't go to see Ethel in these," she decided, "but if I hurry home now I can dress and go right up there after dinner, before she gets off anywhere." The putting must wait. With one regretful glance out over the green, breezy course Betty started resolutely off toward the dusty highway and the noisy trolleys. CHAPTER XVII AN OUNCE OF PREVENTION "I wish I could do it, Betty, but I'm sure it wouldn't be the least use for me to try. I thought I had a little hold on her for a while, but I'm afraid I was too sure of her. She avoids me now--goes around corners and into recitation rooms when she sees me coming. You see--I wonder if she told you about our trip to New York?" Betty nodded, wishing she dared explain the full extent of her information. "I thought so from your coming up here to-night. Well, as you've just said, she's very reserved, strangely so for a young girl; when she lets out anything about herself she wishes that she hadn't the next minute." "Yes, I've noticed that," admitted Betty grudgingly. "And so, having once let me get a glimpse of her better self, and then having decided as usual that she wished she hadn't, she needed a proof from me that I was worthy of her confidence. But I didn't give it; I was busy and let the matter drop, and now I am the last person who could go to her. I'm very sorry." "Oh, dear!" said Betty forlornly. "But isn't it so? Don't you agree with me?" "I'm afraid I do." "Then go back and speak to her yourself, dear. She's very fond of you, and I'm sure a little friendly hint from you is all that she needs." "No, I can't speak to her either, Ethel. You wouldn't suggest it if you knew how things are between us. But I see that you can't. Thank you just as much. No, I mustn't stop to-night." Betty walked down the elm-shaded street lost in thought. Eleanor had declaimed upon the foolishness of coming back on time after vacations through most of the dinner hour, and Betty understood as she had not that afternoon what Dorothy meant. But now her one hope had failed her; Ethel had shown good cause why she should not act as Eleanor's adviser and Betty had no idea what to do next. "Hello, Betty Wales! Christy and I thought we saw you up at the golf club this afternoon." Nita Reese's room overlooked the street and she was hanging out her front window. "I was up there," said Betty soberly, "but I had to come right back. I didn't play at all." "Then I should say it was a waste of good time to go up," declared Nita amiably. "You'd better be on hand to-morrow. The juniors are going to be awfully hard to beat." "I'll try," said Betty unsmilingly, and Nita withdrew her head from the window, wondering what could be the matter with her usually cheerful friend. At the corner of Meriden Place Betty hesitated. Then, noticing that Mrs. Chapin's piazza was full of girls, she crossed Main Street and turned into the campus, following the winding path that led away from the dwelling-houses through the apple orchard. There were seats along this path. Betty chose one on the crest of the hill, screened in by a clump of bushes and looking off toward Paradise and the hills beyond. There she sat down in the warm spring dusk to consider possibilities. And yet what was the use of bothering her head again when she had thought it all over in the afternoon? Arguments that she might have made to Ethel occurred to her now that it was too late to use them, but nothing else. She would go back to Dorothy, explain why she could not speak to Eleanor herself, and beg her to take back the responsibility which she had unwittingly shifted to the wrong shoulders. She would go straight off too. She had found an invitation to a spread at the Belden house scrawled on her blotting pad at dinner time, and she might as well be over there enjoying herself as here worrying about things she could not possibly help. As she got up from her seat she glanced at the hill that sloped off below her. It was the dust-pan coasting ground. How different it looked now in its spring greenery! Betty smiled at the memory of her mishap. How nice Eleanor had been to her then. And Miss Ferris! If only Miss Ferris would speak to Eleanor. "Why, perhaps she will," thought Betty, suddenly remembering Miss Ferris's note. "I could ask her to, anyway. But--she's a faculty. Well, Ethel is too, though I never thought of it." And Dorothy had wanted Betty's help in keeping the matter out of the hands of the authorities. "But this is different," Betty decided at last. "I'm asking them not as officials, but just as awfully nice people, who know what to say better than we girls do. Miss King would think that was all right." Without giving herself time to reconsider, Betty sped toward the Hilton house. All sorts of direful suppositions occurred to her while she waited for a maid to answer her ring. What if Miss Ferris had forgotten about writing the note, or had meant it for what Nan called "a polite nothing"? Perhaps it would be childish to speak of it anyway. Perhaps Miss Ferris would have other callers. If not, how should she tell her story? "I ought to have taken time to think," reflected Betty, as she followed the maid down the hall to Miss Ferris's rooms. Miss Ferris was alone; nevertheless Betty fidgeted dreadfully during the preliminary small-talk. Somebody would be sure to come in before she could get started, and she should never, never dare to come again. At the first suggestion of a pause she plunged into her business. "Miss Ferris, I want to ask you something, but I hated to do it, so I came right along as soon as I decided that I'd better, and now I don't know how to begin." "Just begin," advised Miss Ferris, laughing. "That is what they say to you in theme classes," said Betty, "but it never helped me so very much, somehow. Well, I might begin by telling you why I thought I could come to you." "Unless you really want to tell that you might skip it," said Miss Ferris, "because I don't need to be reminded that I shall always be glad to do anything I can for my good friend Betty Wales." "Oh, thank you! That helps a lot," said Betty gratefully, and went on with her story. Miss Ferris listened attentively. "Miss Watson is the girl with the wonderful gray eyes and the lovely dark hair. I remember. She comes down here a great deal to see Miss Cramer, I think. It's a pity, isn't it, that she hasn't great good sense to match her beauty? So you want me to speak to her about her very foolish attitude toward our college life. Suppose I shouldn't succeed in changing her mind?" "Oh, you would succeed," said Betty eagerly. "Mary Brooks says you can argue a person into anything." Miss Ferris laughed again. "I'm glad Miss Brooks approves of my argumentative ability, but are you sure that Miss Watson is the sort of person with whom argument is likely to count for anything? Did you ever know her to change her mind on a subject of this sort, because her friends disapproved of her?" Betty hesitated. "Yes--yes, I have. Excuse me for not going into particulars, Miss Ferris, but there was a thing she did when she came here that she never does now, because she found how others felt about it. Indeed, I think there are several things." Miss Ferris nodded silently. "Then why not appeal to the same people who influenced her before?" It was the question that Betty had been dreading, but she met it unflinchingly. "One of them thinks she has lost her influence, Miss Ferris, and another one who helped a little bit before, can't, because--I'm that one, Miss Ferris. I unintentionally did something last term that made Eleanor angry with me. It made her more dissatisfied and unhappy here too; so when I heard about this I felt as if I was a little to blame for it, and then I wanted to make up for the other time too. But of course it is a good deal to ask of you." Betty slid forward on to the edge of her chair ready to accept a hasty dismissal. Miss Ferris waited a moment. "I shall be very glad to do it," she said at last. "I wanted to be sure that I understood the situation and that I could run a chance of helping Miss Watson. I think I can, but you must forgive me if I make a bad matter worse. I'll ask her to have tea with me to-morrow. May I send a note by you?" "Of course you won't tell her that I spoke to you?" asked Betty anxiously, when Miss Ferris handed her the note. Miss Ferris promised and Betty danced out into the night. Half-way home she laughed merrily all to herself. "What's the joke?" said a girl suddenly appearing around the corner of the Main Building. "It was on me," laughed Betty, "so you can't expect me to tell you what it was." It had just occurred to her that, as there was no possibility of Eleanor's finding out her part in Miss Ferris's intervention, a reconciliation was as far away as ever. "She wouldn't like it if she should find out," thought Betty, "and perhaps it was just another tactless interference. Well, I'm glad I didn't think of all these things sooner, for I believe it was the right thing to do, and it was a lot easier doing it while I hoped it might bring us together, as Nan said. I wonder what kind of things Nan meant." She dropped the note on the hall table and slipped softly up-stairs. As she sat down at her desk she looked at the clock and hesitated. It was not so late as she had thought, only quarter of nine. There was still time to go back to the Belden. But after a moment's wavering Betty began getting out of her dress and into a kimono. Since the day of the basket-ball game she had honestly tried not to let the little things interfere with the big, nor the mere "interruptions" that were fun and very little more loom too large in her scale of living. "Livy to-night and golf to-morrow," she told the green lizard, as she sat down again and went resolutely to work. When Eleanor came in to dinner the next evening Betty could hardly conceal her excitement. Would she say anything? If she said nothing what would it mean? The interview had apparently not been a stormy one. Eleanor looked tired, but not in the least disturbed or defiant. She ate her dinner almost in silence, answering questions politely but briefly and making none of her usual effort to control and direct the conversation. But just as the girls were ready to leave the table she broke her silence. "Wait a minute," she said. "I want to ask you please to forget all the foolish things I said last night at dinner. I've said them a good many times, and I can't contradict them to every one, but I can here--and I want to. I've thought more about it since yesterday, and I see that I hadn't at all the right idea of the situation. The students at a college are supposed to be old enough to do the right thing about vacations without the attaching of any childish penalty to the wrong thing. But we all of us get careless; then a public sentiment must be created against the wrong things, like cutting over. That was what the registrar was trying to do. Anybody who stays over as I did makes it less possible to do without rules and regulations and penalties--in other words hurts the tone of the college, just as a man who likes to live in a town where there are churches but never goes to them himself, unfairly throws the responsibility of church-going on to the rest of the community. I hadn't thought of it in that way; I didn't mean to be a shirk, but I was one." A profound silence greeted Eleanor's argument. Mary Rich, who had been loud in her championship of Eleanor's sentiments the night before, looked angry at this sudden desertion; and Mary Brooks tried rather unsuccessfully not to smile. The rest were merely astonished at so sudden a change of mind. Finally Betty gave a little nervous cough and in sheer desperation began to talk. "That's a good enough argument to change any one's mind," she said. "Isn't it queer how many different views of a subject there are?" "Of some subjects," said Eleanor pointedly. It was exactly what Betty should have expected, but she couldn't help being a little disappointed. Eleanor had just shown herself so fine and downright, so willing to make all the reparation in her power for a course whose inconsistency had been proved to her. It was very disheartening to find that she cherished the old, reasonless grudge as warmly as ever. But if Betty had accomplished nothing for herself, she had done all that she hoped for Eleanor, and she tried to feel perfectly satisfied. "I think too much about myself, anyway," she told the green lizard, who was the recipient of many confidences about this time. The rest of the month sped by like the wind. As Betty thought it over afterward, it seemed to have been mostly golf practice and bird club. Roberta organized the bird club. Its object, according to her, was to assist Mary Brooks with her zoology by finding bird haunts and conveying Mary to them; its ultimate development almost wrought Mary's ruin. Mary had elected a certain one year course in zoology on the supposition that one year, general courses are usually "snaps," and the further theory that every well conducted student will have one "snap" on her schedule. These propositions worked well together until the spring term, when zoology 1a resolved itself into a bird-study class. Mary, who was near-sighted, detested bird-study, and hardly knew a crow from a kinglet, found life a burden, until Roberta, who loved birds and was only too glad to get a companion on her walks in search of them, organized what she picturesquely named "the Mary-bird club." Rachel and Adelaide immediately applied for admission, and about the time that Mary appropriated the forget-me-nots that Katherine had gathered for Marion Lawrence and wore them to a dance on the plea that they exactly matched her evening dress, and also decoyed Betty into betraying her connection with the freshman grind-book, Katherine and Betty joined. They seldom accompanied the club on its official walks, preferring to stroll off by themselves and come back with descriptions of the birds they had seen for Mary and Roberta to identify. Occasionally they met a friendly bird student who helped them with their identifications on the spot, and then, when Roberta was busy, they would take Mary out in search of "their birds," as they called them. Oddly enough they always found these rare species a second time, though Mary, because of her near-sightedness, had to be content with a casual glance at them. "But what you've seen, you've seen," she said. "I've got to see fifty birds before June 1st; that doesn't necessarily mean see them so you'll know them again. Now I shouldn't know the nestle or the shelcuff, but I can put them down, can't I?" "Of course," assented Katherine, "a few rare birds like those will make your list look like something." The pink-headed euthuma, which came to light on the very last day of May, interested Mary so much that she told Roberta about it immediately and Roberta questioned the discoverers. Their accounts were perfectly consistent. "Way out on Paradise path, almost to the end, we met a man dashing around as if he were crazy," explained Betty. "We should have thought he was an escaped lunatic if we hadn't seen others like him." "Yes," continued Katherine. "But he acted too much like you to take us in. So we said we were interested in birds too, and he danced around some more and said we had come upon a rare specimen. Then he pointed to the top of an enormous pine-tree----" "Those rare birds are always in the very tops of trees," put in Mary eagerly. "Of course; that's one reason they're rare," went on Betty. "But that minute it flew into the top of a poplar, and we three pursued it. It was a beauty." "And then you came back after me, and it was still there. Tell her how it was marked," suggested Mary. "Perhaps she knows it under some other name." "It had a pink head, of course," said Katherine, "and blue wings." "Goodness!" exclaimed Roberta suspiciously. "Don't you mean black wings, Katherine?" asked Betty hastily. "Did I say blue? I meant black of course. Mary thought they looked blue and that confused me. And its breast was white with brown marks on it." "What size was it?" asked Roberta. Katherine looked doubtful. "What should you say, Mary?" "Well, it was quite small--about the size of a sparrow or a robin, I thought." "They're quite different sizes," said Roberta wearily. "Your old man must have been color-blind. It couldn't have had a pink head. Who ever heard of a pink-headed bird?" "We three are not color-blind," Katherine reminded her. "And then there's the name." Roberta sighed deeply. The new members of the Mary-bird club were very unmanageable. Meanwhile Mary was industriously counting the names on her list, which must be handed in the next day. "I think I'd better put the euthuma down, Roberta," she said finally. "We saw it all right. They won't look the list over very carefully, but they will notice how many birds are on it, and even with the pink-headed euthuma I haven't but forty-five. I rather wish now that I'd bought a text-book, but I thought it was a waste of money when you knew all about the birds, and it would certainly be a waste of money now." "Oh, yes," said Roberta. "If only the library hadn't wanted its copy back quite so soon!" "It was disagreeable of them, wasn't it?" said Mary cheerfully, copying away on her list. "You were going to look up the nestle too. Girls, did we hear the nestle sing?" "It whistled like a blue jay," said Katherine promptly. "It couldn't," protested Roberta. "You said it was only six inches long." "On the plan of a blue jay's call, but smaller, Roberta," explained Betty pacifically. "Well, it's funny that you can never find any of these birds when I'm with you," said Roberta. Katherine looked scornful. "We were mighty lucky to see them even twice, I think," she retorted. Next day Mary came home from zoology 1a, which to add to its other unpleasant features met in the afternoon, wearing the air of a martyr to circumstance. Roberta, Katherine and Betty happened to be sitting on the piazza translating Livy together. "Girls," she demanded, as she came up the steps, "if I get you the box of Huyler's that Mr. Burgess sent me will you tell me the truth about those birds?" "She had the lists read in class!" shouted Katherine. "I knew it!" said Roberta in tragic tones. "Did you tell her about the shelcuff's neck?" inquired Betty. Mary sat down on the piazza railing with her feet cushioned on a lexicon. "I told her all about the shelcuff," she said, "likewise the euthuma and the nestle. What is more, the head of the zoology department was visiting the class, so I also told him, and when I stayed to explain he stayed too, and--oh, you little wretches!" "Not at all," said Katherine. "We waited until you'd made a reputation for cleverness and been taken into a society. I think we were considerateness itself." Roberta was gazing sadly at Mary. "Why did you try all those queer ones?" she asked. "You knew I wasn't sure of them." "I had to, my dear. She asked us for the rare names on our lists. I was the third one she came to, and the others had floundered around and told about birds I'd never heard of. I didn't really know which of mine were rare, because I'd never seen any of them but once, you know, and I was afraid I should strike something that was a good deal commoner than a robin, and then it would be all up with me. So I boldly read off these three, because I was sure they were rare. You should have seen her face when I got to the pink-headed one," said Mary, beginning suddenly to appreciate the humor of the situation. "Did you invent them?" "Only the names," said Betty, "and the stories about finding them. I thought of nestle, and Katherine made up the others. Aren't they lovely names, Roberta?" "Yes," said Roberta, "but think of the fix Mary is in." Mary smiled serenely. "Don't worry, Roberta," she said. "The names were so lovely and the shelcuff's neck and the note of the nestle and all, and I am honestly so near-sighted, that I don't think Miss Carter will have the heart to condition me. But girls, where did you get the descriptions? Professor Lawrence particularly wanted to know." Betty looked at Katherine and the two burst into peals of laughter. "Mary Brooks, you invented most of those yourself," explained Katherine, when she could speak. "We just showed you the first bird we happened to see and told you its new name and you'd say, 'Why it has a green crest and yellow wings!' or 'How funny its neck is! It must have a pouch.' All we had to do was to encourage you a little." "And suppress you a little when you put colors like pink and blue into the same bird," continued Betty, "so Roberta wouldn't get too suspicious." "Then those birds were just common, ordinary ones that I'd seen before?" "Exactly. The nestle was a blue jay, and the euthuma was a sparrow. We couldn't see what the shelcuff was ourselves, the tree was so tall. "'The primrose by a river's brim, A yellow primrose was to him, And it was nothing more.'" quoted Mary blithely. "You can never put that on my tombstone." "Better tell your friend Dr. Hinsdale about your vivid ornithological imagination," suggested Katherine. "It might interest him." "Oh, I shall," said Mary easily. "But to-night, young ladies, you will be pleased to learn that I am invited up to Professor Lawrence's to dinner, so that I can see his bird skins. Incidentally I shall meet his fascinating brother. In about ten minutes I shall want to be hooked up, Roberta." "She's one too many for us, isn't she?" said Katherine, as Mary went gaily off, followed by the devoted Roberta, declaring in loud tones that the Mary-bird club was dissolved. "I wish things that go wrong didn't bother me any more than they do her," said Betty wistfully. "Cheer up," urged Katherine, giving her a bearish hug. "You'll win in the golf again to-morrow, and everything will come out all right in the end." "Everything? What do you mean?" inquired Betty sharply. "Why, singles and doubles--twosomes and foursomes you call them, don't you? They'll all come out right." A moment later Katherine burst in upon her long-suffering roommate with a vehemence that made every cup on the tea-table rattle. "I almost let her know what we thought," she said, "but I guess I smoothed it over. Do you suppose Eleanor Watson isn't going to make up with her at all?" CHAPTER XVIII INTO PARADISE--AND OUT It was a glorious summer twilight. The air was sweet with the odor of lilacs and honeysuckle. One by one the stars shone softly out in the velvet sky, across which troops of swallows swooped and darted, twittering softly on the wing. Near the western horizon the golden glow of sunset still lingered. It was a night for poets to sing of, a night to revel in and to remember; but it was assuredly not a night for study. Gaslight heated one's room to the boiling point. Closed windows meant suffocation; open ones--since there are no screens in the Harding boarding house--let in troops of fluttering moths and burly June-bugs. "And the moral of that is, work while it is yet light," proclaimed Mary Brooks, ringing her bicycle bell suggestively. There was a sudden commotion on the piazza and then Betty's clear voice rose above the tumult. "We won it, one up! Isn't that fine? Oh no, not the singles; we go on with them to-morrow, but I can't possibly win. Oh, I'm so hot!" Eleanor Watson smiled grimly as these speeches floated up to her from below. She had been lounging all the breathless afternoon, trying vainly to get rid of a headache; and the next day's lessons were still to be learned. "Ouch, how I hate June-bugs," she muttered, stopping for the fifth time in as many minutes to drive out a buzzing intruder. She had just gotten one out when another flew straight at her unperceived and tangled himself in her hair. That was the limit of endurance. With one swift movement Eleanor turned off the gas, with another she pulled down her hair and released the prisoned beetle. Then she twisted up the soft coil again in the dark and went out into the sweet spring dusk. At the next corner she gave an angry little exclamation and turned back toward the house. The girls had deserted the piazza before she came down, and now the only light seemed to be in Betty's room. Every window there was shut, so it was no use to call. Eleanor climbed the stairs and knocked. Katherine and Betty were just starting for a trolley ride, to cool off the champion, Katherine explained; but Helen was going to be in all the evening. "I pity you from the bottom of my heart," said Eleanor, "but if you are really going to be here would you tell Lil Day when she comes that I have an awful headache and have gone off--that I'll see her to-morrow. I could go down there, but if she's in, her room will be fuller of June-bugs than mine. Hear them slam against that glass!" She turned to Betty stiffly. "I congratulate you on your victory," she said. "Oh thank you!" answered Betty eagerly. "Christy did most of it. Would--won't you come out with us?" "No, thank you. I feel like being all alone. I'm going down for a twilight row on Paradise." "You'll get malaria," said Katherine. "You'll catch cold, too, in that thin dress," added Helen. "I don't mind, if only I don't see any June-bugs," answered Eleanor, "or any girls," she added under her breath, when she had gained the lower hall. The quickest way to Paradise was through the campus, but Eleanor chose an unfrequented back street, too ugly to attract the parties of girls who swarmed over the college grounds, looking like huge white moths as they flitted about under the trees. She walked rapidly, trying to escape thought in activity; but the thoughts ill-naturedly kept pace with her. As everybody who came in contact with Eleanor Watson was sure to remark, she was a girl brimful of strong possibilities both for good and evil; and to-night these were all awake and warring. Her year of bondage at college was nearly over. Only the day before she had received a letter from Judge Watson, coldly courteous, like all his epistles to his rebellious daughter, inquiring if it was her wish to return to Harding another year, and in the same mail had come an invitation from her aunt, asking her to spend the following winter in New York. Eleanor shrewdly guessed that in spite of her father's disapproval of his sister's careless frivolity, he would allow her to accept this invitation, for the obvious relief it would bring to himself and the second Mrs. Watson. He was fond of her, that she did not for a moment question, and he honestly wished her best good; but he did not want her in his house in her present mood. "For which I don't in the least blame him," thought Eleanor. She had started to answer his letter immediately, as he had wished, and then had hesitated and delayed, so that the decision involved in her reply was still before her. And yet why should she hesitate? She did not like Harding college; she had kept the letter of her agreement to stay there for one year; surely she was free now to do as she pleased--indeed, her father had said as much. But what did she please--that was a point that, unaccountably, she could not settle. Lately something had changed her attitude toward the life at Harding. Perhaps it was the afternoon with Miss Ferris, with the perception it had brought of aims and ideals as foreign to the ambitious schemes with which she had begun the year as to the angry indifference in which she was finishing it. Perhaps, as poor Helen had suggested, it was the melting loveliness of spring term. At any rate, as she heard the girls making their plans for the next year, squabbling amiably over the merits of the various campus houses, choosing roommates, bargaining for furniture, even securing partners for the commencement festivities still three years off, an unexplainable longing to stay on and finish the four years' drama with the rest had seized upon Eleanor. But each time it came she had stifled it, reminding herself sternly that for her the four years held no pleasant possibilities; she had thrown away her chance--had neglected her work, alienated her friends, disappointed every one, and most of all herself. There was nothing left for her now but to go away beaten--not outwardly, for she still flattered herself that she had proved both to students and faculty her ability to make a very brilliant record at Harding had she been so inclined, and even her superiority to the drudgery of the routine work and the childish recreations. But in her heart of hearts Eleanor knew that this very disinclination to make the most of her opportunities, this fancied superiority to requirements that jarred on her undisciplined, haphazard training, was failure far more absolute and inexcusable than if dulness or any other sort of real inability to meet the requirements of the college life had been at the bottom of it. Her father would know it too, if the matter ever came to his notice; and her brother Jim, who was making such a splendid record at Cornell--he would know that, as Betty Wales had said once, quoting her sister's friend, "Every nice girl likes college, though each has a different reason." Well, Jim had thought for two years that she was a failure. Eleanor gulped hard to keep back the tears; she had meant to be everything to Jim, and she was only an annoyance. It was almost dark by the time she reached the landing. A noisy crowd of girls, who had evidently been out with their supper, were just coming in. They exclaimed in astonishment when her canoe shot out from the boat-house. "It's awfully hard to see your way," called one officious damsel. "I can see in the dark like an owl," sang back Eleanor, her good-humor restored the instant her paddle touched water,--for boating was her one passion. Ah, but it was lovely on the river! She glided around the point of an island and was alone at last, with the stars, the soft, grape-scented breezes, and the dark water. She pulled up the stream with long, swift strokes, and then, where the trees hung low over the still water, she dropped the paddle, and slipping into the bottom of the canoe, leaned back against a cushioned seat and drank in the beauty of the darkness and solitude. She had never been out on Paradise River at night. "And I shall never come again except at night," she resolved, breathing deep of the damp, soft air. Malaria--who cared for that? And when she was cold she could paddle a little and be warm again in a moment. Suddenly she heard voices and saw two shapes moving slowly along the path on the bank. "Oh, do hurry, Margaret," said one. "I told her I'd be there by eight. Besides, it's awfully dark and creepy here." "I tell you I can't hurry, Lil," returned the other. "I turned my ankle terribly back there, and I must sit down and rest, creeps or no creeps." "Oh, very well," agreed the other voice grudgingly, and the shapes sank down on a knoll close to the water's edge. Eleanor had recognized them instantly; they were her sophomore friend, Lilian Day, and Margaret Payson, a junior whom Eleanor greatly admired. Her first impulse was to call out and offer to take the girls back in her canoe. Then she remembered that the little craft would hold only two with safety, that the girls would perhaps be startled if she spoke to them, and also that she had come down to Paradise largely to escape Lil's importunate demands that she spend a month of her vacation at the Day camp in the Adirondacks. So, certain that they would never notice her in the darkness and the thick shadows, she lay still in the bottom of her boat and waited for them to go on. "It's a pity about her, isn't it?" said Miss Payson, after she had rubbed her ankle for a while in silence. "About whom?" inquired Lilian crossly. "Why, Eleanor Watson; you just spoke of having an engagement with her. She seems to have been a general failure here." Eleanor started at the sound of her own name, then lay tense and rigid, waiting for Lilian's answer. She knew it was not honorable to listen, and she certainly did not care to do so; but if she cried out now, after having kept silent so long, Lilian, who was absurdly nervous in the dark, might be seriously frightened. Perhaps she would disagree and change the subject. But no---- "Yes, a complete failure," repeated Lilian distinctly. "Isn't it queer? She's really very clever, you know, and awfully amusing, besides being so amazingly beautiful. But there is a little footless streak of contrariness in her--we noticed it at boarding-school,--and it seems to have completely spoiled her." "It is queer, if she is all that you say. Perhaps next year she'll be----" "Oh, she isn't coming back next year," broke in Lilian. "She hates it here, you know, and she sees that she's made a mess of it, too, though she wouldn't admit it in a torture chamber. She thinks she has shown that college is beneath her talents, I suppose." "Little goose! Is she so talented?" "Yes, indeed. She sings beautifully and plays the guitar rather well--she'd surely have made one of the musical clubs next year--and she can act, and write clever little stories. Oh, she'd have walked into everything going all right, if she hadn't been such a goose--muddled her work and been generally offish and horrid." "Too bad," said Miss Payson, rising with a groan. "Who do you think are the bright and shining stars among the freshmen, Lil?" "Why Marion Lustig for literary ability, of course, and Emily Davis for stunts and Christy Mason for general all-around fineness, and socially--oh, let me think--the B's, I should say, and--I forget her name--the little girl that Dottie King is so fond of. Here, take my arm, Margaret. You've got to get home some way, you know." Their voices trailed off into murmurs that grew fainter and fainter until the silence of the river and the wood was again unbroken. Eleanor sat up stiffly and stretched her arms above her head in sheer physical relief after the strain of utter stillness. Then, with a little sobbing cry, she leaned forward, bowing her head in her hands. Paradise--had they named it so because one ate there of the fruit of the tree of knowledge? "A little footless streak!" "An utter failure!" What did it matter? She had known it all before. She had said those very words herself. But she had thought--she had been sure that other people did not understand it that way. Well, perhaps most people did not. No, that was nonsense. Lilian Day had achieved a position of prominence in her class purely through a remarkable alertness to public sentiment. Margaret Payson, a girl of a very different and much finer type, stood for the best of that sentiment. Eleanor had often admired her for her clear-sightedness and good judgment. They had said unhesitatingly that she was a failure; then the college thought so. Well, it was Jean Eastman's fault then, and Caroline's, and Betty Wales's. Nonsense! it was her own. Should she go off in June and leave her name spelling failure behind her? Or should she come back and somehow change the failure to success? Could she? She had no idea how long she sat there, turning the matter over in her mind, viewing it this way and that, considering what she could do if she came back, veering between a desire to go away and forget it all in the gay bustle of a New York winter, and the fierce revolt of the famous Watson pride, that found any amount of effort preferable to open and acknowledged defeat. But it must have been a long time, for when she pulled herself on to her seat and caught up the paddle, she was shivering with cold and her thin dress was dripping wet with the mist that lay thick over the river. Slowly she felt her way down-stream, pushing through the bank of fog, often running in shore in spite of her caution, and fearful every moment of striking a hidden rock or snag. Soft rustlings in the wood, strange plashings in the stream startled her. Lower down was the bewildering net-work of islands. Surely there were never so many before. Was the boat-house straight across from the last island, or a little down-stream? Which was straight across? And where was the last island? She had missed it somehow in the mist. She was below it, out in the wide mill-pond. Somewhere on the other side was the boat-house, and further down was a dam. Down-stream must be straight to the left. All at once the roar of the descending water sounded in Eleanor's ears, and to her horror it did not come from the left. But when she tried to tell from which direction it did come, she could not decide; it seemed to reverberate from all sides at once; it was perilously near and it grew louder and more terrible every moment. Suddenly a fierce, unreasoning fear took possession of Eleanor. She told herself sternly that there was no danger; the current in Paradise River was not so strong but that a good paddler could stem it with ease. In a moment the mist would lift and she could see the outline of one shore or the other. But the mist did not lift; instead it grew denser and more stifling, and although she turned her canoe this way and that and paddled with all her strength, the roar from the dam grew steadily to an ominous thunder. Then she remembered a gruesome legend that hung about the dam and the foaming pool in the shadow of the old mill far below, and dropped her paddle in an agony of fear. She might hurry herself over the dam in striving to escape it! And still the deafening torrent pounded in her ears. If only she could get away from it--somewhere--anywhere just to be quiet. Would it be quiet in the pool by the mill? Eleanor slipped unsteadily into the bottom of her boat and tried to peer through the darkness at the black water, and to feel about with her hands for the current. As she did so, a bell rang up on the campus. It must be twenty minutes to ten. Eleanor gave a harsh, mirthless laugh. How stupid she had been! She would call, of course. If she could hear their bell, they could hear her voice and come for her. There would be an awkward moment of explanation, but what of that? "Hallo! Hallo--o-o!" she called. Only the boom of the water answered. "Hallo! Hallo--o-o!" Again the boom of the water swallowed her cry and drowned it. It was no use to call,--only a waste of strength. Eleanor caught up her paddle and began to back water with all her might. That was what she should have done from the first, of course. She was cold all at once and very tired, but she would not give up yet. She had quite forgotten that only a little while before it had not seemed to matter much what became of her. "But if I can't keep at it all night----" she said to the mist and the river. CHAPTER XIX A LAST CHANCE Helen's choice of closed windows in preference to invading companies of moths and June-bugs had made the room so insufferably warm that between heat and excitement Betty could not get to sleep. Instead she tossed restlessly about on her narrow couch, listening to the banging of the trolleys at the next corner and wishing she were still sitting on the breezy front seat, as the car dashed down the long hill toward the station. At length she slipped softly out of bed and opened the door. Perhaps the breeze would come in better then. As she stood for a moment testing the result of her experiment, she noticed with surprise that Eleanor's door was likewise open. This simple fact astonished her, because she remembered that on the hottest nights last fall Eleanor had persisted in shutting and locking her door. She had acquired the habit from living so much in hotels, she said; she could never go to sleep at all so long as her door was unfastened. "Perhaps it's all right," thought Betty, "but it looks queer. I believe I'll just see if she's in bed." So she crept softly across the hall and looked into Eleanor's room. It was empty, and the couch was in its daytime dress, covered with an oriental spread and piled high with pillows. "I suppose she stopped on the campus and got belated," was Betty's first idea. "But no, she couldn't stay down there all night, and it's long after ten. It must be half past eleven. I'll--I'd better consult--Katherine." She chose Katherine instead of Rachel, because she had heard Eleanor speak about going to Paradise, and so could best help to decide whether it was reasonable to suppose that she was still there. Rachel was steadier and more dependable, but Katherine was resourceful and quick-witted. Besides, she was not a bit afraid of the dark. She was sound asleep, but Betty managed to wake her and get her into the hall without disturbing any one else. "Goodness!" exclaimed Katherine, when she heard the news. "You don't think----" "I think she's lost in Paradise. It must have been pitch dark down there under the trees even before she got started, and you know she hasn't any sense of direction. Don't you remember her laughing about getting turned around every time she went to New York?" "Yes, but it doesn't seem possible to get lost on that little pond." "It's bigger than it looks," said Betty, "and there is the mist, too, to confuse her." "I hadn't thought of that. Does she know how to manage a boat?" "Yes, capitally," said Betty in so frightened a voice that Katherine dropped the subject. "She's lost up stream somewhere and afraid to move for fear of hitting a rock," she said easily. "Or perhaps she's right out in the pond by the boat-house and doesn't dare to cross because she might go too far down toward the dam. We can find her all right, I guess." "Then you'll come?" said Betty eagerly. "Why, of course. You weren't thinking of going alone, were you?" "I thought maybe you'd think it was silly for any one to go. I suppose she might be at one of the campus houses." "She might, but I doubt it," said Katherine. "She was painfully intent on solitude when she left here. Now don't fuss too long about dressing." Without a word Betty sped off to her room. She was just pulling a rain-coat over a very meagre toilet when Katherine put her head in at the door. "Bring matches," she said in a sepulchral whisper. Betty emptied the contents of her match-box into her ulster pocket, threw a cape over her arm for Eleanor, and followed Katherine cat-footed down the stairs. In the lower hall they stopped for a brief consultation. "Ought we to tell Mrs. Chapin?" asked Betty doubtfully. "Eleanor will hate us forever if we do," said Katherine, "and I don't see any special advantage in it. If we don't find her, Mrs. Chapin can't. We might tell Rachel though, in case we were missed." "Or we might leave a note where she would find it," suggested Betty. "Then if we weren't missed no one need know." "All right. You can go more quietly; I'll wait here." Katherine sank down on the lowest stair, while Betty flew back to scribble a note which she laid on Rachel's pillow. Then the relief expedition started. It was very strange being out so late. Before ten o'clock a girl may go anywhere in Harding, but after ten the streets are deserted and dreadful. Betty shivered and clung close to Katherine, who marched boldly along, declaring that it was much nicer outdoors than in, and that midnight was certainly the top of the evening for a walk. "And if we find her way up the river we can all camp out for the night," she suggested jovially. "But if we don't find her?" Katherine, who had noticed Betty's growing nervousness, refused to entertain the possibility. "We shall," she said. "But if we don't?" persisted Betty. "Then I suppose we shall have to tell somebody who--who could--why, hunt for her more thoroughly," stammered Katherine. "Or possibly we'd better wait till morning and make sure that she didn't stay all night with Miss Day. But if we don't find her, there will be plenty of time to discuss that." At the campus gateway the girls hesitated. "Suppose we should meet the night-watchman?" said Betty anxiously. "Would he arrest us?" Katherine laughed at her fears. "I was only wondering if we hadn't better take the path through the orchard. If we go down by the dwelling-houses we might meet him, of course, and it would be awkward getting rid of him if he has an ordinary amount of curiosity." "But that path is spooky dark," objected Betty. "Not so dark as the street behind the campus," said Katherine decidedly, "and that's the only alternative. Come on." When they had almost reached the back limit of the campus Katherine halted suddenly. Betty clutched her in terror. "Do you see any one?" she whispered. Katherine put an arm around her frightened little comrade. "Not a person," she said reassuringly, "not even the ghost of my grandmother. I was just wondering, Betty, if you'd care to go ahead down to the landing and call, while I waited up by the road. Eleanor is such a proud thing; she'll hate dreadfully to be caught in this fix, and I know she'd rather have you come to find her than me or both of us. But perhaps you'd rather not go ahead. It is pretty dark down there." Betty lifted her face from Katherine's shoulder and looked at the black darkness that was the road and the river bank, and below it to the pond that glistened here and there where the starlight fell on its cloak of mist. "Of course," said Katherine after a moment's silence, "we can keep together just as well as not, as far as I am concerned. I only thought that perhaps, since this was your plan and you are so fond of Eleanor--oh well, I just thought you might like to have the fun of rescuing her," finished Katherine desperately. "Do you mean for me to go ahead and call, and if Eleanor answers not to say anything to her about your having come?" "Yes." "Then how would you get home?" "Oh, walk along behind you, just out of sight." "Wouldn't you be afraid?" "Hardly." "But I should be taking the credit for something I hadn't done." "And Eleanor would be the happier thereby and none of the rest of the world would be affected either way." Betty looked at the pond again and then gave Katherine a soft little hug. "Katherine Kittredge, you're an old dear," she said, "and if you really don't mind, I'll go ahead; but if she asks me how I dared to come alone or says anything about how I got here, I shall tell her that you were with me." "All right, but I fancy she won't be thinking about that. The matches are so she can see her way to you. It's awfully hard to follow a sound across the water, but if you light one match after another she can get to you before the supply gives out, if she's anywhere near. Don't light any till she answers. If she doesn't answer, I'll come down to you and we'll walk on up the river a little way and find her there." "Yes," said Betty. "Where shall you stay?" "Oh, right under this tree, I guess," answered Katherine carelessly. "Good-bye." "Good-bye." When Betty had fairly gone, doubts began to assail Katherine, as they have a habit of assailing impulsive people, after it is too late to pay heed to them. It occurred to her that she was cooperating in what might easily turn out to be a desperate adventure, and that it would have been the part of wisdom to enlist the services of more competent and better equipped searchers at once, without risking delay on the slender chance of finding Eleanor near the wharf. "Eleanor would have hated the publicity, but if she wants to come up here in the dark and frighten us all into hysteria she must take the consequences. And I'd have let her too, if it hadn't been for Betty." An owl hooted, and Katherine jumped as nervously as Betty would have done. Poor Betty! She must be almost at the landing by this time. At that very moment a little quavering voice rang out over the water. "Eleanor! Eleanor Watson! Eleanor! Oh, Eleanor, where are you?" For a long moment there was silence. Then the owl hooted again. That was too much. Katherine jumped up with a bound and started down the bank toward Betty. She did not stop to find the path, and at the second step caught her foot and fell headlong. Apparently Betty did not hear her. She had not yet given up hope, for she was calling again, pausing each time to listen for the answer that did not come. "Oh, Eleanor, Eleanor, aren't you there?" she cried and stopped, even the courage of despair gone at last. Katherine, nursing a bruised knee on the hill above, had opened her mouth to call encouragement, when a low "Who is it?" floated across the water. "Eleanor, is that you? It's I--Betty Wales!" shrieked Betty. Katherine nodded her head in silent token of "I told you so," and slid back among the bushes to recuperate and await developments. For the end was not yet. Eleanor was evidently far down toward the dam, close to the opposite bank. It was hard for her to hear Betty, and still harder for Betty to hear her. Her voice sounded faint and far off, and she seemed to be paralyzed with fear and quite incapable of further effort. When Betty begged her to paddle right across and began lighting matches in reckless profusion to show her the way, Eleanor simply repeated, "I can't, I can't," in dull, dispirited monotone. "Shall--I--come--for--you?" shouted Betty. "You can't," returned Eleanor again. "Non--sense!" shrieked Betty and then stood still on the wharf, apparently weighing Eleanor's last opinion. "Go ahead," called Katherine in muffled tones from above. Betty did not answer. "Thinks I'm another owl, I suppose," muttered Katherine, and limped down the bank to the wharf, frightening the nervous, overwrought Betty almost out of her wits at first, and then vastly relieving her by taking the entire direction of affairs into her own competent hands. "You go right ahead. It's the only way, and it's perfectly easy in a heavy boat. That canoe might possibly go down with the current, but a big boat wouldn't. Rachel and I tried it last week, when the river was higher. Now cross straight over and feel along the bank until you get to her. Then beach the canoe and come back the same way. Give me some matches. I'll manage that part of it and then retire,--unless you'd rather be the one to wait here." "No, I'll go," answered Betty eagerly, vanishing into the boat-house after a pair of oars. "She must be hanging on to something on shore," went on Katherine, when Betty reappeared, "and she's lost her nerve and doesn't dare to let go. If you can't get her into your boat, I'll come; but somebody really ought to stay here. I had no idea the fog was so thick. Hurry now and cross straight over. You're sure you're not afraid?" "Quite sure." Betty was off, splashing her oars nervously through the still water, wrapped in the mist, whispering over and over Katherine's last words, "Hurry and go straight. Hurry, hurry, go straight across." When she reached the other shore she called again to Eleanor, and the sobbing cry of relief that answered her made all the strain and effort seem as nothing. Cautiously creeping along the bank where the river was comparatively quiet, backing water now and then to test her strength with the current, she finally reached Eleanor, who had happened quite by chance to run near the bank and now sat in the frail canoe hanging by both hands to a branch that swept low over the water, exactly as Katherine had guessed. "Why didn't you beach the canoe, and stay on shore?" asked Betty, who had tied her own boat just above and was now up to her knees in the water, pulling Eleanor in. "I tried to, but I lost my paddle, and so I was afraid to let go the tree again, and the water looked so deep. Oh, Betty, Betty!" Eleanor sank down on the bank, sobbing as if her heart would break. Betty patted her arm in silence, and in a few moments she stood up, quieted. "You're going to take me back?" she asked. "Of course," said Betty, cheerfully, leading the way to her boat. "Please wait a minute," commanded Eleanor. Betty trembled. "She's going to say she won't go back with me," she thought. "Please let me do it, Eleanor," she begged. "Yes," said Eleanor, quickly, "but first I want to say something. I've been a hateful, horrid thing, Betty. I've believed unkind stories and done no end of mean things, and I deserve all that I've had to-night, except your coming after me. I've been ashamed of myself for months, only I wouldn't say so. I know you can never want me for a friend again, after all my meanness; but Betty, say that you won't let it hurt you--that you'll try to forget all about it." Betty put a wet arm around Eleanor's neck and kissed her cheek softly. "You weren't to blame," she said. "It was all a mistake and my horrid carelessness. Of course I want you for a friend. I want it more than anything else. And now don't say another word about it, but just get into the boat and come home." They hardly spoke during the return passage; Eleanor was worn out with all she had gone through, and Betty was busy rowing and watching for Katherine's matches, which made tiny, glimmering dots of light in the gloom. Eleanor did not seem to notice them, nor the shadowy figure that vanished around the boat-house just before they reached the wharf. From her appointed station under the pine-tree Katherine heard the grinding of the boat on the gravel, the rattle of oars thrown down on the wharf, and then a low murmur of conversation that did not start up the hill toward her, as she had expected. "Innocents!" sighed Katherine. "They're actually stopping to talk it out down there in the wet. I'm glad they've made it up, and I'd do anything in reason for Betty Wales, but I certainly am sleepy," and she yawned so loud that a blue jay that was roosting in the tree above her head fluttered up to a higher branch, screaming angrily. "The note of the nestle," laughed Katherine, and yawned again. Down on the wharf Betty and Eleanor were curled up close together in an indiscriminate, happy tangle of rain-coat, golf-cape, and very drabbled muslin, holding a conversation that neither would ever forget. Yet it was perfectly commonplace; Harding girls are not given to the expression of their deeper emotions, though it must not therefore be inferred that they do not have any to express. "Oh, Betty, you can't imagine how dreadful it was out there!" Eleanor was saying. "And I thought I should have to stay all night, of course. How did you know I hadn't come in?" Betty explained. "I don't see why you bothered," said Eleanor. "I'm sure I shouldn't have, for any one as horrid as I've been. Oh, Betty, will you truly forgive me?" "Don't say that. I've wanted to do something that would make you forgive me." "Oh, I know you have," broke in Eleanor quickly. "Miss Ferris told me." "She did!" interrupted Betty in her turn. "Why, she promised not to." "Yes, but I asked her. It seemed to me queer that she should have taken such an interest in me, and all of a sudden it flashed over me, as I sat talking to her, that you were at the bottom of it. So I said, 'Miss Ferris, Betty Wales asked you to say this to me,' and she said, 'Yes, but she also asked me not to mention her having done so.' I was ashamed enough then, for she'd made me see pretty plainly how badly I needed looking after, but I was bound I wouldn't give in. Oh, Betty, haven't I been silly!" "I didn't mean to hurt your feelings by what I said at that class meeting, Eleanor," said Betty shyly. "You didn't hurt them. I was just cross at things in general--at myself, I suppose that means,--and angry at you because I'd made you despise me, which certainly wasn't your fault." "Eleanor, what nonsense! I despise you?" A rustling on the bank reminded Betty that Katherine was waiting. "We must go home," she said. "It's after midnight." "So it is," agreed Eleanor, getting up stiffly. "Oh, Betty, I am glad I'm not out there hanging on to that branch and shivering and wondering how soon I should have to let go and end it all. Oh, I shall never forget the feel of that stifling mist." They walked home almost in silence. Katherine, missing the murmur of conversation, wondered if this last effort at reconciliation had failed after all; but near Mrs. Chapin's the talk began again. "I'm only sorry there isn't more of spring term left to have a good time in. Why, Eleanor, there's only two weeks." "But there's all next year," answered Eleanor. "I thought you weren't coming back." "I wasn't, but I am now. I've got to--I can't go off letting people think that I'm only a miserable failure. The Watson pride won't let me, Betty." "Oh, people don't think anything of that kind," objected Betty consolingly. "I know one person who does," said Eleanor with decision, "and her name is Eleanor Watson. I decided while I was out there waiting for you that one's honest opinion of herself is about as important as any outsider's. Don't you think so?" "Perhaps," said Betty gaily. "But the thing that interests me is that you're coming back next year. Why, it's just grand! Shall you go on the campus?" CHAPTER XX LOOSE THREADS Betty Wales had to leave her trunk half packed and her room in indescribable confusion in order to obey a sudden summons from the registrar. She had secured a room on the campus at last, so the brief note said; but the registrar wished her to report at the office and decide which of two possible assignments she preferred. "It's funny," said Betty to Helen, as she extracted her hat from behind the bookcase, where she had stored it for safe keeping, "because I put in my application for the Hilton house way back last fall." "Perhaps she means two different rooms." "No, Mary says they never give you a choice about rooms, unless you're an invalid and can't be on the fourth floor or something of that kind." "Well, it's nice that you're on," said Helen wistfully. "I don't suppose I have the least chance for next year." "Oh, there's all summer," said Betty hopefully. "Lots of people drop out at the last minute. Which house did you choose?" "I didn't choose any because Miss Stuart told me I would probably have to wait till junior year, and I thought I might change my mind before then." "It's too bad," said Betty, picking her way between trunk trays and piles of miscellaneous débris to the door. "I think I shall stop on my way home and get a man to move my furniture right over to the Hilton." "Oh, wouldn't it be lovely if I'd got into the Hilton house too!" said Helen with a sigh of resignation. "Then perhaps we could room together." "Yes," said Betty politely, closing the door after her. Under the circumstances it was not necessary to explain that Alice Waite and she had other plans for the next year. It was a relief to stop trying to circumvent the laws of nature by forcing two objects into the space that one will fill--which is the cardinal principle of the college girl's June packing--and Betty strolled slowly along under the elm-trees, in no haste to finish her errand. On Main Street, Emily Davis, carrying an ungainly bundle, overtook her. "I was afraid I wasn't going to see you to say good-bye," she said. "Everybody wants skirt braids put on just now, and between that and examinations I've been very busy." "Are those skirts?" asked Betty. "Yes, two of Babbie's and one of Babe's. I was going up to the campus, so I thought I'd bring them along and save the girls trouble, since they're my best patrons, as well as being my good friends." "It's nice to have them both." "Only you hate to take money for doing things for your friends." "Where are you going to be this summer?" inquired Betty. "You never told me where you live." "I live up in northern New York, but I'm not going home this summer. I'm going to Rockport----" "Why, so am I!" exclaimed Betty. "We're going to stay at The Breakers." "Oh, dear!" said Emily sadly, "I was hoping that none of my particular friends would be there. I'm going to have charge of the linen-room at The Breakers, Betty." "What difference does that make?" demanded Betty eagerly. "You have hours off, don't you? We'll have the gayest sort of a time. Can you swim?" "No, I've never seen the ocean." "Well, Will and Nan will teach you. They're going to teach me." Emily shook her head. "Now, Betty, you must not expect your family to see me in the same light that you do. Here those things don't make any difference, but outside they do; and it's perfectly right that they should, too." "Nonsense! My family has some sense, I hope," said Betty gaily, stopping at the entrance to the Main Building. "Then I'll see you next week." "Yes, but remember you are not to bother your family with me. Good-bye." "Good-bye. You just wait and see!" called Betty, climbing the steps. Half-way up she frowned. Nan and mother would understand, but Will was an awful snob. "He'll have to get used to it," she decided, "and he will, too, after he's heard her do 'the temperance lecture by a female from Boston.' But it will certainly seem funny to him at first. Why, I guess it would have seemed funny to me last year." The registrar looked up wearily from the litter on her desk, as Betty entered. "Good-afternoon, Miss Wales. I sent for you because I was sure that, however busy you might be you had more time than I, and I can talk to you much quicker than I could write. As I wrote you, I have reached your name on the list of the campus applicants, and you can go into the Hilton if you choose. But owing to an unlooked-for falling out of names just below yours, Miss Helen C. Adams comes next to you on the list. You hadn't mentioned the matter of roommates, and noticing that you two girls live in the same house, I thought I would ask you if you preferred a room in the Belden house with Miss Adams. There are two vacancies there, and she will get one of them in any case." "Oh!" said Betty. "I shall be very glad to know your decision to-night if possible, so that I can make the other assignment in the morning, before the next applicant leaves town." "Yes," said Betty. "You will probably wish to consult Miss Adams," went on the registrar. "I ought to have sent for her too--I don't know why I was so stupid." "Oh, that's all right," said Betty hastily. "I will come back in about an hour, Miss Stuart. I suppose there isn't any hope that we could both go into the Hilton." "No, I'm afraid not. Any time before six o'clock will do. I shan't be here much longer, but you can leave the message with my assistant. And you understand of course that it was purely on your account that I spoke to you. I thought that under the circumstances----" The registrar was deep in her letters again. But as Betty was opening the door, she looked up to say with a merry twinkle in her keen gray eyes, "Give my regards to your father, Miss Wales, and tell him he underrates his daughter's ability to take care of herself." "Oh, Miss Stuart, I hoped you didn't know I was that girl," cried Betty blushing prettily. Miss Stuart shook her head. "I couldn't come to meet you, but I didn't forget. I've kept an eye on you." "I hope you haven't seen anything very dreadful," laughed Betty. "I'll let you know when I do," said Miss Stuart. "Good-bye." Betty went out on to the campus, where the shadows were beginning to grow long on the freshly mown turf, and took her favorite path back to the edge of the hill, where she sat down on her favorite seat to consider this new problem. On the slope below her a bed of rhododendrons that had been quite hidden under the snow in winter, and inconspicuous through the spring, had burst into a sudden glory of rainbow blossoms--pink and white and purple and flaming orange. "Every day is different here," thought Betty, "and the horrid things and the lovely ones always come together." Helen would be pleased, of course; as she had hinted to the registrar, there was really no need of consulting Helen; the only person to be considered was Betty Wales. If only Miss Stuart had assigned her to the Hilton house and said nothing! From her seat Betty could look over to Dorothy King's windows. It would have been such fun to be in the house with Dorothy. Clara Madison was going to leave the campus and go to a place where they would make her bed and bring her hot water in the morning. Alice's room was a lovely big one on the same floor as Dorothy's, and she had delayed making arrangements to share it with a freshman who was already in the house, until she was sure that Betty did not get her assignment. Eleanor had applied for an extra-priced single there, too, to be near Betty. Helen was a dear little thing and a very considerate roommate, but she was "different." She didn't fit in somehow, and it was a bother always to be planning to have her have a good time. She would be lonely in the Belden; she loved college and was very happy now, but she needed to have somebody who understood her and could appreciate her efforts, to encourage her and keep her in touch with the lighter side of college life. She didn't know a soul in the Belden--but then neither did lots of other freshmen when they moved on to the campus. She need never hear anything about the registrar's plan, and she could come over to the Hilton as much as she liked. Nita Reese would be at the Belden, and Marion Lawrence; and Mary Brooks was going there if she could get an assignment. It was a splendid house, the next best to the Hilton. But those girls were not Dorothy King, and Miss Andrews was not Miss Ferris. It would have been lovely to be in the house with Miss Ferris. Would have been! Betty caught herself suddenly. It wasn't settled yet. Then she got up from her seat with quick determination. "I'll stop in and see Miss Ferris for just a minute, and then I shall go back and tell Miss Stuart right off, for I must finish packing to-night, whatever happens." Miss Ferris was in, and she and her darkened, flower-scented room wore an air of coolness and settled repose that was a poignant relief after the glaring sunshine outside and the confusion of "last days." "So you go to-morrow," said Miss Ferris pleasantly. "I don't get off till next week, of course. Are you satisfied?" "Satisfied?" repeated Betty. She had heard of Miss Ferris's habit of flashing irrelevant questions at her puzzled auditors, but this was her first experience of it. "With your first year at Harding," explained Miss Ferris. "Oh!" said Betty, relieved that it was no worse. "Why, y-es--no, I'm not. I've had a splendid time, but I haven't accomplished half that I ought. Next year I'm going to work harder from the very beginning, and----" Betty stopped abruptly, realizing that all this could not possibly interest Miss Ferris. "And what?" "I didn't want to bore you," apologized Betty. "Why, I'm going to try to--I don't know how to say it--try not scatter my thoughts so. Nan says that I am so awfully interested in every one's else business that I haven't any business of my own." "I see," said Miss Ferris musingly. "That's quite a possible point of view. Still, I'm inclined to think that on the whole we have just as much orange left and it tastes far better, if we give a good deal of it away. If we try to hang on to it all, it's likely to spoil in the pantry before we get around to squeeze it dry." Betty looked puzzled again. "You don't like figures of speech, do you?" said Miss Ferris. "You must learn to like them next year. What I mean is that it seems to me far better in the long run to be interested in too many people than not to be interested in people enough. Of course, though, we mustn't neglect to be sufficiently interested in ourselves; and how to divide ourselves fairly between ourselves and the rest of the world is the hardest question we ever have to answer. You'll be getting new ideas about it all through your course--and all through your life." There was a moment of silence, and then Betty rose to go. "I have to pack and I know you are busy. Miss Ferris, I'm going to be at the Belden next year." "I'm sorry you're not coming here," said Miss Ferris kindly. "Couldn't you manage it?" "Yes, but the--the orange seems to cut better the other way," said Betty. "That isn't a good figure, but perhaps you can see what it means." * * * * * It was worth most of what it had cost to see Helen's face when she heard the news. "Oh Betty, it's too good to be true," she cried, "but are you sure you want me?" "Haven't I given up the Hilton to be with you?" said Betty, with her face turned the other way. Alice was disappointed, but she would be just as happy with Constance Fayles. She found more "queer" things to like at Harding every day, and she considered Betty Wales one of the queerest and one of the nicest. Eleanor pleased Betty by offering no objection to the change of plan. "Only you needn't think that you can get rid of me as easily as all this," she said. "I shall camp down in the registrar's office until she says that 'under the circumstances,' which is her pet phrase, she will let me change my application to the Belden. By the way, Betty, Jean Eastman wants to see you after chapel to-morrow. She said she'd be in number five." After "last chapel," with its farewell greetings, that for all but the seniors invariably ended with a cheerful "See you next September," and the interview with Jean, in which the class president offered rather unintelligible apologies for "the stupid misunderstanding that we all got into," Betty went back to the house to get her bags and meet Katherine, who was going on the same train. Some of the girls had already gone, and none of them were in but Rachel, who was perched in a front window watching anxiously for a dilatory expressman, and Katherine, who was frantically stowing the things that would not go in her trunk into an already well-filled suit-case. "Well, it's all over," said Betty, sitting down on the window seat beside Rachel. "Wish it were," muttered Katherine, shutting the case and sitting down on it with a thud. "No, it's only well begun," corrected Rachel. "A lot of things are over anyway," persisted Betty. "Just think how much has happened since last September!" "Jolly nice things too," said Katherine cheerfully. She had quite unexpectedly succeeded in fastening the lock. "Weren't they!" agreed Betty heartily. "But I guess the nicest thing about it is what you said, Rachel--that it's 'to be continued in our next.' Won't it be fun to see how everything turns out?" "I wish that expressman would turn up," said Rachel ruefully. "We'll tell him so if we meet him," said Betty, shouldering her bag and her golf clubs, while Katherine staggered along with the bursting suit-case. As they boarded a car at the corner, Mary Brooks and the faithful Roberta waved to them energetically from the other side of Main Street. "Good-bye! Good-bye!" shrieked Katherine. "See you next September," called Betty, who had said good-bye to them once already. "Katherine Kittredge has grown older this year," said Mary critically, "but Betty hasn't changed a bit. I remember the night she came up the walk, carrying those bags." "She has changed inside," said Roberta. As the car whizzed by the Main Building, Betty wanted to wave her hand to that too, but she didn't until Dorothy King, appearing on the front steps, gave her an excuse. "Well," she said with a little sigh, as the campus disappeared below the crest of the hill, "you and Rachel may talk all you like, but I feel as if something was over, and it makes me sad. Just think! We can never be freshmen at Harding again as long as we live." "Quite true," said Katherine calmly, "but we can be sophomores--that is, unless the office sees fit to interfere." "Yes, we can be sophomores; and perhaps that's just as nice," said Betty optimistically. "Perhaps it's even nicer." * * * * * The Books in this Series are: BETTY WALES, FRESHMAN BETTY WALES, SOPHOMORE BETTY WALES, JUNIOR BETTY WALES, SENIOR BETTY WALES, B. A. BETTY WALES & CO. BETTY WALES ON THE CAMPUS BETTY WALES DECIDES 
33873	----	Proofreading Team at http://www.fadedpage.net [Illustration: Dolly.] DOLLY'S COLLEGE EXPERIENCES BY MABEL CRONISE JONES The C. M. Clark Publishing Company BOSTON MDCCCCIX Copyright, 1909 THE C. M. CLARK PUBLISHING CO, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS U. S. A. All Rights Reserved ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE Dolly Frontispiece "My brother says that I can heat water splendidly" 9 Beth and Dolly were discussing it one day as they took their usual walk 35 There were music and singing later in the evening 62 A moment later Dolly had been introduced to Beth's father 107 "Let me introduce you to two more of your classmates" 156 "Father could really get the papers by mail quite as well, I think, Mother" 206 "Aren't you going to say anything to me, Dolly?" 267 DOLLY'S COLLEGE EXPERIENCES DOLLY'S COLLEGE EXPERIENCES CHAPTER I Sitting down on the edge of the bed, Dolly looked around forlornly enough. Of course, she wanted to go to college, but for the first time she realized how dreadful it was, to be away from all the home-folks. In all those great buildings, with their hundreds of students, there was not a soul that Dolly knew. Outside the door she could hear the old girls talking and chattering together. But she was not an old girl. She was just an insignificant little Freshman. No one took the least notice of her. Her father had put her on the train and had even come part way with her. But the real loneliness commenced after she reached Westover. The college bus was there, and there was a good-natured man whom the girls all hailed as Patrick, and who seemed to belong to the college. He was evidently an expert at picking out the students, for when he caught sight of Dolly, he had walked up to her respectfully, and had inquired if she were not going to Westover College. Then he put her safely into the bus, took her checks and looked after her bundles. A few moments later the bus was filled to overflowing with girls, the most of them apparently old students, for they seemed well acquainted with each other and were chattering like magpies. Some of them had been on the same train as Dolly, and our poor little Freshman had looked at them then with wistful, speculative eyes. But she had been too shy to attempt any conversation with them. When they reached the college, all too soon for Dolly, she had hung back irresolutely, while the rest rushed up and embraced the teachers who stood in the reception room, ready to receive the newcomers. She was feeling quite left out in the cold, and wishing heartily that she was back in the home-nest. Only for a moment, though. Her hand was cordially taken, and she turned to find herself addressed by a sweet-faced little woman, much shorter than Dolly herself, with gray hair and kindly eyes. "I think this must be Miss Alden. Am I right?" "Quite right, but I do not see how you knew." "Your father telegraphed that you would come by this train, and you see, my dear, that you are the only Freshman in the crowd, so that it did not require much shrewdness on my part to pick you out. Now let me introduce you to some of the girls. You will soon feel acquainted here, I know. Margery," and as a tall, rather handsome girl turned around, she added; "I want you to meet Miss Alden, one of our new girls. Miss Ainsworth--and here are Miss Rummel, Miss Paterson and Miss Graves. Margery, will you show Miss Alden to 77? Your room-mate will not be here for several days yet. She is detained by her sister's marriage, which will occur this week. I hope you will like her; we tried to do our best in the arrangement of room-mates; next year, you can select your own. Excuse me now." And she turned to another newcomer, and Dolly followed Miss Ainsworth down the long corridor. "You will like Westover, I'm sure," Miss Ainsworth remarked sedately; she evidently thought it her duty to make small talk, and act as Dolly's temporary guardian. "Of course, you'll feel lonesome at first until you get fitted in; all the girls do, but that soon wears off." "Are you a Senior?" queried Dolly innocently. Miss Ainsworth seemed so very old and so very superior, that Dolly could only think of her as a Senior. Her companion's cheeks flushed perceptibly as she answered stiffly; "No, I am not a Senior yet. Here is your room, Miss Alden. The bedroom on the right will be yours, I suppose, as I see that they have put your trunk there. The one on the left will be your room-mate's, and you will use this sitting-room in common." After a few more words Dolly's companion passed on, and the unfortunate Freshman wandered dolefully into her bedroom and sat down on the edge of the bed where we first saw her. As a rule, Dolly and tears were strangers, but just now poor Dolly felt unutterably miserable. Not only was she homesick, but she felt outside all the college fun and good camaraderie of the place. "I ought to unpack that trunk and take off my things," she told herself, but she felt more inclined to run out of the door, back to the depot and on board the first train bound for her home. "Well, of all the forlorn damsels I ever saw, you certainly are the worst, and I thought you looked so full of fun when I noticed you downstairs." Dolly glanced up in surprise, to see a merry face regarding her from the doorway. The newcomer was much below medium height, with a very freckled face, very red, curly hair, and a very good-natured expression. "Didn't you feel forlorn yourself last year?" retorted Dolly. "Or, if you are a dignified Junior or Senior, I suppose you have forgotten how poor little Freshmen feel, when they are dumped in with a lot of strangers. I am just like a cat in a strange garret." "You are no stranger than I," and the newcomer ensconced herself in the only rocking-chair that the room afforded. "I'm a Freshman like yourself, only I got here last evening. I'm Elizabeth Newby, at your service," and she made a sweeping bow. "I saw you come in and I thought I'd make an early call, but I _did_ suppose you would have your things off by this time." "It was awfully good of you to come," said Dolly gratefully. "I'll get my things off and brush up a bit." She turned and looked suddenly at her new acquaintance. "How does it come that you are not homesick? Everything must be as strange to you as it is to me, but you look jolly and happy." "I am," returned the other emphatically. "You may not know it, but homesickness is a luxury in which only the fortunate can indulge. I'm not troubled with it. Now tell me, can I help you with your trunk? My things are all in order. When you have fixed up your room and had Patrick put your trunk away, you will feel that you are here to stay, and you will begin to be more comfortable in your mind." "If you don't mind helping me then," and Dolly commenced to tug at her straps energetically. "I want to do it. I like to be poking into other people's affairs, it keeps one from thinking." "Then you are homesick, after all?" and Dolly glanced up with twinkling eyes. "No, I am not. I am only homesick because I am _not_ homesick, and that is Greek or worse to you." Dolly gave her companion a keen look, but said no more. There was evidently something in the background, and Dolly surmised that Elizabeth's home-life, for some reason or other, was not as happy as it should be. "What lovely, dainty things you have for your sitting-room!" and Elizabeth held up an armful of pretty articles with honest admiration. "My room looks as prim as an old maid's. I never thought of these little accessories." "Those are what I had in my room at home, and Mother thought that I had better bring them. They _will_ make these rooms look quite natural." "They just will. I wish we were room-mates, for I haven't an earthly thing to trim up with, and neither has my room-mate." "Who is your room-mate? Do you know her? Is she nice?" "I don't know her. Her name is Margaret Ainsworth. She's a Sophomore, and between ourselves I don't believe that we shall have much to do with each other." "Then it was your room-mate who brought me here. I thought that she was a Junior at least." "Only a Sophomore, my dear, and a conditioned one at that, though to hear her talk you would suppose that she was taking a post-graduate course." "Isn't it funny that she hasn't any little decorations for your sitting-room, as she is an old student?" [Illustration: "My brother says that I can heat water splendidly."] Elizabeth shrugged her shoulders. "I found out that she expected to room with Charlotte Graves. They roomed together last year, you know, just by chance. The Faculty put them together just as they are giving us room-mates now, for I didn't know anyone with whom I wished to room this year, and I suppose you didn't. Well, Miss Graves is the richest girl here, and she had loads of beautiful things, so that their suite was just a dream of beauty, according to my room-mate's account. It seems that she was not as anxious to room with Miss Ainsworth again as Miss Ainsworth was to room with her, and she quietly made arrangements to have a room all to herself, and that is how it all happened. She was put in with me at the last moment, to our mutual disgust, I expect." Dolly stopped in her unpacking. "I didn't know that anyone could room alone." "You have to pay a steep price for the privilege, but Miss Graves can afford it. What a dear chafing-dish. Can you cook with it?" "My brother says that I can heat water splendidly," and Dolly laughed. "I don't think any girl with a brother is apt to grow conceited, though Fred is a dear and would do anything in the world for me. I really _can_ make lovely fudge, though, and very good tea. Mother was a little afraid of fire because of the alcohol lamp, but I have promised to be dreadfully careful. I have some chocolate in that box." "Let's make fudge tonight," said Elizabeth, enthusiastically. "That will keep you from getting homesick. You can make it and I will eat it." "Can we do it? I don't know anything about the rules here yet." "There will not be many rules enforced this week. Professor Graydon told me that much. She is the teacher to whom you were talking when you first came in. I know I shall like her. I haven't made up my mind about the others yet." "There, that is the last thing!" and Dolly drew a breath of relief, "the trunks are empty anyway. What shall I do with them now, Miss Newby?" "In the name of goodness, don't call me Miss Newby. I'm Elizabeth. I'll let Patrick know that they are ready, and he will carry them off to the trunk-room at once. I've only been here twenty-four hours, but I've found out that this college would never run without Patrick. And Patrick knows it." She started from the room on her self-appointed errand, but put her head back to call out; "If you have any specially stunning gown, just get it out. Tonight will be a good time to wear it. Hustle the rest of your things away and dress." "Now, why--," commenced Dolly. But Elizabeth had vanished and Dolly was questioning the empty air. "I suppose I had better do as she says," Dolly soliloquized. "I like her immensely. I should be sitting on the bed dissolved in tears if she had not come in. I wonder where she lives. Here I have told her all about home, and Mother and Father and Fred, and she has not said a word about herself. How long she is getting back." In fact, before Elizabeth returned, Dolly had put away all of her belongings, and had donned a pretty white dress which the warm day rendered appropriate. She was giving a last pat to her hair, when a knock came at the door, and a moment later Elizabeth's face peered into the bedroom. "Oh, I see why you were so long returning. I concluded that you had forgotten me and had gone off to help some other Freshman unpack." "No, thanks," and Elizabeth gave a little shrug that Dolly soon learned to be characteristic. "I'm not in the missionary business. I just took a fancy to you, and I saw that you had no friends here any more than I did. We were two of a kind. Do you like my dress?" "Immensely. That shade of blue is just your color. But why are we dressing up, please? Is this a daily performance?" "Hardly. The Sophomores are going to pay their respects to the new girls tonight, and while there is nothing like hazing allowed here, there are all sorts of tricks played that the Faculty never takes any notice of. I thought that we might feel more ready for them if we had the moral support of our best clothes." "How do you know so much? and what shall we do?" "I spent last evening in Professor Graydon's room, and she told me everything that she thought a Freshman ought to know. If you want me to, I will come over here and we can receive together. Your room is stunning and we can certainly hold our own." "I thought we were going to make fudge." "So we shall, but we'll hide it when they come. Don't waste candy on Sophomores, my dear." Dolly looked up with a sparkle in her eye. "What will they do?" "There's no telling. Nothing dreadful. Make us sing for them or recite, or go through some absurdity." "If we refuse?" "They will simply let us alone, not only tonight, but during the rest of the year. The best thing is to meet them good-naturedly, do what they require, and turn the tables on them, if we can." "You must come here, of course. 'Tis a pity if a few Sophomores can frighten us with their jokes. I know one thing that we can do, Elizabeth. You see there is some advantage in having a brother." CHAPTER II "What? Tell me quickly. I would give almost anything to get ahead of Margaret Ainsworth. I know that she will be one of those to come. You must have done something, Dolly, to offend her, for she seems to meditate vengeance on you." Dolly drew her brows together in a perplexed frown. "I asked if she were a Senior, and she did--" Elizabeth shouted: "Of course she did. She doubtless supposed you were trying to be sarcastic. Well, never mind. Hear that awful gong? Dinner will be ready in five minutes now. Come down to the veranda, and I will tell you who some of the people are." Dolly was quite ready to go, and as they ran lightly down the steps, she confided in a whisper to Elizabeth her plan for the Sophomores' discomfiture. "You are a genius; I am sure that will work! Hurrah! Oh, Miss Randall, I want you to meet Miss Alden. Can't we sit at your table tonight?" "Of course you can, I shall be very glad to have you. Miss Alden, I know that you are going to do fine work here, your entrance examinations were most excellent." Then she passed on, leaving Dolly happy and Elizabeth surprised. "I hadn't supposed that you were a bookworm and a student, and all that. You don't look it." "Mother has always helped me and been so interested in my lessons. It will be hard to study without her. She has always explained and encouraged me. I shall miss her fearfully." "I suppose you will," said Elizabeth slowly, with a hard look on her face that prevented further conversation on that point. The girls took whatever seats they wished at the table for the first few days. The next week they would be given permanent places. With her new friend beside her, Dolly found the meal pleasant enough. Afterward, they hurried to Dolly's sitting-room and began their preparations for making fudge. There was lots of fun and laughter over it. "How many do you think will come? I want just about enough pieces on this plate to go around. If any should be left over, they might want us to finish it, and I think that we may have had enough by that time." "I am sure that we shall," and Elizabeth nibbled away voraciously. "How small you are making the pieces, Dolly." "No need of wasting anything. I want each one to have a piece small enough so that she will put it all in her mouth at once. See? You did not tell me how many guests we might expect." "About fifteen, I think. They go out in squads. All of them cannot visit every Freshman, so they divide up. I heard them talking in our sitting-room while I was dressing. They didn't know that I was there, fortunately." "I'm going to shove that plate half under the paper, so--" suiting the action to the word, "they will think we are hiding it from them. Here are some pieces for us to nibble. Quick, sit down; take the candy in your hand, I hear them coming." A knock at the door. "Come in." "Arise and open the door." Dolly smothered a giggle and glanced inquiringly at Elizabeth, who nodded her head. So she crossed to the door and swung it wide. Fifteen Sophomores in fantastic kimonos and stately head-dresses stood outside. "Freshies, we have come to inspect your premises. Stand aside while we enter and examine you as regards your worthiness to remain within these sacred precincts. Stand in front of us, so!" There was a moment's pause while the fifteen uninvited guests took possession of the few chairs, window-seats and stools which the room afforded. "Miss Alden, you may answer first. What is the chief duty of every Freshman?" "To squelch the Sophomores," returned Dolly promptly. A deep groan sounded from all fifteen. "Wrong! Wrong! You have not the first idea of your fundamental duties. We shall be obliged to send you home, I fear. Miss Newby, answer!" "Most potent, grave and reverend Sophomores, the great duty of every Freshman is to try and become a Sophomore herself, so that she may try to impress unsophisticated Freshies with a sense of her own importance and make everyone forget that she herself was nothing but a Freshman one short year--" "Stop! Wrong! Wrong!" and a chorus of groans again broke forth. "The obvious duty of every Freshie is to run errands for the Sophomores and make life as pleasant as possible for them. Miss Alden, I see a banjo on the table there. Sing something to us." Dolly picked up the instrument with a mock-humble bow and touched the strings, a little uncertainly for a moment, but her touch soon became firmer, and a malicious little twinkle appeared in her eye. "Oh, these Sophomores, vain Sophomores, In all their swelling pride, I would to them the giftie gie, To see--" "Stop!" The fifteen rose majestically to their feet as Dolly, with assumed meekness, dropped her instrument at her side. "You may expect to hear from the faculty tomorrow. I regret that it is impossible for you to be retained at this hall of learning. Your influence would doubtless corrupt the other Freshmen, and teach them insubordination. You have also been guilty of greediness. I see the remains of a repast which you tried to conceal as we entered. You are ordered to pass that plate to your superiors." Elizabeth demurely obeyed the command. The bits of fudge were small, and there were just enough to go around. They were taken with great stateliness and dignity, but a moment later the room was filled with groans, coughs, shrieks and wrathful exclamations. "They would poison us!" "Let us be avenged!" "Choke them!" "Perish the Freshmen!" "Water, minions! water!" But Dolly and Elizabeth had taken good care that there should be no water at hand, so the unlucky Sophomores rushed away to their own rooms, followed by the taunting laughter of the two Freshmen and many gratuitous pieces of advice. "I wonder if they will try to pay us back," Dolly said, with sudden gravity. "No, tonight ends it all; Professor Graydon told me so. The Sophomores are allowed to air their new dignity this one evening, but nothing is tolerated after tonight. I do not think they came out much ahead of us. I must go now, Dolly, I wish I were your room-mate, but I presume that you will have a much more congenial one than I would be." "I do not think so," Dolly said, with evident sincerity. "I have a dreadful feeling whenever you mention her. Good-night, and thank you a thousand times." The next few days were busy ones. Dolly had new studies planned out for the term, and she found to her delight that she and Elizabeth had elected the same courses. The two were congenial, though Elizabeth was as reticent as Dolly was frank and open. Dolly had begun to hope that her unknown room-mate would not arrive at all, but on Tuesday, when she returned from her recitation in history, she found that Miss Sutherland had appeared. In fact there was no doubt that she was there, and had been there for a couple of hours at least. Dolly's dainty pink pillows, banners, and other trifles, had been summarily displaced. She could see no vestige of them. The room was now ornamented in a stiff sort of fashion with brilliant red tidies, afghans, and other things which Dolly considered quite antediluvian. The room had lost all of its dainty personality and prettiness. It certainly looked very unattractive, and it was not much wonder that Dolly drew a deep breath of disgust. The sound reached the ears of the newcomer, and she turned quickly. Dolly's bright eyes took in every detail, the thick hair drawn back so tightly and unbecomingly, the heavy brown dress, just the shade that the girl with such a dark, sallow complexion should never have worn, the cheap jewelry and the clumsy shoes. And she must room with this girl instead of with Elizabeth--it was too bad, it was--and Dolly's whole soul rose up in rebellion. "You are Miss Alden, aren't you? I am Mary Sutherland. I just came, and I have been trying to get my things in order." "I see." Dolly glanced dryly around the room. "Where are my belongings?" "I put them carefully on your bed, they were so pretty that it seemed a shame to have them get soiled; red is more substantial than pink, and of course, the two colors would not go well together--at least, I thought not"--looking a little timidly at Dolly's unresponsive face. "No! I quite agree that pink and red don't harmonize, at least these particular shades," and Dolly passed on to her bedroom and closed the door. She sat down on her bed while angry tears rose in her eyes. She was just beginning to make some pleasant acquaintances among the girls. They liked to come to her pretty room and eat her fudge and drink her tea. There had been several gay evenings. But how could she ever bring them into such a room as this was now? It was worse than a nightmare. The clang of the gong reminded her that she must hurry to the lecture on Roman art. She picked up her note-book and pencil, and rushed down the corridor. "Wait, oh, wait, my bonny maid," and Elizabeth caught her arm. "Why, Dolly, you have been crying!" "Yes, I am an awful goose. But you see my room-mate has come, and--" "I saw her, she hardly strikes me as being your style, but she will be quiet and inoffensive, I imagine." "Quiet and inoffensive?" Dolly gave a hysterical laugh. "Just wait until you see my room; all of my pretty things are reposing on my bed now, and that sitting-room is too awful to contemplate." "Dorothy Alden, are you in earnest?" "Yes, I am. Of course, I suppose I had taken possession of it rather coolly, but at least it is half mine." "Didn't you give her to understand that?" "No, I didn't. I was very angry, and I remembered that Mother made me promise to think twice before I acted, when I got furious. I shall propose something, though, when I go back. We might take the room by alternate weeks, or each of us trim a half of it. Which do you think would be the better plan?" "Either is bad," Elizabeth said decisively. "Why, oh, why, were we not put together? You could have had your things then in peace, and it would have saved me all the bother I am having now. I didn't think about my room before I came, and now that Miss Ainsworth has nothing to liven us up with either, we look as prim as a Quaker meeting-house. I have ordered some things, however, that will make us gorgeous. What do you say to a yellow room?" "I say that it will be handsome if your room-mate leaves the arrangement in your hands." "I made sure of that before I ordered anything," Elizabeth said, with a wise nod. "She was very willing that I should do all I wished, and on that understanding I went ahead." The girls had reached the lecture-room by this time, and further discussion was impossible; but all through Professor Randall's talk, Dolly's thoughts roamed to the room she had left. How could she stand it? Dolly was exceedingly susceptible by nature to all artistic effects, and anything inharmonious grated on her. She acknowledged to herself that Miss Sutherland did not seem aggressive, and apparently she had not acted as she had done through any petty spirit. As far as Dolly could judge, she was merely tactless and tasteless. She and Elizabeth talked the matter over a little more as they walked back to their rooms, but Elizabeth abstained from offering any advice. "I'll go in and see how the place looks. I'm curious to meet Miss Sutherland anyway." They found her sitting on the easiest rocking-chair, studying the college catalogue. She rose quickly as the girls came in, and Dolly introduced her friend. They tried to make the conversation general, but it was no easy matter. Mary Sutherland would answer questions, and occasionally ask one herself, but when the conversation took a wider range, she sat by, looking out of place and constrained. There was a knock at the door, and Charlotte Graves entered, followed by Winifred Paterson and Ada Rummel. They were all Sophomores, and had been among the fifteen who had called on Dolly the first evening. They had swallowed the red pepper which Dolly had hid in the fudge as best they could, and none of them bore any malice. "All things were fair in love and college," as Charlotte Graves tersely remarked. The trio halted now on the threshold in open astonishment. "What have you been doing to your room, Miss Alden?" Winifred demanded abruptly. "For a Freshman you showed most unusual taste, and you had about the prettiest den out, but now--pardon me if I ask why this thusness? It is quite too awful." Dolly carefully refrained from looking at her room-mate. Miss Paterson was certainly frank to the verge of rudeness. "Pray have some seats, most august Sophomores. You see that red is more serviceable than pink, and in view of the fact that we are liable to have numerous visits from those who were Freshmen last year, and who of course do not know how to treat delicate things with proper respect--" "Well, let me tell you one thing," Miss Graves interrupted, "you will be troubled with precious few calls from anyone if you intend to make this a permanent thing." Dolly's cheeks flushed. She must stop them at any cost. Despite her own annoyance, she could not help feeling sorry for Miss Sutherland, who evidently thought that she had made the room charming. She turned to introduce her, but she was only in time to see her vanish into her own bedroom. Dolly's quick ears caught the sound of a sob as the door closed. She forgot her own anger of an hour before and turned wrathfully on her guests. "Commend me to Sophomores for superlative rudeness and a total disregard of the feelings of others. These articles belong to my room-mate. She just came. She hasn't met any of the girls yet, and you have given her a beautiful welcome, haven't you?" Dolly's cheeks burned like coals of fire. She spoke in a low tone so that her words should not be heard in the adjoining room, but every syllable was vibrant with feeling. The Sophomores looked ashamed. "Bring her out and let me apologize," begged Winifred. "And make a bad matter worse? Not much. We will all go out for a walk until dinner-time. I hope," added Dolly, severely, "that when I become a Sophomore I shall not forget all my manners." "Come, my dear, cool down," Charlotte Graves said languidly, putting her own arm through Dolly's. "It strikes me that you have forgotten your manners already to talk so to your own guests." There was a ripple of laughter at this, and Dolly looked a trifle shamefaced. "I was making general remarks," she said loftily. "Come on, we shall forgive you this once, and Winifred shall eat humble-pie for your room-mate's benefit at the first opportunity. As class president I decree it." There by tacit consent, the subject dropped. The girls had a pleasant walk, and when the dinner-gong sounded, Dolly hurried up to her room; she knew that she would not find her room-mate very congenial, but at least she would not be so selfish as to let Miss Sutherland go down to the dining-room alone, on this first night. As she opened the door of their common sitting-room she stopped in amazement. CHAPTER III She looked around with a gasp of surprise, and then rubbed her eyes to make sure she was not dreaming. All of her own dainty trifles were back in place. Every vestige of the obnoxious red decorations had vanished. Dolly felt a sudden moisture in her eyes. The poor girl! She knocked lightly on Miss Sutherland's door. There was a faint stir inside, but no response. Dolly hesitated, and then boldly opened the door. "Excuse me, please, for coming in when you did not ask me to, but I was sure you were here, and you must come down to dinner at once." "I am not going down tonight." "Indeed you are," Dolly said, after one comprehensive look at the mottled, tear-stained face before her. "The students must all be on hand promptly for meals. I cannot take you to my table, for that is full now, and we have been given our permanent places for the term, but I will introduce you to Professor Newton; there is a vacant place at her table, I know. You will like her, I am sure." Miss Sutherland gave her room-mate a curious look, started to say something, changed her mind, and then got up from the bed and commenced to brush her hair back with nervous, impatient fingers. "Don't do that," Dolly ejaculated suddenly, "can't you see how much better you look when your hair lies loosely, so as to soften the outlines of your face? Here, give me the brush." She took the brush and comb from Miss Sutherland's hand, pushed her down into a chair, and worked rapidly for two or three minutes. "There, the last bell will ring in a second and there is no time to fuss with it longer tonight, but can't you see how much better it looks? You have such lovely hair that it is too bad to spoil it." "Mother always liked it combed straight back," was all Miss Sutherland vouchsafed, speaking in a very distant tone. Dolly flushed. Would she never learn to be less impetuous, she wondered, and to mind her own business? She felt like a child of three, whose ears had been soundly boxed. "There was no need, Miss Sutherland, for you to change the arrangement of the sitting-room. Of course you have rights there as well as I." The matter had better be settled now, Dolly thought, at once and forever. "I suppose red and pink would hardly answer in the same room at the same time, but we might agree on some third color together, and you fix part of the room and I part, or else you could have charge of the sitting-room one month and I the next. Which plan would you prefer?" Dolly listened anxiously for the reply. It did not seem probable that her room-mate would feel that she could afford to buy new furnishings, and how could Dolly ever stand the red atrocities for five months, even if her beloved belongings were to be used for the other five? There was no hesitancy in Miss Sutherland's answer. "I can't afford to waste any more money on things for my room, and I shan't put up my mother's work for those fools to laugh at, so I guess the sitting-room, as you call it, will likely stay as it is." Dolly felt uncomfortable. Miss Sutherland had a way of putting things that made one seem very small. It was clear, from the tone of her voice, that she worshiped her mother, and Dolly could see how the ridicule of her mother's handiwork had hurt the girl's feelings. "You must remember," she said gently, "that the sitting-room is as much yours as mine. Forgive me if I had seemed to take complete possession of it before you came." "That won't matter, I guess; I don't suppose I shall be in it much, anyway. I don't seem to belong there." The dinner-gong sounded at that moment, and Miss Sutherland went into the hall, Dolly following in a very perturbed frame of mind. "I will take you to Professor Newton now," she remarked as they reached the dining-room door. "I don't reckon that you need to, I know Professor Newton," Miss Sutherland returned, with the queer little smile that Dolly again failed to note. "Oh, you met her when you came, did you? Good-bye, then, for a few minutes," and Dolly crossed the room to Miss Randall's table, where Elizabeth was waiting for her. Their seats were next each other, and after the meal had fairly commenced, Dolly told her all that had transpired up in her room. Elizabeth gave a soft whistle. "I pity you, my dear; you see you have a tender conscience, and you are going to bother yourself about Miss Sutherland all of the time. Now, if I were you, I should never give her another thought, especially as your room has returned to its normal condition." "You slander yourself," Dolly retorted, "didn't you act the part of a good Samaritan to me?" "Oh, you--you are different! Don't you know that you are going to be one of the most popular girls here? You are pretty and bright, and friendly with everyone." "Hush up, Beth." "How came you to call me that?" Elizabeth's tone was queer, and Dolly turned to look at her. "'Beth,' do you mean? It is often a nickname of Elizabeth, you know, and I have always loved the name since the days of Miss Alcott's 'Little Women.' Don't you like it?" "Yes, I like it, but no one has called me by it for years, and when you said it just now, I felt absolutely startled." "I will not use it again if you would rather I did not." "I would rather that you did, however," and then Elizabeth joined in the general conversation around the table. Dolly wondered if she did it to avoid further questioning. The college soon settled down to the regular routine of work. Before a month had passed, the Freshmen knew who their best students were, and who stood a chance of being elected class officers. The other three classes had held their elections at the end of the first fortnight, their old officers holding over until that time. It was an unwritten law, however, that the Freshmen should wait for their class elections until Thanksgiving time; that would afford opportunity for them to get acquainted with each other, and to determine who were the most suitable candidates. [Illustration: Beth and Dolly were discussing it one day as they took their usual walk.] It was an all-important subject in the eyes of the Freshmen, and so, not unnaturally, Beth and Dolly were discussing it one day as they took their usual walk. "I believe that Margaret Hamilton will be elected president," predicted Dolly. "She is so tall and handsome, she would be such a magnificent president." "She knows it," returned Beth dryly. "She has been posing for it ever since the term opened. She dresses for it, talks for it, and is always working for it--not openly, but in a hundred little subtle ways." "You don't like Margaret." "Not to any great extent, I'll confess. I would much rather see you class president." "Me? I haven't any dignity, and you know it." "Well, you have other qualifications that are quite as desirable." "I'm out of the question, so stop talking about it. There goes Miss Hamilton now. I wonder why she always turns down that lane? It is a private one, you know, and I'm sure she has no permission to go to the house every day." "I'm positive she doesn't even know the people," Beth said, staring after her classmate. "I am consumed with curiosity. What do you suppose she does want, anyway?" "I have not the faintest idea, and I really do not suppose that it concerns us, anyway. What do you think?" "Don't be snubby! Margaret Hamilton is queer in some ways, though none of you seem to have discovered it but myself." "That simply shows what an imagination you have. I must go into the library now and scribble a note to Fred. I don't see when you get your home letters written, Beth. I must send one to Father and Mother twice a week, or they would think that I was sick and rush on here: and Fred, off at Harvard, demands one just as often. I told him that I would write as long as he did, but that when he commenced to shirk on his letters to me, I would stop. So far he has done remarkably well, and Mother likes me to write him often, not mere notes, you know, but long, chatty letters; she thinks that home-letters help to keep boys out of temptation." "I presume they do," said Beth soberly, as if struck by a new thought. "Possibly it would not hurt me to write to Roy, he is off at a preparatory school." "Have you a brother? I didn't know it." "I have not been much more communicative than Margaret Hamilton, have I? But I hardly imagine that our reasons are the same for keeping so quiet: If there is time after our letters are finished, I'll give you a biographical sketch of our family. Roy is my half brother, I have no own brothers or sisters." And then Beth commenced to talk of something else as if she repented her momentary confidence, and the girls went in to write their letters. Beth finished first. "There, the surprise that will strike Roy when he reads that letter may bring on an apoplectic fit. 'Twill be the very first letter he ever had from me." "Has he been away from home long?" "This is his second year. I believe that you are aware of the fact that I live in Philadelphia. Father is a lawyer, and he isn't a poor one, either. He makes considerable money, but I have my own money that was my mother's." "Have you any other brothers beside Roy?" "As I said, I haven't any brothers or sisters really. Roy is ten, Hugh is eight, and Nell is three. I think Roy is far too young to send away to school, and I know that his mother is of the same opinion. But Father seemed to think that it was best." "What do you call your stepmother, Beth?" "I do not think I ever called her anything in speaking to her. Of course, I call her Mrs. Newby when I allude to her, but that is very seldom." "Isn't she nice, Beth? I don't mean to be impertinent, but you know that I care for you a great deal, and I cannot help feeling concerned about everything regarding you." "You couldn't be impertinent if you tried, Dolly, and I would answer your question if I could. I really don't know how she would appear to an outsider. You must go home with me sometime and judge for yourself. She is a perfect lady, and that is about all that I feel qualified to say." Beth had talked all that she cared to on the subject, and Dolly wisely let the matter drop. Beth had told her no more than any mere acquaintance of the family's could have repeated. She had let Dolly know something about her family, but nothing about her feelings. It was months before the subject ever came up again. As Thanksgiving time approached, the Freshmen became very much excited over the approaching election. Several girls were mentioned in connection with the class presidency, notably Margaret Hamilton and Dolly herself. Abby Dunbar and Grace Chisholm would also be candidates in all probability. Beth was intensely interested over the affair, and Dolly suspected her of doing considerable electioneering. It became more and more evident, as the time drew nearer, that Miss Hamilton and Dolly Alden would poll the most votes. Dolly tried to keep cool and unconcerned. It was a great surprise to her that her name should even be mentioned in this connection. "But you would like it--you know you would like it!" insisted Beth as they went over the question for the final time in Dolly's room. That was at noon on Monday, the election would be held that evening. "Why, yes," said Dolly honestly, "I would like it if it comes to me naturally, but I will not beg any of the girls to vote for me. That would spoil it all. If the girls prefer Miss Hamilton, she ought to be elected. She would make a much better presiding officer than I." "I don't think so, do you, Miss Sutherland?" and Beth turned to Dolly's room-mate who was the only other person present. Dolly broke in impetuously. "Don't ask Mary embarrassing questions. She doesn't have to vote for me just because we chance to room together, and, of course, she knows that Miss Hamilton would make a better president than I. By the way, why don't you two drop formality and say 'Elizabeth' and 'Mary?' It is quite time you did so." "I shall be very glad to do so, if I may be permitted," Beth said. Then as she caught a slight smile on Mary's face, she added, "Very well, that weighty matter is settled for the remainder of the college course. You see, I did not dare to say 'Mary' so familiarly to one who is such a wonderful scholar in biology as you." "That is the only thing I _do_ know, so please do not make fun of me." "Gracious, I would never dare to make fun of you! We all hold our breath with awe when you recite. Really, Mary, don't look so hurt and annoyed. We do admire you tremendously. That is such an unusual branch for a girl to fancy." "You had better talk about the class election, I think," said Mary decidedly. "Why? do you think it will be close?" "Miss Hamilton's friends are working hard. Lots of the girls had no special preferences, but I think all of those will vote for Miss Hamilton now." Beth groaned. "I am an idiot to sit still here. I shall go right out in the highways and byways of this building, and see if I cannot accomplish something myself." "You will stay here, Beth." "I will not." In the midst of the good-humored scrimmage that followed, the lunch-gong sounded, and the girls hurried to their rooms to freshen up a wee bit before going to the dining-room. It was apparent early in the evening that Miss Hamilton's friends felt confident of victory. Their plans were well laid, and one of their number was promptly elected chairman. The preliminary business was gotten out of the way very speedily. Margaret Hamilton was nominated for the class president by Florence Smith. Beth nominated Dolly, and then Abby Dunbar, Grace Chisholm and Bessie Worth were quickly nominated by their friends. The tellers distributed papers and pencils and the balloting commenced. Dolly found herself actually trembling with excitement. What fun it would be if she could telegraph to Fred and sign her name, "Dorothy Alden, President, Class '09." "I wish I were one of those tellers," murmured Beth. "It is simply maddening to sit here and do nothing. Hush, there they come, Dolly. Oh, I do hope that you were elected." CHAPTER IV The faces of the tellers told nothing as they entered the room, carrying the little slip of paper that meant so much to these Freshmen. The chairman rapped loudly for order, and a pin could have been heard drop while the result was read: Miss Hamilton . . . . 145 votes Miss Alden . . . . . 145 " Miss Dunbar . . . . . 10 " Miss Chisholm . . . . 9 " Miss Worth . . . . . 6 " "We'll have to take another ballot," Beth said in a low tone excitedly. "How close it is! Oh, Dolly, I do hope that you will get it." The tension was growing too much. Sharp things were said in undertones, and a little bitterness was evident in the remarks that were made and the suggestions that were offered. Dolly sat back quietly, a troubled look on her face. Even if she were elected, half of the class would be more or less opposed to her. There would certainly be two factions. What could she do? What was the _right_ thing to do? What would her mother advise? "I wonder if I ought to withdraw my name?" Dolly said to herself, as another acrimonious remark was made by one of Margaret Hamilton's admirers. "I have just as much right to run as she has, and, if she is elected I shall not be hateful to her. I shall congratulate her, and do all that I can to help her. I would like to be president, and yet--" The tellers had returned again. The result was announced amid a breathless silence. "Miss Hamilton, 157; Miss Alden, 157," announced the chairman of the tellers. "As there are 315 present, it is quite evident that someone did not vote." Obeying a sudden impulse, Dolly rose to her feet. "Madam Chairman, I did not cast any vote, and while it may be a little irregular for me to do so now, after the result has been announced, I hope that I may be accorded that privilege. If so, I cast my vote for Miss Hamilton." For a moment no one spoke or seemed to take in the full meaning of Dolly's generous speech. Then there was a deafening uproar, and the room was filled with wild cheers. Dolly had done a fine thing, and the girls were quick to show their appreciation of it. As soon as the hubbub had partially subsided, Dolly was nominated for the vice-presidency and unanimously elected. The rest of the meeting went off smoothly. Something in Dolly's action had touched the better nature of the girls, and they all felt secretly ashamed of their momentary bitterness and injustice. Beth was elected recording secretary, and the other offices were filled without ill feeling or jealousy. After the meeting Margaret Hamilton went straight to Dolly. "I want to thank you for my election," she said, with outstretched hand. "You are the most generous girl I ever knew. I was glad to be elected," with a look in her eyes that Beth noted, but could not understand. "But I do hope that sometime I can help make _you_ president. I shall certainly not forget what you did." They talked it over afterward in Dolly's room, girl-fashion. "There was no sense in your doing that," Beth said bluntly. "Of course Margaret Hamilton voted for herself; if you had voted for yourself at first, you would have been elected. Don't you see?" "And don't you see how much feeling there would have been in the class? I would much rather be vice-president and be elected unanimously the way I was, than to be president twenty times over. We can't afford to start our Freshman year with factional feelings, can we, Mary?" Dolly was in the habit of appealing to Mary whenever she was present. She had discovered that Mary Sutherland had a great fund of common sense, and then, too, she did not like her room-mate to feel ignored. She noticed that of late Mary was trying to do her hair up as Dolly had done it for her that first night. She had not yet become expert in the process, but the result was much more satisfactory than before. Dolly noted, too, little changes in dress that softened the harsh outlines and lent a little color to her face. She longed to offer advice sometimes, but the remembrance of the first night restrained her. She would not invite any snubs. If Mary Sutherland wished her help, Dolly would give it willingly, but she was not going to make any advances again. And yet that was just what her shy, diffident room-mate was longing to have her do. She had not meant to repulse Dolly that first night, but she had been feeling hurt and grieved then, her ideals were all shattered, and out of the depths of a heart loyal to her poor hardworking mother, had come the remark that made Dolly draw back, and that kept her from ever proffering assistance or suggestions now. She and Mary saw comparatively little of each other, considering that they were room-mates. Both were Freshmen, but while Dolly and Beth were taking the classical course, Mary was taking the scientific. Mary's recitations, for the most part, came during Dolly's study hours. Of course there were the evenings, but some way Mary was very seldom in the room during the evening. Dolly often wondered where she spent the time, for she had no intimate friend. She was careful, however, not to question her. They had never reached a degree of intimacy that would permit that. Today Mary seemed more companionable than usual, and Dolly found, to her astonishment, that her taciturn room-mate had been quite as disappointed as Beth over the outcome of the elections. However, she was more ready than Beth to acknowledge that Dolly had done the only thing that could have secured class harmony and good fellowship. On Wednesday noon college would close for the balance of the week. Those students who lived near enough could go home to eat their Thanksgiving dinners, the rest would stay at the Hall and get up such impromptu entertainments as the occasion suggested and their genius could devise. Dolly was one of the fortunate ones who could go home. Mary lived west of the Rocky Mountains, and Beth seemed to have no desire to go home. Dolly was wild over the prospect. Fred was coming home from Harvard, and she could stay until the early morning train on Monday. "It is worth getting up at four o'clock," she announced decidedly. "Oh, by the way, I'll send Fred a telegram signed 'Vice-President Class '09.' That doesn't sound as big as 'President' would, of course, but it will do. Patrick will take it down to the office for me. Blessed Patrick." She scratched off her message humming gaily: "Hurrah! hurrah! oh, jubilation! Two more days and then vacation; No more Latin, no more French, No more sitting on a hard wooden bench." She turned suddenly and caught an expression of utter homesickness and loneliness on her room-mate's face. Beth was looking hard and bitter, a look that Dolly had come to know and dread. She mentally anathematized herself for talking of home before these two girls. Then a brilliant thought struck her. "I have a bit of news for you," she announced briefly. "It may be of interest to you. The fact is, you are both going home with me on Wednesday." Her companions stared at her. "Don't be a goose, Dolly. 'Tis very good of you to propose it, but your father and mother, to say nothing of that brother of yours, will want all of your time. They will not care to have strangers there whom they must entertain." "They will not entertain you, my dear. I am taking you to entertain a couple of boys whom Fred proposes taking home. Don't you see how useful you can make yourselves?" "Elizabeth could," Mary Sutherland replied quietly, but with a certain wistfulness. "I would be no help at all. I never could talk to boys; then, I have no clothes to wear, and you would be ashamed of me." "If you cannot entertain boys, you must learn to do it before you are a week older. No one expects college girls to have many clothes, so that part of the question is disposed of. I am going to send an extra telegram to Mother now, so that she will be sure to get a large turkey. I don't want you to go hungry when you eat your Thanksgiving dinner with me." "But, Dolly--" "Oh, will you please be still? Both of you? You interrupt me." "You are wasting your money by sending that telegram, and your strength in writing it," said Beth coolly, "for I, at least, am not going." But Dolly had a very persuasive way of her own, and in the end both Beth and Mary Sutherland succumbed, the latter, however, not without sundry misgivings. "You know that my dresses are old-fashioned and I cannot afford any new ones. Will you not be ashamed of me?" "Of course not," and while that was perfectly true, Dolly knew that she could not take the same pride in introducing Mary that she could in introducing stylish, winning Beth; for Beth, despite her red hair, was strikingly pretty. Her freckles had disappeared with the summer, and her gowns always fitted to perfection. She could play and sing and act. There was no doubt, at all, but that she would prove very popular with Fred's chums. Beth was small and slender, her eyes were a marvelously deep blue and her complexion fair. Mary was tall, dark and awkward. Her hair was thick, and, properly arranged, showed its full beauty. But Mary knew nothing of the art of dressing. She felt it, and did not want her friend to be ashamed of her. She went to the point directly, which was characteristic of her, when she had once made up her mind on a point. "Will you tell me what dresses to take, and can you give me any hints about fixing my things up? Of course, I have not the clothes that you and Elizabeth have, but if you will help me, I will try to do the best I can with my limited wardrobe." Dolly studied a moment in silence. "White always looks well, even if it is simple. You have a couple of white dresses. They are laundered, I know. Take both of them along, you will need them for dinner dresses. Father always likes us to dress a little for dinner. He says it rests him to come home and see Mother and me with something pretty on, and we are quite ready to humor him. Then--I think--yes--I am sure that you had better wear your blue for a travelling dress. You'll not need anything else, for we shall be gone such a little time. Have you bright ribbons? Never mind if you haven't. We shall all draw on Mother's stock, she is used to that sort of thing, and doesn't mind a bit." "I must go down town today to buy a hat. Would you very much mind going with me to help?" "Not at all. I just love to buy things, but Beth and I have been down town so often lately that Miss Newton may refuse permission." "I'll fix that part," Mary said quietly. "You will? How confidently you say that. Professor Newton is very nice, my dear, and I adore her, but I don't imagine that she is very easily 'fixed.'" Miss Sutherland looked amused. "I will go and speak to her now," was all she said. She came back with the desired permission, and the two went off gaily, while Beth went to her room to write to Roy. To Beth's great surprise, Roy had answered that first letter of hers very promptly, and though his letter had been the short, unsatisfactory kind that boys always write, especially boys as young as Roy, Beth had been touched and pleased at his evident delight over the fact that she had written to him. Since then her missives went regularly. She felt sorry for the homesick lad. "I wonder if Dolly's father would have sent Fred off at that age," she said to herself. "I am anxious to see Dolly's people. Shall I like them? Well, the vacation is not long, anyway." No, it would not be long, and yet there would be plenty of time in it for the happening of various things of more or less importance to the college lassies. CHAPTER V When the train on Wednesday evening halted for a moment at the first suburban station outside Dolly's city home, she gave a little shriek of surprise and delight. A moment later three young men entered the Pullman where Dolly and her friends were seated. One of the young men was instantly pounced upon by Dolly and given an enthusiastic reception; meanwhile his two companions stood back smilingly, and proceeded to scrutinize Dolly's companions very closely. "Oh, dear, where shall we begin with the introductions? We have all got to be introduced, I see. Well, this is my brother, Fred, Miss Newby and Miss Sutherland. He is really very nice, girls. I have brought him up quite properly." "The bringing up was altogether the other way, as I chance to be a couple of years my sister's senior. Now, boys, come forward." A moment later and the girls had formally made the acquaintance of "Mr. Martin" and "Mr. Steele." "I told the mater to let us meet you, and she finally consented, though she made us promise not to loiter on the way. We got here this morning, you know." "How jolly, Fred, and oh! how good it is to be at home once more," Dolly said, as the train came to a standstill in the great station. "Let us walk up, we can get there in ten minutes and we can talk so much better that way. Tell me about your friends, Fred." "There's not time to tell you very much, but I'll give you the main points. Steele is working his way through college. He is one of the most popular men there. He hasn't a near relation in the world. He was born somewhere out West. His father took a claim; dry seasons, big mortgage and prairie fires killed the mother and the father, too. There wasn't a cent left for Bob. He has done about everything that a boy could do, I guess, and he has lived in every large city between here and Kansas. He was three years in Chicago, and managed to graduate from the High School there. Did jobs for some millionaire night and morning for his board and a dollar a week. Wherever he lived he went to school. That's how he managed to prepare for college." "But how does he do now?" "He won a scholarship, and then he is steward of our club. He does private tutoring and half a dozen other things. He'll get along. He had more invitations for Thanksgiving, I'll wager, than any other fellow in college." "And Mr. Martin? Talk fast. We are almost home. You know all about the girls, for I told you all that I could think of in my letters." "There isn't so much to tell about Martin, Dolly. He comes from one of the oldest families in Boston, has lots of money, and plenty of brains, but he is fearfully lazy. What he needs--" But Fred's sentence was destined to remain unfinished, for just then the sextette came in sight of Dolly's home, and Dolly spied in the doorway the person whom she most loved on earth. With one spring she vanished up the walk and darted into her mother's arms. It was all a merry hubbub for a time. Dolly's mother seemed to Beth just an older and more mature type of Dolly herself. Dolly's father was there, too, and the greeting given the two strange girls was cordial enough to make them feel at home and to dispel all restraint. "You boys must try to amuse yourselves without us for a little while," said Mrs. Alden, her arm still around Dolly. "I am going to take the girls upstairs now, and by the time we come down, dinner will be served." "Your old room is ready for you, Dolly, just as you left it; I have put your friends in the two little rooms across the hall. I supposed that you would want to be near each other." "You are correct, as usual, Motherdie. Come in and help me dress now. You always used to put the finishing touches on for me, you know. Leave your doors open, girls, so that we can talk to one another." "I like your friends," Dolly's mother said quietly, when the two found themselves alone later. "Miss Newby doesn't look very happy, and there is an expression on her face that I do not like to see on so young a girl. I think that Miss Sutherland has latent possibilities about her." "Yes, and they are almost all latent as yet, but you can help to bring them out, I know. By the way, Mother, I want to brighten her up a bit. She must make a good impression on the boys this first night. Have you any rose-colored ribbons? Just put them on her, won't you? There's a dear. She cannot tie a bow any more than a sparrow can." "You do not need me any more?" "No, thanks. Oh, it is so blessed to be home, Mother. I'm going to your room at bedtime for a long talk. Will I do?" "Very well," and Mrs. Alden looked with pardonable pride on the tall, graceful figure of her daughter, straight as an arrow; the fair, happy face, sunny and sweet, the light curling hair, the dainty white dress and the knots of blue ribbon scattered over it, made a picture of which any mother might well feel proud. When Dolly went into Mary's room, she stopped in genuine surprise. "How pretty you do look, Mary. I am proud of you." And yet "pretty" was hardly the correct adjective to apply to her room-mate. Mary's face was fine, and now that she was dressed with some taste, the possibilities of future beauty became apparent. But it was by no means a handsome face, though it might become so in later years. Beth came in trailing a white cashmere behind her. Dolly laughed mischievously. "Beth thinks that she can add several inches to her height by wearing long dresses. She does it on every possible occasion." Beth retorted merrily, and the four went downstairs, where they found the three boys as well as Dolly's father awaiting them rather impatiently. There was plenty of lively conversation, in which everyone took part. It was easy to see that Dolly was the light of the house, and that she was woefully missed by her home people. Rob Steele proved to be a good talker. He had been through so much in the course of his short life, that he had an endless fund of stories on hand for almost any occasion. He was not at all conceited, but he talked well and easily. "You must have acquaintances all over the United States," Beth exclaimed at last. "Aren't you always seeing people that you know?" "Not often; you see, I was hardly in a position to make acquaintances, Miss Newby. I was doing all sorts of odd jobs, and while I will doubtless remember the faces of the persons for whom I worked, they will not recall me, and would certainly not claim acquaintanceship. However, I did see a young lady on your train whose face was so familiar to me that I bowed involuntarily." "I noticed you speaking to that stunning girl all dressed in brown. Who is she, Bob?" "Her name is Hamilton--Miss Margaret Hamilton. I knew her just casually in Chicago, where I stayed longer than I ever did in any other place after Father died. We were in the same class, that is, we graduated the same year. I saw nothing much of her at school, but I frequently caught glimpses of her when I was sent to old Worthington's on some errand." "Was she a relation of that rich old Worthington who died two years ago?" "No relation, she was the daughter of his housekeeper, a very nice girl, too. Rather proud, I fancied, but thoroughly free from nonsense and silly sentimentalism." It was some moments before Dolly dared to glance at her friends. There were significant glances interchanged, but no comments were made, and Dolly's people did not surmise then, that the young woman under discussion had been Dolly's successful rival for the class presidency. There were music and singing later in the evening, and Beth felt that she knew for the first time, perhaps, what home-life might really mean. After the girls had slipped into their dressing-gowns that night, they ran over to Dolly's room to discuss the subject that was just then uppermost in the minds of them all--Margaret Hamilton. They halted at the door, however, for there was Dolly enjoying a comfortable chat with her mother. [Illustration: There were music and singing later in the evening.] "Come in, girls, I've just been telling Mother all about Margaret. I always tell her everything, you know, and she has just asked if Margaret ever made any statements at variance with the real truth about herself. It is no disgrace to be poor, and I hope that we are not snobs enough to care for that part of it; but has she been trying to pass herself off for something that she is not?" There was a little silence. Mary Sutherland was the first to speak. "I never saw much of Miss Hamilton, and so I do not know what she is in the habit of saying about herself. The only time that I ever heard her mention the past, was when Miss Raymond asked her where she lived. She replied that her home had been in Chicago, but that death had broken it up. There was nothing more said." "Very possibly all of that was strictly true," Mrs. Alden said thoughtfully, "and she certainly was under no special obligation to tell every student at Westover her private affairs. But how does she have the means to go through college? Dolly tells me that she dresses very nicely, although not extravagantly. I can see how she would prefer to keep some facts to herself. Girls are not as tolerant as boys in some particulars. Mr. Steele is popular at Harvard, despite his poverty and struggles; but you know very well that a girl, with similar experiences, would be unmercifully snubbed at Westover." "And you think--" "I do not know your friend, or perhaps I should say your classmate, as I see Miss Newby frowning over the word 'friend' so it is not easy for me to draw conclusions, but if she has merely kept still, and been reticent on her past life, I do not see that she is open to censure. Of course, if she has been pretending to be what she is not, that is a totally different affair." "She has always been very careful, Mrs. Alden, to say as little as possible about herself. I noticed it, and commented on the fact to Dolly, but I do not imagine that anyone else noticed it. As far as my observation has gone, she has told no untruths. But she certainly did seem accustomed to all the little luxuries that rich people have. One could notice it at table and in a hundred little ways." "Doubtless she was accustomed to many of those things, if her mother was housekeeper for Mr. Worthington. He was one of the richest men in the West, and Miss Hamilton would have had an opportunity in his house, if she were at all adaptable, of becoming thoroughly familiar with all such little niceties. Even at the housekeeper's table there was certainly plenty of opportunity for Miss Hamilton to grow perfectly familiar with the ways of the rich." "But where is her mother, and where did her money come from?" "Those are questions that we can't answer, so we might as well drop them. I wonder where she was going?" "Oh, didn't you know? Helen Raymond asked her to spend the Thanksgiving vacation at her home." Mrs. Alden leaned forward, a serious look on her face. "Girls, if I were you, I should not mention this subject at school. Miss Hamilton is your class president, she will be your president for a year to come. You want everything smooth and harmonious, don't you?" "Of course we do, Mrs. Alden, and we will keep perfectly mum, but if Dolly had only been sensible and voted for herself, there would not be any such situation as there is at present." Dolly laughed. "Beth never will learn to recognize some facts; now, for instance, that subject was finally settled long, long ago." "I don't see--" began Beth. But Mrs. Alden rose hastily to her feet. "You girls must all get to bed and to sleep as soon as possible. The boys have plans for every moment of the day, and you will want to feel fresh tomorrow. Dolly, you may come over to my room for just a few minutes." The next morning there was a drive through the lovely suburbs of the city, then they came back to the Thanksgiving dinner; in the evening there was a fine concert to which Mr. Alden took them all. Friday and Saturday were full of fun and pleasure. Sunday evening came all too soon. Dolly was having a quiet chat in the library with Fred and her mother. The rest were all in the drawing-room. "I have been very much astonished at the way our guests paired off. Naturally, one would think that Mr. Steele would care to talk to Mary rather than to Beth. Mary knows what hard work and life on a farm mean. She would not be at college now, if some aunt were not paying her tuition; she told me so. I supposed that she and Mr. Steele would have ever so many things in common, but I never see them talking together at all. Mr. Martin seems really to find Mary very attractive, and Mr. Steele devotes most of his time to Beth, who is certainly his opposite in every particular." "That is just the reason Steele likes her, I presume," Fred rejoined with an air of superior wisdom. "The attraction of opposites, you know; though, for that matter, Steele quite approves of you. He thinks you are a remarkably nice little girl, for he told me so." "How horribly condescending of him," Dolly said, tilting her chin upward. Fred laughed. It was great fun to tease Dolly. "He thinks you did a remarkably fine thing in throwing the class presidency to that classmate of yours who voted for herself. By the way, her name was Hamilton, I remember; she wasn't that girl of whom Bob was talking the other night, was she?" Dolly flushed. "Tell Fred the whole story, dear, you can trust your brother." So Dolly told it, and whatever Fred thought, he kept to himself, merely promising not to mention the affair to anyone. Mrs. Alden sent the girls off to bed at an early hour, for, as Beth said, they must be awake at a most unearthly time. The boys set their alarm clock in order to be up to see the girls off. They, themselves, were not obliged to go until a later train. "We have had just a beautiful time, Mrs. Alden," Beth declared that evening. "I can't tell how much it has meant to me. I want Dolly to go home with me as soon as you can spare her, but I suppose you will want her at Christmas?" "Perhaps we could arrange a compromise," Mrs. Alden returned smilingly; "you might stop here for a week, and then we _might_ agree to loan you Dolly for the remaining time." "I do wish you would. I would be more glad than I can tell you. I am going to consider that point settled, and I thank you a thousand times. Dolly, I want to tell you something about that room-mate of mine when we get upstairs. I've meant to do it all vacation, and our jolly times have just crowded it out of my head." CHAPTER VI But it was not until they were on the train the next day, that an opportunity came for Beth to tell her story. There had been a jolly, sleepy crowd that had eaten the early breakfast and then gone down to the station. The boys had supplied them well with magazines, flowers and boxes of candy. To Mary Sutherland it was all like a new world--the handsome house, the elegant furnishings, the plenty and comfort that pervaded the whole atmosphere, and while that part was nothing at all new to Beth, she, too, felt as if she were in a new world, for it was a world in which the home-atmosphere was sweet and wholesome, blessed as it was with love and mutual forbearance. The good-byes were all said at last, and Dolly had to wink hard to keep back the tears. "Do you remember how homesick I was in September, Beth, and how you came to the rescue like a good angel? What should I have done without you? It will be only a month now until the Christmas holidays, and I certainly ought to be able to stand it four weeks without getting lonesome." "You should have seen what a forlorn object she was, Mary," interrupted Beth. "She sat on the edge of her bed looking as if she had not a friend in all the world." "In all the college, you mean, and I had not, either, until you walked in. I shall bless you forever for that deed of humanity. Even my room-mate was missing then; you stayed for the marriage of a sister, did you not, Mary?" "Yes, and I am afraid that I was not much comfort to you after I _did_ appear. I didn't mean to be dictatorial and horrid, but I am afraid that--" "You were nothing but what was all right, Mary," Dolly interrupted. "We were not acquainted at first, that was all." "I was not nice, but I meant to be, and I'll try to fit in better hereafter. You should have had Beth for a room-mate, though I'm too selfish to propose any change this year." "We can all three be good friends, Mary, so far as that goes, but I certainly wish that some other room-mate had been allotted to me than Margery Ainsworth." "You were going to tell us something about her, Beth; now is a good opportunity." "Very well, only you girls must understand that I am telling this in confidence, because I want your advice. I don't know whether it is my duty to say anything or not. Of course, girls don't like to be tell-tales any more than boys do, but it seems to me that the good name of the college is more or less concerned in this, and we cannot afford to have any girl do things which would bring us into disrepute." "Of course not," Dolly said energetically. "Well, what is it?" "In the first place, she systematically breaks all of the rules. I cannot room with her, of course, and not know that. She probably depends upon my good nature or sense of honor not to give her away. She never reports any broken rule, and she goes downtown whenever she feels inclined, and only once a month or so gets permission. I imagine that she goes for some reason instead of shopping, for she never has any bundles sent home. The worst thing, in my mind, was a couple of Sundays ago. She pretended to go to church with the rest of us, but she did not; she went off some place else and appeared again just as church was over. She went back to the college with the rest of us. I did ask her what she had been doing that time." "What did she say?" "Nothing very satisfactory. She wanted to know if I would like an outline of the sermon, and she proceeded to give me the text and some of the leading points. Of course, she heard all of the girls discussing it at the table, for it was the day that Dr. Hyde preached, and we were all intensely interested." "Where do you suppose she was?" It was Mary Sutherland who asked the question. "I really have not the faintest idea. I know, though, that she was some place where, of course, she could not have gotten permission to go, had she asked, for otherwise she would never have run the risk she ran. The faculty do not overlook that sort of thing readily." "She would certainly be suspended at the least." "Well, I cannot go and tell any one of the professors what she does, but I wish something would happen to make her more careful. I don't like to have the college girls talked about. I feel jealous of our good name." Beth looked perplexed and worried. All three of the girls knew that Margery Ainsworth had violated one of the strictest rules, and she could only have done it in order to achieve some end which the faculty would never have countenanced. It was not pleasant for Beth to room with a girl as utterly devoid of principle as Margery Ainsworth daily proved herself to be. It was inevitable that they should be thrown more or less together. Margery was no student at all, and she and Beth really had no ideas in common. "This is the second secret that has come our way this vacation," Dolly said. "Such secrets are not nice. I hope we shall not be compelled to hear any more. First, we learned more about our president's life than she would probably care to have us know, and now comes this, which is, of course, a thousand times worse. As far as I am concerned, I have no suggestions to offer." "As I understand the matter, you want her forced to obey the rules, but at the same time you are not going to tell any member of the faculty about her." "Of course I am not," Beth said indignantly. "That is simply out of the question." "And yet, for her own sake, it would be much better if the faculty knew something of her doings. She cannot go into town so often for any good purpose. She may be getting into mischief that she will repent all of her after-life." "Very true, still I can say nothing." "Will you let me see what I can do?" "That would be the same as doing it myself, Mary, and then trying to sneak out of a mean act by putting it on your shoulders." "If you are willing to trust me, I will not tell anything definite. I will not mention your name, or tell what Miss Ainsworth has done. I shall merely make sure that she will be so warned and hedged in hereafter, that she will not dare to break the rules again. And this ought to be done, Elizabeth, both for her own sake and the sake of the college." "My dear infant, do you suppose for a moment that you could make the indefinite statement which you propose, to any member of the faculty, and not have a full explanation demanded at once of everything that has been done?" "That would be true, usually, I know--" "But--" Beth's voice sounded a trifle impatient--"do you think you could manage the professors better than the rest of us?" "Not all of them," Mary returned serenely, "but I probably can Professor Newton, because, you see, she is my aunt." "What!" The amazement in her companions' voices made Mary leap back and burst into laughter. "It is true. She is Mother's sister. I really do not know why I told no one at first. I took a notion that I didn't want the girls to know, and Aunt Mary humored me. I am her namesake." "And that is where you have been evenings when I wondered so where you were," Dolly broke out a trifle incoherently. "Yes, I was up in her room. I can go there any time I wish. I thought that I would leave you and Beth an opportunity to talk and study in our sitting-room." "Professor Newton must have a high opinion of me," Dolly interjected discontentedly, "if she thinks that I drive you away." "You needn't worry about Aunt Mary. She knows how lovely you have been to an awkward, green girl from the western prairies, and she is very grateful. Now you see, don't you, that I can say just enough to her confidentially to warrant her in warning Miss Ainsworth that the faculty will expect different behavior from her in the future? That is all that will be necessary, I am sure, only, of course, she will be watched after this. I will not mention a single name, and I will not tell anything that she has done in the past. If she behaves herself after the warning, she will be all right. There will be no harm done, but lots of good will have been accomplished. If she doesn't choose to take heed--" "She will deserve to suffer the full consequences," declared Beth. "Yes, go ahead, that is the best plan. Truly, I am not thinking entirely of the college either, when I say it. While I care nothing, personally, for Margery Ainsworth, I do not want her to ruin her whole life by some piece of folly." The girls talked the subject over more fully, and the matter was finally left entirely in Mary's hands. A sudden recollection struck Dolly. "No wonder that you did not care to have me introduce you to Professor Newton that first evening; do you remember? And of course she had saved a place at her table purposely for you. Mary Sutherland, if I supposed you repeated to her all the nonsense that you have heard me talk about her, I should never let you return to college alive." Mary smiled, not very much overcome by the threat. "You always say nice things about her; now, if it had been Professor Arnold--you really don't like her at all." "Of course I don't. An angel from heaven couldn't suit Professor Arnold when it comes to a Latin translation. But just to think how I have gushed over Professor Newton. Mary Sutherland, have you ever told her the silly things I have said?" "You might know that I would not repeat anything that would displease Aunt Mary." Dolly looked at her sharply. "You are evading my questions, Mary Sutherland. I just know that you have told Professor Newton how I have gushed over her, and how deeply in love with her I am. Don't try to fool me. I will never, never tell anything to you again. Don't talk to me about unsophisticated girls from the country, they are deeper than any city girl I ever saw." And Dolly settled back in her seat with a look of vengeance in her eyes, that did not disturb Mary in the least. It was very true that Dolly had fallen deeply in love with Professor Newton, after the harmless fashion that students have. Her lessons for Professor Newton were faultlessly prepared, and while she was a good student in all her chosen studies, she absolutely shone in Professor Newton's classes. There was something very attractive about this teacher. She understood girls and knew how to deal with them. She had written a couple of textbooks herself, and it was generally understood among the students that she had supported herself when attending college. Yet she had not become hard or bitter. Her face was strong, but sweet, and her own experience made her very tender toward those girls who were trying to win an education against great odds. It was to this aunt that Mary Sutherland went, knowing that she could trust her implicitly to do the very best for all concerned. Beth knew that her room-mate was summoned to the president's room the following Wednesday, and that she came back looking very angry and half frightened as well. Evidently, whatever had been said to her was of such a nature that she did not suspect Beth in the least. In fact, the president (alluding, of course, to Professor Newton) had said that "one of the members of the faculty had told her that Miss Ainsworth was proving herself untrustworthy." Then there had followed a serious talk in which Margery said as little as she could. She surmised that she had probably been seen by some one of the professors on one of her many escapades; on which one it might have been, she had no means of knowing, and she was afraid of saying too much in extenuation or excuse, lest she might inadvertently admit some misdemeanor of which the president was ignorant up to this time. Therefore, she returned to her room both wrathful and alarmed. Beth reported later to Dolly, that her room-mate was doing more studying and paying more attention to the rules, than she ever had before. "Will it last, do you think?" queried Dolly anxiously. "I have my doubts. In my humble opinion, she is simply trying to throw them off their guard now, and to induce them to believe that she does not need watching. From several little things that have happened, however, I am perfectly positive that the faculty is keeping a very wide-awake eye on her. We have not many rules here, you know, but it goes hard with any girl who attempts to break those few." "Yes, the mere fact that we are on our honor to a great extent, ought to make the girls behave. I feel like being doubly careful." "My dear, you are hardly the same type of girl as Margery Ainsworth. She is the sort to take advantage of any privilege. She is so very quiet now, that I cannot help thinking there is some special reason why she is endeavoring to throw them off their guard before the Christmas holidays." "They are only a week distant. Remember that you are going to eat Christmas dinner with me, Beth. Mary will go, too, and Fred has invited Mr. Martin and Mr. Steele for the holidays, so that we shall have the same crowd we did at Thanksgiving time." "That will be jolly, but you must go home with me after Christmas. I don't pretend that you will have as good a time in Philadelphia with me, as I did at your home, but I want you to come. I asked Mary to go, too, because I knew she could not afford to go way out to her own home, but she said that she was to take a little trip with her aunt, and so I shall have you all to myself. I'm rather glad of it, to tell the truth." "Yet you like Mary?" "More than I ever imagined that I could. I am getting to know her better, for one thing. Of course, I shall never care for her as much as I do for you, but she is thoroughly genuine. There is nothing mean or underhanded about her." "No, there certainly is not, and hasn't she improved wonderfully in personal appearance since she came?" "You are responsible for that. Since she allows you to superintend her purchases, and tell her what colors to wear, she looks more like a girl, and less like a relic of some former geological era." "Poor child, she had no opportunity to learn on the farm, and very little money to spend for anything, I fancy." "All very true, and Professor Newton is a trump for giving her forlorn namesake this chance. Of course, she pays all Mary's expenses." "Yes, and Mary is going to be a credit in the end to all her relatives and friends. I wish I could say as much of your room-mate." "You can't. The most I dare hope in that direction is that Margaret will not do anything to make us ashamed of her." But the next week proved that this hope would not be realized. CHAPTER VII On Thursday the girls would leave for their Christmas vacation. Dolly, as well as Beth and Mary Sutherland, had passed their examinations in a very satisfactory manner, and could enjoy the holidays with clear consciences. The freshmen had been getting up a musical extravaganza under the energetic direction of their president. There was no denying the fact that Margaret Hamilton made a fine class president. She had insisted upon Dolly's having a prominent part. Margaret, herself, had a fine contralto voice, and by common vote, another of the principal parts was given to her. Beth had a minor part, and Mary appeared only in the choruses. A number of the other girls had remarkably fine voices, and all of the leading parts were well carried. The class president seemed unusually elated and happy. The entertainment would be given by the freshmen in the College Hall on Wednesday evening. The faculty was invited, of course, as well as the sophomores, juniors and seniors. It was the first entertainment that the freshmen had given, and everyone was eager to see what they could do. Professor Newton had been admitted to the last rehearsal, and she assured the girls that it was the best thing that she had ever seen done by any freshman class. "There wasn't a flaw in it. The idea is unique, the costuming fine and the solo work was absolutely superb. You must have worked hard. It will be something for all the classes to talk about for years to come. Just do as well as you did at this rehearsal, and you will find yourselves covered with glory, if you do not attempt anything else in your entire college course." "It is all due to our president," said one of the group who surrounded Professor Newton. "It was her idea in the first place; she adapted the extravaganza to our class, and it is she who has made us work so hard at it." "You have every reason to be proud of your work, Miss Hamilton," Professor Newton said cordially. "I am tremendously proud of the girls, Professor Newton. Of course, I could have done nothing at all if they had not been so willing." Just then the ringing of the gong summoned the majority of the girls to a recitation, and Margaret added in a lower tone, "I am only afraid of Ada Willing's last solo." "But why, Miss Hamilton? That is one of the best things in the entire entertainment. It is so full of good-natured hits at the other classes and the faculty. It is sheer, pure fun; everyone will enjoy it, and Miss Willing has a magnificent voice." "But it is so uncertain. That solo should be sung well, for it is the most unique thing that we have. Sometimes Miss Willing does it superbly, and sometimes she does it miserably. Once or twice she has actually forgotten the opening words, they are pure nonsense, you know, and not very easy to remember, if a person be nervous." "Don't worry about it," Professor Newton advised kindly. "I am sure you will come out all right this evening. You should rest the balance of the day." "I want to go out for a little while, Professor Newton; then I shall surely take your advice." Dolly and Beth had been almost the only ones who had heard this conversation. As the two walked down the corridor, Beth said thoughtfully: "I would be willing to wager a peanut that our president has gone out merely to walk up Murray's lane. She goes there every single day at this hour." "I don't believe it is for any wrong purpose, Beth. The lane is within the limits that we are allowed to go. Some way I have faith in Miss Hamilton." "I am not saying that I have not. But certainly she is secretive. Of course, that is no sin, as we decided long ago; at the same time one cannot help speculating about her, more or less." "I have watched her rather closely ever since Thanksgiving, and she really has never said a word in my hearing that was untrue or false. Last week, in Miss Dunbar's room, the subject of wealth and aristocracy came up in some way. Miss Hamilton was appealed to. I do not think you were present, but Miss Dunbar asked if Miss Hamilton did not consider good breeding and refinement inseparable from wealth and family position." "What a snob she is." "We all know that. I was rather curious to hear what our president would say. She did not say much. She is like Grant. She knows the wisdom of silence. She told Miss Dunbar that she did not agree with her at all. Then she made the first personal remark that I ever heard her make. She said that as far as she was concerned, she had no wealth, and while she was proud of her family, herself, she had no idea that Ward McAllister would ever have admitted them to his sacred list of four hundred." "Good for her. She told the truth, and yet the girls did not realize just how true it was, I presume. She has an air about her that seems to betoken wealth and distinction. How misleading appearances are." "Yes, aren't they? Well, the facts will be sure to come out some day, for this world is small, after all, and what we learned, others will be sure to learn, too. There is no harm at all in it, but Miss Dunbar and that set of girls who fawn so around her, would never speak to her again. You'll see." "I don't like to think that you are a true prophet, Dolly, for the sake of our sex. Why should we be more ungenerous to Margaret Hamilton than the Harvard boys are to Mr. Steele?" "There is no reason at all why we should be, and if the test ever comes, I, for one, shall stand by her." "And I, too," said Beth. "Though I hope the necessity will never arise." It did, however, and the two girls proved true to their promises. College Hall was crowded that evening. Friends from the town had been invited, and everyone was anxious to see what the freshmen class could do. Whispers of something a little beyond the ordinary had gotten out, and all were expectant. There was a spontaneous burst of applause when the curtain went up, and showed the picturesque setting of the first scene, representative of the grove in the college grounds. The girls were at their best, and everything went smoothly during the first three acts. The fourth act was the last, and the most difficult singing and acting came in it. All had gone perfectly so far, and the class president's face began to look serene and confident. Miss Willing's solo was near the end. There had been no flaw up to that point, but when it came time for her to break in with the merry, half-saucy characterization of the other classes, there was an ominous silence. Dolly and Beth, glancing at her, and recalling what Margaret Hamilton had said, realized that the girl's memory had failed her entirely, just through sheer nervousness. The president's face turned pale. She had so wished this to be a most notable success; it seemed imperative to her, for many reasons. She wished to please one most dear to her, and then, too, if she could win these laurels for her class, no matter what might happen in the future, the girls could not be utterly ungrateful to her. And now Ada Willing was turning her wonderful success in to a most disastrous defeat. It all meant so much to Margaret Hamilton. She recalled the words perfectly herself, and longed to take the solo into her own hands, but this was a soprano solo which she could not hope to compass with a contralto voice. She was tasting the full bitterness of defeat, when a voice broke out with the solo, clear, sweet, piquant--not Ada Willing's voice, but Beth's. And Beth put a verve and daring into the words which Miss Willing was perfectly incompetent to do. Verse after verse flowed on, smoothly, triumphantly. The whole hall was shaking with unrestrained laughter. The president's color came back to cheeks and lips. Beth had saved the day; she was doing better than Ada Willing could have done, for she was an inimitable actress, and in her song she rapidly personified sophomores, juniors and seniors, as well as professors, in a manner that was perfectly unmistakable. The applause was so generous and long-continued, that Beth was forced to repeat some portions several times. When the curtain went down shortly after that, for the last time, Beth was surrounded by rapturous classmates who were ready to fall on her neck or carry her around the grounds, for thus saving their reputation. "Come and meet my mother, will you not--you and Miss Alden?" Margaret Hamilton said after she had tried in a somewhat tremulous tone to thank Beth for her ready wit. "I would like to have you both meet her." "I did not know that she was here," Dolly said in surprise. "I thought your home was in the West." "We did live in Chicago until recently. Now we have no home exactly. Mother and I are all there are in the family, and she will board here in town so as to be near me. She might as well, there is no reason why we should be separated by several hundred miles now." With much silent bewilderment, Beth and Dolly followed Miss Hamilton to one corner of the room, where they found Mrs. Hamilton engaged in conversation with Professor Newton. "Thank you so much for looking after Mother a little, Professor Newton," Margaret said gratefully. "I was in such haste that I did not have time to introduce her to anyone else before our entertainment," and then she presented Beth and Dolly. The girls scrutinized her closely. She was dressed in black, but with a certain quiet style that convinced Dolly that Margaret had supervised the making of the gown. The face was not handsome, but it was good-natured, and denoted a large amount of practical common sense. The girls sat down on either side of her. They had their own reasons for wanting to know more of their class president's mother. She was evidently brimming over with pride and love for Margaret. In the course of their conversation it became very evident that she knew nothing of "society's small talk," or of the subjects that college girls often bring up naturally in connection with their studies. Nevertheless, she could talk well and interestingly on many commonplace themes, especially when her subject of conversation related more or less closely to her daughter. Her grammar was good, and her language quite as choice as one usually meets with in a casual acquaintance. Dolly and Beth, watching their classmate closely, noticed with secret relief that she introduced her mother to all the members of the faculty, as well as to Miss Dunbar and to the most exclusive girls of the class. She did it with a quiet, unassuming dignity which her two close critics could not but admire. The evening was over, the entertainment was universally conceded to have been the most unique and successful affair ever given by any freshman class, and even the seniors owned frankly that they would be compelled to look to their laurels next term, or they would be quite outdone by the insignificant freshies. Beth and Dolly had gone upstairs, the visitors had all departed, at least, so the girls thought. Dolly remembered a book which she needed from the library. They turned into the wing to get it, and Dolly ran on before to switch on the electric light which had just been turned off. Margaret's voice, low but penetrating, reached them distinctly. "I told several of the girls, Mother, that you were going to board in town so as to be near me." There was a startled exclamation from Mrs. Hamilton. "Indeed, Mother, I had to do it. Of course you want to see me, and I want to see you. If it is clearly known that you are boarding in town, I can readily get permission to go and see you as often as I have time. And you can come and see me every evening. As it is, I feel as if I were guilty all the time of doing something wrong." "You haven't broken a single rule, Margaret. I would be just as careful about that, as you would, yourself." "I know, but why should I sneak off up Murray's lane to meet my mother, and why should you have to go there every day through the woods, when one might just as well meet openly? It has often been almost impossible for me to get off alone at the time you go there. Believe me, Mother, my way is the best. I am not ashamed of you. I should not deserve any success in life if I were." "I know all that, Margaret; at the same time, would you have been elected class president or invited to your friend's house at Thanksgiving, if it were generally known that your mother had been a servant nearly all her life, and that your father had been merely a coachman? Of course, he had a good education, and if it had not been for that accident, we would have had our own little home. But when that happened, we just had to do the best we could, and he took a coachman's position with Mr. Worthington because that was the first thing that offered. And he kept it all his life. But would your fine friends feel the same toward you if they knew that?" "No, they would not, Mother," Margaret answered in a low and rather sad tone. "It hardly seems fair, does it? I know that many of them would never speak to me again. I do not consider my affairs any business of theirs, and I promise you not to volunteer any information. On the other hand, Mother, I cannot meet you secretly any more. If you are really afraid that someone will recognize you here, you can stay in the town as quietly as you wish. I know that you are ambitious for me, Mother, and I will do the very best I can for us both. I want to succeed, too. If I am absolutely cornered, I shall tell no lies, though. I have not done it so far, and I shall not hereafter. I suppose the truth may naturally be known some day, but I am not going to be ashamed of either of my parents, and you would be ashamed of me if I were, Mother." "Yes, I suppose I would, Margaret, but if you can only get your education, now that Mr. Worthington made it possible, I shall be willing to stand in the background for four years. You were slighted all through the public schools as soon as anyone knew that you were just the daughter of Mr. Worthington's housekeeper, and it would be worse here." "Well, never mind, Mother, if--" And there, to the girls' relief Mrs. Hamilton and her daughter passed out of hearing. "_She_ is true blue, no matter whether her blood is blue or not," said Dolly softly. "Confess now, Beth dear, that you are glad she is our president." "She makes a good one," Beth acknowledged, and then they separated, each going to her own room. A moment later, however, there was a quick tap at Dolly's door, and Beth's excited face appeared. "What do you think has happened, Dolly?" CHAPTER VIII "What is it, and has it anything to do with Mary? She isn't here, and I haven't the faintest idea where she is." "It has nothing to do with Mary, but I hope Mary may be able to explain to us. Professor Arnold is in our room, and Margery is packing up everything she owns. They are going to take the five o'clock train tomorrow morning for New York. You know Professor Arnold lives there, too. She called me into my room, and spoke to me privately. She asked if I would object to rooming with you tonight, as she would like to sleep in my room herself." "Just as if Margery were a prisoner and she the jailer," said Dolly, in an awe-struck tone. "That is just about the size of it, my dear. Of course, I said I was sure you would take me in. Evidently Margery tried to slip off tonight, thinking that amid all the excitement she would not be missed. I wonder what she did!" "And they go on the five o'clock train? No Latin for us then. Professor Arnold did not intend to go, I know, until Friday. We were to have all of our regular lessons tomorrow morning." "We had better get to bed, or someone will be after us, even if today is an exceptional time." "That's true, but where _is_ Mary?" "Here," answered Mary's own voice, as the sitting-room door opened. "Where have you been? Give an account of yourself." "I have been hearing the true story of Elizabeth's room-mate. I suppose you know by this time that she is to go home early tomorrow?" Both girls nodded. "After our entertainment I went upstairs to Aunt Mary's room. We were talking, when Professor Arnold came to the door. She called Aunt Mary into the hall, and stood there for some time. I could not help hearing a part of what was said, so, when aunty came back, she told me the full story, and said that I might tell you. We are not to repeat it to the other girls, but, of course, they will be told in chapel that Miss Ainsworth has been sent home." "Yes, well?" "It seems that Professor Graydon has noticed how very restless Margery has seemed this week. From several little things, she decided that Miss Ainsworth would try to slip away when we were all in the College Hall, and so she kept a careful watch on her. Patrick knew about it, too, and when he saw her slip out of the side gate and run off toward the city, he went after her. He met one of the maids and sent word back to Professor Graydon. Mrs. Carruther's carriage was at the college, and Professor Graydon got into it and soon overtook Patrick. He was standing outside a boarding-house on Summit Avenue, looking as perplexed as he well could look. He didn't like to go in and order Margery out; he had no right or business to do that, and, of course, it never would have done. So he just stood outside and wondered what was the right thing for him to do. I reckon" (Mary still lapsed into her favorite idioms at times) "that he was mighty glad when he saw Professor Graydon in the carriage. She rang the bell at once and asked for Miss Ainsworth. I imagine that there was a very stormy scene inside, but of course Professor Arnold was in too great a hurry to tell Aunt Mary all the details. Presently Professor Graydon came out with Margery and took her to the president's room. They managed to get the full story out of Margery at last. It seems that there is a young lady at the boarding-house, a Miss Lampton, very proud and flashy and fast; Margery knew her in New York, and the two became quite intimate before Margery's parents found out about it. The girl has been mixed up in several scandals. She went to Boston once in a smoking-car and smoked cigarettes all the way. You can imagine what sort of a girl she is from that." "I wouldn't want to imagine," broke in Dolly disgustedly. "How could Miss Ainsworth ever tolerate her?" "Birds of a feather," said Beth wisely. "But we must let Mary tell her story and then get to bed." "Yes, it is horribly late. Well, as soon as the Ainsworths found out the sort of girl she was, they tried to break off the intimacy, but Margery kept contriving to meet her places, and there was a brother who was just as bad--worse, in fact. So, finally, Margery was sent here to college to get her away from them. She was told not to correspond with either, but there is no surveillance on the letters here, and Margery corresponded all last year with them both, though her parents never knew it. This fall Miss Lampton decided to come here and board for a while. She had just gotten into a scrape that was a little worse than usual in New York, and I suppose she thought she had better go away till the talk blew over." "Has the girl no parents?" "No, only an aunt, who acts as sort of a figurehead, and who has no control over either Miss Lampton or her brother. So she came here to board last fall, and of course wrote to Miss Ainsworth as soon as she came. That is where Beth's room-mate has gone whenever she has disappeared in town." "That is certainly bad enough, but it is not as bad as I feared it might be." "You haven't heard the worst yet, Elizabeth. Every little while the brother came down, and at last he and Margery decided that they were in love with each other, and do you know that they had planned an elopement for this very night?" The girls gave a cry of horror. "Yes, that is absolutely true. If Elizabeth had not let me tell Aunt Mary, so that the faculty was on guard, you see what a dreadful thing would have happened. Now they have telegraphed to Mr. Ainsworth, and Professor Arnold will not leave Margery until she is safe with her father." "How dreadful it all is," and then, despite the lateness of the hour, the girls talked the matter over until there came a light tap at their door. Professor Arnold looked in. "We are not going to be very strict tonight with you freshmen, after you have just achieved such a triumph at your entertainment, but there is really reason in all things, and I advise you to have your light out and to be in bed within five minutes." "Yes'm," three voices responded meekly, and then there was hurried scrambling and the freshmen settled down for the night. The next afternoon saw the three girls at Dolly's home. The following day brought Fred and his two friends, and there was a lively time until Christmas. Christmas morning found them all down in the library, bright and early. The subject of Christmas gifts had troubled Dolly a little, because she feared lest Mary and Mr. Steele might feel that they had no part in the good times. "You see, mamma, that I want to give Mary something as nice as I do Beth, but I know that Mary has hardly any money to spend for presents, and I do not want her to feel mean or awkward about it. And then there is Mr. Steele; he certainly cannot afford to do much in that line, either, and yet, of course, we want to remember him. What shall we do?" "Just get what your good sense dictates, without thinking of their presents at all. You do not give for what will be given to you. You give for the pleasure of giving. Don't think of that phase of the question. As for Mr. Steele, I feel that we owe him more than we can ever repay." "How so, mamma?" "He has great influence over Fred, and he has certainly helped him to keep steady at college." "Oh, mamma, you do not mistrust Fred?" "I know how much Fred likes a good time, dear. Sometimes he takes it without thinking of consequences. I rather dreaded college for him; but he is growing much more independent and self-reliant." "Fred is a darling, and you know it, mamma." "Of course, but I can see his weaknesses, and so I am glad that he has taken a liking to Robert Steele. I intend to do my best to have this Christmas one that he will like to remember." There could be no doubt at all but that she succeeded. There was a load of pretty remembrances for everyone. Rob Steele had been bothered somewhat, too, over the question of gifts. Fortunately, while not an artist, he had some skill with brush and pencil, and after considerable cogitating, he devoted his few spare moments to painting some dainty marine views in water colors; he had these inexpensively framed, and told himself that he would not worry; he had done the best he could, though, of course, his trifles were not to be mentioned in the same breath as the elegant presents which Martin would buy. But on Christmas morning, Bob Steele found that his little gifts received much more attention than the handsome ones that Dick Martin had given. And even Mary Sutherland, with all her supersensitiveness, never thought of comparing the relative value of the inexpensive books she had given, with the very beautiful muff, handkerchiefs, ribbons and laces which she found in her Christmas corner. There were no heart-burnings and no jealousies. The only drawback to the day, as Fred declared, was the thought that the party would be partially broken up on the morrow. Dick Martin was going back to Boston. Mary would join her aunt at college for a little trip, and Dolly and Beth would leave for Philadelphia. Fred grumbled considerably at such a scattering of the congenial party, but there was no help for it. Rob Steele would stay with him until Harvard reopened, and Dolly and Beth might be able to stay over night on their way back to Westover. [Illustration: A moment later Dolly had been introduced to Beth's father] When Dolly found herself actually on the train next day, bound for Philadelphia, she wondered more and more to what kind of a home she was going. Beth grew more quiet and sedate as they neared the city, and the reserved, rather hard expression which she had partially lost of late, was intensified. As they entered the main gate at the Broad Street Station, a tall, handsome man took Beth's valise from her hand and bent to kiss her. A moment later Dolly had been introduced to Beth's father. A carriage was waiting for them outside the station, and as they drove to Beth's home, Dolly scrutinized Mr. Newby's features closely, trying hard to find therein the explanation of much that had mystified her in Beth. He was evidently a man of culture and brains. Dolly could not imagine him in a temper or exhibiting any lack of self-control. Why did he and Beth not chatter more familiarly, though? He was asking questions about the college in the same fashion that he might have asked them of Dolly herself, and Beth was replying in the same formal, courteous way. Even Mr. Newby's kiss of welcome at the station had seemed a perfunctory duty-kiss, not at all like the spontaneous ones given by Dolly's father. And Beth could chatter fast enough! Why wasn't she doing it now? Though, if Dolly had only known it, both Beth and her father were making a great effort to have the conversation lively and animated. Dolly had gained no light when they reached the pleasant suburban home where the Newbys lived. On the broad veranda she could see a lovely, gracious woman and three children. They must be Roy, Hugh and Nell, she knew. The carriage drove rapidly up the lawn along the smooth driveway. Mrs. Newby hastened to meet them. She kissed Beth a little wistfully, Dolly thought, and gave Dolly herself a very cordial, hearty welcome. The children were well-mannered and decidedly attractive. Dolly fancied that Roy did not look very strong. Mrs. Newby took them upstairs presently. She had given the girls adjoining rooms, and went in with them to see that everything was in perfect readiness. The house was roomy and delightful, and Dolly drew in a deep breath of surprise and enjoyment. "How nice your home is, Beth. You funny child, never to have told me anything about it." "I'm glad you like it. How about the people in it?" "How do I like them, do you mean? Why, I have hardly seen them yet, you know, but I think that you must feel proud of your father; and Mrs. Newby has one of the sweetest faces I ever saw. The children seem very nice, and you know how I love children." "Yes, I know--well, I am glad if you like us and our home." That was all Beth said. Dolly watched quietly and shrewdly. Something was ajar, and she longed to know if it were not something that could be adjusted. Whatever it was, it was spoiling Beth's life. But she could see nothing. Beth was as reserved as ever, even in her own home. Both of her parents seemed to treat her more as a guest than as a daughter of the house. Her wishes were consulted, and she was deferred to more as a stranger would be, Dolly thought, than as a daughter whose preferences they were supposed to know. Everyone was polite and courteous. It was not a household that would ever tolerate quarreling or strife. Yet there was something lacking. They all seemed anxious that Dolly should have a good time, and there were many pleasant little plans for her entertainment. Dolly grew to like them all, but she was especially fond of Mrs. Newby. She often wondered why Beth did not adore her stepmother, she was so gracious and kind, so just and generous. The vacation days passed all too rapidly for the girls. They would go back the next day, and Dolly was no nearer discovering the "rift within the lute" that served to make the music mute, than she had been on the day of her arrival. She concluded that she would never be any wiser, but that evening an incident happened that gave her a glimpse of Beth's hidden life. CHAPTER IX It was Nell's fourth birthday anniversary, and the child was to have a little party in the afternoon; in the evening Mrs. Newby had arranged for a small farewell party for Beth and Dolly. Both affairs would be more or less informal, but they would be none the less enjoyable for that reason. Nell was wild with delight. Fifteen of her small friends had been sent pretty invitations, and she told everyone of the wonderful birthday cake that Bridget had made, and that would have four little wax candles on it for her to blow out. "I don't like that part of the program myself," Mrs. Newby remarked in a low tone to the two girls. "I am always so afraid of some accident; but I really believe that Nell would feel she had not been given a party at all, if she did not have her birthday cake and her four candles." "Don't worry, Mrs. Newby," Dolly said comfortingly. "If you chance to be out of the room when the wonderful cake comes in, Beth and I will watch Nell carefully until the candles are extinguished." "Thank you, Dolly. I presume I am foolish, but such dreadful things do happen, you know." Dolly assented, and then in the bustle of preparations for the two parties, which unfortunately came on the same day, she forgot all about her promise. Afterward, she reproached herself bitterly for her neglect. The day was bright and sunny. The small folks had had a glorious time, and were now sitting around the table enjoying Nell's birthday feast. The sandwiches and other substantials had been passed, and Mrs. Newby had gone into the kitchen a moment to see about the ices. Dolly and Beth had been waiting on the little people and enjoying the fun as much as they. The butler brought in the grand birthday cake and put it in front of the small hostess. Then he, too, went into the kitchen. Nell looked at her cake for a few moments in silent rapture, enjoying the exclamations of admiration which she heard from all her little guests. Suddenly it seemed to her, that one of the candles leaned a little to one side. She stretched out her hand to straighten it. Instantly a flame leaped up from the thin white fabric of her sleeves. In a second it had sprung to her curls and the children were shrieking in horror and affright. In another second Beth had pulled the child from her chair, wrapped a rug around her, and crushed the flames from the pretty curls with her own unprotected hands. It was all over before Peter had reappeared with the ices, but the cries had reached Mrs. Newby, and with a dreadful premonition she had rushed to the dining-room with her husband, who had returned early from his office, in honor of Nell's birthday. As they entered, Beth was unwrapping the rug from Nell. The flames were extinguished and the child was safe, though the fright had completely unnerved her, and she was sobbing hysterically. Her dainty dress was burned, and her curls were singed in front, but that was the extent of the damage. Mrs. Newby caught her child to her arms in a gush of unspeakable thankfulness, while Dolly poured out her remorse and sorrow with a flood of tears. Mr. Newby stood by, looking more shaken than Dolly had ever believed possible for so self-contained a man. He questioned Dolly and Beth closely, and when the full particulars of the accident had been told, he put his arms around Beth and called her his "brave, sensible daughter;" but his voice trembled and Dolly was sure there were tears in his eyes. Peter waited on the little folks for the remainder of the meal, while Mrs. Newby carried Nell off to change her dress and to look after Beth's hands. They were badly burned; not seriously, however, and while Beth might suffer considerably from them for two or three weeks, there would probably be no permanent scars. Mr. Newby had insisted on summoning a physician at once, despite Beth's protests. Her hands had been dressed, and she had been told that she must consent to be waited upon for the next week or two like a baby. "But I must go back to college tomorrow, Doctor, that is a positive fact." Dr. Thornton looked rather grave. "If you are careless, Miss Newby, your hands will be permanently scarred. They should be dressed every day, and you should use them as little as possible." "I do not think that I can consent to your going, Beth," said her father gravely. "And I cannot consent to staying at home, Father," Beth returned decidedly. "Dr. Randolph, our college physician, will dress my hands for me every day. I promise to be very careful." "If you are willing to have her go," Dolly said anxiously, "I will do everything that I can for her during the next two or three weeks. I feel as if this were all my fault, anyway, for I had promised Mrs. Newby that I would look after the birthday cake. Then I was attending to something else when it came in and I forgot all about it. If it had not been for Beth--" She stopped shudderingly. "I know that you would do all you possibly could for Beth," Mr. Newby said slowly. "Still I do not feel that she ought to go." "I must, Father," and Beth turned away with an air of finality, as if the matter were settled once for all. Mr. Newby said nothing more at the moment, but he looked far from satisfied. He followed Beth from the room presently, leaving Dolly and his wife alone, for Baby Nell had fallen asleep and the tiny guests had all gone home. Mrs. Newby turned to Dolly with tears in her eyes. "Elizabeth has saved me from a lifetime of sorrow, but she will not even let me thank her. If she only loved me--" She broke off as if afraid to trust her voice. Dolly broke in impetuously: "I do not see how anyone can help loving you, Mrs. Newby." Mrs. Newby smiled rather sadly. "I cannot blame Beth at all, nor myself, either, for that matter. I believe I will tell you about it, Dolly, if you care to hear. I have never discussed the subject with anyone before, but Elizabeth's coldness and want of affection have been very hard to bear." "Yet you said that you did not blame her, Mrs. Newby?" Dolly said, a little wonderingly. "And I do not. It is rather strange that I should be mentioning this subject to you at all, when you are such a mere child yet; but you understand Elizabeth, and she seems more like a girl with you than I ever saw her before. I have tried to give her everything that I have fancied she wanted, but there were some things that I could not give her--that she would not let me give her. I do not know whether Elizabeth has ever talked to you about her own mother or not. She must have been a very beautiful woman; she and Elizabeth were passionately devoted to each other. They were always together, and I have been told by the old servants here in the family, that they seldom saw such absolute love as Elizabeth gave her mother. She deserved it, for she was an ideal mother in every respect." Mrs. Newby stopped and caught her breath. The hardest part of her story was still to be told. "She caught a cold the fall that Elizabeth was nine years old, and it developed into pneumonia. In a week she was dead. They feared at first that the child, too, would die; but her mother had had a long, loving talk with her after she knew that there was no hope of her recovery. Exactly what she said to Elizabeth, of course, no one ever knew, but her Christian faith was one of her most marked characteristics, and she must have succeeded in imparting it to her child in a very vivid manner, for while Elizabeth grieved intensely, her grief was more like one who sorrowed for a person gone on a long journey, than like one bereft by death. Of course, everything that her mother had said or done was sacred in her eyes. She did not like anyone to touch her room, her chair, or any of her belongings. That was all perfectly right and natural. And now, Dolly, comes the hard part of my story. I cannot tell it without seeming to censure my husband, and yet I presume that he thought he was doing all for the best. He and I have never discussed the subject since the first night when I came to this house. I learned the truth then, and I know that I spoke to him very bitterly and harshly. Since then the subject has not been mentioned between us; nevertheless, it has been a cloud on all our married life. I would not be telling you all this so frankly, Dolly, if I did not want you to understand Elizabeth fully, and to help her. She is honest as the day. I often feel hungry for her affection. I shall never be satisfied without it, but the manner in which I came here rendered it impossible for me to win her love." Mrs. Newby paused again, and Dolly waited in growing bewilderment. "The winter after Elizabeth's mother died, Mr. Newby went west on business. He met me there. He was lonesome, and we were congenial in many ways. He came west several times, and we became engaged. We were married quietly the next summer. There were no invitations because of my mother's recent death; we sent announcement cards, but that was all. Of course, I knew that John had been married before, and that he had a daughter. What I did not know was that his wife had been dead less than a year, and that Elizabeth knew nothing of his marriage. Dolly, I believe that many men are cowards in their own families. I cannot imagine why my husband acted as he did. I can see Elizabeth's startled, shocked face yet, as her father took me into the house and told her that he had brought her a new mother." "Hadn't the servants told her?" "They did not know of it either, Dolly, as I learned later. The child then was shocked and stunned. She said very little, but I heard her cry herself to sleep that night and countless nights afterward. A little tact would have saved all the trouble. If she had been told kindly and tenderly beforehand, that her father was lonely, and that he was going to bring me here--not to be a mother to Elizabeth--but to be a friend and helper to them both, there would have been no trouble. As it was, the child was too hurt ever to care for me. My chance of winning her affection had been lost. Had things been different, there would have been no trouble. Had she been old enough then to understand matters, I should have told her the truth. But she was too young then. Can you wonder, Dolly, that I felt bitter and heartsick that night? I spoke very angrily to John, and that did not mend matters in the least." Dolly slipped her hand into Mrs. Newby's. "I am so dreadfully sorry, for it all seems to me to have been so needless. I hardly see why Mr. Newby did not tell both you and Beth everything." "He was afraid to tell Elizabeth, my dear, for he felt at a disadvantage with her. He did not want to take the time and patience necessary to make her see the subject from his standpoint. In fact, he meant to have his own way, and he did not mean to run any chance of obstacles being placed in his path. He was afraid to tell me the truth for fear I would insist upon delaying our marriage, and I certainly should have done so. Had we waited a little, and had Elizabeth come to visit me first, my married life would have been a very different thing. John had his own way, but I think that he found that it hardly paid in the end. Selfishness does not pay in the long run, Dolly." "I wonder, Mrs. Newby, that you never explained things to Beth when she grew older." "As I said, Dolly, she was too young at first to tell her the facts of the case. She was merely hurt and heartbroken then. As she grew older and comprehended the situation better, she judged me more harshly. How could she believe I had married her father in less than a year from the time of her mother's death without knowing that fact, and how could she know, too, that I had supposed her to be a mere baby, not older than Nell, at most, whose love could be won after our marriage instead of before, as should have been the case with her? There has never been a time when I felt that I could tell her, and yet, in justice to myself, I wish that she knew." "Won't you tell her now, Mrs. Newby? I do wish you would." "It is too late," Mrs. Newby said despairingly. "One cannot alter the habits and feelings of years at a moment's notice." "But still--" "Never mind, Dolly, I understand now--for I was guilty of listening. I did it purposely, Mother--I couldn't help it. Will you forgive me? When I came back, you had commenced to talk to Dolly, and I heard my name. I stopped, for I wanted to hear what you were saying; it was a dreadful thing for me to do, of course, but I'm not a bit sorry. I am awfully stupid to have lived with you all these years, and yet to have supposed you were such a person as I have always pictured you in my thoughts. I wonder if you are going to forgive me at this late day--" And then Dolly slipped out of the room, glad to the inmost depths of her heart that things were getting "straightened out" as she phrased it. Mr. Newby had had two sensitive natures with which to deal in the days gone by, and he had not appreciated the fact in the least. One of the persons had been only a child, and he had not counted on her as being a definite influence at all. _There_ he had made a great mistake. Even after his marriage, however, if he could have had the courage to tell his story frankly to Beth, and confess his loneliness to her, she would have viewed the matter in a different light. Mrs. Newby knew that in his so doing, lay her only hope of winning the child's heart; but she was proud, too, and if he would not do this voluntarily, she would not beg him to do it. And so, during all these years, for lack of the word never spoken, she and Beth had missed the mutual love and helpfulness which they might have given each other, and which would have made their lives so much sweeter and brighter. Despite the accident of the afternoon, the evening party was a great success, and Beth, much to her open disgust, found herself regarded as something of a heroine. Once during the course of the evening, Mr. Newby heard Beth address his wife as "Mother." A new light had come into his eyes at the time, and a look of quiet determination. The look was still there when he sought his wife in the library after their young guests had gone. CHAPTER X She was putting the room in order, and he stepped to her side as she stood by the table. "Christine, are matters all right at last between you and Elizabeth?" "Yes, John, I think that they are." "It is all my fault that they have ever been any other way. I was selfish, at first, in my fear lest you would ask me to postpone our wedding day; then, afterward, when I saw what a grave mistake I had made, I was too cowardly to take the blame myself and explain matters to the child as I should have done. There was a sort of tacit deceit on my part, Christine, for which I have paid very bitterly. You have made our home beautiful, but, because of my folly, there has been that one jarring note in it." "It is all right now." "But no thanks to me. However, I am going to have a talk with Beth yet tonight. I shall not excuse myself; what is the worst thing in my own eyes, Christine, has been my cowardice in not facing the subject fairly long ago and telling Elizabeth that you were not in the least open to censure. The fault was all mine, but I have left you to bear the blame." This was so absolutely true that Mrs. Newby made no reply, but she looked at her husband with a very forgiving smile as she laid her hand on his. "You are an angel, Christine. Some women would never forgive me." She laughed a little tremulously. "I know better, my dear, than to expect perfection from a poor, frail man. I am not an angel myself, as you know very well." "I don't know it at all," he retorted, bending to kiss her. "I hear Elizabeth in the drawing-room. I shall see her before she goes upstairs. Christine, you are perfectly happy now?" "No," she replied promptly, and evidently to his surprise. "Then tell me the trouble at once." "I am worried about Roy. He is too young to be sent away to school. I presume it answers very well with some children, but he needs me." "But the public schools are so far away from us, dear, and I thought that he was hardly strong enough to stand the strain of the two sessions there. I did not know that you objected to his going. You said nothing, you know, to that effect." "You seemed so very sure that it was the right thing to do, and I did not know but it might turn out better than I feared. But he dreads the going back unspeakably. I found him crying about it last night, and I cannot consent to his return." "Then he certainly shall not go," Mr. Newby returned promptly. "But what do you propose to do with him?" "He can have some private lessons here at home. I shall see that he has enough to do, but not too much. Boys of that age need a mother, John." "I presume so," Mr. Newby returned ruefully. "So far as I can see, I have made a mess of about everything that I have attempted to manage." "Don't slander yourself; I would not let anyone else say that of you, most assuredly, and, besides, it is not true, John." "I am not at all sure of that, Christine." Then he kissed her again, and went in search of Beth, with whom he had a long talk, despite the fact that it was then after midnight. After all, Beth did not return with Dolly. Mrs. Newby frankly owned that she should feel very anxious if Beth went off to college before her hands had healed, and Beth found herself the next morning watching her stepmother unpack her trunk, while she herself was quite rejoiced over the fact that she should have another week or two at home. So Dolly went back alone. Beth came ten days later, and Dolly knew, from the expression of contentment and happiness on her face, that she was now enjoying the blessing which a real home and home-love can give. The term was a busy one for all the girls. They had come to college, for the most part, at least, because they were inspired by a genuine love for knowledge. They had their times of recreation, of course, and their merry evenings in Dolly's room when they again made fudge and tea. Nevertheless, there was plenty of good, hard work done, and the Easter holidays found them all ready for a brief rest again. Mary went home with Dolly, and Beth would stop for one night on her return to college; but now, strangely enough, as it seemed to Beth herself, she could scarcely wait to get home. Beth had roomed alone since Margery Ainsworth's expulsion, and while Dolly often longed to get permission to move her possessions across the hall, and become Beth's room-mate, she was too truly fond of Mary by this time, to wish to hurt her feelings. So, while the girls often wished that they could room together, it did not seem possible, for the freshmen year at least. As commencement time drew near, the other students began to make arrangements for the next year. Rooms and room-mates were chosen, and everything gotten into readiness for the ensuing term. Dolly and Beth were talking it over one day, rather lugubriously, in Beth's room. "All the other girls have settled their plans, and I have been hoping that Mary would say something to me. She must know that we want to room together. Of course, I like her, but not as much as I like you. I am going to speak to her today, Beth." "I really think that that is the only thing left to be done; but we don't want to hurt her feelings, Dolly." "I'll try not to do that, Beth, but we must settle affairs." However, Mary herself introduced the weighty topic that evening, when the three were making tea. "Of course, I know that you two girls want to room together next year, but I hope that you have not spoken for a room yet." Dolly flushed a little. "We would not be very apt to make any arrangements without telling you, Mary. You ought to know that we don't do underhanded things." "Why, Dolly, I didn't mean to hurt your feelings at all, but I supposed you would room together. That was settled long ago, wasn't it? But I have a little scheme, too, that I trust you will like." "Tell us about it," and Dolly looked a trifle ashamed of her unnecessary heat. "Aunt Mary has her bedroom and sitting-room, of course, to herself, but opening onto her sitting-room from the other side is a small storeroom. The president says that I may have that as a bedroom if I wish, and I can use Aunt Mary's sitting-room. They will fit it up this summer. The college needs more rooms, anyway. Now beyond my room are some lovely rooms for you girls, if you want them. What do you say? I don't want to be selfish, but it did seem to me that it might be a lovely plan." "Lovely? It is grand! Superb! You are a duck and a darling, Mary, to have thought of it." "Dolly thinks that she will be near Professor Newton now, and she would be willing to room on the roof to effect that," said Beth mischievously. But Dolly was too elated to mind Beth's teasing. "We'll make all sorts of pretty things this summer. By the way, Beth, where do you intend to spend the summer, anyway?" "Father says that Mother and I may decide that weighty matter. We have been in the habit of going to the seashore, but he fancies that some other place would be better for Roy, although the child is very much stronger since Mother has had him at home under her eye." "Then, Elizabeth Newby, I will tell you what to do. Mother writes that Father has taken the same cottage at the Thousand Isles that we had last year. You must come there, too. We can have an ideal time. Fred likes fishing and yachting. He will be away part of the summer, but will be with us at first, and a crowd of his friends, too. We can have glorious times! Hurrah!" "Hurrah!" echoed Beth, for the idea caught her fancy. "We shall certainly do it! Mother will agree to whatever I propose. I wish you were to be there, too, Mary." But Mary shook her head contentedly. "I know it is much more beautiful than our farm, but I don't believe that even a sight of the Alps would induce me to miss my visit home." "Of course not. But you see, fortunately, Dolly and I mean to take our families along. What a good time we shall have! I wonder if Professor Newton wouldn't like to make us a little visit? It is beautiful there, and the ride on the steamers, out and in among the islands on a moonlight night, is as lovely as anything in fairyland." "Go and ask her, Dolly, run right off! Someone else may get her promise first!" "Be still, Beth! Do you think that she would like to go, Mary?" "I should certainly suppose that she would be delighted. By the way, as we are only insignificant freshies still, and have no receptions or other grand functions on hand like the other classes, she wanted to know if we would spend Tuesday evening with her." "Will we? Of course we will! When did she ask us? Why didn't you tell us before?" "She gave me the message this afternoon, and you have really not given me a chance to tell it before." "What a libel. Say to her that we will go; no doubt of that, is there, Dolly? Let us put on our best gowns and do justice to the occasion. Is anyone else invited, Mary?" "We are to go immediately after dinner, and a couple of hours later, Miss Hamilton and some fifteen others will arrive. We must help entertain them. You know there is nothing special on hand for Tuesday evening." "We should go, anyway, no matter where else we were invited," declared Dolly with decision. "By the way, girls, the year is practically over, and our president still goes on her way serenely, and the very snobbiest girls in the class adore her." "I am glad. We don't want any class rows, and you know very well how Abby Dunbar and Helen Raymond would act, if they knew the truth. Though, after all, I cannot see what difference it makes." "Where is she going this summer? Do either of you know?" "I asked her yesterday. She is going home for three or four weeks with Abby Dunbar. After that, she and her mother are going to some quiet country place." Beth gave a sudden laugh. "You know, Mrs. Hamilton never comes to the college, but Margaret goes to see her almost daily. Abby Dunbar must have seen her on the evening of our entertainment, for she told me that she admired Mrs. Hamilton _so_ much; it was such a pity that she was an invalid! Margaret has never said that she was an invalid, you know. I suppose Abby just concluded that she must be, because she leads such a quiet life." "She does it entirely for Margaret's sake, I'm sure. Not that Margaret asks her to do it, but she fears to meet people who knew her when she was a servant. Abby approves of her, because she dresses well, and is at the most aristocratic boarding-place in Westover." "There is just one thing that I should not do, were I Margaret," said Beth slowly. "Knowing Abby Dunbar as well as she does, she must be confident that Abby would not take her home, did she know that both of Margaret's parents had been servants the greater part of their lives. Knowing that, I think that Margaret does wrong to go." "Isn't that a matter of standpoints? Margaret may reason that _she_ is the one invited, and that who or what her parents were, need not concern any person save herself. She would not deny the truth if questioned, but she sees no use in advertising it. I must say," concluded Mary, energetically, "that I agree with her." "Well, in her place, my dear, I should accept no invitations except such as I were sure would be given, even if all the facts were known." "I hope they will not be known for the next three years, at least. By the way, do you both thoroughly realize that when we return this fall, we shall not be insignificant freshmen, but lofty sophomores? That we shall not be lonely and homesick and have no one to whom to talk, and that we can haze the newcomers?" The girls laughed. "What bliss awaits us! By the way, Dolly, you must be our president next year." "I don't know," began Dolly, but Beth broke in; "No, she can't be. Don't look so surprised; I am wiser now than formerly, and I want Dolly to be president in our senior year. I find that it is an unwritten law that the same person cannot be president during two years. It seems to be the opinion that there is plenty of good material for officers in the class, and that it would be piggish for one person to be president twice. It doesn't make any difference about the other officers, for they are not so important. I am glad, now, that Margaret Hamilton was elected last fall." "And I am glad that you confess it at last, Beth. Listen a moment! Let us go and see what all that hubbub in the hall means. Even for the last week of college, it seems to me there is a dreadful amount of noise." "There certainly is, and it behooves us to investigate." A louder scream from the hallway made the girls rush out unceremoniously. CHAPTER XI At the farther end of the corridor, a crowd had gathered, and the three girls hurrying there, found that the commotion issued from Charlotte Graves's room. Charlotte was explaining; "It was my exasperating lamp. It has always been wobbly, and tonight, when I chanced to hit the table, it went over. I might have known enough to pull a blanket off the bed, and smother it; but, of course, I just stood here and screamed. Then Margaret Hamilton came in and put it out. That's what it is to have presence of mind! I always was a fool when there was anything to be done. I tell you what, Miss Hamilton, those freshmen knew what they were doing when they elected you class president. If I'm not brilliant myself, I can recognize a good thing when I see it." "Miss Graves, I tell you what you must do in sheer gratitude to the freshmen--invite us all in and get out those delicious cakes and pickles of yours. You ought to treat." "That is certainly so, come along, all of you. Sit on the floor if you can't find any other place to sit," and after the girls had properly bestowed themselves, she got out her jars and boxes, for Charlotte was fond of good things and always kept an unlimited supply on hand. "I trust you understand," she said severely, "that the rest of you freshmen are only here out of compliment to your president. I don't for a moment consider the rest of you her equal in anything. As she has the misfortune, however, to belong to the class of '09 instead of '08, we must put up with the rest of you, I suppose, for her sake." There was a chorus of groans from the freshmen, and Charlotte's voice was drowned in an outburst of animated retorts. Under cover of the fun, Abby Dunbar said to Dolly, who chanced to be sitting next to her on the window ledge; "One can see that Margaret is a true aristocrat. It shows in every move she makes, and every word she says." "Do you think so?" "Why, yes, indeed. Surely you have noticed it? Mamma is always so careful about my associates, but she cannot help being perfectly delighted with Margaret. Don't you like her?" "I certainly do." "I thought you must, for you were so good last fall at the time of our class elections. Margaret has made an ideal president." Then the conversation became general again, much to Dolly's relief. In some way the subject branched off to military men, and Margaret was appealed to. "Were any of your relatives army men, Miss Hamilton? And don't you think that they are the finest men in the world?" "I have not been blessed with many relations, Miss Fox, and so I have not had the chance to have military men in my own family and to know them intimately, as some of you have done. Of course, I admire them. Some of my ancestors were in the wars of 1776 and 1812, but I never saw them. My own father was anxious to be a military man and he entered West Point. He had a splendid record there, and was in love with the life, when he met with an accident out yachting that ruined his health, left him a trifle lame, and forced him to give up all thoughts of a military life. He never got over the disappointment." There was a general expression of sympathy, and Margaret found herself the target for more questions than she cared to answer. In such a babel of voices, however, it was easy to disregard any which she did not choose to hear, so that she extricated herself serenely from a position which Dolly knew to be rather trying. It was late, and as Charlotte's cakes and pickles had been demolished, the girls separated presently. "You think that Margaret's story was quite true?" Beth asked as they slowly paced the corridor on the way back to their rooms. "I'm sure of it. Of course, her ancestors may have been privates in the wars of 1776 and 1812, but still they would have been soldiers all the same." "But about her father?" "I imagine that he won his West Point cadetship by a competitive examination. You know those appointments are given in that way. He may have been very poor, indeed, but if he stood highest in the examination, he would certainly receive the appointment. When he left West Point he evidently had no friends to help him to a good position, and so he took the first honest work that he could find, at least, I imagine that such was the case." "You are about right, I'm sure. Poor Margaret. I don't know why I pity her, though. She seems quite capable of holding her own. She is worth a score of Abby Dunbars." "Miss Dunbar will either be a freshman next year, again, or else become a special student. I understand that the stupid ones who fail in their examinations, usually linger on for a year or two as 'specials,' so that they can say they have been at Westover." "And Miss Dunbar has failed?" "Flatly." "I'm glad that we got through, Beth, and Mary is all right, too. I was rather worried about Mary's mathematics, to tell the truth, but her aunt gave her some coaching at the last. She is so thankful that she will not have to take them next year." "And I like mathematics better than anything else. I shall take an extra course in it." "You will be sure to win the senior prize for that branch, Beth. I am a little like Mary, however. I shall not take more mathematics than I absolutely must." "We'll not take mathematics, or anything else, for three blessed months." "We shall have jolly times, my dear, see if we don't." And they certainly did. In Dolly's eyes, at least, the evening spent in Professor Newton's room was more important than the commencement exercises themselves. Professor Newton had taken a quiet moment to thank Dolly for her real kindness to Mary during the year, and Dolly thereupon had summoned courage to beg Professor Newton to visit her during the summer at the Thousand Isles. The invitation had been accepted, and Dolly felt that her cup of happiness was running over. Mrs. Newby was very glad to accede to Beth's wishes for the summer; and the girls had a delightful time, for Mr. Newby was fortunate enough to secure the cottage adjoining the one which Dolly's father had taken. Fred brought a crowd of college chums again, and there was plenty of yachting and fishing. In the evenings there were lovely rows on the St. Lawrence, and music and singing. The girls were provided with kodak cameras, and every week they sent a group of pictures to Mary. She had started for her home on the day that college closed, but she wrote regularly, and her letters, which seemed at first quite stiff and formal, grew toward the end of the vacation to be as chatty and bright as those sent her by Beth and Dolly. Professor Newton's visit had been postponed until the last fortnight, and when she came, she found a comparatively small crowd at the Alden cottage. All of Fred's former visitors had left, but Dick Martin and Bob Steele had come down for the last part of the vacation. The former had spent his time in the woods of Maine, while Robert Steele had been doing hard work in a law office in Boston; for he had fully made up his mind that he would be a lawyer. He would have a hard time, but he was becoming accustomed to hard times, and his innate grit and indomitable pluck would doubtless carry him triumphantly through. Roy had grown brown and healthy during the summer outing, and Mrs. Newby declared every day, that she was under infinite obligations to Dolly for suggesting their coming to the place. Beth and her stepmother had grown to know each other well, and Beth was devoted to Mrs. Newby. It seemed as if she were anxious to make up in some way, for those miserable years that were lost to them through a wretched misunderstanding. Mr. Newby seemed younger and brighter than Beth had ever known him before. While he said but little, his wife realized that he, too, had paid a heavy penalty during those years, and that now he was rejoicing in the real family love and good fellowship that pervaded his home. Professor Newton looked at them all with interested eyes. It seemed strange enough to her that Robert Steele, whose history she knew, should find Beth so congenial. While there was plenty of depth to Beth, she usually showed strangers only the froth and sparkle of her character. However, the two seemed to understand each well, and to be the best of friends. One day Professor Newton heard Mr. Newby suggesting that Rob spend the next summer in Philadelphia and read law in his office. Naturally enough, the young man grasped the opportunity eagerly. It was a chance which many young men of wealth and social position coveted, and it had come to him unsolicited. Professor Newton could not help wondering if Mr. Newby quite realized what he was doing, but she had no right to interfere, and she was not even sure that she would have interfered if she had had the right. Despite the happy summer-time, the girls were not sorry to return to college. They were sophomores now, and could afford to look down on the green freshmen who seemed so forlorn and lonesome. Beth and Dolly fixed up their rooms in a gorgeous and artistic manner. Dolly's chafing-dish still held a conspicuous place. Beth had one, too, this year, and their room bade fair to be one of the most popular in the building. Mary was next door, and just beyond was Professor Newton's sitting-room; for the girls had been able to carry out the plan that Mary had proposed at the close of the freshmen year. Margaret Hamilton looked into their room as they were giving the finishing touches. "May I come in, or are you too busy to talk?" "As if we were ever too busy to talk to our president," said Dolly promptly, pushing her guest down into an easy chair. "I shall not be president after this week, you know, and that is what brought me here. Who is your candidate for the place?" "Not Dolly," said Beth promptly. "I have set my heart on her being president during our senior year." Margaret's brow cleared. "She would make a capital president for our last year, and I pledge myself to work for her. Now, as she is out of the question, for the present, I want to tell you that my candidate is Elizabeth Newby." "How perfectly absurd!" That was Beth's exclamation, of course. "It is not absurd, and I want you, please, to listen to me. She can be elected, for the girls have not forgotten how grateful they were to her for saving our reputation at the entertainment last fall. There is no other strong candidate. Of course, ever so many names will be proposed in as large a class as ours, but the only one who will carry many votes is Hazel Fox." "Hazel Fox!" the girls both exclaimed aghast. "Yes, and you see what I mean. She is not the person for the place. We could not feel proud of her in any way. She barely escaped conditions this year, and I don't suppose she will ever get through the sophomore year with a clean record. The class is so grateful to Elizabeth, that she could be elected almost unanimously. What do you say?" "Never mind what Beth says, I say that it is a 'go.' I'll work for her with all my might and main. I'm sure she will be elected! Of course, you will be made chairman of the executive committee." This was a position which the classes had uniformly given the retiring president. "I do not know. The girls may want someone else elected." And Dolly told herself that Margaret never felt sure of her hold on her classmates. She felt that Margaret would feel more secure if every bit of her history were known; probably, too, she would be happier. They talked over the coming elections at some length, and had just decided upon the list of candidates whom they would favor when Mary entered. The news was told to her, and she endorsed Beth's candidacy very heartily, despite the fact that Beth herself persisted in regarding the whole matter as a huge joke. It was impossible, seemingly, for Beth to realize that she was actually popular with the girls, that her many little deeds of quiet kindness, and her bright ways, had won her a warm corner in every heart. The matter was talked over again after Mary's entrance, and then Mary announced a bit of news herself. "We have an addition to our class. Did you know it? Miss Van Gerder was a freshman two years ago, and was a fine student, I believe; but she was not here last year because her mother's health was poor, and they went to Europe. We shall have one of the largest sophomore classes ever enrolled here. I am glad that she is to be one of us, aren't you?" "Do you know her first name and in what city she lives?" Margaret asked, ignoring Mary's question. "She lives in New York, and her first name is Constance." Something in Margaret Hamilton's tone had caused all three of the girls to look at her intently. There was no disguising the fact that she was startled and dismayed. All of them realized that Miss Van Gerder must have known Margaret in the old days in Chicago, and all three felt sorry for her now. Her position was not enviable. She showed little of what she felt, however, and soon after returned to her own room. Dolly and Beth were passing along the lower corridor to the dining-room that evening, when they heard someone exclaim; "Why, Margaret, how glad I am to see you! I did not know what had become of you after you left Chicago!" The speaker was a tall, stylish girl, whom they knew to be Miss Van Gerder. At least, she appeared to like Margaret, and Dolly saw Abby Dunbar's eyes sparkle at this unmistakable proof of her friend's "aristocracy," for Constance Van Gerder was the daughter of one of the richest men in the country, and neither Miss Dunbar, nor anyone else at the college could claim the wealth or social distinction of the Van Gerders. Her face was not handsome, but Dolly liked it; it was fine and clear-cut. A face that was too noble for petty motives or mean ambitions. Margaret had no time to say more than a few words in reply, when the second gong hurried them to the dining-room. Dolly tried to gain Miss Van Gerder's side and sit beside her at the table, for as yet the permanent places had not been assigned, and the students took whatever seats they wished. Dolly found herself foiled, however, in this attempt, by Abby Dunbar, who had evidently determined to make the most of the opportunity, and who kept beside her new classmate until they took their seats at table. Beth and Dolly were opposite them, but Margaret was at another table at the far end of the room. "Miss Van Gerder looks kind," whispered Beth to Dolly. "If we only sat next to her, so as to prevent her saying anything during this meal, there would be no further danger. After dinner I shall carry her off to our room and tell her the whole story. Oh, yes! you needn't look so surprised. I'm not acquainted with her, but I shall do it anyway. You must mount guard outside, during the scene, and not let anyone else come in." "If only she does not say something, all unconsciously, during the dinner! I feel on pins and needles myself. What must Margaret feel?" CHAPTER XII "Margaret has pluck and pride. She will hold her head as high as ever, no matter what Miss Van Gerder may choose to say, and if there be any snubbing to be done, she will do it as effectually as Abby Dunbar." "Very true, but to think that the two are rooming together!" "Yes, I confess that, in my opinion, Margaret made a mistake there. I should not have accepted any favors or any invitations from that girl had I been Margaret, but that is her affair, after all." "Look! Look quickly, at Abby Dunbar's face," whispered Dolly excitedly. "The murder is out! I would give a dime to hear what she is saying. There! Miss Van Gerder realizes that she has said something she will regret. I suppose Abby was pumping in the very persistent way she has, and Miss Van Gerder merely answered her questions. Oh, how could she have been so thoughtless, though? She might have known that Westover is one of the snobbiest colleges in the world." "There is no use trying to head her off now," Beth declared disconsolately. "Still, I mean to have my talk with her anyway. If it be possible to repair the mischief, she will do it. Miss Dunbar is glaring at Margaret as if she would like to murder her!" "Do you suppose that she remembers all the speeches she has made about Margaret's aristocratic bearing? If she acts as contemptibly as I expect she will, I shall repeat some of those speeches for her benefit. I've been treasuring them in my memory." "I wish this meal would come to an end." To the two impatient girls, anxious to find out just what Miss Van Gerder had said, and what she would do in amends, dinner seemed a most interminable meal. It came to an end at last, however, and Beth, with her usual directness, walked at once to Miss Van Gerder. "Will you please come to my room a few moments? I wish very particularly to see you. I am Elizabeth Newby, and I am very fond of Margaret Hamilton," and Beth was speaking the truth when she made that assertion, for she had come to like Margaret as she had not expected that she ever would. Miss Van Gerder rose instantly, despite Abby Dunbar's exclamation of annoyance. She had not been able to hear what Beth said, but she was not at all ready to resign her claim on the new arrival. "Please don't go, Miss Newby. Miss Van Gerder has just been telling me the most awful thing about Margaret Hamilton, and to think I begged her to room with me, and took her home with me this summer, and that we made her class president, it is too awful--and--" Miss Van Gerder paused a moment, a rather dangerous light in her eyes. "I shall be glad if I can persuade you to relinquish your claims on Margaret, for I want her as a room-mate myself." Then she passed on. Beth squeezed her arm ecstatically, regardless of the fact that they had never been even introduced. "You are a darling, but, oh, what possessed you to tell that girl anything about Margaret?" "How do you know I did? Oh, I suppose you were watching us. I noticed your eyes on us all through the meal. How do you happen to know anything more about Margaret than her room-mate?" "That is what I want to tell you. Will you come in, please? This is my room. Let me introduce you to two more of your classmates--my room-mate, Miss Alden, and Miss Sutherland, our star student in biology. No, don't go, girls." "I thought that I was to keep intruders out." "We will just lock the doors, and pay no attention to any knocks. Now, Miss Van Gerder, if you please, we will tell you first, what we know about Margaret and how we learned it; we are the only ones in the college who do know anything more than she has seen fit to tell. But don't imagine that she has said that she was anything that she really wasn't." "I am glad of that, now tell me your story." So Beth told it, with various interpolations by Dolly and Mary; she repeated both Rob Steele's story and the conversation which she and Dolly had chanced to overhear on the night of the freshman entertainment. [Illustration: "Let me introduce you to two more of your classmates."] Miss Van Gerder drew a deep breath. "I shall never forgive myself for the mischief I have done, but I will do my best to repair it. Let me tell you what I know of Margaret's family. In the first place, Mr. Worthington was my great-uncle, and I visited at his Chicago home very often, so that is the way I came to know Margaret. I never saw very much of her, for she was in school or busy helping her mother, and, of course, I was going to teas and receptions, and such things, when I was there, although I wasn't much more than a child. Mrs. Hamilton was uncle's housekeeper for years, and after his wife died, he depended on her entirely for things not often entrusted to a servant. He had no children. Mrs. Hamilton was a farmer's daughter; she is a good, sensible, honest woman. She has always been very ambitious for Margaret, and that is not strange, for Margaret has a fine intellect. She inherits it from her father. He was a farmer's boy and came from the same locality as Mrs. Hamilton. They knew each other as children, and went to the same district school. There Mrs. Hamilton's education stopped. Mr. Hamilton, however, had made up his mind, as a boy, to go to West Point. He had no political influence to help him, so he studied with all his energy and might. He finally went to the city, obtained employment at a boarding-house to do work out of schooltime, and so he managed to gain a thorough foundation. He knew that his only chance of getting to West Point at all, lay in his ability to outdistance other boys in a competitive examination. So I suppose no boy ever studied harder than did he." She stopped a moment to look at the interested faces of her auditors. "His chance finally came and he was ready for it. A congressional appointment was offered the boy who stood highest. Mr. Hamilton won it. He went to West Point, and for nearly three years he did fine work. While he was there, his father died. His mother had died long before. His father was ill for months before his death, and Mr. Hamilton sent home every cent that he could spare. At Easter time in his third year he was invited, with some other West Pointers, to spend the day with an acquaintance up the Hudson. They got permission and went. I do not know who their host was, but he was not a West Pointer. During the afternoon he took the cadets out in a sailboat. I presume he knew enough of boats ordinarily, but he was drunk that day; he would not let any of the other young men take charge, and so, when a little gust of wind came up, the boat went over. The others escaped with a ducking--even the drunken fellow who was solely responsible for the accident; but Mr. Hamilton struck on a rock, on the boat, or on something--no one ever knew just how it happened; anyway, the boys had hard work saving him, though he was a fine swimmer. When they pulled him into the boat, he was insensible. For weeks they thought that he would not recover, and when he did get well, it was only to learn that he must resign his cadetship. There had been an accident to his spine which rendered him totally unfit for a cadet's life." "How horribly, horribly sad." "It was sad, and he wished thousands of times that his companions had let him drown. He would not give up hope until he had spent every cent of money he possessed in consulting specialists. But they could do nothing for him. He drifted to Chicago, perfectly unfit for any heavy work. He tried several things and had to give them up. Then uncle chanced to advertise for a coachman. Mr. Hamilton answered the advertisement, told uncle his story, and stayed with him from that time until his death about six years ago." "And Mrs. Hamilton?" "He had very few friends, and all the time that he was at West Point he had corresponded with Mrs. Hamilton. They had always been good friends; she must have been very pretty as a girl. When uncle heard that they were to be married, he fitted up a tiny coachman's house in the rear of his grounds. He liked them both very much. Afterward, he induced Mrs. Hamilton to come up to the house and act as his housekeeper. He came to depend upon her more and more." "But where do you suppose their money came from?" "Uncle left Mrs. Hamilton seven thousand dollars. He knew that Margaret wished to fit herself for a teacher in the higher grades, and he always meant to help her through college. The money was intended partly for that purpose, I am sure. Margaret probably refused to come unless her mother would stop working. After she has graduated here, she can easily secure a position, and support them both. They will have plenty of money to last until then, for Mrs. Hamilton must have saved considerable, too. Uncle paid her generously." "I think that your story of her father is very sad. With his education it does seem as if he could have secured some clerical work or some position in a bank." "There are eight hundred applicants for every such place; besides, Mr. Hamilton could not sit in a cramped position, writing; he had to have a certain amount of outdoor life, though he could not walk far. Really, his work at my uncle's, suited his health admirably, though it was hard for him to take a servant's position; there is no doubt of that. Uncle was kind to him, and made the position as easy as possible, still there was no denying the fact that he was a coachman. One day a young man came to visit uncle while I was there. It turned out that he had been at West Point while Mr. Hamilton was a cadet. Margaret's father felt horribly disgraced, though there was no reason why he should. He had to meet Lieutenant Maynard, and it hurt his pride fearfully to act the part of a servant toward his former classmate. He always felt rebellious and bitter. He wasn't big enough to realize that 'a man's a man for a' that.' I suppose it is hard to keep that fact in mind under all circumstances, and I have no business to be preaching, for I would probably feel more bitter than did he, if I should ever be similarly placed. As long as his own ambitions had been defeated, he became ambitious for Margaret. She was to have a fine education, and to be a professor in some college. She had a few school friends, but not many intimates. Her mother felt that she was slighted at school." "And yet," Beth could not resist saying reproachfully, "you have made it even worse for her here." "Yes, but you must believe that I did it all unwittingly. I never gave a thought to what I was saying. I shall never forgive myself for my carelessness. It came about naturally enough, though. Miss Dunbar seemed intensely interested in Margaret, and kept asking questions until I was rather out of patience, particularly as I was trying to listen to a story which Professor Newton was telling. She wanted to know where I had met Margaret and if I knew her very well. I said that I met her at my uncle's home in Chicago. Was Margaret visiting there? No, she lived there. Oh, then she was some relative of my uncle's? And I carelessly said no, that her mother had charge of uncle's house. I should have thought twice before speaking, if I had not been giving my main attention to Professor Newton. As soon as I had made the remark, there seemed to be a volcanic eruption at my side, and I thought that Miss Dunbar would have hysterics on the spot. She said that she regretted the fact that Margaret was her room-mate; that she was not accustomed to rooming with servants, and, of course, she will be awfully disagreeable to her. I took a double room, but I intended to be alone. Now, however, I shall ask one of the professors to allow Margaret to come in with me. The sooner that is done, the better for all concerned. I wonder to whom I had better go?" "Go to Professor Newton," said Dolly promptly, "and take Miss Sutherland with you. She is Professor Newton's niece, and can help you out, if you need any assistance, but I do not suppose you will." "Thanks for the suggestion. I shall get the permission first, but possibly Margaret will not care to room with me after the hornet's nest I have raised. I wonder, Miss Alden, if you would ask her to come here while Miss Sutherland and I are interviewing Professor Newton?" "I shall be very glad to do so. It will be much better to have your talk here, than in her room, where Abby Dunbar would be liable to interrupt you at any moment. And, Miss Van Gerder, do not feel too conscience-stricken over your inadvertence. For my part, I believe that Margaret will be glad, after the first fuss is over. No one, then, can accuse her of sailing under false colors. Everything will be perfectly open and aboveboard." "It is good of you to say so, but I am sure that your room-mate does not hold that opinion. At least, I made no mention of her father. I presume that would be a still harder thing for Miss Dunbar to overlook." "I think," said Dolly persistently, "that it would have been better for all concerned, if you had said that Mr. Hamilton was your uncle's coachman. Then everything would have been told at once, and Margaret would have no future disclosures to dread." "I think I was sufficiently stupid as it was;" and then Mary and Miss Van Gerder went off to see Professor Newton, while Dolly went in search of Miss Hamilton. She did not fancy the errand much, for she had a premonition that Miss Dunbar might also be in the room, and that a scene would be inevitable. And she was not wrong. CHAPTER XIII As she drew near Margaret's room, she caught the sound of excited voices. Abby Dunbar's tones reached her, high-pitched and shrill. "You have been a fraud, nothing but a fraud, from beginning to end. You have imposed upon us all. There is no use trying to carry it off with such a high hand! You led us all to suppose that your people were respectable, and so we took you in, and now it seems that your mother was nothing but a servant, and--" "And perhaps you would also like to know (as you evidently are not aware of the fact as yet), that my father was a coachman. I am exceedingly proud of them both, and--" "I don't see how you dare to stand there and face us! Let me tell you one thing, though--" Dolly ran hastily down the hall. She could stand it no longer. Her indignation burned hotly for Margaret. Why were girls so much narrower than boys? Rob Steele had been a coachman and errand-boy, and even a bootblack. He did not hesitate to say so; and yet, with possibly a very few exceptions, none of the students at Harvard treated him with any the less respect for it. But Margaret-- Dolly paused in the doorway, almost breathless. "Oh, Margaret, we are going to have a little impromptu tea in my room--Miss Van Gerder, and a couple of others. I have been sent for you. Please come!" "You do not know that you are inviting the daughter of a coachman and a housekeeper, Miss Alden. It is time for people to know exactly who and what our class president is. She has been sailing under false colors long enough." Margaret stood pale and cold during this tirade. The room was full of sophomores--Abby Dunbar's sympathizers, as was very evident. "Oh, yes," said Dolly carelessly, "of course I've known all about Miss Hamilton's parents since early in our freshman year, but I didn't see what difference it made. Are you going to ask us all to write out our ancestral history for your benefit? I'm afraid that we are too good republicans here to do that for you. By the way, Margaret, Miss Van Gerder is going to beg permission of Professor Newton for you to room with her. In fact, she has gone to her now, and she wants to coax you into the plan." Dolly threw this little bombshell with secret glee. If Miss Van Gerder intended taking Margaret up, how could these girls, with not a tithe of her wealth or standing, urge their petty reasons for snubbing Margaret? She carried her off before there was time for further controversy. There should be no more ill words said than she could help. It is hard to unsay harsh things. It is much better to prevent their being uttered at all. There would doubtless be enough said at best, but Dolly felt that her prompt action had probably prevented a few bitter flings anyway. At the door of her room Margaret detained her. Dolly had chattered all of the way down the hall. Margaret had not uttered a word. Now she looked steadily at Dolly. "Are you not laboring under some delusion or excitement? I had better give you the details of our family history before I go in." "Nonsense! I have known your history, as I said, since the Christmas holidays. What does it matter? Come in, and Beth shall make tea for us." "But do tell me how you knew." "I will tell you everything, only come in," and Dolly gave her a good-natured push into the room where the others were waiting for them, for Mary and Miss Van Gerder had already returned with permission for Margaret to change rooms, if she desired. "I sincerely hope that you do desire, for I really want you, Margaret." "You are very good, Miss Van Gerder." "Now stop right there, Margaret. Whether you room with me or not, you shall not be formal. My name is Constance, and you know it very well." "I never called you by it," said Margaret steadily. "I hope you will now. Please don't spoil the entire year for me. If you will consent to share my rooms, and let me make up for my thoughtlessness in so far as I may, you will be doing me a great favor." "I do not see why you should not have said what you did; it was the truth, and there was no reason why it should not have been told. You must not feel that you owe me any reparation. That is not true. So far as I am concerned, while the present moment may be a little disagreeable in many respects, I cannot altogether regret what has occurred. Mother, naturally, will feel sorry, but there cannot be further disclosures, for I filled in, for Miss Dunbar's benefit, all the details that you had omitted. She knows that Father was your uncle's coachman, and--" "And he was a good one, and we all liked him. What a tempest in a teapot this is! Now be sensible. You are going to be my room-mate as a favor to me. I beg it. That is settled. I shall see that Patrick comes and moves your trunks this afternoon, and as soon as we have had some of Miss Newby's tea, we are all going over to your room to help you carry the lighter things. There is no need to bother packing those." "Of course not," said Beth readily. "We shall be delighted to help you. With five of us at work, we shall have everything moved in half an hour." Margaret looked only half-satisfied. She had pride, too. If Constance Van Gerder was taking her in a spirit of self-sacrifice, she had no intention of becoming her room-mate. Things would not be pleasant, but she could stand it, even if she _were_ ostracized. But Constance read her easily, and without referring again to the subject, she soothed her wounded pride and contrived to let her know that she was actually wanted. A little later they all started for Margaret's room to aid her in the "moving process." The room was still filled with Abby Dunbar's friends, and they were evidently much excited. Constance included them all in the cool little nod that she gave on entering. "You must not bear malice against me, Miss Dunbar, for stealing your room-mate. I did not know that she was at Westover, so I made arrangements to room alone, but now I must put in my claim. My right is the prior one, for I have known her so much longer." Constance had been talking against time. She wanted Margaret to leave the room with her load of small articles. There was just one word that she intended saying to these girls on the subject they were discussing; then she intended to have the matter closed forever, so far as she was concerned. Abby Dunbar herself gave the opportunity for the desired remark, just as Margaret passed from the room. "Are you actually in earnest? I did not believe you could mean it! Have you asked her to room with you? Of course, we understand that you did it in a charitable spirit, and because you are sorry for her position here, since she has been found out, but--" "Excuse my interrupting you. I have asked Miss Hamilton to room with me because her companionship will be a pleasure. I had to coax rather hard before she would consent. There is just one other thing to be said. Our sitting-room is common property, and I shall never care to see anyone there who is at all discourteous to Margaret!" With that she turned away and picked up a pile of Margaret's books. She had made a telling speech and she knew it. Constance could not be unaware of the influence she exerted socially, by means of her mere name. The girls would not wish to shut themselves out from all the privileges of her room, and there would be no more open acts of aggression so far as Margaret was concerned. Of that Constance felt assured. At the same time it was certain that Margaret would be subjected to many petty slights and snubs and wounds. But she would have to endure those, and her nature was too fine to allow of her growing bitter because of them. There was gossip and much quiet talk, but Constance Van Gerder's determined stand put an end to open insults and recriminations. Two days later, there was another subject for gossip, also, for Margery Ainsworth had been readmitted to college on "probation." Such a thing had rarely been known before, and the stigma of disgrace attaching to such students as were on "probation" was great. It was understood that they were under special surveillance, and the many privileges accorded other students were withheld from them. Of course, Margery had come back as a freshman. The girls had heard that Mr. Ainsworth was intensely angry with Margery, and had declared that she must stay at Westover until she graduated, if it took a hundred years. She was to room with a freshman, and, judging from her expression, she had come back reluctantly and rebelliously. Dolly and Beth talked it over, and wondered what good end Mr. Ainsworth could hope to effect by sending her to college, when she was in such an obstinate frame of mind. "At least, she has diverted the attention of the girls from Margaret, and, Beth, I like her more than I ever supposed I could. Didn't she preside with dignity at our class meeting last evening, though? No one would ever have guessed how some of the girls stormed at her only a few days ago." "'Tis fortunate that she has Constance Van Gerder as a loyal friend. To tell the truth, I think that she is relieved now. There is nothing for her to hide or cover up. We must see Constance about the class elections, though. They will come in two days, and I am positive that Abby Dunbar will try to prevent Margaret's being elected chairman of the executive committee. That is a position which has always been given to the retiring president, and certainly Margaret has done enough for our class to deserve the honor. It would be a shame to slight her." "Yes, it would. Constance is in her room now, I think, and Margaret will be at the literature lecture. Come, we will see her at once." Constance was very glad to promise her help to the girls, and the work commenced that day in earnest. They soon found that Abby and her particular coterie had been hard at work for some little time, but Margaret's supporters labored with a will, and went to their class meeting with hopeful hearts. "I am anxious about two offices," Dolly confessed to Miss Van Gerder as she walked down the hall toward the room in which the meeting would be held. "I want to see Beth elected president, and I want Margaret made chairman of the executive committee." Some way, rather to their own astonishment, Beth and Dolly found themselves on very intimate terms with Miss Van Gerder. The three, with Margaret, made a very congenial quartette. Mary Sutherland felt at a disadvantage before this girl, whose father's name was a world-wide synonym for wealth. She was never at her best when Constance was present. She utterly refused to go to her room, and Dolly finally lost all patience with her. "You must have a very low opinion of yourself, Mary Sutherland, if you think that a few dollars are worth more than you are. Can't you see what kind of a girl Constance Van Gerder is? Of course, she knows that she is immensely rich, but she is not silly. She doesn't dress extravagantly, or load herself with jewelry. In fact, there are a dozen girls here, who spend more on dress in the course of a year than she does. Her gowns fit to perfection, and they are always made in good taste, but she doesn't care for such things. She is forever doing quiet, lovely things for other people. Your aunt told me that she thought Miss Van Gerder would take up college settlement work. Whether she does or not, she will not be a useless butterfly of fashion." "There is no use my trying to know her better. We have nothing in common. I am poor and she is tremendously rich." "You mean that you are vilely proud, Mary Sutherland. If you were not so proud, you would see how gracious and lovely Constance Van Gerder is. It is just as much a crime for a poor person to be proud as for a rich one. Why can't you be yourself, and enjoy Constance and her bright ways as Beth and I do?" But Mary refused to listen to reason, and drew more and more into her shell. College had only been in session a short time now, but it was evident that Mary was going to isolate herself, despite all that Dolly and Beth could say, and despite Dolly's exasperated appeals to Professor Newton. There was a strong vein of stubbornness in Mary, and much as she loved her aunt, she declined to argue this matter with her. "The girls had been good to her last year, because Dolly had been compelled to room with her, but she was not their kind, anyway, and she wasn't going to force herself in where she was not wanted." Professor Newton and the girls had given up the effort in despair, and Mary was left to gang her ain gait. The sophomore elections had been deferred a little for one reason and another, and it was now the end of the third week. If Margaret's friends had worked hard in her behalf, the opposition had been working hard, also, and before the meeting had advanced far, Dolly began to lose heart. CHAPTER XIV When things were fairly under way, Dolly nominated Beth for the presidency. Half a dozen other nominations were made, but the result was very satisfactory to Beth's friends, as she was elected by a large majority. Constance was made vice-president without opposition, and the rest of the balloting went smoothly enough until the executive committee was reached. Then Constance made her first little speech, nominating Margaret for the chairmanship, and putting forcibly before the class, the good work that she had done as president, and "for which," Constance concluded with significant emphasis, "we want, most assuredly, to show our gratitude now, in the only way possible." Abby Dunbar was immediately nominated by Grace Chisholm, and then, as no other names were mentioned, the balloting proceeded. Beth felt more nervous over this, than she had when her own name was up for the presidency. Constance had done her best, and there was no doubting her influence; still, the balloting was secret, and might not some of the girls leave Constance under the impression that they would vote for Margaret, and now, when the time had come for the voting, cast their ballots for Abby Dunbar? Constance would not be able to tell what girls had kept faith with her, and what ones had not. "I would never do for a politician," Beth confided to Dolly in a whisper. "I am too nervous and excitable; see how cool Constance is, and Margaret, too." "Yet Margaret will feel it bitterly, if she is defeated under these circumstances; and as a class we ought to be ashamed of it if she _be_ defeated, for it will be an open acknowledgment of the fact that we care more for dollars and cents, than we do for genuine worth and ability. I shall be ashamed of the sophomores if Margaret is not elected." The class had lost some of its members, and had gained several new ones, so that at this time it numbered an even three hundred. Even Margaret, with all her self-control, began to show the strain before the tellers appeared. The chairman was an enthusiastic admirer of Margaret, and her voice vibrated triumphantly as she tried to announce in a perfectly calm tone, the result of the voting: Margaret Hamilton . . . . 153 votes. Abby Dunbar . . . . . . . 147 votes. There was a moment of utter silence, then Constance started the applause which grew and grew until it became an actual uproar. Even those who had voted against Margaret, now, with few exceptions, joined in the applause, for Constance's keen eyes were sweeping the room, and not a girl present wished to be ranged in open opposition to her. It was she, and she alone, who had carried the day for Margaret. Margaret realized the fact, and, while she was grateful, she felt stung and hurt. Constance found her in tears when she went to their room sometime after the meeting had dispersed. Tears, with Margaret, were a rare thing. Constance knew what they meant this time, although she affected not to. "You see, Margaret, that you were elected, despite your declaration that you would not be. Aren't you ashamed of the little faith you had in your friends?" "It was your friends who elected me, Constance, not mine. I am in no danger of making any mistake on that point. Do you suppose that I do not know how you have been working for me?" "What of that?" "If you had been as poor as I, how much influence would you have had? I am not ungrateful to you--please do not think that--but I have been treated to such a succession of slights all of my life, that I cannot help feeling a wee bit bitter. I was not elected tonight because of any gratitude or liking that the girls have for me, but merely because you--Constance Van Gerder, who will one day be one of the richest women in this country--have chosen to befriend me, and so asked those girls to vote for me. If it were not a cowardly thing to do, I should go away from here to some other college. I would take care to proclaim my full history the very first day I was there, and I would not attempt to make a single friend." "That would be a cowardly thing to do. Next year neither Abby Dunbar nor Grace Chisholm will be here. They will never manage to get through the sophomore work. They are the only ones who are your active enemies, and they are such, merely through spite and jealousy. You are a good student, Meg; do your best for your mother's sake and for mine, too. I want you to carry off some honors on Commencement Day." "I will do my best for you; you have done so much for me that I could not refuse to try, at least. I think I shall get permission to run down and see my mother for an hour. Professor Newton may think it too late to go, but I would like to tell Mother that I was elected. I should not have let you propose my name at all, if it had not been for her." "Then you would have been a big simpleton. I am positive, Meg, that Professor Newton will not listen to your going out tonight, but you can telephone to your mother. Will not that do?" "And have Abby Dunbar and all the other girls hear me? I couldn't possibly. If the telephone were not just inside the reception room where the entire college can hear what is said, I might do that." "I see. Don't trouble yourself. It is out of the question for you to go to town tonight at this hour. Professor Newton would consider you crazy to ask, but I can appreciate your mother's anxiety, and I am going to telephone to her. It will give me great pleasure to do this, and the more of Abby's friends that are within hearing, the better." "You are very kind, but--" Constance had gone unceremoniously, and Margaret's expostulation was cut short. As Constance had predicted, the little tempest created by the revelation of Margaret's family history soon died down. Of course, it was only Constance's strong influence which brought about this result; none of the girls wished to cut themselves off absolutely from her acquaintance, and Constance made it very plain that those who showed the least discourtesy to Margaret were no friends of hers. Poor Mrs. Hamilton had been almost heartbroken when she first learned of Margaret's troubles, but Margaret herself had made as light as possible of them, and the fact that she was now Constance's room-mate, reconciled Mrs. Hamilton to everything. The sophomore year was generally conceded by both the students and the faculty, to be the hardest year at Westover College. While the girls whom we know managed to have some good times in a quiet way, they found themselves, for the most part, kept very busy. Mary Sutherland drew more and more into her shell, as Beth and Dolly grew more intimate with Margaret and Constance. Dolly complained of it repeatedly to Professor Newton. "Mary acts as if we did not have love enough to go around. Just as if Beth and I couldn't care for her now, because we like Margaret and Constance Van Gerder. I wonder if she thinks that love is measured out by the quart, Professor Newton, and that Beth and I have exhausted our supply?" "You must be patient with my stubborn little niece, Dolly dear; she is her own worst enemy. Neither you nor I can say anything to her now. She is wilfully losing lots of enjoyment out of these college days. She has made no new friendships, for she thinks too much of you and Beth to do that. In truth, she is jealous and unreasonable, but she fails to see it. She might as well demand that God's blessed sunshine shall illumine only a few places. Some things grow by the using. Our power of loving is one of those things, Dolly. God's love reaches all the infinity of His creatures, and yet its depths are boundless. It is immeasurable. Sometime Mary will learn this." At Thanksgiving time Dolly carried Mary off to her own home. Beth could not be persuaded to stop this time. She thought of last year, when she had had no desire to go home at all, and could not but marvel at the difference in her feelings now. In truth, Beth was making up for all those years of repression and coldness, by the wealth of love which she lavished upon her own people. And they returned it a thousandfold. Dearly as Mrs. Newby loved her own dainty little Nell, she knew that this child was no dearer to her than was Beth. Mary had gone home with Dolly half under protest, but Dolly would listen to no excuses, and Professor Newton urged her so strongly to accept the invitation, that Mary finally went. Dolly felt confident that this brief visit would serve to clear away the clouds that had come between them; but in this she was disappointed. Some way she saw little of Mary, after all. Did Fred monopolize Mary's society--the two were certainly together a great deal--or, had she enjoyed Dick Martin's indolent witticisms and quiet humor so much that she had neglected Mary? She felt rather uneasy about it, and promised herself to atone at the Christmas holidays. But when the Christmas holidays came, there were new plans for all. Margaret was to go home with Constance for the entire vacation. She had demurred about leaving her mother, but Mrs. Hamilton had insisted strongly that she should go for the whole time. "It is not as if you were where I could not see you every day, dear. Of course, I would love to have you with me, but just now I would much rather have you visit Miss Van Gerder." And Margaret, seeing that her mother really meant what she said, yielded the point, and went home with Constance. There was to be a house party at Constance's for the last week of the vacation. Dolly and Beth were invited as well as Hope Brereton and Hazel Browne. "I don't know Miss Sutherland well enough to ask her to be of our party," Constance said to Dolly. "She is so far away from home that I would like to ask her if I felt better acquainted. I don't see how you ever came to know her. She absolutely repels all advances." Dolly laughed, although she was inwardly provoked with Mary. What good times she was cheating herself of! Could she not recognize genuine goodness when she saw it? What made Mary so blind and obtuse in these days? "Mary is just like a chestnut-burr on the outside," she replied now to Constance. "Sometime she will get tired of pricking all of her friends, and then everyone will see what a genuine heart of gold she has." "I hope she will shed the burr soon, for her own sake. People do not like to get stung and pricked when they approach her in a friendly manner." "I have preached until I am tired. We must leave her alone now. I am going to take her home with me, and Mother intends keeping her after I go on to your house. She is quite in love with Mother, and is as nearly demonstrative with her, as it is possible for Mary to be with anyone. We shall be a very congenial party at your house, Constance. You always do manage to get together people that suit." "I am afraid that you will take back that remark when you know of one more invitation that I want to give today." "What in the world do you mean?" "Don't be stunned, but I want to have Margery Ainsworth. Shall I?" "The idea of asking us whom you shall invite to your own home! How absurd!" "But you don't like Margery." "I hadn't known that you did either," Dolly said frankly. "I have felt a little sorry for her lately. We have seen more or less of each other all our lives; we both live in New York, and as children we went to the same kindergarten, and we have seen each other with some frequency during all the in-between years. Just now Margery is not having an easy time. Instead of being a junior, as she would have been in the ordinary course of events, she is only a freshman, but I have learned that she is doing extra work and has taken some extra examinations. She hopes to come into our class as a full sophomore after Christmas." "I wonder what has roused her so. She was never a student in any sense of the word, last year." "She knows that her father is earnest in his determination to have her complete her course here, and so she is resolved to get through as quickly as possible. She has lost one year, but there is no reason why she should lose two. She is discovering unsuspected capabilities for study in herself; you must have noticed that she takes no recreation and has no friends. She is settling down into a mere 'grind.'" "Margery Ainsworth, of all people!" "It is strange. She does not love study any better than she once did, but she has an indomitable perseverance when her will is aroused. Just now she is determined to get through college as soon as possible, and to maintain a good standing. I cannot see why Mr. Ainsworth is so resolved that she shall graduate from here. She is an only child, and her mother is an invalid. He must have some weighty reason for sending her off, when she would be such a comfort to her mother." "It must hurt her pride fearfully to be under constant supervision, not to be able to go where other girls go, and to feel that she is not trusted." "It is hard, most certainly, but Margery brought all that on herself. One cannot do wrong without meeting the penalties for it, in some way or other, even in this life. But if she succeeds in making the sophomore class, she will come into it with a clean page turned. I happen to know that the faculty means to give her a chance to wipe out old scores." "And you want to help the girl? Well, you don't suppose that any of the rest of us would be so mean-spirited as to make objections? If you think that, you had better withdraw our invitations." "Don't talk nonsense, my dearest Dolly," Constance said indolently. "I am too fatigued to argue with you." "Then come and have a walk, Con. Beth is working away at some problem in her advanced trigonometry that it would make me ill even to read over. I have come to have an added respect for Beth this year, when I see how deliberately she picks out all the mathematical courses. It would not be possible for me to do that. It tasks all of my mathematical resources just to keep account of my own allowance." Con laughed. "You excel Beth in some other things, so that you may consider yourself even. By the way where is Margaret? I would like her to go with us." "We might look into the library. She may be there," and Dolly made a mental note of Constance's unfailing watchfulness and care for her room-mate. As they drew near to the library, it became evident that Margaret _was_ there. The other occupants of the room were Abby Dunbar and her immediate coterie of half a dozen friends. For the most part, Abby had preserved a haughty coldness toward Margaret, although she indulged in petty meannesses and flings at her, whenever she imagined that she could do it without Constance's knowledge. She had no intention of cutting herself off absolutely from Miss Van Gerder's acquaintance. Today, however, she had just chanced to learn of the house-party at Constance's home. She was not invited, and Margaret was! She was so full of wrath and indignation, that she forgot her usual caution. She commenced talking to her friends in a tone which would easily reach Margaret, and she contrived to put all the bottled up venom of the past term into her words. To all appearances Margaret heard not a syllable. Just as Constance and Dolly approached the library, Abby turned, not seeing them, addressing a remark directly to Margaret. Margaret turned toward her, a quiet scorn in her brown eyes. "Miss Dunbar, if you were unaware of some things when you invited me to your house, we are certainly quits, for I have since learned facts concerning your family which would have prevented my ever putting a foot inside your house had I known them before." CHAPTER XV She looked steadily at her classmate for a moment. Constance and Dolly had paused in the doorway. Margaret did not need their assistance. Something in Margaret's tone made Abby recoil with a sudden, inexplicable apprehension. Yet, after all, what could that girl say to hurt her--Abby Dunbar? "I believe that by this time you are all rather well posted on my family history. Consequently you know that my father was a West Point cadet, and but for a useless accident, caused by a drunken acquaintance, he would, in all probability, be alive today, and be an officer in the regular army. His health was ruined, his hopes in life destroyed, and himself and my mother forced into menial positions, because an acquaintance to whose home he had been invited, was too drunk to manage a yacht, and too drunk, also, to let anyone else take the management in his place. The boat capsized, as you know. The only person injured was my father. I had rather today," and Margaret's voice rang out clear and strong, "be his daughter--the daughter of an honest servant--than be what you are--the daughter of a man whose drunken folly wrecked the life of as good and noble a father as ever lived." There was a silence that made itself felt. "How dare you? It is not true! you know it is not true!" "I am not in the habit of telling falsehoods or of making statements about which I am not sure. Suppose you ask your father about the matter? He will, perhaps, enjoy telling you of it. Until a week ago, neither my mother nor I knew who your father was. You may be sure that, if I had known, there would have been no inducement strong enough to take me inside your home." Margaret turned to leave the library, and all her auditors became aware then, that Constance and Dolly had been standing in the doorway. Constance spoke a few low words to Margaret, took her arm, and, with Dolly following, walked down the hall. Abby watched them a moment, and then burst into a flood of tears. In her heart she had a terrible conviction that Margaret's story was true. She must write and ask, not her father, of course, but her older brother. She remembered what a dread her father had of yachts, and how fearful he had been lest her brother should come to use liquor as freely and as carelessly as many college boys do. He was a charitable man--very charitable, and what was it that she had once heard him say, when her mother had mildly remonstrated against a piece of benevolence that seemed actually prodigal in its lavishness? Surely he had said something to the effect that there was one debt which he could never hope to pay, now, in this life, and that he must atone, if possible, in other directions. Her mother had seemed to understand, and had said no more. She must write to her brother that night, and tell him the whole story; no, not quite all. She need not say anything about her recent treatment of Margaret, for she had an instinctive feeling that Raymond would disapprove her conduct in emphatic terms. She hurried to her room with a few petulant words to her friends, and scribbled off a lengthy and not over-coherent letter to her brother. She waited for the reply anxiously. It came in an unexpected form. There was a note from her brother, to be sure, but her own letter he had handed directly to their father, and the answer was from Mr. Dunbar. Margaret's story was true. Hamilton was not an uncommon name by any means, and he had never surmised, when he talked with his daughter's friend during the past summer, that she was in any way related to the man whose life he had practically ruined. Hamilton had disappeared from West Point; he had tried to trace him in vain, for he had been told by the congressman to whom Hamilton owed his appointment, that the lad was friendless and penniless. He had left no stone unturned in his search, but the result had been fruitless. It was his fault, alone, that Margaret's father had been forced into such a humble position in life. Hamilton had possessed the brains and power to make himself a name in the army; but all of his tastes ran in that one direction, and when he found himself forced to leave West Point, there was practically nothing to which he could turn. He was glad to learn that Mr. Worthington had been generous to the Hamiltons in his will, and he was also glad that his own daughter had acted the part of a friend toward Margaret. It was something for which he felt peculiarly grateful. He wanted Abby to be sure and bring both Margaret and her mother home for the coming holidays. He was writing to them by the same post, and Abby must add her persuasions to his. The letter made Abby most uncomfortable. Why had she written home anything about Margaret? During the last days of school, she watched anxiously to see if either Margaret or Constance would broach the subject. Nothing was said, and Abby was compelled to wait until she reached home to learn that her father's invitation had been briefly declined, Margaret stating that she had already accepted an invitation for the holiday season, and that her mother did not feel equal to going among strangers alone. No word of comment was offered further, though Abby knew that her father had written a long letter full of remorse and grief. They discussed it the evening after Abby's return. "I am going to see Miss Hamilton in New York next week," Ray announced decidedly. "That letter does not sound like her one bit. You can't go, Pater, because of that unlucky fall you got on Wednesday, but you may trust me not to make a botch of the affair. I was charmed with Miss Hamilton last summer, but that letter is evidently written under some sort of constraint. It is no reply to yours." "I cannot blame her in the least, Ray, for feeling bitter toward me." "Perhaps not," Raymond said regretfully. "Still I intend to see her. You have no objections, Father?" "No. The matter cannot drop here, and for the present I am unfortunately tied to the house." "I would not go if I were you, Raymond," Abby interposed. "It will give her a chance to snub us." "I don't understand you, Abby; I thought that you and Miss Hamilton were warm friends. You haven't gushed about her as much this term as formerly, but I did not know that you had quarreled." "We are not as good friends as we were. I am dreadfully disappointed in her. She is not the girl I had supposed her." "It is rather odd that you didn't tell us something about this in your letters. Miss Hamilton seems to be good enough for Miss Van Gerder, even if she is not for you. I intend to see her, Abby, and that is all there is to the matter." It was with no comfortable feelings that Abby saw him depart for New York on the next Tuesday. Thursday brought her a short note from him. I don't wonder in the least that you objected to my coming here. Miss Van Gerder has given me the history of the past term. I do not feel proud of the part my sister played. Father and I will have hard work undoing the mischief you have wrought. R. D. That was all that Abby heard directly, but she knew that her father and Ray had vainly tried to get Margaret's promise to spend the Easter recess with them. No allusion was made to the matter when the girls were back at school once more. Abby heard Constance's friends talking of the gay time they had had, and she more than half envied them. Dolly seemed brimming over with fun and spirits. She had had a thoroughly enjoyable time at home and afterward in New York. Dick Martin had run down for several days, and Fred had called on New Year's. Constance was an ideal hostess. Mary had spent the time at Dolly's home, and had joined Dolly on her return to college. Mrs. Alden had vainly tried to accomplish some good by ridiculing Mary's feeling toward Constance Van Gerder. She owned to Dolly that she had effected nothing. "I think that one or two caustic remarks Fred made did more good than all my lengthy talks." But, to all appearances, Fred had not accomplished much, either, for Mary refused to go walking with the girls when Constance was to be of the party, and she would not visit in their rooms save at times when she knew that Constance had a recitation. She was not going to be patronized, she declared, and Dolly vowed in disgust that she would never mention the subject again. Nothing of any special interest happened through the next two terms. The four girls were growing to be extremely popular. Beth made a capital president, and the little quartette composed of herself, Dolly, Margaret and Constance were coming to be generally known as the "diggers." There were students more bright than they, perhaps, in some particular branches, but there were no harder workers, and none who were more reliable. Beth, to her extreme disappointment, had not been allowed to go home at Easter time, for Nell was suffering from an attack of scarlet fever. She had implored her mother to let her go anyway, but Mrs. Newby had written a most decided and positive negative. "I am anxious and troubled about one daughter now, dear, I cannot stand the thought that another one is exposed to danger, too. We are strictly quarantined, and if you came, you could not return to college for several weeks. We have a good trained nurse, and Nell's case is not severe. Be patient, Beth, and do not ask to come. It is such a relief to know that you are safe." Beth had resolved to stay at the college during the short Easter recess--she was not good company for anyone, she declared--but Dolly carried her off despite her protests. Mary stayed with her aunt, and Constance took both Margaret and her mother home this time. Mr. Dunbar had come, himself, to see Margaret, but she would make no promises. Raymond had told his father something of Abby's treatment of her room-mate, after she had become aware of Margaret's lack of social position. Mr. Dunbar rarely exercised any parental authority; Abby had always found him indulgent and kind. On this occasion he had been more stern than Abby had believed it possible for him to be. He had insisted upon an apology being made to Margaret, and Abby dared not refuse. It had been a farce, however, for she had offered her apologies under compulsion. At present the relations between her and the "diggers" were coldly civil. Abby would not return to college the next year. She was a poor student, and had cared more for the fun of college life than for the knowledge that she might acquire. It was already arranged that she should travel abroad with a maiden aunt of her mother's. Nell had recovered from her attack of scarlet fever, but Hugh and Roy had both come down with it. They were all convalescent by Commencement time, but the family physician was anxious for a change of air for them all. So, it had been decided that they should again spend the hot weather among the Thousand Isles, as all three of the children were eager to go there. Mr. Alden had talked of going to the seashore, but he found both Fred and Dolly so energetically opposed to the project, that they, too, went back to their cottage at the Thousand Isles. Dick Martin spent a couple of weeks with Fred, and Rob Steele was occasionally sent there on some important errand by Mr. Newby, in whose office he was now reading law. Mr. Newby vibrated between his office and the Islands, and Rob Steele was sent back and forth with papers that needed signing or personal revision. "Father could really get the papers by mail quite as well, I think, Mother," Beth said one evening when the two were having a comfortable talk. "I think so myself, but he probably wants to give the boy a little breathing space. 'Tis rather hot in the city, and a few days here will do him good." "Father is very kind," Beth said demurely, and her stepmother, well as she had come to know Beth, could not tell whether she was particularly pleased or not at Rob's coming. The children gained strength slowly during the summer, but when September came at last, they were brown as nuts and as healthy as country children. Fred and his friends were seniors at Harvard now. Their plans for the future were well formulated. To his father's disappointment, Fred evinced no liking for the law. His tastes ran toward electrical engineering, and with a sigh Mr. Alden resigned all hopes of having his son succeed him in business. [Illustration: "Father could really get the papers by mail quite as well, I think, Mother."] Dick Martin had determined to be a doctor; there was no special need for him to work at all, but despite his surface indolence, there was no actual laziness about him, and he wanted to do a man's work in the world. He told Dolly of his plans that summer. He was rich enough not to need any income from his profession, and while he would not turn away rich patients, he intended to practice among the poor almost exclusively. He would charge as little as possible; less even than the medicines would cost; but, except in cases of really abject poverty, he thought it best to charge a mite, so as not to pauperize his patients and make them lose their self-respect. "I've thought about this matter considerably. It seems to me that the physicians who do the most among the poor, are the ones who are not well off themselves, and who cannot afford either the time or the means for such a practice. The rich fellows generally have a practice among their own class, and they do not need the fees at all. I do not like to give money outright, except in rare cases, but I can give my services when I become qualified; if I do not charge them the same fees that I shall my richer patients, they will never know the difference. I mean to provide the medicines myself, and to fill my own prescriptions. I can do it more cheaply, and then I shall be sure that they get the stuff. Half of the time the poor have no money with which to have prescriptions filled. What do you think of the plan?" Dolly considered it a noble plan and was not backward in saying so. Beth thought that Dick seemed much more gratified by Dolly's approbation than by her own, which was quite as frankly expressed. But she was careful not to say so to Dolly. The girls were juniors now, a fact that they found it hard to realize. College seemed like a second home to them when they returned, and they went over every nook and corner of it with real affection. Several girls had dropped out of the class, as was only to be expected, but they had gained some new members also, so that they were still the largest junior class ever enrolled at Westover. They numbered 291, but Abby Dunbar and three of her most intimate friends had dropped out. Mary kept her old room. Constance and Margaret were room-mates again, so were Dolly and Beth. Even Mary was inveigled into the little reunion which they held in Dolly's room on the night after they all returned. CHAPTER XVI They had talked over the summer holidays quite thoroughly, when Beth brought up the subject of class elections. "We want Dolly for president next year; we shall want Margaret as editor-in-chief of the _Chronicle_ (the _Chronicle_ was a college monthly managed entirely by the senior class, although contributions were frequently accepted from members of the other classes), we want Constance for class historian, too, and Mary ought to be on the executive committee; as we shall want so much then, I think that we had better keep in the background this year, don't you?" "Is that all you want, Beth?" Dolly questioned dryly. Beth ignored the protests that Constance and Mary both were making regarding their fitness for the positions to which Beth wished them elected. "I do not want too much, and I do not want more than I mean to get either! If we work for the other girls this year, they can afford to help us next. I was president last year, and of course I am still president for a few days yet. After I go out we will all keep in the background during this junior year, for really we are not pigs." "So glad you told us that; some people might think we were," murmured Dolly. Beth gave her a vigorous pinch and went on calmly. "You girls are just the ones for the places I named, and we want our best material to the fore during our senior year. None of you have any special candidates at heart this year, have you?" "I do not want to interfere with any of your plans for Dolly's election next year, Beth, but I would be glad if Margery Ainsworth could be elected to one of the minor committees this year." "Now, in the name of common sense, why do you care about her?" "I feel sorry for the girl, Beth. She is studying well now, she has no special friends, and a little honor like that would do her an immense amount of good." "Do you really like her, Con?" "I am not sure that her character is enough settled yet for me to say. Of course, I do not care for her as I do for you girls here, but I feel immensely sorry for her. Her pride is hurt continually. She will either develop into something strong and good, or else grow unlovable and unloving. Let us help her this wee bit, girls. Her pride is being wounded all of the time now, and a little recognition by her classmates may come at just the right time." "Oh, if you want us to do missionary work, Con, and put it on high moral grounds--" "Be still. I just ask you to do a nice little thing for a girl who feels that she has no friends. And you will do it, too." "Will I?" and Beth looked mutinous. Constance smiled serenely. She was sure of Beth's help when the time should come. The girls all felt that the one who was made president, during this, their junior year, should be both capable and popular. Either Constance or Dolly could have been elected, had they so chosen, but Constance utterly refused to consider the matter, and Beth would not hear to Dolly's being nominated. It ended with the election of Hope Brereton, and the "diggers" were not represented at all in the offices, with the exception of Beth, who was made chairman of the executive committee since she was the retiring president. Margery Ainsworth, to her own intense surprise and gratification, was put on the entertainment committee. It did not take long for the girls to settle into their former grooves again. The old friendships were cemented, and some new ones were formed. Mary retreated again into her shell, and Dolly felt more than once like shaking her. In other ways Mary had improved materially. She could not afford handsome dresses, but those that she had, were becoming in color and soft in texture. Her hair was arranged to show its real beauty, and while she was far from being a pretty girl, she had a fine, intelligent face, and the promise of future beauty. She was looking forward to the time when she could teach, and earn money to lighten the burdens on that western farm. Just before Thanksgiving time, the sophomores gave a little entertainment to the juniors. Mary came into Dolly's room one day with a wry face. "I fear that I shall not be able to attend that entertainment which the sophomores are giving us." "I would like to know why?" "We shall have to wear some sort of evening dress, I suppose, and the only thing that I have is my white." "That would be just the thing," said Constance, who chanced to be present. "It's not very elegant, but it would do, only I have not got it. I sent it to Mrs. O'Flaherty three weeks ago to be laundered, and it hasn't been sent back yet." "Write to her." "I have. I've sent her a dozen missives. But she does not answer." "Go and see her." "She lives too far away." "Then try one more note; make it pathetic and appealing and stern and threatening all in one. That will surely bring the dress." "Very well, I will." But as she was about to commence the note, Mary decided, that after all, she had better go herself. She dressed rapidly, and started out alone. Either Dolly or Beth would have gone with her willingly, but she would not ask them. Mrs. O'Flaherty lived at the farther side of Westover. Mary found herself out of breath and impatient when she reached there. She was about to knock when the door opened, and Constance came out, Mary's dress in her arms. "I was going to take the liberty of carrying your dress to a woman whom I know. She will do it up beautifully for you, even on this short notice. Mrs. O'Flaherty is ill--too ill to answer your notes or to think about your dress at all." "Then I had better go in and see her a moment." "You can do no good, I am sure." "Perhaps not, but still I will go in; if you can wait for me just a moment, I will relieve you of that bundle." "There is really nothing to be done, Mary, and Mrs. O'Flaherty is just falling asleep." Mary made no comment, but went directly in, taking care, however, to move more gently than usual. Mary was not a quiet person ordinarily, being the last one that an invalid would care to have in a sick room. She wondered angrily why Constance had tried to prevent her from entering. If she were as rich as Constance Van Gerder, she would do something for poor Mrs. O'Flaherty. She was too poor to do anything herself, but at least she could show a little sympathy! Full of indignation against Constance, Mary was pushing into the tiny house, when her way was suddenly barred. Looking up, she recognized Dr. Leonard, the leading physician in Westover. "I cannot let you in, Miss Sutherland. Mrs. O'Flaherty has some kind of a low fever. I cannot tell just what it will develop into yet, but I could not allow you to run the risk of going in there." "But is there nothing I can do? The woman is so horribly poor. I'm not rich myself, but--" "She will be all right now. Miss Van Gerder has gotten hold of her. She just chanced to learn today, that Mrs. O'Flaherty was ill, or she would have had me here before. You need not worry, Miss Sutherland. Miss Van Gerder will do all that is necessary. She has given me money for food, fuel and nurse. I can call upon her for as much more as I need. I wonder if you girls up at the college know half the good that Miss Van Gerder is doing with her wealth?" "No, we don't," Mary said shortly, and then, ashamed of her curtness, she lingered to make some more inquiries. Constance was waiting for her by the gate. Mary took the bundle from her arms, despite Constance's remonstrances. "You are not going to carry my bundles, when I am along, at least. If you will tell me where that other woman lives of whom you were speaking just now, I will try to hunt her up." "I can take you there, but she lives on such a funny back street that I cannot well give you any directions." "How do you know all these people? I have never been to Mrs. O'Flaherty's house before, and I should not have gone this time, if my dress had been sent home on time. Did you go because of what I said today? I would really like to know." And Mary meant it. "Yes, I suppose I did, but there is nothing very wonderful about that. I concluded that she must be sick or in trouble, when you failed to hear from her, so I looked her up." "And you, probably, had never heard of her before, while she has been doing my laundry work ever since I came to Westover. It strikes me that I have been both thoughtless and selfish." "You have been busy," Constance said gently, "and then, in a certain sense, I feel as if these cases were my work just as much as Greek and History. Mother does not believe in indiscriminate giving. She believes in personal investigation as far as possible. That takes longer, of course, and is much more bother, but she has made me feel that I have no right to waste my money (even if I do have more than most girls), by a lazy way of giving. What I give carelessly to some unworthy person who asks aid, may really belong by right to someone else who is deserving and whom I would have found, had I investigated personally. Do you see what I mean? I cannot help everyone, and so where I _do_ help, I want my money to do good, not harm." "Your way must cost a great amount of time and trouble." "It often does, and that is my real, personal part of the giving. I cannot take credit to myself for giving the money which comes to me with no exertion on my part." "What shall you do when you are out of college and in society?" "I never expect to be in society, as I suppose you understand that term. I have no particular fondness for receptions and germans and balls. One tires of it all fearfully soon. I shall do some sort of college settlement work, but I shall not undertake it until I feel better prepared than at present." "Dolly always said that I never knew anything about you, and she was right. In your place I know that I should just be getting all of the good times that I could for myself. I'm afraid that I should not care for much except the frivolous part of life. It is well that I am poor, and not likely to see much gaiety, because it has an irresistible attraction for me. You would not imagine it, would you?" But Constance could understand perfectly how Mary's hard, prosaic life on the western farm had caused her to think with deep longing of the bright, fashionable world in which she had no part or lot. Constance's comprehension was so perfect, and her sympathy so delicate, that Mary grew bitterly ashamed of the narrow feelings and jealousy which had marred all her sophomore year. There should be no more of it, she told herself sharply. Mary was not afraid to face facts when she once met them. She owned, now, that she had been jealous of Dolly's open admiration for Constance. Then she had called Constance proud and unfeeling. Who had stood Margaret Hamilton's friend? Who was helping Margery Ainsworth to regain her self-respect? Who had gone to Mrs. O'Flaherty on the first hint of sickness? And had not the doctor declared that the college girls were ignorant of the greater part of her charitable deeds? "I believe that I have been a big snob," Mary told herself. "We can only be measured by our inclinations and our deeds. Certainly, even in proportion to my limited means, I have done far less good than Constance. It never occurred to me, for instance, to look up Mrs. O'Flaherty for her own sake, because she might be ill. I only thought of getting my dress." Mary never resorted to half-way measures. She now gave as frank and open admiration to Constance as did any of the "diggers;" Dolly and Beth rejoiced over her conversion. But Beth said, "If she felt at all toward Constance as I now feel toward Margery Ainsworth, when I see Constance wasting her sweetness in that direction, I can sympathize with her. Mary was rather jealous of your affection for Constance, Dolly, and while I do not think that I myself am jealous, I surely hate to see Con lavishing time and patience on Margery." "You are sure it is wasted?" "Yes, I am. Don't forget that I was Margery's room-mate. I flatter myself that I know about all that there is to know concerning that young lady." "Yet I think that Constance is a tolerably good judge of character. There must be latent possibilities in Margery which you have never discovered." Beth shook her head obstinately, but that very day proved the correctness of Dolly's conclusions and made Beth resolve to be more charitable in her judgments. CHAPTER XVII That evening Dolly was wishing for some one's note-book on Greek art, that she might make up a lecture she had lost because of a headache. Beth noted rather anxiously that Dolly had many headaches in these days. This was something new. Until very lately, Dolly and headaches had been strangers. The junior year was conceded by everyone to be the easiest year in the entire course, so Beth did not believe that Dolly was working too hard. Yet she seemed tired so much of the time! She had been so anxious that athletics at Westover should be revived, but now, when an effort was being made in that direction, Dolly took only a languid interest in the matter. Beth helped her in many little ways, and hid her increasing anxiety, although she was fully determined to write to Mrs. Alden, if Dolly did not grow stronger within a short time. Beth looked up as Dolly was expressing her wish for the notes on Greek art. She, herself, was not taking that course, for she preferred logarithms and abstruse calculations, to the marvels of the Parthenon. "I'll get you Margery Ainsworth's note-book, Dolly; she has full notes on everything, the girls say." "Yes, her book would do splendidly, if she will loan it, but I ought to get it myself. There is no reason in the world why you should be running my errands in this fashion." "I like it, so don't talk nonsense," and Beth went off briskly. She gave a little tap at Margery's door, then entered, thinking that she had heard Margery speak. When she was fairly in the room, however, she saw Margery lying on her couch, sobbing as if her heart would break. "Why, Margery, what is the trouble? have you had bad news? Do tell me." Margery sat up hastily. Beth was not the person whom she would have selected as her confidant. "I have just received a letter from Father. He has been crippled in business for some time by the recent bank failures, and now he has lost everything." "Oh, Margery, I am dreadfully sorry." "Mother is such an invalid that it will be hard on her. She has a little money of her own, not much, but enough, Father says, to pay up every cent he owes and to keep me here until I graduate." "It must be a comfort, Margery, to feel that he will not owe any person a cent." "Yes, it is," with an irrepressible sob, "but, oh, I want to be at home helping, but Father says that I can help best by going through and graduating. He was afraid of this, and that was the reason he was so determined that I should graduate here and be prepared to teach. Mother may need to depend upon me entirely some day, for, of course, Father is not young any more, and we have no near relatives; no one, at least, upon whom we would ever call for help." "You must be proud of the fact that your father can depend upon you, dear." "There is not much to be proud of. Just think, Beth, if I had not wasted so much of my time, I should be graduating this year. Now I cannot be of any help for nearly two years. That is the bitterest part of all. We have never been rich people, but Father made a comfortable living for us. I ought to have realized that it cost a great deal for him to send me here, and I should have made the most of my time--but I didn't." "No one could have done better than you have been doing lately, Margery." "But I cannot make up that lost year. That is the dreadful part of it. Repentance doesn't take away the consequences of one's folly, does it? We have to pay for it all. Just now, when I ought to be in a position to help at home, I am only an added burden. Father has seen this coming for years, but I did not know it. He lost many thousands of dollars in a great bank failure four years ago. He has never quite recovered from that blow. If there had not been several failures lately, though, among people who owed him money, he would have managed to pull through." "But you knew nothing of all this, Margery, so do not blame yourself too severely." "I knew that Father was not rich, and I ought not to have wasted my time. I know that I must graduate now, if I would teach, but it is dreadfully hard to think that I must use up my mother's little pittance for it." "But she wants you to take it, dear, and I am sure that the best thing you can do for your parents, now, is to be cheerful and happy. You will probably have many long years in which to work for them both; and really, Margery, you are working for them now just as truly as if you were earning money for them." But even Beth's bright reasoning failed to console the girl, and Beth went back to Dolly feeling quite downcast. "There, if I didn't forget your book! Let me tell you the news and then I will go back and get it." "Never mind the book," said Dolly when Beth had told the story. "I feel too wretched to use it tonight. I wish you would tell Constance, though. She may know how to comfort Margery a little, and perhaps she can devise some plan for helping her." But while Constance was sympathetic and kind, she could think of no way for assisting Margery just then. "When she is ready to teach, I can help her, I am sure. I think it likely that she may be able to get a good position in one of the fashionable boarding-schools in New York; then she will not be obliged to leave home." So Margery's friends did all that they could for her in a quiet way, but, after all, they could not carry her burden, and Margery felt in those days as if life were a hard thing. Dolly's headaches had grown no better; they had become perpetual, until Beth, in frightened desperation, wrote to Mrs. Alden. Before her mother reached the college, however, Dolly had been removed to the hospital, and several of the other students were developing symptoms of the same malarial fever that had attacked Dolly. "There is much of this disease in the lower portion of the city. I have been attributing the trouble there to bad drinking water, but that hardly seems to account for the outbreak here, because your drinking water is wonderfully clear and pure." "We are often in that part of the city, though," Beth said, "and we almost always get a drink at the fountain." "That accounts for it, then. How often have you been in the habit of going to that part of Westover?" "Nearly every day. You know that we are required to take outdoor exercise." "We must see that no more mischief is done," the Doctor said, with a grave face. But although the fountain was removed and a new system of drainage introduced, the mischief was already wrought, so far as Dolly was concerned. All of the girls liked her, and were ready to do all in their power to make things easier for her when she returned once more to her classes. Her illness was not serious, but it was tedious and wearisome. Constance copied her own literature notes into Dolly's book, and Margery copied the Greek art. The professors did everything in their power to smooth things, but Christmas found Dolly pale and thin, and utterly aghast at the work she must take up; for the half-yearly examinations to which the juniors were treated would come at the end of January and she was far from being prepared. "I wonder if I hadn't better give up college altogether, Mother? It will break my heart to do it, but, honestly, I do not see how I can ever make up all this work. I lack the energy to attack it. It is not merely the work that I have missed, either, during these three weeks since I have been in the hospital. I could not do good work for several weeks before that. To think of Beth's graduating, and my not even being in college then," and Dolly tried to wink away the tears which would come, for Dolly was not strong yet. Mrs. Alden had stayed throughout Dolly's sickness, and now she looked at her daughter thoughtfully. "I want to do the best thing for you, Dolly, and, as far as I am concerned, I feel like bundling you up and taking you home for good. I wrote Fred to that effect, but he says that you will not forgive me in after years if I do it. He has a plan of his own, and you shall hear it. Then you can decide for yourself what to do. You are old enough to make the decision unaided. Fred wants to bring home Rob Steele for the holidays. There will be nearly three weeks. He says that Rob has been overworking fearfully, and is in danger of breaking down. Rob refuses to come, because he says that he is already under so many obligations to Fred. He is as obstinate as a mule, your brother declares. So Fred proposes that you take home your note-books and whatever else you need, and let Rob coach you up in the mornings. He can make him come under those circumstances. He wants me to tell you that Rob is a splendid coach, and that he will fix you up so that you can go back in January with a free mind. You can give your mornings to study, and have plenty of time for fun beside. What shall I tell him, Dolly, dear? I must write at once." "I believe, I actually believe, that I could do it in that way. Beth wanted to help me, but we do not have the same studies, and I knew how anxious she was to be at home, too. This plan will help Mr. Steele, and Fred will like that." "Yes, Fred will like that, for he is fond of Rob, but, most of all, he will like helping you, Dolly. Fred is proud of his sister. Can you do this without overtasking yourself? Health must come first." "I know I can. It was mostly the thought of sitting down to the horrid old books all alone; I merely didn't have the courage to face the prospect. This will improve matters. I would rather do it than not--much rather. I am considerable of a baby since I have been sick, Motherdie, and I dreaded going at the work that will have to be done. At the same time, I couldn't bear to fall behind the class. Fred is a jewel." And so the matter was settled, to the delight of all. Beth's face looked brighter than it had since Dolly's illness. "I just could not stand it to have you drop out, Dolly. Tell Fred that he is the nicest young man I know, to think of this solution of the difficulty. You will get through all right, I know!" And Dolly did get through, for she worked faithfully during the holidays. Rob Steele was about the best person she could have had to help her, and, as Fred surmised, he agreed to go willingly enough, when he found that there was work for him to do. When vacation was over, and Mr. Alden tried to pay him, however, he bluntly refused to take a cent. He was so positive in his refusal, and so hurt that the offer was even made, that the subject was dropped. Margaret and Mary had gone home with Constance. Several of the other girls had joined the party later and Margery Ainsworth had been with them for a couple of days. Beth and Dolly had been invited, but Dolly could not spare the time from her studies, and Beth would not go without her. Besides, as she told Mrs. Newby: "I like home better than any other place, so what is the use of running off the moment I get here?" "We like to have you with us, dearie, but we must not be selfish. If you are really happy here at home, we shall be glad to keep you. Nell and the boys have been looking forward to vacation time very eagerly. You know, though, that you would have a gay round of pleasure if you should go to Constance." "But I am not going, Mother, and that is positively settled. You need not say another word unless you want to get rid of me." "That is so likely!" So Beth and Dolly spent their holidays this time in their own homes, and while they would have enjoyed the good times which Constance gave her friends, they doubtless went back to their studies all the fresher for the quiet rest they had had. Dick Martin had run down to see Fred on New Year's Day. He pretended to feel much hurt and slighted when he found that Rob Steele had been coaching Dolly all vacation. "Why didn't you ask me? I was in need of such a job, and I would have done it for much less than Steele! Next time you want help, don't forget me." "Have you any references from former pupils?" Dolly asked maliciously. "Now, I call that a very unkind speech. If you are going to doubt my ability, I have nothing more to say, of course; still, next time you need help I do hope that you will give me a chance. I mean it, Miss Dolly." "I trust that there will be no 'next time.' A few such setbacks as this, and I should be obliged to leave college." "I sincerely hope there will not be, either. Now I would like a promise from you, and I hope you will not refuse to grant it. I have been intending to speak about it for some time." CHAPTER XVIII "Well?" "You want to see your brother graduate?" "Of course I do. We have not made any definite plans as yet, but I have been counting on being at Harvard for all of commencement week, if I can manage to get permission. Fred wants me to bring Mary and Beth, too." "That will be fine, but don't you see that Fred cannot do justice to three young ladies? Let me do the honors of Harvard as far as you are concerned. Come, now, promise!" Dolly shook her head. "Fred is a model brother, and I am sure that he would be utterly disgusted if I should make any such promise as that. I think that he will be equal to the three of us, but I shall be glad if you will assist him in his onerous duties." "You are not very generous to me, but when you find Fred engrossed with Miss Sutherland, and entirely oblivious to the fact that he has a sister, I will forgive you, and take you under my protecting care." "Fred will not forget me." Her companion laughed mischievously. "I would like to make a wager on that point, but I know that you never bet--so all I can do is to wait for the future to prove me a true prophet." During the busy weeks that followed, Dolly thought of his words more than once. Was it possible that Fred cared particularly for Mary? She did not think so. She hoped not, too, for she knew Mary well enough to be sure that that young lady wasted no thoughts upon Fred, or upon any other young man. "All Mary cares for," she told herself half-angrily, "is biology, and her own family. She has her future mapped out, and she expects to teach forever and forever. Fred need not waste a single thought on her, and I do not believe that he does, either." But when commencement time approached, and Fred was so plainly cast down over Mary's refusal to go to Harvard, Dolly began to think that she might be wrong in her conclusions. Fred had the matter so much at heart that he bespoke his mother's influence, and Mary at length gave a reluctant consent. "But I have nothing to wear that is new and pretty, Dolly, and you will be ashamed of me." The conversation took place in Professor Newton's room, and she interposed at this point. "You must have a new white dress, Mary, and it shall be my present to you. We will get a very pretty one, and with what you have already, Dolly need not be ashamed of you." "As if I would be, anyway," Dolly protested reproachfully. But Professor Newton realized that a new dress may give a girl a certain self-possession and ease, so she was determined that her niece should have at least one gown that would be becoming and suitable. Mary grumbled, over the waste of money, as she termed it, but her aunt quietly silenced her, and sent her off to Harvard, hoping that, for once in her life, Mary would act like a young girl instead of an old woman, and would get as much pleasure out of the week as Beth and Dolly did. Probably, to the majority of visitors, the Commencement that year was like other Commencements, but Dolly was sure that it was much more brilliant than anything ever before held at old Harvard. Rob Steele had won substantial honors, and both Fred and Dick Martin had earned their degrees. The boys saw that the girls had a share in all the fun that was going on. Westover would not close for another fortnight, but examinations were over, and the girls could enjoy themselves with an easy mind. Dolly found herself depending upon Dick Martin rather more than she had expected to do. "Am I not a better prophet than you thought?" he asked one day when Fred and Mary had disappeared. "I am afraid that you are." "Afraid! I beg your pardon, but I do not understand you. I imagined that you would be quite pleased to find that Fred appreciated Miss Sutherland." "But she does not appreciate him!" "You are sure?" "Positive." Dick gave a low whistle. "I never thought of that phase of the subject, I'll confess. Fred is such a good fellow that I supposed anyone would like him." "Mary likes him, but that is all. He certainly cannot vie in interest in her mind with biology." "Poor Fred." Dolly sprang up. "I am not going to worry about Fred. Mary and he are good friends, and Fred is far too young yet to think of anything else." Martin indulged in a long laugh. "Don't let him hear you, or he will think that you do not appreciate his years and new dignities. As a matter of fact, more than fifty per cent. of the students here are engaged." "How unutterably foolish." "Why, pray?" "Because they are too young to know what they want, or what kind of women they really like. If they studied harder, they would not be getting into so much mischief." "Then you think the boys should wait until--" "Until they are not boys," finished Dolly abruptly. "Come and let us hunt up the others." And for the remaining days of the visit, Dolly was unapproachable, though why she acted just so, was a matter which she herself could not have explained very satisfactorily. There had been considerable discussion over the summer plans. The Aldens and Newbys went to the Thousand Isles finally, though Mr. Alden insisted that another year they must try the seashore. Rob Steele had gone directly from Harvard to Philadelphia, and was working hard in Mr. Newby's office. He had not broken down during his senior year, but he had been very near doing so. Later in the summer he and Fred might go camping for a fortnight in the Adirondacks, but he refused all invitations to the Islands. "He could afford neither the time nor the money, for such a delightful outing." Constance and her mother had gone to England for the summer. Margaret Hamilton and her mother were spending the warm weather at a pleasant farmhouse near Westover. Dolly and Beth heard from both the girls frequently. Margery Ainsworth had found tutoring to do--and was perfectly happy in consequence. She begged her father to let her try and find some work the next year; she was sure that she could find something which she was capable of doing, but her father would not listen. "My health is none too good, Margery, and when I am gone, I want to know that you will be able to take care of your mother well. You cannot do that now. You are not fitted for any special thing. You would be compelled to work for a low salary, and when hard times came, you might find yourself without any position at all. I should like to give you a couple of years of post-graduate study, too, but that is impossible now." So Margery yielded, knowing in her heart that her father's plan was really the wisest, and promising herself to utilize every moment. Yet she hated the thought of drawing upon their small reserve fund for her college expenses. It was Professor Arnold who finally came to her assistance. College had opened and the work of the year had fairly commenced. Professor Arnold was none too popular with the girls, principally for the reason that none of them understood her well. She was exacting in the classroom, and indolent students received small mercy at her hands. Yet when people once penetrated beneath her reserve, they found her lovable, charming and sincere. She knew Margery Ainsworth's circumstances well, and since the girl's second entrance at college had watched her keenly. Now she went to her with a proposition that filled Margery with the keenest gratitude. "Miss Ainsworth, could you manage to take the Latin classes in the preparatory department? You are perfectly competent to do the work, and if you think that you can find the time and if you care to undertake it, what you do there will balance your expenses here." There was no doubt that Margery would find the time. What wouldn't she do for the sake of paying her own way? So she undertook the work eagerly, and wrote a joyful letter home. Mr. Ainsworth shook his head rather dubiously over it. He feared that his daughter was undertaking more than her strength would permit, but he did not like to forbid the plan definitely, and so Margery went on with the work. There were many times when she was so tired that it did seem as if she could not prepare her own recitations for the next day, but she never quite gave way, and she never once regretted the fact that she had undertaken the extra duties. Professor Arnold kept a watchful eye on her, although Margery was not aware of it, and she became more and more certain, as the year went by, that Margery was just the person that Madame Deveaux would want the next year, at her exceedingly fashionable school in New York. One of the teachers would leave at the close of the present year, and Madame had already asked Professor Arnold to secure someone for her. So, although Margery did not know it, her way was being made plain and easy. Constance, too, had been thinking of Margery, but when she found out, accidentally, what Professor Arnold's plan was, she said nothing more, merely resolving to make Margery's holidays as pleasant as possible. And Margery would be happy in her work, knowing that she was helping her home folks and was making the best atonement possible for her former folly. Class elections passed off smoothly. As Beth said, she had not planned things for two long years just to fail at the last moment. Beth's "ticket," as Dolly insisted on calling it, was carried through triumphantly, and without any hard feelings on the part of any one. So Dolly was elected president, Margaret was editor-in-chief of the _Chronicle_, Constance was historian, and both Mary and Beth were on the executive committee. Beth had objected decidedly when her name was proposed, but she was so capable and energetic, that her classmates really wanted her in that all-important place. The majority of the girls had their plans more or less well defined for the next year. Margaret had already given her name to the faculty as an applicant for a school, and it was hardly to be doubted that she would get what she wished. Westover ranked so high among colleges, that its graduates were in demand every place, and each year brought the faculty scores of letters, from both public and private schools, asking that one of Westover's graduates be sent them. Constance would take a couple of years of post-graduate work before going into the College Settlement. Several of the others expected to be back for one year at least, Hope Brereton, Hazel Browne, Ada Willing and Florence Smith. Some of the others, too, perhaps, but neither Dolly nor Beth felt that they could be spared longer from home. Beth knew how much her stepmother and the children looked forward to the next year, and so, although she did wish at times that she might be back at Westover for some special work in mathematics, she did not entertain the thought seriously, for the boys really needed her, and her father said that they were lonesome at home without her. She would help to make her home as pleasant as she could, and she would do some earnest work with her music. Without doubt there would be enough to keep her busy! She would find plenty of duties when she came to look for them. Dolly knew that her father and mother felt that they had spared her as long as they could. Fred would still be away for several years, for he had decided to take a thorough course in electrical engineering in Boston. Dick Martin was studying medicine there, so that the two saw considerable of each other. Mary Sutherland was hoping for a place in the preparatory department the next year, so that she could teach, and yet do extra work in the line of biology. "Why, Mary Sutherland," Dolly exclaimed, when Mary first confided this plan to her, "I should think that you knew all there was to be known about that subject now." Mary stared at her friend in honest horror. "I could never know all about it, Dolly, if I should live as long as Methuselah and study day and night. I don't know enough to try and teach anything about it yet, but sometime I hope I may." "Fred can't hope to compete with biology, so far as Mary is concerned," Dolly told herself emphatically, for by this time she acknowledged that Dick Martin had been correct, and that Fred's interest in Mary was more than a friendly one. It seemed strange enough to Dolly that this was so, for Mary was not pretty, and she had none of the little accomplishments which usually attract young men. Now, if it had only been Beth! and Dolly sighed dismally. It would have been so lovely to have Beth for a sister; of course, she liked Mary, but she could never care as much for her, or for anyone else, as for Beth. While all of the girls were anxious to be at home, they dreaded the leaving of college and the breaking up of the ties which had bound them so closely for four years. It seemed as if time had never rushed on as swiftly as during those last months. Class Day and Commencement were upon them almost before they realized it. Dolly had made a very dignified, impartial president, and the class was delighted at its own good judgment in selecting her. The _Chronicle_ had flourished under Margaret's management; it had contained more bright and witty things than ever before, and Beth heard some of the juniors groaning over their patent inability to keep the magazine, during the ensuing year, up to its present standard of merit. Beth repeated the remark with much delight to Margaret. "It has been a great success, girls, and we owe it all to Margaret. She has put soul and life into it. In fact, I think we can be proud of our record all the way through college; we have the largest class ever graduated; we certainly have some of the brightest students that were ever within these walls, we have the most unique entertainments of any class, and the _Chronicle_ has never been as good as it is this year." "How we apples do swim!" said Dolly mockingly. "You are as proud of this class as I am, and you know it, Dolly Alden! Professor Newton told me the other day that the faculty was perfectly satisfied with us. We have some actually brilliant students here. Look at Amy Norton, for instance! She is a phenomenon. Our choir is fine, and altogether," Beth wound up emphatically, "we are just about as nice a class as you can find any place." "We are nice," Dolly conceded, "but, Beth, let me tell you that our pride is going to have a fearful fall in one particular." "I don't understand you." CHAPTER XIX "I am talking about the athletic contests that come off the first of Commencement week. We simply shan't be in it. Vassar, Wellesley, Smith, and all the others, seem to be in great shape, but we shall disgrace ourselves." "But, Dolly dear, we must do tolerably well, or we should never be in the contests at all. There were scores of colleges that tried for a place and we were one of the six successful ones, so we must certainly be able to do something." "You would not be feeling so confident if you took more interest in athletics. We should never have won a place at all except for Ruth Armstrong. She was superb at everything; running, jumping, throwing--everything. It was she, and she alone, who won us our place on the list. She was simply phenomenal, but, as you know, she isn't here this year, and there is no one at all on whom we can count. Vassar is sure now of one event, and the Cornell girls will get another, that is positive. I had hoped that we could do something in the running contests, but Rose Wilson has twisted her ankle, so the only thing in which we stood the least show is out of the question." "Well, Dolly dear, with six colleges represented, and only three events to come off, everyone could not win." "Of course not, and now Westover will not be one of the lucky three. We shall not even win second place in anything! In short, we are in such bad shape that I wish we had never tried to revive athletics here at Westover. The other colleges have been working in this direction for years, and it was absurd for us to compete with them." "Don't worry; I think that we have won honor enough simply by being admitted to the competition. Lots of colleges are envious of us." "They will not be very long," said Dolly soberly. There was really nothing to be said that could comfort Dolly. All that she asserted was only too true. None of the quartette were on the athletic teams, but all of the students had been discussing the coming contests with grave faces. "If we had not made the absurd rule that only Seniors could be in these contests, we might do something even yet. There is rather good material among the freshmen and sophomores." "But the other colleges only admit the seniors, so we could not be allowed to pick from all the classes. If only Ruth Armstrong were here!" But Ruth, just then, was climbing the Alps, with no thought of her former classmates who stood in such dire need of her. "Tell me once more on what contests you have finally decided." Of course, it was Mary who asked the question; any other girl would have known. "The idea of your not knowing!" "Well, you have changed your minds so often, and I have been so busy with my new experiments, that I do not think it wonderful that I am not posted. Tell me, Dolly." "The faculties limited us to three contests. I felt indignant at the time, for I wanted a dozen, at least, but now I am ready to bow to their superior wisdom. The more contests there are, the more defeats there would be for us." "But how have you finally settled it?" "We have settled and unsettled matters a dozen times, but our last decision is really final; there will be running and jumping, and, last of all, a boat race." "And we do not stand a show?" "Not a ghost of a show for even second place," and Dolly sighed. Being president, she felt as if the honor or disgrace of the college rested on her. Mary broke the silence at last. "I have not gone in for athletics since I have been here, because I don't care for such things, but I can do considerable in the running and jumping line. I can't row at all, and I would be no good there, but if you want me to try and help you out in the other things, I will." "Why, Mary Sutherland, and you never said a word before! But you must be awfully out of practice. Do you actually think that you can save us from total disgrace?" "I don't know what the girls at the other colleges can do, so I am hardly prepared to say how much I can aid you, dear. I am not so fearfully out of practice, either. Every summer I have been kept in trim by my brothers, and really I can beat them both at running and jumping, when I am in good condition." "But that was nearly a year ago, Mary." "I know, but I have been to the gymnasium every night after my experiments. I have done all sorts of running and jumping there just to tire myself out so that I could sleep. No one has ever seen me at that time, and I never thought of your really needing my services. I expect that I have been horribly selfish." "You are just angelic now, for I know that you were planning to do a lot of extra work with Professor Reimer during these last days of college, and you would rather be with him than helping us out of a hole." That was so very true that Mary blushed. She had felt reluctant to even mention her prowess, but a second thought had made her ashamed of her hesitancy. What had not Dolly and these other friends of hers done to make college life pleasant for her during the past four years? Mary herself could not get up much enthusiasm with regard to the athletics. If there were a scientific contest now! "Come up to the gymnasium, girls, and I will get into my suit and show you what I can do. As I said, I practice almost every evening, for after the laboratory work I am so wide awake that I could never go to sleep at all. I found that out long ago. I would just lie in bed and think out different experiments. Of course, the next day my head felt like lead, and I was as stupid as an owl. So I resorted to the gymnasium. There is no trouble any more about my sleeping, for I tire myself out physically before I stop. Now, just wait a moment. I hope you will not be disappointed after all my boasting. I really do not know whether I am better than the rest of the girls you have picked out or not. I suppose I must be pretty good at running and jumping, because the boys think so, and they are usually very chary of their praise where sisters are concerned." But after the first five minutes there was no doubt in anyone's mind as to Mary's superiority over all the other girls. She was really fine. Dolly's drooping spirits rose with a bound. "I shall love you forever for saving the day for us, Mary. You are not out of practice a bit, but still you will let Mr. Thornbury have all your extra leisure until the games come off, won't you? I hate to ask it," Dolly went on hurriedly, for she knew that this would involve the giving up of all the extra laboratory work which Mary was doing. "But you will do it for the sake of the college, will you not?" "Oh, yes. If I am going to go into this thing at all, I want to do my best. I didn't see the trial competitions last year, but you and Beth did. How do I compare with the girls from the other colleges?" "You do better than they did then, but I hear that they have been practicing hard ever since." "I will do my very best, Dolly; perhaps we can win a 'second' after all. Mr. Thornbury shall give me all the drilling and training that he wishes to. My examinations are all over, and I really do not have to do a single thing more. I was doing the extra work with Professor Reimer just because it was such a wonderfully good chance." And Mary, true to her word, gave up all her time to gymnasium work. All of their friends came flocking to Westover for Commencement week. In fact, the closing ceremonies occupied nearly ten days. All of the "diggers" had won their degrees, and also, rather to their astonishment, a place on the "honor" roll. Beth, as everyone expected, had taken the mathematical prize, Mary had been awarded the special prize given occasionally for exceptionally fine work along scientific lines, Margaret had won a year's study abroad for the highest average throughout the entire course. Margery received an honorable mention for her work, but she was not eligible for any prize, as those were open only to students who went straight through the four years' course, and Margery had not done that. There was an archaeological prize that went to Helen Stetson, and several other prizes or scholarships in post-graduate work that went to girls who had excelled in some special line. The friends of the "diggers" were more than satisfied with the work that had been done by them. It seemed to Dolly as if everyone had come to Westover that she had ever known. All of Beth's relatives and hers, even to the third and fourth cousins. Constance's people were there, of course, and they did not fail to exert themselves to make Mrs. Hamilton comfortable and at ease. Her delight and pride in Margaret were something beautiful to see. The prize which she had so unexpectedly won, changed Margaret's plans somewhat. She would go to Girton for a year's study; her mother was also to go; there was money enough for that, for neither of them had been extravagant during these four years just past. A fine position was already promised Margaret on her return. Mary had secured the coveted place in the preparatory school at Westover, and had arranged to do special work at the college next year. She had been very sober when the other girls had been talking about Commencement and their friends who were coming. It seemed hard to Mary that her father and mother could not be there. But she knew that such an expense was simply out of the question, and she tried to be content. Then a most wonderful thing happened, just a fortnight before Commencement. Some one (Mary suspected Constance, though she never knew surely) had sent Mr. and Mrs. Sutherland two railroad tickets to Westover and return; there were Pullman seats enclosed, too, for the day on which they should depart, and so, after all, Mary's father and mother were present. And if their hands were toilworn and their clothes very old-fashioned, Mary did not care. After all, in the great throng no one's garments were noticed very particularly. It was only the graduating class that was especially scrutinized, and it was hard to tell whether the girls looked more enchanting in their white, filmy dresses or in their caps and gowns. Class Day, with all its gayety, passed off brilliantly. Constance made a fine historian; Hazel Browne read the class poem, and it was very generally conceded, even among the old graduates, to be one of the best things that had ever been read in the old Westover Hall. It was pungent and witty, without being at all bitter or malicious. Dolly presided on all the numerous occasions necessitated by Commencement week, with a pretty dignity and grace that more than one person found very fascinating. The weather was perfect, sunshiny and bright, but not overpoweringly hot, and the exercises went off with a smoothness that made Dolly wild with satisfaction and delight. "You are getting altogether too proud, sister mine," asserted Fred. "If Westover should actually happen to win something in tomorrow's contest, there will be no living with you." "I am proud of the girls and of the college, and of everything connected with it." "To tell the truth, I am rather proud of you! I don't wish to make you conceited and all puffed up with vanity, but really, Dolly, you make a first-class president. We are just brimming over with pride. Can't you see how satisfied Father and Mother are looking? You owe me something for getting Rob to coach you last year. I verily believe that you were just about ready to give up then." "I was, for a fact, and I shall be grateful to you all my life, Fred, for what you planned. Just think of missing this," and Dolly drew a deep breath. "It would have been too bad, that's sure," affirmed Dick Martin, who chanced to be present. "I never saw a more ideal Commencement. Perfect weather, lovely girls and original programs. How did you ever manage it all so smoothly, Miss Dolly? I see that your special friends captured the choicest prizes and scholarships. Was it all a prearranged plan? Things went your way--you could hardly ask anything more than you and your friends got." "Yes, I could," and Dolly sobered down. "The athletic contests come tomorrow, the very last thing on our program. We could not get them in before, and perhaps it is just as well, for I do not expect that we shall win any glory." "I thought Fred said that Miss Sutherland was to save the day for you?" "She is our only hope; the rest of the girls do not amount to anything. But Vassar and Smith, to say nothing of Cornell and Wellesley and Mount Holyoke, have been boasting so securely since they arrived that our hopes are now below zero." "You are anxious to win?" "Very. Westover has been out of all athletic contests for so long that we want to get our place again, and if our own particular class could achieve that, we should feel that we had nothing more to ask." "I should say you wouldn't have, for your class is leaving a great record here, that is sure. I have faith in your friend. I believe that she will help you out, despite all the boasting of the others." "I hope you are right. I do hope it. I shall be so glad, so glad--" "So glad, that you will grant all sorts of favors?" her companion asked, as they sauntered slowly over the lawn. Fred had disappeared in search of Mary. "Yes, quite glad enough to do anything for anyone," asserted Dolly recklessly. A moment later she caught her breath, and wished she had not said just that. CHAPTER XX "I am going to remind you of that tomorrow evening," Dick said quietly. "I am confident now that Miss Sutherland will come off victorious." Dolly was glad that a bevy of girls surrounded them just then, demanding all the latest information with regard to the contests on tomorrow. She slipped away from her companion soon, and managed to hold him at a distance until the next afternoon, when the great events came off. The best places for seeing had been reserved for the seniors and their friends, so when Dolly took her place by her mother, it was not at all strange that Dick Martin should be seated on the other side of her. On the opposite benches were the friends of the other competitors, and college flags and college cries were much in evidence. Cornell and Vassar seemed particularly confident, and as Dolly heard their shouts and noticed their jubilant flags, she grew despondent. Beth was sitting just back of her. "Don't give up before we fairly commence, Dolly. We have just as much right to shout as they have. Mary did magnificently this morning." "And don't forget that you are to take a walk with me this evening, and I'll tell you then what I want you to do for me." That was Dick Martin. "Oh, don't you know that tonight we give a supper to the visitors from the other colleges? I can't go with you possibly." "I mean to have my walk either before or after; you shall not snub me in that fashion." But Dolly pretended not to hear. Her eyes were on the smooth stretch of road in front of her. They were jumping, yes--Mary was not as good at that as she was at running. Dolly slipped her hand into her mother's. "It is a very good thing that such events as this come only once in a lifetime. I am too excitable to stand the strain equably like Constance." "Once in a lifetime is quite enough, I'll agree," said Mrs. Alden, looking rather anxiously at Dolly's flushed cheeks. "I shall be glad to have you safely at home, where I can keep you quiet and have you rest." "Yes, Mother," said Dolly, not really hearing a word of what Mrs. Alden was saying. "Oh, look! Wasn't that splendid of Mary? Do cheer her, Mr. Martin. Louder! Louder yet! Mary has gone farther than any of them, but I am afraid of Miss Smith of Vassar. That is she now! Oh!" A despairing note in her tone as Miss Smith made a better record than Mary had done. "How dreadful! But Mary has won us a second at least, and that is really more than I dared hope." "Cheer up, then. There are two more chances for you." "We do not stand the slightest chance in the boat race, and I am afraid that Mary cannot do any better in the running. Still I am grateful for what she has won for us. We shall not be disgraced, at least." "Now watch!" as the runners lined up in position. "I have a presentiment that you will feel jubilant when this race is over." And it became evident, almost from the first second, that Westover would win. Mary's pride was fully roused. She knew how anxious her class was to come off victorious in one of the contests at least, and she did her very best, but her best was needed, for Cornell was very close behind her. The cheering and yelling were almost deafening. Really, Mr. Alden said, it was quite as bad as one of the Harvard football games. He didn't see to what the girls' colleges were coming, if this sort of thing continued. But Dolly and Beth, to whom his words were addressed, heard not a syllable of his raillery. They were too intent on waving their flags and cheering Mary. Westover had covered herself with glory, and Dolly could go home tomorrow with not a wish ungratified. Fred hurried up to his people. "Mary saved the day for you, didn't she? She is having a regular ovation down by the Oaks. Shall I take you to her, Dolly?" "Yes, yes, I am wild to see her and thank her. The idea of Mary's being the one to come to the rescue so nobly. I always knew she was a dear! You need not save my seat for me, Mother, I would rather not see the boat race at all, we stand no show there." And Dolly whisked down from her high seat of honor as president of the class, and ran in search of Mary, whose father and mother could not comprehend the importance of all the athletic contests, but who were nevertheless filled with very pardonable pride at their daughter's triumph. When Dolly reached the Oaks, Mary had disappeared, and the most diligent search in grounds and rooms failed to reveal her. Dolly wandered back disconsolately just in time to hear the crowd cheering for Wellesley, who had won the boat race, with Vassar a close second. "They can have their victory, and welcome," Dolly said contentedly to Dick Martin, who joined her just then. "We have all we want. I must go now and see if the tables are all in readiness for tonight." "I just heard Miss Newby declare that everything had been done, so I hope you will walk down to the end of the grounds with me. Can't you do that, Dolly? I have been trying to get a moment with you for a long time. I must go back to Boston at eight o'clock, and this is my last opportunity to talk with you." [Illustration: "Aren't you going to say anything to me, Dolly?"] "Well," with an unaccountable hesitation in her manner. "I suppose that a class president ought not to run away like this, but if you will not take me far--" "I want to take you all along life's journey, Dolly. Is that too much to ask? You know what I hope to do, what my plans are and how I am longing to do a little good in the world. Will you help me? I think I have cared for you ever since the first time we met. Aren't you going to say anything to me, Dolly?" Dolly's brain was in a whirl. How could she tell? Yet, did she want him to go off and never come back? No, no, she knew she could hardly endure that. And Dick, not knowing what her silence meant, and fearing that a bitter disappointment was in store for him, leaned down to look in her face. Dolly smiled up at him tremulously, and Dick had the answer he wished, although no words were spoken. * * * * * Late that night Dolly sought out her mother for a word. "I could not go to sleep tonight without telling you, Mother, but--" "I understand, Dolly, Dick has spoken, hasn't he? I knew that he would, for he wished to do so a year ago, but I think he feared a refusal then. We have known his feeling for you for a long time, Dolly dearest, and I know that he will make your life very happy. But he must let you stay with us for a long time yet." "Of course," said Dolly hastily. "Of course, why, I would never, never go off from you now. Dick will not be through with his medical studies for two or three years yet. You will have me at home a long time, Motherdie." "We can't have you too long, Dolly; we would like to keep you always, but that is impossible, evidently." And then Dolly turned consoler, and there was a long, long talk, despite the fact that it was in the wee small hours, and that they were all to take a railroad journey that day. Dolly got up at last reluctantly enough, but she stopped even then when she reached the door. "Mother, did you notice Fred late last evening? What was the matter with him? He looked so grave and sober." "He has not told me anything at all, Dolly, but I imagine that he has spoken to Mary." "Oh, Mother, couldn't he see for himself that Mary cares nothing for him? The poor boy!" "I am sorry for him, dear; I feared that he would speak too soon, but it was best to say nothing. Fred will not give up easily, and in time Mary may come to appreciate him. Now she does not give a thought to anything beyond her plans and her work." "I do not believe that she will ever change," and Dolly went to her room with her own new joy tinged with sadness as she thought of Fred's disappointment. * * * * * It is more than two years later. The class of '09 had been holding a reunion in New York. A number of the members lived in that city, and others were within easy access of it. So Constance had proposed that there should be semi-annual reunions at her home for as many as could come. Several of these reunions had been held now, and the girls enjoyed them, perhaps even more than the yearly gatherings at Westover during Commencement week, when they did not really have time to compare notes and gossip, as they liked to do, over all the little happenings of the past year. This time there seemed even more news than usual to be talked over and discussed. Sarah Weston would sail the next week for India as a missionary, Grace Egle was studying medicine, Ellen Terence and Kate Seaton were doing work on New York newspapers, and were doing it well, too. Margaret had run off for a day from the well-known college in which she had a good position; Mary was there, too, but after the holidays she would go west, for she had accepted the chair of Biology in a new woman's college just started there. One of the girls was singing in a fashionable church, though, when she used that adjective, Beth protested vigorously. "I think that it is horrible to speak of a fashionable church. I know that it is often done, but a church that merits such an adjective cannot be a church in the true sense of the term." There had been some lively talk on the subject after Beth's remark, and the girls had enjoyed it, for it seemed like the old days at Westover, when they were constantly picking each other up and holding conversational tilts. Another of the class was doing lyceum work as a public reader. Still another had opened a kindergarten, and many more, like Beth and Dolly, were filling quietly and efficiently the little niches at home which sadly needed them. For the most part, college life had broadened all of the girls, so that none of them were entirely content to lead a perfectly useless life of fashion and gayety. Constance herself had gone into college settlement work, just as she had planned to do long before. After the rest of their classmates had gone, Mary and the "diggers" (for the old name seemed still to cling to them) stayed for a cosy chat with Constance. Beth and Dolly, indeed, would stay for a couple of days longer. They were sipping tea, which Constance had insisted on making, when her sharp eyes caught the gleam of a new ring on Margaret's finger. "Who gave you that, Meg? Are you keeping secrets from your crowd? I wouldn't have believed it of you." Margaret flushed richly. "I truly meant to tell you girls before I left tonight, but it was not easy to tell someway. It is absurd to think of it, but really, I am going, if nothing happens, to be Abby Dunbar's sister some day." "Margaret! how lovely! no, not that you will be her sister, but that you will be Raymond Dunbar's wife, for he is as broad and generous and fine as she is petty and narrow." "I congratulate you with all my heart, Meg, and I am so glad that Abby married that Englishman and will live abroad. Raymond is just the one man in all the world that you should marry." "Thank you a thousand times, girls," Margaret said heartily when she had been duly kissed and hugged. "But you know really, that he is much better and nobler than I. It is so, and you need not try to contradict me. I thought at first that he was trying in this way to atone for his father's youthful faults, but--" "But you do not think so any more," Dolly said shrewdly, looking at her friend's changing face. "No, I do not," Margaret owned softly. Constance looked around on the other faces. "Now I wonder if any more of you are hiding weighty secrets. If so, confess!" "How about our hostess, herself?" retorted Beth quickly. Constance smiled serenely. "I have absolutely nothing to confess. I feel like a grandmother, with all this talk of engagements and marriage going on around me. I am outside of it all. Margery Ainsworth and I will probably be the old, staid spinsters of the class; we have found work enough to fill all our lives. By the way, Dolly, how long is Mr. Martin going to consent to wait for you? You have been engaged a couple of years now." "More than that, and his patience seems about exhausted," Dolly acknowledged with a frank blush. "So I presume that you will receive our cards immediately after Christmas." "It is your turn, now, Mary. What have you to say for yourself?" Constance continued mercilessly. "Absolutely nothing beyond what you already know. I have the position which I have coveted all my life, so, of course, I am quite satisfied." Despite Mary's words, however, there was a new tone in her voice, which made Dolly resolve to catechise her later. Something had happened, but Dolly could not make out what. "Your turn now, Elizabeth," commanded Constance. Dolly laughed mischievously. She alone knew that Beth really had some news to tell. "Shall I spare your blushes and help you out, dear? She has only been engaged two days now, so that she cannot carry her new honors as sedately as--" "As some people who have worn an engagement ring for two years and a half," Beth interposed. "I'll tell my own story, Dolly Alden. Father has offered to take Mr. Steele into partnership this summer, and--" "And the daughter thought it such a good scheme that she is going to do likewise," Dolly interjected, and then after the first burst of astonishment was over, the girls had a long talk over their plans and hopes. It was a couple of hours later before Dolly found the quiet opportunity that she wanted for speaking to Mary. "Aren't you ever going to be good to Fred, Mary? He is one of the very best boys in the world." "I know it, and it doesn't seem fair to him that he should be wasting his time and thoughts on me." Dolly looked at her friend keenly. "You and Fred have some new understanding. Aren't you going to tell me what it is?" Mary looked troubled. "It is not an understanding at all, and I cannot have you think that, or Fred either. I have promised to write to him, and he says he will not take my final answer for a couple of years. It does not seem fair to him--" Dolly interrupted her with a kiss. "Don't worry your tender conscience. Just leave it all to time, and to Fred. If he is contented, you can afford to be." And to herself Dolly added: "Fred has the wisdom of the serpent; Mary cares more for him than she realizes, and he will win her in the end." SELECTIONS FROM LIST OF The C. M. Clark Publishing Co. WINDING WATERS. By Frances Parker. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. Author of the two big Western successes: "Hope Hathaway" and "Marjie of the Lower Ranch." This is the first work from the pen of Miss Parker in four years. You will find in her new strong and compelling story of the Great West many startling disclosures of our land that will rouse criticism and interest. TRACT NUMBER 3377. By George H. Higgins and Margaret Higgins Haffey. Spendidly Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. Tells how Ashton Walbridge, a young college man, enters the oil regions to make his fortune, and how he overcomes all obstacles. You will admire Enoch, laugh at "Little Prue" and sympathize with Anna. Said by many critics who have read the advance sheets to be far and ahead of John Fox, Jr.'s "The Trail of the Lonesome Pine." Bound to be a big seller. REAL LETTERS OF A REAL GIRL. By Betty. Richly bound. Price, $1.25. The author of this splendid book possesses that rarest of gifts, genuine and spontaneous humor. She has, moreover, the broad outlook of life and the people that travel in many lands, coupled with the keen observation and wit to record her impressions that makes her book at once unique and captivating. THE HEART OF SILENCE. By Walter S. Cramp. Richly bound. Price, $1.50. The scene of the opening part of this story is laid in Italy with an American family, consisting of a retired manufacturer from the United States, his wife and daughter, who is the heroine, and a foster son. Around this family is woven a charming tale of love and romance. Not a dull line. MY SOLDIER LADY. By Ella Hamilton Durley. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.25. This bright little book gives the other half of the correspondence comprising that charming story, "The Lady of the Decoration," but is complete in itself and entirely independent and original in conception and heart interest. Five editions and still selling. THE TOBACCO TILLER. By Sarah Bell Hackley. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. A strong and compelling romance woven about an industry and placed in a section of the country that is attracting international attention at the present time. IN THE TWILIGHT ZONE. By Roger Carey Craven. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. A story of the South. It is instinct with ambitions, passions and problems of its strongly drawn characters. THE DRAGNET. By Elizabeth B. Bohan. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. A timely story dealing with the liquor question and municipal reform. These topics are interwoven in a powerful story, in a fearless way that will stimulate thought along these lines. CHANEY'S STRATAGEM. By Hannah Courtenay Pinnix. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.60. A striking piece of fiction. The sudden and unexpected turn of Fortune's Wheel, by which the heroine and the other characters find their level, makes mighty interesting reading. TOMPKINSVILLE FOLKS. By Nettie Stevens. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. Is a careful study of human nature in human life. The pathos and charm of its rural setting and homely characters are drawn with firm yet skilful touch. THE CAREER OF JOY. By Grace Eleanore Towndrow. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.25. Genuinely, tenderly, and with a pervasive charm impossible to describe, the author tells the story of the old love, which returns to the woman's life after the fetters of a loveless marriage enchain her. Which path shall she choose? THE VASSALAGE. By Adelaide Fuller Bell. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. The story is vivid, dramatic, picturesque, and the strong strange psychic forces in the lives of the principal characters add a wholly unique interest to the tale. THE BELL COW. By Bryant E. Sherman. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. Decidedly a story of simple country life. The trials and pleasures are those of the out-of-the-way places. There is plot strong enough to keep the reader's interest from cover to cover. Humor, pathos and excitement are all here, but the most important part is played by the Aunt Betsy, the old maid with the big heart. ALICE BRENTON. By Mary Josephine Dale. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. The author has drawn a vivid picture of Colonial Newport, with her wealth and culture, spacious mansions and handsome grounds. Mrs. Gale describes the sufferings and privations of the people during those trying days, calls attention to the depredations of the soldiers, and in the end makes love triumph over all obstacles. The book has ingenuity in plot, and much interesting material.--_The News, Newport, R. I._ THE DOOR WHERE THE WRONG LAY. By Mary E. Greene. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. A story that will well repay the reading is "The Door Where The Wrong Lay." The plot is a strange and unusual one, and the story is one which will linger in the memory long after many a lighter tale is forgotten.--_Boston Times._ A KNIGHT IN HOMESPUN. By John Charles Spoth. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. A homely little tale of wholesome sentiment, bearing the title, "A Knight In Homespun," has its scene mainly in and about Pocono Mountains in Eastern Pennsylvania. It is told through the medium of the old clock, which for many years had ticked off the time in the hall of the home of Dr. Henry Boosch, while it watched the development of the human drama which went on in the household.--_New York Times._ UNCLE SIM. By Fred Perrine Lake. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. A story with a charming rural setting is "Uncle Sim." It gives admirable portraiture of the types to be found in a country village--pleasant, kindly, royal-hearted folk, whose acquaintance is well worth the reader's while.--_Boston Times._ AT THE SIGN OF THE BLUE ANCHOR. By Grace R. Osgood. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. This tale of Colonial Days in New Jersey takes one among charming people, through delightful and romantic scenes both in the Old World and New. WHERE MEN HAVE WALKED. By H. Henry Rhodes. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. Wild and varied as the ocean itself is this strong tale of pirate deeds and hidden treasures. UP THE GRADE. By David W. Edwards. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. A story of tender filial devotion that should be read by every young man in the land. A tale of a strong, brave man and a true, loving woman. THE TRAGEDY OF THE DESERTED ISLE. By Warren Wood. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. A story woven about the Burr and Blennerhassett conspiracy. Much has been written concerning this famous episode, but in this book many hitherto and amazing unknown incidents are revealed. A COWBOY CAVALIER. By Harriet C. Morse. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. A Texas ranch is the background of a love story whose heroine is an attractive Eastern girl, and her lover a brave cowboy cavalier, giving pictures of rough and tragic customs that will soon be only memories.--_McClurg's Monthly Bulletin._ THE JAYHAWKER. By John A. Martin. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. Mr. Martin's little story is well done and is worth while. His characters are as real as the scenes he depicts, and the incidents which go to embellish his plot are dramatic and full of excitement.--_Boston Herald._ THE LAW OF THE RANGE. By Wayne Groves Barrows. Illustrated. Cloth. Price, $1.50. A vivid and realistic tale of the factional wars waged by the plainsmen of New Mexico a generation ago. For complete list send to The C. M. Clark Publishing Co. Boston, Mass. 
41837	----	Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustration. See 41837-h.htm or 41837-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/41837/41837-h/41837-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/41837/41837-h.zip) [Illustration: The man sprang back in fear--Chapter XII.] Adventure Stories for Girls THE SECRET MARK by ROY J. SNELL The Reilly & Lee Co. Chicago Printed in the United States of America Copyright, 1923 by The Reilly & Lee Co. All Rights Reserved CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I A Mysterious Visitor 7 II Elusive Shakespeare 19 III The Gargoyle 30 IV What the Gargoyle Might Tell 40 V The Papier-Mache Lunch Box 50 VI "One Can Never Tell" 62 VII The Vanishing Portland Chart 73 VIII What Was In the Papier-Mache Lunch Box 81 IX Shadowed 94 X Mysteries of the Sea 102 XI Lucile Shares Her Secret 111 XII The Trial By Fire 121 XIII In the Mystery Room at Night 131 XIV A Strange Request 138 XV A Strange Journey 143 XVI Night Visitors 155 XVII A Battle in the Night 166 XVIII Frank Morrow Joins in the Hunt 176 XIX Lucile Solves No Mystery 190 XX "That Was the Man" 199 XXI A Theft in the Night 211 XXII Many Mysteries 218 XXIII Inside the Lines 228 XXIV Secrets Revealed 235 XXV Better Days 242 The Secret Mark CHAPTER I A MYSTERIOUS VISITOR Lucile Tucker's slim, tapered fingers trembled slightly as she rested them against a steel-framed bookcase. She had paused to steady her shaken nerves, to collect her wits, to determine what her next move should be. "Who can it be?" her madly thumping heart kept asking her. And, indeed, who, besides herself, could be in the book stacks at this hour of the night? About her, ranging tier on tier, towering from floor to ceiling, were books, thousands on thousands of books. The two floors above were full of books. The two below were the same. This place was a perfect maze of books. It was one of the sections of a great library, the library of one of the finest universities of the United States. In all this vast "city of books" she had thought herself quite alone. It was a ghostly hour. Midnight. In the towers the great clock had slowly struck. Besides the striking of the clock there had been but a single sound: the click of an electric light snapped on. There had instantly gleamed at her feet a single ray of light. That light had traveled beneath many tiers of books to reach her. She thought it must be four but was not quite sure. She had been preparing to leave the "maze," as she often called the stacks of books which loomed all about her. So familiar was she with the interior of this building that she needed no light to guide her. To her right was a spiral stairway which like an auger bored its way to the ground four stories below. Straight ahead, twenty tiers of books away, was a small electric elevator, used only for lifting or lowering piles of books. Fourteen tiers back was a straight stairway. To a person unfamiliar with it, the stacks presented a bewildering labyrinth, but to Lucile they were an open book. She had intended making her way back to the straight stairway which led to the door by which she must leave. But now she clutched at her heart as she asked herself once more: "Who can it be? And what does he want?" Only one thing stood out clearly in her bewildered brain: Since she was connected with the stacks as one of their keepers, it was plainly her duty to discover who this intruder might be and, if occasion seemed to warrant, to report the case to her superiors. The university owned many rare and valuable books. She had often wondered that so many of these were kept, not in vaults, but in open shelves. Her heart gave a new bound of terror as she remembered that some of these, the most valuable of all, were at the very spot from which the light came. "Oh! Shame! Why be so foolish?" she whispered to herself suddenly. "Probably some professor with a pass-key. Probably--but what's the use? I've got to find out." With that she began moving stealthily along the narrow passageway which lay between the stacks. Tiptoeing along, with her heart thumping so loudly she could not help feeling it might be heard, she advanced step by step until she stood beside the end of the stack nearest the strange intruder. There for a few seconds she stuck. The last ounce of courage had oozed out. She must await its return. Then with a sudden burst of courage she swung round the corner. The next instant she was obliged to exert all her available energy to suppress a laugh. Standing in the circle of light was not some burly robber, but a child, a very small and innocent looking child. Yet a second glance told her that the child was older than she looked. Her face showed that. Old as the face was, the body of the child appeared tiny as a sparrow's. A green velvet blouse of some strangely foreign weave, a coarse skirt, a pair of heavy shoes, unnoticeable stockings and that face--all this flashed into her vision for a second. Then all was darkness; the light had been snapped out. The action was so sudden and unexpected that for a few seconds the young librarian stood where she was, motionless. Wild questions raced through her mind: Who was the child? What was she doing in the library at this unearthly hour? How had she gotten in? How did she expect to get out? She had a vaguely uneasy feeling that the child carried a package. What could that be other than books? A second question suddenly disturbed her: Who was this child? Had she seen her before? She felt sure she had. But where? Where? All this questioning took but seconds. The next turn found her mind focused on the one important question: Which way had the child gone? As if in answer to her question, her alert ears caught the soft pit-pat of footsteps. "She's going on to my right," she whispered to herself. "That's good. There is no exit in that direction, only windows and an impossible drop of fifty feet. I'll tiptoe along, throw on the general switch, catch her at that end and find out why she is here. Probably accepting a dare or going through with some childish prank." Hastily she tiptoed down the aisle between the stacks. Then, turning to her left, she put out her hand, touched a switch and released a flood of light. At first its brightness blinded her. The next instant she stared about her in astonishment. The place was empty. "Deserted as a tomb," she whispered. And so it was. Not a trace of the child was to be seen. "As if I hadn't seen her at all!" she murmured. "I don't believe in ghosts, but--where have I seen that face before? You'd never forget it, once you'd seen it. And I have seen it. But where?" Meditatively she walked to the dummy elevator which carried books up and down. She started as her glance fell upon it. The carrier had been on this floor when she left it not fifteen minutes before. Now it was gone. The button that released it was pressed in for the ground floor. "She couldn't have," she murmured. "The compartment isn't over two feet square." She stared again. Then she pressed the button for the return of the elevator. The car moved silently upward to stop at her door. There was nothing about it to show that it had been used for unusual purposes. "And yet she might have," she mused. "She was so tiny. She might have pressed herself into it and ridden down." Suddenly she switched off the lights and hurried to a window. Did she catch a glimpse of a retreating figure at the far side of the campus? She could not be sure. The lights were flickering, uncertain. "Well," she shook herself, then shivered, "I guess that's about all of that. Ought to report it, but I won't. They'd only laugh at me." Again she shivered, then turning, tiptoed down the narrow passageway to carry out her original intention of going out of the building by way of the back stairs. Her room was only a half block away in a dormitory on the corner of the campus nearest the library. Having reached the dormitory, she went to her room and began disrobing for the night. In the bed near her own, wrapped in profound sleep, lay her roommate. She wished to waken her, to tell her of the strange event of the night. For a moment she stood with the name "Florence" quivering on her lips. The word died unspoken. "No use to trouble her," she decided. "She's been working hard lately and needs the sleep." At last, clad in her dream robes, with her abundant hair streaming down her back and her white arms gleaming in the moonlight, she sat down by the open window to think and dream. It was a wonderful picture that lay spread out before her, a vista of magnificent Gothic structures of gray sandstone framed in lawns of perfectly kept green. Sidewalks wound here, there, everywhere. Swarming with students during the waking hours, they were silent now. Her bosom swelled with a strange, inexpressible emotion as she realized that she, a mere girl, was a part of it all. Like her roommate, she was one of the thousands of girls who to-day attend the splendid universities of our land. With little money, of humble parentage, they are yet given an opportunity to make their way toward a higher and broader understanding of the meaning of life through study in the university. The thought that this university was possessed of fifty millions of dollars' worth of property, yet had time and patience to make a place for her, both awed and inspired her. The very thought of her position sobered her. Four hours each week day she worked in the stacks at the library. Books that had been read and returned came down to her and by her hands were placed in their particular niches of the labyrinth of stacks. The work was not work to her but recreation, play. She was a lover of books. Just to touch them was a delight. To handle them, to work with them, to keep them in their places, accessible to all, this was joy indeed. Yet this work, which was play to her, went far toward paying her way in the university. And at this thought her brow clouded. She recalled once more the occurrence of a short time before and the strange little face among the stacks. She knew that she ought to tell the head of her section of the library, Mr. Downers, of the incident. Should anything happen, should some book be missing, she would then be free from suspicion. Should suspicion fall upon her, she might be deprived of her position and, from lack of funds, be obliged to give up her cherished dream, a university education. "But I don't want to tell," she whispered to the library tower which, like some kindly, long-bearded old gentleman, seemed to be accusing her. "I don't want to." Hardly had she said this than she realized that there was a stronger reason than her fear of derision that held her back from telling. "It's the face," she told herself. "That poor little kiddie's face. It wasn't beautiful, no, not quite that, but appealing, frankly, fearlessly appealing. If I saw her take a book I couldn't believe that she meant to steal it, or at least that it was she who willed it. "But fi-fum," she laughed a low laugh, throwing back her head until her hair danced over her white shoulders like a golden shower, "why borrow trouble? She probably took nothing. It was but a childish prank." At that she threw back the covers of her bed, thrust her feet deep down beneath them and lay down to rest. To-morrow was Sunday; no work, no study. There would be plenty of time to think. She believed that she had dismissed the scene in the library from her mind, yet even as she fell asleep something seemed to tell her that she was mistaken, that the child had really stolen a book, that there were breakers ahead. And that something whispered truth, for this little incident was but the beginning of a series of adventures such as a college girl seldom is called upon to experience. Being ignorant of all this, she fell asleep to dream sweet dreams while the moon out of a cloudless sky, beaming down upon the faultless campus, seemed at times to take one look in at her open window. CHAPTER II ELUSIVE SHAKESPEARE The sun had been up for more than an hour when on the following morning Lucile lifted her head sleepily and looked at the clock. "Sunday morning. I'm glad!" she exclaimed as she leaped out of bed and raced away for a cold shower. As she dressed she experienced a sensation of something unfinished and at the same time a desire to hide something, to defend someone. At first she could not understand what it all meant. Then, like a flash, the occurrence of the previous night flashed upon her. "Oh, that," she breathed. She was surprised to find that her desire to shield the child had gained tremendously in strength while she slept. Perhaps there are forces we know nothing of, which work on the inner, hidden chambers of our mind while we sleep, and having worked there, leave impressions which determine our very destinies. Lucile was not enough of a philosopher to reason this all out. She merely knew that she did not want to tell anyone of the strange incident, no not even her roommate. And in the end that was just what happened. She told no one. When she went back to her work on Monday night a whole busy day had passed in the library. Thousands of books had shot up the dummy elevator to have their cards stamped and to be given out. Thousands had been returned to their places on their shelves. Was a single book missing? Were two or three missing? Lucile had no way of knowing. Every book that had gone out had been recorded, but to look over these records, then to check back and see if others were missing, would be the work of weeks. She could only await developments. She was surprised at the speed with which these developments came. Mr. Downers, the superintendent, was noted for his exact knowledge regarding the whereabouts of the books which were under his care. She had not been working an hour when a quiet voice spoke to her and with a little start she turned to face her superior. "Miss Tucker," the librarian smiled, "do you chance to have any knowledge of the whereabouts of the first volume of our early edition of Shakespeare?" "Why, no," the girl replied quickly. "Why--er"--there was a catch in her throat--"is it gone?" Mr. Downers nodded as he replied: "Seems temporarily so to be. Misplaced, no doubt. Will show up later." He was still smiling but there were wrinkles in his usually placid brow. "I missed it just now," he went on. "Strange, too. I saw it there only Saturday. The set was to be removed from the library to be placed in the Noyes museum. Considered too valuable to be kept in the library. Very early edition, you know. "Strange!" he puzzled. "It could not have been taken out on the car, as it was used only in the reference reading room. It's not there. I just phoned. However, it will turn up. Don't worry about it." He turned on his heel and was gone. Lucile stared after him. She wanted to call him back, to tell him that it was not all right, that it would not turn up, that the strangely quaint little person she had seen in the library at midnight had carried it away. Yet she said not a word; merely allowed him to pass away. It was as if there was a hand over her mouth forbidding her to speak. "There can't be a bit of doubt about it," she told herself. "That girl was standing right by the shelf where the ancient Shakespeare was kept. She took it. I wonder why? I wonder if she'll come back. Why, of course she will! For the other volume, or to return the one she has. Perhaps to-night. Two volumes were too heavy for those slim shoulders. She'll come back and then she shan't escape me. I'll catch her in the act. Then I'll find out the reason why." So great was her faith in this bit of reasoning that she resolved that, without telling a single person about the affair, she would set a watch that very night for the mysterious child and the elusive Shakespeare. She must solve the puzzle. That night as she sat in the darkened library, listening, waiting, she allowed her mind to recall in a dim and dreamy way the face and form of the mysterious child. As she dreamed thus there suddenly flashed into the foreground from the deepest depths of her memory the time and circumstance on which she had first seen that child. She saw it all as in a dream. The girl had been dressed just as she was Saturday at midnight. She had entered the stacks. That had been a month before. She had appeared leading an exceedingly old man. Bent with the weight of years, leaning upon a cane, all but blind, the old man had moved with a strangely youthful eagerness. He had been allowed to enter the stacks only by special request. He was an aged Frenchman, a lover of books. He wished to come near the books, to sense them, to see them with his age-dimmed eyes, to touch them with his faltering hands. So the little girl had guided him forward. From time to time he had asked that he be allowed to handle certain volumes. He had touched each with a reverent hand. His touch had resembled a caress. Some few he had opened and had felt along the covers. "I wonder why he did that," Lucile had thought to herself. She paused. A sudden thought had flashed into her mind. At the risk of missing her quarry, she groped her way to the shelf where the companion to the stolen volume lay and took it down. Slowly she ran her fingers over the inner part of the cover. "Yes," she whispered, "there is something." She dared not flash on the light. To do so might betray her presence in the building. To-morrow she would see. Replacing the volume in its accustomed niche, she again tiptoed to her post of waiting. As she thought of it now, she began to realize what a large part her unconscious memory had played in her longing to shield the child. She had seen the child render a service to a feeble and all but helpless old man. Her memory had been trying to tell her of this but had only now broken through into her wakeful mind. Lucile was aroused by the thought. "I must save her," she told herself. "I must. I must!" Even with this resolve came a perplexing problem. Why had the child taken the book? Had she done so at the old man's direction? That seemed incredible. Could an old man, tottering to his grave, revealing in spite of his shabby clothing a one-time more than common intellect and a breeding above the average, stoop to theft, the theft of a book? And could he, above all, induce an innocent child to join him in the deed? It was unthinkable. "That man," she thought to herself, "why he had a noble bearing, like a soldier, almost, certainly like a gentleman. He reminded me of that great old general of his own nation who said to his men when the enemy were all but upon Paris: 'They must not pass.' Could he stoop to stealing?" These problems remained all unsolved, for on that night no slightest footfall was heard in the silent labyrinth. The next night was the same, and the next. Lucile was growing weary, hollow-eyed with her vigil. She had told Florence nothing, yet she had surprised her roommate often looking at her in a way which said, "Why are you out so late every night? Why don't you share things with your pal?" And she wanted to, but something held her back. Thursday night came with a raging torrent of rain. It was not her night at the library. She would gladly have remained in her cozy room, wrapped in a kimono, studying, yet, as the chimes pealed out the notes of Auld Lang Syne, telling that the hour of ten had arrived, she hurried into her rubbers and ulster to face the tempest. Wild streaks of lightning faced her at the threshold. A gust of wind seized her and hurried her along for an instant, then in a wild, freakish turn all but threw her upon the pavement. A deluge of rain, seeming to extinguish the very street light, beat down upon her. "How foolish I am!" she muttered. "She would not come on a night like this." And yet she did come. Lucile had not been in her hiding place more than a half hour when she caught the familiar pit-pat of footsteps. "This time she shall not escape me," she whispered, as with bated breath and cushioned footstep she tiptoed toward the spot where the remaining Shakespeare rested. Now she was three stacks away. As she paused to listen she knew the child was at the same distance in the opposite direction. She moved one stack nearer, then listened again. She heard nothing. What had happened?--the child had paused. Had she heard? Lucile's first impulse was to snap on a light. She hesitated and in hesitating lost. There came a sudden glare of light. A child's face was framed in it, a puzzled, frightened face. A slender hand went out and up. A book came down. The light went out. And all this happened with such incredible speed that Lucile stood glued to her tracks through it all. She leaped toward the dummy elevator, only to hear the faint click which told that it was descending. She could not stop it. The child was gone. She dashed to a window which was on the elevated station side. A few seconds of waiting and the lightning rewarded her. In the midst of a blinding flash, she caught sight of a tiny figure crossing a broad stretch of rain-soaked green. The next instant, with rubbers in one hand and ulster in the other, she dashed down the stairs. "I'll get her yet," she breathed. "She belongs down town. She'll take the elevated. There is a car in seven minutes. I'll make it, too. Then we shall see." CHAPTER III THE GARGOYLE Down a long stretch of sidewalk, across a sunken patch of green where the water was to her ankles, down a rain-drenched street, through pools of black water where sewers were choked, Lucile dashed. With no thought for health or safety she exposed herself to the blinding tempest and dashed before skidding autos, to arrive at last panting at the foot of the rusted iron stairs that led to the elevated railway platform. Pausing only long enough to catch her breath and arrange her garments that the child might not be frightened away by her appearance, she hurried up the stairs. The train came thundering in. There was just time to thrust a dime through the wicker window and to bound for the door. Catching a fleeting glimpse of the dripping figure of the child, she made a dash for that car and made it. A moment later, with her ulster thrown over on the seat beside her, she found herself facing the child. Sitting there curled up in a corner, as she now was, hugging a bulky package wrapped in oilcloth, the child seemed older and tinier than ever. "How could she do it?" was Lucile's unspoken question as she watched the water oozing from her shoes to drip-drip to the floor below. With the question came a blind resolve to see the thing through to the end. This child was not the real culprit. Cost what it might, she would find who was behind her strange actions. There is no place in all the world where a thunderstorm seems more terrible than in the deserted streets in the heart of a great city at night. Echoing and re-echoing between the towering walls of buildings, the thunder seems to be speaking to the universe. Flashing from a thousand windows to ten thousand others, the lightning seems to be searching the haunts and homes of men. The whole wild fury of it seems but the voice of nature defying man in his great stronghold, the city. It is as if in thundering tones she would tell him that great as he may imagine himself, he is not a law unto himself and can never be. Into the heart of a great city on a night like this the elevated train carried Lucile and the child. On the face of the child, thief as she undoubtedly was, and with the stolen goods in her possession, there flashed not one tremor, not a falling of an eyelash, which might be thought of as a sign of fear of laws of nature, man or God. Was she hardened or completely innocent of guilt? Who at that moment could tell? It would be hard to imagine a more desolate spot than that in which the car discharged its two passengers. As Lucile's eye saw the sea of dreary, water-soaked tenements and tumbledown cottages that, like cattle left out in the storm, hovered beside the elevated tracks, she shivered and was tempted to turn back--yet she went on. A half block from the station she passed a policeman. Again she hesitated. The child was but a half block before her. She suspected nothing. It would be so easy to say to the policeman, "Stop that child. She is a thief. She has stolen property concealed beneath her cape." The law would then take its course and Lucile's hands would be free. Yet something urged her past the policeman, down a narrow street, round a corner, up a second street, down a third, still narrower, and up to the door of the smallest, shabbiest cottage of the whole tumble-down lot. The child had entered here. Lucile paused to consider and, while considering, caught the gleam of light through a torn window shade. The cottage was one story and a garret. The window was within her range of vision. After a glance from left to right, she stepped beneath the porch, which gave her an opportunity to peer through the opening. Here, deep in the shadows, she might look on at the scene within without herself being observed by those within or by passers-by on the street. The picture which came to her through the hole in the shade was so different from that which one might expect that she barely suppressed a gasp. In the room, which was scrupulously clean and tidy, there were but two persons, the child and the old man who had visited the library. Through the grate of a small stove a fire gleamed. Before this fire, all unabashed, the child stripped the water-soaked clothing from her meager body, then stood chafing her limbs, which were purple with cold. The old man appeared all absorbed in his inspection of the book just placed in his hands. Lucile was not surprised to recognize it as the second Shakespeare. From turning it over and over, he paused to open it and peer at its inside cover. Not satisfied with this, he ran his finger over the upper, outside corner. It was then that Lucile saw for the first time the thing she had felt while in the library in the dark. A small square of paper, yellow with age, was in that corner, and in its center was a picture of a gargoyle. A strange looking creation was this gargoyle. It was with such as these the ancients were wont to decorate their mansions. With a savage face that was half man and half lion, he possessed the paws of a beast and the wings of a great bird. About two sides of this picture was a letter L. "So that was it," she breathed. The next moment her attention was attracted by a set of shelves. These ran across one entire end of the room and, save for a single foot of space, were entirely filled with books. The striking fact to be noted was that, if one were able to judge from the appearance of their books, they must all of them be of great age. "A miser of books," she breathed. Searching these shelves, she felt sure she located the other missing volume of Shakespeare. This decision was confirmed at last as the tottering old man made his way to the shelf and filled some two inches of the remaining vacant shelf-space by placing the newly-acquired book beside its mate. After this he stood there for a moment looking at the two books. The expression on his face was startling. In the twinkling of an eye, it appeared to prove her charge of book miser to be false. This was not the look of a Shylock. "More like a father glorying over the return of a long-lost child," she told herself. As she stood there puzzling over this, the room went suddenly dark. The occupants of the house had doubtless gone to another part of the cottage to retire for the night. She was left with two alternatives: to call a policeman and have the place raided or to return quietly to the university and think the thing through. She chose the latter course. After discovering the number of the house and fixing certain landmarks in her mind, she returned to the elevated station. "They'll not dispose of the books, that's certain," she told herself. "The course to be taken in the future will come to me." Stealing silently into her room on her return, she was surprised to find her roommate awake, robed in a kimono and pacing the floor. "Why, Florence!" she breathed. "Why, yourself!" Florence turned upon her. "Where've you been in all this storm? Five minutes more and I should have called the matron. She would have notified the police and then things would have been fine. Grand! Can you see it in the morning papers? 'Beautiful co-ed mysteriously disappears from university dormitory in storm. No trace of her yet found. Roommate says no cause for suicide.'" "Oh!" gasped Lucile, "you wouldn't have!" "What else could I do? How was I to know what had happened? You hadn't breathed a word. You--" Florence sat down upon her bed, dug her bare toes into the rug and stared at her roommate. For once in her life, strong, dependable, imperturbable Florence was excited. "I know," said Lucile, removing her watersoaked dress and stockings and chafing her benumbed feet. "I--I guess I should have told you about it, but it was something I was quite sure you wouldn't understand, so I didn't, that's all. But now--now I've got to tell someone or I'll burst, and I'd rather tell you than anyone else I know." "Thanks," Florence smiled. "Just for that I'll help you into dry clothes, then you can tell me in comfort." The clock struck three and the girls were still deep in the discussion of the mystery. "One thing is important," said Florence. "That is the value of the Shakespeare. Perhaps it's not worth so terribly much after all." "Perhaps not," Lucile wrinkled her brow, "but I am awfully afraid it is. Let's see--who could tell me? Oh, I know--Frank Morrow!" "Who's Frank Morrow?" "He's the best authority on old books there is in the United States to-day. He's right here in this city. Got a cute little shop on the fifteenth floor of the Marshal Annex building. He's an old friend of my father. He'll tell me anything I need to know about books." "All right, you'd better see him to-morrow, or I mean to-day. And now for three winks." Florence threw off her kimono and leaped into bed. Lucile followed her example and the next instant the room was dark. CHAPTER IV WHAT THE GARGOYLE MIGHT TELL Frank Morrow was the type of man any girl might be glad to claim as a friend. He had passed his sixty-fifth birthday and for thirty-five years he had been a dealer in old books, yet he was neither stooped nor near-sighted. A man of broad shoulders and robust frame, he delighted as much in a low morning score at golf as he did in the discovery of a rare old book. His hair was white but his cheeks retained much of their ruddy glow. His quiet smile gave to all who visited his shop a feeling of genuine welcome which they did not soon forget. His shop, like himself, reflected the new era which has dawned in the old book business. Men have come to realize that age lends worth to books that possessed real worth in the beginning and they are coming to house them well. On one of the upper floors of a modern business block Frank Morrow's shop was flooded with sunshine and fresh air. A potted plant bloomed on his desk. The books, arranged neatly without a painful effort at order, presented the appearance of some rich gentleman's library. A darker corner, a room by itself, to the right and back, suggested privacy and seclusion and here Frank Morrow's finds were kept. Many of them were richly bound and autographed. The wise and the rich of the world passed through Frank Morrow's shop, for in his brain there rested knowledge which no other living man could impart. Did a bishop wish to purchase an out-of-print book for his ecclesiastical library, he came to Frank Morrow to ask where it might be found. Did the prince of the steel market wish a folio edition of Audubon's "Birds of America"? He came to Frank and somewhere, in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Frank found it for him. Authors came to him and artists as well, not so much for what he could find for them as for what he might impart in the way of genial friendship and the lore of books. It was to this man and this shop that Lucile made her way next morning. She was not prepared to confide in him to the extent of telling him the whole story of her mystery, for she did not know him well. He was her father's friend, that was all. She did wish to tell him that she was in trouble and to ask his opinion of the probable value of the set of Shakespeare which had been removed from the university library. "Well, now," he smiled as he adjusted his glasses after she had asked her question, "I'll be glad to help you if I can, but I'm not sure that I can. There are Shakespeares and other Shakespeares. I don't know the university set--didn't buy it for them. Probably a donation from some rich man. It might be a folio edition. In that case--well"--he paused and smiled again--"I trust you haven't burned this Shakespeare by mistake nor had it stolen from your room or anything like that?" "No! Oh, no! Not--nothing like that!" exclaimed Lucile. "Well, as I was about to say, I found a very nice folio edition for a rich friend of mine not so very long ago. The sale of it I think was the record for this city. It cost him eighteen thousand dollars." Lucile gasped, then sat staring at him in astonishment. "Eighteen thousand dollars!" she managed to murmur at last. "Of course you understand that was a folio edition, very rare. There are other old editions that are cheaper, much cheaper." "I--I hope so," murmured Lucile. "Would you like to see some old books and get a notion of their value?" he asked. "Indeed I would." "Step in here." He led the way into the mysterious dark room. There he switched on a light to reveal walls packed with books. "Here's a little thing," he smiled, taking down a volume which would fit comfortably into a man's coat pocket; "Walton's Compleat Angler. It's a first edition. Bound in temporary binding, vellum. What would you say it was worth?" "I--I couldn't guess. Please don't make me," Lucile pleaded. "Sixteen hundred dollars." Again Lucile stared at him in astonishment. "That little book!" "You see," he said, motioning her a seat, "rare books, like many other rare things, derive their value from their scarcity. The first edition of this book was very small. Being small and comparatively cheap, the larger number of the books were worn out, destroyed or lost. So the remaining books have come to possess great value. The story--" He came to an abrupt pause, arrested by a look of astonishment on the girl's face, as she gazed at the book he held. "Why, what--" he began. "That," Lucile pointed to a raised monogram in the upper inside cover of the book. "A private mark," explained Morrow. "Many rich men and men of noble birth in the past had private marks which they put in their books. The custom seems to be as old as books themselves. Men do it still. Let's see, what is that one?" "An embossed 'L' around two sides of the picture of a gargoyle," said Lucile in as steady a tone as she could command. "Ah! yes, a very unusual one. In all my experience I have seen but five books with that mark in them. All have passed through my hands during the past two years. And yet this mark is a very old one. See how yellow the paper is. Probably some foreign library. Many rare books came across the sea during the war. I believe--" He paused to reflect, then said with a tone of certainty, "Yes, I know that mark was in the folio edition of Shakespeare which I sold last year." His words caught Lucile's breath. For the moment she could neither move nor speak. The thought that the set of Shakespeare taken from the library might be the very set sold to the rich man, and worth eighteen thousand dollars, struck her dumb. Fortunately the dealer did not notice her distress but pointing to the bookmark went on: "If that gargoyle could talk now, if it could tell its story and the story of the book it marks, what a yarn it might spin. "For instance," his eyes half closed as the theme gripped him, "this mark is unmistakably continental--French or German. French, I'd say, from the form of the 'L' and the type of gargoyle. Many men of wealth and of noble birth on the continent have had large collections of books printed in English. This little book with the gargoyle on the inside of its cover is a hundred years old. It's a young book as ancient books go, yet what things have happened in its day. It has seen wars and bloodshed. The library in which it has reposed may have been the plotting place of kings, knights and dukes or of rebels and regicides. "It may have witnessed domestic tragedies. What great man may have contemplated the destruction of his wife? What noble lady may have whispered in its presence of some secret love? What youths and maids may have slipped away into its quiet corner to utter murmurs of eternal devotion? "It may have been stolen, been carried away as booty in war, been pawned with its mates to secure a nobleman's ransom. "Oh, I tell you," he smiled as he read the interest in her face, "there is romance in old books, thrilling romance. Whole libraries have been stolen and secretly disposed of. Chests of books have been captured by pirates. "Here is a book, a copy of Marco Polo's travels, a first edition copy which, tradition tells us, was once owned by the renowned pirate, Captain Kidd. I am told he was fond of reading. However that may be, there certainly were men of learning among his crew. There never was a successful gang of thieves that did not have at least one college man in it." He chuckled at his own witticism and Lucile smiled with him. "Well," he said rising, "if there is anything I can do for you at any time, drop in and ask me. I am always at the service of fair young ladies. One never grows too old for that; besides, your father was my very good friend." Lucile thanked him, took a last look at the pocket volume worth sixteen hundred dollars, made a mental note of the form of its gargoyle, then handed it to him and left the room. She little dreamed how soon and under what strange circumstances she would see that book again. She left the shop of Frank Morrow in a strange state of mind. She felt that she should turn the facts in her possession over to the officials of the library and allow them to deal with the child and the old man. Yet there was something mysterious about it all. That collector of books, doubtless worth a fortune, in surroundings which betokened poverty, the strange book mark, the look on the old man's face as he fingered the volume of Shakespeare, how explain all these? If the university authorities or the police handled the case, would they take time to solve these mysteries, to handle the case in such a way as would not hasten the death of this feeble old man nor blight the future of this strange child? She feared not. "Life, the life of a child, is of greater importance than is an ancient volume," she told herself at last. "And with the help of Florence and perhaps of Frank Morrow I will solve the mystery myself. Yes, even if it costs me my position and my hope for an education!" She paused to stamp the pavement, then hurried away toward the university. CHAPTER V THE PAPIER-MACHE LUNCH BOX "But, Lucile!" exclaimed Florence after she had heard the latest development in the mystery. "If the books are worth all that money, how dare you take the risk of leaving things as they are for a single hour?" "We don't know that they are that identical edition." "But you say the gargoyle was there." "Yes, but that doesn't prove anything. There might have been a whole family of gargoyle libraries for all we know. Besides, what if it is? What are two books compared to the marring of a human life? What right has a university, or anyone else for that matter, to have books worth thousands of dollars? Books are just tools or playthings. That's all they are. Men use them to shape their intellects just as a carpenter uses a plane, or they use them for amusement. What would be the sense of having a wood plane worth eighteen thousand dollars when a five dollar one would do just as good work?" "But what do you mean to do about it?" asked Florence. "I'm going down there by that mysterious cottage and watch what happens to-night and you are going with me. We'll go as many nights as we have to. If it's necessary we'll walk in upon our mysterious friends and make them tell why they took the books. Maybe they won't tell but they'll give them back to us and unless I'm mistaken that will at least be better for the girl than dragging her into court." "Oh, all right," laughed Florence, rising and throwing back her shoulders. "I suppose you're taking me along as a sort of bodyguard. I don't mind. Life's been a trifle dull of late. A little adventure won't go so bad and since it is endured in what you choose to consider a righteous cause, it's all the better. But please let's make it short. I do love to sleep." Had she known what the nature of their adventure was to be, she might at least have paused to consider, but since the things we don't know don't hurt us, she set to work planning this, their first nightly escapade. Reared as they had been in the far West and the great white North, the two girls had been accustomed to wildernesses of mountains, forest and vast expanses of ice and snow. One might fancy that for them, even at night, a great city would possess no terrors. This was not true. The quiet life at the university, eight miles from the heart of the city, had done little to rid them of their terror of city streets at night. To them every street was a canyon, the end of each alley an entrance to a den where beasts of prey might lurk. Not a footfall sounded behind them but sent terror to their hearts. Lucile had gone on that first adventure alone in the rain on sudden impulse. The second was premeditated. They coolly plotted the return to the narrow street where the mysterious cottage stood. Nothing short of a desire to serve someone younger and weaker than herself could have induced Lucile to return to that region, the very thought of which sent a cold shiver running down her spine. As for Florence, she was a devoted chum of Lucile. It was enough that Lucile wished her to go. Other interests might develop later; for the present, this was enough. So, on the following night, a night dark and cloudy but with no rain, they stole forth from the hall to make their way down town. They had decided that they would go to the window of the torn shade and see what they might discover, but, on arriving at the scene, decided that there was too much chance of detection. "We'll just walk up and down the street," suggested Lucile. "If she comes out we'll follow her and see what happens. She may go back to the university for more books." "You don't think she'd dare?" whispered Florence. "She returned once, why not again?" "There are no more Shakespeares." "But there are other books." "Yes." They fell into silence. The streets were dark. It grew cold. It was a cheerless task. Now and again a person passed them. Two of them were men, noisy and drunken. "I--I don't like it," shivered Lucile, "but what else is there to do?" "Go in and tell them they have our books and must give them up." "That wouldn't solve anything." "It would get our books back." "Yes, but--" Suddenly Lucile paused, to place a hand on her companion's arm. A slight figure had emerged from the cottage. "It's the child," she whispered. "We must not seem to follow. Let's cross the street." They expected the child to enter the elevated station as she had done before, but this she did not do. Walking at a rapid pace, she led them directly toward the very heart of the city. After covering five blocks, she began to slow down. "Getting tired," was Florence's comment. "More people here. We could catch up with her and not be suspected." This they did. Much to their surprise, they found the child dressed in the cheap blue calico of a working woman's daughter. "What's that for?" whispered Lucile. "Disguise," Florence whispered. "She's going into some office building. See, she is carrying a pressed paper lunch box. She'll get in anywhere with that; just tell them she's bringing a hot midnight lunch to her mother. "It's strange," she mused, "when you think of it, how many people work while we sleep. Every morning hundreds of thousands of people swarm to their work or their shopping in the heart of the city and they find all the carpets swept, desks and tables dusted, floors and stairs scrubbed, and I'll bet that not one in a hundred of them ever pauses to wonder how it all comes about. Not one in a thousand gives a passing thought to the poor women who toil on hands and knees with rag and brush during the dark hours of night that everything may be spick and span in the morning. I tell you, Lucile, we ought to be thankful that we're young and that opportunities lie before us. I tell you--" She was stopped by a grip on her arm. "Wha--where has she gone?" stammered Lucille. "She vanished!" "And she was not twenty feet before us a second ago." The two girls stood staring at each other in astonishment The child had disappeared. "Well," said Lucile ruefully, "I guess that about ends this night's adventure." "I guess so," admitted Florence. The lights of an all-night drug store burned brightly across the street. "That calls for hot chocolate," said Florence. "It's what I get for moralizing. If I hadn't been going on at such a rate we would have kept sight of her." They lingered for some time over hot chocolate and wafers. They were waiting for a surface car to carry them home when, on hearing low but excited words, they turned about to behold to their vast astonishment their little mystery child being led along by the collar of her dress. The person dragging her forward was an evil looking woman who appeared slightly the worse for drink. "So that's the trick," they heard her snarl. "So you would run away! Such an ungratefulness. After all we done for you. Now you shall beg harder than ever." "No, I won't beg," the girl answered in a small but determined voice. "And I shan't steal either. You can kill me first." "Well, we'll see, my fine lady," growled the woman. All this time the child was being dragged forward. As she came opposite the two girls, the woman gave a harder tug than before and the girl almost fell. Something dropped to the sidewalk, but the woman did not notice it, and the child evidently did not care, for they passed on. Lucile stooped and picked it up. It was the paper lunch box they had seen the child carrying earlier in the evening. "Something in it," she said, shaking it. "Lucile," said Florence in a tense whisper, "are we going to let that beast of a woman get that child? She doesn't belong to her, or if she does, she oughtn't to. I'm good for a fight." Lucile's face blanched. "Here in this city wilderness," she breathed. "Anywhere for the good of a child. Come on." Florence was away after the woman and child at a rapid rate. "We'll get the child free. Then we'll get out," breathed Florence. "We don't want any publicity." Fortune favored their plan. The woman, still dragging the child, who was by now silently weeping, hurried into a narrow dismal alley. Suddenly as she looked about at sound of a footstep behind her, she was seized in two vises and hurled by some mechanism of steel and bronze a dozen feet in air, to land in an alley doorway. At least so it seemed to her, nor was it far from the truth. For Florence's months of gymnasium work had turned her muscles into things of steel and bronze. It was she who had seized the woman. It was all done so swiftly that the woman had no time to cry out. When she rose to her feet, the alley was deserted. The child had fled in one direction, while the two girls had stepped quietly out into the street in the other direction and, apparently quite unperturbed, were waiting for a car. "Look," said Lucile, "I've still got it. It's the child's lunch basket. There's something in it." "There's our car," said Florence in a relieved tone. The next moment they were rattling homeward. "We solved no mystery to-night," murmured Lucile sleepily. "Added one more to the rest," smiled Florence. "But now I _am_ interested. We must see it through." "Did you hear what the child said, that she'd rather die than steal?" "Wonder what she calls the taking of our Shakespeare?" "That's part of our problem. Continued in our next," smiled Lucile. She set the dilapidated papier-mache lunch box which she had picked up in the street after the child had dropped it, in the corner beneath the cloak rack. Before she fell asleep she thought of it and wondered what had been thumping round inside of it. "Probably just an old, dried-up sandwich," she told herself. "Anyway, I'm too weary to get up and look now. I'll look in the morning." One other thought entered her consciousness before she fell asleep. Or was it a thought? Perhaps just one or two mental pictures. The buildings, the street, the electric signs that had encountered her gaze as they first saw the child and the half-drunk woman passed before her mind's eye. Then, almost instantly, the picture of the street on which the building in which Frank Morrow's book shop was located flashed before her. "That's queer!" she murmured. "I do believe they were the same!" "And indeed," she thought dreamily, "why should they not be? They are both down in the heart of the city and I am forever losing my sense of location down there." At that she fell asleep. CHAPTER VI "ONE CAN NEVER TELL" When Lucile awoke in the morning she remembered the occurrence of the night before as some sort of bad dream. It seemed inconceivable that she and Florence, a couple of co-eds, should have thrown themselves upon a rough-looking woman in the heart of the city on a street with which they were totally unfamiliar. Had they done this to free a child about whom they knew nothing save that she had stolen two valuable books? "Did we?" she asked sleepily. "Did we what?" smiled Florence, drawing the comb through her hair. "Did we rescue that child from that woman?" "I guess we did." "Why did we do it?" "That's what I've been wondering." Lucile sat up in bed and thought for a moment. She gazed out of the window at the lovely green and the magnificent Gothic architecture spread out before her. She thought of the wretched alleys and tumble-down tenements which would greet the eye of that mysterious child when she awoke. "Anyway," she told herself, "we saved her from something even worse, I do believe. We sent her back to her little old tottering man. I do think she loves him, though who he is, her grandfather or what, I haven't the faintest notion. "Anyway I'm glad we did it," she said. "Did what?" panted Florence, who by this time was going through her morning exercises. "Saved the child." "Yes, so am I." The papier-mache lunch box remained in its place in the dark corner when they went to breakfast Both girls had completely forgotten it. Had Lucile dreamed what it contained she would not have passed it up for a thousand breakfasts. Since she didn't, she stepped out into the bright morning sunshine, and drinking in deep breaths of God's fresh air, gave thanks that she was alive. The day passed as all schooldays pass, with study, lectures, laboratory work, then dinner as evening comes. In the evening paper an advertisement in the "Lost, Strayed or Stolen" column caught her eye. It read: "REWARD "Will pay $100.00 reward for the return of small copy of The Compleat Angler which disappeared from the Morrow Book Shop on November 3." It was signed by Frank Morrow. "Why, that's strange!" she murmured. "I do believe that was the book he showed me only yesterday, the little first edition which was worth sixteen hundred dollars. How strange!" A queer sinking sensation came over her. "I--I wonder if she could have taken it," she whispered, "that child? "No, no," she whispered emphatically after a moment's thought. "And, yet, there was the gargoyle bookmark in the inside cover, the same as in our Shakespeare. How strange! It might be--and, yet, one can never tell." That evening was Lucile's regular period at the library, so, much as she should have liked delving more deeply into the mystery which had all but taken possession of her, she was obliged to bend over a desk checking off books. Working with her was Harry Brock, a fellow student. Harry was the kind of fellow one speaks of oftenest as a "nice boy." Clean, clear-cut, carefully dressed, studious, energetic and accurate, he set an example which was hard to follow. He had taken a brotherly interest in Lucile from the start and had helped her over many hard places in the library until she learned her duties. Shortly after she had come in he paused by her desk and said in a quiet tone: "Do you know, I'm worried about the disappearance of that set of Shakespeare. Sort of gives our section a long black mark. Can't see where it's disappeared to." Lucile drew in a long breath. What was he driving at? Did he suspect? Did he-- "If I wasn't so sure our records were perfect," he broke in on her mental questioning, "I'd say it was tucked away somewhere and would turn up. But we've all been careful. It just can't be here." He paused as if in reflection, then said suddenly: "Do you think one would ever be justified in protecting a person whom he knew had stolen something?" Lucile started. What did he mean? Did he suspect something? Had he perhaps seen her enter the library on one of those nights of her watching? Did he suspect her? For a second the color rushed flaming to her cheeks. But, fortunately, he was looking away. The next second she was her usual calm self. "Why, yes," she said steadily, "I think one might, if one felt that there were circumstances about the apparent theft which were not clearly understood. "You know," she said as a sudden inspiration seized her, "we've just finished reading Victor Hugo's story of Jean Valjean in French. Translating a great story a little each day, bit by bit, is such a wonderful way of doing it. And that is the greatest story that ever was written. Have you read it?" He nodded. "Well, then you remember how that poor fellow stole a loaf of bread to feed his sister's hungry children and how, without trying to find out about things and be just, they put him in prison. Then, because he tried to get out, they kept him there years and years. Then when they at last let him out, in spite of it all, after he had come into contact with a beautiful, unselfish old man, he became one of the most wonderful characters the world may hope to know. Just think how wonderful his earlier years, wasted in prison, might have been if someone had only tried a little to understand." "You're good," smiled Harry. "When I get arrested I'll have you for my lawyer." Lucile, once more quite herself, laughed heartily. Then she suddenly sobered. "If I were you," she said in a low tone, "I shouldn't worry too much about that set of Shakespeare. Someway I have an idea that it will show up in its own good time." Harry shot her a quick look, then as he turned to walk away, said in a tone of forced lightness: "Oh! All right." The following night they were free to return to the scene of the mystery, the cottage on dreary Tyler street where the old man and the strange child lived. A light shone out of the window with the torn shade as they loitered along in front of the place as before. Much to their surprise, not ten minutes had passed when the child stole forth. "We were just in time," breathed Florence. "Dressed just as she was on the first night I saw her," Lucile whispered as the child passed them. "She's making for the elevated station this time," said Florence as they hurried along after her. "That means a long trip and you are tired. Why don't you let me follow her alone?" "Why I--" Lucile cut her speech short to grip her companion's arm. "Florence," she whispered excitedly, "did you hear a footstep behind us?" "Why, yes, I--" Florence hesitated. Lucile broke in: "There was one. I am sure of it, and just now as I looked about there was no one in sight. You don't think someone could suspect--be shadowing us?" "Of course not." "It might be that woman who tried to carry the child away." "I think not. That was in another part of the city. Probably just nothing at all." "Yes, yes, there it is now. I hear it. Look about quick." "No one in sight," said Florence. "It's your nerves. You'd better go home and get a good night's sleep." They parted hurriedly at the station. Florence swung onto the train boarded by the child, a train which she knew would carry her to the north side, directly away from the university. "Probably be morning before I get in," she grumbled to herself. "What a wild chase!" Yet, as she stole a glance now and then at the child, who, all unconscious of her scrutiny, sat curled up in the corner of a near-by seat, she felt that, after all, she was worth the effort being made for her. "Whosoever saveth a soul from destruction," she whispered to herself as the train rattled on over the river on its way north. In the meantime Lucile had boarded a south-bound car. She was not a little troubled by the thought of those footsteps behind them on the sidewalk. She knew it was not her nerves. "Someone _was_ following us!" she whispered to herself. "I wonder who and why." She puzzled over it all the way home; was puzzling over it still when she left her car at the university. Somewhat to her surprise she saw Harry Brock leave the same train. He appeared almost to be avoiding her but when she called to him he turned about and smiled. "So glad to have someone to walk those five lonely blocks with," she smiled. "Pleasure mutual," he murmured, but he seemed ill at ease. Lucile glanced at him curiously. "He can't think I've got a crush on him," she told herself. "Our friendship's had too much of the ordinary in it for that. I wonder what is the matter with him." Conversation on the way to the university grounds rambled along over commonplaces. Each studiously avoided any reference to the mystery of the missing books. Lucile was distinctly relieved as he left her at the dormitory door. "Well," she heaved a sigh, "whatever could have come over him? He has always been so frank and fine. I wonder if he suspects--but, no, how could he?" As she hung her wrap in the corner of her room, her eye fell upon the papier-mache lunch box. Her hand half reached for it, then she drew it back and flung herself into a chair. "To-morrow," she murmured. "I'm so tired." Fifteen minutes later she was in her bed fast asleep, dreaming of her pal, and in that dream she saw her rattling on and on and on forever through the night. CHAPTER VII THE VANISHING PORTLAND CHART Florence was not rattling on and on through the night as Lucile dreamed. Some two miles from the heart of the city her journey on the elevated came to a halt. The child left the car and went bounding down the steps. Not many moments passed before Florence realized that her destination was a famous library, the Newburg. Before she knew it the massive structure of gray sandstone loomed up before her. And before she could realize what was happening, the child had darted through the door and lost herself in the labyrinth of halls, stairways and passageways which led to hundreds of rooms where books were stacked or where huge oak tables invited one to pause and read. "She's gone!" Florence gasped. "Now how shall I find her?" Walking with all the speed that proper conduct in such a spacious and dignified hostelry of books would allow, she passed from room to room, from floor to floor, until, footsore and weary, without the least notion of the kind of room she was in or whether she was welcome or not, she at last threw herself into a chair to rest. "She's escaped me!" she sighed. "And I promised to keep in touch with her. What a mess! But the child's a witch. Who could be expected to keep up with her?" "Are you interested in the exhibit?" It was the well-modulated tone of a trained librarian that interrupted her train of thought. The question startled her. "The--er--" she stammered. "Why, yes, very much." What the exhibit might be she had not the remotest notion. "Ah, yes," the lady sighed. "Portland charts are indeed interesting. Perhaps you should like to have me explain some of them to you?" "Portland charts." That did sound interesting. It suggested travel. If there was any one thing Florence was interested in, it was travel. "Why, yes," she said eagerly, "I would." "The most ancient ones," said the librarian, indicating a glass case, "are here. Here you see one that was made in 1440, some time before Columbus sailed for America. These maps were made for mariners. Certain men took it up as a life work, the making of Portland charts. It is really very wonderful, when you think of it. How old they are, four or five hundred years, yet the coloring is as perfect as if they were done but yesterday." Florence listened eagerly. This was indeed interesting. "You see," smiled the librarian, "in those days nothing much was known of what is now the new world, but from time to time ships lost at sea drifted about to land at last on strange shores. These they supposed were shores of islands. When they returned they related their experiences and a new island was stuck somewhere on the map. The exact location could not be discovered, so they might make a mistake of a thousand or more miles in locating them, but that didn't really matter, for no one ever went to them again." "What a time to dream of," sighed Florence. "What an age of mysteries!" "Yes, wasn't it? But there are mysteries quite as wonderful to-day. Only trouble is, we don't see them." "And sometimes we do see them but can't solve them." Florence was thinking of the mystery that thus far was her property and her chum's. "The maps were sometimes bound in thin books very much like an atlas," the librarian explained. "Here is one that is very rare." She indicated a book in a case. The book was open at the first map with the inside of the front cover showing. Florence was about to pass it with a glance when something in the upper outside corner of the cover caught and held her attention. It was the picture of a gargoyle with a letter L surrounding two sides of it. It was a bookmark and, though she had not seen the mark in the missing Shakespeare, she knew from Lucile's description of it that this must be an exact duplicate. "Probably from the same library originally," she thought. "I suppose these charts are worth a great deal of money," she ventured. "Oh! yes. A great deal. One doesn't really set a price on such things. These were the gift of a rich man. It is the finest collection except one in America." As Florence turned to pass on, she was startled to see the mysterious child who had escaped from her sight nearly an hour before, standing not ten feet from her. She was apparently much interested in the cherubs done in blue ink on one chart and used to indicate the prevailing direction of the winds. "Ah, now I have you!" she sighed. "There is but one door to this room. I will watch the door, not you. When you leave the room, I will follow." With the corner of an eye on that door, she sauntered from case to case for another quarter of an hour. Then seized with a sudden desire to examine the chart book with the gargoyle in the corner of its cover, she drifted toward it. Scarcely could she believe her eyes as she gave the case a glance. _The chart book was gone._ Consternation seized her. She was about to cry out when the thought suddenly came to her that the book had probably been removed by the librarian. The next moment a suggestion that the ancient map book and the presence of the child in the room had some definite connection flashed through her mind. Hurriedly her eye swept the room. The child was gone! There remained now not one particle of doubt in her mind. "She took it," she whispered. "I wonder why." Instantly her mind was in a commotion. Should she tell what she knew? At first she thought she ought, yet deliberation led to silence, for, after all, what did she know? She had not seen the child take the book. She had seen her in the room, that was all. And now the librarian, sauntering past the case, noted the loss. The color left her face, but that was all. If anything, her actions were more deliberate than before. Gliding to a desk, she pressed a button. The next moment a man appeared. She spoke a few words. Her tone was low, her lips steady. The man sauntered by the case, glanced about the room, then walked out of the door. Not a word, not an outcry. A book worth thousands had vanished. Yet as she left the library, Florence felt how impossible it would have been for her to have carried that book with her. She passed four eagle-eyed men before she reached the outside door and each one searched her from head to foot quite as thoroughly as an X-ray might have done. "All the same," she breathed, as she reached the cool, damp outer air of night, "the bird has flown, your Portland chart book is gone, for the time at least. "Question is," she told herself, "what am I going to do about it?" CHAPTER VIII WHAT WAS IN THE PAPIER-MACHE LUNCH BOX "We can tell whether she really took it," said Lucile after listening to Florence's story of her strange experiences in the Portland chart room of the famous old library. "We'll go back to Tyler street and look in at the window with the torn shade. If she took it, it's sure to be in the empty space in the book-shelf. Looks like he was trying to fill that space." "He's awfully particular about how it's filled," laughed Florence. "He might pick up enough old books in a secondhand store to fill the whole space and not spend more than a dollar." "Isn't it strange!" mused Lucile. "He might pack a hundred thousand dollars' worth of old books in a space two feet long, and will at the rate he's going." "The greatest mystery after all is the gargoyle in the corner of each book they take," said Florence, wrinkling her brow. "He seems to be sort of specializing in those books. They are taken probably from a private library that has been sold and scattered." "That is strange!" said Lucile. "The whole affair is most mysterious! And, by the way," she smiled, "I have never taken the trouble to look into that papier-mache lunch box the child lost on the street, the night we rescued her from that strange and terrible woman. There might possibly be some clue in it." "Might," agreed Florence. Now that the thought had occurred to them, they were eager to inspect the box. Lucile's fingers trembled as they unloosed the clasps which held it shut. And well they might have trembled, for, as it was thrown open, it revealed a small book done in a temporary binding of vellum. Lucile gave it one glance, then with a little cry of surprise, dropped it as if it were on fire. "Why! Why! What?" exclaimed Florence in astonishment. "It's Frank Morrow's book, Walton's 'Compleat Angler.' The first edition. The one worth sixteen hundred dollars. And it's been right here in this room all the time!" Lucile sank into a chair and there sat staring at the strangely found book. "Isn't that queer!" said Florence at last. "She--she'd been to his shop. Got into the building just the way you said she would, by posing as a scrubwoman's child, and had made a safe escape when that woman for some mysterious reason grabbed her and tried to carry her off." "Looks that way," said Florence. "And I guess that's a clear enough case against her, if our Shakespeare one isn't. You'll tell Frank Morrow and he'll have her arrested, of course." "I--I don't know," hesitated Lucile. "I'm really no surer that that's the thing to do than I was before. There is something so very strange about it all." The book fell open in her hand. The inside of the front cover was exposed to view. The gargoyle in the corner stared up at her. "It's the gargoyle!" she exclaimed. "Why always the gargoyle? And how could a child with a face like hers consciously commit a theft?" For a time they sat silently staring at the gargoyle. At last Lucile spoke. "I think I'll go and talk with Frank Morrow." "Will you tell him all about it?" "I--I don't know." Florence looked puzzled. "Are you going to take the book?" Lucile hesitated. "No," she said after a moment's thought, "I think I sha'n't." "Why--what--" Florence paused, took one look at her roommate's face, then went about the business of gathering up material for a class lecture. "Sometimes," she said after a moment, "I think you are as big a riddle as the mystery you are trying to solve." "Why?" Lucile exclaimed. "I am only trying to treat everyone fairly." "Which can't be done," laughed Florence. "There is an old proverb which runs like this: 'To do right by all men is an art which no one knows.'" Lucile approached the shop of Frank Morrow in a troubled state of mind. She had Frank Morrow's valuable book. She wished to play fair with him. She must, sooner or later, return it to him. Perhaps even at this moment he might have a customer for the book. Time lost might mean a sale lost, yet she did not wish to return it, not at this time. She did not wish even so much as to admit that she had the book in her possession. To do so would be to put herself in a position which required further explaining. The book had been carried away from the bookshop. Probably it had been stolen. Had she herself taken it? If not, who then? Where was the culprit? Why should not such a person be punished? These were some of the questions she imagined Frank Morrow asking her, and, for the present, she did not wish to answer them. At last, just as the elevator mounted toward the upper floors, she thought she saw a way out. "Anyway, I'll try it," she told herself. She found Frank Morrow alone in his shop. He glanced up at her from over an ancient volume he had been scanning, then rose to bid her welcome. "Well, what will it be to-day?" he smiled. "A folio edition of Shakespeare or only the original manuscript of one of his plays?" "Oh," she smiled back, "are there really original manuscripts of Shakespeare's plays?" "Not that anyone has ever discovered. But, my young lady, if you chance to come across one, I'll pledge to sell it for you for a million dollars flat and not charge you a cent commission." "Oh!" breathed Lucile, "that would be marvelous." Then suddenly she remembered her reason for being there. "Please may I take a chair?" she asked, her lips aquiver with some new excitement. "By all means." Frank Morrow himself sank into a chair. "Mr. Morrow," said Lucile, poising on the very edge of the chair while she clasped and unclasped her hands, "if I were to tell you that I know exactly where your book is, the one worth sixteen hundred dollars; the Compleat Angler, what would you say?" Frank Morrow let a paperweight he had been toying with crash down upon the top of his desk, yet as he turned to look at her there was no emotion expressed upon his face, a whimsical smile, that was all. "I'd say you were a fortunate girl. You probably know I offered a hundred dollar reward for its return. This morning I doubled that." Lucile's breath came short and quick. She had completely forgotten the reward. She would be justly entitled to it. And what wouldn't two hundred dollars mean to her? Clothes she had longed for but could not afford; leisure for more complete devotion to her studies; all this and much more could be purchased with two hundred dollars. For a moment she wavered. What was the use? The whole proposition if put fairly to the average person, she knew, would sound absurd. To protect two persons whom you have never met nor even spoken to; to protect them when to all appearances they were committing one theft after another, with no excuse which at the moment might be discovered; how ridiculous! Yet, even as she wavered, she saw again the face of that child, heard again the shuffling footstep of the tottering old man, thought of the gargoyle mystery; then resolved to stand her ground. "I do know exactly where your book is," she said steadily. "But if I were to tell you that for the present I did not wish to have you ask me where it was, what would you say?" "Why," he smiled as before, "I would say that this was a great old world, full of many mysteries that have never been solved. I should say that a mere book was nothing to stand between good friends." He put out a hand to clasp hers. "When you wish to tell me where the book is or to see that it is returned, drop in or call me on the phone. The reward will be waiting for you." Lucile's face was flushed as she rose to go. She wished to tell him all, yet did not dare. "But--but you might have a customer waiting for that book," she exclaimed. "One might," he smiled. "In such an event I should say that the customer would be obliged to continue to wait." Lucile moved toward the door and as she did so she barely missed bumping into an immaculately tailored young man, with all too pink cheeks and a budding moustache. "I beg your pardon," he apologized. "It was my fault," said Lucile much confused. The young man turned to Frank Morrow. "Show up yet?" he asked. "Not yet." "Well?" "I'll let you know if it does." "Yes, do. I have a notion I know where there's another copy." "Well, I'll be sorry to lose the sale, but I can't promise delivery at any known date now." "Perhaps not at all?" "Perhaps." The young man bowed his way out so quickly that Lucile was still in the shop. "That," smiled Frank Morrow, "is R. Stanley Ramsey, Jr., a son of one of our richest men. He wanted 'The Compleat Angler.'" He turned to his work as if he had been speaking of a mere trifle. Lucile was overwhelmed. So he did have a customer who was impatient of waiting and might seek a copy elsewhere? Why, this Frank Morrow was a real sport! She found herself wanting more than ever to tell him everything and to assure him that the book would be on his desk in two hours' time. She considered. But again the face of the child framed in a circle of light came before her. Again on the street at night in the clutches of a vile woman, she heard her say, "I won't steal. I'll die first." Then with a sigh she tiptoed toward the door. "By the way," Frank Morrow's voice startled her, "you live over at the university, don't you?" "Yes." "Mind doing me a favor?" "Certainly not." "The Silver-Barnard binderies are only two blocks from your station. You'll almost pass them. They bind books by hand; fine books, you know. I have two very valuable books which must be bound in leather. I'd hate to trust them to an ordinary messenger and I can't take them myself. Would you mind taking them along?" "N--no," Lucile was all but overcome by this token of his confidence in her. "Thanks." He wrapped the two books carefully and handed them to her, adding, as he did so: "Ask for Mr. Silver himself and don't let anyone else have them. Perhaps," he suggested as an afterthought, "you'd like to be shown through the bindery. It's rather an interesting place." "Indeed I should. Anything that has to do with books interests me." He scribbled a note on a bit of paper. "That'll let you through," he smiled, "and no thanks due. 'One good turn,' you know." He bowed her out of the room. She found Mr. Silver to be a brisk person with a polite and obliging manner. It was with a deep sense of relief that she saw the books safely in his hands. She had seen so much of vanishing books these last few days that she feared some strange magic trick might spirit them from her before they reached their destination. The note requesting that she be taken through the bindery she kept for another time. She must hurry back to the university now. "It will be a real treat," she told herself. "There are few really famous binderies in our country. And this is one of them." Little she realized as she left the long, low building which housed the bindery, what part it was destined to play in the mystery she was attempting to unravel. She returned to the university and to her studies. That night she and Florence went once more to Tyler street, to the tumble-down cottage where the two mysterious persons lived, and there the skein of mystery was thrown into a new tangle. CHAPTER IX SHADOWED A cold fog hung low over the city as the two girls stole forth from the elevated station that night on their way to Tyler street. From the trestlework of the elevated there came a steady drip-drip; the streets reeked with damp and chill; the electric lamps seemed but balls of light suspended in space. "B-r-r!" said Florence, drawing her wraps more closely about her. "What a night!" "Sh!" whispered Lucile, dragging her into a corner. "There's someone following us again." Scarcely had she spoken the words when a man with collar turned up and cap pulled low passed within four feet of them. He traveled with a long, swinging stride. Lucile fancied that she recognized that stride, but she could not be sure; also, for the moment she could not remember who the person was who walked in this fashion. "Only some man returning to his home," said Florence. "This place gets on your nerves." "Perhaps," said Lucile. As they reached the street before the cottage of many mysteries they were pleased to see lights streaming from the rent in the shade. "At least we shall be able to tell whether they have the book of Portland charts," sighed Lucile as she prepared to make a dash for the shadows. "Now," she breathed; "there's no one in sight." Like two lead-colored drifts of fog they glided into a place by the window. Lucile was first to look. The place seemed quite familiar to her. Indeed, at first glance she would have said that nothing was changed. The old man sat in his chair. Half in a doze, he had doubtless drifted into the sort of day-dream that old persons often indulge in. The child, too, sat by the table. She was sewing. That she meant to go out later was proved by the fact that her coat and tam-o'-shanter lay on a near-by chair. As I have said, Lucile's first thought was that nothing had changed. One difference, however, did not escape her. Two books had been added to the library. The narrow, unfilled space had been narrowed still further. One book was tall, too tall for the space which it was supposed to occupy, so tall that it leaned a little to the right. The other book did not appear to be an old volume. On the contrary its back was bright and shiny as if just coming from the press. It was highly ornamented with figures and a title done all in gold. These fairly flashed in the lamplight. "That's strange!" she whispered to herself. But even as she thought it, she realized that this was no ordinary publishers' binding. "Leather," she told herself, "rich leather binding and I shouldn't wonder if the letters and decorations were done in pure gold." Without knowing exactly why she did it, she made a mental note of every figure which played a part in the decorating of the back of that book. Then suddenly remembering her companion and their problem, she touched her arm as she whispered: "Look! Is that tall book second from the end on the shelf with the vacant space the Portland chart book?" Florence pressed her face to the glass and peered for the first time into the room of mysteries. For a full two minutes she allowed the scene to be photographed on the sensitive plates of her brain. Then turning slowly away she whispered: "Yes, I believe it is." They were just thinking of seeking a place of greater safety when a footstep sounded on the pavement close at hand. Crouching low they waited the stranger's passing. To their consternation, he did not pass but turned in at the short walk which led up to the cottage. Crouching still lower, scarcely breathing, they waited. The man made his way directly to the door. After apparently fumbling about for an electric button, he suddenly flashed out an electric torch. With an inaudible gasp Florence prepared to drag her companion out of their place of danger. But to their intense relief the man flashed the light off, then gave the door a resounding knock. That one flash of light had been sufficient to reveal to Lucile the features of his face. She recognized it instantly. In her surprise she gripped her companion's arm until she was ready to cry out with pain. The door flew open. The man entered. The door was closed. "Look!" whispered Lucile, pressing Florence toward the spot where the light streamed out. "Look, I know him." She gave Florence but a half moment, then dragging her from the place of vantage pressed her own face to the glass. "This would be abominable," she whispered, "if it weren't for the fact that we are trying to help them--trying to find a way out." The man, a very young man with a slight moustache, had removed his coat and hat and had taken a seat. He was talking to the old man. He did the greater part of the talking. Every now and again he would pause and the old man would shake his head. This pantomime was kept up for some time. At last the young man rose and walked toward the bookshelves. The old man half rose in his chair as if to detain him, then settled back again. The young man's eyes roved over the books, then came to rest suddenly in a certain spot. Then his hand went out. The old man sprang to his feet. There were words on his lips. What they were the girls could not tell. Smiling with the good-natured grace of one who is accustomed to have what he desires, the young man opened the book to glance at the title page. At once his face became eager. He glanced hurriedly through the book. He turned to put a question to the old man beside him. The old man nodded. Instantly the young man's hand was in his pocket. The two girls shrank back in fear. But the thing he took from his pocket was a small book, apparently a check book. Speaking, he held the check book toward the old man. The old man shook his head. This touch of drama was repeated three times. Then, with a disappointed look on his face, the young man replaced the book, turned to the chair on which his hat and coat rested, put them on, said good night to the old man, bowed to the child and was gone. The two girls, after stretching their cramped limbs, made their way safely to the sidewalk. "Who--who was he?" whispered Florence through chattering teeth. "R. Stanley Ramsey." "Not the rich Ramsey?" "His son." "What did he want?" "I don't know," said Lucile, "but it may be that we have found the man higher up, the real criminal. It may be that this rich young fellow is getting them to steal the books so he can buy them cheap." Lucile told of the incident regarding the copy of "The Compleat Angler." "He said he thought he knew where there was another copy. Don't you see, he may have gotten the girl to steal it. And now he comes for it and is disappointed because they haven't got it for him." "It might be," said Florence doubtfully, "but it doesn't seem probable, does it? He must have plenty of money." "Perhaps his father doesn't give him a large allowance. Then, again, perhaps, he thinks such things are smart. They say that some rich men's sons are that way. There's something that happened in there though that I don't understand. He--" "Hist," whispered Florence, dragging her into a slow walk; "here comes the child." Once more they saw the slim wisp of a girl steal out like a ghost into the night. CHAPTER X MYSTERIES OF THE SEA The trail over which the mystery child led them that night revealed nothing. Indeed, she eluded them, escaping the moment she left the elevated train at a down town station. "Nothing to do but go home," said Florence in a disappointed tone. "Oh, well, cheer up," smiled Lucile. "We've had a new chapter added to our mystery, as well as a whole new character who promises to become interesting. But look, Florence," she whispered suddenly. "No, don't stare, just glance down toward the end of the platform. See that man?" "The one with his collar turned up and with his back to us?" "Yes." "That's the man who passed us when we were on our way to the mystery cottage." "Are you sure?" "Can't be mistaken. Same coat, same hat, same everything." "Why then--" Florence checked herself. A moment later she said in a quiet tone of voice: "Lucile, don't you think it's about time we waded ashore? Came clear and got out of this affair; turned facts over to the authorities and allowed them to take their course?" Lucile was silent for a moment. Then suddenly she shivered all over and whispered tensely: "No--no, not quite yet." "We may get in over our necks." "I can swim. Can't you?" "I'll try," Florence laughed, and there for the time the matter ended. Lucile worked in the library two hours the next day. One fact could not escape her attention. Harry Brock had been losing a lot of sleep. She saw him rubbing his eyes from time to time and once he actually nodded over his records. "Been studying late?" she asked in friendly sympathy. He shot her a quick, penetrating glance, then, seeming to catch himself, said, "Oh, yes, quite a bit." That afternoon, finding study difficult and being in need of a theme for a special article to be written for English 5b, she decided to use her card of admittance to the bindery and glean the material for the theme from that institution. She could scarcely have chosen a more fitting subject, for there are few places more interesting than a famous book bindery. Unfortunately, something occurred while she was there that quite drove all the thoughts of her theme out of her head and added to her already over-burdened shoulders an increased weight of responsibility. A famous bindery is a place of many wonders. The stitching machines, the little and great presses, the glowing fires that heat irons for the stamping, all these and many more lend an air of industry, mystery and fine endeavor to the place. Not in the general bindery, where thousands of books are bound each day, did Lucile find her chief interest, however. It was when she had been shown into a small side room, into which the natural sunlight shone through a broad window, that she realized that she had reached the heart of the place. "This," said the young man attending her, "is the hand bindery. Few books are bound here; sometimes not more than six a year, but they are handsomely, wonderfully bound. Mr. Kirkland, the head of this department, will tell you all about it. I hear my autophone call. I will come for you a little later." Lucile was not sorry to be left alone in such a room. It was a place of rare enchantment. Seated at their benches, bending over their work, with their blue fires burning before them, were three skilled workmen. They were more than workmen; they were artists. The work turned out by them rivaled in beauty and perfection the canvas of the most skilled painter. They wrought in inlaid leather and gold; the artist in crayon and oils. The artist uses palette, knife and brush; their steel tools were fashioned to suit their art. Ranged along one side of the room was a long rack in which these tools were kept. There were hundreds of them, and each tool had its place. Every now and again from the benches there came a hot sizzling sound, which meant that one of these tools was being tested after having been heated over the flame. Seeing her looking at the rack of tools, the head workman, a broad-shouldered man with a pleasant smile and keen blue eyes, turned toward her. "Would you like to have me tell you a little about them?" he asked. "Indeed I should." "Those tools once belonged to Hans Wiemar, the most famous man ever known to the craft. After he died I bought them from his widow. He once spent three years binding a single book. It was to be presented to the king of England. He was a very skillful artisan. "We bind some pretty fine books here, too," he said modestly. "Here is one I am only just beginning. You see it is a very large book, a book of poetry printed in the original German. I shall be at least two months doing it. "The last one I had was much smaller but it was to have taken me four months." A shadow passed over his face. "Did--did you finish it?" asked Lucile, a tone of instinctive sympathy in her voice. "It was an ancient French book, done in the oldest French type. It was called 'Mysteries of the Sea,'" he went on without answering her question. "This was the tool we used most on it," he said, holding out the edge of a steel tool for her inspection. "You see, the metal is heated and pressed into the leather in just the right way, then gold, twenty-two carat gold, is pressed into the creases that are left and we have a figure in gold as a result. This one you see is in the form of an ancient sailing ship." Lucile started, then examined the tool more carefully. "Here is another tool we used. It represents clouds. This one makes the water. You see we use appropriate tools. The book was about ships and the sea, written before the time of Columbus." He was silent for a moment, then said slowly, a look of pain coming into his fine face, "I suppose I might as well tell you. The book was stolen, stolen from my bench during the lunch hour." Lucile started violently. The artist stared at her for a second, then went on. "Of course, I can't be held responsible, yet no doubt they blame me in a way. The book was very valuable--worth thousands of dollars. And it would have been finished in two days." He bowed his head as if in silent grief. "Please," Lucile's lips quivered with emotion as she spoke, "did the book have three of these ancient ship designs on the back of it, one large and two small?" "Yes." "And was it done in dark red leather with the decorations all in gold?" "Yes, yes!" the man's tones were eager. "And, and," Lucile whispered the words, "was there a bookmark in the upper corner of the inside of the front cover?" "Yes, yes, yes!" He uttered the words in a tense whisper. "How can you know so much about the book?" "Please," pleaded Lucile, "I can't tell you now. But per--perhaps I can help you." "I will take you to our president, to Mr. Silver." "Please--please--no--not now. Please let me go now. I must think. I will come back--truly--truly I will." With the instinct of a born gentleman he escorted her to a side door and let her out. The sunshine, as she emerged, seemed unreal to her. Everything seemed unreal. "The gargoyle! The gargoyle!" she whispered hoarsely. "Can I never escape it? Can I go no place without discovering that books marked with that hated, haunting sign have been stolen? That book, the hand-bound copy of 'Mysteries of the Sea,' is the latest acquirement of the old man in the mystery cottage on Tyler street. She stole it; the child stole it. And why? Why? It seems that I should tell all that I know," she whispered to herself, "that it is my duty. Surely the thing can't go on." She bathed her flushed cheeks in the outer air. "And yet," she thought more calmly, "there are the old man, the child. There _is_ something back of it all. The gargoyle's secret. Oh! if only one knew!" CHAPTER XI LUCILE SHARES HER SECRET As Lucile returned to her room it seemed to her that she was being hedged about on all sides by friends who had a right to demand that she reveal the secret hiding-place of the stolen books. The university which had done so much for her, Frank Morrow, her father's friend, the great scientific library which was a friend to all, and now this splendid artist who worked in leather and gold; they all appeared to be reaching out their hands to her. In her room for two hours she paced the floor. Then she came to a decision. "I'll tell one of them; tell the whole story and leave it to him. Who shall it be?" The answer came to her instantly: Frank Morrow. "Yes, he's the one," she whispered. "He's the most human of them all. White-haired as he is, I believe he can understand the heart of a child and--and of a girl like me." She found him busy with some customers. When he had completed the sale and the customers had gone, she drew her chair close to his and told him the story frankly from beginning to end. The only thing she left out was the fact that she held suspicions against the young millionaire's son. "If there's ground for suspicion, he'll discover it," she told herself. Frank Morrow listened attentively. At times he leaned forward with the light on his face that one sometimes sees upon the face of a boy who is hearing a good story of pirates and the sea. "Well," he dampened his lips as she finished, "well!" For some time after that there was silence in the room, a silence so profound that the ticking of Frank Morrow's watch sounded loud as a grandfather's clock. At last Frank Morrow wheeled about in his chair and spoke. "You know, Miss Lucile," he said slowly, "I am no longer a child, except in spirit. I have read a great deal. I have thought a great deal, sitting alone in this chair, both by day and by night. Very often I have thought of us, of the whole human race, of our relation to the world, to the being who created us and to one another. "I have come to think of life like this," he said, his eyes kindling. "It may seem a rather gloomy philosophy of life, but when you think of it, it's a mighty friendly one. I think of the whole human race as being on a huge raft in mid-ocean. There's food and water enough for everyone if all of us are saving, careful and kind. Not one of us knows how we came on the raft. No one knows whither we are bound. From time to time we hear the distant waves break on some shore, but what shore we cannot tell. The earth, of course, is our raft and the rest of the universe our sea. "What's the answer to all this? Just this much: Since we are so situated, the greatest, best thing, the thing that will bring us the greatest amount of real happiness, is to be kind to all, especially those weaker than ourselves, just as we would if we were adrift on a raft in the Atlantic. "Without all this philosophy, you have caught the spirit of the thing. I can't advise you. I can only offer to assist you in any way you may suggest. It's a strange case. The old man is doubtless a crank. Many book collectors are. It may be, however, that there is some stronger hand back of it all. The girl appears to be the old man's devoted slave and is too young truly to understand right from wrong. I should say, however, that she is clever far beyond her years." Lucile left the shop strengthened and encouraged. She had not found a solution to her problem but had been told by one much older and wiser than she that she was not going at the affair in the wrong way. She had received his assurance of his assistance at any time when it seemed needed. That night a strange thing happened. Lucile had learned by repeated experience that very often the solution of life's perplexing problems comes to us when we are farthest from them and engaged in work or pursuit of pleasure which is most remote from them. Someone had given her a ticket to the opera. Being a lover of music, she had decided to abandon her work and the pursuit of the all-absorbing mystery, to forget herself listening to outbursts of enchanting song. The outcome had been all that she might hope for. Lost in the great swells of music which came to her from hundreds of voices or enchanted by the range and beauty of a single voice, she forgot all until the last curtain had been called and the crowd thronged out. There was a flush on her cheek and new light in her eyes as she felt the cool outer air of the street. She had walked two blocks to her station and was about to mount the stairs when, to her utter astonishment, she saw the mystery child dart across the street. Almost by instinct she went in full pursuit. The child, all oblivious of her presence, after crossing the street, darted down an alley and, after crossing two blocks, entered one of those dark and dingy streets which so often flank the best and busiest avenues of a city. At the third door to the left, a sort of half basement entrance that one reached by descending a short stairs, the child paused and fumbled at the doorknob. Lucile was just in time to get a view of the interior as the door flew open. The next instant she sprang back into the shadows. She gripped at her wildly beating heart and steadied herself against the wall as she murmured, "It couldn't be! Surely! Surely it could not be." And yet she was convinced that her eyes had not deceived her. The person who had opened the door was none other than the woman who had treated the child so shamefully and had dragged her along the street. And now the child had come to the door of the den which this woman called home and of her own free will had entered the place and shut the door. What could be the meaning of all this. Some mysteries are long in solving. Some are apparently never solved. Some scarcely become mysteries before their solution appears. This mystery was of the latter sort. Plucking up all the courage she could command, Lucile made her way down the steps and, crowding herself through a narrow opening, succeeded in reaching a position by a window. Here she could see without being seen and could catch fragments of the conversation which went on within. The child had advanced to the center of the room. The woman and a man, worse in appearance, more degraded than the woman, stood staring at her. There was something heroic about the tense, erect bearing of the child. "Like Joan of Arc," Lucile thought. The child was speaking. The few words that Lucile caught sent thrills into her very soul. The child was telling the woman that she had had a book, which belonged to her friend, Monsieur Le Bon. This book was very old and much prized by him. She had had it with her that other night in a lunch box. The woman had taken it. She had come for it. It must be given back. As the child finished, the woman burst into a hoarse laugh. Then she launched forth in a tirade of abusive language. She did not admit having the book nor yet deny it. She was too intent upon abusing the child and the old man who had befriended her for that. At last she sprang at the child. The child darted for the door, but the man had locked and bolted it. There followed a scramble about the room which resulted in the upsetting of chairs and the knocking of kitchen utensils from the wall. At last the child, now fighting and sobbing, was roped to the high post of an ancient bedstead. Then, to Lucile's horror, she saw the man thrust a heavy iron poker through the grate of the stove in which a fire burned brightly. Her blood ran cold. Chills raced up her spine. What was the man's purpose? Certainly nothing good. Whatever these people were to the child, whatever the child might be, the thing must be stopped. The child had at least done one heroic deed; she had come back for that book, the book which at this moment rested in Lucile's own room, Frank Morrow's book. She had come for it knowing what she must face and had come not through fear but through love for her patriarchal friend, Monsieur Le Bon. Somehow she must be saved. With a courage born of despair, Lucile made her way from the position by the window toward the door. As she did so, she thought she caught a movement on the street above her. She was sure that a second later she heard the sound of lightly running footsteps. Had she been watched from above? What was to come of that? There was no time to form an answer. One hand was on the knob. With the other she beat the door. The door swung open. She stepped inside. It seemed to her that the door shut itself behind her. For a second her heart stood still as she realized that the man was behind her; that the door was bolted. CHAPTER XII THE TRIAL BY FIRE The moment Lucile heard the lock click behind her she knew that she was trapped. But her fighting blood was up. Even had the door been wide open she would not have retreated. "You release that child," she said through cold, set lips. "Yes, you tell me 'release the child,'" said the woman, with an attempt at sarcasm; "you who are so brave, who have a companion who is like an ox, who likes to beat up poor women on the street. You say, 'release the child.' You say that. And the child, she is my own stepdaughter." "I--I don't believe it," said Lucile stoutly. "It is true." "If it is true, you have no right to abuse her--you are not fit to be any child's mother." "Not fit," the woman's face became purple with rage. "I am no good, she says; not fit!" She advanced threateningly toward Lucile. "Now, now," she stormed, "we have you where we want you. Now we shall show you whether or not we can do as we please with the child that was so very kindly given to us." She made a move toward the stove, from which the handle to the heavy poker protruded. By this time the end must be red hot. "It's no use to threaten me," said Lucile calmly. "I wouldn't leave the room if I might. If I did it would be to bring an officer. I mean to see that the child is treated as a human being and not as a dog." The woman's face once more became purple. She seemed petrified, quite unable to move, from sheer rage. But the man, a sallow-complexioned person with a perpetual leer in one corner of his mouth, started for the stove. With a quick spring Lucile reached the handle of the poker first. Seizing it, she drew it, white hot, from the fire. The man sprang back in fear. The woman gripped the rounds of a heavy chair and made as if to lift it for a blow. Scarcely realizing that she was imitating her hero of fiction, she brought the glowing iron close to the white and tender flesh of her forearm. "You think you can frighten me," she smiled. "You think you can do something to me which will cause me to cease to attempt to protect that child. Perhaps you would torture me. I will prove to you that you cannot frighten me. What I have been doing is right. The world was made for people to live in who do right. If one may not always do right, then life is not worth living." The fiery weapon came closer to her arm. The woman stared at her as if fascinated. The child, who had been silently struggling at her bands, paused in open-mouthed astonishment. For once the leer on the man's lips vanished. Then, of a sudden, as she appeared to catch the meaning of it all, the child gave forth a piercing scream. The next instant there came a loud pounding at the door as a gruff voice thundered: "Here, you in there! Open up!" The woman dropped upon the ill-kept bed in a real or pretended swoon. Lucile allowed the poker to drop to her side. With trembling fingers the man unloosed the door and the next instant they were looking into the faces of a police sergeant and two other officers of the law. "What's going on here?" demanded the sergeant. Suddenly recovering from her swoon, the woman sprang to her feet. "That young lady," she pointed an accusing finger at Lucile, "is attempting to break up our home." The officer looked them over one by one. "What's the girl tied up for?" he demanded. "It's the only way we can keep her home," said the woman. "That young lady's been enticing her away; her and an old wretch of a man." "Your daughter?" "My adopted daughter." "What about it, little one?" the officer stepped over, and cutting the girl's bands, placed a hand on the child's head. "Is what she says true?" "I--I don't know," she faltered. Her knees trembled so she could scarcely stand. "I never saw the young lady until now but I--I think she is wonderful." "Is this woman your stepmother." The girl hung her head. "Do you wish to stay with her?" "Oh! Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu! No! No! No! Oh, Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!" The child in her agony of fright and grief threw herself face down upon the bed. The officer, seating himself beside her, smoothed her hair with his huge right hand until she was quiet, then bit by bit got from her the story of her experiences in this great American city. Lucile listened eagerly as the little girl talked falteringly. A Belgian refugee, she had been brought to the United States during the war, and because this unprincipled pair spoke French, which she too understood, the good-hearted but misguided people who had her in charge had given her over to them without fully looking up their record. Because she was small and had an appealing face, and because she was a refugee, they had set her to begging on the street and had more than once asked her to steal. Having been brought up by conscientious parents, all this was repulsive to her. So one day she had run away. She had wandered the streets of the great, unfriendly city until, almost at the point of starvation, she had been taken home by a very old man, a Frenchman. "French," she said, "but not like these," she pointed a finger of scorn at the man and woman. "A French gentleman. A very, very wonderful man." She had lived with him and had helped him all she could. Then, one night, as she was on an errand for him, the woman, her stepmother, had found her. She had been seized and dragged along the street. But by some strange chance she did not at all understand, she had been rescued. That night she had been carrying a book. The book belonged to her aged benefactor and was much prized by him. Thinking that her foster mother had the book, she had dared return to ask for it. She proceeded to relate what had happened in that room and ended with a plea that she might be allowed to return to the cottage on Tyler street. "Are you interested in this child?" the officer asked Lucile. "I surely am." "Want to see that she gets safely home?" "I--I will." "And see here," the officer turned a stern face on the others, "if you interfere with this child in the future, we've got enough on you to put you away. You ain't fit to be no child's parents. Far as I can tell, this here old man is. This case, for the present, is settled out of court. See!" He motioned to his subordinates. They stood at attention until Lucile and the child passed out, then followed. The sergeant saw the girl and the child safely on the elevated platform, then, tipping his hat, mumbled: "Good luck and thank y' miss. I've got two of 'em myself. An' if anything ever happened to me, I'd like nothin' better'n to have you take an interest in 'em." Something rose up in Lucile's throat and choked her. She could only nod her thanks. The next instant they went rattling away, bound for the mystery cottage on Tyler street. For once Lucile felt richly repaid for all the doubt, perplexity and sleepless hours she had gone through. "It's all very strange and mysterious," she told herself, "but somehow, sometime, it will all come out right." As she sat there absorbed in her own thoughts, she suddenly became conscious of the fact that the child at her side was silently weeping. "Why!" she exclaimed, "what are you crying for? You are going back to your cottage and to your kind old man." "The book," whispered the child; "it is gone. I can never return it." A sudden impulse seized Lucile, an impulse she could scarcely resist. She wanted to take the child in her arms and say: "Dear little girl, I have the book in my room. I will bring it to you to-morrow." She did not say it. She could not. As far as she knew, the old man had no right to the book; it belonged to Frank Morrow. What she did say was, "I shouldn't worry any more about it if I were you. I am sure it will come out all right in the end." Then, before they knew it, they were off the elevated train and walking toward Tyler street and Lucile was saying to herself, "I wonder what next." Hand-in-hand the two made their way to the door of the dingy old cottage. CHAPTER XIII IN THE MYSTERY ROOM AT NIGHT Much to her surprise, just when she had expected to be trudging back to the station alone, Lucile found herself seated by a table in the mystery room. She was sipping a delicious cup of hot chocolate and talking to the mystery child and her mysterious godfather. Every now and again she paused to catch her breath. It was hard for her to realize that she was in the mystery room of the mysterious cottage on Tyler street. Yet there she certainly was. The child had invited her in. A dim, strangely tinted light cast dark shadows over everything. The strange furniture took on grotesque forms. The titles of the books along the wall gleamed out in a strange manner. For a full five minutes the child talked to the old man in French. He exclaimed now and then, but other than that took no part in the conversation. When she had finished, he held out a thin, bony hand to Lucile and said in perfect English: "Accept my thanks for what you have done to protect this poor little one, my pretty Marie. You are a brave girl and should have a reward. But, alas, I have little to give save my books and they are an inheritance, an inheritance thrice removed. They were my great-grandfather's and have descended direct to me. One is loath to part with such treasure." "There is no need for any reward," said Lucile quickly. "I did it because I was interested in the child. But," with a sudden inspiration, "if you wish to do me a favor, tell me the story of your life." The man gave her a quick look. "You are so--so old," she hastened to add, "and so venerable, so soldier-like, so like General Joffre. Your life must have been a wonderful one." "Ah, yes," the old man settled back in his chair. As if to brush a mist from before his eyes, he made a waving motion with his hand. "Ah, yes, it has been quite wonderful, that is, I may say it once was. "I was born near a little town named Gondrecourt in the province of Meuse in France. There was a small chateau, very neat and beautiful, with a garden behind it, with a bit of woods and broad acres for cattle and grain. All that was my father's. It afterwards became mine. "In one room of the chateau were many, many ancient volumes, some in French, some in English, for my father was a scholar, as also he educated me to be. "These books were the cream of many generations, some dating back before the time of Columbus." Lucile, thinking of the book of ancient Portland charts, allowed her gaze for a second to stray to the shelf where it reposed. Again the man threw her a questioning look, but once more went on with his narrative of his life in far-off France. "Of all the treasures of field, garden, woods or chateau, the ones most prized by me were those ancient books. So, year after year I guarded them well, guarded them until an old man, in possession of all that was once my father's, I used to sit of an evening looking off at the fading hills at eventide with one of those books in my lap. "Then came the war." Again his hand went up to dispel the imaginary mist. "The war took my two sons. They never came back. It took my three grandsons. We gave gladly, for was it not our beloved France that was in danger? They, too, never returned." The old man's hand trembled as he brushed away the imaginary mist. "I borrowed money to give to France. I mortgaged my land, my cattle, my chateau; only my treasure of books I gave no man a chance to take. They must be mine until I died. They of all the treasures I must keep. "One night," his voice grew husky, "one night there came a terrible explosion. The earth rocked. Stones of the castle fell all about the yard. The chateau was in ruins. It was a bomb from an airplane. "Someway the library was not touched. It alone was safe. How thankful I was that it was so. It was now all that was left. "I took my library to a small lodging in the village. Then, when the war was ended, I packed all my books in strong boxes and started for Paris." He paused. His head sank upon his breast. His lips quivered. It was as if he were enduring over again some great sorrow. "Perhaps," he said after a long time, "one is foolish to grieve over what some would say is a trifle compared to other losses. But one comes to love books. They are his very dear friends. With them he shares his great pleasures. In times of sorrow they console him. Ah, yes, how wonderful they are, these books?" His eyes turned toward the shelves. Then, suddenly, his voice changed. He hastened on. He seemed to desire to have done with it. One might have believed that there was something he was keeping back which he was afraid his lips might speak. "I came to America," he said hoarsely, "and here I am in your great city, alone save for this blessed child, and--and my books--some of my books--most of my books." Again he was silent. The room fell into such a silence that the very breathing of the old man sounded out like the exhaust of an engine. Somewhere in another room a clock ticked. It was ghostly. Shaking herself free from the spell of it, Lucile said, "I--I think I must go." "No! No!" cried the old man. "Not until you have seen some of my treasures, my books." Leading her to the shelves, he took down volume after volume. He placed them in her hands with all the care of a salesman displaying rare and fragile china. She looked at the outside of some; then made bold to open the covers and peep within. They were all beyond doubt very old and valuable. But one fact stood out in her mind as she finally bade them good night, stood out as if embossed upon her very soul: In the inside upper corner of the cover of every volume, done on expensive, age-browned paper, there was the same gargoyle, the same letter L as had been in the other mysterious volumes. "The gargoyle's secret," she whispered as she came out upon the dark, damp streets. "The gargoyle's secret. I wonder what it is!" Then she started as if in fear that the gargoyle were behind her, about to spring at her from the dark. CHAPTER XIV A STRANGE REQUEST "But, Lucile!" exclaimed Florence in an excited whisper, springing up in her bed after she had heard Lucile's story. "How did the police know that something was going wrong in that house? How did they come to be right there when you needed them most?" "That's just what I asked the sergeant," answered Lucile, "and he just shrugged his shoulders and said, 'Somebody tipped it off.'" "Which meant, I suppose, that someone reported the fact to police headquarters that something was wrong in that house." "I suppose so." "Is that all you know about it?" "Why, I--I thought I heard someone hurrying away on the sidewalk just as I was going to enter." "You don't suppose--" "Oh, I don't know what to suppose," Lucile gave a short, hysterical laugh. "It is getting to be much too complicated for me. I can't stand it much longer. Something's going to burst. I think all the time that someone is dogging my tracks. I think someone must suspect me of being in league with this old man and the child." "But if they did, why should they call the police for your protection?" "Yes, why? Why? A whole lot of whys. And who would suspect me? I would trust Frank Morrow to keep faith with me. I am sure he trusts me fully. The Portland chart book affair I was not in at all. The bindery would scarcely suspect me. There's only our own library left. You don't think--" "One scarcely knows what to think," said Florence wearily. "We sometimes forget that we are but two poor girls who are more or less dependent on the university for our support while we secure an education. Perhaps you should have confided in the library authorities in the beginning." "Perhaps. But it's too late now. I must see the thing through." "You don't believe the old Frenchman's story." "I don't know. It's hard to doubt it. He seems so sincere. There's something left out, I suppose." "Of course there is. In order to keep from starving, he was obliged to sell some of his books. Then, being heartbroken over the loss of them, he has induced the child to steal them back for him. That seems sensible enough, doesn't it? Of course it's a pity that he should have been forced to sell them, but they were, in a way, a luxury. We all are obliged to give up some luxuries. For my part, I don't see how you are going to keep him out of jail. The child will probably come clear because of her age, but there's not a chance in a million of saving him. There's got to be a show-down sometime. Why not now? The facts we have in our possession are the rightful property of others, of our library, Frank Morrow, the scientific library, of the Silver-Barnard bindery. Why not pass them on?" Florence was sitting bolt upright in bed. She pointed her finger at her roommate by way of emphasis. But, tired and perplexed as she was, Lucile never flinched. "Your logic is all right save for two things," she smiled wearily. "What two?" "The character of the old man and the character of the child. They could not do the thing you suggest. No, not for far greater reward. Not in a thousand years." She beat the bed with her hands. "There must be some other explanation. There must. There must!" For a moment there was silence in the room. Lucile removed her street garments, put on her dream robe, then crept into bed. "Oh," she sighed, "I forgot to tell you what that extraordinary child asked me to do." "What?" "She said she had an errand to do for the old Frenchman; that it would take her a long way from home and she was afraid to go alone. She asked me if I would go with her." "What did you tell her?" "I--I told her that both my roommate and I would go." "You did!" "Why, yes." "Well," said Florence, after a moment's thought, "I'll go, but if it's another frightful robbery, if she's going to break in somewhere and carry away some book worth thousands of dollars, I'm not in on it. I--I'll drag her to the nearest police station and our fine little mystery will end right there." "Oh, I don't think it can be anything like that," said Lucile sleepily. "Anyway, we can only wait and see." With that she turned her right cheek over on the pillow and was instantly fast asleep. CHAPTER XV A STRANGE JOURNEY The hours of the following day dragged as if on leaden wings. With nerves worn to single strands, Lucile was now literally living on excitement. The fact that she was to go with the mystery child on a night's trip which held promise of excitement and possible adventure in it, went far toward keeping her eyes open and on their task, but for all this, the hours dragged. At the library she was startled to note the worn and haggard look on Harry Brock's face. She wanted to ask him the cause of it and to offer sympathy, but he appeared to actually avoid her. Whenever she found some excuse to move in his direction, he at once found one for moving away to another corner of the library. "Whatever can be the matter with him?" she asked herself. "I wonder if I could have offended him in any way. I should hate to lose his friendship." Night came at last and with it the elevated station and Tyler street. With her usual promptness, the child led them to a surface car. They rode across the city. From the car they hurried to an inter-urban depot of a steam line. "So it's to be out of the city," Florence whispered to Lucile. "I hadn't counted on that. It may be more than we bargained for." "I hope not," shivered Lucile. "I've been all warmed up over this trip the whole day through and now when we are actually on the way I feel cold as a clam and sort of creepy all over. Do--do you suppose it will be anything very dreadful?" "Why, no!" laughed Florence. "Far as feelings go mine have been just the opposite to yours. I didn't want to go and felt that way all day, but now it would take all the conductors in the service to put me off the train." With all the seriousness of a grown-up, the child purchased tickets for them all, and now gave them to the conductor without so much as suggesting their destination to the girls. "I don't know where I'm going but I'm on my way," whispered Florence with a smile. "Seems strange, doesn't it?" said Lucile. "Sh," warned Florence. The child had turned a smiling face toward them. "I think it's awfully good of you to come," she beamed. "It's a long way and I'm afraid we'll be late getting home, but you won't have to do anything, not really, just go along with me. It's a dreadfully lonesome place. There's a long road you have to go over and the road crosses a river and there is woods on both sides of the river. Woods are awful sort of spooky at night, don't you think so?" Florence smiled and nodded. Lucile shivered. "I don't mind the city," the child went on, "not any of it. There are always people everywhere and things can't be spooky there, but right out on the roads and in the woods and on beaches where the water goes wash-wash-wash at night, I don't like that, do you?" "Sometimes I do," said Florence. "I think I'm going to like it a lot to-night." "Oh, are you?" exclaimed the child. "Then I'm glad, because it was awfully nice of you to come." "A long road, woods and a river," Florence repeated in Lucile's ear. "Wherever can we be going? I supposed we would get off at one of the near-in suburbs." "Evidently," said Lucile, forcing a smile, "we are in for a night of it. I'm going to catch forty winks. Call me when we get to the road that crosses the river in the woods." She bent her head down upon one hand and was soon fast asleep. She was awakened by a shake from Florence. "We're here. Come on, get off." What they saw on alighting was not reassuring. A small red depot, a narrow, irregular platform, a square of light through which they saw a young man with a green shade over his eyes bending before a table filled with telegraph instruments; this was all they saw. Beyond these, like the entrance to some huge, magical cave, the darkness loomed at them. The child appeared to know the way, even in the dark, for she pulled at Florence's sleeve as she whispered: "This way please. Keep close to me." There was not the least danger of the girls' failing to keep close, for, once they had passed beyond sight of that friendly square of light and the green-shaded figure, they were hopelessly lost. True, the darkness shaded off a trifle as their eyes became more accustomed to it; they could tell that they were going down a badly kept, sandy road; they could see the dim outline of trees on either side; but that was all. The trees seemed a wall which shut them in on either side. "Trees _are_ spooky at night," Lucile whispered as she gripped her companion's arm a little more tightly. "Where are we?" Florence whispered. "I couldn't guess." "Pretty far out. I counted five stops after the lights of the city disappeared." "Listen." "What is it?" "Water rushing along somewhere." "Might be the river. She said there was one." "Rivers rush like that in the mountains but not here. Must be the lake shore." "Hist--" The child was whispering back at them. "We are coming to the bridge. It's a very long bridge, and spooky. I think we better tiptoe across it, but we mustn't run. The gallopin' goblins'll come after us if we do; besides, there's an old rusty sign on the bridge that says, 'No trotting across the bridge.'" The next moment they felt a plank surface beneath their feet and knew they were on the bridge. It must have been a very ancient bridge. This road had never been remodelled to fit the need of automobiles. The planks rattled and creaked in an ominous manner in spite of their tiptoeing. "I wonder how much more there is of it," Florence groaned in a whisper when they had gone on tiptoes for what seemed an endless space of time. "If my toes don't break, I'm sure my shoes will." As for Lucile, she was thinking her own thoughts. She was telling herself that if it were not for the fact that this night's performance gave promise of being a link in the chain of circumstances which were to be used in dragging the gargoyle's secret from its lair, she would demand that the child turn about and lead them straight back to the city. Since she had faith that somehow the mystery was to be solved and her many worries and perplexities brought to an end, she tiptoed doggedly on. And it was well that she did, for the events of this one night were destined to bring about strange and astounding revelations. She was not to see the light of day again before the gargoyle's secret would be fully revealed, but had she known the series of thrilling events which would lead up to that triumphant hour, she would have shrunk back and whispered, "No, no, I can't go all that way." Often and often we find this true in life; we face seemingly unbearable situations--something is to happen to us, we are to go somewhere, be something different, do some seemingly undoable thing and we say, "We cannot endure it," yet we pass through it as through a fog to come out smiling on the other side. We are better, happier and stronger for the experience. It was to be so with Lucile. The bridge was crossed at last. More dark and silent woods came to flank their path. Then out of the distance there loomed great bulks of darker masses. "Mountains, I'd say they were," whispered Lucile, "if it weren't for the fact that I know there are none within five hundred miles." For a time they trudged along in silence. Then suddenly Florence whispered: "Oh, I know! Dunes! Sand dunes! Now I know where we are. We are near the lake shore. I was out here somewhere for a week last summer. By day it's wonderful; regular mountains of sand that has been washed up and blown up from the bed of the lake. Some of them are hundreds of feet above the level of the lake. There are trees growing on them and everything." "But what are we doing out here?" "I can't guess. There is a wonderful beach everywhere and cottages here and there." "But it's too late for summer cottages. They must all be closed." "Yes, of course they must." Again they trudged on in silence. Now they left the road to strike away across the soft, yielding surface of the sand. They sank in to their ankles. Some of the sand got into their shoes and hurt their feet, but still they trudged on. The rush of waters on the shore grew louder. "I love it," Florence whispered. "I like sleeping where I can hear the rush of water. I've slept beside the Arctic Ocean, the Behring Sea and the Pacific. I've slept by the shore of this old lake. Once in the Rocky Mountains I climbed to the timber-line and there slept for five nights in a tent where all night long you could hear the rush of icy water over rocks which were more like a stony stairway than the bed of a stream. It was grand. "When I am sleeping where I can hear the rush of water I sometimes half awaken at night and imagine I am once more on the shore of the Arctic or in a tent at the timber-line of the Rockies." While she was whispering this they felt the sand suddenly harden beneath their feet and knew that they had reached the beach. "You know," the child whispered suddenly and mysteriously back at them, "I don't like beaches at night. I lived by one when I was a very little girl. There was a very, very old woman lived there too. She told me many terrible stories of the sea. And do you know, once she told me something that has made me afraid to be by the shore at night. It makes it spooky." She suddenly seized Lucile's arm with a grip that hurt while she whispered, "That's why I wanted you to come. "She told me," she went on, "that old woman told me," Lucile fancied she could see the child's frightened eyes gleaming out of the night, "about the men who were lost at sea; brave seamen who go on ships and brave soldiers too. Their bodies get washed all about on the bottom of the water; the fishes eat them and by and by they are all gone. But their souls can't be eaten. No sir, no one can eat them. The old woman told me that." The child paused. Her breath was coming quick. Her grip tightened on Lucile's arm as she whispered: "And sometimes I'm afraid one of their souls will get washed right up on the sand at night. That's what frightens me so. What do you think it would look like? What do you? Would it be all yellow and fiery like a glowworm or would it be just white, like a sheet?" "Florence," whispered Lucile, with a shiver, "tell her to be quiet. She'll drive me mad." But there was no need. There is much courage to be gained by telling our secret fears to others. The child had apparently relieved her soul of a great burden, for she tramped on once more in silence. Several moments had passed when she suddenly paused before some dark object which stood out above the sand. "A boat," whispered Lucile. "If you'll just help me," said the child, "we can push it into the water." "What for?" Florence asked. "Why, to go in, of course. It's the only way." For a moment the two girls stood there undecided. Then Florence whispered: "Oh, come on. It's not rough. Might as well see it through." CHAPTER XVI NIGHT VISITORS A moment later they were listening to the creak of rusty oarlocks and the almost inaudible dip-dip of the oars as the child herself sent the boat out from the beach to bring it half about and skirt the shore. The boat was some sixteen feet long. A clinker-built craft, it was light and buoyant, but for all that, with three persons aboard, the rowing of it was a tax on the strength of the child's slender arms. To add to her troubles, the water began to rubber up a bit. Small waves came slap-slapping the boat's side. Once a bit of spray broke in Florence's face. "Here," she whispered, "it's too heavy for you. Let me have the oars, then you tell me which way to go." "Straight ahead, only not too close in. There's a wall." "A wall?" Lucile thought to herself. "Sounds like a prison. There's a parole camp out here somewhere. It can't be!" she shuddered. "No, of course not. What would that old man and child have to do with prisons?" Then, suddenly an ugly thought forced its way into her mind. Perhaps after all these two were members of a gang of robbers. Perhaps a member of the gang had been in prison and was at this moment in the parole camp. What if this turned out to be a jail-breaking expedition? "No, no!" she whispered as she shook herself to free her mind of the thought. "There's the wall," whispered Florence, as a gray bulk loomed up to the right of them. They passed it in silence. To Lucile they seemed like marines running a blockade in time of war. But Florence was busy with other thoughts. That wall seemed vaguely familiar to her. It was as if she had seen it in a dream, yet could not recall the details of the dream. A storm was brewing off in the west. Now and then a distant flash of lightning lighted up the surrounding waters. Of a sudden one of these, more brilliant than the rest, lighted up the shore, which, at a word from the child, they were now nearing. What Florence saw was a small, artificially dredged buoy with a dock and large boathouse at the back. Instantly what had been a dream became a reality. She had seen that wall and the little buoy and boathouse as well. Only the summer before she had spent two nights and a day with a party on the dunes. They had hired a motor boat and had skirted the shore. This place had been pointed out to her and described as the most elaborate and beautiful summer cottage on the shore. "Why," she whispered, with a sigh of relief, "this is the summer cottage of your friend, R. Stanley Ramsey, Jr., the young man you saw at Frank Morrow's place and whom we saw later at the mystery cottage. This isn't any brigandish thieving expedition. It is merely a business trip. Probably the old man has sold him one of his books." Lucile's first reaction to this news was intense relief. This was not a jail-breaking expedition; in fact, was not to be in any way an adventure. But the next instant doubt came. "What would that young man be doing in a summer cottage at this time of year?" she demanded. "All the cottages must have been closed for nearly a month. Society flies back to the city in September. Besides, if it's plain business, why all this slipping in at the lake front instead of passing through the gate?" Florence was silent at that. She had no answer. "Does seem strange," she mused. "There's a very high fence all about the place, but of course there must be a gate." The next instant the boat grated on the sandy beach and they were all climbing out. Lucile shivered as she caught sight of a large, low, rambling building which lay well up from the shore. "What next?" she whispered to herself. The storm was still rumbling in the west. The sky to the east was clear. Out from the black waters of the lake the moon was rolling. Its light suddenly brightened up the shore. The girls stared about them. Up from the beach a little way was an affair which resembled an Indian tepee. It was built of boards and covered with birch bark. Its white sides glimmered in the moonlight. Through the shadows of trees and shrubbery they made out a rustic pavilion and beyond that the cottage which was built in rustic fashion as befits a summer residence of a millionaire, although little short of a mansion. "Wouldn't you like to see the inside of it?" breathed Florence. "I've always wondered what such a place was like." "Yes," whispered Lucile, "but I'd prefer daylight." They had been following the child. She had led them as far as a rustic arbor. Built of cedar poles with the bark left on, this presented itself as an inviting place to rest. "You stay here," the child whispered. "I'll come back." She vanished into the shadows. "Well!" whispered Lucile. "What do you make of it?" Florence asked. "Nothing yet." "Is someone here to meet her or is she entering the place to get something?" "Don't know. I--" Lucile stopped short. "Did you see that?" she whispered tensely as she gripped her companion's arm. "What?" "There was a flash of light in the right wing of the building, like the flicker of a match." "She can't have reached there yet." "No." "Do you think we should warn her? I can't help thinking she's going to break into the place." "If she is, she should be caught. If we think she is, perhaps we should notify the police." "The police? In such a place? You forget that we are many miles from the city and two or three miles from even a railroad station. Guess we'll have to see it through." "Let's do it then?" The two girls rose and began making their way stealthily in the direction the child had taken. Now and again they paused to listen. Once they heard a sound like the creaking of a door. Lucile caught a second flash of light. They paused behind two pine trees not ten feet from the side entrance. The wind rustled in the pine trees. The water broke ceaselessly on the shore. Otherwise all was silence. "Creepy," whispered Lucile. "Ghostly," Florence shivered. "I believe that door's ajar." "It is." "Let's creep up close." The next moment found them flattened against the wall beside the door. This door stood half open. Suddenly they caught a flash of light. Leaning far over to peer within, they saw the child bent over before a huge bookcase. The room, half illumined by her flashlight, was a large lounging room. The trimmings were rustic and massive. Beamed ceiling and heavy beams along the walls were flanked by a huge fireplace at the back. The furniture was in keeping, massive mission oak with leather cushions on chairs. "What a wonderful place!" Florence whispered. "What wouldn't one give to have it for a study?" The child had taken three books from the shelves. All these she replaced. She was examining the fourth when Lucile whispered, "That's the one she has come for." "Why?" "The light fell full upon the inside of the cover. I saw the gargoyle there." The prediction proved a true one, for, after carefully closing the case, the child switched off the light. Scarcely realizing what they were doing, the girls lingered by the door. Then suddenly Lucile realized their position. "She'll be here in a second," she whispered. They turned, but not quickly enough, for of a sudden a glare of light from a powerful electric flashlight blinded them while a masculine voice with a distinctly youthful ring to it demanded: "Who's there?" To their consternation, the girls felt the child bump into them as she backed away and there they all stood framed in a circle of light. The glaring light with darkness behind it made it impossible for them to see the new arrival but Lucile knew instantly from the voice that it was the millionaire's son. For a full moment no one spoke. The tick-tock of a prodigious clock in one corner of the room sounded out like the ringing of a curfew. "Oh! I see," came at last in youthful tones from the corner; "just some girls. And pretty ones, too, I'll be bound. Came to borrow a book, did you? Who let you in, I wonder. But never mind. Suppose you're here for a week-end at one of the cottages and needed some reading matter. Rather unconventional way of getting it, but it's all right. Just drop it in the mail box at the gate when you're done with it." The girls suddenly became conscious of the fact that the child was doing her best to push them out of the door. Yielding to her backward shoves, they sank away into the shadows and, scarcely believing their senses, found themselves apparently quite free to go their way. "That," breathed Florence, "was awful decent of him." "Decent?" Lucile exploded. "It--it was grand. Look here," she turned almost savagely upon the child, "you didn't intend to give that book back but you're going to do it. You're going to put it in that mail box to-night." "Oh, no, I'm not," the child said cheerfully. "You--you're not?" Lucile stammered. "What right have you to keep it?" "What right has he? It does not belong to him. It belongs to Monsieur Le Bon." "Why, that's nonsense! That--" Lucile broke off suddenly. "Look!" she exclaimed. "The boat's gone!" It was all too true. They had reached the beach where they had left the boat. It had vanished. "So we are prisoners after all," Florence whispered. "And, and he was just making fun of us. He knew we couldn't get away," breathed Lucile, sinking hopelessly down upon the sand. CHAPTER XVII A BATTLE IN THE NIGHT "Oh, brace up!" exclaimed Florence, a note of impatience creeping into her voice. "We'll get out of this place some way. Perhaps the boat wasn't taken. Perhaps it has--" She stopped to stare away across the water. "I believe it's out there away down the beach. Look, Lucile. Look sharp." The moon had gone behind a small cloud. As it came out they could see clearly the dark bulk of the boat dancing on the water, which was by now roughening up before the rising storm. "It's out there," exclaimed Florence. "We failed to pull it ashore far enough. There is a side sweep to the waves that carried it out. We must get it." "Yes, oh, yes, we must!" the child exclaimed. "It wasn't mine; it was borrowed." "You borrow a lot of things," exclaimed Florence. "Oh, no, indeed. Not many, not hardly any at all." "But, Florence, how can we get it?" protested Lucile. "I'm a strong swimmer. I swam a mile once. The boat's out only a few hundred yards. It will be easy." "Not with your clothes on." Florence did not answer. She threw a glance toward the millionaire's cottage. All was dark there. "Here!" Lucile felt a garment thrust into her hands, then another and another. "Florence, you mustn't." "It's the only way." A moment later Florence's white body gleamed in the moonlight as she raced away down the beach to gain the point nearest the boat. To the listening ears of Lucile and the child there came the sound of a splash, then the slow plash, plash, plash of a swimmer's strokes. Florence was away and swimming strong. But the wind from off a point had caught the boat and was carrying it out from shore, driving it on faster than she knew. Confident of her ability to reach the goal in a mere breath of time, she struck out at once with the splendid swing of the Australian crawl. Trained to the pink of perfection, her every muscle in condition, she laughed at the wavelets that lifted her up only to drop her down again and now and again to dash a saucy handful of spray in her face. She laughed and even hummed a snatch of an old sea song. She was as much at home in the water as in her room at the university. But now, as she got farther from the shore, the waves grew in size and force. They impeded her progress. The shore was protected by a rocky point farther up the beach. She was rapidly leaving that protection. Throwing herself high out of the water, she looked for the boat. A little cry of consternation escaped her lips. She had expected to find it close at hand. It seemed as far away as when she had first seen it. "It's the wind off the point," she breathed. "It's taking it out to sea. It--it's going to be a battle, a real scrap." Once more she struck out with the powerful stroke which carries one far but draws heavily upon his emergency fund of energy. For three full moments she battled the waves; then, all but breathless, she slipped over on her back to do the dead man's float. "Just for a few seconds. Got to save my strength, but I can't waste time." Now for the first time she realized that there was a possibility that she would lose this fight. The realization of what it meant if she did lose, swept over her and left her cold and numb. To go back was impossible; the wind and waves were too strong for that. To fail to reach the boat meant death. Turning back again into swimming position, she struck out once more. But this time it was not the crawl. That cost too much. With an easy, hand-over-hand swing which taxed the reserve forces little more than floating, she set her teeth hard, resolved slowly but surely to win her way to the boat and to safety. Moments passed. Long, agonizing moments. Lucile on the shore, by the gleam of a flare of lightning, caught now and then a glimpse of the swimmer. Little by little she became conscious of the real situation. When it dawned upon her that Florence was in real peril, she thought of rushing to the cottage and calling to her assistance any who might be there. Then she looked at the bundle of clothing in her arms and flushed. "She'd never forgive me," she whispered. Florence, still battling, felt the spray break over her, but still kept on the even swing. Now and again, high on the crest of a wave, she saw the boat. She was cheered by the fact that each time it appeared to loom a little larger. "Gaining," she whispered. "Fifty yards to go!" Again moments passed and again she whispered, "Gaining. Thirty yards." A third time she whispered, "Twenty yards." After that it was a quiet, muscle-straining, heart-breaking, silent battle, which caused her very senses to reel. Indeed at times she appeared conscious of only one thing, the mechanical swing of her arms, the kick, kick of her feet. They seemed but mechanical attachments run by some electrical power. When at last the boat loomed black and large on the crest of a wave just above her she had barely enough brain energy left to order her arms into a new motion. Striking upward with her right hand, she gripped the craft's side. The next instant, with a superhuman effort, without overturning it she threw herself into the boat, there to fall panting across a seat. "Wha--what a battle!" she gasped. "But I won! I won!" For two minutes she lay there motionless. Then, drawing herself stiffly up to a sitting position, she adjusted the oars to their oarlocks and, bending forward, threw all her magnificent strength into the business of battling the waves and bringing the boat safely ashore. There are few crafts more capable of riding a stormy sea than is a clinker-built rowboat. Light as a cork, it rides the waves like a seagull. Florence was not long in finding this out. Her trip ashore was one of joyous triumph. She had fought a hard physical battle and won. This was her hour of triumph. Her lips thrilled a "Hi-le-hi-le-hi-lo" which was heard with delight by her friends on land. Her bare arms worked like twin levers to a powerful engine, as she brought the boat around and shot it toward shore. A moment for rejoicing, two for dressing, then they all three tumbled into the boat to make the tossing trip round the wall to shore on the other side. For the moment the book tightly pressed under the child's arm was forgotten. Florence talked of swimming and rowing. She talked of plans for a possible summer's outing which included days upon the water and weeks within the forest primeval. As they left the boat on the beach, they could see that the storm was passing to the north of them. It had, however, hidden the moon. The path through the forest and across the river was engulfed in darkness. Once more the child prattled of haunts, spooks, and goblins, but for once Lucile's nerves were not disturbed. Her mind had gone back to the old problems, the mystery of the gargoyle and all the knotty questions which had come to be associated with it. This night a new mystery had thrust its head up out of the dark and an old theory had been exploded. She had thought that the young millionaire's son might be in league with the old man and the child in carrying away and disposing of old and valuable books, but here was the child coming out to this all but deserted cottage at night to take a book from the young man's library. "He hasn't a thing in the world to do with it," she told herself. "He--" She paused in her perplexing problem to grip her companion's arm and whisper, "What was that?" They were nearing the plank bridge. She felt certain that she heard a footstep upon it. But now as she listened she heard nothing but the onrush of distant waters. "Just your nerves," answered Florence. "It was not. I was not thinking of the child's foolish chatter. I was thinking of our problem, of the gargoyle's secret. Someone is crossing the bridge." Even as she spoke, as if in proof of her declaration, there came a faint pat-pat-pat, as of someone moving on the bridge on tiptoe. "Someone is shadowing us," Lucile whispered. "Looks that way." "Who is it?" "Someone from the cottage perhaps. Watching to see what the child does with the book. She must take it back." "Yes, she must." "It might be," and here even stout-hearted Florence shuddered, "it might be that someone had shadowed us all the way from the city." "The one who followed me the night I got caught in that wretched woman's house, and other times?" "Yes." "But he couldn't have gone all the way, not up to the cottage. He couldn't get through the fence and there was no other boat." "Well, anyway, whoever it is, we must go on. Won't do any good standing here shivering." Once more they pressed into the dark and once more Lucile resumed her attempt to disentangle the many problems which lay before her. CHAPTER XVIII FRANK MORROW JOINS IN THE HUNT That she had reached the limit of her resources, her power to reason and to endure, Lucile knew right well. To go on as she had been day after day, each day adding some new responsibility to her already overburdened shoulders, was to invite disaster. It was not fair to others. The set of Shakespeare, the volume of Portland charts, the hand-bound volume from the bindery and this book just taken from the summer home of the millionaire, were all for the moment in the hands of the old man and the child. How long would they remain there? No one could tell save the old man and perhaps the child. That she had had no part whatever in the taking of any of them, unless her accompanying of the child on this trip might be called taking a part, she knew quite well. Yet one is responsible for what one knows. "I should have told what I knew about the set of Shakespeare in the beginning," she chided herself. "Then there would have been no other problems. All the other books would be at this moment in their proper places and the old man and child would be--" She could not say the words, "in jail." It was too terrible to contemplate! That man and that child in jail! And, yet, she suddenly remembered the child's declaration that she would not return the book to the summer cottage. She had said the book belonged to the old man. Perhaps, after all, it did. She had seen the millionaire's son in the mystery room talking to the old man. Perhaps, after all, he had borrowed the book and the child had been sent for it. There was some consolation in that thought. "But that does not solve any of the other problems," she told herself, "and, besides, if she has a right to the book, why all this creeping up to the cottage by night by way of the water. And why did he assume that she was borrowing it?" And so, after all her speculation, she found herself just where she had left off; the tangle was no less a tangle than before. "Question is," she whispered to herself, "am I going to go to the police or to the university authorities with the story and have these mysterious people arrested, or am I not?" They reached the station just as the last train was pulling in. Florence and the child had climbed aboard and Lucile had her hand on the rail when she saw a skulking figure emerge from the shadows of the station. The person, whoever he might be, darted down the track to climb upon the back platform just as the train pulled out. "That," Lucile told herself, "is the person who crossed the bridge ahead of us. He is spying on us. I wonder who he is and what he knows." A cold chill swept over her as if a winter blast had passed down the car. When Florence had been told of what Lucile had seen, she suggested that they go back and see who the man was. "What's the use?" said Lucile. "We can't prove that he's following us. It would only get us into another mess and goodness knows we're in enough now." So, with the mystery child curled up fast asleep in a seat before them, hugging the newly acquired book as though it were a doll, they rattled back toward the city. In spite of the many problems perplexing her, Lucile soon fell asleep. Florence remained to keep vigil over her companion, the child and the supposedly valuable book. They saw nothing more of the mysterious person who had apparently been following them. Arrived at the city, they were confronted with the problem of the immediate possession of the latest of the strangely acquired volumes. Should the child be allowed to carry it to the mysterious cottage or should they insist on taking it to their room for safe keeping? They talked the matter over in whispers just before arriving at their station. "If you attempt to make her give it up," Florence whispered, "she'll make a scene. She's just that sort of a little minx." "I suppose so," said Lucile wearily. "Might as well let her keep it. It's as safe as any of the books are at that cottage, and, really, it's not as much our business as you keep thinking it is. We didn't take the book. True, we went along with her, but she would have gone anyway. We're not the guardians of all the musty old books in Christendom. Let's forget at least this one and let that rich young man get it back as best he can. He took the chance in allowing her to take it away." Lucile did not entirely agree to all this but was too tired to resist her companion's logic, so the book went away under the child's arm. After a very few hours of restless sleep, Lucile awoke with one resolve firmly implanted in her mind: She would take Frank Morrow's book back to him and place it in his hand, then she would tell him the part of the story that he did not already know. After that she would attempt to follow his advice in the matter. With the thin volume of "The Compleat Angler" in the pocket of her coat, she made her way at an early hour to his shop. He had barely opened up for the day. No customers were yet about. Having done his nine holes of golf before coming down and having done them exceedingly well, he was feeling in a particularly good humor. "Well, my young friend," he smiled, "what is it I may do for you this morning? Why! Why!" he exclaimed, turning her suddenly about to the light, "you've been losing sleep about something. Tut! Tut! That will never do." She smiled in spite of herself. Here was a young-old man who was truly a dear. "Why I came," she smiled again, as she drew the valuable book from her pocket, "to return your book and to tell you just how I came to have it." "That sounds interesting." Frank Morrow, rubbing his hands together as one does who is anticipating a good yarn, then led her to a chair. Fifteen minutes later, as the story was finished, he leaned back in his chair and gave forth a merry chuckle as he gurgled, "Fine! Oh, fine! That's the best little mystery story I've heard in a long time. It's costing me two hundred dollars, but I don't begrudge it, not a penny of it. The yarn's really worth it. Besides, I shall make a cool hundred on the book still, which isn't so bad." "Two hundred dollars!" exclaimed Lucile in great perplexity. "Yes, the reward for the return of the book. Now that the mystery is closed and the book returned, I shall pay it to you, of course." "Oh, the reward," she said slowly. "Yes, of course. But, really, the mystery is not ended--it has only just begun." "As you like it," the shopkeeper smiled back. "As matters go, I should call the matter closed. I have a book stolen. You recover it and are able to tell me that the persons who stole it are an old man, too feeble to work, and an innocent child. You are able to put your finger on them and to say, 'These are the persons.' I can have them arrested if I choose. I too am an old man; not so old as your Frenchman, yet old enough to know something of what he must feel, with the pinch of age and poverty dragging at the tail of his coat. I happen to love all little children and to feel their suffering quite as much as they do when they must suffer. I do not choose to have those two people arrested. That ends the affair, does it not? You have your reward; I my book; they go free, not because justice says they should but because a soft heart of an old man says they must." He smiled and brushed his eyes with the back of his hands. Having nothing to say, Lucile sat there in silence. Presently Frank Morrow began, "You think this is unusual because you do not know how common it is. You have never run a bookstore. You would perhaps be a little surprised to have me tell you that almost every day of the year some book, more or less valuable, is stolen, either from a library or from a bookshop. It is done, I suppose, because it seems so very easy. Here is a little volume worth, we will say, ten dollars. It will slip easily into your pocket. When the shopkeeper is not looking, it does slip in. Then again, when he is not paying any particular attention to you, you slip out upon the street. You drink in a few breaths of fresh air, cast a glance to right and left of you, then walk away. You think the matter is closed. In reality it has just begun. "In the first place, you probably did not take the book so you might have it for your library. Collectors of rare books are seldom thieves. They are often cranks, but honest cranks. More books are stolen by students than by any other class of people. They have a better knowledge of the value of books than the average run of folks, and they more often need the money to be obtained from the sale of such books. "Nothing seems easier than to take a book from one store, to carry it to another store six or eight miles away and sell it, then to wash your hands of the whole matter. Nothing in reality is harder. All the bookstore keepers of every large city are bound together in a loosely organized society for mutual protection. The workings of their 'underground railways' are swifter and more certain than the United States Secret Service. The instant I discover that one of my books has been carried off, I sit down and put the name of it on a multigraph. This prints the name on enough post cards to go to all the secondhand bookshops in the city. When the shopkeepers get these cards, they read the name and know the book has been stolen. If they have already bought it, they start a search for the person who sold it to them. They generally locate him. If the book has not yet been disposed of, every shopkeeper is constantly on the lookout for it until it turns up. So," he smiled, "you see how easy it is to steal books. "And yet they will steal them," he went on. "Why," he smiled reminiscently, "not so long ago I had the same book stolen twice within the week." "Did you find out who it was?" "In both cases, at once." "Different people." "Entirely different; never met, as far as I know. The first one was an out and out rascal; he wanted the money for needless luxuries. We treated him rough. Very rough! The other was a sick student who, we found, had used the money to pay carfare to his home. I did not even trouble to find out where his home was; just paid the ten dollars to the man who had purchased the book from him and charged it off on my books. That," he stroked his chin thoughtfully, "that doesn't seem like common sense--or justice, either, yet it is the way men do; anyway it's the way I do." Again there was silence. "But," Lucile hesitated, "this case is different. The mystery still exists. Why does Monsieur Le Bon want the books? He has not sold a single volume. Something must be done about the books from the university, the Scientific Library and the Bindery." "That's true," said Frank Morrow thoughtfully. "There are angles to the case that are interesting, very interesting. Mind if I smoke?" Lucile shook her head. "Thanks." He filled and lighted his pipe. "Mind going over the whole story again?" "No, not a bit." She began at the beginning and told her story. This time he interrupted her often and it seemed that, as he asked question after question, his interest grew as the story progressed. "Now I'll tell you what to do," he held up a finger for emphasis as she concluded. He leaned far forward and there was a light of adventure in his eye. "I'll tell you what you do. Here's a hundred dollars." He drew a roll of bills from his pocket. "You take this money and buy yourself a ticket to New York. You can spare the week-end at least. When you get to New York, go to Burtnoe's Book Store and ask for Roderick Vining. He sold me that copy of 'The Compleat Angler.' I sent out a bid for such a book when I had a customer for it and he was one of two who responded. His book was the best of the two, so I took it. He is in charge of fine binding in the biggest book store in his city. They deal in new books, not secondhand ones, but he dabbles in rare volumes on the side. Tell him that I want to know where he got the book; take the book along, to show you are the real goods. When he tells you where, then find that person if you can and ask him the same question. Keep going until you discover something. You may have to hunt up a half dozen former owners but sooner or later you will come to an end, to the place where that book crossed the sea. And unless I miss my guess, that's mighty important. "I am sorry to have to send you--wish I could go myself," he said after a moment's silence. "It will be an interesting hunt and may even be a trifle dangerous, though I think not." "But this money, this hundred dollars?" Lucile hesitated, fingering the bills. "Oh, that?" he smiled. "That's the last of my profit on the little book. We'll call that devoted to the cause of science or lost books or whatever you like. "But," he called after her, as she left the shop, "be sure to keep your fingers tight closed around the little book." This, Lucile was destined to discover, was not so easily done. CHAPTER XIX LUCILE SOLVES NO MYSTERY Buried deep beneath the blankets of lower 9, car 20, bound for New York, Lucile for a time that night allowed her thoughts to swing along with the roll of the Century Limited. She found herself puzzled at the unexpected turn of events. She had never visited New York and she welcomed the opportunity. There was more to be learned by such a visit, brief though it was bound to be, than in a whole month of poring over books. But why was she going? What did Frank Morrow hope to prove by any discoveries she might make regarding the former ownership of the book she carried in her pocket? She had never doubted but that the aged Frenchman when badly in need of funds had sold the book to some American. That he should have repented of the transaction and had wished the book back in his library, seemed natural enough. Lacking funds to purchase it back, he had found another way. That the ends justified the means Lucile very much doubted, yet there was something to be said for this old man because of his extreme age. It might be that he had reached the period of his second childhood and all things appeared to belong to him. "But here," she told herself, rising to a sitting posture and trying to stare out into the fleeing darkness, "here we suddenly discover that the book came from New York. What is one to make of that? Very simple, in a way, I suppose. This aged Frenchman enters America by way of New York. He needs funds to pay his passage and the freight on his books to Chicago, so he sells one or two books to procure the money. Yet I doubt if that would be Frank Morrow's solution of the problem. Surely he would not sacrifice a hundred dollars to send me to New York merely to find out who the man was to whom the old Frenchman had sold the book. He must think there is more to it than that--and perhaps there is. Ho, well," she sighed, as she settled back on her pillow, "let that come when it comes. I am going to see New York--N-e-w Y-o-r-k--" she spelled it out; "and that is a grand and glorious privilege." The next moment the swing of the Century Limited as it click-clicked over the rails and the onward rush of scenery meant nothing to her. She was fast asleep. Morning found her much refreshed. After a half hour in the washroom and another in the diner, over coffee and toast, she felt equal to the facing of any events which might chance to cross her path that day. There are days in all our lives that are but blanks. They pass and we forget them forever. There are other days that are so pressed full and running over with vivid experience that every hour, as we look back upon it, seems a "crowded hour." Such days we never forget, and this was destined to be such a day in the life of Lucile. Precisely at nine o'clock she was at the door of Burtnoe's Book Store. To save time she had taken a taxi. The clerk who unfastened the door looked at her curiously. When she asked for Roderick Vining, she was directed by a nod to the back corner of the room. She made her way into a square alcove where an electric light shining brightly from the ceiling brought out a gleam of real gold from the backs of thousands of books done in fine bindings. Bending over a desk telephone was the form of a tall, slender-shouldered man. "Are--are you Roderick Vining?" she faltered, at the same time drawing "The Compleat Angler" half out of her pocket. His only answer was to hold up one long, tapering finger as a signal for silence. Someone was speaking at the other end of the wire. With burning cheeks and a whispered apology, the girl sank back into the shadows. Her courage faltered. This was her introduction to New York; she had made a faux pas as her first move; and this man, Roderick Vining, was no ordinary person, she could see that. There was time to study him now. His face was long, his features thin, but his forehead was high. He impressed her, seated though he was, as one who was habitually in a hurry. Pressing matters were, without doubt, constantly upon his mind. Now he was speaking. She could not avoid hearing what he was saying without leaving the alcove, and he had not requested her to do that. "Why, yes, Mrs. Nelson," he was saying, "we can get the set for you. Of course you understand that is a very special, de luxe edition; only three hundred sets struck off, then the plates destroyed. The cost would be considerable." Again he pressed the receiver to his ear. "Why, I should say, three thousand dollars; not less, certainly. All right, madam, I will order the set at once. Your address? Yes, certainly, I have it. Thank you. Good-bye." He placed the receiver on its hook with as little noise as if it had been padded, then turned to Lucile. "Pardon me; you wanted to see me? Sorry to keep you waiting." "Frank Morrow sent me here to ask you where you purchased this book." She held the thin volume out for his inspection. He did not appear to look at it at all. Instead, he looked her squarely in the eye. "Frank Morrow sent you all the way from Chicago that you might ask me that question? How extraordinary! Why did he not wire me? He knows I would tell him." A slight frown appeared on his forehead. "I--I am--" she was about to tell him that she was to ask the next person where he got it, but thinking better of it said instead, "That is only part of my mission to New York. Won't you please look at the book and answer my question?" Still he did not look at the book but to her utter astonishment said, while a smile illumined his face, "I bought that copy of 'The Compleat Angler' right here in this alcove." "From whom?" she half whispered. "From old Dan Whitner, who keeps a bookshop back on Walton place." "Thank you," she murmured, much relieved. Here was no mystery; one bookshop selling a book to another. There was more to it. She must follow on. "I suppose," he smiled, as if reading her thoughts, "that you'd like me to tell you where Dan got it, but that I cannot answer. You must ask him yourself. His address is 45 Walton place. It is ten minutes' walk from here; three blocks to your right as you leave our door, then two to your left, a block and a half to your left again and you are there. The sign's easy to read--just 'Dan Whitner, Books.' Dan's a prince of a chap. He'll do anything for a girl like you; would for anyone, for that matter. Ever been to New York before?" he asked suddenly. "No." "Come alone?" "Yes." He whistled softly to himself, "You western girls will be the death of us." "When there's some place that needs to be gone to we go to it," she smiled half defiantly. "There's nothing so terrible about that, is there?" "No, I suppose not," he admitted. "Well, you go see Dan. He'll tell you anything he knows." With that he turned to his work. Lucile, however, was not ready to go. She had one more question to ask, even though it might be another faux pas. "Would you--would you mind telling me how you knew what book I had when you did not see it?" she said. "I did see it," he smiled, as if amused. "I didn't see it when you expected me to see it, that was all. I saw it long before--saw it when I was at the phone. It's a habit we book folks have of doing one thing with our ears and another with our eyes. We have to or we'd never get through in a day if we didn't. Your little book protruded from your pocket. I knew you were going to say something about it; perhaps offer to sell it, so I looked at it. Simple, wasn't it? No great mystery about it. Hope your other mysteries will prove as simple. Got any friends in New York?" "No." He shook his head in a puzzled manner, but allowed her to leave the room without further comment. CHAPTER XX "THAT WAS THE MAN" Dan Whitner was a somewhat shabby likeness of Roderick Vining; that is, he was a gray-haired, stoop-shouldered, young-old man who knew a great deal about books. His shelves were dusty, so too was a mouse-colored jacket. Yes, he "remembered the book quite well." Lucile began to get the notion that once one of these book wizards set eyes upon an ancient volume he never forgot it. "Strange case, that," smiled Dan as he looked at her over his glasses. "Ah! Here is where I learn something of real importance," was the girl's mental comment. "You see," Dan went on, "I sometimes have dinner with a very good friend who also loves books--the Reverend Dr. Edward Edwards. Dinner, on such occasions, is served on a tea-wagon in his library; sort of makes a fellow feel at home, don't you know? "Well, one of these evenings when the good doctor had an exceptional roast of mutton and a hubbard squash just in from the farm and a wee bit of something beside, he had me over. While we waited to be served I was glancing over his books and chanced to note the book you now have in your hand. 'I see,' I said to him jokingly, 'that you have come into a legacy.' "'Why, no,' he says looking up surprised. 'Why should you think that?' "I pointed to this little copy of 'The Compleat Angler' and said, 'Only them as are very rich can afford to possess such as this one.' "He looked at me in surprise, then smiled as he said, 'I did pay a little too much for it, I guess, but the print was rather unusual; besides, it's a great book. I don't mind admitting that it cost me fifteen dollars.' "'Fifteen dollars!' I exploded. "'Got trimmed, did I?' he smiled back. 'Well, you know the old saying about the clergy, no business heads on them, so we'll let it stand at that.' "'Trimmed nothing!' I fairly yelled. 'The book's a small fortune in itself; one of those rare finds. Why--I'd venture to risk six hundred dollars on it myself without opening the covers of it. It's a first edition or I'm not a book seller at all.' "'Sold!' he cried in high glee. 'There are three families in my parish who are in dire need. This book was sent, no doubt, to assist me in tiding them over.' "So that's how I came into possession of the book. I sold it to Vining at Burtnoe's, as you no doubt know." "But," exclaimed Lucile breathlessly, feeling that the scent was growing fresher all the while, "from whom did the doctor purchase it at so ridiculous a price?" "From a fool bookstorekeeper of course; one of those upstarts who know nothing at all about books; who handle them as pure merchandise, purchased at so much and sold for forty and five per cent more, regardless of actual value. He'd bought it to help out some ignorant foreigner, a Spaniard I believe. He'd paid ten dollars and had been terribly pleased within himself when he made five on the deal." "Who was he?" Lucile asked eagerly, "and where was his shop?" "That I didn't trouble to find out. Very likely he's out of business by now. Such shops are like grass in autumn, soon die down and the snow covers them up. The doctor could tell you though. I'll give you his address and you may go and ask him." The short afternoon was near spent and the shades of night were already falling when at last Lucile entered the shop of the unfortunate bookseller who had not realized the value of the little book. Lunch had delayed her, then the doctor had been out making calls and had kept her waiting for two hours. The little shop had been hard to find, but here at last she was. A pitiful shop it was, possessing but a few hundred volumes and presided over by a grimy-fingered man who might but the day before have been promoted from the garbage wagon so far as personal appearance was concerned. Indeed, as Lucile looked over the place she was seized with the crazy notion that the whole place, books, shelves and proprietor, had but recently climbed down from the junk cart. "And yet," she told herself, "it was from this very heap of dusty paper and cardboard that this precious bit of literature which I have in my pocket, was salvaged. I must not forget that. "I believe," she told herself with an excited intake of breath, "that I am coming close to the end of my search. All day I have been descending step by step; first the wonderful Burtnoe's Book Store with all its magnificence and its genius of a bookman, then Dan Whitner and the doctor, now this place, and then perhaps, whoever the person is who sold the book to this pitiful specimen of a bookseller." Her heart skipped a beat as the bookman, having caught sight of her, began to amble in her direction. She made her question short and to the point. "Where did you get this book?" "That book?" he took it and turned it over in his hand. He scratched his head. "That, why that book must have been one I bought with a lot at an auction sale last week. Want'a buy it?" "No. No!" exclaimed Lucile, seizing the book. "It's not your book. It is mine but you had it once and sold it. What I wish to know is, where did you get it?" Three customers were thumbing through the books. One seated at a table turned and looked up. His face impressed the girl at once as being particularly horrible. Dark featured, hook-nosed, with a blue birthmark covering half his chin, he inspired her with an almost uncontrollable fear. "We--we--" she faltered "--may we not step back under the light where you can see the book better?" The shopkeeper followed her in stolid silence. It was necessary for her to tell him the whole story of the purchase and sale of the book before he recognized it as having once been on his shelves. "Oh, yes," he exclaimed at last. "Made five dollars on her. Thought I had made a mistake, but didn't; not that time I didn't. Where'd I get her? Let's see?" As he stood there attempting to recall the name of the purchaser, Lucile's gaze strayed to an opening between two rows of books. Instantly her eyes were caught as a bird's by a serpent, as she found herself looking into a pair of cruel, crafty, prying eyes. They vanished instantly but left her with a cold chill running up her spine. It was the man who had been seated at the table, but why had he been spying? She had not long to wait before a possible solution was given her. "I know!" exclaimed the shopkeeper at this instant, "I bought it from a foreigner. Bought two others from him, too. Made good money on 'em all, too. Why!" he exclaimed suddenly, "he was in here when you came. Had another book under his arm, he did; wanted to sell it, I judge. I was just keeping him waiting a little so's he wouldn't think I wanted it too bad. If they think you want their books bad they stick for a big price." His voice had dropped to a whisper; his eyes had narrowed to what was meant to be a very wise-meaning expression. "May be here yet." He darted around the stand of books. "That's him just going out the door. Hey, you!" he shouted after the man. Paying not the least attention, the person passed out, slamming the door after him. Passing rapidly down the room, the proprietor poked his head out of the door and shouted twice. After listening for a moment he backed into the room and shut the door. "Gone," he muttered. "Worse luck to me. Sometimes we wait too long and sometimes not long enough. Now some other lucky dog will get that book." In the meantime Lucile had glanced about the shop. Two persons were reading beneath a lamp in the corner. Neither was the man with the birthmark. It was natural enough to conclude that it was he who had left the room. "Did he have a birthmark on his chin, this man you bought the book from?" she asked as the proprietor returned. "Yes, ma'am, he did." "Then I saw him here a moment ago. When is he likely to return?" "That no one can tell. Perhaps to-morrow, perhaps never. He has not been here before in three months. Did you wish to speak with him?" Lucile shivered. "Well, perhaps not," she half whispered. "Huh!" grunted the proprietor suddenly, "what's this? Must be the book he brought. He's forgotten it. Now he is sure to be back." Lucile was rather of the opinion that he would not soon return. She believed that there had been some trickery about the affair of these valuable books which were being sold to the cheapest book dealer in the city for a very small part of their value. "Perhaps they were stolen," she told herself. At once the strangeness of the situation came to her; here she was with a book in her possession which had been but recently stolen from Frank Morrow's book shop by a girl and now circumstances seemed to indicate that this very book had been stolen by some person who had sold it to this bookmonger, who had passed it on to the doctor who had sold it to Dan Whitner, who had sold it to Roderick Vining, who had sold it to Frank Morrow. "Sounds like the house that Jack built," she whispered to herself. "But then I suppose some valuable books have been stolen many times. Frank Morrow said one of his had been stolen twice within a week by totally different persons." Turning to the shopkeeper, she asked if she might see the book that had been left behind. As she turned back the cover a low exclamation escaped her lips. In the corner of that cover was the same secret mark as had been in all the mystery books, the gargoyle and the letter L. Hiding her surprise as best she could, she handed the book to the man with the remark: "Of course you cannot sell the book, since it is not your own?" "I'd chance it." "I'll give you ten dollars for it. If he returns and demands more, I will either pay the price or return the book. I'll give you my address." "Done!" he exclaimed. "I don't think you'll ever hear from me. I'll give him seven and he'll be glad enough to get it. Pretty good, eh?" he rubbed his hands together gleefully. "Three dollars clean profit and not a cent invested any of the time." Like the ancient volume on fishing, this newly acquired book was small and thin, so without examining its contents she thrust it beside the other in the large pocket of her coat. "I suppose I oughtn't to have done it," she whispered to herself as she left the shop, "but if I hadn't, he'd have sold it to the first customer. It's evidence in the case and besides it may be valuable." A fog hung over the city. The streets were dark and damp. Here and there a yellow light struggled to pierce the denseness of the gloom. As she turned to the right and walked down the street, not knowing for the moment quite what else to do, she fancied that a shadow darted down the alley to her left. "Too dark to tell. Might have been a dog or anything," she murmured. Yet she shivered and quickened her pace. She was in a great, dark city alone and she was going--where? That she did not know. The day's adventures had left her high and dry on the streets of a city as a boat is left by the tide on the sand. CHAPTER XXI A THEFT IN THE NIGHT There is no feeling of desolation so complete as that which sweeps over one who is utterly alone in a great city at night. The desert, the Arctic wilderness, the heart of the forest, the boundless sea, all these have their terrors, but for downright desolation give me the heart of a strange city at night. Hardly had Lucile covered two blocks on her journey from the book shop when this feeling of utter loneliness engulfed her like a bank of fog. Shuddering, she paused to consider, and, as she did so, fancied she caught the bulk of a shadow disappearing into a doorway to the right of her. "Where am I and where am I to go?" she asked herself in a wild attempt to gather her scattered senses. In vain she endeavored to recall the name of the street she was on at that moment. Her efforts to recall the route she had taken in getting there were quite as futile. "Wish I were in Chicago," she breathed. "The very worst of it is better than this. There at least I have friends somewhere. Here I have none anywhere. Wish Florence were here." At that she caught herself up; there was no use in wishing for things that could not be. The question was, what did she intend to do? Was she to seek out a hotel and spend the night there, to resume her search for the first person in America who had sold the ancient copy of the Angler, or was she to take the first train back to Chicago? She had a feeling that she had seen the man she sought and that weeks of search might not reveal him again; yet she disliked going back to Frank Morrow with so little to show for his hundred dollars invested. "Anyway," she said at last with a shudder, "I've got to get out of here. Boo! it seems like the very depths of the slums!" She started on at a brisk pace. Having gone a half block she faced about suddenly; she fancied she heard footsteps behind her. She saw nothing but an empty street. "Nerves," she told herself. "I've got to get over that. I know what's the matter with me though; I haven't eaten for hours. I'll find a restaurant pretty soon and get a cup of coffee." There is a strange thing about our great cities; in certain sections you may pass a half dozen coffee shops and at least three policemen in a single block; in other sections you may go an entire mile without seeing either. Evidently, eating places, like policemen, crave company of their own kind. Lucile had happened upon a policeless and eat-shopless section of New York. For a full twenty minutes she tramped on through the fog, growing more and more certain at every step that she was being followed by someone, and not coming upon a single person or shop that offered her either food or protection. Suddenly she found herself in the midst of a throng of people. A movie theater had disgorged this throng. Like a sudden flood of water, they surrounded her and bore her on. They poured down the street to break up into two smaller streams, one of which flowed on down the street and the other into a hole in the ground. Having been caught in the latter stream, and not knowing what else to do, eager for companionship of whatever sort, the girl allowed herself to be borne along and down into the hole. Down a steep flight of steps she was half carried, to be at last deposited on a platform, alongside of which in due time a train of electric cars came rattling in. "The subway," she breathed. "It will take me anywhere, providing I know where I want to go." Just as she was beginning to experience a sense of relief from contact with this flowing mass of humanity she was given a sudden shock. To the right of her, through a narrow gap in the throng, she recognized a face. The gap closed up at once and the face disappeared, but the image of it remained. It was the face of the man she had seen in the shop, he of the birthmark on his chin. "No doubt of it now," she said half aloud. "He _is_ following me." Then, like some hunted creature of the wild, she began looking about her for a way of escape. Before her there whizzed a train. The moving cars came to a halt. A door slid open. She leaped within. The next instant the door closed and she was borne away. To what place? She could not tell. All she knew was that she was on her way. Quite confident that she had evaded her pursuer, she settled back in her seat to fall into a drowsy stupor. How far she rode she could not tell. Having at last been roused to action by the pangs of hunger, she rose and left the car. "Only hope there is some place to eat near," she sighed. Again she found herself lost in a jam; the legitimate theaters were disgorging their crowds. She was at this time, though she did not know it, in the down town district. Her right hand was disengaged; in her left she carried a small leather bag. As she struggled through the throng, she experienced difficulty in retaining her hold on this bag. Of a sudden she felt a mighty wrench on its handle and the next instant it was gone. There could be no mistaking that sudden pull. It had been torn from her grasp by a vandal of some sort. As she turned with a gasp, she caught sight of a face that vanished instantly, the face of the man with the birthmark on his chin. Instantly the whole situation flashed through her mind; this man had been following her to regain possession of one or both of the books which at this moment reposed in her coat pocket. He had made the mistake of thinking these books were in the bag. He would search the bag and then-- She reasoned no further; a car door was about to close. She dashed through it at imminent risk of being caught in the crush of its swing and the next instant the car whirled away. "Missed him that time," she breathed. "He will search the bag. When he discovers his mistake it will be too late. The bird has flown. As to the bag, he may keep it. It contains only a bit of a pink garment which I can afford to do without, and two clean handkerchiefs." Fifteen minutes later when she left the car she found herself in a very much calmer state of mind. Convinced that she had shaken herself free from her undesirable shadow, and fully convinced also that nothing now remained but to eat a belated supper and board the next train for her home city, she went about the business of finding out what that next train might be and from what depot it left. Fortunately, a near-by hotel office was able to furnish her the information needed and to call a taxi. A half hour later she found herself enjoying a hot lunch in the depot and at the same time mentally reveling in the soft comfort of "Lower 7" of car 36, which she was soon to occupy. CHAPTER XXII MANY MYSTERIES One might have supposed that, considering she was now late into the night of the most exacting and exciting day of her whole life, Lucile, once she was safely stowed away in her berth on the train, would immediately fall asleep. This, however, was not the case. Her active brain was still at work, still struggling to untangle the many mysteries that, during the past weeks, had woven themselves into what seemed an inseparable tangle. So, after a half hour of vain attempt to sleep, she sat bolt upright in her berth and snapped on the light, prepared if need be to spend the few remaining hours of that night satisfying the demands of that irreconcilable mind of hers. The train had already started. The heavy green curtains which hid her from the little outside world about her waved gently to and fro. Her white arms and shoulders gleamed in the light. Her hair hung tumbled in a mass about her. As the train took a curve, she was swung against the hammock in which her heavy coat rested. Her bare shoulder touched something hard. "The books," she said. "Wonder what my new acquirement is like?" She drew the new book from her pocket and, brushing her hair out of her eyes, scanned it curiously. "French," she whispered. "Very old French and hard to read." As she thumbed the pages she saw quaint woodcuts of soldiers and officers. Here was a single officer seated impressively upon a horse; here a group of soldiers scanning the horizon; and there a whole battalion charging a very ancient fieldpiece. "Something about war," she told herself. "That's about all I can make out." She was ready to close the book when her eye was caught by an inscription written upon the fly leaf. "Looks sort of distinguished," she told herself. "Shouldn't wonder if the book were valuable because of that writing if for nothing else." In this surmise she was more right than she knew. She put the book carefully away but was unable to banish the questions which the sight of it had brought up. Automatically her mind went over the incidents which had led up to this precise moment. She saw the child in the university library, saw her take down the book and flee, saw her later in the mystery cottage on Tyler street. She fought again the battle with the hardened foster mother of the child and again endured the torturing moments in that evil woman's abode. She thought of the mysterious person who had followed her and had saved her from unknown terrors by notifying the police. Had that person been the same as he who had followed her this very night in an attempt to regain possession of the two books? No, surely not. She could not conceive of his doing her an act of kindness. She thought of the person who had followed them to the wall of the summer cottage out at the dunes and wondered vaguely if he could have been the same person who had followed them on Tyler street at one time and at that other saved her from the clutches of the child's foster parents. She wondered who he could be. Was he a detective who had been set to dog her trail or was he some friend? The latter seemed impossible. If he was a detective, how had she escaped him on this trip? Or, after all, had she? It gave her a little thrill to think that perhaps in the excitement of the day his presence near her had not been noticed and that he might at this very moment be traveling with her in this car. Involuntarily she seized the green curtains and tried to button them more tightly, then she threw back her head and laughed at herself. "But how," she asked herself, "is all this tangle to be straightened out? Take that one little book, 'The Compleat Angler.' The child apparently stole it from Frank Morrow; I have it from her by a mere accident; Frank Morrow has it from one New York book shop; that shop from another; the other from a theologian; he from a third book shop; and that shop more than likely from a thief, for if he would attempt to steal it from me to-night, he more than likely stole it in the first place and was attempting to get it from me to destroy my evidence against him. Now if the book was stolen in the first place and all of us have had stolen property in our possession, in the form of this book, what's going to happen to the bunch of us and how are we ever to square ourselves? Last of all," she smiled, "where does our friend, the aged Frenchman, the godfather of that precious child, come in on it? And what is the meaning of the secret mark?" With all these problems stated and none of them solved, she at last found a drowsy sensation about to overcome her, so settling back upon her pillow and drawing the blankets about her, she allowed herself to drift off into slumber. The train she had taken was not as speedy as the one which had taken her to New York. Darkness of another day had fallen when at last she recognized the welcome sound of the train rumbling over hollow spaces at regular intervals and knew that she was passing over the streets of her own city. Florence would be there to meet her. Lucile had wired her the time of her arrival. It certainly would seem good to meet someone she knew once more. As the train at last rattled into the heart of the city, she caught an unusual red glow against the sky. "Fire somewhere," she told herself without giving it much thought, for in a city of millions one thinks little of a single blaze. It was only after she and Florence had left the depot that she noted again that red glow with a start. The first indication that something unusual was happening in that section of the city was the large amount of traffic which passed the street car they had taken. Automobiles, trucks and delivery cars rattled rapidly past them. "That's strange!" she told herself. "The street is usually deserted at this time of night. I wonder if the fire could be over this way; but surely it would be out by now." At last the traffic became so crowded that their car, like a bit of debris in a clogged stream, was caught and held in the middle of it all. "What's the trouble?" she asked the conductor. "Bad fire up ahead, just across the river." "Across the river? Why--that's where Tyler street is." "Yes'm, in that direction." "Come on," she said, seizing Florence by the arm; "the fire's down toward Tyler street. I think we ought to try to get to the cottage if we can. What could that child and the old Frenchman do if the fire reached their cottage? He'd burn rather than leave his books and the child wouldn't leave him; besides there are the books that belong to other people and that I'm partly responsible for. C'm'on." For fifteen minutes they struggled down a street that was thronged with excited people. "One wouldn't believe that there could be such a crowd on the streets at this hour of the night," panted Florence, as she elbowed her way forward. "Lucile, you hang to my waist. We must not be separated." They came to a dead stop at last. At the end of the river bridge a rope had been thrown across the street. At paces of ten feet this rope was guarded by policemen. None could pass save the firemen. The fire was across the river but sent forth a red glare that was startling. By dint of ten minutes of crawling Florence succeeded in securing for them a position against the rope. A large fire in a city at night is a grand and terrible spectacle. This fire was no exception. Indeed, it was destined to become the worst fire the city had experienced in more than forty years. Starting in some low, ancient structures that lay along the river, it soon climbed to a series of brick buildings occupied by garment makers. The flames, like red dragons' tongues, darted in and out of windows. With a great burst they leaped through a tar-covered roof to mount hundreds of feet in air. Burning fragments, all ablaze, leaped to soar away in the hot currents of air. The firemen, all but powerless, fought bravely. Here a fire tower reared itself to dizzy heights in air. Here and there fire hose, like a thousand entwined serpents, writhed and twisted. Here a whole battery of fire engines smoked and there two powerful gasoline driven engines kept up a constant heavy throbbing. Roofs and walls crumbled, water tanks tottered and fell, steel pillars writhed and twisted in the intense heat, chimneys came crashing in heaps. The fire had all but consumed the row of four-story buildings. Then with a fresh dash of air from the lake it burst forth in earnest, a real and terrible conflagration. Lucile, as she stood there watching it, felt a thousand hitherto unexperienced emotions sweep over her. But at last she came to rest with one terrible fact bearing down upon her very soul. Tyler street was just beyond this conflagration. Who could tell when the fire would reach the mysterious tumble-down cottage with its aged occupant? She thought of something else, of the books she might long since have returned to their rightful owners and had not. "Now they will burn and I will never be able to explain," she told herself. "Somehow I must get through!" In her excitement she lifted the rope and started forward. A heavy hand was instantly laid on her shoulders. "Y' can't go over there." "I must." "Y' can't." The policeman thrust her gently back behind the rope and drew it down before her. "I must go," she told herself. "Oh, I must! I must!" CHAPTER XXIII INSIDE THE LINES "Come on," Lucile said, pulling at Florence's arm. "We've got to get there. It must be done. For everything that must be done there is always a way." They crowded their way back through the throng which was hourly growing denser. It was distressing to catch the fragments of conversation that came to them as they fought their way back. Tens of thousands of people were being robbed of their means of making a living. Each fresh blaze took the bread from the mouths of hundreds of children. "T'wasn't much of a job I had," muttered an Irish mother with a shawl over her head, "but it was bread! Bread!" "Every paper, every record of my business for the past ten years, was in my files and the office is doomed," roared a red-faced business man. "It's doomed! And they won't let me through." "There's not one of them all that needs to get through more badly than I," said Lucile, with a lump in her throat. "Surely there must be a way." Working their way back, the two girls hurried four blocks along Wells street, which ran parallel to the river, then turned on Madison to fight their way toward a second bridge. "Perhaps it is open," Lucile told Florence. Her hopes were short-lived. Again they faced a rope and a line of determined-faced policemen. "It just must be done!" said Lucile, setting her teeth hard as they again backed away. An alley offered freer passage than the street. They had passed down this but a short way when they came upon a ladder truck which had been backed in as a reserve. On it hung the long rubber coats and heavy black hats of the firemen. Instinctively Lucile's hand went out for a coat. She glanced to right and left. She saw no one. The next instant she had donned that coat and was drawing a hat down solidly over her hair. "I know it's an awful thing to do," she whispered, "but I am doing it for them, not for myself. You may come or stay. It's really my battle. I've got to see it through to the end. You always advised against going further but I ventured. Now it's do or die." Florence's answer was to put out a hand and to grasp a fireman's coat. The next moment, in this new disguise, they were away. Had the girls happened to look back just before leaving the alley they might have surprised a stoop-shouldered, studious-looking man in the act of doing exactly as they had done, robing himself in fireman's garb. Dressed as they now were, they found the passing of the line a simple matter. Scores of fire companies and hundreds of firemen from all parts of the city had been called upon in this extreme emergency. There was much confusion. That two firemen should be passing forward to join their companies did not seem unusual. The coats and hats formed a complete disguise. The crossing of the bridge was accomplished on the run. They reached the other side in the nick of time, for just as they leaped upon the approach the great cantilevers began to rise. A huge freighter which had been disgorging its cargo into one of the basements that line the river had been endangered by the fire. Puffing and snarling, adding its bit of smoke to the dense, lampblack cloud which hung over the city, a tug was working the freighter to a place of safety. "We'll have to stay inside, now we're here," panted Lucile. "There's a line formed along the other approach. Here's a stair leading down to the railway tracks. We can follow the tracks for a block, then turn west again. There'll be no line there; it's too close to the fire." "Might be dangerous," Florence hung back. "Can't help it. It's our chance." Lucile was halfway down the stair. Florence followed and the next moment they were racing along a wall beside the railway track. A switch engine racing down the track with a line of box cars, one ablaze, forced them to flatten themselves against the wall. There was someone following them, the studious boy in a fireman's uniform. He barely escaped being run down by the engine, but when it had passed and they resumed their course, he followed them. Darting from niche to niche, from shadow to shadow, he kept some distance behind them. "Up here," panted Lucile, racing upstairs. The heat was increasing. The climbing of those stairs seemed to double its intensity. Cinders were falling all about them. "The wind has shifted," Florence breathed. "It--it's going to be hard." Lucile did not reply. Her throat was parched. Her face felt as if it were on fire. The heavy coat and hat were insufferable yet she dared not cast them away. So they struggled on. And their shadow, like all true shadows, followed. "Look! Oh, look!" cried Florence, reeling in her tracks. A sudden gust of wind had sent the fire swooping against the side of a magnificent building of concrete and steel. Towering aloft sixteen stories, it covered a full city block. "It's going," cried Lucile as she heard the awful crash of glass and saw flames bursting from the windows as if from the open hearth furnace of a foundry. It was true. The magnificent mahogany desks from which great, high-salaried executives sent out orders to thousands of weary tailors, made quite as good kindling that night as did some poor widow's washboard, and they were given quite as much consideration by that bad master, fire. "Hurry!" Lucile's voice was hoarse with emotion. "We must get behind it, out of the path of the wind, or we will be burned to a cinder." Catching the full force of her meaning, Florence seized Lucile's hand and together they rushed forward. Burning cinders rained about them, a half-burned board came swooping down to fall in their very path. Twice Lucile stumbled and fell, but each time Florence had her on her feet in an instant. "Courage! Courage!" she whispered. "Only a few feet more and then the turn." After what seemed an age they reached that turn and found themselves in a place where a breath of night air fanned their cheeks. Buildings lay between them and the doomed executive building. The firemen were plying these with water. The great cement structure would be completely emptied of its contents by the fire but it would stand there empty-eyed and staring like an Egyptian sphinx. "It may form a fire-wall which will protect this and the next street," said Florence hopefully. "The worst may be over." CHAPTER XXIV SECRETS REVEALED On a night such as this, one does not stand on formalities. There was a light burning in the mystery cottage on Tyler street. The girls entered without knocking. The scene which struck their eyes was most dramatic. On a long, low couch lay the aged Frenchman. Beside his bed, her hair disheveled, her garments blackened and scorched by fire, knelt the child. She was silently sobbing. The man, for all one could see, might be dead, so white and still did he lie. Yet as the girls, still dressed in great coats and rubber hats, stepped into the room, his eyes opened; his lips moved and the girls heard him murmur: "Ah, the firemen. Now my books will burn, the house will go. They all will burn. But like Montcalm at Quebec, I shall not live to see my defeat." "No, no, no!" the child sprang to her feet. "They must not burn! They shall not burn!" "Calm yourself," said Lucile, advancing into the room and removing her coat as she did so. "It is only I, your friend, Lucile. The fire is two blocks away and there is reason to hope that this part of Tyler street will be saved. The huge concrete building is burning out from within but is standing rugged as a great rock. It is your protection." "Ah, then I shall die happy," breathed the man. "No! No! No!" almost screamed the child. "You shall not die." "Hush, my little one," whispered the man. "Do not question the wisdom of the Almighty. My hour has come. Soon I shall be with my sires and with my sons and grandsons; with all the brave ones who have so nobly defended our beloved France. "And as for you, my little one, you have here two friends and all my books. It is in the tin box behind the books, my will. I have no living kin. I have made you my heir. The books are worth much money. You are well provided for. Your friends here will see that they are not stolen from you, will you not?" Florence and Lucile, too touched to trust themselves to speak, bowed their heads. "As for myself," the man went on in a hoarse whisper, "I have but one regret. "Come close," he beckoned to Lucile. "Come very close. I have something more to tell you." Lucille moved close to him, something seeming to say to her, "Now you are to hear the gargoyle's secret." "Not many days ago," he began, "I told you some of my life, but not all. I could not. My heart was too sore. Now I wish to tell you all. You remember that I said I took my books to Paris. That is not quite true. I started with all of them but not all arrived. One box of them, the most precious of all, was stolen while on the way and a box of cheap and worthless books put in its place. "Heartbroken at this loss, I traced the robbers as best I could at last to find that the books had been carried overseas to America. "I came to America. They had been sold, scattered abroad. The thief eluded me, but the books I could trace. By the gargoyle in the corner and by the descriptions of dealers in rare books, I located many of them. "Those who had them had paid handsomely for them. They would not believe an old man's story. They would not give them up. "I brought suit in the courts. It was no use. No one would believe me. "Young lady," the old man's voice all but died away as his feeble fingers clutched at the covers, "young lady, every man has some wish which he hopes to fulfill. He may desire to become rich, to secure power, to write a book, to paint a great picture. There is always something. As for me, I wished but one thing, a very little thing: to die with the books, those precious volumes I had inherited. The foolish wish of a childish old man, perhaps, but that was my wish. The war has taken my family. They cannot gather by my bedside; I have only my books. And, thanks to this child," he attempted to place his hand on the child's bowed head, "thanks to her, there are but few missing at this, the last moment." For a little there was silence in the room, then the whisper began again, this time more faint: "Perhaps it was wrong, the way I taught the child to get the books. But they were really my own. I had not sold one of them. They were all my own. She knows where they came from. When I am gone, if that is the way of America, they may all be returned." Lucile hesitated for a moment, then bent over the dying man. "The books," she whispered. "Were two of them very small ones?" The expression on the dying man's face grew eager as he answered, "Yes, yes, very small and very rare. One was a book about fishing and the other--ah, that one!--that was the rarest of all. It had been written in by the great Napoleon and had been presented by him to one of his marshals, my uncle." Lucile's hand came out from behind her back. In it were two books. "Are these the ones?" she asked. "Yes, yes," he breathed hoarsely. "Those are the very most precious ones. I die--I die happy." For a second the glassy eyes stared, then lighted up with a smile that was beautiful to behold. "Ah!" he breathed, "I am happy now, happy as when a child I played beneath the grapevines in my own beloved France." Those were his last words. A moment later, Lucile turned to lead the silently weeping child into another room. As she did so, she encountered a figure standing with bowed head. It was the studious looking boy who had donned the fireman's coat and followed them. "Harry Brock!" she whispered. "How did you come here?" "I came in very much the same manner that you came," he said quietly. "I have been where you have been many times of late. I did not understand, but I thought you needed protection and since I thought of myself as the best friend you had among the men at the university, I took that task upon myself. I have been in this room, unnoticed, for some time. I heard what he said and now I think I understand. Please allow me to congratulate you and--and to thank you. You have strengthened my faith in--in all that is good and beautiful." He stepped awkwardly aside and allowed her to pass. CHAPTER XXV BETTER DAYS There was no time for explanations that night. The fire had been checked; the cottage and the rare books were safe, but there were many other things to be attended to. It was several days before Lucile met Harry Brock again and then it was by appointment, in the Cozy Corner Tea Room. Her time during the intervening days was taken up with affairs relating to her new charge, the child refugee, Marie. She went at once to Frank Morrow for advice. He expressed great surprise at the turn events had taken but told her that he had suspected from the day she had told the story to him that the books had been stolen from Monsieur Le Bon. "And now we will catch the thief and if he has money we will make him pay," he declared stoutly. He made good his declaration. Through the loosely joined but powerful league of book sellers he tracked down the man with the birthmark on his chin and forced him to admit the theft of the case of valuable books. As for money with which to make restitution, like most of his kind he had none. He could only be turned over to the "Tombs" to work out his atonement. The books taken from the university and elsewhere were offered back to the last purchasers. In most cases they returned them as the child's rightful possession, to be sold together with the many other rare books which had been left to Marie by Monsieur Le Bon. In all there was quite a tidy sum of money realized from the sale. This was put in trust for Marie, the income from it to be used for her education. As for that meeting of Lucile and Harry in the tea room, it was little more than a series of exclamations on the part of one or the other of them as they related their part in the mysterious drama. "And you followed us right out into the country that night we went to the Ramsey cottage?" Lucile exclaimed. "Yes, up to the wall," Harry admitted. "The water stopped me there." "And it was you who told the police I was in danger when that terrible man and woman locked me in?" Harry bowed his assent. He related how night after night, without understanding their strange wanderings, he had followed the two girls about as a sort of bodyguard. When Lucile thought how many sleepless nights it had cost him, her heart was too full for words. She tried to thank him. Her lips would not form words. "But don't you see," he smiled; "you were trying to help someone out of her difficulties and I was trying to help you. That's the way the whole world needs to live, I guess, if we are all to be happy." Lucile smiled and agreed that he had expressed it quite correctly, but down deep in her heart she knew that she would never feel quite the same toward any of her other fellow students as she did toward him at that moment. And so their tea-party ended. Frank Morrow insisted on the girls' accepting the two-hundred-dollar reward. There were two other rewards which had been offered for the return of missing books, so in the end Lucile and Florence found themselves in a rather better financial state. As for Marie, she was taken into the practice school of the university. By special arrangement she was given a room in the ladies' dormitory. It was close to that of her good friends, Lucile and Florence, so she was never lonely, and in this atmosphere which was the world she was meant to live in she blossomed out like a flower in the spring sunshine. The Roy J. Snell Books Mr. Snell is a versatile writer who knows how to write stories that will please boys and girls. He has traveled widely, visited many out-of-the-way corners of the earth, and being a keen observer has found material for many thrilling stories. His stories are full of adventure and mystery, yet in the weaving of the story there are little threads upon which are hung lessons in loyalty, honesty, patriotism and right living. Mr. Snell has created a wide audience among the younger readers of America. Boy or girl, you are sure to find a Snell book to your liking. His works cover a wide and interesting scope. Here are the titles of the Snell Books: _Mystery Stories for Boys_ 1. Triple Spies 2. Lost in the Air 3. Panther Eye 4. The Crimson Flash 5. White Fire 6. The Black Schooner 7. The Hidden Trail 8. The Firebug 9. The Red Lure 10. Forbidden Cargoes 11. Johnny Longbow 12. The Rope of Gold 13. The Arrow of Fire 14. The Gray Shadow 15. Riddle of the Storm 16. The Galloping Ghost 17. Whispers at Dawn; or, The Eye 18. Mystery Wings 19. Red Dynamite 20. The Seal of Secrecy 21. The Shadow Passes 22. Sign of the Green Arrow _The Radio-Phone Boys' Series_ 1. Curlie Carson Listens In 2. On the Yukon Trail 3. The Desert Patrol 4. The Seagoing Tank 5. The Flying Sub 6. Dark Treasure 7. Whispering Isles 8. Invisable Wall _Adventure Stories for Girls_ 1. The Blue Envelope 2. The Cruise of the O'Moo 3. The Secret Mark 4. The Purple Flame 5. The Crimson Thread 6. The Silent Alarm 7. The Thirteenth Ring 8. Witches Cove 9. The Gypsy Shawl 10. Green Eyes 11. The Golden Circle 12. The Magic Curtain 13. Hour of Enchantment 14. The Phantom Violin 15. Gypsy Flight 16. The Crystal Ball 17. A Ticket to Adventure 18. The Third Warning * * * * * * Transcriber's note: --Copyright notice provided as in the original printed text--this e-text is in the public domain in the country of publication. --Obvious typographical errors were corrected without comment. --Dialect and non-standard spellings were not changed. --Promotional material was moved to the end of the book, and the list of books in the three series was completed by using other sources. 
20821	----	[Illustration: THE STREAM OF GIRLS DESCENDED] ----------------------------------------------------------------------- BETTY WALES SENIOR by MARGARET WARDE _author of_ BETTY WALES, FRESHMAN BETTY WALES, SOPHOMORE BETTY WALES, JUNIOR BETTY WALES, B.A. BETTY WALES & CO. BETTY WALES ON THE CAMPUS BETTY WALES DECIDES ILLUSTRATED BY EVA M. NAGEL THE PENN PUBLISHING COMPANY, PHILADELPHIA 1919 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- COPYRIGHT 1907 BY THE PENN PUBLISHING COMPANY Betty Wales, Senior ----------------------------------------------------------------------- INTRODUCTION For the information of those readers who have not followed Betty Wales through the first three years of her college career, as described in "Betty Wales, Freshman," "Betty Wales, Sophomore," and "Betty Wales, Junior," it should be explained that most of Betty's little circle began to be friends in their freshman year, when they lived off the campus at Mrs. Chapin's, and Mary Brooks, the only sophomore in the house, ruled them with an autocratic hand. Betty found Helen Adams a comical and sometimes a trying roommate. Rachel Morrison and Katherine Kittredge were also at Mrs. Chapin's, and Roberta Lewis, who adored Mary Brooks and was desperately afraid of every one else in the house, though Betty Wales guessed that shyness was at the bottom of Roberta's haughty manner. Eleanor Watson was the most prominent member of the group that year and part of the next. Betty admired her greatly but found her a very difficult person to win as a friend, though in the end she proved worthy of all the trouble she had cost. At the beginning of sophomore year the Chapin House girls moved to the campus, and "the B's" and Madeline Ayres, who explained that she lived in "Bohemia, New York," joined the circle. In their junior year Betty and her friends organized the "Merry Hearts" society, and Georgia Ames, a freshman friend of Madeline's, amused and mystified the whole college until she was finally discovered to be merely one of Madeline's many delightful inventions. But the joke was on the "Merry Hearts" when a real Georgia Ames entered college. It was when they were juniors, too, that the "Merry Hearts" took a vacation trip to the Bahamas and incidentally manoeuvred a romance for two of their faculty friends--which caused Mary Brooks to rename their society the Merry Match-makers. And now if any one wishes to know what Betty Wales and her friends did after they left college, well--there's something about it in "Betty Wales, B.A.," "Betty Wales & Co.," "Betty Wales on the Campus," and "Betty Wales Decides." ----------------------------------------------------------------------- CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I "BACK TO COLLEGE AGAIN" 9 II A SENIOR CLASS-MEETING 25 III THE BELDEN HOUSE "INITIATION PARTY" 49 IV AN ADVENTUROUS MOUNTAIN DAY 69 V THE RETURN OF MARY BROOKS 86 VI HELEN ADAMS'S MISSION 106 VII ROBERTA "ARRIVES" 126 VIII THE GREATEST TOY-SHOP ON EARTH 143 IX A WEDDING AND A VISIT TO BOHEMIA 169 X TRYING FOR PARTS 189 XI A DARK HORSE DEFINED 211 XII CALLING ON ANNE CARTER 230 XIII GEORGIA'S AMETHYST PENDANT 250 XIV THE MOONSHINERS' BACON-ROAST 269 XV PLANS FOR A COOPERATIVE COMMENCEMENT 291 XVI A Hoop-Rolling and a Tragedy 308 XVII BITS OF COMMENCEMENT 325 XVIII THE GOING OUT OF 19-- 350 XIX "GOOD-BYE!" 366 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE The Stream of Girls Descended _Frontispiece_ "Here Are Some Perfectly Elegant Mushrooms" 76 "Oh, I Beg Your Pardon," 132 "I Do Care About Having Friends Like You," She Said 171 "Well, We've Found Our Shylock," He Said 224 The Girls Watched Her in Bewilderment 318 "Ladies, Behold the Preceptress of the Kankakee Academy" 373 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- BETTY WALES, SENIOR CHAPTER I "BACK TO THE COLLEGE AGAIN" "Oh, Rachel Morrison, am I too late for the four-ten train?" Betty Wales, pink-cheeked and breathless, her yellow curls flying under her dainty lingerie hat, and her crisp white skirts held high to escape the dust of the station platform, sank down beside Rachel on a steamer trunk that the Harding baggage-men had been too busy or too accommodating to move away, and began to fan herself vigorously with a very small and filmy handkerchief. "No, you're not late, dearie," laughed Rachel, pulling Betty's hat straight, "or rather the train is late, too. Where have you been?" Betty smiled reminiscently. "Everywhere, pretty nearly. You know that cunning little freshman that had lost her trunks----" "All those that I've interviewed have lost their trunks," interpolated Rachel. Betty waved a deprecating hand toward the mountain of baggage that was piled up further down the platform. "Oh, of course, in that lovely mess. Who wouldn't? But this girl lost hers before she got here--in Chicago or Albany, or maybe it was Omaha. She lives in Los Angeles, so she might have lost them almost anywhere, you see." "And of course she expected Prexy or the registrar to go back and look for them," added Rachel. Betty laughed. "Not she. Besides she doesn't seem to care a bit. She seems to think it's a splendid chance to go to New York next week and buy new clothes. But what she wanted of me was to tell her where she could get some shirt waists--just enough to last until she's perfectly sure that the trunks are gone for good. I didn't want to stick around here from three to four, so I said I'd go and show her Evans's and that little new shirt waist place. Of course I pointed out all the objects of interest along the way, and when I mentioned Cuyler's, she insisted upon going in to have ices." "And how many does that make for you to-day?" demanded Rachel severely. "Well," Betty defended herself, "I treated you once, and you treated me once, and then we met Christy Mason, and as you couldn't go back with her I had to. But I only had lemonade that time. And this child was so comical, and it was such a good idea." "What was such a good idea?" inquired Rachel. "Oh, didn't I tell you? Why, after we'd finished at Cuyler's, she asked me if there weren't any other places something like it, and she said she thought if we tried them all in a row we could tell which was best. But we couldn't," sighed Betty regretfully, "because of course things taste better when you're hungriest. But anyhow she wanted to keep on, because now she can give pointers to other freshmen, and make them think she is a sophomore." "How about the shirt waists?" "Oh, she had just got to that when I had to leave her." Betty rose, sighing, as a train whistled somewhere down the track. "Do you suppose Georgia Ames will be on this one?" "Who can tell?" said Rachel. "There'll be somebody that we know anyway. Wasn't that first day queer and creepy?" "Yes," agreed Betty, "when nobody got off but freshmen frightened to pieces about their exams. And that was only two days ago! It seems two weeks. I've always rather envied the Students' Aid Society seniors, because they have such a good chance to pick out the interesting freshmen, but I shan't any more." "Not even after to-day?" Betty frowned reflectively. "Well, of course to-day has been pretty grand--with all those ices, and Christy, and the freshmen all so cheerful and amusing. And then there's the eight-fifteen. Won't it be fun--to see the Clan get off that? Yes, I think I do envy myself. Can a person envy herself, Rachel?" She gave Rachel's arm a sudden squeeze. "Rachel," she went on very solemnly, "do you realize that we can't ever again in all our lives be Students' Aid Seniors, meeting poor little Harding freshmen?" Rachel hugged Betty sympathetically. "Yes, I do," she said. "Why at this time next year I shall be earning my own living 'out in the wide, wide world,' as the song says, miles from any of the Clan." Betty looked across the net-work of tracks, to the hills that make a circle about Harding. "And miles from this dear old town," she added. "But we can write to each other, and make visits, and we can come back to class reunions. But that won't be the same." Rachel looked at the pretty, yellow-haired child, and wondered if she realized how different her "wide, wide world" was likely to be from Katherine's or Helen Chase Adams's--or Rachel Morrison's. To some of the Clan Harding meant everything they had ever known in the way of culture and scholarly refinement, of happy leisure and congenial friendship. It was comforting somehow to find that girls like Betty and the B's, who had everything else, were just as fond of Harding and were going to be just as sorry to leave it. Rachel never envied anybody, but she liked to think that this life that was so precious to her meant much to all her friends. It made one feel surer that pretty clothes and plenty of spending-money and delightful summers at the seashore or in the mountains did not matter much, so long as the one big, beautiful fact of being a Harding girl was assured. All this flashed through Rachel's mind much more quickly than it can be written down. Aloud she said cheerfully, "Well, we have one whole year more of it." "I should rather think so," declared Betty emphatically, "and we mustn't waste a single minute of it. I wish it was evening. It seems as if I couldn't wait to see the other girls." "Well, there's plenty to do just now," said Rachel briskly, as the four-ten halted, and the streams of girls, laden with traveling bags, suit-cases, golf-clubs, tennis-rackets, and queer-shaped bulky parcels that had obviously refused to go into any trunk, began to descend from it. Rachel hurried forward at once, eager to find someone who needed help or directions or a friendly word of welcome. But Betty stood where she was, just out of the crowd, watching the old girls' excited meetings and the new girls' timid progresses, which were sure to be intercepted before long by some white-gowned, competent senior, anxious to miss no possible opportunity for helpfulness. Betty had done her part all day, and in addition had taken Rachel's place earlier in the afternoon, to give her a free hour for tutoring. She was tired now and hot, and she had undoubtedly eaten too many ices; but she was also trying an experiment. Where she stood she could watch both platforms from which the girls were descending. Her quick glance shot from one to the other, scanning each figure as it emerged from the shadowy car and stopped for an instant, hesitating, on the platform. The train was nearly emptied of its Harding contingent when all at once Betty gave a little cry and darted forward to meet a girl who was making an unusually careful and prolonged inspection of the crowd below her. She was a slender, pretty girl, with yellow hair, which curled around her face. She carried a trim little hand-bag and a well-filled bag of golf-clubs. "Can I help you in any way?" asked Betty, holding out a hand for the golf-bag. The pretty freshman turned a puzzled face toward her, and surrendered the bag. "I don't know," she said doubtfully. "I'm to be a freshman at Harding. Father telegraphed the registrar to meet me. Could you point her out, please?" "I knew it," laughed Betty, gleefully. Then she turned to the girl. "The registrar is up at the college answering fifty questions a minute, and I'm here to meet you. Give me your checks, and we'll find an expressman. Oh, yes, and where do you board?" The pretty freshman answered her questions with an air of pleased bewilderment, and later, on the way up the hill, asked questions of her own, laughed shamefacedly over her misunderstanding about the registrar, was comforted when Betty had explained that it was not an original mistake, and invited her new friend to come and see her with that particular sort of eager shyness that is the greatest compliment one girl can pay to another. "Dear old Dorothy," thought Betty, when she had deposited the freshman, considerably enlightened about college etiquette, at one of the pleasantest of the off-campus houses, and was speeding to the Belden for tea. "What a little goose she must have thought me! And what a dear she was! I wonder if this freshman will ever really care about me that way. I do mean to try to make her. Oh, what a lot of things seniors have to think about!" But the only thing to think about that evening was the arrival of the eight-fifteen train, which would bring Eleanor, the B's, Nita Reese, Katherine Kittredge, Roberta Lewis, and Madeline Ayres, together with two-thirds of the rest of the senior class back to Harding. It was such fun to saunter down to the station in the warm twilight, to wait, relieved of all responsibilities concerning cabs, expressmen, and belated trunks, while the crowded train pulled in, and then to dash frantically about from one dear friend to another, stopping to shake hands with a sophomore here, and there to greet a junior, but being gladdest, of course, to welcome back the members of "the finest class." Betty and Rachel had arranged not to serve on the reception committee for freshmen that evening, and it was not long before the reunited "Merry Hearts" escaped from the pandemonium at the station to reassemble on the Belden House piazza for what Katherine called a "high old talk." How the tongues wagged! Eleanor Watson had come straight from her father's luxurious camp in the Colorado mountains, where she and Jim had been having a house-party for some of their Denver friends. "You girls must all come out next summer," she declared enthusiastically. "Father sent a special invitation to you, Betty, and he and--and--mother"--Eleanor struggled with the new name for the judge's young wife--"are coming on to commencement, and then of course you'll all meet them. Mother is so jolly--she knows just what girls like, and she enters into all the fun, just like one of us. Of course she is absurdly young," laughed Eleanor, as if the stepmother's youth had never been her most intolerable failing in her daughter's eyes. Babbie had been abroad, on an automobile trip through France. She looked more elegant than ever in a chic little suit from Paris, with a toque to match, and heavy gloves that she had bought in London. "I've got a pair for each of you in my trunk," she announced, "and here's hoping I didn't mix up the sizes." "Sixes for me," cried Bob. "Five and a-half," shrieked Babe. "Six and a-half," announced Katherine, "and you ought to have brought me two pairs, because I wear mine out more than twice as fast as anybody else." "What kind of a summer have you had, K?" asked Babe, who never wrote letters, and therefore seldom received any. "Same old kind," answered Katherine cheerfully. "Mended twenty dozen stockings, got breakfast for seven hungry mouths every morning, played tennis with the boys and Polly, tutored all I could, sent out father's bills,--oh, being the oldest of eight is no snap, I can tell you, but," Katherine added with a chuckle, "it's lots of fun. Boys do like you so if you're rather decent to them." "I just hate being an only child," declared Bob hotly. "What's the use of a place in the country unless there are children to wade in the brook, and chase the chickens and ride the horses? Next summer I'm going to have fresh-air children up there all summer, and you two"--indicating the other B's--"have got to come and help save them from early deaths." "All right," said Babe easily, "only I shall wade too." "And you've got to wash them up before I can touch them," stipulated the fastidious Babbie. "Where have you been all summer, Rachel?" "Right at home, helping in an office during the day and tutoring evenings. And I've saved enough so that I shan't have to worry one single bit about money this year," announced Rachel triumphantly. "Good for old Rachel!" cried Madeline Ayres, who had spent the summer nursing her mother through a severe illness and looked worn and thin in consequence. "Then you're as glad to get back to the grind as I am. Betty here, with her summer on an island in Lake Michigan, and Eleanor, and these lucky B's with their childless farms, and their Parisian raiment, don't know what it's like to be back in the arms of one's friends." "Don't we!" cried a protesting chorus. "Don't you what?" called a voice out of the darkness, and the real Georgia Ames, cheerful and sunburned and self-possessed shook hands all around, and found a seat behind Madeline on the piazza railing. "You were all so busy talking that you didn't see me at the train," she explained coolly. "A tall girl with glasses asked if there was anything she could do for me, and I said oh, no, that I'd been here before. Then she asked me my name, and when I said Georgia Ames, I thought she was going to faint." "She took you for a ghost, my dear," said Madeline, patting her double's shoulder affectionately. "You must get used to being treated that way, you know. You're billed to make a sensation in spite of yourself." "But we're going to make it up to you all we can," chirped Babbie. "And you bet we can," added Bob decisively. "Let's begin by escorting her home," suggested Babe. "There's just about time before ten." "I saw Miss Stuart yesterday about her coming into the Belden," explained Betty, after they had left Georgia at her temporary off-campus boarding place. "She was awfully nice and amused about it all, and she thinks she can get her in right away, in Natalie Smith's place. Natalie's father has been elected senator, you know, and she's going to come out this winter in Washington." "Fancy that now!" said Madeline resignedly. "There's certainly no accounting for tastes." "I should think not," declared Katherine hotly. "If my father was elected President, I'd stay on and graduate with 19-- just the same." "Of course you would," agreed Babbie. "You can come out in Washington any time--or if you can't, it doesn't matter much. But there's only one 19--." "And yet when we go we shan't be missed," said Katherine sadly. "The college will go on just the same." "Oh, and I've found out the reason why," cried Betty eagerly. "It's because all college girls are alike. Miss Ferris said so once. She said if you waited long enough each girl you had known and liked would come back in the person of some younger one. But I never really believed it until to-day." And Betty related the story of her successful hunt for the freshman who was like herself. Everybody laughed. "But then," asserted Babbie loyally, "she's not so nice as you, Betty. She couldn't be. And I don't believe there are freshmen like all of us." "Not in this one class," said Rachel. "But it's a nice idea, isn't it? When our little sisters or our daughters come to Harding they can have friends just as dear and jolly as the ones we have had." "And they will be just as likely to be locked out if they linger on their own or their friends' door-steps after ten," added Madeline pompously, whereat Eleanor, Katherine, Rachel and the B's rushed for their respective abiding places, and the Belden House contingent marched up-stairs singing "Back to the college again," a parody of one of Kipling's "Barrack-Room Ballads" which Madeline Ayres had written one morning during a philosophy lecture that bored her, and which the whole college was singing a week later. CHAPTER II A SENIOR CLASS-MEETING It was great fun exercising all the new senior privileges. One of the first and most exciting was occupying the front seats at morning chapel. "Although," complained Betty Wales sadly, "you don't get much good out of that, if your name begins with a W. Of course I am glad there are so many of 19--, but they do take up a lot of room. Nobody could tell that Eleanor and I were seniors, unless they knew it beforehand." "And then they wouldn't believe it about you," retorted Madeline, the tease. Madeline, being an A, was one of the favored front row, who were near enough "to catch Prexy's littlest smiles," as Helen Adams put it, and who were the observed of all observers as they marched, two and two, down the middle aisle, just behind the faculty. Madeline, being tall and graceful and always perfectly self-possessed, looked very impressive, but little Helen Adams was dreadfully frightened and blushed to the roots of her smooth brown hair every morning. "And yet I wouldn't give it up for anything," she confided to Betty. "I mean--I'll exchange with you any time, but I do just love to sit there, although I dread walking out so. It's just the same when I am talking to Miss Raymond or Miss Mills. I wish I weren't such a goose." "You're a very dear little goose," Betty reassured her, wondering why in the world the clever Helen Adams was afraid of people, while she, who was only little Betty Wales, without much brains and with no big talent, felt perfectly at home with Dr. Hinsdale, Miss Raymond, and even the great "Prexy" himself. "I suppose that is my talent," she decided at last,--"not being afraid, and just plunging right in. Well, I suppose I ought to be glad that I have anything." Another senior privilege is the holding of the first class-meeting. Fresh indeed is the freshman class which neglects this order of precedence, and in deference to their childish impatience the seniors always hold their meeting as early in the term as possible. Of course 19--'s came on a lovely afternoon,--the first after an unusually long and violent "freshman rain." "Coming, Madeline?" asked Betty, passing Madeline's single on her way out. "Where?" inquired Madeline lazily from the depths of her Morris chair. "To the class-meeting of course," explained Betty. "Now don't pretend you've forgotten and made another engagement. I just heard Georgia Ames telling you that she couldn't go walking because of an unexpected written lesson." Madeline wriggled uneasily. "What's the use?" she objected. "It's too nice a day to waste indoors. There'll be nothing doing for us. We elected Rachel last year, and none of the rest of the crowd will do for class officers." "What an idea!" said Betty loftily. "I'm thinking of nominating Babe for treasurer. Besides Rachel is going to wear a cap and gown--it's a new idea that the council thought of, for the senior president to wear one--and Christy and Alice Waite are going to make speeches about the candidates. And I think they're going to vote about our ten thousand dollars." Madeline rose despondently. "All right then, for this once. By the way, whom are they going to have for toastmistress at class-supper? They elect her to-day, don't they?" "I suppose so. I know the last year's class chose Laurie at their first meeting. But I haven't heard any one mentioned." "Then I'm going to nominate Eleanor Watson," declared Madeline. "She's never had a thing from the class, and she's by far the best speaker we have except Emily Davis." "And Emily will be class-day orator of course," added Betty. "Oh, Madeline, I'm so glad you thought of Eleanor. Won't it be splendid to have a 'Merry Heart' for toastmistress?" Madeline nodded carelessly. She was thinking more about a letter from home, with news that her father and mother were to sail at once for Italy, than about matters of class policy. She loved the Italian sea and the warm southern sunshine; and the dear old "out-at-elbows" villa on the heights above Sorrento was the nearest thing she had known to a home. Father had told her to come along if she liked--ever since she could remember she had been allowed to make her own decisions. But then, as Babbie had said, there was only one 19--, and with plenty of "passed up" courses to her credit she could work as little as she pleased this year and never go to a class-meeting after to-day. "Let's stop for the B's," she suggested, as they went out into the September sunshine. "Bob hates meetings as much as I do. I'm not going to be the only one to be disciplined." Before they had reached the Westcott, the B's shouted to them from their hammocks in the apple-orchard, which they reluctantly abandoned to go to the meeting. Bob had just had an exciting runaway--her annual spills were a source of great amusement to her friends and of greater terror to her doting parents--and she was so eager to recount her adventures and display her bruises, that nothing more was said about Madeline's plan for Eleanor. The class-meeting was large and exciting. The election of a senior president is as thrilling an event at Harding as the coronation of a Czar of all the Russias to the world at large. It was a foregone conclusion that Marie Howard would be the unanimous choice of the class, but until the act was fairly consummated--and indeed until Marie had been dined at Cuyler's and overwhelmed with violets to the satisfaction of her many friends--the excitement would not abate. There was a pleasant uncertainty about the other class officers. Six avowed candidates for the treasurership quarreled good naturedly over their respective qualifications for the position, each one in her secret soul intending to withdraw in favor of her dearest friend among the other five. In another corner of the room an agitated group discussed the best disposition of the ten thousand dollar fund. "I don't think we ought to dispose of it hastily," Christy Mason was saying. "It's a lot of money and we ought to consider very carefully before we decide." "Besides," added Emily Davis flippantly, "as long as we delay our decision, we shall continue to be persons of importance in the eyes of the faculty. It's comical to see how deferential they all are. I took dinner at the Burton Sunday, and afterward Miss Raymond invited a few of us into her room for coffee. She didn't mention the money,--she's too clever for that,--but she talked a lot about the constant need for new books in her department. 'You can't run an English department properly unless you can give your pupils access to the newest books'--that was the burden of her refrain. Marion Lustig was quite impressed. I think she means to propose endowing an English department library fund." "Dr. Hinsdale wants books for his department, and a lot of psychological journals--all about ghosts and mediums--that college professors look up about, you know," Nita Reese ended somewhat vaguely. "And Miss Kent is hoping we'll give the whole sum to her to spend for another telescope," added Babe, whose specialty, if one might dignify her unscholarly enthusiasms by that name, was astronomy. "Every one of the faculty wants it for something," said Christy. "Naturally. They're all human, aren't they?" laughed Emily Davis, just as Rachel appeared in the doorway, looking very dignified and impressive in a cap and gown. "Is the tassel right?" she whispered anxiously, as she passed a group of girls seated near the platform steps. "No, put it the other side--unless you're a Ph. D.," returned Roberta Lewis in a sepulchral whisper. "Father has one. He lectures at Johns Hopkins," she added, in answer to nudges from her neighbors and awestruck inquiries as to "how she knew." Then Rachel called the meeting to order. She thanked the class for the honor they had done her, and hoped she had not disappointed them. "I've tried not to consider any clique or crowd," she said--"not to think anything about the small groups in our class, but to find out what the whole big, glorious class of 19-- wanted"--Rachel's voice rang out proudly--"and then to carry out its wishes. I believe in public sentiment--in the big generous feeling that makes you willing to give up your own little plans because they are not big and fine enough to suit the whole class. I hope the elections to-day may be conducted in that spirit. We each want what we all want, I am sure. We know one another pretty well by this time, but perhaps it will help us in choosing the right persons for senior officers if some of the candidates' friends make brief nominating speeches. It is now in order to nominate some one for the office of senior president." Christy was on her feet in an instant, nominating Marie Howard, in a graceful little speech that mentioned her tact and energy and class spirit, recalled some of the things she had done to make the class of 19-- proud of her, and called attention to the fact that she had never had an important office before. "And she wouldn't be having one now if we hadn't succeeded in throwing off the rule of a certain person named Eastman and her friends," muttered Bob sotto voce. Alice Waite seconded the nomination. "I can't make a real speech like Christy's," she stammered, blushing prettily, "but I want to call attention to Marie's--I mean to Miss Howard's sparkling sense of humor and strong personal magnetism. And--and--I am sure she'll do splendidly," ended little Alice, forgetting her set phrases and sitting down amidst a burst of amused applause. Rachel called for other nominations but there were none, so Marie was elected unanimously, and with tremendous enthusiasm. After she had assumed the cap and gown, taken the chair, and thanked her classmates, Barbara Gordon, one of Christy's best friends, was made vice-president. Babe, to her infinite annoyance, found herself the victor in the treasurer's contest, and Nita Reese was ensconced beside Marie in the secretary's chair. "And you said none of 'The Merry Hearts' would do for officers," Betty whispered reproachfully to Madeline. "Well, will they think we are office-grabbers, if I put up Eleanor?" asked Madeline. "Oh, no," declared Betty eagerly. "You see Babe's such a general favorite--she's counted into half a dozen crowds; and Nita is really a Hill girl, only she never would go to class-meetings when she was a freshman and so she was never identified with that set. You will propose Eleanor, won't you?" "Honor bright," promised Madeline, and returned once more to the pages of a new magazine which she had insisted upon bringing, "in case things are too deadly slow." "The next business," said Marie, consulting the notes that Rachel had handed her with the cap and gown, "the next business is to dispose of our ten thousand dollars." Instantly a dozen girls were on their feet, clamoring for recognition. Marion Lustig urged the need of books for the English department. Clara Madison, who after two years of amazement at Harding College in general and hatred of the bed-making it involved in particular, had suddenly awakened to a tremendous enthusiasm for microscopic botany, made a funny little drawling speech about the needs of her pet department. Two or three of Miss Ferris's admirers declared that zoölogy was the most important subject in the college curriculum, and urged that the money should be used as a nest egg for endowing the chair occupied by that popular lady. The Spanish and Italian departments, being newly established, were suggested as particularly suitable objects for benevolence. Dr. Hinsdale's department, the history and the Greek departments were exploited. 19-- was a versatile class; there was somebody to plead for every subject in the curriculum, and at least half a dozen prominent members of the faculty were declared by their special admirers to stand first in 19--'s affections. "Though that has really nothing to do with it," said Jean Eastman testily, conscious that her plea for the modern language departments had fallen on deaf ears. "We're not giving presents to the faculty, but to the college. I like Miss Raymond as well as any one----" "Oh, no, you don't," muttered Bob, who had caught Jean in the act of reading an English condition at the end of Junior year. Jean heard, understood, and flashed back an acrimonious retort about Miss Ferris's partiality for Bob's work. The newly elected president, whose tact had been extolled by Emily Davis, found it speedily put to the test. "Don't you think," she began, "that we ought to hear from the girl who had most to do with our getting this money? Before we act upon the motion to refer the matter to a committee who shall interview the president and the faculty and find out how the rest of the money is to be spent and where ours seems to be most needed, I want to ask Miss Betty Wales for an expression of her opinion." Betty gave a little gasp. Parliamentary law was Hebrew to her, and speech-making a fearful and wonderful art, which she never essayed except in an emergency. But she recognized Marie's distress, and rose hesitatingly, to pour oil on the troubled waters if possible. "I certainly think there ought to be a committee," she began slowly. "And I'm sure I know less than any one who has spoken about the needs of the different courses. I'm--well, I'm not a star in anything, you see. I agree with Jean that we ought not to make this a personal matter, and yet I am sure that the head of whatever department we give the money to will be pleased, and I don't see why we shouldn't consider that and choose somebody who has done a lot for 19--. But there are so many who have done a lot for us." Betty frowned a perplexed little frown. "I wish too," she went on very earnestly, "that we could do something that is like us. You know what I mean. We stand for fair play and a good time for everybody--that was why we had the dresses simple, you know." The frown vanished suddenly and Betty's fascinating little smile came into view instead. "I wonder--of course Prexy is always saying the college is poor, and the faculty are always talking about not having books enough, but I haven't noticed but that they find enough to keep us busy looking up references." ("Hear, hear!" chanted the B's.) "It seems to me that Harding College is good enough as it is," went on Betty, looking reproachfully at the disturbers. "The thing is to let as many girls as possible come here and enjoy it. Do you suppose the man who gave the money would be willing that we should use our share of it for scholarships? Four one hundred dollar scholarships would help four girls along splendidly. Of course that isn't a department exactly,--and perhaps it's a silly suggestion." Betty slipped into her seat beside Madeline, blushing furiously, and looking blankly amazed when her speech brought forth a round of vigorous applause, and, as soon as parliamentary order would permit, a motion that 19-- should, with the consent of the unknown benefactor of the college, establish four annual scholarships. "I name Miss Wales as chairman of the committee to interview the president," said Marie, beaming delightedly on her once more harmonious constituents. "The other two members of the committee I will appoint later. The next and last business of this meeting is to elect a toastmistress for our class-supper. She is always chosen early, you know, so that she can be thinking of toasts and getting material for them out of all the events of the year. Nominations are now in order." "I nominate Eleanor Watson," said Madeline promptly, reluctantly closing her magazine and getting to her feet. "I needn't tell any of you how clever she is nor how well she speaks. Next to one or two persons whose duties at commencement time are obvious and likely to be arduous"--Madeline grinned at Emily Davis, who was sure to be class-orator, and Babe leaned forward to pat Marion Lustig, who was equally sure to be class-poet, on the shoulder--"next to these one or two geniuses, Eleanor is our wittiest member. Of course our class-supper will be the finest ever,--it can't help being--but with Eleanor Watson at the head of the table, it will eclipse itself. To quote the great Dr. Hinsdale, do you get my point?" Kate Denise seconded the nomination with a heartiness that made Eleanor flush with pleasure. Betty watched her happily, half afraid she would refuse the nomination, as she had refused the Dramatic Club's election; but she only sat quite still, her great eyes shining like stars. She was thinking, though Betty could not know that, of little Helen Adams and her "one big day" when she was elected to the "Argus" board. "I know just how she felt," Eleanor considered swiftly. "It's after you've been left out and snubbed and not wanted that things like this really count. Oh, I'm so glad they want me now." "Are there any other nominations?" asked Marie. There was a little silence, broken by a voice saying: "Let's make it unanimous. Ballots take so long, and everybody wants her." Then a girl got up from the back row,--a girl to whom Katherine Kittredge had once given the title of "Harding's champion blunderbuss." She could no more help doing the wrong thing than she could help breathing. She had begun her freshman year by opening the door into Dr. Hinsdale's recitation-room, while a popular senior course was in session. "I beg your pardon, but are you Miss Stuart?" she had asked, looking full at the amazed professor, and upon receiving a gasping denial she had withdrawn, famous, to reappear now and then during her course always in similar rôles. It happened that she had never heard of Eleanor Watson's stolen story until a week before the class-meeting, when some one had told her the unvarnished facts, with no palliation and no reference to Eleanor's subsequent change of heart or renunciation of one honor after another. Virtuous indignation and pained surprise struggled for expression upon her pasty, immobile face. "Madam president," she began, and waited formally for recognition. "Oh, I say, it's awfully late," said somebody. "I've got five recitations to-morrow." This speech and the laugh that followed it put new vigor into the Champion's purpose. "I hope I am not trespassing on any one's time unduly," she said, "by stating that--I dislike to say it here, but it has been forced upon me. I don't think Miss Watson is the girl to hold 19--'s offices. Miss Wales said that we stood for fair play." The Champion took her seat ponderously. The room was very still. Marie sat, nonplused, staring at the Champion's defiant figure. Madeline's hands were clenched angrily. "I'd like to knock her down, the coward," she muttered to Betty, who was looking straight ahead and did not seem to hear. Hardly a minute had gone by, but more slowly than a minute ever went before, when Eleanor was on her feet. She had grown suddenly white, and her eyes had a hunted, strained look. "I quite agree with Miss Harrison," she said in clear, ringing tones, her head held high. "I am not worthy of this honor. I withdraw my name, and I ask Miss Ayres, as a personal favor, to substitute some one's else." Eleanor sat down, and Marie wet her lips nervously and looked at Madeline. "Please, Miss Ayres," she begged. "As a personal favor," returned Madeline slowly, "because Eleanor Watson asks me, I substitute"--she paused--"Christy Mason's name. I am sure that Miss Mason will allow it to be used, as a personal favor to every one concerned." "Indeed I----" began Christy impetuously. Then she met Eleanor's beseeching eyes. "Very well," she said, "but every one here except Miss Harrison knows that Miss Watson would be far better." It took only a minute to elect Christy and adjourn the ill-fated meeting. "I thought she'd feel like hurrying home," said Katherine sardonically, as the Champion, very red and militant, rushed past her toward the door. Betty looked wistfully after the retreating figure. "I would rather have left college than had her say that. It doesn't seem fair--after everything." "Serves me right, anyhow," broke in Madeline despondently. "I was dreaming about castles in Italy instead of tackling the business in hand. If I had thought more I should have known that some freak would seize the opportunity to rake up old scores. Don't feel so bad, Betty. It was my fault, and I'll make it up to her somehow. Come and help me tell Christy that she's a trump, and that I truly wanted her, next to Eleanor." When they had pushed their way through to Christy's side, Eleanor, still white but smiling bravely, was shaking hands. "It was awfully good of you not to mind the little awkwardness," she was saying. "The girls always want you--you know that." She turned to find Betty standing beside her, looking as if her heart was broken. "Why, Betty Wales," she laughed, "cheer up. You've made the speech of the day, and three of your best friends are waiting to be congratulated. Tell Christy how pleased you are that she's toastmistress and then come down town with me." Once out of the crowded room Eleanor grew silent, and Betty, too hurt and angry to know what to offer in the way of comfort, left her to her own thoughts. They had crossed the campus and were half way down the hill when Eleanor spoke. "Betty," she said, "please don't care so. If you are going to feel this way, I don't think I can bear it." Betty stared at her in astonishment. "Why Eleanor, it's you that I care about. I can't bear to have you treated so." Eleanor smiled sadly. "And can't you see--no, of course you can't, for you never did a mean or dishonorable thing in your life. If you had, you would know that the worst part of the disgrace, is that you have to share it with your friends. I don't mind for myself, because what Miss Harrison said is true." "No, it's not," cried Betty hotly. "Not another girl in the whole class feels so." "That," Eleanor went on, "is only because they are kind enough to be willing to forget. But to drag you in, and dear old Madeline, and all 'The Merry Hearts'! You'll be sorry you ever took me in." "Nonsense!" cried Betty positively. "Everybody knows that you've changed--everybody, that is, except that hateful Miss Harrison, and some day perhaps she'll see it." That evening Betty explained to Helen, who had never heard a word of the "Argus" matter, why Eleanor had not been made an editor. "Do you think there were any others to-day who didn't want her?" she asked anxiously. Helen hesitated. "Ye-es," she admitted finally. "I think that Miss Harrison has some friends who feel as she does. I heard them whispering together. And one girl spoke to me. But I am sure they were about the only ones. Most of the girls feel dreadfully about it." "Of course no one who didn't would say anything to me," sighed Betty. "Oh, Helen, I am so disappointed." "Well," returned Helen judicially, "it can't be helped now, and in a way it may be a good thing. Eleanor will feel now that everybody who counts for much in the class understands, and perhaps there will be something else to elect her for, before the year is out." Betty shook her head. "No, it's the last chance. She wouldn't take anything after this, and anyway no one would dare to propose her, and risk having her insulted again." "I guess we shan't any of us be tempted to do anything dishonest," said Helen primly. "Doesn't it seem to you as if the girls were getting more particular lately about saying whether they got their ideas from books and giving their authorities at the end of their papers?" "Yes," said Betty, "it does, and I think it's a splendid thing. I went to a literary club meeting with Nan last Christmas and one of the papers was copied straight out of a book I'd just been reading, almost word for word. I told Nan and she laughed and said it was a very common way of doing. I think Harding girls will do a good deal if they help put a stop to that kind of thing. But that won't be much comfort to Eleanor." When Helen had gone, Betty curled up on her couch to consider the day. "Mixed," she told the little green lizard, "part very nice and part perfectly horrid, like most days in this world, I suppose, even in your best beloved senior year. I wonder if Prexy will like the scholarship idea. I straightened out one snarl, and then I helped make a worse one. And I shall be in another if I don't set to work this very minute," ended Betty, reaching for her Stout's Psychology. CHAPTER III THE BELDEN HOUSE "INITIATION PARTY" Lucile Merrifield, Betty's stately sophomore cousin, and Polly Eastman, Lucile's roommate and dearest friend, sat on Madeline Ayres's bed and munched Madeline's sweet chocolate complacently. "Wish I had cousins in Paris that would send me 'eats' as good as this," sighed Polly. "Isn't it just too delicious!" agreed Lucile. "I say, Madeline, I'm on the sophomore reception committee and there aren't half enough sophomores to go round among the freshmen. Won't you take somebody?" "I? Hardly." Madeline shrugged her shoulders disdainfully. "Don't you know, child, that I detest girl-dances--any dances for that matter. Ask me to do something amusing." "You ought to want to do something useful," said Polly reproachfully. "Think of all those poor little friendless freshmen!" "What kind of a class is it this year?" inquired Madeline, lazily, breaking up more chocolate. "Any fun?" "The chief thing I've noticed about them," said Lucile, "is that they're so horribly numerous." "Fresh?" asked Madeline. "Yes, indeed," declared Polly emphatically, "dreadfully fresh. But somehow,--I'm on the grind committee, you know,--and they don't do anything funny. They just do quantities and quantities of stupid, commonplace things, like mistaking the young faculty for freshmen and expecting Miss Raymond to help them look up their English references. I just wish they'd think of something original," ended Polly dolefully. "Why don't you make up something?" asked Madeline. Polly stared. "Oh, I don't think that would do at all. The grinds are supposed to be true, aren't they? They'd be sure to find out and then they'd always dislike us." Polly smiled luminously. "I've got a good many freshmen friends," she explained. "Which means violet-bestowing crushes, I suppose," said Madeline severely. "You shouldn't encourage that sort of thing, Polly. You're too young." "I'm not a bit younger than Lucile," Polly defended herself, "and they all worship her." Polly giggled. "Only instead of violets, they send her Gibson girls, with touching notes about her looking like one." "Come now," said Lucile calmly. "That's quite enough. Let Madeline tell us how to get some good grinds." Madeline considered, frowning. "Why if you won't make up," she said at last, "the only thing to do is to lay traps for them. Or no--I'll tell you what--let's give an initiation party." "A what?" chorused her guests. "Oh, you know--hazing, the men would call it; only of course we'll have nice little amusing stunts that couldn't frighten a fly. Is anything doing to-night?" "In the house, you mean?" asked Lucile. "Not a thing. But if you want our room----" "Of course we do," interposed Madeline calmly. "It's the only decent-sized one in the house. Go and straighten it up, and let this be a lesson to you to keep it in order hereafter. Polly, you invite the freshmen for nine o'clock. I'll get some more sophomores and seniors, and some costumes. Come back here to dress in half an hour." "Goodness," said the stately Lucile, slipping out of her nest of pillows. "How you do rush things through, Madeline." Madeline smiled reminiscently. "I suppose I do," she admitted. "Ever since I can remember, I've looked upon life as a big impromptu stunt. I got ready for a year abroad once in half an hour, and I gave the American ambassador to Italy what he said was the nicest party he'd ever been to on three hours' notice, one night when mother was ill and father went off sketching and forgot to come in until it was time to dress. Oh, it's just practice," said Madeline easily,--"practice and being of a naturally hopeful disposition. Run along now." "I thought I'd better not tell them," Madeline confided to the genius of her room, when the sophomores were safely out of earshot, "that I haven't the faintest notion what to do with those freshmen after we get them there. Being experienced, I know that something will turn up; but they, being only sophomores, might worry. Now what the mischief"--Madeline pulled out drawer after drawer of her chiffonier--"can I have done with those masks?" The masks turned up, after the Belden House "Merry Hearts" had searched wildly through all their possessions for them, over at the Westcott in Babbie Hildreth's chafing dish, where she had piled them neatly for safe-keeping the June before. "Madeline said for you each to bring a sheet," explained Helen Adams, who had been deputed to summon the B's and Katherine. "They're to dress up in, I guess. She said we couldn't lend you the other ones of ours, because they might get dirty trailing around the floors, and we must have at least one apiece left for our beds." The B's joined rapturously in the preparations for Madeline's mysterious party. Katherine could not be found, and Rachel and Eleanor were both engaged for the evening; but that was no matter, Madeline said. It ought to be mostly a Belden House affair, but a few outsiders would help mystify the freshmen. Promptly at quarter to nine Polly, Lucile, and the rest of the Belden House contingent arrived, each bringing her sheet with her, and presently Madeline's room swarmed with hooded, ghostly figures. "Is that you, Polly?" whispered Lucile to somebody standing near her. "No, it's not," squeaked the figure, from behind its little black mask. "Why, we shan't even know each other, after we get mixed up a little," giggled somebody else, as the procession lined up for a hasty dash through the halls. "Now, don't forget that you've all got to help think up things for them to do," warned Madeline, "especially you sophomores." "And don't forget to remember the things for grinds," added Polly Eastman lucidly. "That's what the party is for." "If the freshmen find out that you had to get us to help you, you'll never hear the last of it," jeered Babe. "Now Babe, we're their natural allies," protested Babbie. "Of course we always help them." "Sh!" called a scout, sticking her head into the room. "Coast's clear. Make a rush for it." The last ghost had just gotten safely into the room, when two freshmen, timid but much flattered by Polly's cordial invitation, knocked on the door. "Come in," called Polly in her natural voice, and once unsuspectingly inside, they were pounced upon by the army of ghosts, and escorted to seats as far as possible from the door. The other guests luckily arrived in a body headed by Georgia Ames, who, having come into the house only the day before, was already an important personage in the eyes of her classmates. What girl wouldn't be who called Betty Wales by her first name, and wasn't one bit afraid to "talk back" to the clever Miss Ayres? Georgia's attitude of amused tolerance therefore set the tone for the freshmen's behavior. "Don't you see that it's some sophomore joke?" she demanded. "Might as well let the poor creatures get as much fun out of us as they can, and then perhaps they'll give us something good to eat by and by." "We'll give you something right away," squeaked a ghost. "Georgia Ames and Miss Ashton, stand forth. Now kneel down, shut your eyes and open your mouths." "Don't do it. It will be some horrid, peppery mess," advised a sour-tempered freshman named Butts. But Georgia and her companion stood bravely forth, to be rewarded by two delicious mouthfuls of Madeline's French chocolate. After this pleasant surprise, the freshmen, all but Miss Butts and one or two more, grew more cheerful and began to enter into the spirit of the occasion. "Josephine Boyd, you are elected to scramble like an egg," announced a tall ghost. Josephine's performance was so realistic that it evoked peals of laughter from ghosts and freshmen alike. "We'll recommend you for a part in the next menagerie that the house or the college has," said the tall ghost, who seemed to be mistress of ceremonies. "The Dutton twins are now commanded to push matches across the floor with their noses. You'll find the matches on the table by the window. Somebody tie their hands behind them. Now start at the door and go straight across to Georgia Ames's chair. The one that wins the race must send Polly some flowers," added the tall ghost maliciously as the twins, blushing violently at this barefaced reference to their rivalry for Polly's affections, took their matches, and at Georgia's signaled "One, two, three, go!" began their race. Pushing a match across a slippery floor with one's nose looked so easy and proved so difficult that both ghosts and freshmen, as they cheered on the eager contestants, longed to take part in the enticing sport. The fluffy-haired twin kept well ahead of her straight-haired sister, until, when her match was barely a foot from Georgia's chair it caught in a crack and broke in two. "Oh, dear!" sighed the fluffy-haired twin forlornly, trying to single out her divinity from among the sheeted ghosts. Her despair was too much for soft-hearted Polly. "Never mind," she said kindly "The race is hereby called off." "And we can both send you flowers, can't we?" demanded the straight-haired twin, jumping up, flushed and panting from her exertions. Every one waited eagerly to hear what the next stunt would be. "This is for you, Miss Butts," announced the tall ghost, after a whispered colloquy with her companions, "and as you don't seem very happy to-night we've made it easy. Tell the name of your most particular crush. Now don't pretend you haven't any." "I won't tell," muttered Miss Butts sullenly. "Then you'll have to make up Lucile Merrifield's bed for two weeks as a penalty for disobeying our decrees. Now all the rest of you may tell your crushes' names. I will explain, as some of you look a little dazed about it, that your crush is the person you most deeply adore." Some of the freshmen meekly accepted the penalty rather than divulge their secret affections, one declared that she hadn't a crush, one, remembering the legend of Georgia Ames, made up a sophomore's name and after she had been safely "passed" exulted over the simplicity of her victims. A few, including Georgia, calmly confessed their divinities' names and gloated over the effect their announcements had upon some of the ghosts. When this entertainment was exhausted, the ghosts held another conference. "Carline Dodge, get under the bed and develop like a film," decreed the leader finally. "Oh, not under mine," cried a tall, impressive-looking ghost plaintively. "My botany and zoölogy specimens are under it. She'd be sure to upset the jars." "There!" said Georgia Ames complacently. "That makes six of you that we know. Polly Eastman and now Lucile have given themselves away. Babbie Hildreth crumpled all up when Carline Dodge called out her crush's name. If she's here, the other two that they call the B's are, and Madeline Ayres is directing the job. It's easy enough to guess who the rest of you are, so why not take off those hot things and be sociable?" "Go on, Carline Dodge," ordered the tall ghost imperturbably. "But I don't get the idea of the action," objected the serious-faced freshman, and looked amazed that everybody should laugh so uproariously. "That's so funny that we'll let you off," said Madeline, when the mirth had subsided. "I foresee that you've invented a very useful phrase." And sure enough Carline's reply was speedily incorporated into Harding's special vocabulary, and its author found herself unwittingly famous. "Now," said Madeline cheerfully, "you may all chase smiles around the room for a while, and when I say 'wipe,' you are to wipe them off on a crack in the floor. Then we'll have a speech from one of you and you will be dismissed." Most of the freshmen entered gaily into the "action" of chasing smiles, and caught a great many on their own and each other's faces. That frolic ended, Madeline called upon a quiet little girl who had hardly been seen to open her mouth since she reached Harding, to make a speech. To every one's surprise she rose demurely, without a word of objection or the least appearance of embarrassment, and delivered an original monologue supposed to be spoken by a freshman newly arrived and airing her impressions of the college. It hit everybody with its absurd humor, which no one enjoyed better, apparently, than the quiet little freshman herself. "Encore! Encore! Give us another!" shouted the freshmen when she had finished; but their quiet little classmate only shook her head, and assuming once more the mincing, confidential tone she had been using in the monologue, remarked: "Do you know, there are some girls in our class that will forget their heads before long. Why, when they're being hazed, they forget it and think they're at a real party." Everybody laughed again, and the tall ghost made the little freshman blush violently by saying, "You'll get a part in the house play, my child, and if you can write that monologue down I'll send an 'Argus' editor around after it." The little freshman, whose name was Ruth Howard, pinched herself softly, when no one was looking, to make sure that she was awake. Like Mother Hubbard she felt a little doubtful of her identity, as she noticed the admiring glances cast upon her by even the haughtiest of the freshmen. She had been rather lonely during these first weeks, and it was very pleasant now to find that the things she could do were going to make a place for her in this big, busy college world. "A hazing party isn't a half-bad idea, is it?" said Georgia Ames, reflectively. "It's got us all acquainted a lot faster than anything else would, I guess,--even if there wasn't any food." "Considering that we've done everything else, you children might find the food----" began one of the ghosts, but a bell in the corridor interrupted her. "Is that the twenty-minutes-to or the ten o'clock?" asked another ghost anxiously. "Ten," said a freshman. "The other rang while we were chasing smiles." "Then we're locked out," cried a small ghost tragically, and three sheeted figures rushed down the hall, tripping over their flowing robes and struggling with their masks as they ran. "My light is on. Will they report it?" asked little Ruth Howard shyly of Georgia Ames. "Mine will be reported all right before I've done with it," declared a ghost gloomily. "I've got to study for a physics review. I oughtn't to have come near this festive function." "Same here." "Come on, Carline. Don't you know the action of going home?" "Jolly fun though, wasn't it?" The initiation party dissolved noisily down the dusky corridors. Next day the college rang with the report that hazing was now practiced at Harding. Strange accounts of the Belden House party were passed from group to group of excited freshmen who declared that they were "just scared to death" of the sophomores and wouldn't for the world be out alone after dark, and of amused upper-classmen who allowed for exaggerations and considered the whole episode in the light of a good joke. But a particularly susceptible Burton House freshman, who sat at Miss Stuart's table and burned to make a favorable impression upon that august lady, repeated the story to her at luncheon. Miss Stuart received it in silence, wondered what the truth of it was, and asked some of her friends about it that afternoon at a faculty meeting. Of course some of the wrong people heard about it and took it up officially, as a matter calculated to ruin the spirit of the college. The result was that Miss Ferris and Dr. Hinsdale were furnished with the names of some of the offenders and requested to interview them on the subject of their misdemeanors. Miss Ferris unerringly selected Madeline Ayres as the ring-leader of the affair and Betty Wales as the best person to make an appeal to, if any appeal was needed, and set an hour for them to come and see her. Madeline, who never looked at bulletin-boards, did not get her note of summons, and Betty, who had taken hers as a friendly invitation to have tea with her friend, went over to the Hilton House alone and in the highest spirits. But Miss Ferris was not serving tea, and Dr. Hinsdale showed no intention of leaving them in peace to indulge in one of those long and delightful talks that Betty had so anticipated. Indeed it was he, with his coldest expression and his dryest tone, who introduced the subject of the initiation party and demanded to know why Madeline Ayres had neglected Miss Ferris's summons. Betty had no trouble in explaining that to everybody's satisfaction, but she longed desperately for Madeline's support, as she listened to Dr. Hinsdale's stern arraignment of the innocent little gathering. "It's not lady-like," he asserted. "It's aping the men. Hazing is a discredited practice anyhow. All decent colleges are dropping it. We certainly don't want it here, where the aim of the faculty has always been to encourage the friendliest relations between classes. The members of the entering class always find the college life difficult at first. It's quite unnecessary to add to their troubles." Betty listened with growing horror. What dreadful thing had she unwittingly been a party to? And yet, after all, could it have been so very dreadful? If Dr. Hinsdale had been there, would he have felt this way about it? A smile wavered on Betty's lips at this thought. She looked at Miss Ferris, who smiled back at her. "Say it, Betty," encouraged Miss Ferris, and Betty began, explaining how Madeline had happened to think of the hazing, relating the absurdities that she and the rest had devised, dwelling on Ruth Howard's clever impersonation and Josephine Boyd's effective egg-scrambling. Gradually Dr. Hinsdale's expression softened, and when she repeated Carline Dodge's absurd retort, he laughed like a boy. "Do you think it was so very dreadful?" Betty inquired anxiously, whereupon her judges exchanged glances and laughed again. "There's another thing," Betty began timidly after a moment. "I don't know as I should ever have thought of it myself, but it did certainly work that way." And Betty explained Georgia Ames's idea of the hazing-party as a promoter of good-fellowship. "It's awfully hard to get acquainted with freshmen, you see," she went on. "We have our own friends and we are all busy with our own affairs. But since that night we've been just as friendly. That one evening took the place of lots of calls and formal parties. We know now what the different ones can do. Of course," Betty admitted truthfully, "it didn't help Miss Butts any, unless it showed her that at Harding you've got to do your part, if you want a good time. She's certainly been a little more agreeable since. But Ruth Howard now--why it would have been ages--oh, I mean months," amended Betty blushingly, "before we should have known about her, unless Madeline had called for that speech." Again the judges exchanged amused glances, and Dr. Hinsdale cleared his throat. "Well, Miss Wales," he said, "you've made your point, I think. You've found the legitimate purpose for a legitimate and distinctly feminine kind of hazing. And now, if Miss Ferris will excuse me, I have an engagement at my rooms." So Betty had her talk and her tea, after all, and went away loving Miss Ferris harder than ever. For Miss Ferris, by the mysterious process that brought all college news to her ken, had heard about Eleanor Watson and the Champion Blunderbuss, and she was looking out for Eleanor, who, she was sure from a number of little things she had noticed and pieced together, was now quite capable of looking out for herself. This confirmation of her own theory encouraged Betty vastly, and she was able to feel a little more charitable toward the Champion, who, as Miss Ferris had pointed out, was really the one most to be pitied. CHAPTER IV AN ADVENTUROUS MOUNTAIN DAY "The 19-- scholarships, providing aid to the approximate sum of one hundred dollars for each of four students, preferably members of an upper class"--thus the announcement was to appear formally in the college catalogue. The president and the donor had both heartily approved of Betty's scheme, and the scholarships were an accomplished fact. It had been the donor's pleasant suggestion that 19-- should keep in perpetual touch with its gift to the college by appointing a committee to act with one from the faculty in disposing of the scholarships. Betty Wales was chairman, of course. 19-- did not intend that she should forget her connection with those scholarships. Betty took her duties very seriously. She watched the girls at chapel, in the recitation halls, on the campus, noted those with shabby clothes and worried faces, found out their names and their boarding-places, and set tactful investigations on foot about their needs. The enormous number of her "speaking acquaintances" became a college joke. "Bow, Betty," Katherine would whisper, whenever on their long country walks, they met a group of girls who looked as if they might belong to the college. And then, "Is it possible I've found somebody you don't know? Better look them up right away." "It's splendid training for your memory," Betty declared, and it was, and splendid training besides in helpfulness and social service, though Betty did not put it so grandly. To her it was just trying to take Dorothy King's place, and not succeeding very well either. In looking up strangers, Betty did not forget her friends. Nobody could be more deserving of help than Rachel Morrison. Her hard summer's work had worn on her and made the busy round of tutoring and study seem particularly irksome. But Rachel, while she was pleased to think that she had been the joint committee's first choice, refused the money. "I could only take it as a loan," she said, "and I don't want to have a debt hanging over my head next year. I'm not so tired now as I was when I first got back, and I can rest all next summer. Did I tell you that Babbie Hildreth's uncle has offered me a position in his school for next fall?" Emily Davis, on the other hand, was very glad to accept a scholarship,--"As a loan of course," she stipulated. She had practically supported herself for the whole four years at Harding, and the strain and worry had begun to tell on her. A little easier time this year would mean better fitness for the necessarily hard year of teaching that was to follow, without the interval of rest that Rachel counted upon. Emily's mother was dead now, and her father made no effort to help his ambitious daughter. She might have had a place in the woolen mills, where he worked years before, he argued; since she had not taken it, she must look out for herself. But with the serious side of life was mixed, for Betty and the rest, plenty of gaiety. 19-- might not be greatly missed after they had gone out into the wide, wide world, but while they stayed at Harding everybody seemed bent on treating them royally. "You know this is the last fall you'll have here," Polly Eastman would say, pleading with Betty to come for a drive. "There's no such beautiful autumn foliage near Cleveland." Or, "You must come to our house dance," Babbie Hildreth would declare. "Just think how few Harding dances there are left for us to go to!" Even the most commonplace events, such as reading aloud in the parlors after dinner, going down to Cuyler's for an ice, or canoeing in Paradise at sunset took on a new interest. Seniors who had felt themselves superior to the material joys of fudge-parties and scorned the crudities of amateur plays and "girl-dances," eagerly accepted invitations to either sort of festivity. "And the moral of that, as our dear departed Mary Brooks would say," declared Katherine, "is: Blessings brighten as diplomas come on apace. Between trying not to miss any fun and doing my best to distinguish myself in the scholarly pursuits that my soul loves, I am well nigh distraught. Don't mind my Shakespearean English, please. I'm on the senior play committee, and I recite Shakespeare in my sleep." Dearest of all festivities to the Harding girl is Mountain Day, and there were all sorts of schemes afoot among 19--'s members for making their last Mountain Day the best of the four they had enjoyed so much. Horseback riding was the prevailing fad at Harding that fall, and every girl who could sit in a saddle was making frantic efforts to get a horse for an all-day ride among the hills. Betty was a beginner, but she had been persuaded to join a large party that included Eleanor, Christy, Madeline, Nita, and the B's. They were going to take a man to look after the horses, and they had planned their ride so that the less experienced equestrians could have a long rest after luncheon, and taking a cross-cut through the woods, could join the others, who would leave the picnic-place earlier and make a long detour, so as to have their gallop out in peace. It was a sunny, sultry Indian summer day,--a perfect day to ride, drive or walk, or just to sit outdoors in the sunshine, as Roberta Lewis announced her intention of doing. She helped the horseback riders to adjust their little packages of luncheon, and looked longingly after them, as they went cantering down the street, waving noisy farewells to their friends. "I wish I weren't such a coward," she confided to Helen Adams, who was starting to join Rachel and Katherine for a long walk. "I love horses, but I should die of fright if I tried to ride one." "Oh, they have a man with them," said Helen easily, "and it's a perfect day for a ride." Roberta, who almost lived outdoors, and was weatherwise in consequence, looked critically at the western horizon. "I shouldn't be a bit surprised if it rained before night," she said. "You'd better decide to laze around in Paradise with me." But Helen only laughed at Roberta's caution and went on, whereat Roberta Lewis was very nearly the only Harding girl who was not drenched to the skin before Mountain Day was over. The riding-party galloped through the town and stopped at the edge of the meadows for consultation. "Let's go by the bridge and come back by the ferry," suggested Madeline. "Then we shall have the prettiest part of the ride saved for sunset." "And you'll have a better road both ways, miss," put in the groom practically. So the party crossed the long toll-bridge, the horses stepping hesitatingly and curveting a little at the swish of the noisy water, climbed the sunny hills beyond, and dipped down to a level stretch of wood, in the heart of which they chose a picnic-ground by the side of a merry little brook. "We must have a fire," announced Bob, who had fallen behind the procession, and now came up at the trot, just as the others were dismounting. "But we haven't anything to cook," objected Eleanor. "Coffee," grinned Bob jubilantly. "I've got folding cups stuffed around under my sweater, and I stopped at that farmhouse back by the fork in the road to get a pail." "And there are marshmallows to toast," added Babe. "That's what I've got in my sweater." "I thought you two young ladies had grown awful stout on a sudden," chuckled the groom, beginning to pile up twigs under an overhanging ledge of rock. "And here are some perfectly elegant mushrooms," declared Madeline, who had been poking about among the fallen leaves. "We can use the pail for those first, and have the coffee with dessert." All the girls had brought sandwiches, stuffed eggs, cakes, and fruit, so that, with the extras, the picnic was "truly elegant," as Babe put it. They sang songs while they waited for the coffee to boil, and toasted Babe's marshmallows, two at a time, on forked sticks, voting Babe a trump to have thought of them. Then they lay on the green turf by the brook, talking softly to the babbling accompaniment of its music. Finally Eleanor shivered and sat up. "Where is the sun?" she asked. "Oughtn't we to be starting?" [Illustration: "HERE ARE SOME PERFECTLY ELEGANT MUSHROOMS"] The sky was not dark or threatening, only a bit gray and dull. The groom was to stay with the novices--Christy, Babe and Betty--who, as soon as the rest had mounted, raced down the road to get warm and also to return the pail that Bob had borrowed, to its owner. By the time they got back, after making a short call on the farmer's wife, the sun was struggling out again, but the next minute big drops began to patter down through the leaves. The groom considered the situation. "I guess you'll jest have to wait and git wet. Miss Hildreth's horse is skittish on ferries. I wouldn't wanter go on with you an' leave her to cross alone." So they waited, keeping as dry as possible under a pine tree, until the time appointed for starting to the rendezvous. It was raining steadily now. Babe's horse objected to getting wet, and pulled on the reins sullenly. The sky was fairly black. Altogether it was an uncomfortable situation. The road to the river was damp and slippery, and most of it was a steep down-grade. There was nothing to do but walk the horses, Babe's dancing sidewise in a fashion most upsetting to Betty's nerves. By the time they had reached the ferry, darkness seemed to have settled, and there were low growlings of thunder. Babe's horse reared, and she dismounted and stood at his head while they waited for the ferry to cross to them. "I guess there's goin' to be a bad shower," volunteered the groom. "I guess we'd better wait over in that barn till it's over. Animals don't like lightning." The ferry seemed to crawl across the river, but it arrived at last, and each girl led her horse on board. They were all frightened, but nobody showed the "white feather." Babe's cheeks were pale, though, as she patted her restive mount, and laughed bravely at Madeline's futile efforts to feed sugar to her tall "Black Beauty," who jerked his nose impatiently out of her reach each time she tried. "Beauty must be awfully upset if he doesn't want sugar," said Babbie, who was standing next the groom. "He's the greed----" The next minute Betty found herself holding her own and the groom's horse, while he plunged after Babbie's, who was snorting and kicking right into the midst of everything. It had lightened, and between the lightning and the water Babbie's high-spirited mare was frantic, and was fast communicating her excitement to the others. A minute later there was a tremendous jolt which set all the horses to jumping. "I swan," said the apathetic ferryman who had paid no attention to the previous confusion. "We're aground." The girls looked at one another through the gathering shadows. "How are we going to get off?" asked the groom desperately. The ferryman considered. "I dunno." Babbie's horse plunged again. "Can we wade to shore?" asked the groom, when something like order was restored. "Easy. You see I knew the river was awful low, but I s'posed----" "The only thing that I can think of," interrupted the groom, "is for us to leave you girls with the horses, while we get to shore. Then you send 'em off one by one, and we'll catch 'em. Miss Hildreth, you send yours first. No, Miss Wales, you send mine first, then Miss Hildreth's may follow better. I'm awfully sorry to make you young ladies so much trouble." "Oh, it doesn't matter," said Babbie bravely, shaking the water out of her eyes. "Only--do hurry, please." The "easy wading" proved to be through water up to a man's shoulders, and it lightened twice, with the usual consequences to Babbie's horse, before the groom signaled. His horse went off easily enough, but Babbie's balked and then reared, and Betty's lay down first and then kicked viciously, when she and Babbie between them had succeeded in getting him to stand up. Finally Madeline broke her crop in getting him over the side, and when Black Beauty had also been sent ashore the ferry lurched a little and floated. "Do you suppose we shall ever get dry again?" asked Eleanor lightly, while they waited for the ferryman to come back to them. Babbie touched her black coat gingerly. "Am I wet?" she whispered to Betty. "Of course I am, but I'd forgotten it." The reins had cut one of her hands through her heavy glove, but she had forgotten that too, as she shivered and clung to the railing that Black Beauty had splintered when he went over. All she could think of was the horror of riding that plunging, foam-flecked horse home. The ferryman took them to his house, which was the nearest one to the landing; and while he and the groom rubbed down the horses, his wife and little daughter made more coffee for the girls and helped them wring out their dripping clothes. Babe pretended to find vast enjoyment in watching the water trickle off her skirts and gaiters. Christy, who rode bare-headed, declared that she had gotten a beautiful shampoo free of charge. Even Babbie smiled faintly and called attention to the "mountain tarn" splashing about in the brim of her tri-corn hat. "I tell ye, them girls air game," declared the ferryman watching them ride off as soon as the storm was over. "That little slim one on the bay mare is a corker. Her horse cut up somethin' awful. They all offered to change with her, but she said she guessed she could manage. Look at the way she sets an' pulls. She's got grit all right. I guess I'll have to make out to have you go to college, Annie." Whereupon little Annie spent a rapturous evening dreaming of the time when she should be a Harding girl, and be able to say bright, funny things like Miss Ayres. She resolved to wear her hair like Miss Watson and to have a pleasant manner like Miss Wales, and above all to be "gritty" like Miss Hildreth. For the present evening the fiercest steed she could find to subdue was an arithmetic lesson. Annie hated arithmetic, but in the guise of a plunging bay mare, that it took grit to ride, she rather enjoyed forcing the difficult problems to come out right. Meanwhile the riding party had reached the campus, a little later and a little wetter than most of their friends, and they were provided with hot baths and hot drinks, and put to bed, where they lay in sleepy comfort enjoying the feeling of being heroines. Very soon after dinner Betty got tired of being a heroine, and when Georgia Ames appeared and announced that a lot of freshmen were making fudge in her room and wished Betty would come and have some and tell them all about her experiences, she looked anxiously at Helen Adams, who was the only person in the room just then. "It's awfully good fudge--got marshmallows in it, and nuts," urged Georgia. "They want Miss Adams too." "Can I come in a kimono?" asked Betty. "I'm too tired to dress." "Of course. Only----" Georgia hesitated. "There's a man in the parlor, calling on Polly Eastman. And the folding doors are stuck open. I wish my room wasn't down on that floor. You have to be so careful of your appearance." Betty frowned. "I want awfully to come. Can't you two think of a way?" "Why of course," cried Georgia gleefully, after a moment's consideration. "We'll hold a screen around you. The man will know that something queer is inside it, but he can't see what." So the procession started, Helen and Georgia carrying the screen. At the top of the last flight, they adjusted it around Betty, and began slowly to make the descent. At the curve Georgia looked down into the hall and stopped, in consternation. "They've moved out into the hall," she whispered. "No--this is Lucile Merrifield and another man. We've got to go right past them." "Let's go back," whispered Betty. "But they've seen us," objected Helen, "and you'd miss the fudge." A moment later, three girls and a Japanese screen fell through Georgia's door into the midst of an amazed freshmen fudge party. "Goodness," said Georgia, when she had recovered her breath. "Did you hear that horrid Lucile? 'A regular freshman trick'--that's what she said to her man. They blame everything on us." "Well if this fudge is regular freshman fudge, it's the best I ever tasted," said little Helen Adams tactfully. Later in the evening Betty trailed her red kimono into Helen's room. "Helen," she began, "did I have on my pearl pin when we started down-stairs to-night? I can't find it anywhere." "I don't think you did," said Helen, thoughtfully, "but I'll go and see. You might have dropped it off when we all landed in a heap on the floor." But the freshmen had not found the pin and diligent search of Georgia's room, as well as of the halls and stairways, failed to reveal it. "Oh, well, I suppose it will turn up," said Betty easily. "I lost it once last year, and ages afterward I found it in my desk. I shan't worry yet awhile. I didn't have it on this morning, did I?" This time Helen remembered positively. "No, you had on your lucky pin--the silver four-leaved clover that I like so much. I noticed particularly." "All right then," said Betty. "I saw it last night, so it must be about somewhere. Some day when I'm not so lame from riding and so sleepy, I'll have a grand hunt for it." CHAPTER V THE RETURN OF MARY BROOKS All through the fall Mary Brooks's "little friends" had been hoping for a visit from her, and begging her to come soon, before the fine weather was over. Now she was really and truly coming. Roberta had had the letter of course, by virtue of being Mary's most faithful satellite; but it was meant for them all. "The conquering heroine is coming," Mary wrote. "She will arrive at four on Monday, and you'd better, some of you, meet the train, because there's going to be a spread along, and the turkey weighs a ton. Don't plan any doings for me. I've been to a dance or a dinner every night for two weeks and I'm already sick of being a busy bud, though I've only been one for a month--not to mention having had the gayest kind of a time all summer. So you see I'm coming to Harding to rest and recuperate, and to watch you children play at being seniors. I know how busy you are, and what a bore it is to have company, but I shall just take care of myself. Only get me a room at Rachel's little house around the corner, and I won't be a bit of trouble to anybody." "Consider the touching modesty of that now!" exclaimed Katherine. "As if we weren't all pining for a sight of her. And can't you just taste the spread she'll bring?" "We must make her have it the very night she gets here," said Betty practically. "There's a lot going on next week, and as soon as people find out that she's here they'll just pounce on her for all sorts of things." "I hereby pounce upon her for our house dance," announced Babbie Hildreth hastily. "Isn't it jolly that it comes this week? I had a presentiment that I'd better save one of my invitations." "You needn't have bothered," said Babe enviously. "I guess there'll always be room for Mary Brooks at a Westcott House dance--as long as 19-- stays anyway." "Don't quarrel, children," Madeline intervened. "Your dance is on Wednesday. Is there anything for Tuesday?" "A psychology lecture," returned Helen Adams promptly. "Cut it out," laughed Katherine. "Mary isn't coming up here to go to psychology lectures." "But she does want to go to it," declared Roberta, suddenly waking up to the subject in hand. "I thought it was queer myself, but she speaks about it particularly in her letter. Let me see--oh, here it is, in the postscript. It's by a friend of Dr. Hinsdale, she says; and somebody must have written her about it and offered her a ticket, because she says she's already invited and so for us not to bother. Did you write her, Helen?" "No," said Helen, "I didn't. The lecture wasn't announced until yesterday. There was a special meeting of the Philosophical Club to arrange about it." "It's queer," mused Katherine. "Mary was always rather keen on psychology----" "On the psychology of Dr. Hinsdale you mean," amended Madeline flippantly. "But that doesn't explain her inside information about this lecture. We'll ask her how she knew--that's the quickest way to find out. Now let's go on with our schedule. What's Thursday?" "The French Club play," explained Roberta. "I think she'd like that, don't you?" Madeline nodded. "Easily. It's going to be awfully clever this time. Then that leaves only Friday. Let's drive out to Smuggler's Notch in the afternoon and have supper at Mrs. Noble's." "Oh, yes," agreed Betty. "That will make such a perfectly lovely end-up to the week. And of course we shall all want to take her to Cuyler's and Holmes's. May I have her for Tuesday breakfast? I haven't any class until eleven, so we can eat in peace." "Then I'll take lunch on Tuesday," put in Katherine hastily, "because I am as poor as poverty at present, and a one o'clock luncheon preceded by a breakfast ending at eleven appeals to my lean pocketbook." "I should like to take her driving that afternoon," put in Babbie. "You may, if you'll take me to sit in the middle and do the driving," said Bob, "and let's all have dinner at Cuyler's that night--a grand affair, you know, ordered before hand, at a private table with a screen around it, and a big bunch of roses for a centre piece. Old girls like that sort of thing. It makes them feel important." "With or without food?" demanded Madeline sarcastically, but no one paid any attention to her, in the excitement of bidding for the remaining divisions of Mary's week. All the Chapin House girls and the three B's met her at the station and "ohed" and "ahed" in a fashion that would have been disconcerting to anybody who was unfamiliar with the easy manners of Harding girls, at the elegance of her new blue velvet suit and the long plumes that curled above her stylishly dressed hair, and at the general air of "worldly and bud-like wisdom," as Katherine called it, that pervaded her small person. They had not finished admiring her when her trunk appeared. "Will you look at that, girls!" cried Katherine, feigning to be quite overpowered by its huge size. "Mary Brooks, whatever do you expect to do with a trousseau like that in this simple little academic village?" Mary only smiled placidly. "Don't be silly, K. Some of the spread is in there. Besides, I want to be comfortable while I'm here, and this autumn weather is so uncertain. Who's going to have first go at carrying the turkey?" "I've got a runabout waiting," explained Babbie. "I'm going to drive him up. There'll be room for you too, Mary, and for some of the others." The seat of a runabout can be made to hold four, on a pinch, and there is still standing-room for several other adaptable persons. The rest of the party walked, and the little house around the corner was soon the scene of a boisterous reunion. Mary's conversation was as abundant and amusing as ever, and she did not show any signs of the weariness that her letter had made so much of. "That's because I have acquired a society manner," she announced proudly. "I conceal my real emotions under a mask of sparkling gaiety." "You can't conceal things from us that way," declared Katherine. "How under the sun did you hear about that psychology lecture?" "Why, a man I know told me," explained Mary innocently. "He's also a friend of the lecturer. We were at dinner together one night last week, and he knew I was a Harding-ite, and happened to mention it. Any objections?" "And you really want to go?" demanded Madeline. "Of course," retorted Mary severely. "I always welcome every opportunity to improve my mind." But to the elaborate plans that had been made for her entertainment Mary offered a vigorous protest. "My dears," she declared, "I should be worn to a frazzle if I did all that. Didn't I tell you that I'd come up to rest? I'll have breakfast with anybody who can wait till I'm ready to get up, and we'll have one dinner all together. But it's really too cold to drive back from Smuggler's Notch after dark, and besides you know I never cared much for long drives. But we'll have the spread to-night, anyway, just as you planned, because it's going to be such a full week, and I wouldn't for the world have any of you miss anything on my account." "And you don't care about the French play?" asked Roberta, who had moved heaven and earth to get her a good seat. "No, dear," answered Mary sweetly. "My French is hopelessly rusty." "Then I should think you'd go in for improving it," suggested Babe. "There's not enough of it to improve," Mary retorted calmly. "Well, you will go to our house-dance, won't you?" begged Babbie. "Oh, you must," seconded Bob. "I've told piles of people you were coming." "We shall die of disappointment if you don't," added Babe feelingly. Mary laughed good-naturedly. "All right," she conceded, "I'll come. Only be sure to get me lots of dances with freshmen. Then I can amuse myself by making them think I'm one, also, and I shan't be bored." On the way back to the campus the girls discussed Mary's amazing attitude toward the pleasures of college life. "She must be awfully used up," said Roberta, solemnly. "Why, she used to be crazy about plays and dances and 'eats.'" "No use in coming up at all," grumbled Katherine, "if she's only going to lie around and sleep." "She doesn't look one bit tired," declared Betty, "and she seems glad to be back, only she doesn't want to do anything. It's certainly queer." "She must be either sick or in love," said Madeline. "Nothing else will account for it." "Then I think she's in love," declared little Helen Adams sedately. "She has a happy look in her eyes." "Bosh!" jeered Bob. "Mary isn't the sentimental kind. I'll bet she feels different after the spread." But though the spread was quite the grandest that had ever been seen at Harding, and though Mary seemed to enjoy it quite as heartily as her guests, who had conscientiously starved on campus fare for the week before it, it failed to arouse in her the proper enthusiasm for college functions. On Tuesday "after partaking of a light but elegant noontide repast on me," as Katherine put it, Mary declared her intention of taking a nap, and went to her room. But half an hour later, when Babbie tiptoed up to ask if she really meant to waste a glorious afternoon sleeping, and to put the runabout at her service, the room was empty, and Mary turned up again barely in time for the grand dinner at Cuyler's. "We were scared to death for fear you'd forgotten us," said Madeline, helping her off with her wraps. "Where have you been all this time?" "Why, dressing," explained Mary, wearing her most innocent expression. "It takes ages to get into this gown, but it's my best, and I wanted to do honor to your very grand function." "That dress was lying on your bed when I stopped for you exactly fifteen minutes ago," declared Bob triumphantly. "So you'll have to think of another likely tale." Mary smiled her "beamish" smile. "Well, I came just after you'd gone and isn't fourteen minutes to waste on dressing an age? If you mean where was I before that, why my nap wasn't a success, so I went walking, and it was so lovely that I couldn't bear to come in. These hills are perfectly fascinating after the city." "You little fraud," cried Madeline. "You hate walking, and you can't see scenery----" "As witness the nestle," put in Katherine. "So please tell us who he is," finished Madeline calmly. "The very idea of coming back to see us and then going off fussing with Winsted men!" Babe's tone was solemnly reproachful. But Mary was equal to the situation. "I haven't seen a Winsted man since I came," she declared. "I was going to tell you who was with me this afternoon, but I shan't now, because you've all been so excessively mean and suspicious." A waitress appeared, and Mary's expression grew suddenly ecstatic. "Do I see creamed chicken?" she cried. "Girls, I dreamed about Cuyler's creamed chicken every night last week. I was so afraid you wouldn't have it!" Her appreciation of the dinner was so delightfully whole-hearted that even Roberta forgave her everything, down to her absurd enthusiasm over a ponderous psychology lecture and the very dull reception that followed it. At the latter, to be sure, Mary acted exactly like her old self, for she sat in a corner and monopolized Dr. Hinsdale for half an hour by the clock, while her little friends, to quote Katherine Kittredge, "champed their bits" in their impatience to capture her and escape to more congenial regions. The next night at the Westcott House dance Mary was again her gay and sportive self. If she was bored, she concealed it admirably, and that in spite of the fact that her little scheme of playing freshman seemed doomed to failure. Mary had walked out of chapel that morning with the front row, and, even without the enormous bunch of violets which none of her senior friends would confess to having sent her, she was not a figure to pass unnoticed. So most of the freshmen on her card recognized her at once, and the few who did not stoutly refused to be taken in by her innocent references to "our class." She had the last dance but one with the sour-faced Miss Butts, who never recognized any one; but Mary did not know that, and being rather tired she swiftly waltzed her around the hall a few times and then suggested that they watch the dance out from the gallery. "What class are you?" asked Miss Butts, when they were established there. "My card doesn't say." "Doesn't it?" said Mary idly, watching the kaleidoscope of gay colors moving dizzily about beneath her. "Then suppose you guess." Miss Butts considered ponderously. "You aren't a freshman," she said finally, "nor a sophomore." "How are you so sure of that?" asked Mary. "I was just going to say----" "You're a junior," announced Miss Butts, calmly disregarding the interruption. Mary shook her head. "Senior, then." Mary shook her head again. "I didn't think you looked old enough for that," said Miss Butts. "Then I was mistaken and you're a sophomore." "No," said Mary firmly. Miss Butts stared. "Freshman?" "No," said Mary, who considered the befooling of Miss Butts beneath her. "I graduated last year." "Oh, I don't believe that: I believe you're a freshman after all," declared Miss Butts. "You started to say you were a few minutes ago." "No, I graduated last June," repeated Mary, a trifle sharply. "Here's Miss Hildreth coming for my next dance. You can ask her. I'm her guest this evening. Didn't I graduate last year, Babbie?" Babbie stared uncomprehendingly for a moment. Then she remembered Mary's plan. "Why, you naughty little freshman!" she cried reprovingly. "Have you been telling her that?" Miss Butts looked dazedly from the amused and reproachful Babbie to Mary, whose expression was properly cowed and repentant. "Are you really a freshman?" she asked. "Why, I don't believe you are. I--I don't know what to believe!" Mary smiled at her radiantly. "Never mind," she said, "you'll know the truth some day. Next fall at about this time I'll invite you to dinner, and then you'll know all about me. Now good-bye." Babbie regarded this speech as merely Mary's convenient little way of getting rid of the stupid Miss Butts, who for her part promptly forgot all about it. But Mary remembered, and she declared that the sight of Miss Butts's face on the occasion of that dinner-party, with all its rather remarkable accessories, was worth many evenings of boredom at "girl dances." It was not until Friday, that Mary's "little friends" caught her red-handed, in an escapade that explained everything from the size of her trunk to the puzzling insouciance of her manner. They all, and particularly Roberta, had begun to feel a little hurt as the days went by and Mary indulged in many mysterious absences and made unconvincing excuses for refusing invitations that, as Katherine Kittredge said, were enough to turn the head of a crown-princess. Friday, the day that had been reserved for the expedition to Smuggler's Notch, dawned crisp and clear, and some girls who had had dinner at Mrs. Noble's farm the night before brought back glowing reports of the venison her brother had sent her from Maine, and the roaring log fire that she built for them in the fireplace of her new dining-room. So Roberta and Madeline hurried over before chapel to ask Mary to reconsider. But she was firm in her refusal. She had waked with a headache. Besides, she had letters to write and calls to make on her faculty friends and the people she knew in town. The embassy returned, disconsolate, and reported its failure. "It's just a shame," said Eleanor. "We've been saving that trip all the fall, so that Mary could go." "Let's just go without her," suggested Katherine rebelliously. "There can't be many more nice days." But Betty shook her head. "We don't want to hurt her feelings. She's a dear, even if she does act queerly this week. Besides, every one of us but Roberta and Madeline has that written lesson in English 10 to-morrow, and we ought to study. I'm scared to death over it." "So am I," agreed Katherine sadly. "I suppose we'd better wait." "But we can go walking," said Madeline to Roberta, and Roberta, more hurt than any of the rest by her idol's strange conduct, silently assented. They were scuffling gaily through the fallen leaves on an unfrequented road through the woods, when they heard a carriage coming swiftly up behind them and turned to see--of all persons--Mary Brooks, who hated driving, and Dr. Hinsdale. Mary was talking gaily and looked quite reconciled to her fate, and Dr. Hinsdale was leaving the horses very much to themselves in the pleasant absorption of watching Mary's face. Indeed so interested were the pair in each other that they almost passed the two astonished girls standing by the roadside, without recognizing them at all. But just as she whirled past, Mary saw them, and leaned back to wave her hand and smile her "beamish" smile at the unwitting discoverers of her secret. It was dusk and nearly dinner time before Dr. Hinsdale drew his horses up in front of the house around the corner, but Mary's "little friends" gave up dressing, without a qualm, and even risked missing their soup to sit, lined up in an accusing row on her bed and her window-box, ready to greet her when she stumbled into her dark room and lit her gas. "Oh, girls! What a start you gave me!" she cried, suddenly perceiving her visitors. "I suppose you think I'm perfectly horrid," she went on hastily, "but truly I couldn't help it. When a faculty asks you to go driving, you can't tell him that you hate it--and I couldn't for the life of me scrape up a previous engagement." "Speaking of engagements"--began Madeline provokingly. "All's fair in love, Mary," Katherine broke in. "You're perfectly excusable. We all think so." "Who said anything about love?" demanded Mary, stooping to brush an imaginary speck of dust from her skirt. "Next time," advised Rachel laughingly, "you'd better take us into your confidence. You've given yourself a lot of unnecessary bother, and us quite a little worry, though we don't mind that now." "Why didn't you tell us that he spent the summer at the same place that you did?" asked little Helen Adams. Mary started. "Who told you that?" she demanded anxiously. "Nobody but Lucile," explained Betty in soothing tones. "She visited there for a week, and this afternoon just by chance she happened to speak of seeing him. It fitted in beautifully, you see. She doesn't know you were there too, so it's all right." Mary gave a relieved little sigh, and then, turning suddenly, fell upon the row of pitiless inquisitors, embracing as many as possible and smiling benignly at the rest. "Oh, girls, he's a dear," she said. "He's worth twenty of the gilded youths you meet out in society." She drew back hastily. "But we're only good friends," she declared. "He's been down a few times to spend Sunday--that was how I heard about the lecture--but he comes to see father as much as to see me--and--and you mustn't gossip." "We won't," Katherine promised for them all. "You can trust us. We always seem to have a faculty romance or two on our hands. We're getting used to it." "But it's not a romance," wailed Mary. "He took me walking and driving because mother asks him to dinner. We're nothing but jolly good friends." "Nothing but jolly good friends--" That was the last thing Mary said when, late the next afternoon, her "little friends" waved her off for home. "Isn't she just about the last person you'd select for a professor's wife?" said Helen, as Mary's stylish little figure, poised on the rear platform of the train, swung out of sight around a curve. "No, indeed she isn't," declared Roberta loyally. "She'll be a fine one. She's awfully clever, only she makes people think she isn't, because she knows how to put on her clothes." "And it's one mission of the modern college girl," announced Madeline oracularly, "to show the people aforesaid that the two things can go together. Let's go to Smuggler's Notch Monday to celebrate." CHAPTER VI HELEN ADAMS'S MISSION The particular mission that Madeline had discovered for the modern college girl was one that Helen Chase Adams would never probably do much to fulfil. But Helen had a mission of her own--the mission of being queer. Sometimes she hated it, sometimes she laughed at it, always it seemed to her a very humble one, but she honestly tried to live up to its responsibilities and to make the most of the opportunities it offered. The loneliness of Helen's freshman year had made an indelible impression on her. Even now that she was a prominent senior, an "Argus" editor, and a valued member of Dramatic Club, she never seemed to herself to "belong" to things as the other girls did. She was still an outsider. An unexplainable something held her aloof from the easy familiarities of the life around her, and made it inevitable that she should be, as she had been from the first, an observer rather than an actor in the drama of college life. And from her vantage point of observation she saw many strange things, and made her own little queer deductions and comments upon them. On a certain gray and gloomy afternoon in November Helen sat alone in the "Argus" sanctum. She loved that sanctum--the big oak table strewn with books and magazines, the soft-toned oriental rugs, and the shimmering green curtains between which one could catch enchanting glimpses of Paradise River and the sunsets. She liked it as much as she hated her own bare little room, where the few pretty things that she had served only to call attention to the many that she hadn't. But to-day she was not thinking about the room or the view. It was "make-up" day for the sketch department--Helen's department of the "Argus." In half an hour she must submit her copy to Miss Raymond for approval--not that the exact hour of the day was specified, but if she waited until nearer dinner-time or until evening Miss Raymond was very likely to be at home, and Helen dreaded, while she enjoyed a personal interview with her divinity. Curiously enough she was more than ever afraid of Miss Raymond since she had been chosen editor of the "Argus." She was sure that Miss Raymond was responsible for her appointment, but she had never gotten up courage to thank her, and she was possessed by the fear that she was disappointing Miss Raymond in the performance of her official duties. So she preferred to find Miss Raymond's fascinating sitting-room vacant when she brought her copy, to drop it swiftly on the table nearest the door, and stopping only for one look at the enticing prospect of new books heaped on old mahogany, to flee precipitately like a thief in the night. The copy for this month was all ready. There was Ruth Howard's monologue, almost as funny to read as it had been in the telling, next, by way of contrast, a sad little story of neglected childhood by a junior who had never written anything good before, and a humorous essay on kittens by another junior that nobody had suspected of being literary. There was also a verse, or rather two verses; and it was these that caused the usually prompt and decisive Helen to hesitate and even to dawdle, wasting a precious afternoon in a futile attempt to square her conscience and still do as she pleased about those verses. One of them was Helen's own. It was good; Miss Raymond had said so with emphasis, and Helen wanted it to go into the "Argus." She had rather expected that Jane Drew would ask for it for the main department of the magazine; but she hadn't, and her copy had gone to Miss Raymond the day before. The other verses were also stamped with Miss Raymond's heartiest approval, and like the rest of the articles that Helen had collected, they were the work of a "nobody." Helen's vigorous unearthing of undiscovered talent was a joke with the "Argus" staff, and her own great pride. But to-day she was not in a benevolent mood. She had refused all through the fall to have anything of her own in the "Argus"; she did not believe in the editors printing their own work. But these verses were different; she loved them, she wanted people to see them and to know that they were hers. She had thought of consulting Jane or Marion Lustig, who was editor-in-chief, but she knew beforehand what either of them would say. "Put in your own verse, silly child! Why didn't you say you'd like it used in the other department? We've got to blow our own horns if we want them blown. Use the others next time--or give them back." But by next month there might be an embarrassment of good material, and as for giving them back, Jane could do it easily enough, but Helen, being queer, couldn't. For who knew how much getting into the "Argus" might mean to that unknown other girl? Helen had never so much as heard her name before, though she was a sophomore. She had a premonition that she was queer too, and lonely and unhappy. The verses were very sad, and somehow they sounded true. "Perhaps she'll be an editor some day," Helen sighed. "Anyway I'll give her a chance." She put on her coat and gathered up her manuscripts, first folding her own verses and pushing them vindictively into the depths of her own particular drawer in the sanctum table. When she reached the Davidson she noticed with relief that Miss Raymond's windows were dark. She was in time then. But when she knocked on the half-opened door she was taken aback to hear Miss Raymond's voice saying, "Come in," out of the shadows. "Oh, excuse me!" began Helen in a frightened voice. "I've brought you the material for the sketch department. Please don't bother about a light. I mustn't stay." But Miss Raymond went on lighting the lamp on her big table. As she stood for a moment full in the glare of it, Helen noticed that she looked worn and tired. "I'm very sorry that I disturbed you," she said sadly. "You were resting." Miss Raymond shook her head. "Not resting. Thinking. Do you like to think, Miss Adams?" "Why--yes, I suppose so," answered Helen doubtfully. "Isn't that what college is supposed to teach us to do?" "I shouldn't like to guarantee that it would in all cases," said Miss Raymond smilingly. "Has it taught you that?" "Yes," said Helen. "I don't mean to be conceited, Miss Raymond, but I think it has." "And you find it, as I do, rather a deadly delight," went on Miss Raymond, more to herself than to Helen. "And sometimes you wish you had never learned. When people tell you sad things, you wish you needn't go over and over them, trying to better them, trying to reason out the whys and wherefores of them, trying to live yourself into the places of the people who have to endure them. And when they don't tell you, you have to piece them out for yourself just the same." Miss Raymond came sharply back to the present and held out her hand for Helen's bundle of manuscript. Helen gave it to her in puzzled silence, and watched her as she looked rapidly through it. "Ruth Howard?" she questioned, when she reached the signature of the monologue. "Do I know her? Oh, a freshman, is she? She sounds very promising. Ellen Lacey--yes, I remember that story. Cora Wentworth--oh, I'm very glad you've got something of hers. She needs encouragement. Anne Carter--oh, Miss Adams, how did you know?" "How did I know?" repeated Helen in bewilderment. Miss Raymond looked at her keenly. "So you didn't know," she said. "It is a mere coincidence that you are going to print her verses." "I don't know anything about her," Helen explained. "I heard you read the verses in your theme class last week. And at the close of the hour I asked you to let me have them and several other things. I used these first because I had all the prose I needed for this time." "I see," said Miss Raymond. "Have you told her yet that you want them?" "No," said Helen, guiltily. "I was going to write her a note as soon as I got home. I didn't suppose she would care." "I presume you noticed that they are very remarkable." Helen blushed, thinking how she had hesitated between these and her own production, which she was sure could not be considered at all "remarkable." "I--well, I went mostly by what you said. I don't believe I am a good judge of poetry--of verses, I mean." "You needn't be afraid to call these verses poetry. But I don't blame you for not fully appreciating them. No girl ought to understand the tragedy of utter defeat, which is their theme." Miss Raymond paused, and Helen wondered if she ought to go or stay. "Miss Adams," Miss Raymond went on again presently, "the author of those verses was in my room just before you came. She wanted to return a book that I lent her early in the term, by way of answering some question that she had brought up in my sophomore English class. She says that the book and the word of appreciation that went with it are the only kindness for which she has to thank Harding college, and that I am the only person to whom she cares to say good-bye. I don't know why she should except me. I had quite forgotten her. I associated nothing whatever with the name on those verses until I looked at it again just now. I considered the tragic note in them merely as a literary triumph. I never thought of the girl behind the tragedy." She waited a moment. "She's going to leave college," she went on abruptly. "She says that a year and a half of it is a fair trial. I couldn't deny that. She says that she has made no friends, leaves without one regret or one happy memory. Miss Adams, would you be willing, instead of writing her a note, to tell her personally about this?" "Why, certainly," said Helen, "if you think she'd like it better." "Yes, I am sure she would. You won't find her at all hard to get on with. She has a dreadful scar on one cheek, from a cut or a burn, that gives her face a queer one-sided look. I suspect that may be at the bottom of her unhappiness." On the way across the campus Helen had an inspiration, which led her a little out of her way, to the house where Jane Drew, the literary editor of the "Argus" lived. "I'm so relieved that my department is all made up," she told Jane artfully, "that I feel like celebrating. Won't you meet me at Cuyler's for supper?" Jane promised, a good deal surprised, for Helen was not in the habit of asking her to supper at Cuyler's; and Helen, after arranging to meet her guest down-town, hurried on to the address that Miss Raymond had given her, one of the most desirable of the off-campus houses. Miss Carter was in, the maid said, and a moment later she appeared to speak for herself. She flushed with embarrassment when she saw Helen, and her dreadful, disfiguring scar showed all the more plainly on her reddened cheek. "Oh, I supposed it was the woman with my washing," she said. "I don't have many calls. You must excuse this messy shirt waist. Please sit down." "Won't you take me up to your room?" asked Helen, trying to think how Betty Wales would have put the other girl at her ease. "We can talk so much better there." Miss Carter hesitated. "Why, certainly, if you prefer. It's in great confusion. I'm packing, or getting ready to pack, rather," and she led the way up-stairs to a big room that, even in its half-dismantled condition, looked singularly attractive and quite different somehow from the regulation college room. "I have a dreadful confession to make," said Helen gaily, when they were seated. "I've taken your verses for the 'Argus.' I've already sent them in to Miss Raymond, and now I've come to ask if you are willing. I do hope you are." "Why certainly," said Miss Carter quietly. "You are perfectly welcome to them of course. You needn't have taken the trouble to come away up here to ask." Then she relapsed into silence. Helen could not tell whether she was pleased or not. She had an uncomfortable feeling that she was being dismissed; but she did not go. Never in her life had she worked so hard to make conversation as she did in the next ten minutes. The "Argus," the new chapel rules, Miss Raymond and her theme classes, the sophomore elections,--none of them evoked a responsive chord in the strange girl who sat impassive, with no thought apparently of her social duties and responsibilities. "She must think I don't know how to take a hint," reflected Helen, "but I don't care. I'm going to keep on trying." Presently she noticed that from Miss Carter's window could be seen Mrs. Chapin's house and the windows of her and Betty's old room. "That was where I lived when I first came to Harding," she began awkwardly, pointing them out. Then she looked at the girl opposite, read the misery in her big gray eyes, and opened her heart. Betty Wales, who had worked so hard to get at a little of the story of Helen's freshman year would have been amazed at the confidences she poured out so freely to this stranger. Indeed Helen was surprised herself at the ease with which she spoke and the dramatic quality that she managed to put into her brief account of the awkward, misfit, unhappy freshman. Miss Carter listened at first apathetically, then with growing interest. "Thank you," she said gravely, when Helen had finished. "I thought I was the only one who felt so." "Oh, no, you aren't," said Helen brightly. "There are lots of others, I guess." "No one with a thing like this," said the girl, with a swift, passionate gesture toward her scar. "Don't," said Helen gently. "Please don't think about it. No one else does, I'm sure." "I got it just before I came here," went on the girl, speaking almost fiercely. "It came in a horrible way, but it's horrible just of itself. I entered Harding because I thought the college life--the girls and the good times and the work--would help me to forget it--or to get used to being so ugly." Helen considered a moment in silence. "I guess we're even more alike than I thought," she said at last. "We both expected college to do it all for us, while we--just sat. But I can tell you--do you play basket-ball? Anyhow you've seen it played. Well, you've got to keep your eye on the ball, and then you've got to jump--hard. Have you noticed that?" Miss Carter laughed happily at Helen's whimsical comparison. "No," she said, "I've never been much interested in basket-ball. I'm afraid I've 'just sat' or jumped the wrong way." Helen considered again, her small face wrinkled with the intensity of her thought. "You mean you've jumped away from the very things you were trying to get hold of," she said. "You've expected things to come to you. They won't. You've got to do your part. You've got to jump very often, and as if you meant it." The girl nodded. "I see." "You can do one thing right away," said Helen briskly, rising and buttoning her coat. "Do you know Jane Drew? Well, she's an awfully clever senior and an editor. She's going to have dinner with me at Cuyler's, and I'd like you to come too. You see one of the things you have jumped into already is being a star contributor to the 'Argus,' and we always want to meet our star contributors." Miss Carter hesitated. "Never mind your waist," Helen urged tactfully. "It looks perfectly fresh to me, but you can keep your coat on if you'd rather." "All right, I'll come," said Miss Carter bravely. And having yielded, she kept to the spirit, as well as the letter, of her promise. Jane, who was a very matter-of-fact young person, treated her with the same off-hand cordiality that she would have bestowed on any other chance acquaintance with interesting possibilities. The girls who stopped at the table to speak to Jane or Helen, smiled and nodded affably when they were introduced. Some of them stared a little, at the unusual combination of two prominent seniors and an obscure underclassman, but Miss Carter did not flinch. After dinner, when Jane had gone to speak to some friends at another table, she leaned forward toward her hostess. "I want to thank you," she said shyly, "for telling me about yourself and for bringing me here. Do you know, I was going to leave college, but I'm not now. I'm going to stay on--and try jumping," she ended quickly as Jane reappeared. So Helen felt that her dinner had been a success, even though she should have to borrow largely from her next month's meagre allowance to pay for it. On her way through the campus she met Miss Raymond, hurrying to meet an important engagement. But she stopped to inquire about Miss Carter. "I knew you'd manage it," she said, when she had heard Helen's brief story of her adventures. "You're a person of resources. That's why we wanted you on the 'Argus' board." Helen fairly danced the rest of the way to the Belden. "Perhaps I shan't be afraid of her next time," she thought. "I'd rather she'd say that than have sixty verses in the 'Argus.' Oh, what a selfish pig I was trying to be! I don't deserve to have it all come out so beautifully. And--oh, dear, I'm late for the meeting of the house play committee, and Betty said it was awfully important." She found the committee in riotous and jubilant session in Madeline's room. "Three cheers for Sara Crewe!" shrieked Polly Eastman, when Helen appeared. "Goodness, I'm not Sara," gasped Helen. "Oh, I mean the play, not the character," explained Polly impatiently. "It's going to be simply great. What do you suppose we've got now, Helen?" "I don't know," said Helen, sitting down on the floor, since the bed and all the chairs were fully occupied. "Well guess," commanded Polly, tossing her a cushion. "A lot of Turkish-looking things for Mr. Carrisford's study." "Nonsense! We can get those all right when the time comes." "Josephine Boyd has learned her part." "Then she's done a tall lot of work on it since last rehearsal," said Polly serenely. "I'm sure I hope she has, but this is something any amount nicer." "Then I give up." "Well, it's a monkey," cried Polly triumphantly, "a real live monkey that belongs to a hand-organ man in Boston. The Italian bootblack at the station knows him, and--did he promise fair and square to get them up here, Lucile?" "Fair and square," repeated Lucile promptly. "I said we'd give him five dollars and his fare up from Boston. It's well worth it. A cat would have been too absurd when everybody knows the story." "I hope Sara won't mind carrying a live monkey across the stage," said Betty. "I should be dreadfully afraid it would bite." "She ought to have thought of that when she took the part," said Madeline. "She can't flunk now." "Let's hurry it through and have the organ-man play for a dance afterward," suggested the ingenious Georgia Ames. "He'd surely throw that in for the five dollars." "Better have him play between the acts too," put in somebody else. "There's nothing like getting your money's worth." "And we'll pay him all in pennies," added Polly gleefully. "We can take turns handing them out to the monkey. How many pennies will there be in five dollars and a fare from Boston, Lucile?" Helen listened to their gay banter, wondering, as many thoughtful people have wondered before her, at the light-hearted abandon of these other girls. "It must be fun to be like that," she reflected, "but I don't believe I should want to change places with any of them. They only see their own little piece of things, and they don't even know it's little,--like the man who didn't know anything about the forest he was walking through, because he got so interested in the trees. My tree is just a scraggly, crooked little sapling that won't ever amount to much, but I can see the whole big forest, and hear it talk, and that makes up. I'm glad I'm one of the kind that college teaches to think," ended Helen happily. A moment later she made an addendum. "Betty Wales is a kind by herself," she decided. "She doesn't exactly think, but she knows. And she's really responsible for to-day. I wish I could tell her about it." CHAPTER VII ROBERTA "ARRIVES" It was dress rehearsal night for the Belden House play, and the hall in the Students' Building, where the big house-plays are performed was the scene of a tremendous bustle and excitement. The play was to be "Sara Crewe," or rather "The Little Princess," for that is the title of the regular stage version of Mrs. Burnett's story which the Belden House was giving by the special permission of the Princess herself. The pretty young actress who had "created" the part was a friend of Madeline's father, and Madeline, being on the committee to choose a play, declared that she was tired to death of seeing the girls do Sheridan and Goldsmith and the regulation sort of modern farce, and boldly wrote to the Princess for permission to act her play, because it seemed so exactly suited to the capabilities of college girls. The Princess had not only said yes, but she had declared that she should be very much interested in the success of the play, and when Madeline, writing to thank her, had suggested that the Belden House would be only too delighted if she came up to see their performance, she had accepted their invitation with enthusiasm. Of course the committee and the cast were exceedingly flattered, but they were also exceedingly frightened and nervous, and even the glorious promise of a live monkey, with a hand-organ man thrown in, did not wholly reassure them. To-night everything seemed to be at sixes and sevens. Though most of the committee had toiled over it all the afternoon, the stage resembled pandemonium rather than the schoolroom of Miss Minchen's Select Seminary, which was to be the scene of the first act. The committee were tired and, to speak frankly, cross, with the exception of Madeline, who was provokingly cool and nonchalant, though she had worked harder than any one else. The cast were infected with that irresponsible hilarity that always attacks an amateur company at their last rehearsal. They danced about the stage, getting in the way of the committee, shrieking with laughter at their first glimpses of one another's costumes, and making flippant suggestions for all sorts of absurd and impossible improvements. Meanwhile, regardless of the fact that the rehearsal ought to have begun half an hour before, the committee and Mr. Carrisford's three Hindu servants were holding a solemn conclave at the back of the stage. The chef-d'oeuvre of their scenic effects was refusing to work; the bagdads that were to descend as if by Hindu magic and cover the bare walls of Sara's little attic bedroom when the good fairies, in the guise of the aforesaid servants, effected its transformation in the second act. There weren't enough of the draperies for one thing, and some of them wouldn't unroll quickly, while others threatened to tumble down on the servants' devoted heads. "Well, we'll just have to let them go for to-night," said Nita Reese dejectedly at last. She was chairman of the committee. "To-morrow we'll fix them all up again, the way Madeline says is right, and you three must come over and do that part of the scene again. Is everybody ready?" "Miss Amelia Minchen isn't," said Betty, "She just came in carrying her costume." "Then go and help her hurry into it," commanded Nita peremptorily. "Madeline, will you fix Ram Dass's turban? He's untwisted it again of course. Georgie Ames, line up the Seminary girls and the Carmichael children, and see whether any of their skirts are too long. Take them down on the floor. Everybody off the stage, please, but the scene-shifters." "Oh, Nita," cried Polly Eastman, who had just come in, rushing breathlessly up to the distracted chairman, "I'm so sorry to be late, but some people that I couldn't refuse asked me down-town to dinner. I ate and ran, really I did. And Nita, what do you think----" "I'm much too tired to think," returned Nita, wearily. "What's happened now?" "Why, nothing has actually happened, only I was at the station this afternoon, and I asked the shoe-shine man about the monkey, and he hasn't heard, but he told the organ-man that the play began at half-past eight, and all the trains have been horribly late to-day, so if he should plan to get in on the eight-fifteen----" "Have him telegraph that it begins at six," said Nita, firmly. "Go and see to it now." "Why, I did tell him to," said Polly, sighing at the prospect of going out again. "Only he's so irresponsible that I think we ought to decide----" "Go and stand over him while he telegraphs," said Nita with finality. "We can't understudy a monkey. Josephine Boyd, come here and go through your long speech. I want to be sure that you get it right. It didn't make sense the way you said it yesterday." "Oh, Nita." It was Lucile Merrifield holding out a yellow envelope. Nita clutched it frantically. "Perhaps she's not coming. Wouldn't I be relieved!" "It's not a telegram," explained Lucile, gently, "only the proof of the programs that the printer has taken this opportune moment to send up. The boy says if you could look at it right off, why, he could wait and take it back. They want it the first thing in the morning." "Give it to Helen Adams," said Nita, turning back to Josephine. "She can mark proof. Go on Josephine, I'm listening, and don't stop again for anybody." Josephine, who was the father of the large and irrepressible Carmichael family, had just finished declaiming her longest speech with praiseworthy regard for its meaning, when somebody called out, "Ermengarde St. John isn't here yet." Nita sank down in Miss Amelia Minchen's armchair with a little moan of despair. "Somebody go and get her," she said. "Betty Wales, you'd better go. You can dress people fastest." It seemed to Betty, as she hurried down-stairs and over to the Belden, that she had toiled along the same route, laden with screens, rugs and couch-covers, at least a hundred times that afternoon. She was tired and exasperated at this final hitch, and she burst into the room of the fat freshman who had Ermengarde's part with scant ceremony. What was her amazement to find it quite empty. "Oh, she can't have forgotten and gone off somewhere!" wailed Betty. "Why, every one was talking about the rehearsal at dinner time." The cast and committee included so many members of the house that it was almost depopulated, and none of the few girls whom Betty could find knew anything about the missing Ermengarde. "I must have passed her on the way here," Betty decided at last, and rushed down-stairs again. As she went by the matron's door she almost ran into that lady, hurrying out. "Oh, I beg your pardon, Mrs. Kent," she said. "You haven't seen Ermengarde--that is, I mean Janet Kirk, have you?" "No, not yet," said Mrs. Kent briskly. "I only heard about it five minutes ago. I'm just getting ready now to go up and take the poor child some things she's sent for." "But she isn't in her room," said Betty, bewildered but certain that Mrs. Kent's apparent affection for the irresponsible Janet was very ill-bestowed. "Of course not, my dear," returned Mrs. Kent, serenely. "She's at the infirmary with a badly sprained ankle. She'll have to keep off it for a month at least, the doctor says." [Illustration: "OH, I BEG YOUR PARDON"] "Oh, Mrs. Kent!" wailed Betty. "And she's Ermengarde St. John in the house-play. What can we do?" Mrs. Kent shook her head helplessly. "You'll have to do without Janet," she said. "That's certain. She was on her way home to dinner when she slipped on a piece of ice near the campus-gate. She lay there several minutes before any one saw her, and then luckily Dr. Trench came along and drove her straight to the infirmary. She fainted while they were bandaging her ankle." "I'm very sorry," said Betty, her vision of a possible hasty recovery dispelled by the last sentence. After a moment's hesitation she decided not to go back to the Students' Building to consult Nita. It would be better to bring some one over from the house to read the part for to-night. It was important, but luckily it wasn't very long, and somebody would have to learn it in time for the play the next evening. So she hurried up-stairs again and the first person she met was Roberta Lewis, marching down the corridor with a huge Greek dictionary under her arm. "Put that book down, Roberta; and come over to the rehearsal," commanded Betty. "Ermengarde St. John has sprained her ankle, and gone to the infirmary and everybody's waiting." "You mean that you want me to go and get her?" asked Roberta doubtfully. "Because I think it would take two people to help her walk, if she's very lame. She's awfully fat, you know." "We want you to read Janet's part," explained Betty, "just for to-night, until the committee can find some one to take it." And she gave a little more explicit account of the state of affairs at the rehearsal. "Yes, indeed, I'll be glad to," said Roberta readily. She was secretly delighted to be furnished with an excuse for seeing the dress rehearsal. She had longed with all her soul to be appointed a member of the play-committee, but of course the house-president had not put her on; she was the last person, so the president thought, who would be useful there. And Roberta could not screw her courage up to the point of trying for a place in the cast. So no one knew, since she had never told any one, that she thought acting the most interesting thing in the world and that she loved to act, in spite of the terrors of having an audience. But she had let slip her one chance--the offer of a part in Mary's famous melodrama away back in her freshman year--and she had never had another. And now, because she was Roberta Lewis, proud and shy and dreadfully afraid of pushing in where she wasn't wanted, she did not think it necessary to mention to Betty that she had borrowed a copy of the play from little Ruth Howard, who was Sara, and that she had read it over until she knew almost every line of it by heart. Of course the committee were thrown into a state bordering upon panic by the news of Janet's accident, but Madeline comfortingly reminded them that the worse the last rehearsal was, the better the play was sure to be; and there was certainly nothing to do now but go ahead. So they began to rehearse at last, almost an hour late, and the first act went off with great spirit, in spite of the handicap of a strange Ermengarde, who had to read her part because she was ashamed to confess that she knew it already, and who was supposed not to be familiar with her "stage business." To be sure, she had not very much to do in this scene, but at the end everybody thanked her effusively and Ruth Howard declared that she never saw anybody who "caught on" so fast. "You ought to take the part to-morrow night," she said. "Oh, oh!" Roberta cautioned her, in alarm and embarrassment. "They're going to have Polly Eastman. I heard Nita say so. Besides, I wouldn't for anything." Ermengarde's chance comes in the second act, where, half in pity and half in admiration for the queer little Sara Crewe, she comes up to make friends with her, and, finding to her horror that Sara is actually hungry, decides to bring her "spread" up to Sara's attic. There, later, the terrible Miss Minchen finds her select pupils gathered, and wrathfully puts an end to their merry-making. At the opening of this scene the attic was supposed to be lighted by one small candle, and consequently the stage was very dim. "I don't believe Roberta can manage with that light," whispered Nita to Betty who was standing with her in one of the wings. "Don't let's change unless we have to," Betty whispered back. "You know we wanted to get the effect of Miss Minchen's curl papers and night-cap. Why, Nita, Roberta hasn't any book. She's saying her part right off." "No!" Nita was incredulous. "Why, Betty Wales, she is, and she's doing it splendidly, fifty per cent, better than Janet did." Sure enough Roberta, becoming engrossed in the play, had forgotten to conceal her unwarranted knowledge of it. She realized what she had done when a burst of applause greeted her exit, and actors and committee alike forgot the proprieties of a last rehearsal to make a united assault upon her. "Roberta Lewis," cried Betty accusingly, "why didn't you tell me that you knew Ermengarde's part?" "Oh, I don't know it," protested Roberta. "I only know snatches of it here and there. Polly can learn it in no time." "She won't have the chance," said Nita decisively. "You must take it, Roberta. Why didn't you tell people that you could act like that?" "I shall have stage-fright and spoil everything," declared Roberta forlornly. "Nonsense," said Nita. "You'd be ashamed to do anything of the kind." "Yes," agreed Roberta solemnly, "I should." Whereupon everybody laughed, and Nita hugged Roberta and assured her that there was no way out of it. "Somebody go and get Janet's costume," she ordered, "and any one who has a spare minute can be fitting it over. We shall have to have an extra rehearsal to-morrow of the parts where Ermengarde comes in. Go on now, Sara. Use Lucile's muff for the monkey." When at last act three was finished it was ten o'clock and Nita gave a sigh of utter exhaustion. "If Madeline's rule holds," she said, "this play ought to go like clockwork to-morrow." And it did, despite the rather dubious tone of the chairman's prophecy. The Princess arrived duly just after luncheon, and everybody except the cast, who would do their share later, helped to entertain her. This was not difficult. She wasn't a college girl, she explained, and she had never known many of them. She just wanted to hear them talk, see their rooms, and if it wasn't too much trouble she should enjoy looking on at a game of--what was it they played so much at Harding? Basket-ball, somebody prompted. Yes, that was it. The sophomore teams which had just been chosen were proud to play a game for her, and they even suggested, fired by her responsive enthusiasm, that they should teach her to play too. "I should love it," she said, "if somebody would lend me one of those becoming suits. But I mustn't." She sighed. "The newspapers would be sure to get hold of it. Besides they're giving a tea for me at the Belden. It begins in five minutes. Doesn't time just fly at Harding?" The monkey also arrived in good season, whether thanks to or in spite of Polly's exertions was not clear, since his master spoke no English and not even Madeline could understand his Italian. The bagdads worked beautifully. The new Ermengarde was letter-perfect, and nobody but herself had any fear that she would be stage-struck, even though the Princess would be sitting in the very middle of the fourth row. Janet's name was still on the program, for Roberta had sternly insisted that it shouldn't be crossed out; and as neither of the two Ermengardes was very well known to the college in general, only a few people noticed the change. But the part made a hit. "Isn't she just like some little girl who used to go to school with you--that funny, stupid Ermengarde?" one girl would say to another. "They're all natural, but she's absolutely perfect." "Sara's a dear," said the Princess, "but I want to talk to Ermengarde. Mayn't I go behind? We actor people always like to do that, you know." So she was escorted behind the scenes, and it was the proudest moment of Roberta's life when the Princess, having asked particularly for her, said all sorts of nice things about her "real talent" and "artistic methods." "That settles it, Roberta," said Betty, who was behind the scenes in her capacity of chief dressing-maid and first assistant to the make-up man. "You've got to try for senior dramatics." "Do you really think I could get a part?" asked Roberta coolly. "I think you might," said Betty, amazed beyond words by Roberta's ready acquiescence. "You probably won't get anything big," she added cautiously. "There are such a lot of people in our class who can act. But the girls say that the only way to get a small part is to try for a big one. Don't you remember how Mary Brooks tried for the hero and the heroine and the villain and then was proud as a peacock to be a page and say two lines, and Dr. Brooks and her mother and two aunts and six cousins came to see her do it." "Dear me," said Roberta in frightened tones, "do you suppose my father and my cousin will feel obliged to come?" "I don't know," laughed Betty, "but I feel obliged to remind you that the third act of Sara Crewe is on and you belong out there where you can hear your cue." "I hope Roberta won't be disappointed about getting a part in the senior play," Betty confided to Madeline, as they parted afterward in the Belden House hall. "She did awfully well to-night, but I think she takes it too seriously. She doesn't realize what tremendous competition there is for the parts in our plays, nor what lots of practice some of the girls have had." "Oh, I wouldn't worry," said Madeline easily. "If she doesn't get anything, she'll have to do without. She'll have plenty of company. She probably won't try when the time comes." "Yes," said Betty, "she will, and she's so sensitive that she'll hate terribly to fail. So, as I started her on her mad career as an actress, I feel responsible." "You always feel responsible for something," laughed Madeline. "While you're in the business why don't you remember that you're responsible for a nice little slice of to-night's performance. Miss Ferris says it's the best house-play she's seen." "I know. Isn't it just splendid?" sighed Betty rapturously. "And isn't the Princess a dear? But Madeline, you haven't any idea how my feet ache." CHAPTER VIII THE GREATEST TOY-SHOP ON EARTH "No," said Betty, "I haven't found it, and now I'm almost sure I shan't, because Nita's lost hers." "What has Nita lost?" asked Madeline from her nest of pillows. It was the evening after the play, and the Belden House felt justified in taking life easily. "She lost her head last night," chuckled Madeline, without waiting for Betty's answer. "Did you hear her imploring the organ-man in her most classic English not to let me take the monkey out in front to show to the President? As if I really would!" "You've done just as crazy things in your time, dear," retorted Katherine Kittredge, who had come over to borrow one of Betty's notebooks and had found the atmosphere of elegant leisure that pervaded the room irresistible. "Do you really think so?" asked Madeline amiably. "Well, before we go into that I want to know what else Nita has lost." "Why, a pin," explained Betty,--"that lovely one with the amethyst in the centre and the ring of little pearls in a quaint old setting. It used to be her great-grandmother's. Mine wasn't much to lose, and I felt sure until to-day that it would turn up, but it hasn't, and now I'm afraid it was really stolen." "Have you looked all through that?" asked Madeline, pointing to the miscellaneous assortment of books, papers, dance-cards and bric-a-brac that littered Betty's small desk to the point of positive inundation. Betty assented with dignity. "And I haven't had time since to put it back in the pigeon-holes. When Nita told me about her pin, I got worried about mine--mother gave it to me and I couldn't bear to lose it for good--so I went through my desk and all my drawers and it was sweeping-day, so I asked Belden House Annie to look too. It's not here." "Is Nita sure hers was stolen?" asked Katherine. Betty nodded. "As sure as she can be without actually seeing it taken. She left it on her cushion yesterday when she came down to luncheon, and when she got back from physics lab, it was gone." "What a shame!" said Madeline. "She ought to tell Mrs. Kent right away. I should strongly suspect the new table-girl." "Oh, but she's a cousin of Belden House Annie's," explained Betty, "and I'm sure Annie would look after her. We all know that she's as honest as the day herself, and all the other maids have been here for years and years." "It's queer," said Katherine, "if it was an outsider--a more or less professional thief, I mean--that he or she should come to this house twice, several weeks apart, and each time take so little. If it was a college girl now----" "Oh, don't, Katherine," begged Betty. "I can't bear to think that any Harding girl would do such a thing. I'd ten times rather never know who it was than to find it was that way." Just then the B's appeared airily attired in kimonos concealed under rain-coats, and laden with a huge pan of marshmallow fudge, which they had made, they explained, in honor of Roberta's successful début. "What are you all looking so solemn about?" demanded Bob, when Babbie had gone in search of Roberta. Betty told her, and Babe and Bob exchanged glances. "It's not necessarily any one in this house who's responsible, I guess," said Babe. "Babbie's lost a valuable pin too, and Geraldine Burdett has lost a ring. Oh, about two weeks ago Gerry's was taken, and Babbie's before that. They've been keeping dark and trying to get up a clue, but they can't. They'll be all off when they hear about these other robberies." "There was one awfully queer thing about Babbie's thief," put in Bob. "Her little gold-linked purse was on the chiffonier right beside her pin and it wasn't touched, though it was just stuffed with bills. That makes them afraid it was some girl who's awfully fond of jewelry and can't afford any." "It isn't right to leave our lovely things around so, is it?" said Betty seriously. "It's just putting temptation in the way of poor girls." "Exactly," agreed Madeline. "We go off for hours, never locking up anything, leaving our money and other valuables in plain sight, and if we do miss anything we can't be sure it's stolen and we don't have time to investigate for weeks after. It's a positive invitation to dishonesty." "But it's such a nuisance to lock up," complained Babe, "and if I hide things I can't ever find them again, so I might as well not bother." "I haven't any golden baubles," said Bob, "but I'm going to keep my money in 'Love's Labor Lost.' You'll find it there if you ever want to borrow." "'Much Ado about Nothing' would be the most appropriate place for mine," laughed Katherine, "so I choose that. You probably won't find any if you want to borrow." "But seriously, girls, let's all be more careful," advised Betty, "and let's ask other people to be. Think how perfectly awful it is to make chances for girls to forget themselves. But I shan't believe it's a Harding girl," she added decisively. "It would be perfectly easy for any dishonest young woman to go through the houses without being questioned. Perhaps she got frightened and didn't notice Babbie's money on that account or didn't have time to snatch up anything but the pin." Just then Babbie appeared, bringing Roberta and Rachel Morrison who had met them in the hall, and in the general attack upon the fudge pan more serious issues were forgotten. It was now the busiest, gayest part of the long fall term. Flying fast on the heels of the house play came Thanksgiving Day. "And just to think of it!" wailed Bob. "Only two days vacation this year, and Miss Stuart and the president dropping the most awful hints about what will happen if you cut over. Nobody can go home. I hope the faculty will all eat too much and have horrible attacks of indigestion." "Well, we may as well have as much fun as we can out of it," said Babbie philosophically. "I've written home for a spread; so we shan't die of hunger." "Mrs. Kent says she's going to give us the best Thanksgiving dinner we ever ate," announced Betty cheerfully. "I hope our matron will be seized with the same lofty ambition," said Katherine. "If she is, and if the skating holds, I shan't mind staying here." "Weren't you going to stay anyway?" asked Helen Adams. "Being a resident of the remote village of Kankakee, Illinois, and not having been urged to visit any of my Eastern friends, I was," admitted Katherine, solemnly, "but that doesn't make it any the nicer to have to work all day Saturday." The skating did last, and the man at the rink, being taken in hand by the B's, sympathized heartily with their wrongs, and promised them a three days' ice carnival, which meant search-lights, bonfires and a big band on the ice every evening. There is nothing in the world more exhilarating than skating to good music. The rink was thronged with Harding girls and Winsted men, and the proprietor could not easily regard himself as a bona fide philanthropist. The paper-chase, to get up an appetite on Thanksgiving morning, was Katherine Kittredge's idea and the basket-ball game in the afternoon between the Thanksgiving Dinners and the Training Tables was too fantastic to have originated with any one but Madeline Ayres. Georgia Ames, dressed as a huge turkey gobbler, captained the Thanksgiving Dinners, who were gotten up as bunches of celery and mounds of cranberry jelly. The captain of the Training Table simulated a big bottle labeled "Pure Spring Water," and the members of her team were tastefully trimmed with slices of dry bread. Being somewhat less spectacular than their rivals, they were a little more agile and they won the game, which was so funny that it sent two of the faculty into hysterics. "And that's almost as bad as indigestion," said Babe, who was a bunch of celery. At least she had been one until she came into collision with the water bottle and lost most of her trimmings. It was really the Thanksgiving game that precipitated the plans for the senior entertainment for the library fund. The fire the year before had not only damaged the library considerably, but it had brought its shortcomings and the absurdly small number of its volumes, compared with the rapidly increasing number of the girls who used them, to the attention of the public. Somebody had offered fifty thousand dollars for a library fund provided the college raised an equal amount. The alumnæ were trying to get the money, and because they had helped the undergraduates with their beloved Students' Building, they wanted the undergraduates to help them now. On the very evening of the game Marie Howard, the senior president, caught Madeline on the way to Babbie's spread and laid the matter before her. "The alums want us to subscribe to the fund," she explained, "and then they think each class ought to give an entertainment. Not a bit nervy, are they? Well, of course 19-- has got to take the lead, and I've fairly racked my brains to think what we can do. Now it's no trouble to you to have lovely, comical ideas, and if you'll only help me out with this entertainment, I'll be your friend for life." "Why don't you appoint a committee to take charge of it?" inquired Madeline, serenely. Marie gave her a mournful look. "I suppose you think I haven't tried. The girls are all willing to help, but they insist upon having the idea to start with. I know you hate committees, Madeline, and I'm not asking you to be on one--" "You'd better not," interpolated Madeline, darkly, remembering the drudgery she had submitted to to make the Belden House play a success. "Just think up the idea," Marie went on, persuasively, "and I'll make a committee do the rest. I don't care what we have, so long as it's new and taking--the sort of thing that you always seem to have in your head. That's what we want. Plays and lectures are too commonplace." "Marie," said Madeline, laughingly, "you talk as if ideas were cabbages and my head was a large garden. I can't produce ideas to order any more than the rest of you can. But if I should think of anything, I'll let you know." "Thank you," said Marie, sweetly, and went back to her room, where she gave vent to some forcible remarks about the "exasperatingness" of clever people who won't let themselves be pinned down to anything. It was Betty Wales who, dancing into Madeline's room the next afternoon, gave, not Madeline, but Eleanor Watson,--who had been having tea with Madeline and listening to her absurd version of Marie's request,--an inspiration. "I wish it wasn't babyish to like toys," she sighed. "I've been down-town with Bob, and they've opened a big toy-shop in the store next Cuyler's, just for the holidays, I suppose. Bob got a Teddy bear, and I bought this box of fascinating little Japanese tops for my baby sister. They're all like different kinds of fruit and you spin them like pennies, without a string. I just love toy-stores." "So do I. So does everybody," said Madeline, oracularly, clearing a place on the polished tea-table and emptying out the miniature tops. "They renew your youth. Let's get all these things to spinning at once, Betty." "Why don't you have a toy-shop for your senior entertainment?" asked Eleanor, watching the two absorbed faces. "How do you mean?" asked Madeline, absently, trying to make the purple plum she was manipulating stay upright longer than Betty's peach. "Why, with live toys, something on the plan of the circus that you and Mary got up away back in sophomore year," explained Eleanor. "I should think you might work it up beautifully." Madeline stared at her for a moment, her eyes half-closed. "Eleanor," she declared at last, "you're a genius. We could. I can fairly see my friends turning into toys. You and Betty and the rest of the class beauties are French dolls of course. Helen Adams would make a perfect jumping-jack--she naturally jerks along just like one." "And Bob can be a jack-in-the-box," cried Betty eagerly, getting Madeline's idea. "Or a monkey that climbs a rope," suggested Eleanor. "Don't you think Babe would pop out of a box better?" "And that fat Miss Austin will be just the thing for a top," put in Madeline. "We can ask five cents for a turn at making her spin." And Madeline twirled the purple plum vigorously, in joyous anticipation of taking a turn at Miss Austin. "Then there could be a counter of stuffed animals," suggested Eleanor, "with Emily Davis to show them off." "Easily," agreed Madeline, "and a Noah's ark, if we want it, and a Punch and Judy show. Oh, there's no end to the things we can have! Let's go over and tell Marie about it before dinner." "You and Betty go," objected Eleanor. "I really haven't time." "Nonsense," said Madeline firmly. "It's long after five now, and--Eleanor Watson, are you trying to crawl out of your responsibilities? It was you that thought of this affair, remember." "Please don't try to drag me in," begged Eleanor. "I'll be a doll, if you like, or anything else that you can see me turning into. But Marie didn't ask me to suggest, and she might feel embarrassed and obliged to ask me to be on the committee, and--please don't try to drag me in, Madeline." Madeline looked at her keenly, for a moment. "Eleanor Watson," she began sternly, "you're thinking about last fall. Don't you know that that stupid girl didn't stand for anybody but her own stupid self?" "She was in the right," said Eleanor simply. "Not wholly," objected Madeline, "and if she was this isn't a parallel case. In making you toastmistress 19-- was supposed to be doing you an honor. You're doing her a favor now, and a good big one." "And if we tell Marie about the toy-shop, we shall tell her that you thought of it," put in Betty firmly. "And we shall also say that you hate committee meetings as much as I do," put in Madeline artfully, "but that we are both willing to help in any way that we can with ideas and costumes." Eleanor looked pleadingly from one to the other. "We won't give in," declared Betty, "so it's no use to make eyes at us like that." "Either we suppress the whole idea and 19-- goes begging for another, or it stands as yours," said Madeline in adamant tones. "Well, then, of course," began Eleanor slowly at last. "Of course," laughed Betty, jumping up to hug her. "I knew you'd see it sensibly in a minute. Come on, Madeline. We haven't any time to lose." "Do you remember what she was like two years ago, Betty?" asked Madeline thoughtfully when Eleanor had left them, persisting that she really had an engagement before dinner. "I even remember what she was like three years ago," laughed Betty happily. "Fancy her giving up a chance like this then!" mused Madeline. "Fancy her contributing ideas to the public good and trying to escape taking the credit for them. Why, Betty, she's a different person." "I'm so glad you're friends now," said Betty, squeezing Madeline's arm lovingly. "That's so," Madeline reflected. "We weren't two years ago. I used to hate her wire-pulling so. And now I suppose I'm pulling wires for her myself. Well, I'm going to be careful not to pull any of them down on her head this time. I say, Betty, wouldn't the Blunderbuss make a superb jack-in-the-box? I'm sure everybody would appreciate the symbolic effect when she popped, and perhaps we could manage to smother her by mistake between times." The toy-shop took "like hot-cakes," to borrow Bob's pet comparison. Everybody told Madeline that it was just like her, and Madeline assured everybody gaily that she had always known she was misunderstood and that anyhow Eleanor Watson was responsible for the toy-shop. Having spent the better part of a day in spreading this information Madeline rushed off to New York on a vague and mysterious errand that had something to do with sub-letting the apartment on Washington Square. * * * * * "I remembered after I got down here," she wrote Betty a week later, "that I couldn't eat my solitary Christmas dinner in the flat if I let it. Besides my prospective tenants are bores, and bores never appreciate old furniture enough not to scratch it. But I'm staying on to oversee the fall cleaning, and we haven't had one for a good while, so it will take another week. I'm sorry not to be on hand for the toy-shop doings (don't you let them put it off, Betty, or I can never make up my work), but I send a dialogue--no, it's for four persons--on local issues for the Punch and Judy puppets. If they can't read it, tell them to cultivate their imaginations. I'll print the title, 'The Battle of the Classes,' to give them a starter. "Miss me a little, "MADELINE. "P. S. How are the wires working?" If Eleanor suspected any hidden motive behind Madeline's sudden departure she had no way of confirming her theory, and when Betty escorted the entertainment committee, all of whom happened to be splendid workers but without a spark of originality among them, to Eleanor's room, and declaring sadly that she couldn't remember half the features of the toy-shop that they had discussed together, claimed Eleanor's half-promise of help, why there was nothing for Eleanor to do but redeem it. Nothing at least that the new Eleanor Watson cared to do. It was plain enough that the committee wanted her suggestions, and what other people might think of her motive for helping them really mattered very little in comparison with the success of 19--'s entertainment. Thus the new Eleanor Watson argued, and then she went to work. "The wires are all right so far," Betty wrote Madeline. "The girls are all lovely, and they'd better be. Eleanor has arranged the dearest play for the dolls, all about a mad old German doll-maker who has a shop full of automatons and practices magic to try to bring them to life. Some village girls come in and one changes clothes with a doll and he thinks he's succeeded. Eleanor saw it somewhere, but she had to change it all around. "Alice Waite wanted the dolls to give Ibsen's 'Doll's House.' She didn't know what it was about of course, or who wrote it. She just went by the name. The other classes have got hold of the joke and guy us to death. "You'd better come back and have some of the fun. Besides, nobody can think how to make a costume for the mock-turtle. It's Roberta, and it's going to dance with the gryphon for the animal counter's side-show. Eleanor thought of that too." But Madeline telegraphed Roberta laconically: "Gray carpet paper shell, mark scales shoe-blacking, lace together sides," and continued to sojourn in Washington Square. Late in the afternoon of the toy-shop's grand opening she appeared in the door of the gymnasium and stood there a moment staring at the curious spectacle within. The curtain was just going down on the dolls' pantomime, and the audience was applauding and hurrying off to make the rounds of the other attractions before dinner time. In clarion tones that made themselves heard above the din Emily Davis was advertising an auction of her animals, beginning with "one perfectly good baa-lamb." "Hear him baa," cried Emily, "and you'll forget that his legs are wobbly." "This way to the Punch and Judy," shouted Barbara Gordon hoarsely through a megaphone. "Give the children a season of refined and educating amusement. Libretto by our most talented satirist. Don't miss it." "Hello, Madeline," cried Lucile Merrifield, spying the new arrival. "When did you get back? Come and see the puppets with me. They say your show is great." "It all looks good to me," said Madeline, "but--is there a top to spin?" Lucile laughed and nodded. "That fat Miss Austin has taken in two dollars already at five cents a spin. She says she used to love making cheeses, and that she hasn't had such a good time since she grew up." "That's where I want to go first," said Madeline decisively; but on her way to the tops the doll counter beguiled her. "Betty Wales," she declared, "when you curl in your lips and stare straight ahead you look just like the only doll I ever wanted. I saw her in a window on Fifth Avenue, and the one time in my life that I ever cried was when daddy wouldn't buy her for me. Where's Eleanor?" "I don't know," said Betty happily. "She was here a minute ago playing for the dolls' pantomime. But she's all right. Everybody has been thanking her and praising the pantomime, and she's so pleased about it all. She told me that she had felt all this year as if everybody was pointing her out as a disgrace to the class and the college, and that she was beginning to think that her whole life was spoiled. And now--" "Why, Madeline Ayres," cried Katherine Kittredge hurrying up to them, her hair disheveled and her hands very black indeed. "I'm awfully glad you've come. There's a class meeting to-morrow to decide on the senior play and I want--" "You want tidying up," laughed Madeline. "What in the world have you been doing?" "Being half of a woolly lamb," explained Katherine. "The other half couldn't come back this evening, so Emily has been selling us--or it, whichever you please--at auction. Now listen, Madeline. You don't know anything about this play business." Madeline had heard Katherine's argument, spun Miss Austin, and seen the "Alice in Wonderland" animals dance before she found Eleanor, and by that time an interview with Jean Eastman had prepared her for the hurt look in Eleanor's eyes and the little quiver in her voice, as she welcomed Madeline back to Harding. Jean was one of the few seniors who had had no active part in the toy-shop. "So I'm patronizing everything regardless," she exclaimed, sauntering up to Madeline and holding out a bag of fudge. "It's a decided hit, isn't it? Polly says the other classes are in despair at the idea of getting up anything that will take half as well." "It's certainly a lovely show," said Madeline, trying the fudge. "And a big feather in Eleanor Watson's cap," added Jean carelessly. "She always was the cleverest thing. I'd a lot rather be chairman of the play committee, or even a member of it, for that matter, than toastmistress. I suppose you know that there's a class-meeting to-morrow." "Have you said that to Eleanor?" asked Madeline coldly. "Oh, I gave her my congratulations on her prospects," said Jean with a shrug. "We're old friends, you know. We understand each other perfectly." Madeline's eyes flashed. "It won't be the least use to tell you so," she said, "but lobbying for office is not the chief occupation of humanity as you seem to think. Neither Eleanor Watson nor any of her friends has thought anything about her being put on the play committee. I made the mistake once of supposing that our class as a whole was capable of appreciating the stand she's taken, and I shan't be likely to forget that I was wrong. But this affair was entirely her idea, and she deserves the credit for it." "Oh, indeed," said Jean quickly. "I suppose you didn't send telegrams--" But Madeline, her face white with anger was half way across the big hall. Jean watched her tumultuous progress with a meaning smile. "Well, I've fixed that little game," she reflected. "If they did intend to put her up, they won't dare to now. They'll be afraid of seeing me do the Blunderbuss's act with variations. She'd have been elected fast enough, after this, and there isn't a girl in the class who could do half as well on that committee. But as for having her and that insufferable little Betty Wales on, when I shall be left off, I simply couldn't stand it." Madeline found Betty taking off her doll's dress by dim candle-light, which she hoped would escape the eagle eye of the night-watchman. "I've come to tell you that the wires are all down again," she began, and went on to tell the story of Jean's carefully timed insinuations. "I almost believe that the Blunderbuss was the tool of the Hill crowd," she said angrily. "At any rate they used her while she served, and now they're ready to take a hand themselves." Betty stared at her in solemn silence. "What an awful lot it costs to lose your reputation," she said sadly. "And it costs a good deal to be everybody's guardian angel, doesn't it, dearie?" Madeline said affectionately. "I oughtn't to have bothered you, but I seem to have made a dreadful mess of things so far." "Oh, no, you haven't," Betty assured her. "Eleanor knows how queer Jean is, and what horrid things she says about people who won't follow her lead. None of that crowd would help about the toy-shop except Kate Denise, but every one else has been fine. And I know they haven't thought that Eleanor was trying to get anything out of them." Madeline sighed mournfully. "In Bohemia people don't think that sort of thing," she said. "It complicates life so to have to consider it always. Good-night, Betty." "Good-night," returned Betty cheerfully. "Don't forget that the senior 'Merry Hearts' have a tea-drinking to-morrow." "I'm not likely to," laughed Madeline. "Every one of them that I've seen has mentioned it. They're all agog with curiosity." "They'll be more so with joy, when I've told them the news," declared Betty, holding her candle high above her head to light Madeline through the hall. "Dear me! I wish there could be a class without officers and committees and editors and commencement plays," she told the green lizard a little later. "Those things make such a lot of worry and hard feeling. But then I suppose it wouldn't be much of a class, if it wasn't worth worrying about. And anyway it's almost vacation." CHAPTER IX A WEDDING AND A VISIT TO BOHEMIA Betty and Madeline went to their class meeting on the following afternoon very much as a trembling freshman goes to her first midyears, but nothing disastrous happened. "I fancy that Jean has taken more than Eleanor and me into her confidence," Madeline whispered. Besides, the Blunderbuss was in her place, her placid but unyielding presence offering an effectual reminder to the girls who had been admiring Eleanor's executive ability and resourcefulness that it would be safer not to mention her name in connection with the play committee. But before that was elected the preliminary committee, which, to quote Katherine Kittredge, had been hunting down the masterpieces of Willy Shakespeare ever since the middle of junior year, made its report. The members had not been able to agree unanimously on a play, so the chairman read the majority's opinion, in favor of "As You Like It," and then Katherine Kittredge explained the position of the minority, who wanted to be very ambitious indeed and try "The Merchant of Venice." There was a spirited debate between the two sets of partisans, after which, to Katherine's infinite satisfaction, 19-- voted to give "The Merchant of Venice" at its commencement. Then the committee to manage the play was chosen, and Betty Wales was the only person who was much surprised when she was unanimously elected to the post of costume member. "I on that committee!" she exclaimed in dismay. "Why, I don't know anything about Shakespeare." "You will before you get through with this business," laughed Barbara Gordon, who had been made chairman. "The course begins to-morrow at two in my room. No cuts allowed." [Illustration: "I DO CARE ABOUT HAVING FRIENDS LIKE YOU," SHE SAID.] Betty's pleasure in this unexpected honor was rather dampened by the fact that Jean Eastman had proposed her name, making it seem almost as if she were taking sides with Eleanor's enemies. But Madeline only laughed at what she called Jean's neat little scheme for getting the last word. "Ruth Ford was all ready to nominate you," she said, "but Jean dashed in ahead of her. She wanted to assure me that I hadn't silenced her for long." So Betty gave herself up to the happy feeling of having shown herself worthy to be trusted with part of 19--'s most momentous undertaking. "I must write Nan to-night," she said, "but I don't think I shall mention the costume part. She would think I was just as frivolous as ever, and Barbara says that all the committee are expected to help with things in general." Whereupon she remembered her tea-drinking, and hurried home to find most of the guests already assembled, and Eleanor, who had not gone to the class meeting but who had heard all about it from the others, waiting on the stairs to congratulate her. "I don't care half as much about being on the committee as I do about having friends like you to say they're glad," declared Betty, hugging Eleanor because there were a great many things that she didn't know how to say to her. "Yes, friends are what count," said Eleanor earnestly, "and Betty, I think I'm going to leave Harding with a good many. At least I've made some new ones this week." And that was all the reference that was ever made to the way Eleanor's oldest friend at Harding had treated her. "Well," said Betty, when everybody had congratulated her and Rachel, whose appointment on all 19--'s important committees had come to be a foregone conclusion, "I hope Nita and Rachel and K. won't be sorry they came. You three aren't so much mixed up in it as the rest of us, but I thought I'd ask you anyway." "Do you mean that I can't have my usual three slices of lemon?" demanded Katherine indignantly. "Hush, material-minded one," admonished Nita. "There's more than tea and lemon in this. There's a great secret. Of course we shall be interested in it. Fire away, Betty." "And everybody stop watching the kettle," commanded Babbie, who had taken it in charge, "and then perhaps it will begin to boil." "What I wanted to tell you," began Betty, impressively, "is that Miss Hale is going to be married this vacation." "Good for Miss Hale!" cried Bob, throwing up a pillow. "Did her sister get well?" "Yes," said Betty. "She was dreadfully ill all summer, and then she had to go away for a change. Ethel wanted to wait until she was perfectly strong, because she had looked forward so to being maid-of-honor." "I think we ought to send Miss Hale a present," said Babe, decisively. "Madame President, please instruct the secretary---- Why, we haven't any president now," ended Babe in dismay. "Let's elect Betty," suggested Nita. "She's too young for such a responsible position," objected Bob. "It's only the dramatics committee that takes infants." "And besides, her hair curls," added Madeline, reaching out to pull one of the offending ringlets. "Curly-haired people don't deserve to be elected to offices." "Let's have Babe," suggested Rachel. "She's older than her name, her hair has always been straight----" "Except once," put in Katherine, and everybody shrieked with laughter at the recollection of Babe's one disastrous experience with a marcelle wave. "And then she looked like a wild woman of Borneo," went on Rachel, "so it shouldn't count against her. Furthermore this society was organized to give her a chance." "All right," agreed Nita. "I withdraw my nomination. Babe, you're elected. Instruct the secretary to cast a unanimous ballot for yourself." "Very well," said Babe with much dignity. "Please do it, Madeline, and then I appoint you and Betty and Eleanor to choose a present for Miss Hale. I was just going to say, when I interrupted myself to remark upon the extraordinary absence of a presiding officer"--Babe coughed and dropped her presidential manner abruptly--"I was going to say that I'm all for a stuffed turtle, like those we got in Nassau. I think a ripping big one would be the very thing." "Babe!" said Babbie scornfully. "Imagine how a turtle would look among her wedding presents." "I think it would look stunning," persisted Babe, "and it would be so appropriate from us." "Don't be dictatorial, Babe," advised Rachel. "It isn't seemly in a president. Perhaps your committee can think of something appropriate that won't be quite so startling as a turtle. When is the wedding, Betty?" "The thirty-first of December at half-past eight," explained Betty. "New Year's eve--what a nice, poetical time," interposed Babbie, thoughtfully. "I think that if I ever marry----" "Hush, Babbie," commanded Nita. "You probably never will. Do let Betty finish her story." "Well, it's to be a very small wedding," went on Betty, hastily, "with no cards, but announcements, but Ethel wrote me herself and she wants us all--the Nassau ones, I mean--and Mary Brooks, to come." "Jolly for Miss Hale!" cried Bob, tossing up two pillows this time. "How perfectly dear of her!" said Babbie. "The biggest turtle we can get won't be a bit too good for her," declared Babe. "But where could we stay over night?" asked Helen, the practical-minded. "You don't give me a chance to tell you the whole of anything," complained Betty, sadly. "We're invited guests--specially invited, I mean, and it's all arranged where we are to stay. Ethel is going to have her sister and four bridesmaids to walk with her, and she wants us girls to hold a laurel rope along the line of march of the wedding-party, as they go through the rooms." "Jolly," began Babe, but she was promptly suppressed by Madeline, who tumbled her flat on her back and held her down with a pillow while she ordered Betty to proceed. "I'll read you what else she says," went on Betty, triumphantly producing Miss Hale's letter. "She says, 'There won't be many people to get in the way of the procession, but the aisle effect will be pretty, and besides I want my match-makers to have a part in the grand dénouement of all their efforts. Will you ask the others and write Mary Brooks, whose address I don't know. My uncle's big house next door to us will have room for you all, and you must come in time for my bridesmaids' luncheon and a little dance, both on the thirtieth.' Now isn't that splendid?" "Perfectly splendid," echoed her auditors. "Why, we shall be almost bridesmaids," said Roberta Lewis in awestruck tones. "Does Mary know?" Betty nodded. "She hasn't had time to answer yet, but she can certainly go, as she lives so near Ethel." "The only difficulty about our going," said Babe, "is what to do with the few days between the wedding and the opening of college." "And that's easily settled," said Madeline promptly. "Miss Hale lives just out of New York, doesn't she? Well, you are all to come and stay in the flat with me. Hasn't it just been beautifully cleaned? And aren't you all longing for a glimpse of Bohemia?" That was the climax of the tea drinking. The Merry Match-Makers spent the evening writing home to their parents for permission to go to the wedding and considering momentous problems of dress. For Roberta's best evening-gown was lavender and Babbie's was pink, and the question was how to distribute Betty, Babe and Helen in white, Bob in blue, Eleanor in her favorite yellow, Madeline in ecru, and Mary in any one of a bewildering number of possible toilettes, so as to justify Ethel's hope that the aisle would be ornamental as well as useful. How the days flew after that! For besides the wedding there were the luncheon and the dance to anticipate and plan for, as well as the unknown joys of Bohemia, New York, not to mention the regular excitement of going home, the fun of tucking Christmas presents into the corners of half-packed trunks, and the terrors of the written lesson that some inhuman member of the faculty always saves for the crowded last week of the term. On the afternoon of the twenty-ninth the Merry Match-Makers met in New York. Babbie had sent a sad little note to Miss Hale and a tearful one to Betty to say that her mother, who was a good deal of an invalid, had "looked pretty blue over my running off early, and so of course I won't leave her;" and Helen Adams had decided that considering all the extra expenses of senior year she couldn't afford the trip to New York. So there were only seven "almost bridesmaids," as Roberta called them, or "posts," which was Bob's name for them, to fall upon one another as if they had been separated for years, instead of a week, say thank you for the presents that were each "just what I wanted," and exclaim excitedly over Betty's new suit, Mary's fur coat, and the sole-leather kit-bag that Santa Claus had brought Roberta. "It's queer," said Bob. "I feel as if I'd had one whole vacation already, and ought to be unpacking and digging on psychology 6 and history 10. Whereas in reality I'm just beginning on another whole vacation. It's like having two Thanksgiving dinners in one year." "Not quite like that, I hope," laughed Eleanor, as they started off to inspect the wedding present, a beautiful pair of tall silver candlesticks. Madeline had ransacked New York to find them, and every one but Babe, who clung to her turtle as far superior to any "musty old antiques," thought them just odd and distinctive enough to please Ethel's fastidious taste. And after that there was barely time to catch the train they had arranged to take out to Ethel's home. Interest in the bride and in their own part of the wedding ceremony had caused the "Merry Hearts" to forget Dr. Eaton, and they had never once considered that of course his college chum, John Alison, would leave the railroad he was building in Arizona and come east to be Dr. Eaton's best man. And it was Mr. John Alison who had "finished" Georgia Ames. He inquired for her at once and so did his brother Tom, who was an usher, and who explained that he had been invited to keep John in order, and to intercede for him with the "posts." "And in return for my services as peacemaker," he said solemnly, "I expect to be treated with special consideration by everybody." Subsequent events seemed to show that the special consideration referred to meant a chance to see as much as possible of Betty Wales. Even more surprising to three of the posts was the presence of Mr. Richard Blake in the wedding-party--Richard Blake, editor of "The Quiver," and one-time lecturer at Harding on the tendencies of modern drama. Eleanor's face was a study when she recognized him, but before Miss Hale could begin any introductions Madeline greeted him enthusiastically and got him into a corner, where they exchanged low-toned confidences for a moment. "I'm particularly glad to meet you again, Miss Watson," he said in a tone of unmistakable sincerity, when he was presented. "We had a jolly dinner together once, didn't we?" "Dick's such an old dear," Madeline whispered to Betty half an hour later. "He confided to me just now that the first evening he saw Eleanor he thought her the most fascinating girl he had ever met, and then he hastened to assure me that that had absolutely nothing to do with his deciding to keep dark about her story. I don't doubt him for a moment--Dick perfectly detests cheating. But he can't make me believe that he's being nice to her now just on my account." There were plenty of other men at the wedding. "We're the only girls in the whole family," Charlotte, Ethel's younger sister explained, "and we have thirty own cousins, most of them grown-up." "Was that one of the thirty that you were sitting on the stairs with at the dance?" inquired Mary Brooks sweetly. Charlotte blushed and Bob flew to her rescue. "We all know why Mary isn't monopolizing any one," she said. "Are you taking notes for future use, Mary?" Mary shrugged her shoulders loftily. "I scorn to answer such nonsense," she retorted. "I'm going to be an old maid and make matches for all my friends." "We'll come and be posts for you any time after commencement," Babe assured her amiably. "Did you know, girls, that Mary can't stay over with Madeline because her mother is giving a New Year's dinner-party. Who do you suppose will be there?" The wedding festivities were over at last. "It was all perfectly scrumptious," Babe wrote Babbie enthusiastically, "and I'm bringing you a little white satin slipper like those we had filled with puffed rice for luncheon favors, and a lovely pin that Miss Hale wants you to have just as if you had come. The nicest thing of all is that vacation isn't over yet. Is it two weeks or two years since I saw you?" And next came Bohemia. Before they had quite reached Washington Square Madeline tumbled her guests hastily off their car. "I forgot to tell Mrs. McLean when to expect us," she explained. "She is our cook. So we'll hunt her up now and we might as well buy the luncheon as we go along." So first they found Mrs. McLean, a placid old Scotch woman who was not at all surprised when Madeline announced that she was giving a house-party for five and had forgotten to mention it sooner. She had a delicious Scotch burr and an irresistible way of standing in the dining-room door and saying, "Come awa', my dears," when she had served a meal. Like everything else connected with the Ayres establishment, she was always there when you wanted her; between times she disappeared mysteriously, leaving the kitchen quite clear for Madeline and her guests, and always turning up in time to wash the fudge-pan or the chafing-dishes. From Mrs. McLean's they went down a dirty, narrow street, stopping at a number of funny, foreign-looking fruit and grocery shops, where they bought whatever anybody wanted. "Though it doesn't matter what you have to eat," said Roberta later, pouring cream into her coffee from an adorable little Spanish jug, "as long as you have it on this lovely old china." They had their coffee in the studio, sitting around the open fire, and while they were drinking it people began to drop in--Mr. Blake, who roomed just across the Square, a pretty, pale girl, who was evidently an artist because every one congratulated her on having some things "on the line" somewhere, three newspaper men from the flat above, who being on a morning daily had just gotten up and stopped in to say "Happy New Year" on their way down to Park Row, and a jolly little woman whom the others called Mrs. Bob. "She's promised to chaperon us," Madeline explained to her guests. "She lives down-stairs, so we can't go in or out without falling into her terrible clutches." Mrs. Bob, who was in a corner playing with the little black kitten that seemed to belong with the house, like Mrs. McLean, stopped long enough to ask if they had heard about the theatre party. They had not, so Mr. Blake explained that by a sudden change of bill at one of the theatres Mr. Sothern and Miss Marlowe were to give "The Merchant of Venice" that evening. "And I understand from Miss Watson that you people are particularly interested in that play," he added, "so I've corraled some tickets and Mrs. Bob and a bunch of men." "And the Carletons will have an early dinner," put in Mrs. Bob. "Oh, I forgot. You don't know about that either. Mrs. Carleton won't be back from the country until four o'clock, so she asked me to give you the invitation to have New Year's dinner with them." "But did she know there were six of us?" asked Betty anxiously, whereupon everybody laughed and Mrs. Bob assured her that Mrs. Carleton had mentioned seven to her, and hadn't seemed in the least worried. That was the way things went all through their visit. Mrs. Bob took them shopping, with frequent intermissions for cakes and tea at queer little tea-rooms, with alluring names like "The London Muffin Room," or the "Yellow Tea-Pot." Her husband escorted them to the east-side brass-shops, assuring them solemnly that it wasn't everybody he showed his best finds to, and mourning when their rapturous enthusiasm prevented his getting them a real bargain. The newspaper men gave a "breakfast-luncheon" for them--breakfast for themselves, and luncheon for their guests--which was so successful that it was continued that same evening by a visit to a Russian puppet-show and supper in a Chinese restaurant. The pretty artist sold one of her pictures and invited them to help her celebrate, just as if they were old friends, who knew how hard she had struggled and how often she hadn't had money enough to buy herself bread and butter, to say nothing of offering jam--in the shape of oysters on the half-shell and lobster Newburg--to other people. It was all so gay and light-hearted and unexpected--the way things happened in Bohemia. Nobody hurried or worried, though everybody worked hard. It was just as Madeline had told them, only more so. The girls said a sorrowful good-bye to Mrs. Bob, Mrs. McLean and the little black kitten and journeyed back to Harding sure that there never had been and never would be another such vacation for them. "How can there be?" said Bob dejectedly. "At Easter we shall all have to get clothes, and after that we shan't know a vacation from mid-year week." "Which delightful function begins in exactly fourteen days," said Katherine Kittredge. "Is there anybody here present whose notes on Hegel have the appearance of making sense?" 19-- took its senior midyears gaily and quite as a matter of course, lectured its underclass friends on the evils of cramming, and kept up its spirits by going coasting with Billy Henderson, Professor Henderson's ten-year-old son, who had admired college girls ever since he found that Bob Parker could beat him at steering a double-runner. Between times they bought up the town's supply of "The Merchant of Venice,"--"not to learn any part, you know, but because we're interested in our play," each purchaser explained to her friends. For there is no use in proclaiming your aspirations to be a Portia or a Shylock until you are sure that your dramatic talent is going to be appreciated. Of course there were exceptions to this rule, but the girl who said at a campus dinner-table, "If I am Portia, who is there tall enough for Bassanio?" became a college proverb in favor of keeping your hopes to yourself, and everybody was secretly delighted when she decided that she "really didn't care" to be in the mob. CHAPTER X TRYING FOR PARTS "Teddie Wilson has gone and got herself conditioned in psych.," announced Bob Parker, bouncing unceremoniously through Betty's half-open door. "Oh, Bob!" Betty's tone was fairly tragic. "Does that mean that she can't try for a part in the play?" Bob nodded. "Cast-iron rule. And she'd have made a perfect Gobbo, young or old, and a stunning Gratiano. Well, her being out of it will give K. a better chance." "But I'm sure Katherine wouldn't want her chance to come this way," said Betty sadly. "Besides--oh, Bob, have you looked at the bulletin-board this afternoon?" "Babe did," said Bob with a grin, "so you needn't worry yet, my child. Ted says she ought to have expected it, because she'd cut a lot and let things go awfully,--depended on the--faculty--knowing--us--well--enough-- by--this--time--to--pass--over--any small--deficiencies, and all that sort of talk. And this just shows, she says, how well they do know her. She's awfully plucky about it, but she cares. I didn't suppose Ted had it in her to care so about anything," declared Bob solemnly. "But of course it's a lot to lose--the star comedy part that was going to be handed out to her by her admiring little classmates, who think that nobody can act like Teddie. I wish I was as sure of a part in the mob." "What are you going to try for, Bob?" asked Betty sympathetically. Bob blushed. "Oh, I don't know," she said, with a fine assumption of indifference. "Everybody says that you ought to begin at the top and then the grateful committee won't forget to throw you a crumb when they get to passing out the 'supers.'" Bob paused and her air of unconcern dropped from her like a mask. "I say, Betty, I do want my family to be proud of me for once. Promise you won't laugh if I come up for Bassanio." "Of course I won't," said Betty indignantly. "I'm sure you'll make love beautifully. Do you know who's going to try for Shylock?" "Only Jean Eastman," said Bob, "and Christy and Emily are thinking of it. I came up from down-town with Jean just now. She thinks she's got a sure thing, though of course she isn't goose enough to say so. If Kate Denise gets Portia, as everybody seems to think she will, it will be quite like freshman year, with the Hill crowd on top all around. I think Jean has been aiming for that, and I also think--you don't mind if I say it, Betty?" "I haven't the least idea what you're going to say," laughed Betty, "but I don't believe I shall mind." "Well," said Bob earnestly, "I think Jean's counting on you to help her with her Shylock deal." "I help her!" said Betty in bewilderment. "How could I?" "What a little innocent you are, Betty Wales," declared Bob. "Have you forgotten that you are on the all-powerful play-committee, and that you five and Miss Kingston, head of the elocution department, practically decide upon the cast?" "Oh!" said Betty slowly. "But I can't see why Jean should expect me to push her, of all people." "She'll remind you why," said Bob, "or perhaps she expects me to do it for her. Can't you honestly think of anything that she might make a handle of?" Betty considered, struggling to recall her recent meetings with Jean. "She has been extra-cordial lately," she said, "but she hasn't done anything in particular--oh, Bob, I know what you mean. She expects me to help her because she nominated me for the committee." Bob nodded. "As if fifty other people wouldn't have done it if she hadn't. I may be wrong, Betty, but she had a lot to say all the way up from Cuyler's about how glad she was that you were on the committee, how she felt you were the only one for the place and was glad the girls agreed with her, how hard she had talked you up beforehand, and so on,--all about her great and momentous efforts in your behalf. I told her that Miss Ferris said once that you had a perfect command of the art of dress and that every one knew you planned the costumes for the Belden play and for the Dramatic Club's masque last spring, also that Barbara Gordon particularly wanted you on if she was chairman, so I didn't see that you needed any great amount of talking up. But she laughed her horrid, sarcastic little laugh and said she guessed I hadn't had much experience with class politics." Betty's eyes flashed angrily. "And in return for what she did, she expects me to work for her, no matter whether or not I think she would make the best Shylock. Is that what you mean, Bob?" "Yes, but perhaps I was mistaken," said Bob soothingly, "and any way I doubt if she ever says anything to you directly. She'll just drop judicious hints in the ears of your worldly friends, who can be trusted to appreciate the debt of gratitude you owe her." "Bob." Betty stared at her hard for a moment. "You don't think--oh, of course you don't! The parts in the play ought to go to the ones who can do them best and the committee ought not to think of anybody or anything but that." "And I know at least one committee woman who won't think of anybody or anything but that," declared Bob loyally. "I only thought I'd tell you about Jean so that, if she should say anything, you would be ready for her. Now I must go and study Bassanio," and Bob departed murmuring, "'What find I here? Fair Portia's counterfeit?'" in tones so amorous that Belden House Annie, who was sweeping on the stairs, dropped her dust-pan with a clatter, declaring that she was "jist overcome, that she was!" "Which was the only compliment my acting of Bassanio ever got," Bob told her sadly afterward. Betty was still hot with indignation over Bob's disclosures when Roberta Lewis knocked on the door. Roberta was wrapped up in a fuzzy red bath-robe, a brown sweater and a pink crêpe shawl, and she looked the picture of shivering dejection. "What in the world is the matter?" demanded Betty, emptying her history notebooks out of the easy-chair and tucking Roberta in with a green and yellow afghan, which completed the variegated color scheme to perfection. "Please don't bother about me," said Roberta forlornly. "I'm going back in a minute. I've lost my wedding-pin--Miss Hale's wedding-pin--well, you know what I mean,--and caught a perfectly dreadful cold." "You don't think that your pin was stolen?" asked Betty quickly. There had been no robberies in the college since Christmas, and the girls were beginning to hope that the mysterious thief had been discouraged by their greater care in locking up their valuables, and had gone off in search of more lucrative territory. "Yes, I do think so," said Roberta. "I almost know it. You see I hadn't been wearing my pin. I only took it out to show Polly Eastman, because she hadn't happened to see one. Then K. came and we went off to walk. I left the pin right on my dressing-table and now it's gone. But the queerest part is that Georgia Ames was in my room almost all the time, because hers was being swept, and before that she was in Lucy Mann's, with the door wide open into the hall, and my door open right opposite. And yet she never saw or heard anything. Isn't it strange?" "She was probably busy talking and didn't notice," said Betty. "People are everlastingly tramping through the halls, until you don't think anything about it. Have you looked on the floor and in all your drawers? It's probably tumbled down somewhere and got caught in a crack under the dressing-table or the rug." "No, I've looked in all those places," said Roberta with finality. "You know I haven't as many things to look through as you." "Please don't be sarcastic," laughed Betty, for Roberta's belongings were all as trim and tailor-made as herself. "How did you get your cold?" "Why K. and I got caught in a miserable little snow flurry," explained Roberta, pulling the pink shawl closer, "and--I got my feet wet. My throat's horribly sore. It won't be well for a week, and I can't try for the play." Roberta struggled out of the encumbering folds of the green afghan and trailed her other draperies swiftly to the window, whose familiar view she seemed to find intensely absorbing. "Oh, yes, you can," said Betty comfortingly. "Why, your throat may be all right by to-morrow, and anyway it's only the Portia and Shylock trials that come then. Were you going to try for either of those parts?" "Yes," gulped Roberta thickly. Behind Roberta's back Betty was free to pucker her mouth into a funny little grimace that denoted amusement, surprise and sympathy, all together. "Then I'll ask Barbara Gordon to give you a separate trial later," she said kindly. "Nothing will be really decided to-morrow. We only make tentative selections to submit to Mr. Masters when he comes up next week. He's the professional coach, you know." But Roberta turned back from the window to shake her head. "I wouldn't have you do that for anything," she said, brushing away the tears. "I'll try for something else if I get well in time. I'm going to bed now. Will you please ask Annie to bring up my dinner? And Betty, don't ever say I meant to try for Shylock. I don't know why I told you, except that you always understand." Betty felt that she didn't quite understand this time, but she promised to tell Annie and come in late herself to conduct another search for the missing pin. She had just succeeded in dismissing Ted, Jean and Roberta from her mind and concentrating it on the next day's history lesson, when Helen Adams appeared. "Helen," began Betty solemnly, "if you've got any troubles connected with trying for parts in the play, please don't divulge them. I don't believe I can stand any more complications." "Poor thing!" said Helen compassionately. "I know how you feel from the times I have with the 'Argus.' Well, I shan't bother you about trying for a part. I should just love to act, but I can't and I know it. I only wanted to borrow some tea, and to tell you that Anne Carter has come to return my call. You know you said you'd like to meet her." So Betty brushed her curls smooth and, stopping to pick up Madeline on her way, went in to meet Miss Carter, whose shyness and silence melted rapidly before Betty's tactful advances and Madeline's appreciative references to her verses in the last "Argus." While Helen made the tea, Miss Carter amused them all with a droll account of her efforts to learn to play basket-ball, "because Miss Adams says it throws so much light on the philosophy of college life." "Then you never played before you came here?" asked Betty idly, stirring her tea. Miss Carter shook her head. "I prepared for college in a convent in Canada. The sisters would have been horribly shocked at the idea of our tearing about in bloomers and throwing a ball just like the boys." "Oh!" said Betty, with a sudden flash of recognition. "Then it was at the convent where you got the beautiful French accent that mademoiselle raves over. You're in my senior French class. I ought to have remembered you." "I'm glad you didn't," said Miss Carter bitterly, and then she flushed and apologized. "I'm so ugly that I'm always glad not to be remembered or noticed. But I didn't mean to say so, and I do hope you'll come to see me, both of you,--if seniors ever do come to see sophomores." The girls laughingly assured her that seniors did sometimes condescend so far, and she went off with a happy look in her great gray eyes. "We must have her in the 'Merry Hearts,'" said Madeline. "She's our kind if she can only get over that morbid feeling about her scar." "But we must be very careful," Helen warned them, with a vivid remembrance of her first interview with Miss Carter. "We mustn't ask her to join until most of us have been to see her and really made friends. She would just hate to feel that we pitied her." "We'll be careful," Betty promised her. "I'll go to see her, for one, the very first of next week," and she skipped gaily off to dress for dinner. After all there were plenty of things in the world besides the class play with its unhappy tangle of rivalries and heartburnings. "And what's the use of borrowing trouble?" Betty inquired the next evening of the green lizard. "If you do, you never borrow the right kind." Jean, to be sure, had done a good deal to justify Bob's theory. She had remembered an urgent message from home which must be delivered to Polly immediately after luncheon, and she kept her innocent little cousin busily engaged in conversation in the lower hall of the Belden House until Betty appeared, having waited until the very last minute in the vain hope of avoiding Jean. But when they opened the door there was Barbara Gordon, also bound for Miss Kingston's office, and much relieved to find that her committee were not all waiting indignantly for their chairman's tardy arrival. So whatever Jean had meant to say to Betty in private necessarily went unsaid. And then, after all her worriment, Jean was the best Shylock! "Which is perfectly comical considering Bob's suspicions," Betty told the green lizard, the only confidant to whom she could trust the play committee's state-secrets. All the committee had been astonished at Jean's success, and most of them were disappointed. Christy or Emily Davis would have been so much pleasanter to work with, or even Kitty Lacy, whom Miss Kingston considered very talented. But Emily was theatrical, except in funny parts, Christy was lifeless, and Kitty Lacy had not taken the trouble to learn the lines properly and broke down at least once in every long speech, thereby justifying the popular inversion of her name to Lazy Kitty, a pseudonym which some college wag had fastened upon her early in her freshman year. "And because she's Kitty, it isn't safe to give her another chance," said Miss Kingston regretfully, when the fifteen aspiring Shylocks had played their parts and the committee were comparing opinions. "Yes, I agree with Barbara that Jean Eastman is by far the most promising candidate, but----" "But you don't think she's very good, now do you, Miss Kingston?" asked Clara Ellis, a rather lugubrious individual, who had been put on the committee because she was a "prod" in "English lit.," and not because she had the least bit of executive ability. Miss Kingston hesitated. "Why no, Clara, I don't. I'm afraid she won't work up well; she doesn't seem to take criticism very kindly. But it's too soon to judge of that. At present she certainly has a much better conception of the part than any of the others." "You don't think we've been too ambitious, do you, Miss Kingston?" asked Barbara, anxiously. Barbara knew Jean well and the prospect of managing the play with her capricious, selfish temperament to be catered to at every turn was not a pleasant one. "I've thought so all along," put in Clara Ellis, decidedly, before Miss Kingston had had a chance to answer. "I think we ought to have made sure of a good Shylock before we voted to give this play. It will be perfectly awful to make a fizzle of it, and everything depends on getting a good Shylock, doesn't it, Miss Kingston?" "A great deal certainly depends on that," agreed Miss Kingston. "But it's much too early to decide that you can't get a good Shylock." "Why, who else is there?" demanded Clara, dismally. "Surely every possible and impossible person has tried to-day." Nobody seemed ready to answer this argument, and Betty, glancing at the doleful faces of her fellow-workers felt very much depressed until a new idea struck her. "Miss Kingston," she said, "there have been fifteen senior plays at Harding, haven't there? And hasn't each one been better than any of those that came before it?" "So each class and its friends have thought," admitted Miss Kingston, smiling at Betty's eagerness, "and in the main I think they have been right." "Then," said Betty, looking appealingly at Clara and Barbara, "I guess we can safely go on thinking that our play will be still better. 19-- is the biggest class that ever graduated here, and it's certainly one of the brightest." Everybody laughed at this outburst of patriotism and the atmosphere brightened immediately, so Betty felt that perhaps she was of some use on the committee even if she couldn't understand all Clara's easy references to glosses and first folio readings, or compare Booth's interpretation of Shylock with Irving's as glibly as Rachel did. Just then there was a smothered giggle outside the door and six lusty voices chanted, "By my troth, our little bodies are a-weary of these hard stairs," in recognition of which pathetic appeal the committee hastily dismissed the subject of Shylock in order to hear what the impatient Portias had to say. They did so well, and there was such a lively discussion about the respective merits of Kate Denise, Babbie Hildreth and Nita Reese that the downcast spirits, of the committee were fully restored, and they went home to dinner resolved not to lose heart again no matter what happened, which is the most sensible resolution that any senior play committee can make. When Betty got home she found a note waiting for her on the hall table addressed in Tom Alison's sprawling hand and containing an invitation to Yale commencement. "I'm asking you early," Tom wrote, "so that you can plan for it, and be so much the surer not to disappoint me. Alice Waite is coming with Dick Grayson, and some of the other fellows will have Harding girls. My mother is going to chaperon the bunch. "Do you remember my kid roommate, Ashley Dwight? He's junior president this year. He's heard a lot about Georgia Ames, real and ideal, and he's crazy to see what the visible part of her is like. I think he meditates asking her to the prom, and making a sensation with her. Can't I bring him up to call on you some day when the real Miss Ames will probably be willing to amuse Ashley?" As Betty joyously considered how she should answer all this, she remembered the four box tickets for the Glee Club concert that Lucile Merrifield had promised to get her--Lucile was business manager of the mandolin club this year. Betty had intended to invite Alice Waite and two Winsted men, but there was no reason why she shouldn't ask Georgia, Tom, and the junior president instead. So she went straight to Georgia's room. "All right," said Georgia calmly, when Betty had explained her project. "I was going to stand up with a crowd of freshmen, but they won't care." "Georgia Ames," broke in her roommate severely, "I should like to see you excited for once. Don't you know the difference between going stand-up with a lot of other freshmen, and sitting in a box with Miss Wales and two Yale men?" "Of course I know the difference," said Georgia, smiling good-naturedly. "Didn't I say that I'd go in the box? But you see, Caroline, if you are only a namesake of Madeline Ayres's deceased double you mustn't get too much excited over the wonderful things that happen to you. Must you, Betty?" "I don't think you need any pointers from me, Georgia," said Betty laughingly. "Has Caroline seen you studying yet?" "Once," said Georgia sadly. "But it was in mid-year week," explained the roommate, "the night before the Livy exam. She mended stockings all the evening and then she said she was going to sit up to study. She began at quarter past ten." "Propped up in bed, to be quite comfortable," interpolated Georgia. "And at half-past ten," went on her roommate, "she said she was so sleepy that she couldn't stand it any longer. So she tumbled the books and extra pillows on the floor and went to sleep." "Too bad you spoiled your record just for those few minutes," laughed Betty, "but I'll take you to the concert all the same," and she hurried off to dress. At dinner she entertained her end of the table with an account of Georgia's essay at cramming. "But that doesn't prove that she never studies," Madeline defended her protégée. "That first floor room of theirs is a regular rendezvous for all the freshmen in the house, so she's very sensible to keep away from it when she's busy." "Where does she go?" "Oh, to the library, I suppose," said Madeline. "Most of the freshmen study there a good deal, and she camps down in Lou Waterson's room, afternoons, because Lou has three different kinds of lab. to go to, so she's never at home." "Well, it's a wonder that Georgia isn't completely spoiled," said Nita Reese. "Just to think of the things that child has had done for her!" And certainly if Georgia's head had not been very firmly set on her square shoulders, it would have been hopelessly turned by her meteoric career at Harding. For weeks after college opened she was a spectacle, a show-sight of the place. Old girls pointed her out to one another in a fashion that was meant to be inobtrusive but that would have flattered the vanity of any other freshman. Freshmen were regaled with stories about her, which they promptly retailed for her benefit, and then sent her flowers as a tribute to her good luck and a recognition of the amusement she added to the dull routine of life at Harding. Seniors who had been duped by the phantom Georgia asked her to Sunday dinner and introduced her to their friends, who did likewise. Foolish girls wanted her autograph, clever ones demanded to know her sensations at finding herself so oddly conspicuous, while the "Merry Hearts" amply fulfilled their promise to make up to her for unintentionally having forced her into a curious prominence. But Georgia took it all as a mere matter of course, smiled blandly at the stories, accepted the flowers and the invitations, wrote the autographs, and explained that she guessed her sensations weren't at all remarkable,--they were just like any other freshman's. "All the same," Madeline declared, whenever the subject came up, "she's absolutely unique. If the other Georgia had never existed, this one would have made her mark here." But just how she would have done it even Madeline could not decide. The real Georgia was not like other girls, but in what fundamental way she was different it was difficult to say. Indeed now that the "Merry Hearts" came to know her better, she was almost as much of a puzzle to them as the other Georgia had been to the rest of the college. CHAPTER XI A DARK HORSE DEFINED "Did you see Mr. Masters in chapel this morning with Miss Kingston?" This was the choice tid-bit of news that 19-- passed from hand to hand as it took its way to its various nine o'clock classes. "I thought he wasn't coming until to-morrow," said Teddie Wilson, who followed every move of the play committee with mournful interest. "He wasn't," explained Barbara Gordon, "but he found he could get off better to-day. It's only for the Shylocks and Portias, you know. We can't do much until they're definitely decided, so we can tell who is left for the other parts." "Gratiano and the Gobbos will come in the next lot," sighed Teddie. "Seems as if I should die to be out of it all!" Jean Eastman was just ahead of them in the crowd. "Poor Teddie!" Barbara began, "I only wish---" She broke off abruptly. She didn't want Jean for Shylock, but it would have been the height of impropriety to let even Teddie, whose misfortunes made her a privileged person, know it. "It's a perfect shame," she went on hastily. "You don't feel half so bad about it as we do." Ted stared incredulously. "Don't I? I say, Barbara, did you know there was a girl in last year's cast who had had a condition at midyears? She kept still and somehow it wasn't reported to Miss Stuart until very late, and by that time it would have made a lot of trouble to take her out. So they hushed it up and she kept her part. A last year's girl wrote me about it." "I don't believe she had much fun out of it, do you, Ted?" asked Barbara. "Anyhow I'm sure you--" "Oh, of course not," interrupted Ted with emphasis. "What in the world are you two talking about?" demanded Jean Eastman curiously, dropping back to join them. "Talking play of course!" laughed Barbara, trying to be extra cordial because she had so nearly said a disagreeable thing a minute before. Meanwhile Ted, who felt that she should break the tenth commandment to atoms if she stayed in Jean's neighborhood another minute, slipped off down a side hall and joined a group of her classmates who were bound like herself for Miss Raymond's English novelists. They were talking play too, of course,--it was in the air this morning,--and they welcomed Ted joyously and deferred to her opinion as that of an expert. "Who'll be Shylock, Teddie?" demanded Bob Parker. "That's the only thing I'm curious about." "Jean," returned Ted calmly, "or at least the committee think so. I can tell by the way Barbara looks at her." "Beastly shame," muttered Bob. "Why couldn't Emily and Christy have braced up and got it themselves?" "Now, Bob," Nita Reese remonstrated, "don't you think you're a bit hard on Jean this time? I know she's a good deal of a land-grabber, but now she's gone into an open competition just like any one else, and if she wins it will be because she deserves to." "Ye-es," admitted Bob grudgingly. "Yes, of course it will. I know that as well as you do, Nita Reese. Just the same she's never any good in Gest and Pant, is she, Teddie?" "In what?" demanded Helen Adams and Clara Madison together. "Gest and Pant--short for Gesture and Pantomime, senior course in elocution," explained Teddie rapidly. "Oh, I don't know. I think she's done some pretty good things once in a while. And anyhow she can't fool the committee and Mr. Masters." "Of course not," agreed Bob. "Just the same," said Madeline Ayres, who had come up in time to hear the end of the argument, "we'll stand for her if she gets the part, but until she does we can hope against hope for a dark horse, can't we, Bob?" "What's a dark horse?" asked Clara Madison in her funny, slow drawl. "Your vocabulary's getting a big increase this morning, isn't it, Clara?" said Madeline quizzically. "Gest and Pant, short for Gesture and Pantomime; dark horse, short for a person like---- Girls, run in, quick. She's begun calling the roll." It was a long morning. The committee watched its hours go by complacently enough. They had heard Jean again and liked her better; and the two girls who were to compete with her had improved, too, on second trial. There was no doubt that the Portias were good. They were also nervous. Kate Denise didn't even pretend to "Take notes, young ladies," though Dr. Hinsdale looked straight at her when he said it, and Babbie Hildreth made herself the butt of endless jibes by absent-mindedly mentioning Nerissa instead of Napoleon in History 10. Jean, on the other hand, was as cool as possible. She sat beside Teddie Wilson in philosophy, much to the annoyance of that unhappy young person, and added insult to injury by trying to discuss the play. Teddie was as unresponsive as she thought consistent with the duty of being lady-like, but Jean didn't seem to mind, for she went off to lunch smiling a satisfied, triumphant little smile that seemed to say she had gotten just what she wanted out of Teddie. At two o'clock Mr. Masters and Miss Kingston met the play committee in Miss Kingston's office, and the Shylock trials began. At ten minutes before three the great Mr. Masters appeared in the door of the office and tossing a careless "Back at four-thirty sharp" over his shoulder, ran down the stairs as lightly as though he were not leaving riot and ruin behind him. A minute later Barbara Gordon came to the door and explained to the Portias who were waiting to come on at three, that it had been found necessary to delay their appearance until evening. Barbara always looked calm and unruffled under the most trying circumstances, but she shut the door unnecessarily hard and the Portias exchanged amazed glances. "Something's happened," declared Babe, sagely. "'Oh, wise young judge!'" quoted Nita. "Why don't you tell us what it is?" "I must go if we have to come back this evening," said Kate Denise, and hurried off to find Jean, who had promised to meet her in the library. Kate understood Jean very well and often disapproved of her, but she had known her a long time and was genuinely fond of her and anxious for her success. Jean had complained of a headache at luncheon and seemed nervous and absent-minded. Kate wondered if she could possibly have broken down and spoiled her chance with Mr. Masters, thus disarranging the committee's plans. But Jean scoffed at this idea. "I did my best," she declared, "and he was awfully nice. You'll like him, Katie. I suppose he had an engagement, or was tired and wanted to go off somewhere and smoke. He gets up plays all the time, you know. It must be horribly boring." Meanwhile Miss Kingston and the play committee sat in mournful conclave. Nobody had much to say. Clara Ellis looked "I told you so" at the rest, and the rest looked back astonishment, dismay and annoyance at Clara. "Is he generally so--so decided and, well,--so quick to make up his mind?" asked Betty, finally. Miss Kingston laughed at Betty's carefully chosen adjectives and shook her head. "He's generally very patient and encouraging, but to-day something seems to have spoiled his temper. I don't believe, though, that his irritability has affected his judgment. I agree perfectly with what he said about Miss Eastman." "Yes," agreed Barbara, "he put into words what we all felt when we first heard her. Afterward we wanted so much to think she was good that we actually cheated ourselves into thinking so." "Do tell me what happened," begged Rachel Morrison. She had been kept at home by a belligerent sophomore who insisted upon being tutored at her regular hour, and had arrived only just in time for Mr. Masters's dramatic exit. "Why, he was perfectly calm while the Shylocks were performing," explained Barbara. "We had Jean come last because we thought that would give them all the best chance. He smiled blandly while she was going through her part and bowed her out as if she had been a second Booth. Then he sat back and looked at me and said 'Well?' and I said, 'Do you like her best, Mr. Masters?' He glared at me for a minute and then began to talk about the seriousness of giving a Shakespearean play and the confidence he'd felt in us to advise us to give this one, and the reasons why none of the girls he'd heard would do at all for Shylock. When he was through he just picked up his hat and coat and told us to go and get the other girls who tried, as he'd be ready to see them at half-past four. After that he apologized to Miss Kingston if he'd been 'in the least abrupt'--and went." "And what are we to do now?" demanded Clara, wearily. "Get them--the forlorn hopes, as he called them," said Barbara, determined to be cheerful, "and hope that we shall be happily disappointed in them. Somebody's got to be Shylock, you know. Betty, will you go for these three girls on Main Street?" She handed Betty a slip of paper. "Clara, will you try to find Emily Davis? Rachel, you look tired to death. Go home and rest. Josephine and I can manage the campus people." "There's no use in your getting the Miller girls," said Clara, decisively. "One lisps and the other stammers." "That's true," agreed Barbara, cheerily. "We'll leave them out, and Kitty Lacy has gone home ill. I wish we could think of some promising people who haven't tried at all. Eleanor Watson used to act very cleverly. Betty, do you suppose she would be willing to come and read the part?" Betty shook her head. "I don't think she would take a part under any circumstances, but certainly not if she had to compete with Jean. They're such old friends." "How about Madeline Ayres?" "She's set her heart on being the Prince of Morocco," laughed Betty, "because she wants to be blackened up. Anyway I don't think--" "No, I don't either, Betty," interposed Miss Kingston. "Miss Ayres couldn't do a part like Shylock." "Then I don't believe there is any one else who didn't try before," said Barbara. "We must just hope for the best, that's all." Betty had opened the door preparatory to starting on her rounds when she happened to remember Roberta and her exaggerated disappointment over missing the last week's trials. "Barbara," she began timidly, closing the door again, "I know some one who intended to try but she was sick with the grippe and couldn't. It's Roberta Lewis. She told me not to speak of her having wanted to try, but I don't see why she shouldn't have a chance now, do you? She couldn't be worse than some of them." "She certainly couldn't," laughed Barbara. "She did awfully well in that little girl play you had," said Clara Ellis, condescending to show a little real interest in the question at issue. "Did you see it, Miss Kingston?" Miss Kingston hadn't seen "The Little Princess" and didn't know Roberta; but she agreed that there was no reason why any girl who was willing to take it shouldn't have a chance to show what she could do toward satisfying Mr. Masters. "But it isn't that I think she will do particularly well," Betty explained, honestly. "Only I was sorry for her because she seemed to care such a lot. Shall I stop and ask her on my way?" Barbara said yes and Betty hurried over to the Belden. Roberta was out, but a neat sign pinned to her door promised that she would be "Back in a few minutes," so Betty scribbled a hasty note to explain matters and hurried off again. She had not much idea that Roberta would care to try for Shylock now, but she was glad she had thought of giving her the chance. Roberta was so quiet and self-contained and so seldom expressed a wish or a preference that it was worth while taking a little trouble to please her. "Even if there isn't much sense in what she wants," thought Betty, as she tramped up Main Street. The Main Street Shylocks all lived in the same house and not one of them was in. Betty pursued them back to the campus, caught one at the library and another in chemistry "lab.," and followed the third down town where she was discovered going into Cuyler's for an ice. As this last captive happened to be the most promising Shylock, next to the ones that Mr. Masters had already seen, Betty led her back to the campus in triumph, too thankful at having her safe to notice that it was fully a quarter to five before they reached college hall. Roberta was sitting by herself on a low window-seat near Miss Kingston's door. She looked pale and frightened and hardly smiled in answer to Betty's gay little nod and wave of the hand. "Goodness, I hope she'll do decently," thought Betty, and was opening the door as softly as possible when somebody gave it a quick push from the other side. It was the great Mr. Masters coming out again. "Oh, Miss Lewis," he called over to Roberta, "have you learned the Portia scenes too? I forgot to ask you. Well, suppose you come over and read them to-night. We should all like to hear you." Betty stared in amazement; so did the Shylocks who crowded the stairs and windowledges. There was no mistaking the fact that this time the great Mr. Masters was genuinely pleased. He held the door open for Betty to pass into the office, assured Roberta once more that he should expect to see her in the evening, and went inside himself, leaving a buzz of excitement behind him and meeting a similar buzz that hushed politely as he came forward. "Well, Miss Kingston," he said, rubbing his hands together with an air of supreme satisfaction, "we've found our Shylock. I'm glad you let her in first this time. I was really getting worried. May I ask why you young ladies kept her up your sleeves so long?" Barbara explained. "But you must have known about her," Mr. Masters persisted. "Why, she's marvelous. She'd save your play for you, single-handed. Hasn't she taken part in any of your college performances?" Barbara explained about that too. "Then how did she happen to come to light at all?" he demanded. This time Barbara looked at Betty, who blushed and murmured, "I didn't suppose she could act very much. I really didn't." Mr. Masters laughed heartily at this. "Well, she seems to be a thorough mystery," he said. "And now the only question is where we need her most, in case I don't like your first choice in Portias any better than I did your Shylocks. We ought to have these other people in, I suppose. Of course there's no question about Miss Lewis, but we'd better know what they can all do, especially if there are any more of Miss Wales's dark horses among them." [Illustration: "WELL, WE'VE FOUND OUR SHYLOCK," HE SAID.] By dinner time the astonishing news had spread over the campus. Roberta Lewis was going to be Shylock. She hadn't been in but one play since she entered college and then she took somebody's place. Nobody had thought she would get it. Nobody knew she could act except Betty Wales. Betty found out about her somehow--she was always finding out what people could do,--and she got her in at the last minute because Mr. Masters didn't like Jean's acting,--or somebody didn't. Roberta's was magnificent. They wanted her for Portia too. Mr. Masters had said it was a great pity there weren't two of her. How did she take it? Why, she acted shy and bored and distant, just as usual. She seemed to have expected to be Shylock! But she wasn't "just as usual." She was sitting by her window in the dark, with Mary Brooks's picture clutched tightly in one hand and her father's in the other, and she was whispering soft little messages to them. "Dear old daddy, you were in all the fraternities and societies, and on all the college papers and the 'varsity eight. Well, I'm on one thing now. You'll have one little chance to be proud of me, perhaps, after all these four years. "Now, Mary Brooks, do you see what I can do? I couldn't write and I couldn't be popular or prominent or a 'star' in any of the classes. I'm not that kind. But after all I shall be something but just one of the Clan before I leave. "Oh, I wonder if Mary and father would like to sit together at the play." While Roberta was considering the probability that they would, Betty knocked her soft little knock on the door. Roberta always knew Betty's knock. "Come," she called in a queer, trembly voice. How was she ever going to thank Betty for seeing what no one else saw, and helping her to stick to it and get her chance in a nice quiet way that wouldn't make her feel awkward if she failed? But Betty didn't give her time to open her mouth. "You dear old thing!" she cried. "Oh, I am so happy! I never thought you'd get it. Honestly, I didn't. I just thought you might as well try. Roberta, you ought to hear the things Mr. Masters has been saying about you." Roberta laughed happily. "It's nice, isn't it?" she said. "Didn't you think I could get a part? You were the one who told me I ought to try." "Yes," said Betty solemnly, "I thought you'd get one of the Sals probably--you know the ones I mean,--Solanio, and the others that sound like him. We call them the Sals for short, I never dreamed of your being Shylock, any more than I planned for you to be Ermengarde. You did it every bit yourself, Roberta Lewis, by just happening to come around at the right times." "And by coming to the right person," added Roberta. But Betty only laughed at her. "It's bad enough to be blamed for things you've done," she said. "I simply won't be praised for things I haven't done. I never was so pleased in my life. Roberta, Miss Kingston says you're a genius. To think of my knowing a genius! I must go and tell Helen Chase Adams." Down-stairs Madeline was telephoning to Clara Madison, who, owing to her strong prejudice against bed-making, still lived off the campus. "A dark horse," she explained, "is a person like Roberta Lewis. I didn't have time to tell you this morning. Good-b----Oh! haven't you heard? She's going to be Shylock. No, the committee haven't announced it yet, but Mr. Masters shouted it aloud in the corridor at college hall. Don't forget what a dark horse is, Clara." The B's, innocently supposing that Roberta was out because her windows were dark, were celebrating in Nita's room, while they awaited her return. This meant that Babbie was doing a cake-walk with an imaginary partner, Babe a clog-dance, and Bob a highland fling, while Nita hugged her tallest vase and her prettiest teacup and besought them to stop before Mrs. Kent came to see who was tearing the house down. Bob stopped first, though not on account of Nita's bric-a-brac or a possible visit from Mrs. Kent. "Nita," she demanded breathlessly, "did you say Betty thought of Roberta?" "Yes," Nita assented. "Nobody else on the committee knows her at all except Rachel, and she is as surprised as the rest of us." "Gee!" Bob's tone was deep with meaning. "Then I know who won't like it." "Who?" Babe ended her dance to ask. "Jean Eastman," said Bob solemnly. Babe gave her a disdainful glance. "How much brains do you think it takes to find that out, Bob Parker? Of course she won't like it." But Bob only smiled loftily and declared that if Roberta hadn't come in by this time they must all go straight home to dinner. CHAPTER XII CALLING ON ANNE CARTER Pleasant things generally submerged the unpleasant ones at Harding, so Betty's delight in Roberta's unexpected success quite wiped out her remembrance of Bob's theories about Jean, until, several days after the Shylock trials, Jean herself confirmed them. "I want to be sure that you know I'm going to try for Bassanio," she said, overtaking Betty on the campus between classes, "so you can have plenty of time to hunt up a rival candidate. I can't imagine who it will be unless you can make Eleanor Watson believe that it's her duty to the class to try. But this time I hope you'll come out into the open and play fair, or at least as nearly fair as you can, considering that you ought to be helping me. I may not be much on philanthropy, but I don't think I can be accused of entirely lacking a sense of honor." "Why Jean," began Betty, trying to remember that Jean was hurt and disappointed and possibly didn't mean to be as rude as her words sounded, "please don't feel that way. It wasn't that I didn't want you for Shylock. Of course Roberta is one of my best friends and I'm glad to have her get the big part in the play, because she's never had anything else; but I didn't dream that she would get it." "Then why did you drag her in at the last minute?" Betty explained how that had happened, but Jean only laughed disagreeably. "I consider that it was a very irregular way of doing things," she said, "and I think a good many in the class feel the same way about it. Besides--but I suppose you've entirely forgotten that it was I who got you on the play committee." "Listen, Jean," Betty protested, anxious to avoid a discussion that would evidently be fruitless. "It was Mr. Masters, and not I or any of the other girls, who didn't like your acting, or rather your acting of Shylock. And Mr. Masters himself suggested that you would make a better Bassanio. Didn't Barbara tell you?" "Oh, yes," said Jean, "she told me. That doesn't alter the fact that if you hadn't produced Roberta Lewis when you did, Mr. Masters might have decided that he liked my Shylock quite well enough." "Jean," said Betty, desperately, "don't you want the play to be as good as it possibly can?" "No," retorted Jean, coolly, "I don't. I want a part in it. I imagine that I want one just as badly as Roberta Lewis did. And if I don't get Bassanio, after what Barbara and Clara Ellis have said to me, I shall know whom to blame." She paused a moment for her words to take effect. "My father says," she went on, "that women never have any sense of obligation. They don't think of paying back anything but invitations to afternoon tea. I must tell him about you. He'll find you such a splendid illustration. Good-bye, or I shall be late to chemistry." Jean sped off in the direction of the science building. "Oh, dear," thought Betty, sadly, "I wish I weren't so stupid and so meek. Madeline can always answer people back when they're disagreeable, and Rachel is so dignified that Jean wouldn't think of saying things like that to her." Then she smiled in spite of herself. It was all such a stupid tangle. Jean insisted on blaming her, and Roberta and the committee had insisted on praising her for finding 19-- a Shylock, when she never intended or expected to do anything of the kind. "It just shows," thought Betty, "that the things that seem like deep-laid schemes are very often just happenings, and the simple-looking ones are the schemes. Well, I certainly hope Jean will get Bassanio. Eleanor's window is open. I wonder if she can hear me." "Oh, Eleanor," she called, when the window had been opened wider in response to her trill, "there isn't any committee meeting this afternoon. Don't you want to go with me to see Anne Carter? Let's start early and take a walk first. It's such a lovely glitter-y day." The "glitter-y" day foregathered with a brisk north wind after luncheon, and it was still mid-afternoon when Betty and Eleanor ran up Miss Carter's front steps, delighted at the prospect of getting in out of the cold. At the door they hesitated. "It's so long since I've regularly called on anybody in college," laughed Betty, "that I've forgotten how to act. Don't we go right up to her room, Eleanor?" "Why yes. That's certainly what people used to do to us in our freshman year. Don't you remember how we were always getting caught with our kimonos on and our rooms fixed for sweep-day by girls we'd never seen?" "I should think so." Betty smiled reminiscently. "Helen Adams used to get so fussed when she was caught doing her hair. Then let's go right up. We want to be friendly and informal and make her feel at home. She has the front room on the second floor. Helen spoke of its being so big and pretty. I do hope she's in." She was in, for she called a brisk "come" in answer to Betty's knock. She was sitting at a table-desk by the window, with her back to her door, and when it opened she did not turn her head. Neither did Jean Eastman who sat beside her, their heads together over the same book. Jean was reading aloud in hesitating, badly accented French, and paid even less attention to the intruders than Miss Carter, who called hastily, "In just one minute, Miss Harrison," and then cautioned Jean not to forget the elisions. "But we're not Miss Harrison," said Betty laughingly, amazed and embarrassed at the idea of meeting Jean here. At the sound of her voice both the girls turned quickly and Miss Carter came forward with a hearty apology for her mistake. "I was expecting some one else," she said, "and I thought of course it was she who came in. It was very stupid of me. Won't you sit down?" "But aren't we interrupting?" asked Betty, introducing Eleanor. "Nothing more important than the tail end of some French," answered Jean Eastman curtly, going to get her coat, which hung over a chair near the door. As she passed Miss Carter she gave her a keen, questioning look which meant, so Betty decided, that Jean was as much surprised to find that this quiet sophomore knew Betty Wales and her crowd, as Betty had been to see Jean established in Miss Carter's room on a footing of apparent intimacy. "I've been here ever since luncheon," Jean went on, "and I was just going, wasn't I, Miss Carter? Oh, no, you're not driving me away--not in the least. I should be delighted to stay and talk to you both if I had time." And with a disagreeable little laugh Jean pinned on her hat, swept up her books, and started for the door. Strange to say, Miss Carter seemed to take her hasty departure as a matter of course and devoted herself entirely to her other visitors, until, just as Jean was leaving, she turned to her with a question. "Oh, Miss Eastman, I don't remember--did you say to-morrow at four?" For a full minute Jean stared at her, her expression a queer mixture of anger and amused reproach. "No, I said to-morrow at three," she answered at last and went off down the stairs, humming a gay little tune. Betty and Eleanor exchanged wondering glances. Jean was notorious for knowing only prominent girls. Her presence here and her peculiar manner together formed a puzzle that made it very difficult to give one's full attention to what Miss Carter was saying. There was also Miss Harrison. Was she the senior Harrison, better known as the Champion Blunderbuss? And if she was coming, why didn't she come? Betty found herself furtively watching the door, which Jean had left open, and she barely repressed a little cry of relief when the Champion's ample figure appeared at the head of the stairs. "I'm terribly late," she called out cheerfully. "I thought you'd probably get tired of waiting and go out. Oh," as she noticed Miss Carter's visitors, "I guess I'd better come back at five. I can as well as not." But Betty and Eleanor insisted that she should do nothing of the kind. "We'll come to see you again when you're not so busy," Betty promised Miss Carter, who gave them a sad little smile but didn't offer any objection to their leaving the Blunderbuss in possession. "Well, haven't we had a funny time?" said Eleanor, when they were outside. "Did you know that Miss Carter tutored in French?" "No," answered Betty. "Helen never gave me the impression that she was poor. Her room doesn't look much as if she was helping to put herself through college, does it?" "Not a bit," agreed Eleanor, "nor her clothes, and yet Miss Harrison certainly acted as if she had come on business." "Yes, exactly like Rachel's pupils. They always come bouncing in late, when she's given them up and we're all having a lovely time. Miss Carter acted businesslike too. She seemed to expect us to go." "Well then, what about Jean?" asked Eleanor. "I couldn't make her out at all. Has she struck up some sort of queer friendship with Miss Carter or was she being tutored too?" Betty gave a little gasp of dismay. "Oh, I don't know. I hoped you would. You see--she's trying for a part in the play." "Then she can't be conditioned," said Eleanor easily. "Teddie Wilson has advertised the rule about that far and wide, poor child." "And you don't think Jean could possibly not have heard of it?" Betty asked anxiously. "Why, I shouldn't think so, but you might ask her to make sure. She certainly acted very much as if we had caught her at something she was ashamed of. Would you mind coming just a little way down-town, Betty? I want to buy some violets and a new magazine." Betty was quite willing to go down-town, but she smiled mournfully at Eleanor's careless suggestion that she should speak to Jean. Asking Jean Eastman a delicate question, especially after the interview they had had that morning, was not likely to be a pleasant task. Betty wondered if she needed to feel responsible for Jean's mistakes. She certainly ought to know on general principles that conditions keep you out of everything nice from the freshman team on. A visit from Helen Adams that evening threw some new light on the matter. "Betty," Helen demanded, "isn't Teddie Wilson trying for a part in our play?" "Helen Chase Adams," returned Betty, severely, "is it possible you don't know that she got a condition and can't try?" "I certainly didn't know it," said Helen meekly. "Why should I, please?" "Only because everybody else does," said Betty, and wondered if Jean could possibly belong with Helen in the ignorant minority. It seemed very unlikely, but then it seemed a sheer impossibility that Helen should have sat at the Belden House dinner-table day after day and not have heard Teddie's woes discussed. At any rate now was her chance to get some information about Miss Carter. "While we are talking about conditions," she began, "does your friend Anne Carter tutor in French?" Helen nodded. "It's queer, isn't it, when she has so much money? She doesn't like to do it either, but mademoiselle made her think it was her duty, because all the French faculty are too busy and there was no other girl who took the senior course that mademoiselle would trust. Anne thinks she'll be through by next week." "Were many people conditioned in French?" asked Betty. "Why, I don't know. I think Anne just said several, when she told me about it." "What I mean is, are all those she tutors conditioned?" "Why, I suppose so," said Helen, vaguely. "Seniors don't generally tutor their last term unless they have to, do they? There wouldn't be much object in it. Why are you so interested in Anne's pupils, Betty?" "Oh, for no reason at all," said Betty, carelessly. "Eleanor and I went up to see her this afternoon, and some one came in for a lesson, as I understood it, so of course we didn't stay." "What a shame! You'll go again soon, won't you?" "Not until after she gets through tutoring," said Betty, decidedly. "I wish Helen Adams had never seen that girl," she declared savagely to the green lizard after Helen had gone. "Or at least--well, I almost wish so. Whatever I do will go wrong. If I ask Jean whether she knows about the rule, she'll be horribly disagreeable, but if she gets Bassanio and then Miss Stuart reports her condition she'll probably come and tell me that I ought to have seen she was conditioned and warned her. Anyway I shall feel that I ought. It's certainly much kinder to speak to her than to ask Barbara to inquire of Miss Stuart. Eleanor can't speak to her. No one can but me." The lizard didn't even blink, but Betty had an inspiration. "I know what. I'll write to her." Betty spent a long time and a great deal of note-paper on that letter, but at last it read to her satisfaction: * * * * * "DEAR JEAN: "After you left this afternoon Miss Harrison came in, evidently to be tutored. So I couldn't help wondering if you could possibly have had the bad luck to get a condition, and if so, whether you know the rule about the senior play,--I mean that no one having a condition can take part. Please, please don't think that I want to be interfering or disagreeable. I know you would rather have me ask you now than to have anything come out publicly later. "BETTY." * * * * * Two days later Jean's answer appeared on the Belden House table. "If you thought I had a condition in French, why didn't you go and ask mademoiselle about it? She would undoubtedly have received you with open arms. Yes, I believe that Miss Carter, whom you seem to know so intimately all of a sudden, tutors the Harrison person. Just why you should lump me with her, I don't see. I know the rule about conditions and the play as well as you do, but being without either a condition or a part, I can't see that it concerns me particularly. "Yours most gratefully, "JEAN REAVES EASTMAN." * * * * * Betty read this note through twice and consigned it, torn into very small pieces, to her waste-basket. But after thinking the whole matter over a little more carefully she decided that Jean had had ample grounds for feeling annoyance, if not for showing it, and that there would be just time before dinner to find her and tell her so. Jean looked a good deal startled and not particularly pleased when she saw Betty Wales standing in her door; but Betty, accepting Jean's attitude as perfectly natural under the circumstances, went straight to the point. "I've come to apologize for my mistake, Jean," she said steadily, "and to tell you how glad I am that it is a mistake. I don't suppose I can make you understand why I was so sure--or at least so afraid----" "Oh, we needn't go into that," said Jean, with an attempt at graciousness. "I suppose Miss Carter said something misleading. You are quite excusable, I think." "No," said Betty, "I'm not. I've studied logic and argument and I ought to know better than to depend on circumstantial evidence. I'm very, very sorry." Jean looked at her keenly. "I suppose you and Eleanor have discussed this affair together. What did she think?" "I haven't mentioned it to her since the afternoon we were at Miss Carter's, and she doesn't know that I wrote you. That day we both felt the same--that is, we didn't know what to think. If you don't mind, I should like to tell her that it's all right." "Why in the world should you bother to do that?" asked Jean curiously. "Because she'll be so glad to know, and also because I think it's no more than fair to all of us. You did act very queerly that afternoon, Jean." "Oh, did I?" said Jean oddly. "You have a queer idea of fairness. You won't work for me when I've put you on a committee for that express purpose; but no matter how disagreeable I am to you about it, you won't take a good chance to pay up, and you won't let Eleanor take hers." "Let Eleanor take hers?" repeated Betty wonderingly. "Yes, her chance to pay up her score. She owes me a long one. You know a good many of the items. Why shouldn't she pay me back now that she has a good chance? You haven't forgotten Mary Brooks's rumor, have you? Eleanor could start one about this condition business without half trying." "Well, she won't," Betty assured her promptly. "She wouldn't think of mentioning such a thing to anybody. But as long as we both misunderstood, I'm going to tell her that it's all right. Good-bye, Jean, and please excuse me for being so hasty." "Certainly," said Jean, and Betty wondered, as she ran down-stairs, whether she had only imagined that Jean's voice shook. The next afternoon Mr. Masters and the committee, deciding that Jean's Bassanio was possibly just a shade more attractive than Mary Horton's, gave her the part. Kate Denise was Portia, and everybody exclaimed over the suitability of having the lovers played by such a devoted pair of friends. As for Betty, she breathed a sigh of relief that it was all settled at last. Jean had won the part strictly on her merits, and she fully understood Betty's construction of a committee-woman's duty to the play. Nevertheless Betty felt that, in spite of all their recent contests and differences of opinion, they came nearer to being friends than at any time since their freshman year, and she wasn't sorry that she had gone more than halfway in bringing about this happy result. Meanwhile the date of the Glee Club concert was fast approaching. Georgia Ames came in one afternoon to consult Betty about the important matter of dress. "I suppose that, as long as we're going to sit in a box, I ought to wear an evening gown," she said. "Why, yes," agreed Betty, "if you can as well as not. It's a very dressy occasion." "Oh, I can," said Georgia sadly. "I've got one all beautifully spick and span, because I hate it so. I never feel at home in anything but a shirt-waist. Beside my neck looks awfully bony to me, but mother says it's no different from most people's. The men are coming, I suppose?" "Oh, yes, they're coming," assented Betty gaily, "and between us we've been asked to every tea on the campus, I should think. So they ought to have a good time in the afternoon, and college men are always crazy over our concerts." "Your man will be all right," said Georgia admiringly, "and I'll do my best for the other one. Truly, Betty, I am grateful to you. I think it's awfully good of you to ask me. Even if you asked me because I'm the other Georgia's namesake, you wouldn't do it if you didn't like me a little for myself, would you?" "Of course not, you silly child," laughed Betty. "I want you to have my reserved seat for the basket-ball game," went on Georgia. "The subs each have one seat to give away, and I've swapped mine with a sophomore, so you can sit on your own side." "I shall clap for you, though," Betty told her, "and I hope you'll get a chance to play. The other Georgia wasn't a bit athletic, so your basket-ball record will never be mixed with hers." Betty repeated Georgia's remark about being nothing but the other Georgia's namesake to Madeline. "I think she really worries about it," she added. Madeline only laughed at her. "She hasn't seemed quite so gay lately--that probably means warnings from her beloved instructors at midyears. It must be awfully hard work to keep up the freshman grind with everybody under the sun asking you to do things. Georgia hates to snub people, so she goes even when she'd rather stay at home. Twice lately I've met her out walking with the Blunderbuss. I must talk to her about the necessity of being decently exclusive." CHAPTER XIII GEORGIA'S AMETHYST PENDANT "Has your man come yet, Lucy?" "Mine hasn't, thank goodness! He couldn't get off for the afternoon." "Mine thought he couldn't and then he changed his mind after I'd refused all the teas." "Oh, I wouldn't miss the teas for anything. They're more fun than the concert." "Of course she wouldn't miss them, the dressy lady, with violets to wear and a new white hat with plumes." "The Hilton is going to have an orchestra to play for dancing. Isn't that pretty cute?" "But did you hear about Sara Allen's men? They both telegraphed her last evening that they could come,--both, please note. And now she hasn't any seats." So the talk ran among the merry crowd of girls who jostled one another in the narrow halls after morning chapel. For it was the day of the Glee Club concert. The first installment of men and flowers was already beginning to arrive, giving to the Harding campus that air of festive expectancy which it wears on the rare occasions when the Harding girl's highest ambition is not to shine in her classes or star in the basket-ball game or the senior play, but only to own a "man." Tom Alison and his junior roommate arrived at the Belden soon after luncheon. Tom looked so distinguished in a frock coat and high hat that Betty hoped her pride and satisfaction in taking him around the campus weren't too dreadfully evident. Ashley Dwight was tall, round-shouldered, and homely, except when he smiled, which he did very seldom because he was generally too busy making every one within hearing of his low voice hysterical with laughter over his funny stories. He took an instant fancy to Georgia, and of course Georgia liked him--everybody liked Ashley, Tom explained. So Betty's last worriment vanished, leaving nothing to mar the perfection of her afternoon. The Hilton girls' brilliant idea of turning their tea into a dance had been speedily copied by the Westcott and the Belden, and the other houses "came in strong on refreshments, cozy-corners, and conversation," as Ashley put it. So it was six o'clock before any one dreamed that it could be so late, and the men went off to their hotels for dinner, leaving the girls to gloat over the flower-boxes piled high on the hall-table, to gossip over the afternoon's adventures, and then hurry off to dress, dinner being a superfluity to them after so many salads and sandwiches, ices and macaroons, all far more appetizing than a campus dinner menu. "I'll come down to your room in time to help you finish dressing," Betty promised Georgia. "My things slip on in a minute." But she had reckoned without a loose nail in the stair-carpet, which, apparently resenting her hasty progress past it, had torn a yard of filmy ruching off her skirt before she realized what was happening. "Oh, dear!" she mourned, "now I shall have to rush just as usual. Helen Chase Adams, the gathering-string is broken. Have you any pink silk? I haven't a thing but black myself. Then would you try to borrow some? And please ask Madeline to go down and help Georgia. Her roommate is going rush to the concert, so she had to start early." Helen had just taken the last stitches in the ruffle and Betty was putting on her skirt again, when Tom's card came up to her. By the time she got down-stairs they were all waiting in the reception-room and Mr. Dwight was helping Georgia into her coat and laughing at the chiffon scarf that she assured him was a great protection, so that Betty didn't see Georgia in her hated evening gown until they took off their wraps at the theatre. "Awfully sorry I couldn't come to help you," she whispered, as they went out to the carriage, "but I know you're all right." "I did my little best not to disgrace you," Georgia whispered back. "My neck is horribly bony, no matter what mother thinks; but I covered some of it up with a chain." When they got to the theatre, almost every seat was filled and a pretty little usher hurried them through the crowd at the door, assuring them importantly over her shoulder that the concert would begin in one minute and she couldn't seat even box-holders during a number. Sure enough, before they had fairly gotten into their places, the Glee Club girls began to come out and arrange themselves in a rainbow-tinted semicircle for the first number. They sang beautifully and looked so pretty that Tom gallantly declared they deserved to be encored on that account alone; and he led the applause so vigorously that everybody looked up at their box and laughed. Alice Waite had the other seats in it, and as the three men were friends and all in the highest spirits, it was a gay party. "There's Jerry Holt," Tom would say, "see him stare at our elegance." "Oh, we're making the rest of the fellows envious all right," Ashley would answer. "Who's the stunning girl in the second row, next the aisle? We don't miss a thing from here, do we?" "Prettiest lay-out I've ever seen, this concert is," Alice's escort would declare fervently. "Sh, Tommie, the banjo club's going to play." And then they would settle themselves to watch the stage and listen to the music for a while. "It's all good, but what I'm looking forward to is this," said Ashley Dwight, pointing out the Glee Club's last number on his program. "I can't wait to hear 'The Fames of Miss Ames.'" "The what?" asked Betty, consulting her card. "Why, Georgia Ames, is it about you? Did you know they were going to have it?" Georgia nodded. "The leader came and asked me if I cared. She seemed to think it would take, so I told her to go ahead. But I didn't realize that this concert was such a big thing," she added mournfully, "and I didn't know I was going to sit in a box." "Pretty grand to be sitting in a box with the celebrity of the evening, isn't it, Ashley?" said Tom. And Ashley said something in a low voice to Georgia, which made her laugh and blush and call him "too silly for anything." Finally, after the Mandolin Club had played its lovely "Gondolier's Song," and the Banjo Club its amusing and inevitable "Frogville Echoes," the Glee Club girls came out to sing "The Fames of Miss Ames," which a clever junior had written and a musical sophomore had set to a catchy melody. A little, short-haired girl with a tremendous alto voice sang the verses, which dealt in witty, flippant fashion with the career of the two Georgias, and the whole club came in strong on the chorus. "And now she's come to life, (Her double's here). And speculation's rife, (It's all so queer). The ghost associations, Hold long confabulations, And the gaiety of nations Is very much enhanced by Georgia dear!" It was only shameless doggerel, but it took. Topical songs always take well at Harding, and never had there been such a unique subject as this one. Between the verses the girls clapped and laughed, nodded at Georgia's box, and whispered explanations to their escorts; and when at last the soloist answered their vociferous demands for more with a smiling head-shake and the convincing statement that "there wasn't any more--yet," they laughed and made her sing it all over. This time Georgia asked one of the men to change seats with her, and slipped quietly into the most secluded corner of the box, behind Betty's chair, declaring that she really couldn't stand it to be stared at any longer. She looked positively pretty, Betty thought, having a chance for the first time to get a good look at her. The sparkle in her eyes and the soft color in her cheeks that the excitement and embarrassment had put there were very becoming. So was the low dress, in spite of the fact that Georgia was undoubtedly right in considering herself a "shirt-waist girl." Her neck wasn't particularly thin, or if it was the lovely old chain that she wore twisted twice around it kept it from seeming so. Betty turned to ask her something about the song and noticed the pendant that hung from her chain. It was of antique pattern--an amethyst in a ring of little pearls, with an odd quaint setting of dull gold. It looked familiar somehow. It was--yes, it was just like Nita Reese's lost pin--the one that belonged to her great grandmother and that had disappeared just before the Belden House play--one of the first thefts to be laid to the account of the college robber. Only, instead of a pin this was a pendant, fastened to the chain by a tiny gold ring. That was the only difference, for--yes, even the one little pearl that Nita had lost of the circle was missing here. Betty didn't hear Georgia's answer to her question. She turned back to the stage, which swayed sickeningly as she watched it. At last the song ended, and while she clapped mechanically with the rest she gave herself a little shake, and told herself sternly that she was being a goose, that it was absurd, preposterous, even wicked--this thought that had flashed into her head. Nita's pin wasn't the only one of its kind; there might be hundreds just like it. Georgia's great grandmother probably had had one too. Betty talked very fast on the way up to the Belden. She was thankful that Tom and his friend were going back to New Haven that night and would have time for only the hastiest of good-byes. "See you later, Miss Ames," Ashley Dwight called back as he ran down the steps after Tom. "He's asked me to the prom, Betty. Think of that!" explained Georgia, her eyes shining. "How--nice," said Betty faintly. "I'm awfully tired, aren't you?" "Tired!" repeated Georgia gaily. "Not a bit. I should like to begin all over again this minute. I'm hot though. We walked pretty fast up the hill." She threw back her coat and unwound the scarf that was twisted over her hair and around her throat. It caught on the amethyst pendant and Georgia pulled it away carefully, while Betty watched in fascinated silence, trying to make up her mind to speak. She might never have a good chance again. Ordinarily Georgia wore no jewelry,--not a pin or a ring. She had certainly never worn this pendant before at Harding. It would be so easy and so sensible to say something about it now and set her uncomfortable thoughts at rest. Betty wet her lips nervously, made an heroic effort, and began. "What a lovely chain that is, Georgia." She hoped her voice sounded more natural to Georgia than it did to herself. "Is it a family heirloom?" Georgia put up her hand absently, and felt of the chain. "Oh, that,--yes, it is. It really belongs to mother, but she let me bring it here. She's awfully fond of old jewelry, and she has a lot. I hate all kinds, but this covers my bones so beautifully." "The pendant is lovely too," put in Betty hastily, as Georgia moved off toward her room. "Is that old too?" "I don't know," said Georgia stiffly. "That isn't a family thing. It was given to me--by somebody I don't like." "The somebody must like you pretty well," said Betty, trying to speak lightly, "to give you such a stunning present." Georgia did not answer this, except by saying, "Good-night. I believe I am tired," as she opened her door. Up in her own corridor Betty met Madeline Ayres. "Back so soon?" said Madeline, who refused to take Glee Club concerts seriously. "I've had the most delicious evening, reading in solitary splendor and eating apples that I didn't have to pass around. I'm sure your concert wasn't half so amusing. How did Georgia's song go?" "Finely," said Betty without enthusiasm. "Did she tell you about it while you helped her dress?" "No, for I didn't help her. I went over to the Hilton right after dinner. Lucile told me, in a valiant attempt to persuade me that I was foolish to miss the concert." "Oh," said Betty limply, opening her own door. Madeline hadn't seen the pendant then. Probably some freshman who didn't know about Nita's loss had helped Georgia to dress. Well, what did that matter? She had Georgia's own word that the pin was a gift. Besides it was absurd to think that she would take Nita's pin and wear it right here at Harding. And yet--it was just the same and the one little pearl was gone. But a person who would steal Nita's pin, wouldn't make a present of it to Georgia. Then the pin couldn't be Nita's. "I'm getting to be a horrid, suspicious person," Betty told the green lizard. "I won't think about it another minute. I won't, I won't!" And she didn't that night, for she fell asleep almost before her head touched the pillow. Next morning she woke in the midst of a long complicated dream about Georgia and the green lizard. Georgia had stolen him and put a ring around his tail, and the lizard was protesting vigorously in a metallic shriek that turned out, after awhile, to be the Belden House breakfast-bell jangling outside her door. "They never ring the rising-bell as loud as that," wailed Betty, when she had consulted her clock and made sure that she had slept over. Before she was dressed Georgia Ames appeared, bringing a delicious breakfast tray. "Helen said that you have a nine o'clock recitation," she exclaimed, "and I thought you probably hadn't studied for it and would be in a dreadful hurry." Betty thanked her, feeling very guilty. Georgia was wearing a plain brown jumper dress, with no ornament of any kind, not even a pin to fasten her collar; and she looked as cool and self-possessed and cheerful as usual. In the sober light of morning it seemed even more than absurd to suppose that she was anything but a nice, jolly girl, like Rachel and K. and Madeline,--the sort of girl that you associated with Harding College and with the "Merry Hearts" and asked to box parties with a nice Yale man, who liked her and invited her to his prom. In the weeks that followed Betty saw a great deal of Georgia, who seemed intent on showing her gratitude for the splendid time that Betty had given her. Betty, for her part, felt that she owed Georgia far more than Georgia owed her and found many pleasant ways of showing her contrition for a doubt that, do her best, she couldn't wholly stifle. The more she saw of Georgia, the more clearly she noticed that there was something odd about the behavior of the self-contained little freshman, and also that she was worrying a good deal and letting nobody know the reason. "But it's not conditions or warnings or anything of that sort," Georgia's round-eyed roommate declared solemnly to Betty, in a burst of confidence about the way she was worrying over Georgia. "She sits and thinks for hours sometimes, and doesn't answer me if I speak to her. And she says she doesn't care whether she gets a chance to play in the big game or not. Just imagine saying that, Miss Wales." "She's tired," suggested Betty loyally. "She'll be all right after vacation." Meanwhile, in the less searching eyes of the college world, Georgia continued to be the spoiled child of fortune. She came back from the prom, with glowing tales of the good times she had had, and whether or not she cared about it she was the only "sub" who got a chance to play in the big game. She made two goals, while Betty clapped for her frantically and her class made their side of the gallery actually tremble with the manifestations of their delight. It was just as Betty was leaving the gym on the afternoon of the game that Jean Eastman overtook her. "Could you come for a walk?" she asked abruptly. "There is something I want to get settled before vacation. It won't take long. It's about Bassanio," she went on, when they had gotten a little away from the crowd. "I want to give up my part. Do you suppose Mary Horton would take it now?" "You want to give up Bassanio?" Betty repeated wonderingly. "Yes. There's no use in mincing matters. I did have a condition in French, and Miss Carter was tutoring me, just as you thought. I had worked it off the day I answered your note, but of course that doesn't alter anything. They say mademoiselle never hands in her records for one semester until the next one is almost over, so nothing would have come to light until it was too late for a new person to learn the part. Don't look so astonished, Betty. It's been done before and it may be done again, but I don't care for it myself." Then, as Betty continued to stare at her in horrified silence, "If you're going to look like that, I might as well have kept the part. The reason I decided to give it up was because I didn't think I should enjoy seeing your face at the grand dénouement. You see, when you and Eleanor came in that afternoon I thought you'd guessed or that Barbara Gordon and Teddie Wilson, who knew of a similar case, had, and had sent you up to make sure. But after you'd apologized for your note and squared things with Eleanor, I--well, I didn't think I should enjoy seeing your face," ended Jean, with a little break in her voice. "I--told you I had a sense of honor, and I have." Betty put out her hand impulsively. "I'm glad you changed your mind, Jean. It's too bad that you can't have a part, but you wouldn't want it in any such way." "I did though," said Jean, blinking back the tears. "I knew it would come out in the end,--I counted on that, and I shouldn't have minded Miss Stuart's rage or the committee's horror. But you're so dreadfully on the square. You make a person feel like a two-penny doll. I don't wonder that Eleanor Watson has changed about a lot of things. Anybody would have to if they saw much of you." Betty's thoughts flew back to Georgia. "I wish I thought so." "Well," said Jean fiercely, "I do. That's why I've always hated you. I presume I shall hate you worse than ever to-morrow. Meanwhile, will you please tell Barbara? I can't help what they all think, and I don't care. I only wanted you to see that I've got a little sense of obligation left and that after I've let a person apologize--Don't come any further, please." Jean ran swiftly down the steep path leading to the lower level of the back campus and Betty turned obediently toward home, feeling very small and useless and unhappy. Jean's announcement had been so sudden and so amazing that she didn't know what she had said in response to it, and she was quite sure that she hadn't done at all what Jean expected. Then this confirmation of her suspicions about Jean gave her an uneasy feeling about Georgia. That baffling young person was just leaving the gym as Betty got back to it, and the sight of her surrounded by a bevy of her admiring friends reassured Betty wonderfully. Nevertheless she decided to go and see Miss Ferris. There was something she wanted to ask about. After half an hour spent in Miss Ferris's cozy sitting-room, she started out to find Barbara, armed with the serene conviction that everything would come out right in the end. "How do people influence other people?" she had demanded early in her call. "There is some one I want to influence, if I could, but I don't know how to begin." "That's a big question, Betty," Miss Ferris assured her smilingly. "In general I think the best way to influence people is to be ourselves the things we want them to be--honest and true and kind." Betty mused on this advice as she crossed the campus. "That was a good deal what Jean said. I guess I must just attend to my own affairs and wait and let things happen, the way Madeline does. This about Jean just happened." She passed Georgia's door on her way up-stairs. The room was full of girls, listening admiringly to their hostess's reminiscences of the afternoon. "That sophomore guard was so rattled. She kept saying, 'I will, I will, I will,' between her teeth and she was so busy saying it that she forgot to go for the ball. But she didn't forget to stick her elbow into me between times--not she. I wanted to slug her a little just for fun, but of course I wouldn't. I perfectly hate people who don't play fair." Betty went on up the stairs smiling happily. She wanted to hug Georgia for that last sentence. CHAPTER XIV THE MOONSHINERS' BACON-ROAST Jean's sudden retirement from the cast of "The Merchant of Venice" was the subject of a good deal of excited conjecture during the few days that remained of the winter term. Betty explained it briefly to Barbara, who in turn confided Jean's story to the rest of her committee. All of them but Clara Ellis thought better of Jean than they ever had before for the courage she had shown in owning herself in the wrong. Teddie Wilson, being in Jean's French division, remembered her letter from the last year's girl and made a shrewd guess at the true state of affairs; but realizing just how sorely Jean had been tempted she was generous enough not to ask any questions or tell anybody what she thought. So the Harding world was divided in its opinions, one party asserting that Jean's acting had proved a disappointment, the other declaring that she had wanted to manage the whole play, and finding that she couldn't had resigned her part in it. Jean herself absolutely refused to discuss the subject, beyond saying that she was tired and had found it necessary to drop something, and she was so sarcastic and ill-tempered that even her best friends began to let her severely alone. Toward Eleanor her manner was as contemptuous as ever, and she kept haughtily aloof from Betty. But one day when two of the Hill girls, gossiping in her room, made some slighting remarks about Betty's prominence in class affairs, Jean flashed out an indignant protest. "She's one of the finest girls in 19--, and if either of you amounted to a third as much, you could be proud of it. No, I don't like her at all, but I admire her immensely, so please choose somebody else to criticise while you're in here." Meanwhile the winter term had ended, the spring vacation come and gone, and the lovely spring term was at full tide in Harding. If you were a freshman, it made you feel sleepy and happy and utterly regardless of the future terrors of the conditioned state in comparison with the present joys of tennis and canoeing or the languorous fascination of a hammock on the back campus,--where one goes to study and remains to dream. If you were a senior it made a lump come in your throat,--the fleeting loveliness of this last spring term, when all the trials of being a Harding girl are forgotten and all the joys grow dearer than ever, now that they are so nearly past. "But it's not going to be any daisy-picking spring-term for 19--," Bob Parker announced gaily to a group of her friends gathered for an after-luncheon conference on the Westcott piazza. "Isn't that a nice expression? Miss Raymond used it in class this morning. She wanted to remind us, she said, that the Harding course is four full years long. Then she gave out a written lesson on Jane Austen for Friday." "What a bother!" lamented Babbie, who hadn't elected English novelists. "Now I suppose we can't have either the Moonshiners' doings or the 'Merry Hearts' meeting on Thursday." "Who on earth are the Moonshiners?" asked Katherine Kittredge curiously. "Learn to ride horseback and you can be one," explained Babbie. "They're just a crowd of girls, mostly seniors, who like to ride together in the cool of the evening and make a specialty of moonlight. We're going to have a bacon-roast the first moonlight night that everybody can come." "Which will be the night after never," declared Madeline Ayres sagely. "What's the awful rush about that bacon-roast?" asked Babe. "I should think it would be nicer to wait awhile and have it for a sort of grand end-up to the riding season." "Why, there isn't but one more moon before commencement," explained Babbie, "and if we wait for that it may be too hot. Who wants to go on a bacon-roast in hot weather?" "The 'Merry Hearts' are going to decide about passing on the society, aren't they?" asked Rachel. "That's a very important matter and we ought to get it off our hands before too many other things come up. Girls, do you realize that commencement is only five weeks off?" "Oh, please don't begin on that," begged Babe, who hated sentiment and was desperately afraid that somebody would guess how tear-y she felt about leaving Harding. "I'll tell you how to settle things. Let's go over all the different afternoons and evenings and see which ones are vacant. Most of the 'Merry Hearts' are here and several Moonshiners. We can tell pretty well what the other girls have on for the different days." "I'll keep tab," volunteered Katherine, "because I belong to only one of these famous organizations. Shall I begin with to-morrow afternoon? Who can't come then to a 'Merry Hearts' meeting?" "We can't. Play committee meets," chanted Rachel and Betty together. "Mob rehearsal from four to six," added Bob. "Helen Adams has to go to a conference with the new board of editors," put in Madeline. "I heard her talking to Christy about it. It begins early and they're going to have tea." "To-morrow evening--Moonshiners' engagements please," said Katherine briskly. "Class supper committee meets to see about caterers," cried Babe. "We can't put it off either. Last year's class has engaged Cuyler's already,--the pills! That committee takes out me and Nita and Alice Waite." "Rehearsal of the carnival dance in the play," added Babbie promptly, "and Jessica, alias me, has to go." "Thursday as I understand it is to be devoted to picking, not daisies, but the flowers of Jane Austen's thought for Miss Raymond." Katherine looked at Babbie for directions. "Shall I go on to Friday afternoon?" "Class meeting," chanted several voices at once. "It won't be out a minute before six," declared Bob. "We've got to elect the rest of our commencement performers----" "Which isn't very many," interposed Madeline. "Well, there'll be reports from dozens and dozens of committees," concluded Bob serenely, "and there'll be quantities of things to discuss. 19-- is great on discussions." "In the evening," Betty took her up, "Marie is going to assign the junior ushers to the various functions, and she's asked most of us to advise her about it, hasn't she?" Several girls in the circle nodded. "Then we come to Saturday," proclaimed Katherine. "Evening's out, I know, for Dramatic Club's open meeting." "I'm on the reception committee," added Betty. "We shall have to trim up the rooms in the afternoon." "All the play people have rehearsals Saturday." "Saturday seems to be impossible," said Katherine. "How about Monday afternoon?" "The Ivy Day committee has a meeting," announced Rachel in apologetic tones. "But don't mind me, if the rest can come then." "The Prince of Morocco has a special audience granted him by Miss Kingston for Monday at five," said Madeline. "But don't mind him." "Dear me," laughed Betty. "I hadn't any idea we were such busy ladies. Is everybody in 19-- on so many committees, do you suppose?" "Of course not, simple child," answered Bob. "We're prominent seniors,--one of the leading crowds in 19--. I heard Nan Whipple call us to a freshman that she had at dinner last Sunday." "And all of us but Madeline work early and late to keep up the position," added Babbie grandly. "The Watson lady is an idler too," put in Madeline, with quick tact, remembering that Eleanor had mentioned no engagements. "We're content to bask in the reflected glory of our friends, aren't we, Eleanor?" Eleanor nodded brightly and Babbie returned to the matter in hand. "We shall never get a date this way," she declared. "Let's put all the days of next week after Monday into Bob's cap. The first one that K. draws out will be the 'Merry Hearts' afternoon; and the next the Moonshiners' evening. Those that can't come at the appointed times will have to stay at home." Everybody agreed to this, and Madeline gallantly sacrificed a leaf from her philosophy note-book to write the days on. "Friday," announced Katherine, drawing out a slip, "and Thursday." "Those are all right for me," said Madeline. "And for me." "Same here." "And here." "We'd much better have drawn lots in the first place," said Babbie. "Now if it only doesn't rain on Thursday and spoil the full moon! Tell the others, won't you, girls? I'm due at the Science Building this very minute." It didn't rain on Thursday. Indeed the evening was an ideal one for a long gallop, with an open-air supper to follow. This was to be cooked and eaten around a big bonfire that would take the chill off the spring air and keep the mosquitoes at a respectful distance. Most of the Moonshiners belonged to the Golf Club, and they had gotten permission to have their fire in a secluded little grove behind the course. Babbie, who had organized the Moonshiners and was their mistress of ceremonies, held many secret conferences with Madeline Ayres and the two spent a long afternoon sewing behind locked doors, on some dark brown stuff, which Babbie subsequently tied into a big, untidy parcel and carried up to Professor Henderson's. So the Moonshiners expected a "feature" in addition to the familiar delights of a bacon-roast, and they turned out in such numbers that Bob had to ride a fat little carriage horse and Babbie bravely mounted the spirited mare "Lady," who had frightened her so on Mountain Day. But there was no storm this time to agitate Lady's nerves, and they kept clear of the river and the ferries; so everything went smoothly and the Moonshiners cantered up to the Club house at half past eight in the highest possible spirits. They could see the grove as they dismounted and every one but Babbie was surprised to find the fire already lighted. The dishes and provisions had been carried out in big hampers in the afternoon, and the wood gathered, so there was nothing to do now but stroll over to the fire and begin. "Why, somebody's there," cried Betty suddenly. She was walking ahead with Alice Waite. "I can see two people. They're stooping over the fire. Why, Alice, it's two dear little brown elves." "Just like those on my ink-stand," cried Alice, excitedly. "How queer!" Everybody had seen the picturesque little figures by this time, and the figures in their turn had spied the riding-party and had begun to dance merrily in the fire-light. They were dressed in brown from head to foot, with long ears on their brown hoods and long, pointed toes curling up at the ends of their brown shoes. They looked exactly like the little iron figures of brownies that every Harding girl who kept up with the prevailing fads had put on her desk that spring in some useful or ornamental capacity. They danced indefatigably, pausing now and then to heap on fresh wood or to poke the fire into a more effective blaze, and looking, in the weird light, quite fantastic enough to have come out of the little hillside behind the fire, tempted to upper earth by the moonlight and the great pile of dry wood left ready to their hands. For a few minutes after the Moonshiners' arrival the trolls resolutely refused to speak. "'Cause now you'll know we ain't real magic," explained Billy Henderson indignantly, when his chum had fallen a victim to Bob's wiles and disclosed his identity. The fire was so big and so hot by this time that it threatened to burn up the whole grove, so the small boys were persuaded to devote their energies to toasting thin slices of bacon, held on the ends of long sticks, and later to help pass the rolls and coffee that went with the bacon, and to brown the marshmallows, which, with delicious little nut-cakes, made up the last course. The Moonshiners had spent so much time admiring Babbie's brownies that they had to hurry through the supper and even so it bid fair to be after ten before they reached the campus. Betty, Bob, and Madeline happened to get back to the horses first and were waiting impatiently for the rest to come when Bob made a suggestion. "Mr. Ware is helping stamp out the fire. Let's get on and start for home ahead of the others. Then we can let most of them in if they're late. Our matron will rage if she catches us again this week." "All right," agreed Madeline. "Mr. Ware said he had told a man to be at the Westcott, ready to take some of the horses. Let's not tell any one. They'll be so surprised to find three horses gone." "We shall have to hurry then," whispered Betty. "They'll be here any minute." "On second thought," said Madeline, "I don't believe I can pick out my own horse. It's inky dark here under the trees." Madeline had ridden all her life but she seldom went out at Harding, and so hadn't a regular mount, like most of the other Moonshiners. "Of course you can, Madeline," scoffed Betty. "You rode Hero, that big black beast hitched to the last post, next to my horse. Don't you remember tying him there?" Bob backed her sturdy cob out from between two restless companions, and with much laughter and whispering and many injunctions to hurry and to be "awfully still," the three conspirators mounted and walked their horses quietly down the drive. "My stirrups seem a lot too long," Betty whispered softly, as they passed down the avenue, dusky with the shadows of tall elms. "Whoa, Tony! Wait just a minute, girls. Why--oh, Bob, Madeline,--I've got the wrong horse. Somebody must have changed them around. This is Lady." Whether it was Betty's nervous clutch on the reins as she made this dire discovery and remembered Lady's antics on the ferry-boat, or whether the saucy little breeze which chose that moment to stir the elm branches and set the shadows dancing on the white road, was responsible, is a matter of doubt. At any rate Lady jerked back her pretty head impatiently, as if in answer to her name, shivered daintily, reared, and ran. She dodged cat-like, between Bob and Madeline and out through the narrow gateway, turned sharply to the right, away from Harding, and galloped off up the level road that lay white in the moonlight, between the Golf Club and a pine wood half a mile away. Betty had presence of mind enough to dig her knees into Lady's sides, and so managed somehow, in spite of her mis-fit stirrups, to stay on at the gate. She tugged hard at the reins as Lady flew along, and murmured soothing words into Lady's quivering ears. But it wasn't any use. Betty had wondered sometimes how it felt to be run away with. Now she knew. It felt like a rush of cold wind that made you dizzy and faint. You thought of all sorts of funny little things that happened to you ages ago. You wondered who would plan Jessica's costumes if anything happened to you. You wished you weren't on so many committees; it would bother Marie so to appoint some one in your place. You made a neat little list of those committees in your mind. Then you got to the pine wood, and something did happen, for Lady went on alone. Madeline, straining her eyes at the gateway, waiting for Bob and Mr. Ware to come, couldn't see that. "She was still on the last I could see," she told them huskily, and Mr. Ware whipped his horse into a run and rushed after Lady. Madeline looked despairingly at Bob. "Let's go too," she said. "I can't stand it to wait here." "All right." They rode fast, but it seemed ages before they got to the pines. Mr. Ware was galloping far ahead of them. "If she's gone so far she'll slow up gradually on that long hill," suggested Bob, trying to speak cheerfully. "Isn't it--pretty--stony?" asked Madeline. "Yes, but after she'd run so far she wouldn't try to throw Betty." "Suppose we wait here. Oh, Bob, what shall we do if she's badly hurt?" "She can't be," said Bob with a thick sob. "Please come on, Madeline. I've got to know if she's----" Bob paused over the dreadful word. There was a little rustling noise in the bushes beside the road. "Did Mr. Ware have a dog?" asked Madeline. "No," gulped Bob. "There's something down there. Who's there?" called Madeline fearlessly, and then she whistled in case Bob had been mistaken about the dog. "It's I--Betty Wales," answered a shaky little voice, with a reassuring suggestion of mirth in it. "I'm so glad somebody has come. I'm down here in a berry-patch and I can't get up." Madeline was off her horse by this time, pushing through the briars regardless of her new riding habit. "Where are you hurt, dear?" she asked bending over Betty and speaking very gently. "Do you suppose you could let me lift you up?" Betty held out her arms, with a merry laugh. "Why, of course I could. I'm not one bit hurt, except scratched. The ferns are just as soft as a feather bed down here, but the thorns up above are dreadful. I can't seem to pull myself up. I'm a little faint, I guess." A minute later she was standing in the road, leaning against Madeline, who felt of her anxiously and asked again and again if it didn't hurt. "Hasn't she broken her collar-bone?" asked Bob, who was holding the horses. "People generally do when they have a bad spill. Are her arms all right?" "I suppose I didn't know how to fall in the proper way," explained Betty, wearily. "I can't remember how it happened, only all at once I found myself down on those ferns with my face scratched and smarting. If Mr. Ware went by ahead of you I suppose I must have been stunned, for I didn't see him." "He's probably hunting distractedly for you on the hill," said Bob, glad to have something definite to do. "I think he's caught Lady, and I'll go and tell him that we've caught you." Just then Professor Henderson's surrey drove up. It had come for Billy, and Babbie had thoughtfully sent it on to bring back "whoiver's hurted," the groom explained. But he made no objection to taking in Betty, though, rather to Billy's disappointment, she did not come under that category. "I never saw a broken arm, ner a broken leg, ner a broken anything," he murmured sleepily. "I thought I'd have a chance now. Say, can I please put my head in your lap?" "My, but your knees wiggle something awful," Billy complained a minute later. "Don't you think they're cracked, maybe?" So Madeline put the sleepy elves in front with the driver and got in herself beside Betty. Curled up in Madeline's strong arms she cried a little and laughed a good deal, never noticing that Madeline was crying, too. For just beyond the berry-patch there was a heap of big stones, which made everything that Bob and Madeline had feared in that dreadful time of suspense seem very reasonable and Betty's escape from harm little short of a miracle. It was striking eleven when the riding party and the surrey turned up the campus drive and the B's noticed with dismay that the Westcott was brilliantly lighted. "I know what's happened," wailed Babe. "Our beloved matron has found us missing and she's hunting for us under the beds and in all the closets, preparatory to calling in the police. Never mind! we've got a good excuse this time." But the Westcott was not burning its lights to accommodate the matron. The B's had not even been missed. Katherine met them in the hall and barely listened to their excited accounts of their evening's adventure. "There's been plenty doing right here, too," she said. "What?" demanded the three. "College thief again, but this time it's a regular raid. For some reason nearly everybody was away this evening, and the ones who had anything to lose have lost it--no money, as usual, only jewelry. Fay Ross thinks she saw the thief, but--well, you know how Fay describes people. You'd better go and see what you've lost." Luckily the thief had neglected the fourth floor this time, so they had lost nothing, but they sat up for an hour longer, consoling their less fortunate friends, and listening to Fay's account of her meeting with the robber. "I'm pretty sure I should know her again," she declared, "and I'm perfectly sure that I've seen her before. She isn't very tall nor very dark. She's big and she looks stupid and slow, not a bit like a crafty thief, or like a college girl either. She had a silk bag on her arm. I wish I'd asked her what was in it." But naturally Fay hadn't asked, and she probably wouldn't see the thief soon again. Next morning Emily Lawrence telegraphed her father about her watch with diamonds set in the back, and he sent up two detectives from Boston, who, so everybody supposed, would make short work of finding the robber. They took statements from girls who had lost their valuables during the year and from Fay, prowled about the campus and the town, and finally went back to Boston and presented Emily's father with a long bill and the enlightening information that the case was a puzzling one and if anything more turned up they would communicate it. Georgia Ames displayed no unusual interest in the robbery. She happened to tell Betty that she had spent the entire evening of the bacon-roast with Roberta, and Betty, watching her keenly, was almost sure that she knew nothing of the excitement at the Westcott until the B's came over before chapel to inquire for "the runaway lady" and brought the news of the robbery with them. The "runaway lady" explained that she wasn't even very lame and should have to go to classes just as usual. Then she hid her face for a minute on Bob's broad shoulder,--for though she wasn't lame she had dreamed all night of Lady and stones and briars and broken collar-bones,--and Bob patted her curls and told her that Lady was going to be sold, and that she should have been frightened to pieces in Betty's place. After which Betty covered her scratches with a very bewitching white veil and went to chapel, just as if nothing had happened. CHAPTER XV PLANS FOR A COOPERATIVE COMMENCEMENT It was Saturday afternoon and time for the "Merry Hearts'" meeting, which had been postponed for a day to let every one recover from Thursday evening's excitement. "Come along, Betty," said Roberta Lewis, poking her head in at Betty's half-open door. "We're going to meet out on the back campus, by Nita's hammock." "Could you wait just a second?" asked Betty absently, looking up from a much crossed and blotted sheet of paper. "If I can only think of a good way to end this sentence, I can inform Madeline Ayres that my 'Novelists'' paper is done. She said I couldn't possibly finish it by five. See my new motto." "'Do not let study interfere with your regular college career,'" read Roberta slowly. "What a lovely sentiment! Where did you get it?" "Helen gave it to me for a commencement present," said Betty, drawing a very black line through the words she had written last. "Isn't it just like her?" "Do you mean that it's like her to give you something for commencement that you won't have much use for afterward?" "Yes," laughed Betty, "and to give it to me because she says I made her see that it's the sensible way of looking at college, although she thinks the person who got up these mottoes probably meant it for a joke. She wishes she could find out for sure about that. Isn't she comical?" "Yes," said Roberta, "she is. You haven't written as much as you've crossed out since I came, Betty Wales. We shall be late." Betty shut her fountain pen with a snap, and tossed the much blotted page on top of a heap of its fellows, which were piled haphazard in a chair beside her desk. "Who cares for Madeline Ayres?" she said, and arm in arm the two friends started for the back campus, where they found all the rest of the senior "Merry Hearts" waiting for them. Dora Carlson couldn't come, Eleanor explained; and Anne Carter and Georgia thought that they were too new to membership in the society to have any voice in deciding how it should be perpetuated. "It's rather nice being just by ourselves, isn't it?" said Bob. "It's rather nice being all together," added Babbie in such a significant tone that Babe gave her a withering glance and summarily called the meeting to order. The discussion that followed was animated, but it didn't seem to arrive anywhere. There were Lucile and Polly and their friends in the sophomore class who would be proud to receive a legacy from the seniors they admired so much; and there was a junior crowd, who, as K. put it, were a "jolly good sort," and would understand the "Merry Hearts'" policy and try to keep up its influence in the college. Everybody agreed that, if the society went down at all, it ought to descend to a set of girls who were prominent enough to give a certain prestige to its democratic principles, and who, being intimate friends, would enjoy working and playing together as the first generation of "Merry Hearts" had, and would know how to bring in the "odd ones" like Dora and Anne, when opportunity offered. "But after all," said Rachel dejectedly, "it would never be quite the same. We are 'Merry Hearts' because we wanted to be. The idea just fitted us." "And will look like a rented dress suit on any one else," added Madeline frivolously. "Of course I'm not a charter member of 19--, and perhaps I ought not to speak. But don't you think that the younger classes will find their own best ways of keeping up the right spirit at Harding? I vote that the 'Merry Hearts' has done its work and had its little fling, and that it would better go out when we do." "Then it ought to go out in a regular blaze of glory," said Bob, when murmurs of approval had greeted Madeline's opinion. "I know a way." Betty spoke out almost before she thought, and then she blushed vividly, fearing that she had been too hasty and that the "Merry Hearts" might not approve of her plan. "Is it one of the things you thought of while you were being run away with?" asked Madeline quizzically. Betty laughed and nodded. "You'd better make a list of the things I thought of, Miss Ayres, if the subject interests you so much." "Was there one for every scratch on your face?" asked Katherine. Betty drew herself up with a comical affectation of offended dignity. "I almost wish I'd broken my collar-bone, as Bob thought I ought to. Then perhaps I should get a little sympathy." "And where would the costumes for the play have been, with you laid up in the infirmary for a month?" demanded Babbie with a groan. "Do you know that's the very thing I worried about most when Lady was running," began Betty, so earnestly that everybody laughed again. "Just the same it wouldn't have been any joke, would it, about those costumes," said Bob, when the mirth had subsided, "nor about all the other committee work that you've done and that nobody else knows much about." "Not even to mention that we should hate to have anything happen to you for purely personal reasons," said Madeline, shivering in the warm sunshine as she remembered how that dreadful pile of white stones had glistened in the moonlight. "I think this class would better pass a law: No more riding by prominent seniors," declared Katherine Kittredge. "If Emily Davis should get spilled, there would go our good young Gobbo and our Ivy Day orator, besides nobody knows how much else." "Christy is toastmistress and Antonio." "Kate is chairman of the supper committee and Portia." "Everybody who's anything is a lot of things, I guess," said little Helen Adams. She herself was in the mob that made the background for the trial scene in "The Merchant of Venice," and she was as elated over her part as any of the chief actors could possibly be over their leading rôles. But that wasn't all. She was trying for the Ivy song, which is chosen each year by competition. She had been working on her song in secret all through the year, and she felt sure that nobody had cared so much or tried so hard as she,--though of course, she reminded herself sternly it took more than that to write the winning song and she didn't mean to be disappointed if she failed. "Order please, young ladies," commanded Babe, who delighted to exercise her presidential dignities. "We are straying far from the subject in hand--to adapt the words of our beloved Latin professor. Betty Wales was going to tell us how the 'Merry Hearts' could go out with a splurge." "I object to the president's English," interrupted Madeline. "The connotation of the term splurge is unpleasant. We don't wish to splurge. Now go ahead, Betty." "Why, it's nothing much," said Betty modestly, "and probably it's not at all what Bob is thinking of. It's just that, as Helen says, everybody who is in anything is in a lot of things and most of the class are being left out of the commencement plans. I thought of it first that day we had a lecture on monopolies in sociology. Don't you remember Miss Norris's saying that there were classes and masses and excellent examples of monopolies right here in college, and that we needn't wait until we were out to have a chance to fight trusts and equalize wages." "Oh, that was just an illustration," objected Bob blandly. "Miss Norris didn't mean anything by it." "She's a Harding girl herself," Betty went on, "and it's certainly true, even if she didn't intend it to be acted on. Thursday night when I went over the things I had to do about commencement and thought I couldn't do any of them I felt dreadfully greedy." "But Betty," Rachel took her up, "don't you think it takes executive ability to be on committees and plan things? Commencement would be at sixes and sevens if the wrong girls had charge of it." "Yes, of course it would," agreed Betty. "Only I wondered if all the left-out people are the wrong kind." "Of course they're not," said Madeline Ayres with decision. "What is executive ability, anyway?" "The thing that Christy Mason has," returned Bob promptly. "Exactly," said Madeline, "and that is just practice in being at the head of things,--nothing more. Christy isn't much of a pusher, she isn't particularly brilliant or particularly tactful; but she's been on committees as regularly as clockwork all through her course, and she's learned when to pull and when to push, and when to sit back and make the rest push. It's a thing any one can learn, like French or bookkeeping or how to make sugar-cookies. I hate it myself, but I don't believe it's a difficult accomplishment." "Perhaps not," protested Bob, "but it takes time, if it's anything like French or cookies--I never tried the bookkeeping. We don't want to make any experiments with our one and only commencement." "Why, I'm an experiment," said Roberta hastily, as if she had just thought of it and felt impelled to speak. "Yes, but you're the exception that proves the rule," said Nita Reese brusquely. Nita's reputation for executive ability was second only to Christy's and she was badly overworked, and tired and cross in consequence. "I don't think I quite get your idea, Betty. Do you want K., for instance, to give up her part in the play to Leslie Penrose, who was told she could have it at first and cried for a whole day when she found there had been a mistake?" "Come, Nita," said Madeline lazily, but with a dangerous flash in her gray eyes. "That's not the way to take our last chance to make more 'Merry Hearts.' Let Betty tell us exactly what she does mean." "Please do, Betty," begged Nita, half ashamed already of her ill-tempered outburst. "Of course I don't want K. to give up her part," began Betty with a grateful look at Madeline and a smile for Katherine. "I only thought that some of us are in so many things that we're tired and rushed all the time, and not enjoying our last term half as much as we might." "My case exactly," put in Nita repentantly. "Whereas there are girls in the class who've never had anything to do here but study, and who would be perfectly delighted to be on some little unimportant commencement committee." "But they ought to realize," said Babbie loftily, "that in a big college like Harding very few people can have a chance to be at the head of things. Our commencement is pretty enough to pay our families for coming even if the girls they are particularly interested in don't have parts. Being on a committee isn't a part anyway." "Girls who are never on them think it is," said Helen Adams. There was an ominous silence. At the end of it Babbie slipped out of the hammock and sat down beside Betty on the grass. "It's no use at all fighting you, Betty Wales," she declared amiably. "You always twist the things we don't want to do around until they seem simple and easy and no more than decent. Of course it's true that we are all tired to death doing things that the left-outs will be blissful at the prospect of helping us with. But it's been so every year and no other class ever turned its play and its commencement upside down. And yet you make it seem the only reasonable thing to do." "Lucky our class-meeting happened to be postponed," said Bob in matter-of-fact tones, "Makes it easier arranging things." "A coöperative commencement will send us out with a splurge all right," remarked Babe. Thus the B's made a graceful concession to the policy of trying more experiments with 19--'s commencement. "One man, one office--that's our slogan," declared Katherine, when Babe had announced that the vote in favor of Betty's plan was unanimous. "No hard and fast policy, but the general encouragement of passing around the honors. I haven't but one myself, so I shall have to look on and see that the rest of you do your duty." "Let's make a list of the vacancies that will probably occur in our midst, as it were," suggested Rachel. "I wonder if we couldn't lengthen the Ivy Day program and make room for a few more girls in that way," put in Eleanor. "The oration and the song don't take any time at all." "Fine idea!" cried Madeline. "We have a lot of musical and literary talent in the class that isn't being used anywhere. We'll turn it over to the Ivy Day committee with instructions to build their program accordingly." "But we must manage things tactfully," interposed Babbie, "as we did about the junior usher dresses. We mustn't let the left-overs suspect that we are making places for them." "By the way," said Madeline, "have you heard that this year's junior ushers are going to keep up the precedent, out of compliment to us?" "Pretty cute," cried Babe. "I hope they'll manage to look as well as we did." "And as we are going to again this year in our sweet simplicity costumes," said Babbie, with a little sigh of regret for the wonderful imported gown that her mother had suggested buying as part of her commencement present. It was growing late, so the "Merry Hearts" made a hasty outline of procedure, and delegated Rachel to see Marie Howard and ask her to help with the plan as far as she could at the approaching class-meeting. Luckily this was not until the following Tuesday, so there was plenty of time to interview all the right people and get the coöperative campaign well established before Marie rose at the meeting to read what would otherwise have seemed an amazing list of committee appointments. Emily Davis gave up Gobbo at once and Christy, after weighing the relative glories of being toastmistress and Antonio decided that she could help more at the class supper. Both girls declared that they were delighted to be relieved of part of their responsibilities. "Those toasts that I hadn't time to brown properly were getting on my nerves," Christy declared. "And my Ivy oration was growing positively frivolous, it was so mixed up with young Gobbo's irresponsible way of changing masters," confessed Emily. "I've wanted to drop out of the play, but I was afraid the girls would think me as irresponsible as Gobbo. Leslie Penrose knows my part and she can step into the place as well as not." It was a surprise to everybody when Kate Denise joined the movement, without even having been asked to do so. She gave up everything but her part as Portia, and used her influence to make the rest of the Hill girls do the same. "I guess she remembers how we did them up last year on the dress business," chuckled Bob. "She's a lot nicer than the rest of her crowd," Babbie reminded her, "and I think she's tired of acting as if she wasn't." "I hate freaks," said Babe, "but it is fun to see them bustle around, acting as if they owned the earth. Leslie's whole family is coming to commencement, down to the youngest baby, and the fat Miss Austin is fairly bursting with pride just because she's on the supper committee. She has some good ideas, too." "Of course they're proud," said little Helen Adams sententiously. "Things you've never had always look valuable to you." Helen had won in the song contest. Her family would see her name and her song in print on the Ivy Day program, and May Hayward, a friend of hers and T. Reed's in their desolate freshman year, was to be in the mob in Helen's place. All the changes had been made without any difficulty and no one was worrying lest experiments should prove the ruin of 19--'s commencement. Mr. Masters had protested hotly against Christy's withdrawal from the play, but the new Antonio was proving herself a great success and even Mr. Masters had to admit that the whole play had gained decidedly the minute that the actors had dropped their other outside interests. But the great difference was in the spirit of good-fellowship that prevailed everywhere. Everybody had something to do now, or if not, then her best friend had, and they talked it over together, told what Christy had suggested about the tables for class-supper, how Kate was having all her own dresses made for Portia and Nerissa couldn't afford to, so Eleanor Watson had lent her a beautiful blue satin, or what the new Ivy Day committees had decided about the exercises. There was no longer a monopoly of anything in 19--. Incidentally, as Katherine pointed out, nobody was resting her nerves at the infirmary. Betty would have been perfectly happy if she hadn't felt obliged to worry a little about Georgia Ames. Ashley Dwight had been up to see her twice since the prom. Betty felt responsible for their friendship and wondered if she ought to warn Tom that she really didn't know anything about Georgia. For suppose Georgia hadn't had anything to do with the Westcott house robbery; that didn't prove anything about her having taken Nita's pin in the fall. If Madeline had spoken to her protégée, as she intended to do, about excluding the Blunderbuss from her acquaintance, Georgia had paid the advice scant heed. The Blunderbuss came to see her more and more often as the term went on. To be sure Georgia was very seldom at home when the senior called. Indeed her roommate was getting to feel decidedly injured because Georgia never used her room except to sleep and dress in. CHAPTER XVI A HOOP-ROLLING AND A TRAGEDY 19-- was having its hoop-rolling. This is the way a senior hoop-rolling is managed: custom decrees that it may take place on any afternoon of senior week, which is the week before commencement when the seniors' work is over though the rest of the classes are still toiling over their June exams. Some morning a senior who feels particularly young and frolicsome suggests to her friends at chapel that, as the time-honored official notice puts it, "The day has come, the seniors said, To have our little fling. Let's buy our hoops and roll them round, And laugh and dance and sing." If her friends also feel frolicsome they pass the word along, and unless some last year's girls have bequeathed them hoops, they hurry down-town to buy them of the Harding dealer who always keeps a stock on hand for these annual emergencies. The seniors dress for luncheon in "little girl" fashion, skirts up and hair down, and the minute the meal is over they rush out into the sunshine to roll hoop, skip rope, swing in the long-suffering hammocks under the apple trees, and romp to their hearts' content. Freshmen hurrying by to their Livy exam, turn green with envy, and sophomores and juniors "cramming" history and logic indoors lean out of their windows to laugh and applaud, finally come down to watch the fun for "just a minute," and forget to go back at all. 19-- had its hoop-rolling the very first day of senior week. As Madeline Ayres said when she proposed it, you couldn't tell what might turn up, in the way of either fun or weather, for the other days, so it was best to lose no time. And such a gay and festive hoop-rolling as it was! First they had a hoop-rolling parade through the campus, and then some hoop-rolling contests for which the prizes were bunches of daisies, "presented with acknowledgments to Miss Raymond," Emily Davis explained. When they were tired of hoops they ran races. When they were out of breath with running they played "drop the handkerchief" and "London Bridge." After that they serenaded a few of their favorite faculty. Then they had a reformed spelling-match, to prove how antiquated their recently finished education had already become. Finally they sat down in a big circle on the grass and had "stunts." Babbie recited "Mary had a little lamb," for possibly the thousandth time since she had learned to do it early in her junior year. Emily Davis delivered her famous temperance lecture. Madeline sang her French songs, Jane Drew did her ever-popular "hen-act," and Nancy Simmons gave "Home, Sweet Home," as sung into a phonograph by Madame Patti on her tenth farewell tour. Most of these accomplishments dated back as far as 19-- itself, and half the girls who heard them knew them by heart, but they listened to each one in breathless silence and greeted its conclusion with prolonged and vigorous applause. It was queer, Alice Waite said, but some way you never, never got tired of seeing the same old stunts. When the long list of 19--'s favorites was finally exhausted and Emily Davis had positively refused to give the temperance lecture for a third time, the big circle broke up into a multitude of little ones. Bob Parker and a few other indefatigable spirits went back to skipping rope; the hammocks filled with exclusive twos and threes; larger coteries sat on the grass or locked arms and strolled slowly up and down the broad path that skirted the apple-orchard. Betty, Helen and Madeline were among the strollers. "One more of the famous last things over," said Madeline with a regretful little sigh. "I'm glad we had it before the alums, and the families begin to arrive and muddle everything up." "Did I tell you that Dorothy King is coming after all?" asked Betty, who, in a short white sailor suit, with her curls flying and her hoop clutched affectionately in one hand, looked at least eight years too young to be a senior, and supremely happy. "Has she told you, Helen?" repeated Madeline dramatically. "She tells me over again every time I see her. When is Mary Brooks scheduled to arrive?" "Thursday," answered Betty, "so that she can see the play all three times." "Not to mention seeing Dr. Hinsdale between the acts," suggested Madeline. "What do you two say to a picnic to-morrow?" Helen said, "How perfectly lovely!" and Betty decided that if Helen and Madeline would come to the gym in the morning and help with the last batch of costumes for the mob, she could get off by three o'clock in the afternoon. "That reminds me," she added, "that I promised Nerissa to ask Eleanor if she has any shoes to match her blue dress. The ones we ordered aren't right at all by gas-light." "There's Eleanor just going over to the Hilton," said Helen. "Find out if she can go to the picnic," called Madeline, as Betty hurried off, shouting and waving her hoop. "We'll be asking the others." "El-ea-nor!" cried Betty shrilly, making frantic gestures with her hoop. But though Eleanor turned and looked back at the gay pageant under the trees, she couldn't single out any one figure among so many, and after an instant's hesitation she went on up the Hilton House steps. So Betty stepped across the campus alone, and being quite out of breath by the time she got indoors went slowly up-stairs and down the long hall to Eleanor's room. The house was very still--evidently its inmates were all out watching the hoop-rolling. Betty found herself walking softly, in sympathy with the almost oppressive silence. Eleanor's door was ajar, so that Betty's knock pushed it further open. "May I come in?" she asked, hearing Eleanor, as she supposed, moving about inside. Without waiting for an answer she walked straight in and came face to face with--not Eleanor, but Miss Harrison, champion Blunderbuss of 19--. "Why, what are you doing here?" she asked, her voice sharp with amazement. "I beg your pardon," she added laughingly, "but I thought of course it was Eleanor Watson. She came into the house just ahead of me." "She hasn't been in here yet," said the Blunderbuss. She had been standing when Betty first caught sight of her. Now she dropped hastily into a chair by the window. "I was sure she'd be back soon and I wanted to speak to her for a minute. But I guess I won't wait any longer. I shall be late to dinner." "Why, no, you won't," said Betty quickly. "It isn't anywhere near dinner-time yet." She didn't care about talking to the Blunderbuss while she waited for Eleanor, but she had a great curiosity to know what the girl could want with Eleanor. "And I don't believe Eleanor will have any more idea than I have," she thought. But the Blunderbuss rose nervously. "Well, anyway, I can't wait," she said. "I guess it's later than you think. Good-bye." Just at that minute, however, somebody came swiftly down the hall. It was Eleanor Watson, carrying a great bunch of pink roses. "Oh, Betty dear," she cried, not noticing the Blunderbuss, who had stepped behind a Japanese screen, "see what daddy sent me. Wasn't it nice of him? Why, Miss Harrison, I didn't see you." Eleanor dropped her roses on a table and came forward, looking in perplexity first at Miss Harrison and then around the room. "Betty," she went on quickly, "have you been hunting for something? I surely didn't leave my bureau drawers open like this." Betty's glance followed Eleanor's to the two drawers in the chiffonier and one in the dressing table which were tilted wide open, their contents looked as if some one had stirred them up with a big spoon. She had been too much engrossed by her encounter with Miss Harrison to notice any such details before. "No, of course I haven't been hunting for anything," she answered quickly. "I shouldn't think of doing such a thing when you were away." "I shouldn't have minded a bit." Eleanor turned back to Miss Harrison. "Did you want to see me," she asked, "or did you only come up with Betty?" The Blunderbuss wet her lips nervously. "I--I wanted to ask you about something, but it doesn't matter. I'll see you some other time. You'll want to talk to Miss Wales now." She had almost reached the door, when, to Eleanor's further astonishment, Betty darted after her and caught her by the sleeve. "Miss Harrison," she said, while the Blunderbuss stared at her angrily, "I'm in no hurry at all. I can wait as well as not, or if you want to see Eleanor alone I will go out. But I think that you owe it to Eleanor and to yourself too to say why you are here." The Blunderbuss looked defiantly from Betty's determined face to Eleanor's puzzled one. "I didn't know it was Miss Watson's room until you came in and asked for her," she vouchsafed at last. "You didn't know it was her room?" repeated Betty coldly. "Why didn't you tell me that long ago? Whose room did you think you were in?" "I thought--I didn't know whose it was." "Then," said Betty deliberately, "if you admit that you were in here without knowing who occupied the room you must excuse me if I ask you whether or not you were looking through Eleanor's bureau drawers just before I came in." There was a strained silence. "You can have all the things back," said the Blunderbuss at last, as coolly as if she were speaking of returning a borrowed umbrella; and out of the pockets of the child's apron which she still wore she pulled a gold chain and a bracelet and held them out to Eleanor. "I don't want them," she said when neither of the others spoke. "I don't know why I took them. It just came over me that while all the others were out there playing it would be a good chance for me to go and look at their pretty things." "And to steal the ones you liked best," added Betty scornfully. The Blunderbuss gave her a vaguely troubled look. "I didn't think of it that way. Anyway it's all right now. Haven't I given them right back?" "Suppose we hadn't come in and found you here," put in Eleanor. "Wouldn't you have taken them away?" "I--I presume so," said the Blunderbuss. "So you are the person who has been stealing jewelry from the campus houses all through this year." Betty's voice grew harder as she remembered the injustice she had so nearly done Georgia and Miss Harrison's self-righteous attack on Eleanor in that dreadful class-meeting. The Blunderbuss accepted the statement without comment. "They could have had the things back if they'd asked for them," she said. "I couldn't very well give them back if they didn't ask." "Will you give them back now?" asked Betty, astonishment at the girl's strange behavior gaining on her indignation. The Blunderbuss nodded vigorously. "Certainly I will. I'll bring them all here to-night. I don't want them for anything. I never wanted them. I'm sure I don't know why I took them. Oh, there's just one thing," she added hastily, "that I can't bring. It isn't with the rest. But I've got everything else all safe and I'll come right after dinner. Good-bye." [Illustration: THE GIRLS WATCHED HER IN BEWILDERMENT] The girls watched her go in a daze of bewilderment. Just outside the door she evidently bumped into some one, and her clattering laugh and loud, "Goodness, how you scared me!" sounded as light-hearted and unconcerned as possible. "How did you ever guess that she was the one?" Eleanor asked at last. "It just came over me," Betty answered. "But, why, she doesn't seem to care one bit!" "About running into me?" asked Jean Eastman, appearing suddenly in the doorway. "Has she been doing damage in here, too?" No one answered and Jean gave a quick look about the room, noticing the rummaged drawers, the girls' excited, tragic faces, and the jewelry that Eleanor still had in her hand. Then she made one of her haphazard deductions, whose accuracy was the terror of her enemies and the admiration of her followers. "Oh, I see--it's more college robber. So our dear Blunderbuss is the thief. I congratulate you, Eleanor, on the beautiful poetic justice of your having been the one to catch her." "Yes, she's the thief," said Betty, before Eleanor could answer. She had a sudden inspiration that the best way to treat Jean, now that she guessed so much, was to trust her with everything. "And she acts so strangely--she doesn't seem to realize what she has done, and she doesn't care a bit that we know it. She said----" And between them they gave Jean a full account of their interview with Miss Harrison. Jean listened attentively. "It's a pathetic case, isn't it?" she said at last, with no trace of her mocking manner. "I wonder if she isn't a kleptomaniac." Betty and Eleanor both looked puzzled and Jean explained the long word. "It means a person who has an irresistible desire to steal one particular kind of thing, not to use, but just for the sake of taking them, apparently. I heard of a woman once who stole napkins and piled them up in a closet in her house. It's a sort of insanity or very nearly that. Of course jewelry is different from napkins, but Miss Harrison has taken so much more than she can use----" "Especially so many pearl pins," put in Betty, eagerly. "Haven't you noticed what a lot of those have been lost? She couldn't possibly wear them all." "Perhaps she meant to sell them," suggested Eleanor. "But her family are very wealthy," objected Jean. "They spend their summers where Kate does, and she says that they give this girl everything she wants. She never took money either, even when it was lying out in plain sight, and her being so ready to give back the things seems to show that she didn't take them for any special purpose." "Then if she's a----" began Betty. "Kleptomaniac," supplied Jean. "She isn't exactly a thief, is she?" "No, I suppose not," said Jean doubtfully. "But she isn't a very safe person to have around," said Eleanor. "I'll tell you what," said Betty, who had only been awaiting a favorable opening to make her suggestion. "It's too big a question for us to try to settle, isn't it, girls? Let's go and tell Miss Ferris all that we've found out so far, and leave the whole matter in her hands." Then Jean justified the confidence that Betty had shown in her. "You couldn't do anything better," she said, rising to leave. "I wish I'd known her well enough to talk things over with her,--not public things like this, I mean, but private ones. Betty, here's a note that Christy Mason asked me to give you. That's what I came in for, originally. Of course this affair of Miss Harrison is yours, not mine, and I shan't mention it again, unless Miss Ferris decides to make it public, as I don't believe she will. By the way, I wonder if you know that Miss Harrison can't graduate with us." "You mean that she has been caught stealing before?" asked Eleanor. "Oh, no, but she couldn't make up the French that she flunked at midyears, and she must be behind in other subjects, too. I heard rumors about her having been dropped, and last week I saw the proof of our commencement program. Her name isn't on the diploma list." "Oh, I believe I'm almost glad of that," said Betty softly. "It's dreadful to be glad that she has failed in every way, but I can't bear to think that she belongs in our class." So it was Miss Ferris who met the Blunderbuss in Eleanor's room that night, who managed the return of the stolen property to its owners, with a suggestion that it would be a favor to the whole college not to say much about its recovery, and she who, finding suddenly that the noise of the campus tired her, spent the rest of the term at Miss Harrison's boarding place on Main Street, where she could watch over the poor girl and minimize the risk of her indulging her fatal mania again while she was at Harding. She was nonchalant over having been caught stealing, but her failure in scholarship had almost broken her heart. She had worked so hard and so patiently up to the very last minute in the hope of winning her diploma that, on the very morning of the hoop-rolling, she had been granted the privilege of staying on through commencement festivities and so keeping her loss of standing as much as possible to herself. After listening to Betty's and Eleanor's stories and talking to Miss Harrison herself, Miss Ferris was fully convinced that the Blunderbuss was not morally responsible for the thefts she had committed, and so she was unwilling to send her home at once and thus expose her to the double disgrace that her going just then would probably have involved. So she found her hands very full until the girl's mother could be sent for and the sad story broken to her as gently as possible. It was the one unrelieved tragedy in 19--'s history; there seemed to be absolutely no help for it,--the kindest thing to do was to forget it as soon as possible. CHAPTER XVII BITS OF COMMENCEMENT But Betty Wales couldn't forget it yet. It stood out in the midst of the happy leisure and anticipation of senior week like a skeleton at the feast,--a gaunt reminder that even the sheltered little world of college must now and then take its share of the strange and sorrowful problems that loom so much larger in the big world outside. But even so, it had its alleviating circumstances. One was Miss Ferris's hearty approval of the way in which Betty and Eleanor had managed their discovery, and another was Jean Eastman's unexpected attitude of helpfulness. She assumed her full share of responsibility, discouraging gossip and speculation about the thefts as earnestly and tactfully as Betty herself, and taking her turn of watching the Blunderbuss at the times when Miss Ferris couldn't follow her without causing too much comment. Betty and Eleanor tried to accept her help as if they had expected nothing else from her, and Jean for her part made no reference to that phase of the matter except to say once to Betty, "If Eleanor Watson can stand by her I guess I can. Besides you stood by me, and I didn't deserve it any more than this poor thing does. Please subtract it from all the times I've bothered you." Betty was very generous with the subtraction. She was in a generous mood, wanting to give everybody the benefit of the doubt that, with a good deal of a struggle, she had managed to give Georgia. Of course the vindicating of the little freshman was quite the happiest result of the whole affair. It didn't take Betty long to identify the amethyst pendant as the one article which the Blunderbuss had said she couldn't return; and she was at once relieved and disappointed, on going over the stolen jewelry with Miss Ferris, to find that Nita's pin was certainly missing. Of course that left room for the possibility that the Blunderbuss had not taken it, and the next thing to do was to consult Georgia and make sure. Betty waited until after dinner that evening for a chance to see her alone and then, unable to stand the suspense any longer, broke abruptly away from her own friends and detached Georgia from a group of tired and disconsolate freshmen sympathizing over examinations. "Let's go for a walk all by ourselves," she said. "No fair, running off to talk secrets," Madeline called after the pair. "Curiosity killed a cat," Betty chanted gaily back at her, leading the way to the back campus. "It's awfully nice of you to ask me to come, when so many people want you," said Georgia shyly. "Oh, no, it's not," protested Betty. "I shall have a whole week with the others after you've gone. Besides, there's something I especially want to talk to you about. Let's go and sit on the bank below the observatory." They found comfortable seats among the gnarled roots of an old elm, where they could look across at Paradise and down on a bed of gorgeous rhododendrons, over which great moths, more marvelously colored than the flowers, flitted lazily in the twilight. Then Betty plunged into the thick of things. "You remember the pendant that you wore on your chain the night of the Glee Club concert. You said it was a present. Would you mind telling me who gave it to you? I have good reason for asking." Georgia flushed a little and made the answer that Betty had hoped for. "The senior Miss Harrison gave it to me last Christmas. I know you and Madeline don't like her, and I don't like her a bit better. But what can you do, Betty, when some one takes a fancy to you? You can't snub her just because she happens to be stupid and unpopular--not if you're a 'Merry Heart,' anyway." "No," said Betty, "you can't. But if you don't like her you won't feel so bad about what I've got to tell you." Georgia listened to the story aghast. "But I'm not so dreadfully surprised," she said. "It explains so many things. She started to take Caroline's class-pin one day in our room. I supposed she had picked it up without thinking, so when she went away I asked her for it and she acted so funny when she gave it back. And then the way she happened to give me this pin. I went to call on her once last fall, after she had asked me to dinner, and I noticed it shining under the edge of the carpet. When I called her attention to it she didn't seem to understand, so I picked it up myself. She acted queer then too, and when I admired it and said what a pretty pendant it would make she fairly insisted on my taking it. Of course I wouldn't, but she had it fixed to go on a chain and sent it to me for Christmas." Georgia interrupted herself suddenly. "It was ages after the Glee Club concert before you found out about Miss Harrison. What did you think of me all that time?" "Why just at first I couldn't understand it," said Betty truthfully, "but after I'd thought it over I was sure you weren't to blame and I've been getting surer and surer all the time. But I am awfully glad to know how it all happened." "And I am awfully glad that it was you who saw it," said Georgia fervently. "I never wore it but that once. I couldn't make her take it back, so I decided to send it to her after college was over--I knew mother wouldn't want me to take such a valuable present from a girl I knew so slightly, and I thought Miss Harrison would be glad to have it back then. You see," Georgia explained, "I think she did things for me in the hope that I would manage to get her in more with the girls I knew. She has been awfully lonely here, I guess. Well, I felt ashamed of having the pin and ashamed of knowing her, and the things Madeline said about her worried me dreadfully, but I couldn't seem to shake her off. Why, I've done everything I could, Betty, that wouldn't hurt her feelings. I've fairly lived in other people's rooms, so that she'd never find me at home, and that hurt my poor little roommate's feelings, so the other day I had to tell her what the matter was. I've never told any one else--I hate people who talk about that sort of thing--but I've been just miserable over it,--indeed I have! And now it seems worse than ever." Georgia's big brown eyes filled with tears. But she smiled again when Betty assured her that she thought it was much better to be bothered and to have things come out all wrong than to be always thinking just of yourself. "You see," Georgia confessed, "the first time I met her she seemed nice enough and I accepted her first invitations without thinking, so when she wanted to be intimate I felt as if I had been partly to blame for letting her begin it." "Yes, you do have to be careful about not being too friendly at first," said Betty soberly, "but I think there are a lot of mistakes worse than that. I'm sorry though, if this has spoiled your first year here." "Oh, it hasn't," said Georgia, eagerly; "it has just spotted it a little. It was a lucky thing, I guess, that I had something to bother me, or I should have been spoiled with all the good times you've given me. I did try to be a good 'Merry Heart,' Betty. Perhaps I shall have better luck next time." "I'm sure you will," said Betty, heartily, and after they had arranged for the returning of Nita's pin in such a way as not to involve Miss Harrison, they started back to the Belden, Georgia to begin her packing and Betty to join the rest of the "Merry Hearts," who were spending the evening on the piazza. But after all Betty slipped past them and went on up-stairs. She was in a very serious mood. She realized to-night as she never had before that her college days were over. The talk with Georgia had somehow put a period to a great many things and she wanted to be alone and think them over. Her little room was stiflingly hot and she threw the window wide open and sat down before it in the dark, leaning her elbows on the sill. The piazza was just below; she could hear the laughter and merriment, and occasionally a broken sentence or two drifted up to her. "There's nothing left to do now but commence," declared Bob Parker, loudly. "And when we have commenced we shall be finished," added Babe, and laughed uproariously at her bad joke. That was just Betty's trouble,--"nothing left to do but commence," which was quite enough if you happened to be a member of the play committee. But before you "began to commence" all the tangled threads of the four happy years ought to be laid straight, and they weren't, or at least one wasn't. Betty had always felt sure that before Eleanor graduated she would get back her standing with the class. But if she had, there was nothing to prove it; the feeling of her classmates toward her had certainly changed but nothing had happened that would take away the sting of the Blunderbuss's insult last fall and of Jean's taunts at the time of the Toy Shop entertainment. Eleanor would go away feeling that on the whole she had failed. Well, it was too late to do anything now. Betty lit her gas long enough to hunt up a scarf that would furnish at least a lame apology for her delay, and went down to the gay group on the piazza. When thoughts will only go round in a circle, the best thing to do is to stop thinking them. "I say, Betty," cried Bob eagerly, "did you know that Christy had gone home? I mean did you know she hasn't come back? She went just for senior week and now her mother is too ill to leave and she's got to stay." "Poor Chris!" said Betty, suddenly remembering Christy's note which, in the excitement over the Blunderbuss she had forgotten to open. "How lucky that she gave up Antonio." "Isn't it?" agreed Bob. "She's coming back for Tuesday of course to run the supper and get her precious little sheepskin. Her mother isn't dangerously sick, I guess, but there are lots of children and Christy seems to think she's the only one who can manage them." "Think of her missing the play!" said Madeline. "Perhaps she'll get back by Saturday night," suggested Eleanor, hopefully. "I think she's a lot more likely not to come back at all," declared Babe, "but it's no use to worry about that yet. Who's going to meet Mary Brooks?" "Everybody who isn't a 'star,' or hasn't got to be made up early must go," commanded Madeline. "She comes at four-ten, remember. Babbie and Roberta, go in out of this damp." Up in her room again Betty closed the window against the invading June-bug and hunted high and low for Christy's note. She hardly expected to find it after so long a time, but it finally turned up hidden in the folds of a crumpled handkerchief which she had stuffed carelessly into her top drawer. And luckily it was not too late to do Christy's commission. She merely told of her hasty departure and wanted Betty to be sure that the supper cards, with the menu and toasts on them, were ready in time. The printer was about as dependable as Billy Henderson, Christy wrote; he needed reminding every morning and watching between times. Betty dashed off a hasty note of sympathy and apology, promising to make the printer's life a burden until he produced the supper-cards, and went to bed. Next day commencement began in earnest. Gay young alumnæ carrying suit-cases, older alumnæ escorting be-ribboned class-babies and their anxious nurses, thronged the streets; inconsiderate families began to arrive a whole day before there was anything in particular for them to do. All the afternoon the "mob" people and the other "sups" besieged the stage door of the theatre waiting their turns to be made up, and then, donning heavy veils hurried back up the hill. It was tiresome being made up so early and having to stay indoors all the hot afternoon, but it couldn't be helped, for there was only one make-up man and he must save plenty of time for the principal actors. So the campus dinner-tables were patronized by young persons with heavily penciled eyebrows and brightly rouged cheeks, who ate cautiously to avoid smearing their paint and powder, and than ran up-stairs to jeer at the masculine contingent whose beards and moustaches had condemned them to privacy and scanty fare. "I shall die of starvation," wailed Bob Parker, when she reached the theatre, confiding her sad story to Betty. "I said I didn't mind being a Jew and having my toes stepped on when the Christians hustle me out of court. But how can any one eat dinner with a thing like this," and she held up her flowing beard disdainfully. "I'm sure I don't know," said Betty absently, consulting a messy memorandum as if she expected to find directions for eating with a beard among its items. "Bob, where is Roberta Lewis? The make-up man wants her this minute. It takes ages to fix on her nose." "Portia is afraid she is going to be hoarse," announced another "supe" importantly. "Then find the doctor," commanded Barbara Gordon swiftly, as Betty disappeared in search of Roberta. "Be careful, men. Look out for that gondola when you move the flies. Rachel, please keep the maskers off the stage." "Why don't we begin?" "Did you ever see such a mess?" "Oh, it's going to be a horrible fizzle. I told you the scenery was too elaborate." But two minutes later the "street in Venice" scene was ready and Antonio and "the Sals," as the class irreverently styled his friends, were chatting composedly together in front of it. The house was packed of course and there was almost as much excitement in front as there was behind the scenes. Of course the under class girls and alumnæ were delighted, but there was a distinguished critic from New York in the fifth row, and when Shylock appeared he was as enthusiastic as Mary Brooks herself. Even the cynical Richard Blake was pleased. He had come up to see the play and also, so he explained, to be a family to the bereft Madeline; but as Madeline was behind the scenes Eleanor Watson was obligingly looking after him. Her father and mother weren't coming until Saturday, and Jim could only make a flying trip between two examinations to spend Monday in Harding, so Eleanor had plenty of spare time with which to help out her busier friends. "I'm going to make out a schedule of my hours," she told Mr. Blake laughingly, "for it would be dreadful if I should forget an engagement and promise to entertain two or three uncongenial people at the same time." "Indeed it would," agreed Mr. Blake soberly. "To-night, for instance, it would have been fatal. I say, Miss Watson, keep an hour or two open Monday evening. If Madeline should urge me, I believe I'd run up again for that outdoor concert. It must be no end pretty. Ah, the carnival scene. I never saw that put on more effectively, Miss Watson." The next night the fathers and mothers and cousins and aunts went into ecstasies over "that lovely Portia" and "sweet little Jessica," laughed at young Gobbo's every motion, and declared that Shylock was "just too wonderful for anything." A funny little old lady who sat next to Roberta's father even went so far as to ask him timidly if he didn't agree with her that Shylock was a man. "I've been telling my sister that no college girl could act like that. I guess I know an old man when I see one," she said, and blushed scarlet when he answered in his courtly way, "Pardon me, madam, but Shylock is my daughter. She will appreciate your unstudied compliment." When the curtain finally went down on the last performance of the play the committee were almost too tired to realize that they were through, and Katherine Kittredge, alias Gratiano, sank down on the nearest grassy knoll (made of green cambric) and expressed the universal sentiments of the cast. "Not for all the ducats in Belmont will I call Portia a learned judge again." "You needn't, K., but please hop up," said Barbara Gordon wearily. "They're singing to us. Get into the centre, Roberta. We've got to let them see us again; they won't stop clapping till we do." And then you should have heard the noise! "Three cheers for good old Shylock," called somebody, and they were given with a will. Then they sang to her. "Here's to you, Roberta Lewis, Here's to you, our warmest friend!" Then they sang to Barbara and to Kate Denise, and to both the Gobbos. "I say, ain't you folks goin' home till mornin'?" shouted a jovial stage-hand, thrusting his head out from the wings. The crowd laughed and cheered him, then cheered everybody and went home, singing to Roberta all the way up the hill. "But you can't blame them," said Betty Wales. "They don't realize how tired we are, and it's something pretty exciting to have given the play that Miss Ferris and Mr. Masters both say is the best yet." "And to have had a perfectly marvelous Shylock," added Kate Denise warmly. "And a splendid Portia," put in Roberta. "Oh, wise young judges, please don't forget to mention Gratiano," said Katherine Kittredge, and set them all to laughing. "It's been splendid fun," said Barbara. "Don't you wish we could give it all over again?" Then they sat down on the green knolls and the gondolas and Portia's best carved chairs, and talked and talked, until, as Babbie said, they all felt so proud of themselves and each other and 19-- that the stage wouldn't hold them. Whereupon they remembered that to-morrow was Baccalaureate Sunday and that most of their families had inconsiderately invited them out to breakfast,--two facts which made it desirable to go home and to bed as speedily as possible. It always rains in the morning of Baccalaureate Sunday, but it generally clears up in time for the service, which is in the afternoon; and even if it doesn't the graduating class and its friends are willing to make the best of a bad matter because it would have been so much worse if the rain had waited for Ivy Day. 19--'s Baccalaureate was showery in an accommodating fashion that permitted the class to sleep late in the morning because their families wouldn't want them to go out in the rain, and cleared off just before and just after the service, so that they didn't need the carriages that they couldn't possibly have gotten, no matter how it poured. And it cleared off for Ivy Day. Helen Adams was up at five o'clock anxiously inspecting the watery sunshine to see if it would last. "For they can't plant the ivy in the rain," she thought, "and if they don't plant it how can they sing the song?" But the sunshine lasted, Marie planted the ivy,--and the college gardener carefully replanted it later, "'cause them gals will be that disapp'inted if it don't live,"--the class sang Helen's song, and the odes, orations and addresses were all duly delivered. Then, as Bob flippantly remarked, the fun began. For Mr. Wales had chartered three big touring cars and invited the "Merry Hearts" to go out to Smugglers' Notch for luncheon, with Mrs. Adams, who had never been in an auto before, for chaperon and himself, Will, and Jim Watson as escorts and chauffeurs. By the time they got back the campus was festooned with Japanese lanterns, little tables ready for bowls of lemonade stood under all the biggest trees, and a tarpaulin dotted with camp chairs covered a roped-off enclosure near the back steps of College Hall. "You've got tickets, father," Betty explained, "so you can sit down in there and listen to the music. Will, you're to call for me." "For Miss Ayres," Will amended calmly. "Watson is going to take you." Judge and Mrs. Watson had seats too, so Eleanor and Mr. Blake, Betty and Jim, and Madeline and Will wandered off together, two and two, enjoying snatches of the concert, exploring the campus, and engaging in a most exciting "Tournament"--Madeline's idea of course--to see who could drink the most lemonade. Will was ahead, with Madeline a close second, when a mysterious whistle sounded from the second floor of the Hilton. "Oh, good-bye, Dick," said Madeline briskly, holding out her hand. "It's time for you to go. Shall I see you to-morrow or not till I get to New York?" "Have we really got to go so soon?" asked Will sadly. Betty nodded. "Or at least we've got to go and put on old dresses, so as to be ready to join in our class march." "Why can't we march too?" demanded Mr. Blake. "Because you're not Harding, 19--," said Madeline with finality. And so, half an hour later, another procession assembled on the spot where the Ivy Day march had started that morning. But this time 19-- was wearing its oldest clothes and heaviest shoes and didn't care whether it rained or not. Four and five abreast they marched, round the campus, up Main Street and back, round and round the campus again. "Just as if we hadn't torn around all day until we're ready to drop," Eleanor Watson said laughingly. It is a perfectly senseless performance, this "class march," which is perhaps the reason why every class revels in it. But the procession was moving more slowly and singing with rather less enthusiasm, when a small A.D.T. approached the leaders. "Is Miss Marie Howard in this bunch?" he demanded. "She orter be at the Burton, but she ain't." "Yes, here I am," called Marie quickly, and the small boy lit a sputtering match, so that she could sign his book and read her telegram. It was from Christy: "Awfully sorry can't come for supper. Writing." "How perfectly dreadful," cried Marie, repeating the message to Bob, who was standing beside her. Bob passed on the bad news, and the procession broke up into little groups to discuss it. "Why don't you appoint some one to take her place right now?" suggested Bob. "Then she can sit up all night and get her remarks ready. She won't have much time to-morrow." Marie looked hastily around her and caught sight of Betty Wales standing under a Japanese lantern that was still burning dimly. "Betty!" she called, and Betty hurried over to her. "I think we ought to fill Christy's place now," whispered Marie. "Shall I appoint Eleanor Watson or have her elected?" "Have her elected," said Betty, as promptly as if she had thought it all out beforehand. "Then will you propose her?" Betty shook her head. "That wouldn't do. Eleanor knows how I feel toward her. It must come from the people who haven't wanted her. They're all here, I think." Betty peered uncertainly through the gloom to make sure that Jean and her friends and the Blunderbuss were still out. "If the whole class wants her badly enough, they'll think of her." Marie stepped out into the light of the one lantern and called the class to order. "It's a queer time to have a class-meeting," she said, "and I'm not sure that it's constitutional, but who cares about that? You all know about Christy and as Bob Parker says the new toastmistress ought to have all the time there is left. So please make nominations." "Why don't you appoint some one, Marie?" called Alice Waite sleepily. "Because the toastmistress who presides over our supper ought to be the choice of her class," said Marie firmly. "Madam president,"--Jean Eastman's clear, sharp voice broke the silence. "It's a good deal to ask of any one, to step in at the last minute like this. Very few of us are capable of doing it,--of making a success of it, I mean. In fact I only know of one person that I should be absolutely sure of. Fortunately no one deserves such an appointment more truly. I nominate Eleanor Watson." A little thrill swept over the "queer" class-meeting. Everybody had known more or less about the bitter feud between Jean and Eleanor, and very few people had had the least suspicion that it had ended. Indeed even Betty and Eleanor had not been sure how far Jean's friendliness could be counted upon. Betty, standing back in the shadows where Marie had left her, gave a little gasp of amazement and clutched Bob's arm so hard that Bob protested. "I second that motion, Miss President." It was the Blunderbuss, and her stolid face grew hot and red in the darkness, as she wondered if any one who knew that she didn't belong to 19-- now would question her right to take part in the meeting. "But I was bound to do it," she reflected. "I guess she isn't the kind of girl I thought she was. Anyhow I didn't mean to hurt her feelings before, and this will sort of make up." "Any other nominations?" inquired Marie briskly. There was silence and then somebody began to clap. In a minute the whole meeting was clapping as hard as it could. "I guess we don't need ballots," said Marie, when she could be heard. "All in favor say aye." There was a regular burst of ayes. "Those opposed?" Silence again. "There's a unanimous vote for you," cried Bob Parker eagerly. "Speech from the candidate! Betty, you're killing my arm!" "Speech!" The class took up Bob's cry. "Where are you, Eleanor?" called Marie, and Eleanor, coming out from behind a big bush said, "I'll try to do my best--and--thank you." It wasn't a brilliant speech to come from the girl who has often been called Harding's most brilliant graduate, but it satisfied everybody, even Betty. "I did it just to show you that I've got the idea," Jean Eastman muttered sulkily, jostling Betty in the crowd; and that was satisfactory too. Indeed when Betty went to bed that night she confided to the green lizard that she hadn't a single thing left to bother about at Harding. CHAPTER XVIII THE GOING OUT OF 19-- Next morning came the really important part of commencement,--the getting of your diploma, or, to speak accurately, the getting of somebody's else diploma, which you could exchange for your own later. "Let's stand in a big circle," suggested Madeline Ayres, "and pass the diplomas round until each one comes to its owner." It wasn't surprising that Eleanor Watson, with her newly acquired duties as toastmistress, should keep getting outside the circle to consult various toasters and members of the supper committee; but it did seem as if Betty Wales might stay quietly in her place. So thought the girls who had noticed that Carlotta Young, the last girl in the line that went up for diplomas had not received any. Carlotta was a "prod"; it was only because she came at the end of the alphabet that she was left out, but thanks to Betty's fly-away fashion of running off to speak to some junior ushers, and then calling the Blunderbuss, whose mother wanted to see her a minute, nobody could find out positively who it was that had been "flunked out" of 19--. The next excitement took place when the class, strolling over to the Students' Building to have luncheon with the alumnæ--why, they were alumnæ themselves now!--met a bright-eyed, brown-haired little girl, walking with a tall young man whose fine face was tanned as brown as an Indian's. "Don't you know me, 19--?" called the little girl gaily. "Why, it can't be--it is T. Reed!" cried Helen Adams, rushing forward. "And her Filipino," shrieked Bob Parker wildly. "Of course I came. Do you think I'd have missed my own commencement?" said T., shaking hands with four girls at once. "Frank, this is Helen Adams, my best friend at Harding. Miss Parker, Mr. Howard. I'm sorry, Bob, but he's not a Filipino. He's just a plain American who lives in the Philippines." "Have you forgotten how to play basket ball, T.?" called somebody. T. gave a rapturous little smile. "Could we have a game this afternoon? That's what I came for, really. We meant to get here last week, but the boat was late. Yes, I'm sorry to have missed the play and the concert; but it's worth coming for, just to see you all." T.'s bright eyes grew soft and misty. "I tell you, girls, you don't know what it means to be a Harding girl until you've been half across the world for awhile. No, I'm not sorry _I_ left, but it's great to be back!" Mary Brooks, arrayed in a bewitching summer toilette, stood at the door of the Students' Building, and managed to intercept Betty and Roberta, as they went in. "You may congratulate me now if you like," she said calmly, leading them off to a secluded corner behind a group of statuary, where their demonstrations of interest wouldn't attract too much attention. The news wasn't at all surprising, but Mary looked so pretty and so happy and assured them so solemnly that she had never dreamed of anything of the kind at Christmas, that there was plenty of excitement all the same. "And of course I must have posts at my wedding," said Mary, whereat Betty hugged her and Roberta looked more pleased than she had when Mr. Masters called her a genius. "And bridesmaids," added Mary, with the proper feeling for climax. "Laurie is going to be maid-of-honor, and if you two can come and be bridesmaids and the rest of the crowd almost--bridesmaids, in the words of the poetical Roberta----" She never finished her sentence for the rest of the crowd had discovered her retreat, and guessing at the news she had for them bore noisily down upon her. "It's so convenient that she's going to be married this summer," said Babbie jubilantly. "We can have our first reunion at the wedding. I simply couldn't have waited until June to see you all again." "We couldn't any of us have waited," declared Bob. "Somebody else must get married about Christmas time." "Why don't you?" asked Babbie nonchalantly, while Madeline looked hard at Eleanor and wished New York and Denver weren't so dreadfully far apart. For how could Dick Blake, busy editor of "The Quiver," make love to the most fascinating girl in the world when she lived at that distance. They had something to eat after a while, sitting on the stairs with Mary, while Dr. Hinsdale beamed on them all and brought them salad and ices. "You mustn't talk about it, you know," Mary explained, "because it won't be announced until next week, and you mustn't think of running off and leaving us out here alone." "All right," Katherine promised her. "We'll be the mossy bank for your modest violet act. Only do try not to look so desperately in love or everybody who sees you will guess the whole thing, and it will look as if we told." Most of the seniors spent the afternoon at the station seeing their families off, but Betty left hers in Nan's care and went canoeing with Dorothy King in Paradise. Dorothy was just as jolly and just as sweet as ever. She wanted to know about everything that had happened at Harding since she left it, and especially all about Eleanor Watson. "You've pulled her through after all, haven't you?" she said. "No, she pulled herself through," Betty corrected her. "I only helped a little, and a lot of others did the same. Why even Jean helped, Dorothy." Dorothy laughed. "I can't imagine Jean in that rôle," she said, "but I'll take your word for it. Let's go and see Miss Ferris." Miss Ferris was alone and delighted to see her visitors. "Everything has come out right, hasn't it?" she said, smiling into Betty's radiant face. Betty nodded. "Just splendidly. Did you know about Eleanor's being toastmistress?" "Yes, she came in to tell me herself. What has come over Jean Eastman, Betty?" "I don't know," said Betty with a tell-tale blush that made Miss Ferris laugh and say, "I thought you were at the bottom of it." "Dorothy used to be the person who managed things of this kind," she went on. "Who's going to take your place, Betty?" "According to what I hear nobody can do that," said Dorothy quickly, and Betty blushed more than ever, until Miss Ferris took pity on her and asked about her plans for next year. Betty looked puzzled. "Why, I haven't any, I'm afraid. I never get a chance to make plans, because the things that turn up of themselves take all my time. I'm just going to be at home with my family." "Leave out the 'just,'" advised Miss Ferris. "So many of you seem to feel as if you ought to apologize for staying at home." "Oh, I'm glad to hear you say that," said Betty soberly. "A lot of girls in our class who don't need to a bit are going to teach, and Carlotta Young said to me the other day that she thought we all ought to test our education in some such way right off, so as to be sure it was really worth something." "And you are sure about yours without testing it?" asked Miss Ferris quizzically. Betty smiled at her happily. "I'm sure I've got something," she said. "I'm afraid Carlotta wouldn't call it much of an education and I know I ought to be ashamed that it isn't more, but I'm awfully glad I've got it." "I'm glad you have, too," said Miss Ferris so earnestly that Betty wondered what she meant. But she didn't get a chance to ask, for somebody knocked just then and the two girls said good-bye and hurried off to dress for their respective class suppers. 19--'s was held in the big hall of the Students' Building. The junior ushers had trimmed it with red and green bunting, and great bowls of red roses transformed the huge T-shaped table into a giant flower-bed. "I hope they haven't more than emptied the treasury for those flowers," said Babe anxiously, when she saw them. "Hardly," Babbie reassured her. "Judge Watson sent the whole lot, so you needn't worry about your treasury. He consulted me about the color. Isn't he a dear?" "Yes, he is," said Bob, "and he evidently thinks his only daughter is another. Where's the supper-chart?" "Out in the hall," explained Babbie, "with the whole class fighting for a chance at it. But I know where we sit. Betty thought we'd better keep things lively down at the end of the T." "Well, I guess, we can do that," said Babe easily. "Where is Betty, anyway?" "Here," answered Betty, hurrying up. "And girls, please don't say anything about it, but non-graduates don't generally come to the suppers and the seating committee forgot about T. Reed, so she hasn't any place." "The idea!" cried Bob indignantly. "But she can have Eleanor's seat." Betty hesitated. "No, because they changed the chart after they heard about Christy's not coming. But Cora Thorne is sick, so I'm going to let T. have my seat, right among you girls that she used to know----" "You're not going to do anything of the kind," declared Babbie hotly. "Shove everybody along one place, or else put in a seat for T." "The chairs are too close together now and Cora's place is way around at the other end. It would make too much confusion to move so many people. Here comes T. now. I shall be almost opposite Eleanor and Katherine, and I don't mind one bit." So it happened that Betty Wales ate her class supper between Clara Madison and the fat Miss Austin, and enjoyed it as thoroughly as if she had been where she belonged, between Babbie and Roberta. The supper wasn't very good--suppers for two hundred and fifty people seldom are--but the talk and the jokes, the toasts and the histories, Eleanor's radiant face at the head of the table, the spirit of jollity and good-fellowship everywhere,--these were good enough to make up. Besides, it was the last time they would all be together. Betty hadn't realized before how much she cared for them all--for the big indiscriminate mass of the class that she had worked and played with these four years. She had expected to miss her best friends, but now, as she looked down the long tables, she saw so many others that she should miss. Yes, she should miss them all from the fat Miss Austin who was so delighted to be sitting beside her to the serious-minded Carlotta Young, with her theories about testing your education. Katherine was reading the freshman history, hitting off the reception, with its bewildering gaiety and its terrifying grind-book, those first horrible midyears, made even more frightful by Mary Brooks's rumor, the basket-ball game--when that was mentioned they made T. Reed stand on her chair to be cheered, and then they cheered the rest of the team, who, as Katherine said, "had marched so gallantly to a glorious defeat." As Christy wasn't there, somebody read her letter, which explained that her mother was better but that the twins had come down with the measles and Christy was "standing by the ship." So they cheered the plucky letter and then they sang to its author. "Oh, here's to our Christine, We love her though unseen, Drink her down, drink her down, Drink her down, down, down!" When the team was finally allowed to sit down, Katherine went on to the joys of spring-term, with its golf and tennis, its Mary-bird club and its tumultuous packing and partings. When she had finished and been applauded and sung to, and finally allowed to sit down and eat a very cold croquette, Betty looked over at Emily Davis and the next minute for no reason at all she found herself winking back the tears. She had had such a good time that year and K. had picked out just the comical little things that made you remember the others that she hadn't mentioned. Little Alice Waite was toasting the cast. Alice was no orator. She stammered and hesitated and made you think she was going to break down, but she always ended by saying or doing something that brought down the house. "I think you ought to have given this toast to somebody else," she began innocently. "I can't act, and I can't speak either, as it happens. Besides words speak louder than actions. No, I mean actions speak louder than words, so I will let the cast toast themselves." "Roast themselves, you mean," said Katherine, pushing back her chair. And then began a clever burlesque of the casket scene in which Gratiano played Portia's part, Shylock was Nerissa, Gobbo Bassanio, and Jessica the Prince of Morocco. Next Alice called for the Gobbos and Portia and the Prince of Morocco "stood forth" and went through a solemn travesty of the scene between the father and son that left the class faint and speechless with laughter. Then there were more toasts and when the coffee had been served they made the engaged girls run around the table. Betty was sorry then that she wasn't in her own place, to help get Babbie Hildreth started. Her friends were all sure that she was engaged and she had hinted that she might tell them more about it at class-supper, but now she denied it as stoutly as ever. Finally Bob settled the question by getting up and running in her place,--a non-committal proceeding that delighted everybody. After that came the last toast, "Our esprit de corps." Kate Denise had it, for no reason that Betty could see unless Christy had wanted to show Kate that the class understood the difference between her and the other Hill girls. And then Kate was one of 19--'s best speakers and so could do justice to the subject. "I think we ought to drink this toast standing," she began. "We've drunk to the cast and the team, to our presidents, our engaged girls, our faculty. Now I ask you to drink to the very greatest pride and honor of this class,--to the way we've always stood together, to the way we stand together to-night, to the way we shall stand together in the future, no matter where we go or what we do. It's not every class that can put this toast on its supper-card. Not every class knows what it means to be run, not in the interest of a clique or by a few leading spirits, but by the good-feeling of the whole big class. And so I ask you to drink one more toast--to the girl who started this feeling of good-fellowship at a certain class-meeting that some of us remember, and who has kept it up by being a friend to everybody and making us all want to be friends. Here's to Betty Wales." When Betty heard her name she almost jumped out of her chair with amazement. She had been listening admiringly to Kate's eloquent little speech, never dreaming how it would end and now they were all clapping and pushing back their chairs again, and Clara Madison was trying to make her stand up in hers. "Speech!" shouted the irrepressible Bob and the girls sat down again and the big table grew still, while Betty twisted her napkin into a knot and smiled bravely into all the welcoming faces. "I'm sure Kate is mistaken," she said at last in a shaky little voice. "I'm sure every girl in 19-- wanted every other girl to have her share of the fun just as much as I did. The class cup, that we won at tennis in our sophomore year is on the table somewhere. Let's fill it with lemonade and sing to everybody right down the line. And while they're filling the cup let's sing to Harding College." It took a long time to sing to everybody, but not a minute too long. Betty watched the faces of the girls when their turns came--the girls who were always sung to, like Emily Davis, and the girls who had never been sung to in all the four years and who flushed with pride and pleasure to hear their names ring out and to feel that they too belonged to the finest, dearest class that ever left Harding. "Now we must have the regular stunts," said Eleanor. There was a shuffling of chairs and she and Betty and the people who had had toasts slipped back to their own particular crowds, leaving the top of the table for the stunt-doers. It was shockingly late, but they wanted all the old favorites. Who knew when Emily Davis would be back to do her temperance lecture or how long it would be before they could hear Madame Patti sing "Home, Sweet Home" through a wheezy gramophone? "Was it all right?" Eleanor whispered to Betty as they hunted up their wraps a little later. "Perfectly splendid," said Betty with shining eyes. "The loveliest end-up to the loveliest commencement that ever was." "We haven't got to say good-bye yet," said somebody. "There's a class meeting to-morrow at nine, you know." "Half of us will probably sleep over," said Babe in a queer, supercilious tone. Not for all the morning naps in the world would Babe have missed that good-bye meeting. CHAPTER XIX "GOOD-BYE!" "And after commencement packing," said Madeline Ayres sadly, "and that's no joke either, I can tell you." "Oh, I don't know," said Babe airily. "Give away everything that you can't sell, and you won't be troubled. That's what I've done." "I couldn't give up my dear old desk," said Rachel soberly, "nor my books and pictures." "Oh, I've kept a few little things myself," explained Babe hastily, "just to remember the place by." "My mother wanted to stay and help me," laughed Nita. "She thought if we both worked hard we might get through in a day." "Mary Brooks did hers in two hours," announced Katherine, "and I guess I'm as bright as little Mary about most things, so I'm not worrying." "Isn't it time to start for class-meeting?" asked Betty, coming out on the piazza with Roberta. "See them walk off together arm in arm," chuckled Bob softly, "just as if they knew they were going to be elected our alumnæ president and secretary respectfully." "Don't you mean respectively, Bob?" asked Helen Adams. "Of course I do," retorted Bob, "but I'm not obliged to say what I mean now. I'm an alum. I can use as bad diction as I please and the long arm of the English department can't reach out and spatter my mistakes with red ink." The election of officers didn't take long. It had all been cut and dried the night before, and the nominating committee named Betty for president and Shylock for secretary without even going through the formality of retiring to deliberate. Then Katherine moved that the surplus in the treasury be turned over to "our pet philanthropy, the Students' Aid," and Carlotta Young inquired anxiously whether the first reunion was to be in one or two years. "In one," shouted the assembly to a woman, and the meeting adjourned tumultuously. But nobody went home, in spite of the packing that clamored for attention. "Good-bye, you dear old thing!" "See you next June for sure. I'm coming back then, if I do live away out in Seattle." "You're going to study art in New York, you say? Oh, I'm there very often. Here, let me copy that address." "Going abroad for the summer, you lucky girl? Well, rather not! I'm going to tutor six young wigglers into a prep. school." "Wasn't last night fun? Don't you wish we could have it all over again,--except the midyears and the papers for English novelists." "Good-bye!" "Good-bye!" "Good-bye!" But these weren't the good-byes that came hardest; those would be said later in the dear, dismantled rooms or at the station, for very close friends would arrange to meet again there. But the close friendships would be kept up in letters and visits, whereas these casual acquaintances might never again be renewed. "I've seen you nearly every day for three years," Madeline Ayres told little Miss Avery, whose name came next to hers on the class-list, "and now you're going to live in Iowa and I'm going to Italy. The world is a big place, isn't it?" But Nita Reese thought it was surprisingly small when she found that Emily Davis was going to teach French in the little town where she lived, and Betty got a great deal of comfort from the fact that four other 19-- girls lived in Cleveland. "Though I can't believe it's really over," Betty confided to Bob. "I don't feel a bit like an alum." "That's because you still look just like a freshman," returned Bob, unfeelingly. "I'll bet you a trolley-ride to any place you choose that you'll be taken for one before you leave Harding." Sure enough Betty, hurrying across the campus a moment later to intercept the man who had promised to crate her desk and then never come for it, was stopped by a timid little sub-freshman with her hair in a braid, who inquired if she was going to take the "major French" examination, and did she know whether it came at eleven or twelve o'clock? "So we're all got to go off on a trolley-ride," shouted Bob jubilantly, and though Betty protested and called Helen to witness that she hadn't promised Bob any trolley-ride whatever, everybody agreed that they ought to have one last picnic somewhere before they separated. So they all hurried home to do what Katherine called "tall strides of work," and at four o'clock they were waiting, with tempting-looking bags and bundles tucked under their arms, for a car. "We'll take the first one that comes," Bob decided, "and go until we see a nice picnic-y place." Generally no one place would have pleased everybody, but to-day no one said a word against Bob's first choice,--a steep, breezy hillside, with a great thicket of mountain laurel in full bloom near the summit and a flat rock, shaded by a giant elm-tree, for a table. [Illustration: "LADIES, BEHOLD THE PRECEPTRESS OF THE KANKAKEE ACADEMY"] It was such a comical supper, for each girl had obeyed Bob's haphazard instructions to bring what she liked best. So Roberta had nothing but ginger-snaps and Babbie solemnly presented each guest with a bottle of olives. Madeline had brought strawberries with sugar to dip them in, and Helen, Betty and Eleanor discovered to their amazement that they had all chosen chocolate éclairs. "It's not a very substantial supper," said Madeliner "but we can stop at Cuyler's on our way back." "For a substantial ice," jeered Bob. "Who's hungry anyway after last night?" asked Nita. "I am," declared Eleanor. "They took away my salad before I was through with it, and K. stole my ice." "Well, you're growing fat," Katherine defended herself, "and you've got to save your lovely slenderness until after Mary's wedding. She'll tell everybody that you're the college beauty and you must live up to the reputation or we shall be undone." Katherine knew that she couldn't come on from Kankakee for that wedding, and Helen and Rachel knew that they couldn't either, though they lived nearer. And Madeline was sailing on Saturday for Italy, "to stay until daddy's paint-box runs out of Italian colors." But they didn't talk about those things at the picnic, nor on the swift ride home across the dark meadows, nor even at Cuyler's, which looked empty and deserted when they tramped noisily in and ordered their ices. "Everybody else is too busy to go on picnics," said Bob. "We always did know how to have the best kind of times," declared Babbie proudly. "Of course. Aren't we 'Merry Hearts'?" queried Babe. "Being nice to freaks was only half of being a 'Merry Heart.'" "_Why_, girls," cried Nita excitedly, "as long as we didn't give away the 'Merry Hearts,' we can go on being them, can't we?" "We couldn't stop if we tried," said Madeline. "Remember, girls, two is a 'Merry Hearts' quorum. Whenever two of us get together they can have a meeting." They said good-night with the emphasis strongly on the last syllable, and went at the neglected packing in earnest. Betty's train didn't go until nearly ten the next morning, but Helen left at nine and Madeline and Roberta ten minutes later, so there wouldn't be much time for anything but the good-byes, that, do what you might, could not be put off any longer. But after all they were gay good-byes. Helen Adams, to be sure, almost broke down When she kissed Betty and whispered, "Good-bye and thank you for everything." But the next minute they were both laughing at K.'s ridiculous old telescope bag. "It's a long rest and a good meal of oats the poor beastie shall have at the end of this trip," said Katherine. "Ladies, behold the preceptress of the Kankakee Academy. Father telegraphed me yesterday that I've got the place, and I hereby solemnly promise to buy a respectable suit-case out of my first month's salary." "Oh, you haven't any of you gone yet, have you?" asked Babbie Hildreth, hurrying up with Eleanor and Madeline. "You see Babe kept more things than she thought and it was too late to send for another packing-box, so she put them into a suit-case and a kit bag and a hat-box. And the carriage didn't come for us, so she tried to carry them all from the car, and of course she got stuck in the turn-stile. The girls are getting her out as fast as they can. They sent us on ahead to find you." Just as Helen's train pulled in Bob appeared with the rest of the "Merry Hearts" as escort and a small boy to help with her luggage; and they had a minute all together. "Well," said Madeline lightly, "we're starting out into the wide, wide world at last. I'll say it because I'm used to starting _off_ to queer places and I rather like it." "Here's hoping it's a jolly world for every one of us," said Rachel. "Here's to our next meeting," added Katherine. "Girls," said Betty solemnly, "I feel it in my bones that we are going to be together again some time. I don't mean just for a 19-- reunion, but for a good long time." "With me teaching in Boston," laughed Rachel. "And me teaching in Kankakee," put in Katherine proudly. "And Madeline in Italy, and the rest of you anywhere between New York and Denver," finished Rachel. "It doesn't look very probable." "It's going to happen though,--I'm sure of it," persisted Betty gaily. "Oh, I do just hope so," said little Helen Adams, stepping on board her train. "They say that what you want hard enough you'll get," said Madeline philosophically. "Come on, Shylock. Don't any of you forget to send me steamer letters." "Wait! we're going on that train too," cried Babe, clutching her parcels. "Babe can't make connections if we wait," explained Babbie. "And she'd get lonely going so far without us," added Bob. The four who were left stood where they could wave by turns at the two trains until both were out of sight. Then Betty caught her three oldest friends into a big, comprehensive hug. "After all," she said, "whether we ever get together or not, we've had this--four whole years of it, to remember all our lives. Now let's go and get one more strawberry ice before train-time." ----------------------------------------------------------------------- The Books in this Series are: BETTY WALES, FRESHMAN BETTY WALES, SOPHOMORE BETTY WALES, JUNIOR BETTY WALES, SENIOR BETTY WALES, B.A. BETTY WALES & CO. BETTY WALES ON THE CAMPUS BETTY WALES DECIDES 
40725	----	Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustration. See 40725-h.htm or 40725-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/40725/40725-h/40725-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/40725/40725-h.zip) [Illustration: _"Oh-h-h-h-e-e!" screamed Sim, "Oh, girls, look here!"_ (_Frontispiece_)] The Arden Blake Mystery Series THE ORCHARD SECRET by CLEO F. GARIS A. L. Burt Company Publishers New York Chicago _The Arden Blake Mystery Series_ BY CLEO F. GARIS The Orchard Secret Mystery of Jockey Hollow Missing at Marshlands Copyright, 1934, by A. L. Burt Company The Orchard Secret Printed in the United States of America Contents CHAPTER PAGE I The Warning 7 II Fruit-Cake 15 III Black Danger 25 IV The Reward Circular 38 V Rescued 52 VI Apple Hazing 62 VII Terror in the Dark 72 VIII A Tea Dance 82 IX The Disappearance of Sim 91 X What to Do 98 XI Sim 107 XII Midnight Mishap 115 XIII Aftermath 123 XIV The Dean Decides 129 XV The Alarm Bell 136 XVI Arden's Adventure 143 XVII In Danger 154 XVIII In Hiding 162 XIX Strange Talk 170 XX A Dire Threat 177 XXI A Bold Stroke 182 XXII Arden Admits It 190 XXIII The Injured Chaplain 196 XXIV The Dean Explains 203 XXV Arden Is Convinced 212 XXVI The Challenge 223 XXVII A Telegram 231 XXVIII A Disturbing Message 241 CHAPTER I The Warning For a few uncertain moments no one had spoken. The old flivver bumped over a little hill, and the girls seemed suddenly to realize they were entering upon that much anticipated new experience--college life. "It's lovely, isn't it!" exclaimed Arden Blake, resting her hand on Terry's shoulder. "Such beautiful pines--so tall and----" "Mysterious!" supplied Sim Westover, making a dive for her compact. "Thank you. I was about to say--stately," remarked Arden with assumed superciliousness. "And see the deer behind the bush, a stone deer, I suppose. But it's all so lovely!" "Lovely indeed," agreed Terry as she was apt to do with anything Arden said or did. "Don't you think so, Sim?" Sim, occupying most of the back seat of the rickety station car, felt differently about it and said so. Sim was that way. "It's all very well," she murmured, busy with her compact, "all very well, my good girls, but isn't it about time we got inside the college? After a train trip like the one we have just endured, I'll be glad to get my feet off Arden's suitcase. Wherever did you get such a big one, Arden?" "It was given to me when we all decided to come to Cedar Ridge. You'll wish it was yours when you see what's inside. Oh, look! That must be the swimming-pool building!" There could be no mistake about it as they could note when the harassed little flivver was slowly completing the half circle of the cinder drive which curved like a crescent moon in front of Cedar Ridge College, and was approaching a glass-roofed structure set somewhat apart from the other buildings. The roof was dome-shaped, and its glass panes, set in frames of copper which glinted in the rays of the red autumn sun, were thick and green like petrified ocean waves. As they rattled past the pool building they saw a wheelbarrow standing right in the pathway. Somehow that odd obstruction looked out of place near a natatorium, and Sim said so, adding: "I wonder what's the idea?" "Oh, they're probably just cleaning it out," suggested Arden. The cultivated rustic setting for the big gray stone structures made the whole scene picturesquely perfect, just as the prospectus had stated. But to the girls the college was also a little forbidding. Certainly there was nothing cozy about it--nothing inviting--and not every girl can boast the artist's taste. The buildings were solid and massive, as solid and dependable as the women instructors within who guided the four student years of "their girls." Besides the swimming pool, only the chapel, with its tall spire, caught the warm sunset glow and displayed it more lavishly. But that, of course, thought Arden, was because there was so much more glass, beautifully tinted, in the chapel windows. As the wheels of the car crunched the cinders, Arden hoped she hadn't been wrong in urging Terry and Sim to come to Cedar Ridge with her. They had come because of her urging. There was no doubt of this. Had it not been for the promise of swimming, implied by the beautiful picture of the pool in the college prospectus, Sim would, she said, have been content to stay at home in Pentville. As for Terry--where Arden went, there went Terry. They had been inseparable since the "baby grade" in Vincent Prep. The driver of the car, a typical country taxi-man, probably too well trained to talk unbidden to the students, pulled up suddenly as he neared a lane that curved around a big elm and wended its way toward a distant grove. "Down below there's th' orchard," he said hesitantly. "Ef I was you, I wouldn't go prowlin' around in it." He indicated a part of the extensive farm ground that was an inheritance of Cedar Ridge College--long rows of old gnarled trees, many of them now heavy with russet, red, golden, and yellow fruit. The orchard was separated from the eastern end of the dormitory building by a tall and tangled hedge but could be seen from the hill on which the building stood. "No, don't go down there," advised the driver as he let in the clutch. "Why?" came a surprised and gasping chorus. "Waal, queer things are said to happen down in that orchard. But don't ask me what!" he quickly cautioned. "I'm only hired to drive this tin Lizzie, an' I dassn't talk." Terry, who sat beside Arden, evinced a desire to put a question but thought better of it. The girls looked wonderingly at one another as the car speeded along. They were puzzled over this mysterious introduction to Cedar Ridge. For here was the college. That was no mystery but a solid fact. They were there! The flivver chugged on to the main entrance, and the girls alighted. As they reached the top of the massive stone steps, a young man, porter evidently, picked up their bags as the taxi-man slid them along to him and quickly led the way inside the portals. The very sight of a young man there, at this college for girls, even clad, as he was, in blue overalls, prompted a giggle. But Arden pinched Sim's arm and Sim didn't. Just inside the doorway, at a desk near which the young man set down the bags, sat a severe-looking woman in black with the judicious linen collar and cuffs. She waited with a pencil poised over a large sheet of paper. "I suppose this is where we are expected to register," murmured Arden. "Yes," agreed Terry, as usual. They gave their names to the severe woman, who permitted herself a frosty smile as she remarked: "Oh, yes, freshmen. You young ladies have all been assigned to the same room. Let me see." She consulted a list. "It is number 513 on the fifth floor of the main building." She made a note on the paper, and then, turning, addressed a distant shadowy corner, saying: "Miss Everett will show you where it is. You may go to your room now, and when you hear the bell you will come to the recreation hall, which you will pass on your way. Miss Everett!" she called sharply. A tall blonde girl came forward from the shadows, a little reluctantly, it appeared. Just why, neither Arden nor her two chums could imagine. They didn't even know, yet, who Miss Everett was. This stately blonde girl, however, took matters into her own hands with some show of authority. "Come this way, please," she said, addressing the three freshmen. They were a little uncertain whether or not to pick up their bags, now that the luggage had been brought into the building for them. But Miss Everett knew what to do. The young fellow in the clean suit of blue overalls could now be seen at the end of the corridor. He was apparently deeply interested in the outside view, for he stood squarely before a window and seemed oblivious of his humble duties. "Tom!" sharply called Miss Everett. At that the blue-clad man turned quickly and hurried toward the desk. "These bags to the fifth floor, Tom!" "Yes'm," he murmured. He kept his head bowed. Perhaps he still wanted to retain that vision of the apple orchard in which he had been so interested. For it was toward the orchard he had been looking, as Arden and her chums noted when they went down toward the window. They could see the strange gnarled trees over the top of the high dark hedge. "Fifth floor?" questioned Tom, the porter. He was also an assistant gardener, as the girls later learned. "Room 513," added the woman at the desk. "Yes'm." Arden thought she saw a little smile playing over the face of the good-looking young man as he started off ahead of the three freshmen, led by the stately Miss Everett. The porter was evidently going to a service elevator, as he passed out through a side door and was then lost to sight, with the bags he carried so efficiently, all three of them, and not small, either. Arden, Terry, and Sim, following Miss Everett, started up the brown polished stairs that reared skyward at the back of the large entrance hall. Up and up and up they walked. All the landings and halls looked exactly alike, and the freshmen wondered how their guide retained her sense of direction and maintained the count. Halfway up Terry murmured to Arden: "Do you think there was anything in what he said?" "Who said?" "The taxi-man who drove us here from the station." "About what?" "The orchard. You know he warned us to keep away from it. And if there is something terrible or scary about an orchard so near the college, why, I'm going----" "You're going to keep right on walking up!" interrupted Arden with her usual clear-headedness in a critical situation. "If there's any mystery here at Cedar Ridge we'll have the time of our lives solving it. But I don't believe there is. That orchard is no different from any other, except, from what little we saw of it, there seemed to be some fine apples there. Now don't go making mountains out of the camel in the eye of the needle, or something like that." "Oh, all right," said Terry meekly. "But I was thinking----" "This is no time to think!" came from Sim. "Use your legs! Whew! Five flights! Is your room this high up, Miss Everett?" "No, I'm a sophomore. I'm a floor lower than you are. But this is the fourth time I've taken freshies up here today. I don't see why they have to pick on me!" "Oh, this is too bad!" exclaimed Sim impulsively. "Perhaps if you could have a swim in the pool before dinner tonight you wouldn't feel so tired." To Sim a dive into a pool with sea-green tiles on the bottom was a cure-all and she recommended it at every opportunity. "Try a swim," she urged. Miss Everett came to a sudden stop on a landing and laughed in a manner that could be described only as cynical. "Listen, freshie!" she exclaimed, "let me tell you something about that pool!" The three girls looked at their guide apprehensively. Was there something mysterious about the pool, as the taxi-man had intimated there was about the orchard? CHAPTER II Fruit-Cake Waiting, with the deference they, as freshmen, guessed was due a sophomore, Arden, Terry, and Sim looked at Miss Everett. There was a smile on her lips, but there was no mirth in her words as she went on. "There's nobody in the world who could have a swim in that pool!" said the tall blonde girl, and one could only surmise whether there was exultation or vindictiveness in her tones. "A swim in that pool! Don't make me laugh! Why, Tiddy, our revered head, uses it as a storehouse for cabbages, potatoes, and turnips that come out of the college garden. Swimming pool--ha!" "Then that accounts for the wheelbarrow," murmured Sim in a strained voice. "Wheelbarrow? Oh, yes," said Miss Everett. "They cart the cabbages, potatoes, and turnips to the pool in the wheelbarrow." "And apples?" asked Arden who, as were her chums, had been taken somewhat aback by this information. Yet Arden couldn't help mentioning apples. She remembered the orchard, about which the taxi-man had so mysteriously hinted and toward which Tom, the porter, had been gazing so steadfastly. What was in the orchard, anyhow? Arden Blake wondered while she waited for the tall blonde girl's reply. "Yes, apples in season," granted Miss Everett. "There's a big orchard here, a fine orchard, as orchards go, I suppose, though, really, I don't know much about them. But we have a crabbed old college farmer who seems well up in that work. And there's Tom." "Where?" asked Terry for she saw no signs of the good-looking young fellow in blue overalls. "Oh, I don't mean he's here now," Miss Everett made haste to reply, with somewhat more interest in her voice. "But he too seems fascinated by our orchard. He seems to know a lot about apples. Yes, they'll store some in the swimming pool, but mostly potatoes, cabbages, and turnips go in there for the winter. I hope you freshies will like vegetables, because you're going to get plenty of them here." "But what in the world is the matter with the swimming pool that they have to store vegetables in it?" asked Sim as they walked down a gloomy corridor. Arden felt her heart sinking. She dared not look at Sim. "What _isn't_ the matter with it?" sneered Miss Everett. "The pump is broken, the concrete walls are full of cracks, the tile bottom is broken in several places so that it won't hold water, and half the edge is gone on one side. It hasn't been kept in service for two years, I imagine." "Why?" asked Sim sharply. "No money. The depression--and other things, I suppose," answered the blonde guide. "And then, too, nobody here, that I know, goes in much for swimming. It isn't my line, I'm sure." Arden ventured to glance at Sim, who at that moment raised her eyebrows with rather a breathless gesture and pushed her smart sport hat back on her head. But Sim did not further pursue the matter then. "Here's the recreation hall for your floor." Miss Everett indicated a large bare room, the broad doors of which were partly open. "And down this way," she went on, "is your room. You're free to do what you like until you hear the bell, and then you're to report in the hall. Hazing," she added ominously, "doesn't begin until next week." "Thank you for bringing us up here," the three chorused as they turned toward No. 513. But the tired sophomore had already vanished down the dusky corridor. For a few moments Arden, Sim, and Terry were too bewildered to speak as they entered their room. Silently they noted that their bags were already there. Tom must have ridden up with them on some sort of an elevator to arrive ahead of the girls. It was a long narrow room with three beds in a row, two on one side of the door and one on the other. There were three bureaus against the opposite wall, and there were three windows, close together, at one end of the apartment. A most attractive and home-like feature was a window seat extending beneath the three casements. Three desks and a small bookcase completed the furnishings. "Thank goodness, there's a large closet for our clothes!" exclaimed Sim, opening the door to disclose it. "I think it's lovely here," murmured Terry. Arden went to the windows and looked out through the gathering dusk. She saw down below, and a far distance it seemed, the cinder circle of the drive with a fountain in the center. On a little plot of grass was the stone deer gazing, in a surprised manner, Arden thought, across the campus toward the railroad tracks. Somewhere to the south of Pentville--and home--for all three freshmen. Just about this time the lights were being turned on. The respective fathers would be shaking out their evening papers and the respective mothers would be seeing to it that the dinners weren't late. With a start Arden turned away from the windows. She wasn't getting homesick, was she, so soon? She who had urged the others to come to Cedar Ridge! A typical freshman trick! But no! Sim and Terry seemed all right. Terry was combing her sandy hair, and Sim was rummaging in her suitcase. Not the prettiest of the three, Sim Westover had something about her that left a clear impression which could be remembered afterward. Her eyes, large and sparkling, were sea-gray in color, with long, dark-brown lashes. It was fitting that Sim's eyes should, somehow, be of a sea tint, for since she was a little girl she had spent all her summers at the shore, and she reveled in surf-bathing and swimming in deep water. Sim made no secret of the fact that some day she was going to be a champion swimmer and diver. That, perhaps, was why she had so readily agreed to Arden's proposal to come to Cedar Ridge when she saw the picture of the swimming pool in the prospectus. And that was why Sim was going to be so bitterly disappointed because the pool was out of use. A storage place for vegetables. Poor Sim! Terry considered herself the luckiest in her family, for all her sisters had straw-colored brows and lashes that are often seen with reddish hair. Tall and muscular was Terry, and she had fine eyes with brown lashes and brows. She played tennis and golf, rode, and was a good swimmer, though, as she admitted, not as "crazy" about it as was Sim. Sim was different. She was small, light-haired, and round of face. She was afraid that some day she would be fat. Perhaps that was why she paid so much attention to water sports. Arden smoothed her dark, softly curling hair, turned her blue eyes away from the window view that was fast being obscured by the darkness outside, and said: "Choose whichever beds you girls want. I'll take the one you leave. And about the pool----" "About the pool!" interrupted Sim. "I came here because of that, and now it might as well not be here. I thought it was queer they'd leave a wheelbarrow at the entrance. It couldn't be used in first-aid rescues; I knew that!" She was almost sneering now, like Miss Everett. "Oh, but Sim!" burst out Arden. "The pool will be fixed. They've just got to fix it! We'll have it repaired. If it's a little money they need, we'll get that, somehow. If you two will help----" "Of course we'll help," Terry was quick to offer. "But you'll never get the money! How can you?" "I don't know, Terry, but there'll be a way, I'm sure." With a gayety she did not feel, Arden stood on her large suitcase, raised one hand as though drinking a toast, and exclaimed: "To the pool! May it never be a pool of tears!" "Oh, my word!" gasped Terry. "My word, Arden Blake! Get off that suitcase! You must be standing right on the fruit-cake!" "Fruit-cake!" echoed Sim. "Is there a fruit-cake? If there is, Arden, get off it! For if some of the stories the old grads tell are true, we'll be mighty glad to have that fruit-cake before long." "Don't get excited, my pets!" mocked Arden, lightly descending. "It's Terry's cake, but she didn't have room for it in her bag so I packed it in mine. But it's in a tin box. So you shall have your cake and also your swimming pool, Sim, my dear!" Smiling, Arden opened the suitcase and took out a gold and red tin box which she set in the center of the middle bureau. With the electrics switched on, the red and gold box gave a high light to the room, a fact to which Terry immediately called attention. She added: "As soon as we can go to town we must get spreads for the beds and covers to match for the bureaus. And I'll have my globe sent up from home. I always think a globe makes a room look as though it were inhabited by a student. And perhaps a lamp with a green shade. Oh, do let's hurry and unpack!" Terry was almost breathless, but her eyes were shining and Arden, who was beginning to worry over the responsibility she had assumed in urging her chums to come to Cedar Ridge, felt she would not have to be concerned for Terry, at least. "I'll take the bed nearest the door, as you know I'm apt to be a 'leetle-mite' slow," drawled Terry. "You take the one nearest the window, Arden. Then you can look up at the stars." Sim laughed and said: "I'll take the middle bed so----" "So you can be the meat in the sandwich, little one!" interrupted Terry. "I'm not so little, Terry Landry! It's just because you're such a giantess!" declared Sim indignantly. "Stop teasing her, Terry! It'll soon be time to go to the Hall, and we haven't so much as washed our faces. Besides----" Before Arden could finish her speech, the sort Terry called "Arden's good-will talk," there sounded a loud knock on the door. Without waiting to be invited, Toots Everett, the tall blonde guide, entered with two other girls. "Stand at attention, freshies!" Toots loudly commanded. "I am Miss Everett. The girl on my right is Miss Darglan and on my left Miss MacGovern. We three have picked you three to haze, when the proper time comes. I'll take the red-head, Jessica," she said to the girl on her right. "I'll take the baby," decided the sophomore called Jessica. "That leaves the black-haired goddess for you, Pip. Don't be too hard with her," she mocked. "She looks as if she had led a sheltered life." "But," began Sim, "we don't----" "We'll do the talking," interrupted Miss Everett coldly. "You girls will report to us every day after classes, for a while. Your time is, henceforth, our time. We hope you have good constitutions. Our room is 416 on the floor below. See that you keep it in good order!" "Oh, my friends, look!" suddenly exclaimed Pip MacGovern, indicating the fruit-cake in plain sight. "A goodie from home that we must not overlook. It is also to be hoped that you freshies brought a tea set and the wherewithals to go with it." "Yes," timidly admitted Terry, "we have----" She was interrupted by a surreptitious kick from Sim. "Good!" declared Toots. "I can see where you three will be very useful to us!" she exulted. "Does anyone care for a piece of cake?" she asked her chums. "Sometimes our dinners here leave much to be desired." She walked with exaggerated undulations toward the bureau, like a model showing a new gown, removed the red and gold cover from the box and sniffed appreciatively. Having no knife, Toots took the cake in both hands and was about to break it as a boy breaks an apple when---- Clang-clang! Clang-clang! Clang-clang! Clang-clang! Clang-clang! An insistent bell, so close to their door that it startled the three freshmen, rang loudly. Arden, Sim, and Terry moved closer together as if for protection. "What's that?" gasped Terry. "Fire?" "No, Brighteyes," mocked Toots. "That's the five-five-five. The bell calling us to listen, most humbly, to Tiddy's welcome-home speech. Your fruit-cake is saved, for the time being. But our time will come!" Whereupon Toots, followed by her fellow hazers, stalked out of the room, leaving Arden, Sim, and Terry staring wonderingly after them. "I--I think," murmured Terry, "that perhaps the bell was also meant for us." "Yes," agreed Sim, "it probably was. Well, here's where we go in off the deep end!" As the three freshmen hastily made ready to attend in the recreation hall, and as the black gloom of night settled down over Cedar Ridge College, out in the old apple orchard a young man in blue overalls wandered beneath the gnarled trees. He looked toward the brightly lighted windows of the recreation hall and then, with a quizzical smile on his bronzed face, while he stroked his mustache, he glanced toward the broken swimming pool and walked softly away through the rows of fruit-laden branches. CHAPTER III Black Danger Rather timid, diffident, and certainly not as self-confident as they had been when the sneering sophomores had invaded their room, Arden, Terry, and Sim stood looking at one another outside the hall. Finally Arden broke the portentous silence by saying: "Well, I suppose we had better go in." "No help for it," voiced Sim. "Oh, it may not be as bad as we think," consoled Terry. "It's like going in for a swim the first day of the season. The first is always the worst." "Don't talk to me about dives and swimming!" snapped Sim. "I'm cheated, and I resent it!" "Oh, Sim!" murmured Arden helplessly. "I don't mean you, my dear. It's just hard times and whoever is responsible for storing vegetables in the pool that I'm sore against!" "Well, come on!" urged Terry. "Let's get it over with." With hearts momentarily beating faster, the three stepped into the recreation hall on their floor. It was a big room that was rapidly filling with girls, girls, and more girls. "Just group yourselves about, young ladies. I shall not detain you very long," said Miss Tidbury Anklon, the dean, with a half smile as she stood teetering upon her toes on the platform at the end of the room. Miss Anklon was a small woman, dark of complexion, and thin. This intermittent raising of herself on her toes as she talked seemed to be an effort to make herself taller and more impressive. Her severity and keen words at times, however, made her sufficiently respected and not a little feared. She was now trying to bring about some semblance of order in the inevitable chaos of the first assembly of new pupils. "Quiet, please!" Miss Anklon tapped her knuckles on a convenient table. "There are a few things I must explain to you freshmen girls on your first night in Cedar Ridge." But, in spite of her promise, the dean did keep them rather long, until Sim found herself standing first on one foot and then on the other. Arden leaned quite frankly on Terry, who in turn rested herself against the nearest wall. It hadn't seemed worth while to sit down at first. Now it was too late to take chairs. The dean generalized. The freshmen must always "sign in and out" when leaving the college grounds and returning. They would find the registry book in the lower vestibule hall. They might go to town, if the time of their classes would permit. But if in going to town a class period was missed, the offending ones would be "campused" for a week. "Not allowed to leave the college precincts," Miss Anklon took pains to translate. Arden, her chums, and the others were told of the "honor system," of "upper classmen" and "lower classmen," and of rules and regulations, until many of the girls began to wonder how they could possibly remember it all. One thing was deeply impressed upon them. Here, at Cedar Ridge, they were, for the time being, freshmen. However great had been their standing at their local high or preparatory schools, now they were the lowest of the low. The dean didn't say that in so many words, but this was the impression she created. Miss Anklon, "Tiddy" to the initiated, implied that as far as instructions along those lines went, the sophomores would not be long in making such matters clear to the freshmen. But it was all to be taken in a sporting manner and in the end would do much to cement friendships and foster school spirit, smiled Tiddy. Terry was busy looking about the room, selecting girls who, she thought, looked like her friends at home. Arden was wondering what Sim was going to do now that there was no pool, and Sim, while also looking about, was debating with herself just how much the loss of the swimming she had counted on was going to mean to her. Arden Blake, Theodosia (Terry) Landry and Bernice (Sim) Westover had been chums through their primary, grammar, and Vincent Prep days. Their friendships began very early, when all three, living near one another in the small city of Pentville, found themselves in the same class. Their association was further cemented when all three graduated at the same time from Vincent, which was an unofficial "feeder" for Cedar Ridge College. Addison Blake, the father of Arden, was a prosperous automobile dealer in Pentville. Terry was the daughter of Mrs. Nelson Landry, a widow with a fairly good income even through the depression. Sim had for her parents Mr. and Mrs. Benson Westover. Mr. Westover owned a large department store, with branches in several cities. Mr. Westover had wanted a boy and his wife a girl, when the daughter was born, and Sim's nickname was a combination of She and Him. It fitted her perfectly. She was clever and popular in the trio and outside of it, more especially as she was in a position to obtain from the grocery department in her father's store many good things to eat--food more or less forbidden at surreptitious school feasts. "There's Mary Todd," whispered Arden as the talk of the dean was obviously drawing to a close. "Yes, and Ethel Anderson and Jane Randall," added Sim. These were three other girls from Vincent, but they lived in a New York suburb. They were friends with but not exactly chums of Arden and her two close companions. They had not made up their minds to come to Cedar Ridge until after the three inseparables had made their announcement. "Now, my dear young ladies," Miss Anklon finally concluded, "you will go to the dining room and be assigned your tables for the term." Instantly a flood of conversation was loosed. Arden and Sim clung together, and Terry, who had been momentarily separated from them, pushed her way through a throng of strange girls to reach her two friends. Dean Anklon led the way, and all the freshmen followed down the five dark flights of stairs to the large dining room that was brilliantly lighted. At the door the dean was called aside by one of the teachers, and the bewildered freshies, swarming in, were left huddled together like a troop of new soldiers whose commander had deserted them. Terry, at this point, took matters into her own hands, and, motioning to her chums to follow, selected a chair at a pleasant table about halfway down the length of the dining room and near a window. Some other freshies followed the lead of the more bold three, and the chairs were all quickly filled. Terry looked at Arden, obviously well pleased with herself at so soon having become a class leader. Her joy was short-lived, however. A none too gentle tap on her shoulder caused her to look up. "You freshies! What do you mean by sitting at our table?" It was Toots Everett, with Jessica Darglan and Priscilla MacGovern standing behind her. All were glaring at the offending freshmen. "A pretty good start, I must say!" sneered Jessica. "Your table is down there!" Dramatically she pointed to the far-distant lower end of the room. "Go down there," Priscilla said a little more gently. "You know you freshmen will have to think, now that you are in college. I'm afraid this means, for you three, the picking of lots of apples." Without a word, but deeply humiliated, the freshmen all rose and followed the lead of Terry, Arden, and Sim to their own proper table. Other freshmen, who had not made this social error, as well as the assembled sophomores, juniors and seniors, looked on, smiling. "What did she mean--picking a lot of apples?" whispered Arden. "How do I know?" gasped Sim. "Oh, is my face red!" The three and the other freshmen quickly seated themselves in the proper chairs, and a chatter of conversation, more or less coherent, began. Most of the girls were strangers among strangers, but, realizing that they were all under the same roof and would be for some time to come, they soon began talking together, introducing themselves and a friendly spirit was quickly engendered. "Oh, Arden! What a dreadful thing to do!" gasped Terry. "Wouldn't you know I'd start something like that!" She was greatly embarrassed. "It's all right, Terry," soothed Arden. "If only, though, it didn't have to be our own particular sophomores whose seats we took." "Our fruit-cake hasn't a chance now, and I'm afraid we shall be really well hazed," said Sim as she looked sadly at Terry. Then she glanced down at her plate, adding: "This cold ham with sliced tomatoes doesn't help to raise my spirits any. Poor fruit-cake! Not a chance!" "Yes, it has a chance, Sim!" excitedly whispered Terry. "I have an idea! If that fruit-cake is to be eaten we had best do it ourselves. There are twelve of us at this table. I'm afraid it doesn't mean much cake each, but we must stick together in times like these." "What is it, Terry? What are you going to do?" Sim wanted to know. "Now, just listen, and you'll find out." Getting the attention of the other girls at the table, Terry continued in a tragic whisper: "As soon as you can, after we three leave, all of you here come to our room. It's 513." She indicated Arden and Sim with herself. "Knock twice, a pause--another knock. Those sophs will never taste that fruit-cake!" "It's a grand idea!" declared Arden. After this, amid bubbling talk, the meal was quickly finished. The students began filing out of the dining hall. Old friends greeted one another with open arms and in a surprisingly short time most of the talking, laughing groups had disappeared into various rooms where, behind closed doors, they still talked and talked and talked. Arden, Sim, and Terry hurried to 513 to get it ready for visitors. It was not long before the first "tap-tap--tap," sounded and the first visitors were admitted. Others followed until the window seat and the beds, to say nothing of the chairs, were all much sat upon until, as Sim whispered to Arden, it was almost necessary to put out a sign of S. R. O. The fruit-cake was brought out from hiding, was much admired, and then went the way of all good fruit-cakes; a nail file being used to cut it into slices, and handkerchiefs serving as plates. In the intervals of eating, the girls found out much about one another and vowed to stick together during the hazing, the prospects of which had really frightened some. Voices rose hilariously higher and higher, and laughter became more frequent. They were having a fine time. It was good to be thus sitting around in a college room, talking to interesting girls, thought Arden and her two chums, and planning future fun. Studies were momentarily pushed into the mental background. Now and again someone would inquire about "math" or "English lit." Girls whose older sisters had been to Cedar Ridge before them were somewhat well informed as to which of the instructors were "easy" and those for whom students must really make adequate preparation. "I don't worry much about English lit, though," Arden remarked, brushing crumbs from her lap. "But math I'll never get through. I just can't do it!" "Math is easy for me," declared Mary Todd, a really lovely-looking girl, wearing a simple, well-cut sports dress of the "shirtmaker" type. "I'll help you, Arden." "Thanks a lot, Mary," Arden responded gratefully. "I have to study hard for everything," lamented Sim. "I'm not a bit clever that way." "Well," began Terry, "I think----" But she never had a chance to say what she thought. Suddenly, before any of the convivial little party realized what was happening, the door of 513 was pushed open and the "Terrible Three," as Arden later nicknamed them, stood within the room. "What's this? Freshmen meeting in your room, Miss Blake!" Toots Everett was very stern. "You girls who don't belong here will go at once to your own rooms and don't do any more of this visiting. Jessica, confiscate the fruit-cake!" Jessica made a noble attempt, but there was no fruit-cake. The red and gold box was empty. All that remained were a few crumbs for the mice. Arden smiled sweetly at Pips MacGovern, Terry was grinning most enjoyably, and Sim's round eyes outdid themselves in roundness. The offending freshmen quickly vanished to their own rooms, while the three sophomores were speechless with indignation. Toots finally found her voice to say frostily: "This is the third time we have met, Miss Westover, Miss Blake and Miss Landry. This meeting is somewhat to your advantage. But we sophomores will not forget. You three will report to me, Miss Everett, in my room tomorrow after classes. The program has been changed. Hazing will begin officially tomorrow!" Waiting an ominous moment to see if the threatening words had any actual effect, the three sophomores then silently left the room. "Well, that's that!" remarked Sim. "Wasn't she dreadful!" murmured Terry. "It's going to be fun, girls!" Arden exclaimed. "I'm not a bit afraid of being hazed. Now, let's unpack the rest of our things, and then we must write some letters home. They will all be so anxious to know what happened on our first day at Cedar Ridge." "Such a lot has happened," murmured Sim, looking doubtful. "I'm afraid we haven't exactly endeared ourselves to those sophs." "Who cares?" laughed Terry. "After hazing is over they'll be our good friends," declared Arden. "It's part of their stock in trade to seem very gruff and terrible now, but we needn't worry about that. Let's get at our letters. You'll have to lend me something to write on, Sim. I don't seem to have any paper in my suitcase. There's some in my trunk. I suppose that'll be up tomorrow." "I expected this, Arden," Sim laughed. "I brought some extra stationery for you. See that you write your mother a nice long letter. No more ten-word telegrams." The room was soon quiet except for the scratching of pens on paper. It was very serene around Cedar Ridge College now, and quiet in the farm and orchard grounds that formed part of the old estate which had been transformed into a seat of learning. The girls had been told that night letters might be placed on a table at the end of their corridor, whence they would be taken up by one of the porters or janitors in time for the early morning mail. "Well, I've finished!" said Terry, sealing her last envelope. "So have I," said Arden. "Let's take them out and leave them on the table," suggested Sim. "The folks will get them tomorrow night." As the three walked down the dimly lighted corridor, they saw two other freshmen going back to their room after having deposited their mail on the table over which glowed a small light. This table was at the end of the corridor nearest the old apple orchard, which formed part of the college farm. The girls had heard something of the college farm, and there had been a veiled threat that the freshmen had to gather apples for their sophomore hazers. The big window in the corridor was open. And as Arden and her two chums dropped their letters upon the table they thrust their heads out for a breath of the fresh night air. "I wonder what sort of apples grow in that orchard?" mused Sim. "They must be very choice," suggested Arden. "How do you know?" asked Terry. "Don't you remember, that good-looking porter with the cute little mustache who took up our bags, was gazing so soulfully out of the window into this same orchard?" suggested Arden. "There was such a queer, rapt look on his face, I'm sure, though I could see only the back of his head." "Oh, my word!" mocked Sim. "Aren't we getting poetical and humorous all of a sudden!" "Hark!" cautioned Terry in a whisper. From the dark orchard below them and to the northeast of the college building sounded a cry of alarm and fright floating through the murky blackness. It was a cry as if someone was in danger. "Oh!" gasped Sim. "Whatever was that?" Then, with one accord, she and her chums ran back to their room and closed the door but did not lock it. For it was against the rules of Cedar Ridge to lock bedroom doors. Miss Anklon had impressed this on the freshmen. Terry, however, insisted on dragging a chair against the portal, bracing the back of it under the knob so it would be difficult to gain access. The three girls gazed at one another with fear in their eyes. Was there danger abroad in the blackness of the night? CHAPTER IV The Reward Circular "What could that have been?" gasped Terry, sinking on her bed. "Then you heard it, too?" asked Arden. "Of course! We all heard it!" declared Sim. "A shout or groan in that dark orchard as if someone were suffering. Do you think there could have been a fight among the help? You know they have a resident farmer here at Cedar Ridge and several laborers. They might have had a bout--or something." Suddenly all three burst out laughing. They couldn't help it. The looks on their faces were so queerly tragic. And Terry said: "I think we're making a lot out of nothing. Probably what happened was that a porter--the blue-eyed porter--was trying to lug in some faculty baggage the back way and it fell on his toes." "Well, whatever it was, don't let's go spreading scandal around the college so early in the term," warned Arden. "We must keep the secret of the orchard to ourselves--if there is a secret." "Guess we'll have to," yawned Sim. "For who knows what the secret is?" "That taxi-man seemed to hint at something," murmured Terry. "Oh--bosh!" exploded Arden. "I guess we're all just worked up and nervous because this is our first night and we've had to stand a lot of annoyance so soon--those sophs and all that." "Well spoken, my brave girl!" declaimed Sim. "Let's forget it." It was this thought which gradually quieted the palpitating hearts and the excited breathing of the three. After they had listened, more or less cowering on their beds, and heard no sounds of any general alarm, they finally prepared to retire for their first night at Cedar Ridge. "After all," said Terry, "it may have been some skylarking boys trying to steal the college apples." "Maybe," agreed Sim. "It didn't sound like boys to me," declared Arden. "It was more like a man's shout." "Well, we don't need to worry about it," went on Terry. "But if those snobby sophs think we're going in that orchard in the dark, after what we just heard, to get apples for them, they can have my resignation." "And mine!" echoed her chums. Sleep was actually in prospect, and final yawns had been stifled when a scratching in one corner of the room aroused the tired girls. "We must get a trap for those mice," Terry sleepily murmured. "I suppose they smell the fruit-cake crumbs." "All very well to trap 'em," chuckled Sim, "but who's going to take 'em out of the trap after they're caught or strangled to death?" "Oh, stop!" pleaded Arden. "Let the poor mice have the crumbs. Maybe they need them." Which seemed sound advice well given. The morning of a new day dawned bright and cool. Fall had only lately checked the glories of summer, and the heavily clumped shrubbery about the college seemed strong enough to withstand many wintry blasts before giving up its well-earned beauty. "Oh, look, girls!" exclaimed Arden, first of the trio out in the corridor ready for breakfast. She pointed a slim finger, well manicured, at the table near the end of the passage. "What?" asked Sim. "Has the orchard noise of last night materialized?" "No. But they didn't collect our letters for the mail," said Terry. "Something must be wrong with the system," spoke Sim. "Though it isn't to be wondered at, in the confusion of opening night. But can't we take them ourselves and drop them into the post office after breakfast? The office is just off the college grounds across the railroad tracks. Can't we do that?" "I don't see why not," reasoned Arden. Breakfast was rather a cold and grim meal compared to the excitement of the supper the night before. It was finally eaten, however, and then, it being too early for any classes yet and no orders having been issued about chapel attendance, the three from room 513 started for the little post office outside the college grounds. Arden looked completely happy. Surroundings were so important to her. Wearing a light wool dress, dull blue in color and with most comfortable walking shoes on, she urged her chums forward. All of the girls were simply dressed. In keeping with the traditions at Cedar Ridge, hats gave place to mortar-boards and, even in freezing weather, they would be donned with a gay defiance of winter winds. "Come on, girls!" Arden was excited. "I must be at Bordmust Hall at nine. My adviser is going to help me arrange my schedule of classes. I hope we can get together at least on a few." "We all have to be there," said Terry, adding with a sigh: "I suppose I'll have an eight-thirty class every day, worse luck!" Morning sleep was so good. "Oh, swimming pool!" chanted Sim as they passed the building now turned to so base a use as that of a vegetable cellar. "When first I saw thee----" "Have patience!" interrupted Arden. "Look who's coming this way!" A white-haired old gentleman, clad somberly in black, was slowly approaching along the path that led from the front campus down to the railroad tracks and across to the post office. His hands were clasped behind his back and, with head bent down, he seemed to observe only the ground at his feet. "Who is he?" whispered Sim. "He must be Rev. Henry Bordmust, the resident chaplain here. Shall we speak--or just bow respectfully?" Terry looked to Arden for advice. "I don't believe he even sees us. He looks as though he were thinking deeply. Let's wait and see if he speaks to us." After this advice, Arden stepped a little in advance of her two chums to invite the clergyman's attention. The daydreaming chaplain had met and was passing the girls now; still without a sign of recognition. But he was saying something--muttering to himself as old men often do. The girls overheard a few words. "Dear, dear! The orchard! The old orchard!" he murmured. Mentally he seemed to be wringing his hands in real distress. "Why doesn't he come out of it?" Rev. Henry Bordmust sighed and passed the freshmen, his eyes still on the path at his feet, as oblivious of the trio as if it did not exist. "Did you hear that?" mumbled Terry as they walked on. "He was talking about the orchard--where we heard the noise last night," spoke Sim. "What can he mean?" "I heard one of the seniors talking about him," volunteered Arden. "He is said to be--queer--says things no one can understand. And he often gives the girls awful scoldings over nothing--and sometimes asks you in to have tea with him, most unexpectedly." "Well, I wish he'd invite us in to tea this afternoon," murmured Sim with new energy. "And I wish he'd explain what he means about someone coming out of the orchard. I hope that weird noise doesn't play any tricks tonight." "Oh, perhaps we misunderstood him," suggested Terry. "The chaplain can't know anything about a mysterious noise in our college apple orchard." "Hardly," agreed Sim. "Well, he certainly never saw us. I don't believe I'd like to have tea with him." "Oh, I think he looks sweet," declared Arden. "Then you won't need sugar in your tea," laughed Terry. "But let's hurry and mail these letters. It would never do to be late for our first class." They had reached the tracks of the Delawanna Railroad, the line that ran from New York to Morrisville, the small city nearest the college. From force of habit the girls stopped and looked up and down the rails for the possible approach of a train. Soon they would know when each one was expected. It was a tradition that by the time one was a senior at Cedar Ridge no watch was necessary, so familiar did the students become with the passage of the trains. The post office was a small one-roomed building with a stove in the center. Two windows, one for the sale of stamps and the other for the mailing of parcels, broke the stretch of tiers of glass-fronted boxes behind which the business was carried on. For the post office served the town as well as the college. The side walls were literally papered with police posters offering rewards for the arrest, or information leading to the arrest or apprehension, of various persons--criminals--men and women. The posters were from the police departments of several cities, New York among them. Many of the placards were adorned with profiles and front views of the oddest faces the girls had ever seen. "Oh, for the love of stamps!" gasped Arden when they had dropped their letters in the slot and were looking at the posters. "What nightmares!" "Aren't they awful!" agreed Terry. "Not a good-looking man among them," was Sim's opinion. "I've heard about these posters. They've been here, some of them, for I don't know how long. It's a sort of a game among the girls to see who can find the funniest face." "Let's try it," suggested Arden, laughing. Suddenly she ceased her mirth and stood as if fascinated in front of a poster showing the full-face picture of a young man. He was rather good-looking and quite an exception to the other portraits so publicly displayed. His face, like most of the others, was smooth, unadorned by beard or mustache. "Terry!" impulsively exclaimed Arden. "Look! Haven't you seen that face before?" Terry considered carefully before slowly answering: "No, I don't believe I have. It isn't a bad face, though." "Rather interesting," agreed Sim. "What's he wanted for, murder or bank robbery?" "Neither," answered Arden. "Listen." She read from the poster: "One thousand dollars reward for information as to the whereabouts of Harry Pangborn." Then followed a general description, the age being given as twenty-three, and there was added the statement that the young man had suddenly disappeared from his home on the estate of his grandfather, Remington Pangborn, on Long Island. Part of the poster consisted of a statement from the attorneys of Remington Pangborn--the _late_ Mr. Pangborn, it was made plain. "Harry Pangborn," the statement read, "is not wanted on any criminal charge whatever. He disappeared from his friends and his usual haunts merely, it is surmised, because he was expected to assume the duties and responsibilities of the large estate he was about to inherit from his grandfather. It is understood that he stated he did not want the inheritance just yet. Of a high-strung and nervous temperament, Mr. Pangborn is believed to have gone away because the responsibilities of wealth are distasteful to him and also, perhaps, because he seeks adventure, of which he is very fond. If this meets his eye or if anyone can convey to him the information that he will be permitted to assume as much or as little of the estate as he wishes, a great service will have been done. All that is desired is that Harry Pangborn will return to his friends and relatives as soon as possible. His hasty action will be overlooked. It is rumored that Mr. Pangborn may be in the vicinity of Morrisville, though he may have gone abroad, as he was fond of foreign travel. "Information and claims for the above reward may be sent to Riker & Tabcorn, Attorneys, New York City, or to the local police department in the municipality where this poster is displayed." The girls, crowding about Arden, read the poster with her. Then Sim said: "Maybe it was in the movies that you saw someone who reminds you of him, Arden. Harry Pangborn isn't bad looking, compared to all the others." With a sweeping gesture she indicated the various poster exhibits. "Why, he's positively handsome when you put him alongside of Dead-eye Dick, here," laughed Terry. "As for Two-gun Bobbie----" "I'm serious, girls," interrupted Arden. "I'm sure I've seen this young man somewhere before. Now, if we could only locate him or tell the lawyers where to look for him and get this reward money, wouldn't it be just wonderful?" "Grand!" agreed Terry. "But wake up, my dear. You're dreaming!" "And I've just thought of something else!" went on Arden, oblivious of the banter. "What?" "If we did collect this money we could donate it to the college to have the swimming pool repaired." "That's sweet of you and a good idea, Arden, but I don't believe we could do it," objected Sim. "Besides, I don't exactly believe what it says on this poster. It seems very silly for a young fellow to disappear just when he's coming into a lot of money--a fortune." "Perhaps he was made to disappear," suggested Terry, her eyes opening wide. "Oh! You mean--kidnaped?" asked Arden. "Yes." "Worse and more of it!" laughed Sim. "Well, anyhow, we could try, couldn't we?" Arden asked. "You'd help, wouldn't you, Terry?" "Yes, indeed I'll help. I've always fancied myself in the rôle of a detective, spouting pithy Chinese philosophy and generally getting underfoot." "Now, Terry, just be serious for once. And Sim, you also. You know how disappointed you were when you found out the swimming pool was----" "_Kapoot!_" chuckled Sim, supplying Arden's evident lack of a word with the latest Russian expression. "Go on!" "Well," resumed Arden, pouting a little, "you never can tell. Maybe we could do it. It isn't impossible. Stranger things have happened. And I just know I've seen that young man on the poster somewhere before. If I could only remember where! Did either of you ever have that feeling?" "Lots of times. I'm for you, Arden!" declared Sim. "I'll do what I can and whatever you say. This mysterious Harry Pangborn may very well be right around here." "Around Cedar Ridge!" shrilled Terry. "Certainly! Why not? If the authorities didn't think it likely that he might be in this vicinity, why did they put the poster up here in the post office? And they mentioned Morrisville," challenged Sim. "There's something in that," Terry admitted. "Oh, if he should be in hiding around here and we could find him and claim the thousand dollars reward," breathed Arden, "wouldn't it be just wonderful! And what a sensation when we magnanimously turned the money over to the college for the swimming pool. Oh, oh!" "Would you do that for dear old Alma Mater when you don't know her so very well?" asked Sim, who, with her chums, was still gazing at the poster of the good-looking but missing heir of the Pangborn estate of millions. "I'd do it for you, Sim, dear," murmured Arden. "I want you to be happy here, since I teased you so to come." "And you think I won't be happy without the swimming pool?" "Will you?" "Not as happy as I would be with it." "But even admitting that this missing young man may be around here," suggested Terry, "what chance have we of finding him? We have so much college work to do. For, after all, we were sent here to learn something," she sighed. "Granted," laughed Arden. "But we may find time for a little detective work on the side as well as for hazing. Oh, it's a wonderful prospect!" She swung around in a few dance steps right there in the old post office. "Well, we'd better be getting back," suggested Sim after this. "Oh, look at the clock!" she gasped. Then followed a hurried sending of some picture postcards they had bought; cards on which they marked with an X the location of their room. The three chums were bubbling with life, laughter, and merriment as they turned to leave the little building, but their mirth was turned to alarm as a stern voice assailed them. "Young ladies!" They looked around to see Rev. Dr. Henry Bordmust sternly regarding them from the doorway. "Yes, Dr. Bordmust," Sim almost whispered as the chaplain appeared to be waiting for formal recognition. "You are freshmen!" he accused, with a glance at their mortarboards, the tassels of which told the tale. "You know you are not permitted over here--in the post office. It is against the college rules--for you freshmen. Return at once! You must! You must!" He appeared strangely stirred and angry, and his dark brows, shading his bright little eyes, bent into a frown. But somehow, after that first booming and accusative "young ladies," the chaplain seemed exhausted, as though the anger pent up in him had taken something from his none too profuse vitality. He was an old man. Now he essayed a wintry smile and added, as he gently waved them out with motions of his thin white hands: "That is to say, you shouldn't have come here. You--er--have no need to be--er--frightened at this first infraction of the rules, but--er--another time you may be--er--campused for such action." Then, having seen that the three were on their way out, Dr. Bordmust turned to the window, evidently to buy some stamps for the letters he held in one hand. He murmured to himself in those queer, quavering, meaningless tones: "Too bad; too bad! I can't always be watching! Dear me!" Wonderingly, Arden and her chums looked at the shrinking figure in black as they passed out of the door. But Dr. Bordmust gave them no further attention. CHAPTER V Rescued Sim, who was hurrying after Arden and Terry up the steep hill on top of which was perched Bordmust Hall, uttered a series of frightened exclamations. "Oo-oo-oo! Oh, my! Oh, but I was frightened. Wasn't he angry!" "Since Dr. Bordmust is our chaplain, it was probably what might be called righteous anger," suggested Arden. "What do you suppose he meant when he spoke about not always watching?" asked Terry. "I don't know," Arden had to admit. "The girls say Dr. Bordmust is really queer at times. I suppose it is because he's such a profound student. He knows such a lot, all about Egypt, so many languages, and they say ancient history is an open book to him." Arden was fairly sprinting along the boardwalk that made the steep path up to Bordmust Hall a little easier. What with talking and hurrying, her breath was a bit gaspy. "Well, don't ask me what it all means," begged Terry. "I can't even guess. But, oh! I do hope I'm not going to be late for this first class." "So say we all of us," chanted Sim. "They can't be too severe at the very beginning," murmured Arden. Bordmust Hall, where most of the class sessions were held, crowned with its classic architecture the summit of the long slope which formed the eminence of the broad acres about Cedar Ridge College. It was behind the main, or dormitory, building in which were housed the executive offices and the residence rooms of the faculty. To the southwest of the hall, and easily viewed from the steps, was the unused pool. To the northwest, and in line with the main building, was the beautiful Gothic chapel with its wonderful stained-glass windows. Near the chapel was the unimposing home of the chaplain, Rev. Dr. Bordmust; one of whose ancestors had partly endowed Cedar Ridge. For this reason the hall was named for him. At the foot of the slope on which the hall stood were the rambling fields and gardens where much of the farm produce for the college tables was raised. The nearest of the farm-lands, so called, was the orchard, part of which could be seen from the southeast windows of the dormitory. And it was this orchard that the taxi-man had indicated in such a warning manner. It was this orchard into which Tom Scott, the good-looking porter, had been staring the night of the arrival of Arden Blake and her chums. So much had been crowded into the comparatively short time the three freshmen had been at college that they had almost forgotten the strange orchard. Even now they had no chance to consider the matter, for they, with many other girls, were hastening to their first classes. They gave a momentary glance toward the orchard, with its quaint gnarled trees. The morning sun was glinting on red, dark-green, and golden russet apples which the gardener and his men had not yet started to gather. Arden, especially, gazed searchingly at the orchard. Apple trees grow in such strange shapes and huddle so closely to themselves, as if each one guarded a secret. There was a puzzled look in Arden's blue eyes as she tried to guess what might be hidden by those trees and the tall hedge surrounding them. Sim was gazing rather sorrowfully at the pool building, but Terry was smiling, perhaps because everything seemed, for the moment, at least, to be so filled with good and pleasant life. "Go on in, kids!" Sim urged her two chums. "I'll be along in a minute or two. I just want to take a look at--I just want to--oh, well, go on. Don't wait for me." "But won't you be late?" objected Arden. "No, I have some time to my credit." As her surprised friends watched, Sim left them and hurried down across a stretch of smooth lawn toward the disused swimming pool. "Too bad," murmured Arden. "What is?" asked Terry. "I really think Sim feels more keenly than we realize about the pool. But she's such a good sport. Look at her! Going to view the ashes of her hopes or the collapse of her dreams or something equally tragic." "Don't let's say anything about this," proposed Terry. "If Sim cares so much, I'm sure she'd rather not talk about this little visit." Arden agreed and, taking Terry's arm, they hurried into the hall. Sim reached the pool building and tried to get some idea of the wreck within by peering through a window. But the sill was too high to afford a view, even if the window had not been made of heavily frosted glass, quite opaque. Then she stepped back and gazed up at the copper and glass domed roof. Around the top of the building were set at intervals glazed tiles depicting nautical scenes. Dolphins were diving merrily as if to tantalize sea horses with necks proudly arched, and mermaids flicked their tails disdainfully at Father Neptune. "I may as well try the door," Sim murmured. "I'd like to see what it's like inside, though it will probably break my heart!" After several hard pushes to the extent of her strength, she succeeded in swinging back the door. She found herself in a sort of vestibule, but the inner door of this opened easily, and then Sim stood almost on the edge of the abandoned pool. A peculiar smell assailed her, as of a place long shut up, but at the same time it had something of out-of-doors about it, the odor of clean earth and ripe vegetables. "It isn't as bad as Toots said," mused Sim. "At least, it looks as though there isn't so very much the matter. It isn't filled with vegetables, either; just a few bags as yet, though they probably will bring in more when they pick the apples. This must have been a beautiful pool once." The bottom of the pool was tiled a pea green, a color which must have given the water a most cooling tone on a hot day. But the white tile sides no longer gleamed, and in more than one place jagged dark cracks ran crazily down the walls like streaks of black lightning. Sim looked at the cracked tile and concrete edge at her feet. The depth was still indicated, though there was no water in the pool--5 feet. "This is the shallow end, of course," Sim thought, and she walked slowly around the edge and toward the melancholy spring-boards to which some strips of cocoa-fiber matting still clung. "How quiet it is in here," Sim murmured. "Like a museum after hours--or an Egyptian tomb." She shivered a little, though it was warm in the natatorium. In the deep end several filled burlap bags were piled up, and in each corner were barrels of cabbages leaning against the walls. "I thought, from what Toots said, the whole place would be filled to the brim with cabbages and turnips," Sim said to herself, smiling a little ruefully. "I wonder how long this pool is, or should I say _was_?" She began to measure the length with her eyes, mentally swimming with long, smooth strokes while her feet churned up and down. "About seventy-five yards long, I guess," she went on. "And about twenty-five across. A lovely size. I could do three lengths a day here and really enjoy it. Let's see how deep it is from the end of the board." She walked gingerly out on the diving plank, choosing the center one for there were three at the deep end, tiered at different heights. It was difficult to estimate, without water in the pool and with the barrels and bags of vegetables scattered about, how close the different boards came to the surface of the filled space. Sim decided that the plank she was standing on was the lowest. She permitted herself a little pre-diving, teetery bounce on the very end, half fearful lest the dried wood should crack beneath even her light weight. But it held, and Sim gave a bolder jump. "A straight dive--cutting the water about there!" With her eyes Sim indicated to herself just the spot where her finger tips should enter the water--had there been any water there. She jumped again and came down safely, with no warning cracking of the dried plank. Then she balanced herself on the very tip of the board before, mentally, springing into the air. Now she performed a most ambitious jump, but this time the stiffened wood snapped back suddenly. Sim was thrown to one side, and she swung her arms around and around like a child on its first roller skates, trying desperately not to topple backward. But her motions only caused the board to quiver more violently, and in a split second Sim slipped off and clung, with her finger tips only, to the edge of the plank, while the hard-tiled bottom of the pool, seemingly miles below, waited to receive her. "Oh, gosh! What'll I do?" poor Sim thought. "Those tiles don't look very soft, and I'll drop in a minute!" Her fingers ached from their stiff clinging grip, and her arms were quickly tiring. She decided she must soon let go for after a futile attempt to sling one leg up over the side edge of the board it bent so alarmingly that she feared it would snap. She began to swing to and fro like a pendulum, hoping she might cast herself upon a bag of vegetables which would serve to break her fall, when, suddenly, she felt her wrists firmly gripped by two hands, and she looked up to see Tom Scott, the porter-gardener, smiling down at her. He was kneeling on the end of the plank. "Don't jump!" he warned. "I'll pull you up. It's rather the reverse of 'don't shoot, I'll come down,' isn't it?" he said lightly. He could not have taken better means to quiet Sim's excited nerves than with Mr. Crockett's little coon banter. With what seemed no effort at all, Tom Scott lifted her up and held her clear of the end of the board so her legs did not scrape against it. Then he carefully walked back with her toward the middle of the plank, where there was no danger of its breaking, set her down, and stood grinning at her. A nice grin it was, too, Sim thought later. She managed to produce a weak, embarrassed smile. "Thank you so much!" she said a bit stiffly. The man must think her crazy. "I--I slipped! I--er--I was--that is, I was trying----" To cover her confusion she looked at her red finger tips. "Hurt?" he inquired. "Broke two or three nails," Sim responded ruefully. "I'm very glad you came along. I might have sprained an ankle if I had let go, for this end must be nine feet deep." "The water, when there is any, is over nine feet deep nearest this wall," said Tom Scott. "You certainly would have been jarred a bit, to say the least." "Then I must thank you again. But please don't mention to anyone that you found me in such a silly fix, will you?" Sim begged. She was quickly regaining her lost composure. "I just wanted to get a look at the pool and foolishly walked out on the board. I imagined myself poising for a dive and I slipped off. You won't tell?" "Of course I won't," Tom agreed, somewhat gayly, it seemed. "I came in to get a few of the early apples we have stored here. One of the cooks asked me to. I imagine there are going to be pies. But, honestly, I won't tell a soul." "Thank you," Sim murmured. The young gardener walked up to the middle of the pool and with athletic ease jumped down in it near several bags of vegetables. He picked up one containing apples, heaved it up on the edge and jumped up himself. Then, slinging the sack up on his shoulder, he walked toward the door, giving Sim a friendly backward glance as he went out. "What a nice young man!" said Sim to herself. "He doesn't seem like a gardener at all. No brogue and no accent of any kind. I wish I could tell Arden and Terry, but I'd rather die than have them know of this dizzy adventure. I must have looked perfectly stupid hanging there on the end of the plank!" The clanging of a distant bell brought Sim back to reality, and as she looked at her wrist watch she left all thoughts of pools and good-looking rescuing gardeners behind her. For it would need a swift dash to get her to Bordmust Hall before she would be late for her class. CHAPTER VI Apple Hazing Girls of various sizes, types, and descriptions were hurrying into the building, and their clothes, of all colors, gave a luster otherwise lacking in the dull, sand-colored structure. The freshmen were easily distinguished from the other students by the fact that they were all carrying or scanning yellow cards which told them in what rooms to report for their first classes. Sim was surprised to see Arden and Terry still outside the hall. "I thought you had to hurry in to class," she said, hoping they wouldn't notice her broken nails. "Wrong number," remarked Terry. "We went in and were told to come back in fifteen minutes, so we came up for air." "Where were you?" asked Arden, glancing sharply at Sim. "Oh--just walking around. I think I'm about in time for my class. Let's go in." The three found they were to be separated for the morning session though the first class in the afternoon would find them in the same room for English literature. "And we must try to sit together," called Arden to Sim and Terry as they parted. Inside the hall all was confusion. Girls were running hither and yon. Stairways were crowded with students going up or coming down, and all were excited. Doors were suddenly pushed open by uncertain freshmen and again by oversure sophomores. The latter, in a spirit of fun, several times sent a poor "frosh" up to the top floor when she should have remained on the first. Another warning bell rang and, almost at once, the corridors were empty and quiet. Inside their classrooms the three girls from 513 looked, listened, and answered somewhat in a daze. That first day always remained more or less of a hazy recollection. Something of an organization was arranged, the roll was checked and corrected, names were asked and given, everyone was on edge and nervous, even the instructors. Strange faces, many of them timid, looked on other strange faces, also somewhat timid. Then came welcome noon, and the rush out of Bordmust and some of the other study buildings to the dining hall was comparable only to the New York subway rush at five o'clock. The afternoon classes were attended by all more pleasantly and with less strain. To their delight, Arden, Sim, and Terry managed to get into the same room and sat near one another. As they were leaving Bordmust Hall, at the close of the afternoon session, Arden heard someone say: "Here come our three!" Toots Everett, Jessica, and Pip were regarding the other trio with sardonic smiles and, as Terry said later, "with murder in their eyes." "Good afternoon, freshies! How about a little song for my friends, here?" Jessica was mockingly speaking. "A song befitting your talents. Arden Blake, come here!" Arden stepped forward, blushing. "I can't sing," she quavered. "You shall learn. Your friend here, with the red hair, looks like a singer. And while you two sing, Sim Westover shall dance. On with the dance, freshies!" The trio from 513 looked at one another in dismay, but there was no help for it. Amused seniors and juniors had gathered to see the fun. From the classmates of Arden and her chums two kinds of advice was forthcoming, the "don't-you-do-it!" and "go-on-be-sports!" Finally, in a weak and uncertain voice, Arden and Terry, after a moment of embarrassed consultation, sang one verse from their prep-school song; something about "Bring Me Violets for My Hair," while Sim tapped about more like a sparrow than a swan. At last it was over. "Not bad," commented Toots. "I've seen worse," said Pip. "But not much," was Jessica's opinion. Then the sophomores delivered a rhyming ultimatum. They stood with their heads together and chanted: "_From yonder orchard, old and green,_ _Where, 'tis said, strange things are seen,_ _You three, upon this fatal day,_ _Must gather apples while ye may._ _At once repair to that dread spot,_ _And in your quest dare pass it not._ _Then bring, for our symbolic use,_ _Fair apples with but smallest bruise._ _Ten perfect fruits, no less, must we_ _Your mentors have, in time for tea._" There was a dramatic pause, following this delivery, and then, as though they had rehearsed it, as, indeed, they had, the three sophomores picked up the books they had deposited on the ground in front of them while singing, and marched away, leaving the trio from 513 the center of an excited and thrilled group. "What does it all mean?" asked Sim. "Is it part of the hazing?" asked Terry. "Must we really go after the apples?" asked Arden in astonishment. "Yes," said Mary Todd. "It's just part of college life. And you may as well go to the orchard now, while it is still light and bright. I certainly hope I don't have to do that stunt. No orchard in mine." "Some of us probably will have to gather the apples later," declared Jane Randall. "But a soph, who got a little friendly with me, said that the best apples were at the far side of the orchard. So you girls had better go there at the start, as Toots and her crowd won't accept nubbins, and you don't want to have to make two trips." "I should say not," murmured Sim. "One is bad enough." Arden and Terry were still a bit bewildered, even after this well-meant advice, and Sim declared she was "dying from embarrassment." "I suppose we may as well go. What do you say, girls?" asked Arden. "Yes, let's! Anything to get away from here!" Sim was regarding the circle of amused girls. "You take our books to our room, will you?" Terry asked Mary Todd. "We'll let you know later how we make out." The fated trio started down the southern slope of Bordmust Hall hill toward the picturesque orchard where, even now, though it was not very late, the shadows were lengthening and the sun had lost some of its brightness. They crossed a field, deep with grass, crawled through the bars of a snake-rail fence, and found themselves beneath the trees. "I vote we pick up the first apples we can see," voiced Terry. "Certainly!" agreed Arden. "Apples are apples," quoth Sim. "Why should we go to the far end to gather fine fruit when windfalls may answer?" "Why, indeed," assented Arden. "But still I suppose we had better not pick up these." With her foot she kicked out from amid the fallen leaves some withered, wrinkled, and partly rotted specimens. "No, they won't do," declared Sim. "Then let's separate a bit. We can cover more ground that way," suggested Arden. "Whoever first finds some decent apples must give a shout, and we'll gather there." She was quite businesslike. "All right, Colonel!" laughed Terry. "'You take the highland and I'll take the low,'" she sang softly. "Scatter, my lassies!" They separated and began the search in the growing dusk. Apples there were, but such poor things, windfalls and rots, that even the enthusiastic Arden began to feel discouraged. They might, after all, need to go to the far end of the orchard. Still, it was delightful beneath the old, gnarled trees. Their trunks were shaped like dragons, their branches like Chinese letters, and the roots, where they cropped out above the ground, like intertwined serpents grim and black, seeming to writhe in the shifting shadows. A little wind rustled the leaves, swung the hanging fruit, and made the limbs squeak as they rubbed one on the other. Here and there they wandered, growing more and more apprehensive and nervous as the darkness deepened. There seemed to be something sinister about that orchard, although it was so close to the life and joy of Cedar Ridge College. The taxi-man had surely warned them--but of what? This was no time to think about that. "Ah!" Sim suddenly exclaimed. "A perfect apple, red and round!" She picked it up from beneath a large gnarled tree. "And there are others," she called. "This way! Over here, girls!" Her voice was joyous. Arden and Terry ran toward Sim. But as Sim stooped to pick up another apple she saw something in a pile of leaves. It looked like--surely not the leg of blue overalls! A last lingering gleam of the setting sun, shining through a cleft in the hills, glinted upon that leg. Sim glided closer. Could it be----? It was part of an overall suit, and there, thrust out of the lower end and twisted grotesquely to one side, was a foot! "Oh-h-h-h-ee!" screamed Sim, dropping her apples. "Oh, girls, look here! Quick! Hurry!" She stood in a panic of terror, rooted as firmly to the spot, for the moment, as one of the black gnarled trees. "What is it, Sim? What's the matter?" gasped Terry, the first to arrive. "Look!" Sim pointed, breathless. She and the others, for Arden was now one of the trio beneath the tree, saw more than just the overall leg and the foot. They saw the huddled form of a man partly buried in the fallen leaves. And they could see--his face! "Why, it's Tom--the porter!" cried Arden. Instantly she was down on her knees beside him. "His head is cut. We must get help. Sim! Terry! Come here to me!" Arden was dependable in a real emergency. She attempted to lift the death-like head. Terry struggled to help her while Sim bravely tried to straighten out a crooked arm beneath the senseless form. It was so terribly tragic. The girls saw where all that blood was coming from. Tom Scott's forehead was cut, and the wound appeared to be serious. Realizing this, the three hesitated about what to do next. "Oh!" gasped Terry. "Is he--dead?" "No," Arden answered. "I can feel him breathing. But he's had a hard blow." "What shall we do?" faltered Terry, becoming more and more alarmed. "If we only had some water," murmured Sim, "we could----" The sound of approaching footsteps caused the girls to glance up. A man was hastening toward them through the aisles of the black trees of the orchard. "Oh, dear!" sighed Arden as she let the inert head fall back on the cushion of leaves. "What is he saying?" asked Terry. "Nothing yet," replied Arden, still watching closely the face of the unconscious man as well as she could in the fast gathering gloom. "Who is coming?" asked Sim, for the approaching footsteps were pounding nearer. No one answered. Then they heard the voice of Tom Scott as he stirred on awakening from the stupor of unconsciousness. "My head!" he murmured. "It--hurts. But it was so black and it came at me so quickly----" The girls were so relieved to hear him speak that they all waited breathlessly. The running footsteps came nearer. It was a man. He fairly leaped through the dark tunnel of trees toward the group. "Get away from here!" he snarled. "Get away--you girls! You're not supposed to come in this orchard. Get away! I'll take care of him!" By his voice, for it was now too dark to distinguish his features, Arden and her chums knew him to be Anson Yaeger, the grim head farmer and gardener of Cedar Ridge. They had seen him from a distance that afternoon, had heard his snarling voice, and had been told who he was. Now he was living up to his reputation in ordering them off. Arden and the others moved away from the still recumbent form of Tom Scott. But more life was coming back to him now. He murmured again: "But I didn't know. I couldn't see--except that it was something black--as black as the hedge--and it--got me!" Then the voice of Anson Yaeger broke in: "All right! All right! I'll look after you, Tom. You girls run away. It's all right, I tell you! Go away!" His angry command seemed to shatter the calm darkness of the night. CHAPTER VII Terror in the Dark Scarcely realizing how they had changed their fright into action, Arden, Terry, and Sim found themselves running away as quickly as they could through the fast-gathering darkness enshrouding the mysterious orchard. The cool wind whipped back their hair, and their feet stumbled on the uneven ground. Loose stones tripped them, and smashed apples made slippery spots that once caused Sim almost to fall. But she quickly recovered herself, ran on, and passed her chums. As the three neared the dormitory building, the grounds about it were deserted, as this was the before-supper lull. "I hope no one saw that mad rush!" panted Arden. "What are we going to do?" asked Terry as they slowed to a walk. "Say nothing--for a while, at least," advised Arden. "Right!" agreed Sim. To this course of action, or, rather, lack of action, each agreed with unspoken loyalty. They must keep the secret of the orchard to themselves. It was their secret. None of the other girls, for the time, must know anything about the mystery tangled in those gnarled trees and in the smoky ivy vines that hung from some branches like tangled snakes. Even the tall and almost impenetrable hedge that, in one corner, formed a terrifying tunnel before it opened into the wide aisles of trees took on a sinister shape and seemed to add to the mystery as the girls thought of it while standing in the gleam of lights from the dormitory building. They were safe now. They need run no longer. They could stop and let their panting breaths ease. They must go inside. Oh, to be able to sit down and calmly consider what had happened. But the five flights of stairs between them and their room! How could they be climbed? The same thought was in the minds of each one. To get safely inside their room and throw themselves down upon the beds until hearts beat a little less poundingly. It was finally accomplished, somehow. Silently they reclined in their favorite relaxed positions. No sound, except a clock-like puffing, disturbed the stillness. The room was almost dark, only a little gleam filtering in from the hall through a transom. No one made a move to turn on a light. Just to rest, for the moment, was enough. Gradually they grew calmer. Arden sat up. "What an adventure!" she exclaimed. "But do you know what we did?" "What?" murmured Terry. "We left the precious apples." "For all I care they can stay there!" Sim had lost all interest. "I'll never forget how that poor young fellow looked! I only wish that old man hadn't chased us away. Perhaps we could have found out what Tom meant by that black thing he talked about." "I'd never have the courage to try!" murmured Terry. "Do you know, girls," burst out Arden, "I think we've stumbled on something important! You remember what Henry, our dear old chaplain, was muttering about the day we passed him. Something about coming out of the orchard and some sort of a promise. And the old taxi-man, too, warned us, in a way. Certainly that orchard holds a real mystery in its dark leafiness." Arden smiled a little smugly. A sort of cat and canary smile, as Sim remarked when she got up off the bed to switch on a light. She and Terry both were very thoughtful after what Arden had said. Perhaps Arden was right. There was certainly something more than merely queer about the orchard, it was getting weird and uncanny. "Do you think those sophs could have known?" asked Terry. "I don't," was Sim's opinion. "They'd never have sent us there if they had known what was going to happen." "I wouldn't be so sure of that," spoke Arden. "Those sophs----" "Hark!" from Sim. Footsteps in the corridor outside. A knock on the door. A little scream from Terry, a quickly hushed scream, however. The door was opened suddenly. It was Toots Everett and her two familiars. "Where are the apples, freshies?" Toots demanded. "We haven't got them," Terry stated simply. "We--ah--we--dropped them." "Oh, you did! And you look at us and calmly tell us you haven't the apples we sent you to get! Well, you'd better get them tonight. It would be just too bad if the dean had to campus you in your first week here." Toots paused ominously and resumed. "For going over to the post office without permission." It was a theatrical finish. "Get those apples for us tonight!" commanded Jessica. "Slip out the back door about eight o'clock and you'll manage it all right. None of the teachers will notice you then. Of course, you'll have sense enough to take flashlights." "We haven't any yet," said Sim lamely. "We haven't been to town, you know." She and her two chums were wondering how the sophomore knew about the post office visit. Had the chaplain told them? "No flashlights!" mocked Pip. "The poor dears! Then they'll have to go in the dark." "Oh, no!" Terry cried out with a dramatic restraining gesture. "Little freshie 'fraid-cats!" sneered Toots. "Well," remarked Jessica, "purely out of the goodness of my heart, and not because I like you, I'll let you take my large flashlight. But don't forget! We expect those apples before 'lights-out' tonight!" With mocking smiles, the sophs withdrew to their room below. "Oh, dear!" wailed Sim. "More trouble! I don't want to go back to that orchard when it's so dark!" "I do and I don't," said Arden. "I want to find out something, but I'm a little scared." "If we all keep together and have a light, it shouldn't take us long. I think I can find the tree we were near when--when----" Terry didn't quite know how to finish. Clang-clang! Clang! Clang-clang! It was the bell calling the students to supper: always a light meal. The "big feed," as the girls called it, came in the middle of the day. Wearily the three arose from the beds whereon they had again cast themselves after the visits of the sophomores, straightened themselves with pulls and twists, and joined their classmates in the dining hall. Their coming hazing task was uppermost in their minds, consequently they did not feel like talking much. Terry was elected to get the light from Jessica while her chums waited in no little trepidation in the main corridor below, near a rear door out of which they had been told they might slip without being observed by those in authority. "Did you get it?" whispered Sim, as Terry came lightly down the stairs. "Sure! Did you think I wouldn't?" "I was hoping you might not, and then we'd have a good excuse for not going," Sim answered. "Well, let's get started," suggested Arden. They went out. The night was clear and beginning to get chilly. Sim knotted her bright scarf more tightly about her throat. Terry turned up the collar of her jacket, and Arden snuggled more closely into her long sweater. At first, after walking away from the rim of light that filtered from the dormitory building, they could see nothing. But gradually their eyes became accustomed to the darkness and, without switching on the flashlight, they headed for Bordmust Hall. For a few of their hesitant steps no one spoke. Then Terry turned on the flashlight, focusing its beams upon the ground while they walked slowly along in triangular formation, Sim and Arden forming the base as Terry with the light was the apex. Nothing disturbed them. All was quiet and still and so absolutely silent that Terry remarked it was the "perfect state of nothingness." The dark orchard seemed miles away. But as they paused for Arden to tie her shoe, a faint rustling could be heard. Tired old apple trees were once more settling down for the long winter sleep after a summer of fruit producing. All at once they were there! Right in the orchard. The stones on the ground seemed to hold back their unwilling feet. They stopped and listened. Terry switched on the light but its penetrating beam seemed only to make the surrounding darkness blacker. "Come on, girls! We're just at the first row of trees. The one we are looking for is farther along. I remember a funny-shaped one, like a rearing crocodile, next to it. But wait, Terry! I heard something moving!" Arden froze into motionless silence to listen. "Don't let your imagination run away with you," Terry gently mocked. "We're just wasting time by listening, and I've got a lot of French to do. Let's get going!" Sim and Terry walked on. Terry, having seen that the way, for some little distance ahead, was clear, turned off the flashlight. They did not want to attract any possible attention. Arden was following a little more slowly. They were beneath some gnarled trees now. "Flash a gleam, Terry," begged Sim. In the glow they looked at the leaf-strewn ground. "There's not a single apple here! I don't see how we found any this afternoon!" said Sim gloomily. "Cheer up, old gal! I think this is the tree. That looks like a pretty good specimen." Terry was examining an apple in the light of Terry's torch. "Pick them up quickly. If they turn out not to be good, we'll blame it on the darkness. Hold the bag, Arden. It was very smart of you to bring it." Quickly the two dropped apples into the paper bag held open by Arden. They were making what they thought was a good collection when Arden suddenly stopped them as she murmured: "Listen! Did you hear that? Sounded like someone sneezing!" They stood motionless and quiet in the frightening darkness. "I heard--something," Sim whispered. "Well, whatever it was, it couldn't have been very close," declared Terry, taking charge of the situation. "If we hurry we can be out of here in another minute." With renewed energy they fell to their task once more. Arden discovered Sim's pile of apples from the afternoon gathering and was putting them into the bag; they could not return to those sophs without filling their orders. Suddenly the night's silence was broken by a loud noise: a sound between a sneeze and a snort, as the girls afterward described it. Then something like a black shadow tore past the frightened trio, moving with great speed and thudding feet, if that tearing scramble could have been made by feet. In her excitement Terry switched off the light. The darkness was at once made more dark. "Oh! Help! Help! It's--got me!" screamed Arden, in a voice filled with terror. Some strange force seemed to fling her aside, her skirt being caught and twisted around her legs, twirling her like a human top. She tried to retain her balance but toppled over and fell heavily in a pile of leaves and apples, too frightened to know where she was. "Arden!" cried Sim. "What happened? Where are you?" "Are you hurt?" demanded Terry trying in vain to get her fingers on the elusive light switch. "Oh, Arden! Whatever--was it?" "It--it just missed me!" panted Arden, struggling to her feet. "But whatever it was, it certainly tried to get me! Oh, for mercy's sake, take those apples and let's get out of here!" "Show a light, Terry!" begged Sim. "Where are the apples?" "I--I dropped the bag when that terrible thing rushed past me and was nearly entangled in my skirt," Arden confessed. "Oh, this is awful!" "Those sophs!" muttered Sim, "and these unlucky apples!" "Beasts!" snapped Terry, who at last had the torch glowing again. Then, never daring to look behind them, the three frightened freshmen, with Sim carrying the bag of apples, Terry focusing the torch on the uncertain way, and Arden almost in hysterical tears, ran out of the perilous orchard. This surely had been a terrifying encounter. "But remember again," breathed Sim when she felt strong enough to do so, "the apples are for--the sophs, but the--mystery--is ours!" Good little Sim! CHAPTER VIII A Tea Dance "There!" Sim flung the bag of apples with desperate aim straight at Jessica Darglan, who stood in surprised dismay near the doorway of her room. "We're back! We got the apples for you. But don't ever ask us to go to that orchard again. It's a _terrible_ place!" Arden almost shook her finger at Jessica. "I think you sophs are going a little too far in this hazing business." Terry spoke firmly. "We tried to be good sports about it, but we might have been hurt or killed--or something! Well, anyhow, here's your lamp, and you have the apples. Come on, girls!" she finished a little lamely, but a little defiantly as well. The three frightened freshmen wearily climbed the last flight of stairs to their room. Never had the sight of those three beds in a row seemed so pleasant, so reassuring. Terry decided to let her French go until morning. Arden and Sim thanked their lucky stars they could go to bed with easy consciences. They had nothing to prepare. "But, Arden, what was it?" asked Sim as she began to undress. "You haven't given us any idea," added Terry. "For the simple reason that I can't," was the answer made after a moment of thought. "It was all so sudden--and terrible--a rushing black shape--something getting tangled in my skirt--twirling me down and--and--around----" "Whoosing, snorting, and sneezing like some giant of an old man with a bad cold," finished Sim. "Yes," Arden assented, glad to have been helped out. "The orchard," murmured Terry. "Could it have been--a snake?" "You're thinking of the Garden of Eden and Eve's apple, I guess," laughed Sim. "Oh, don't let's talk about it!" begged Arden. "Maybe it was--the wind." "You know it wasn't," said Sim calmly. "It may have been--for all I _know_," Arden said. "I'm going to bed and try to forget it. College life should make girls brave." The others followed her example but sleep was long in coming. Adventures like the peril in the orchard called for pulling covers over one's head, Arden remarked, and she did exactly that. Darling sleep came at last. In the morning, at breakfast, the trio guardedly whispered to a few of their friends something of what had happened, but the real secret they kept to themselves. There were murmurs of wonder amid promises, exacted and given, of silence. But the talk spread. The idea of three freshmen--etc.--etc.--! It was two days later, though, before an effect was produced. Then the whole college was called to General Assembly, and the three in room 513 realized to what an extent gossip had traveled. "Any stories which you may have heard about queer things happening in the old orchard must be taken, well--conservatively, at least." It was the dean speaking to the college students, who for once were all vitally interested in her discourse. "There is not much danger of our upper class students taking these things seriously. But in a college of this size, stories travel with remarkable speed. It would not be to the credit of Cedar Ridge to have such rumors spread on the outside. So we shall say no more about it, except to remark that, apparently, our sophomores this year are doing a very good job of hazing. It is to be hoped they will remember where hazing ends and bullying begins." The dean's usually austere manner suddenly melted into a kindly interest. "She must have heard something," Arden whispered to Sim. "Do you notice she doesn't say exactly what happened?" "It's my guess," whispered Sim, "she doesn't _know_ exactly what." The three girls were sitting together in the large assembly hall. "Foxy old thing!" Terry spoke out of the corner of her mouth at Arden. "I'd like to hear just how much she actually knows." The dean had finished with the matter of the orchard. She swept her glance over the faces raised expectantly to hers as she broached a new and not unwelcome subject. "The Sophomore Tea Dance will be held this year earlier than usual; in New York, at the Hotel Chancellor. The committee, of which Jessica Darglan, Margaret Everett, and Priscilla MacGovern are the active heads, ask your support in their undertaking." A murmur of approval greeted this announcement. "They have voted to give any funds they may raise to the college treasury for the reconditioning of the swimming pool. I wish them every success." This was a real pronouncement. Then, gathering herself together and teetering on her toes as if, Terry said, she was getting ready to jump, the dean dismissed her students. "Wouldn't you just know they'd do something like that!" Arden was speaking, as the three chums sauntered toward their classes in Bordmust Hall. "Stealing our plan!" "But we didn't announce it, Arden," Terry remarked. "That is, if you mean we are to try for the thousand dollars reward for information about that missing Harry Pangborn." "That's what I mean." "But we haven't done anything," suggested Sim. "Really, you know, Arden----" "Why didn't they give us a chance? I just know we can solve that mystery if we have time. I'm sure of it!" "Have you decided yet," asked Terry, "where you think you saw the original of that reward-poster picture?" "Not yet," Arden had ruefully to admit. "But I shall. And now those sophs----" "Well, more power to them if they can raise the money for the swimming pool, I say," spoke Sim philosophically. "Never shall I forget, scared as I was, the expression on the face of Jessica as we flung the apples at her! It was almost worth the fright we had," Terry ventured, to change the subject. "I know what we can do, though, to get a little even with them," suggested Arden. "We won't tell, no matter how much they ask, just what happened." "All right, Arden, we'll do that. Now, don't let's talk any more about it. I'm tired of the word orchard. I'd much rather talk about the tea dance," Sim returned, arranging her books more comfortably. "Do you think we can go?" "Of course! Why not?" asked Terry. "Well--boys, you know. We couldn't get any of our own friends from home to come this far for us," Sim decided. "You've been thinking about this dance, have you, Sim? Now, I never would have thought that!" laughed Arden. "Of course I have! I like dances. I've been thinking about this one to such an extent that when I saw the notice on the bulletin board I asked Mary Todd what about it, and she and Ethel Anderson and Jane Randall have already written to their three brothers----" "Oh, my! Has each one three brothers who are eligible for tea dances?" gasped Terry. "No--one each," went on Sim, laughing. "What do you expect? Anyhow, that's how much I've been thinking about it!" "That's quite a lot of thinking," Terry remarked, "for you, my little one! I might say that perhaps you took a great deal for granted, but if it works out all right, I'll be just as glad as you are. Did you have the sisters send their brothers our pictures? That one of you in the school play, Sim, dressed as an old man, is good." "Don't be silly! Of course I didn't. Anyhow, as long as we pay for the bids, those boys ought to be glad to go. They don't have to dance with us all afternoon." "Oh, stop, you two! Do let it go, as long as Sim has engineered it this far. It will be fun, very likely. Russ Albono's orchestra is grand, and we all have new dresses. There are more important things to consider," Arden decided. "We must get our hair and nails done and see about a room in the hotel. I've never been there, have you? Think of going to a real college tea dance in a big New York hotel!" "I was there once on my birthday," Sim remarked. "My loving parents took me to dinner and the theater. We stayed at the hotel a whole week-end. I loved it!" She sighed, remembering. "I hope you'll find it as wonderful this time," remarked Terry. "Let us hope so," murmured Arden. "Mrs. Malvern is to be the official chaperon. You must report to her before the dance and after it is over, as you leave," announced Sim. "I should think she might be pretty tired of answering the phone calls of the girls to her room when they notify her." "Really, Sim, how did you find out so much?" asked Arden. "I asked here and there," Sim admitted. "I also found out that we are to go to New York the afternoon of the dance, which is on Saturday. We don't have to be back here at college until nine that night." "Quite a bit of liberty--for Cedar Ridge," commented Terry. "Oh, dear! Here we are at Bordmust, and we'll have to separate just when the talk is getting exciting!" exclaimed Arden. "But as soon as you two can, come back to 513, and we'll complete our arrangements, will you?" she begged as they reached the grim building. "Yes," nodded Sim and Terry. Groups of students on the steps were discussing the dean's talk, the coming tea dance, and the ever intruding lessons, which, dance or not, must be endured. Suddenly Sim saw Mary Todd. "Have you heard anything, Mary?" she asked. "No, it's too soon. Give them a few more days," called back Mary. "Don't be so anxious, Sim," advised Arden. "You'd think we just couldn't wait to find out about those boys." "Well, I _am_ anxious. If they don't take us, I don't know how we'll get there." Sim sighed, certainly a little downcast. "Don't worry. We'll go all right, and probably make a big hit, too!" Terry was climbing the steps now. "I'll think it out in Latin class. I do some of my best thinking there." "See you later!" Arden waved a hand, laughing. "I'm due at math, worse luck!" and she hurried into the building. Terry and Sim followed. They were already lost in daydreams of music, laughter, lights, and gayety: the prospective coming dance. "Say, listen, Sim," exclaimed Terry suddenly, taking hold of Sim's arm to assure attention. "What is it, darling?" joked Sim. "Got a better idea for our dance boy supply?" "No, nothing about that. But you know our Tom who got that mysterious blow the other night?" "Do I?" "Well, I heard him telling one of the gardeners about it, and he was laughing it off." "Well, what's wrong about that?" demanded Sim. "Sounded flooey to me. He said he merely tripped over a tree stump and another stump cut his head." "Maybe he did," Sim casually answered. "And maybe he _didn't_," retorted Terry significantly. CHAPTER IX The Disappearance of Sim Class matters went all too slowly between the time of the tea dance announcement and the affair itself. Lessons were slighted with bold abandon as the girls made their preparations, their universal excuse being: "We can make it up later." At last it was the day. Soon after noon the college buildings began emptying rapidly, and excited students, carrying overnight bags, hurried to the little station for the New York trains. It was great fun going in to the city. The seniors and juniors were, of course, literally "on their own," but the lower-class girls were chaperoned by the ever-watchful Mrs. Malvern. The train was crowded, but Arden and her friends, after some tactful pushing, managed to get seats together. "It was fine of Mary Todd to help us get the boys to go to the dance with. And it wasn't so hard in her own case, for she lives so near New York. None of the boys we know could travel so far for a tea dance." Terry was chattering excitedly. "Yes, it was nice," Sim agreed. "I was certainly relieved when I heard they could come. If Mother lets me have a house party at Christmas, we could invite them." "Do you mean the boys or the girls?" asked Arden. "I mean the boys," supplied Sim. "How perfectly grand!" exclaimed Terry. "Of course, we haven't seen the boys yet," continued Arden. "So perhaps we had better wait until we do." "And of course, I haven't asked Mother about the party yet, either. It was just an idea," Sim concluded. "Oh--Sim!" was all Arden and Terry could say to that admission, and presently they lapsed into silence while the train clicked on. The ride to New York from Cedar Ridge was hardly long enough, and it seemed no time at all before the various groups of girls were alighting from the variously colored taxis in front of the Chancellor Hotel. Then up to their rooms in the gorgeous bird-cage elevators, to unpack their dresses and give last-minute touches to hair, hands, and complexions. "Sim looks simply darling!" observed Arden in an aside to Terry. "As long as she is small and child-like, I think she's wise in making the most of it." "Yes, she does look sweet," agreed Terry. "And you look nice, too, Arden. I like that color on you. Your hair has a dandy wave. I think that was a good beauty shop, don't you?" "Very good," assented Arden. "And to complete the circle, Terry, you look--wonderful!" "Thanks!" Sim was so busy preening herself before a large glass set in the closet door that she took no part in the conversation until, all at once, she seemed satisfied with her appearance and, turning to her chums, remarked: "Your dress is just perfect, Arden--blue is surely _your_ color. And green is yours, Terry: you look sweet. And I think we all three are credits to Cedar Ridge. But let's go down. It's late, and we have to find Mary and meet the boys. They must have been waiting a long time." So they left their room after many last-minute touches, and with some temerity descended to the ballroom. Already lights were casting soft glows over the tapestry-hung walls. The orchestra was playing a lively tune, and several couples were dancing in the stately Louis XIV room. Smartly dressed girls and good-looking boys were laughing and talking together in little knots, their eager anticipation being distinctly felt if not actually heard. "Have you seen Mary Todd anywhere?" Sim had a chance to ask Helen Burns, a classmate, who was apparently waiting for someone at the door of the ballroom. "Oh, hello, Sim!" Helen greeted. "You look lovely! Yes, I saw Mary and Jane and Ethel and a whole lot of boys over there in that small room." She pointed toward a sort of alcove off the dancing space. "Oh, gosh, Arden!" Sim's poise was leaving her. "What shall we do now? Wait! There's Mary. I see her!" "Why, let's go over and speak to her, of course," suggested Arden. "Your nerve seems to be deserting you, Sim. You got us into this very nicely, but you don't seem so brave about it just now." "You lead the way, Arden, and we'll follow," Terry said, smoothing her bright hair. "I've never been in a situation just like this before. I feel almost as frightened as though I were in the orchard!" "Hey there! No orchards tonight, girlie," cautioned Arden. "Come on, children! We'll get the introductions over with, and the rest will be easy." Arden started toward Mary who was chatting with several young men. Then Mary looked up, saw Arden coming toward her, followed by Sim and Terry, and went halfway to meet the trio. So it wasn't so difficult, after all, to cross to the small room where the boys were waiting. "Arden," said Mary formally, "may I present my brother Jim? This is Arden Blake, Jim. I've told you about her." "How do you do?" greeted Jim. "Mary wrote me all about your adventure." Arden was wondering just what Mary had referred to, but there was no time to ask, for the others were now being presented, Sim and Terry taking their turns. Sim was now her vivacious self, and Terry had lost all her nervousness. Could one boy have brought them such reassurance? Then Ethel Anderson's brother Ed, a tall, good-looking boy, asked Sim to dance, and soon she was humming "Tea for Two" as though they were old friends. Yes, boys did inspire confidence just like that. Terry was dancing with Dick Randall, talking and laughing as they whirled about the big, beautiful room. It truly was exciting. Next Arden and Mary Todd's brother Jim joined the dancers. Arden unconsciously made a pretty picture as she looked up smiling at the handsome boy. She was thinking how easily the introductions had gone off after all and how glad she was to be there. Then, as the music stopped, she glanced about her inquiringly. "There are not as many here as I thought there would be," she remarked. "I wonder if the sophomores will clear expenses and make something for repairing the swimming pool?" "You sound almost as if you wished they wouldn't," observed Jim, somewhat curiously. "It isn't that, exactly," went on Arden. "But, you see, I had sort of planned on raising the money for the pool myself--with the help of Sim and Terry. I suppose it doesn't matter, though, if they have _more_ than they need, just as long as they don't have _less_." "You talk like Alice in Wonderland and you remind me of her, too," laughed Jim. "But that's rather a tall order, isn't it? Trying to raise such a large sum by yourselves--just you girls?" "About a thousand dollars," admitted Arden. "I know it sounds awfully conceited, but back at school, in the post office----" Arden was interrupted by Ed Anderson coming to claim her for a dance. "I'll tell you some other time," she explained gayly to Jim, and to her waiting partner she smiled a little coquettishly as she put up her arms in the correct position as he danced away with her. No thought of ugly orchards now; even college could be forgotten with that rapturous music. Arden was a pretty dancer. The rest of the afternoon dissolved into a lovely kaleidoscope of color, music, and lights. The three sophomore hazers of the trio from 513, headed by Toots Everett, managed the affair extremely well as far as the social end of it was concerned. Arden and her chums had occasional glimpses of "the apple trio," as they were sometimes thought of, surreptitiously regarding them and the good-looking boys with whom the freshmen danced so often. Was there envy in the glances? Now and then an ominous "good-bye" intruded upon the pleasant dream Arden was living in, until, as though she were slowly awakening, she realized that the party was over. The boys and girls of Arden's little group were gathered in a corner near the ballroom door. Like overlapping broadcasts of sound, the farewells and thank-yous crossed and crisscrossed among them. "I want to say good-bye to Sim." Ed Anderson's smiling request caused them all suddenly to stop talking and look at one another. "Where is she?" Dick Randall asked. "I haven't seen her for a long time." "I don't know. She should be somewhere around here. We must find her quickly. We have scarcely time to dress and catch the eight-thirty train back to Cedar Ridge!" Arden exclaimed. "She knew we were to meet her here when the dance was over," Terry said petulantly. "Come, Arden, let's go look for her! We have to hurry." CHAPTER X What to Do Like the reflection of a cloud in a pool of water, a shadow passed over the face of Arden Blake as Terry spoke to her. But she acted quickly. "I'm sorry we must go so soon," Arden said to the somewhat puzzled boys. "But if we miss that train we'll probably be campused. I'm sure Sim has some good excuse for her absence, but we'd better find her and learn what it is. I'll have to say good-bye for her. I really don't know what to think." "It's all right," Dick Randall remarked. "You and Terry go along. Perhaps Sim is upstairs waiting for you." "She doesn't usually do things like this. But I suppose we really should go up," Arden agreed. "We haven't much time." Saying good-bye again, Terry and Arden left the group of boys and walked toward the elevator. But when they reached the room, high up in the large hotel, Sim's bag was closed and packed, as Terry discovered, on the middle of the bed. And she exclaimed: "She isn't here, Arden! We must phone Mary Todd's room." "I'll do it," Arden promptly offered. "She may be down there talking things over." She hurried to the instrument. But Mary Todd hadn't seen Sim since early afternoon! "Don't say anything to anyone, will you, Mary?" Arden pleaded. "I don't want Mrs. Malvern to know yet." "Of course not!" Mary answered. "But Sim will turn up. Don't worry! 'Bye!" and she hung up. "She isn't there, either," said Arden, turning to Terry. "What's the next move?" Terry considered. "Well, this is a pretty big place. Sim may be--" The telephone jingled shrilly. Both girls sprang to answer, but Terry got there first. "Yes, Mrs. Malvern," she said sweetly. "We're all ready, and we'll be in the lobby in a few minutes. Yes. Good-bye!" Quickly she turned from the telephone. "Oh, what shall we do? Mrs. Malvern will see that Sim isn't with us! Think of something, Arden! Quick!" "We'll have to go down, anyhow," said Arden, pulling her dress over her head. "Maybe, in the crowd, she won't notice that Sim is missing. Hurry, Terry, and change your dress." "I am hurrying. I'm as nearly ready as you are. We mustn't show we are excited. She really could be--lots of places." "Whatever possessed Sim to do a thing like this?" Arden was struggling with her garments. "She's probably got some idea into her head. Unless she's been kidnaped and is being held for a ransom!" Both girls stopped their dressing, suddenly frightened, Terry no less, though she had spoken the words. They had been spoken jokingly, but the possibility of such a terrible happening was not pleasant to consider. "Oh, Terry! Do you think we better tell Mrs. Malvern after all? The police----" "No! No! I was only joking. I have a lot of confidence in Sim. She can take care of herself. She knows people in New York. If she isn't in the lobby when we get there, we'll have to decide what to do then." Terry was putting on her hat. "I'm ready. I'll take her bag and mine. You shut the door." Arden swept a last glance around the room. She stepped into the corridor, followed by Terry, who pulled the door shut. They both quickly looked down the long hall. It was empty. "Hurry, Arden, into the elevator, before someone sees there are only two of us when there should be three!" By the greatest of good luck the elevator came quickly in answer to their ring. It was almost filled with chattering girls, and when it reached the ground floor it was impossible to see who got off. The girls for Cedar Ridge were assembled in the magnificent lobby; a happy, chattering, laughing group. Terry and Arden, in unspoken agreement, worked themselves gradually as near to the center of the throng as they could, hoping Mrs. Malvern's gimlet eyes would not note the absence of Sim. "Come, girls, get together!" The chaperon was herding them toward the door leading to the waiting cabs. "Tell the driver to take you to Thirty-third Street tube station and there take a train for Hoboken. When you get there, ask at the information desk which is the next train for Cedar Ridge, and don't forget to sign in as soon as you get back. That is important. We shall have to separate from now on." So far so good. Terry and Arden guiltily got into a gaudy taxi with three other girls. The two were thinking so much about Sim; wondering if, should they go on thinking, some subconscious influence would not cause someone to ask about her. The only thing to do was to talk to the other girls about the dance to keep their thoughts occupied with that subject. "Did they make any money, do you know?" Arden asked a strange girl, one of the three riding with her and Terry. "They cleared expenses, but I heard they only have a few dollars over." "It was a nice party, anyhow," Terry put in, looking anxiously out of the window. "The music was grand!" And that ended the half-hearted attempt at conversation. Both Arden and Terry had too much on their minds to do much talking. The other girls were intimately whispering among themselves. They seemed to give no thought to the missing Sim, nor to the fact that Arden and Terry had been two of a trio, inseparable, but were now only a duet. Their problem was a difficult one. Where was Sim? If she was not waiting at the tube station or in Hoboken, what should they do? How could they get back to Cedar Ridge without Mrs. Malvern or someone with inquisitive authority finding out about the missing girl? Arden privately decided, if they did not find Sim at either station, to tell Mrs. Malvern at the first opportunity. Terry, whose thoughts were following the same line as were Arden's, decided, if they reached Cedar Ridge and found no trace of Sim, that it would be best at once to telephone from college to the parents of the missing girl and ask for advice. There was a milling throng on the platform of the Thirty-third Street tube station on one side of which trains left for Jersey City and Newark, and on the other side for Hoboken and thence to Cedar Ridge. As well as they could, Terry and Arden peered through the crowd for Sim. But she was not to be seen, and the hope thermometer in their hearts went nearer the zero mark. The train was crowded, and it was almost impossible for Arden and Terry to converse above the noise. It didn't matter. They had nothing of interest to talk about, now. They looked anxiously at each other. Were they deserting Sim? Or rather, were they not showing real confidence in her? She must be safe! The excitement of the travel was helping to cheer her chums. When Hoboken terminus was reached and the crowds poured out as they had flowed in, once more the two sought anxiously among the many faces. But though there were scores of their fellow students hurrying to catch the next Cedar Ridge train, Sim was not among them. "She may be on the platform waiting for us," suggested Terry with a hope she did not feel. "Maybe," Arden murmured prayerfully. They almost stumbled up the concrete steps in their haste. The ramp, from the iron gates of which departed many trains for many places, was another place of milling crowds outside the station. A man in a portable information booth was answering questions in a very patient manner. By listening, without asking, Terry and Arden learned from which track their train departed and the time. They had a few precious minutes left. "Let's look around out here and then go inside," proposed Terry, who was lugging along Sim's bag with her own. "She isn't here," Arden sighed, after a search. "Let's go inside the station." There they looked about the big vaulted room: ticket offices on one side, a rank of telephone booths on another, a buffet restaurant, a magazine stand, a large candy booth. All of these spots were eagerly scanned without result. Apparently just to say "hello" to friends, Terry and Arden went from one group of waiting girls to another, glimpsing the pretty, animated faces, but Sim's was not among them. It seemed hopeless. Now, really frightened, Arden and Terry clung together as the stentorian voice announced their train in long-drawn accents. "We'll have to go!" murmured Terry desperately. "Yes. We can't wait any longer. But she may be in the train." It was a sort of last hope for Arden. "We can look, if it isn't too crowded," Terry suggested. But it was. In all the coaches, for most of the college girls had caught this train back, were repeated the same scenes, the same talk and laughter that had marked the going trip. The seekers could not locate Sim in the coach where they were crowded, and they did not dare pass from one car to another as the train quickly gathered speed after leaving Hoboken. The ride back was almost a nightmare for Terry and Arden, and when the train pulled into the Morrisville station, which was the college stop, they were pale and more worried than ever. "Maybe she is already here," breathed Terry, as they alighted. It was a brave attempt to brighten the situation. "Maybe. Let's hurry and see if she has signed in." Arden was only too glad to seize on Terry's suggestion. They almost ran along the path from the station to the college. Terry still insisted on clinging to Sim's bag, though Arden wanted to do her share of carrying it. Then up those back-breaking stairs and into the big recreation room where the registry book was kept for this occasion. Signing their own names, the two frightened freshmen scanned the pages for Sim's. "No, Arden, she hasn't come in." Terry turned sadly from the book. "I left a space between your name and mine," Arden said, "so in case Sim comes in later she can slip hers in without being caught. Hurry, Terry, let's get to our room so we can talk this out and decide upon--something." CHAPTER XI Sim Miles away from Cedar Ridge, Sim Westover idly turned the pages of a movie magazine. She was quite pleased with herself as she sat in a commuters' train, speeding toward Larchmont. It was dark now, and as Sim looked from the window her face was reflected in the glass as in a dull mirror. Just a hint of a shiny nose, but it was enough to cause her to open her envelope bag and search for her compact. But what were those white envelopes? Surely she hadn't forgotten to leave that carefully composed note for the dean--and the one to Arden and Terry! Yes, she had forgotten! "My word! They'll be worried to death!" Sim whispered in a gasp of dismay. "What a stupid thing to do! Write notes explaining everything and then take them with me!" Sim settled herself deeper into the soft green plush of the seat and looked helplessly at the envelopes bearing the imposing red and gold seal of the Chancellor Hotel. She could imagine Terry and Arden dashing madly about asking everywhere for her. And she had intended to leave the note right where they would see it--on the bed near her packed bag. "Oh," mused Sim, "if only they don't do anything rash, such as notifying the police or phoning to my folks!" The adventure she had planned to be such a fine thing was fast losing its savor. Suppose her father was not in Larchmont, after all? But he must be. In his last letter to Sim he had mentioned, casually, this trip which was a reason why he couldn't be in New York to greet her at the tea dance. He would be in Larchmont. It had seemed such a fine idea, when Sim learned the sophomores had not made the amount of money necessary even to start the repairs on the swimming pool, just to go to her father and ask him for it. It would be such a fine thing for the college, and Sim really must do some swimming. She felt that she was entitled to it after coming to Cedar Ridge, having seen the pictures of the pool in the prospectus. The others were dancing as Sim's grand idea was engendered within her, and it seemed too bad to interrupt them. Besides, Arden would, very probably, try to stop her. The simplest thing would be just to write the notes, explaining, and go ahead. The desk clerk at the hotel told her, when she asked, that she had fifteen minutes to get a train for Larchmont from the Grand Central Station. Sim was so glad she had remembered her father had written he was to be there for the week-end at the Newman home--planning another large branch store for business expansion. "Oh, dear! What a fix to be in! I suppose I'll be expelled! Mother will feel terribly bad, and Dad----Oh, dear!" Sim sighed aloud. But there was nothing she could do now. There were the forgotten letters which would have made everything all right. She had hurried up to the room, slipping away from the dance, had written the notes, put them in her bag, and changed her dress. She intended leaving them just before going out of the room. But a glance at the electric clock showed her there was little time to catch a taxi for the Grand Central in time to make the train, and in her haste---- The train ran along smoothly. The clickety-click of the wheels over the rail joints mocked Sim with their ever recurring: "Forgot! Forgot! Forgot!" She grew more upset and worried. She pulled back her coat sleeve and glanced at her wrist watch. Nine o'clock! By this time the girls would be taking the train for Morrisville. What had they done about her disappearance? Sim hated to think about it. This was, indeed, the deepest hole she had ever been in. The conductor opened the door and shouted: "Larch-_mont_! _Larch_-mont! All out for LARCH-MONT!" Sim gathered her things together and prepared to leave. As she alighted from the train, the thought came to her that she must at once go in the station and telephone Arden. But another glance at her watch caused her to hesitate. Arden and Sim might not be in Cedar Ridge yet. So she decided to wait until she reached the house of her father's friend and to telephone from there. She approached a taxi and gave the address to the driver. The ride was not long, and soon was on the steps waiting to be admitted at the Newman house. It was Mr. Newman himself who opened the door. "Why, Sim Westover!" he exclaimed. "What are you doing here? We thought you were safely in bed at Cedar Ridge. But come in! Take off your things!" "Good-evening, Mr. Newman," Sim said quickly. "I should be at Cedar Ridge, but something very important came up, and I decided, in a hurry, to come up here to see Dad. I was in New York at a dance. Dad is here, isn't he?" "Why, no, Sim, he isn't. He telephoned me, late this afternoon, that he couldn't make it after all. Is anything the matter?" Sim's face was a study in many expressions as she faintly replied: "Yes, I guess there is--now. Everything would have been all right if I hadn't been so forgetful!" Sim was close to tears, and the sight of her mother's dear college friend (both ladies had graduated at Cedar Ridge) caused Sim almost to break down. "Come in, Sim!" greeted Mrs. Newman, sensing, as she hastened into the hall, that something was wrong. "Have you had anything to eat? I thought not. Come into the dining room. Marie can get you some tea and sandwiches, at least. Then you can tell us all about it while you eat, and you'll feel better. It isn't serious, is it?" This last prompted by a look at Sim's face. "Well, it isn't going to be very pleasant, I'm afraid." On the way to and in the dining room, while a hasty lunch was made ready, Sim blurted out the whole story. "And so you see," she finished, "I must get word to Arden or Terry as quickly as possible, and it must be managed so that I'm not found out as missing or I shall probably be expelled. I'm away without leave. I must get back tonight." "Go back tonight? Impossible, my dear! Can't you stay with us until morning?" "I think not. If I can slip back all may yet be well. But if I have to explain to the dean----No, it couldn't be done. There must be a train back tonight, isn't there?" She turned questioning eyes on Mr. Newman. He looked at some time-tables, of which he had several in his smoking room, and announced: "You'd never get back until late--very late--by train. But if you feel you must be back in college before morning----" "I do. Oh, yes, I do, Mr. Newman!" "Then the only thing is for me to drive you there. We can make good time at night. I know the roads." "Oh, Mr. Newman! I couldn't dream of----" "Tut, tut, Sim! It's the only way. I don't mind. It will be a little diversion for me. I'll have the chauffeur get the car out now. He can do the driving. I'll sit and talk to you, and the way won't seem so long." "Oh, Mr. Newman, you're wonderful! Now I must phone Arden at once to be watching for me. Luckily our room is on the front of the dorm. How long do you think it will take?" Sim, getting up from the table, at the session of which she had much improved in spirits, was planning rapidly now. Perhaps all would yet be well. "About three hours, I should say," Mr. Newman answered. "It will be slow going from here until we get into New Jersey, and then we can make time. You ought to be back _at_ college around midnight, though whether you can get _in_----" "That's why I must phone Arden or Terry. Oh, what a lot of trouble I'm causing!" Sim's eyes filled with tears, but she blinked them back. "There, now, my dear, never mind!" soothed Mrs. Newman. "We'll help you all we can." "That's the kind of people they are," Sim told Arden, later. "They haven't forgotten what it is to be young." It took some little time to get a telephone connection through to Cedar Ridge, and Sim lived years in moments, she thought, while waiting for Arden to come to the phone. Finally the voice came to her. "Hello, Arden? Yes, I'm all right. I'm up at Larchmont with friends of Dad's. Did they find out about me? No? Good! Listen! Here's my plan. I'll tell you all how it happened later. Someone might hear us if I talked too long now. I'm driving back--yes, driving. I'll get there about midnight. Don't fall asleep. When we get to the entrance--the outside gate, I mean--we'll toot the horn three times. You and Terry slip down and let me in. Do you understand? Fine! I'm leaving right away. Good-bye, darling! I'll explain everything later. I'm quite all right, and nothing has happened. Good-bye!" She hung up and turned to her friends, murmuring: "That's over, thank goodness!" "Well, let's get going, Sim!" Mr. Newman was now almost as much excited as was Sim herself. "Try to sleep on the way out, Sim dear," advised Mrs. Newman. "I'm having robes and a soft cushion put in the car. You can snuggle up in a corner of the sedan." "I thought she was going to talk to me!" chuckled Mr. Newman. "Of course I will--if I can find anything to talk about." "No, you mustn't," decided his wife. "Sim must try to get some sleep. You will, won't you, my dear?" "Yes, I will. Luckily tomorrow will be Sunday, and I can sleep late in my room--if I get there. Thank you both--so much! I'll never forget this--never!" Sim put her arms about Mrs. Newman's neck and kissed her affectionately. "Oh, my poor dear! I know just how you feel. You meant it all for the best, and there is really no harm done." "Not yet," said Sim a trifle grimly as she followed Mr. Newman out to the big sedan that was waiting, with the chauffeur at the door, on the drive. CHAPTER XII Midnight Mishap Arden's slippered feet pad-padded up the dark stairs like small, softened trip-hammers as she hurried away from the telephone to inform Terry of the good news that Sim was safe and on her way. She pushed open the door of 513 and shut it quickly behind her, panting and excited from her swift upward flight. "Terry! Terry!" she began breathlessly. "It was Sim--on the phone. I talked to her!" "Oh--good! Is she--all right?" "Yes. She didn't have time to talk much. She was 'way up in Larchmont. Said she'd explain everything later. She is coming back around midnight, and she wants us to watch for her and let her in." "What was she doing in Larchmont?" the practical Terry wanted to know. "I can't guess," replied Arden. "We'll have to wait until we see her. She said she was all right and nothing had happened. I can hardly wait until she gets here." "Midnight," murmured Terry. "We'll have to stand our turns at watch as they do aboard ships. Now that I know Sim is safe, I'm suddenly very sleepy. How is she coming--train?" "No. She's driving. We'll have to listen for a car. She thought she'd better walk in from the entrance instead of having the car drive right up, so no one would hear. They'll toot the horn so we'll know." Arden went to the window and gazed at the black scene below. "It's absolutely dark out," she continued. "I hope we'll be able to see the lights of the car as it comes up the road. We'd better get undressed in case anyone comes in." "All right," Terry agreed. "I'll take the first watch. Let's make them an hour each. You sleep until I call you. I'll sit here on the window seat. If I go to sleep I'll probably fall off, and that will wake me up." Quickly they got into their pajamas. Terry put on a robe and slippers and curled herself on the window seat. "I never remember a blacker or stiller night," she remarked. "I'm glad Sim isn't alone. She's with friends of her father's." "Do you suppose we can let her in all right? What if we can't get the door open?" Arden asked nervously. "I'll think that possibility out while I'm on watch. You go to sleep as quickly as you can. Don't worry so much, Arden. You'll be gray by morning!" "I'll be exhausted by morning, anyhow. However, toodle-oo--sailor, beware, and all that sort of thing! I'm going to try to get some rest." There was not a sound in the room for at least five minutes when Terry suddenly flung a tennis ball with a thudding crash at a marauding mouse. The ball, one of a supply of such ammunition kept in readiness for just this contingency, bounced a few times and rolled under a bed as the mouse, with a protesting squeak, darted back into a hole beneath the baseboard. The college had settled for the night. The appearance of the mouse was one proof of this. Terry tried not to be too comfortable and kept shifting her position on the window seat. It was getting cold, so she pulled a blanket off her bed and wrapped it around her. The next thing she remembered someone was shaking her to wakefulness. It was Arden. "Fine sailor you are! You were sound asleep! Sim might be trying to get in. You get in bed, Terry. I'll watch." "No," sleepily. "Yes," firmly. "Oh--all right, Captain. Let's see how you make out. Anyhow, she can't be here yet--it's too early." Terry rolled herself into the bed, and Arden took her place on the uncomfortable window seat. After a few minutes there she leaned forward and pressed the side of her face to the cold, dark glass in order to look as far as possible to the east, the direction from which the traveling car would come. But the highway beyond the college grounds showed no blinking lights, so Arden drew her knees up to her chin under her robe and stared moodily out into the night. What was going to come of all this, she wondered? What might happen if Sim were caught was too disheartening to think of, so Arden tried to piece together the events of the afternoon in a brave effort to keep awake. The whole affair had so many missing links, though. It was just Sim's usual good luck that she was not missed by Mrs. Malvern when the girls returned to school. "Oh, dear!" sighed Arden at the thought of how she and Terry would have been put to it to explain. But they had not been obliged to do any explaining--so far. The mouse, grown bolder in the silent darkness, was conducting a rustling, rattling search among some papers on a desk for tasty crumbs. Arden got up quietly and reached for another tennis ball. As she stood up she looked once more toward the highway and waited in strained tenseness. Yes, she was sure of it. Far down the road a light bounced about as a speeding car neared the college. "Terry! Terry!" Arden whispered. "I think they're coming! Wake up!" Terry was up in an instant and glided over to the window. "It's a car, sure enough. But we'd better make certain before we start down. Keep watch while I fasten the belt of my robe." "I will," whispered Arden. "Is it stopping at the far gate?" "No, it's going on. Oh, no, it isn't, either. It hasn't passed the gate. It must be Sim! We'll give her a few seconds to get out and walk up the drive. I hope she knows enough to stay on the grass and not on that crunchy gravel." "Trust Sim for that," murmured Terry. "Now I'm ready. But give Sim time to get to the door. We don't want to wait down in the dark lower hall any longer than we have to." "No. Come on! And don't use your flashlight unless you have to." Cautiously Arden opened the door and, followed by Terry, stepped out into the dark corridor which seemed to stretch for miles and miles the length of the building, disappearing into blackness at the end. At the top of the first flight of stairs leading down from the floor of the 513 room was a small light bulb doing its little best to dispel the gloom. Holding hands, Arden and Terry tiptoed down the first flight. Arden's free hand slid noiselessly along the polished banister rail. Now and then the stairs creaked and snapped with what seemed to be the noise of a gun. They stopped to rest at the first landing, not so much from physical weariness as from the nervous strain. On the first and several other landings was a large window facing the distant orchard. The orchard was now only a black blur but Arden and Terry thought they could see the gnarled trees beneath which they, with Sim, had been so frightened on the occasion of the hazing. "I wouldn't go down there now for anything!" whispered Terry. "Down where? Do you mean to let Sim in?" "No, I mean that awful orchard. What do you suppose is in there, Arden?" "I wish I knew. No, I don't. Let's don't talk about it now." "The subject isn't very heartening in the present circumstances," agreed Terry in queer little gulps. They tiptoed down to the next floor. Every now and then they halted, trembling, waiting for some door to open and lead to their discovery. But the other students must, indeed have been sleeping the sleep of the just, for Arden and Terry eventually reached the lower entrance hall without mishap. The ground glass of the heavy front doors showed a little lighter than the surrounding wooden frames. Arden was there, fumbling with the old-fashioned key. Terry was watching apprehensively. Suddenly two dark figures were outlined on the glass of the door. One was that of Sim! "I'll have it open in a moment, Sim!" Arden panted, working desperately with the key. "It's turning now!" "And none too soon!" whispered Terry. "Oh, I'm so frightened!" The lock clicked. Arden turned the knob and pulled the heavy door inward, just far enough to admit Sim, who slithered in with the speed of a wind-blown leaf. Thrusting her gloved hand out through the opening crack she had slid through, while Arden braced herself to prevent the portal from swinging too far back, Sim waved to someone unseen and hoarsely whispered: "Good-night, Mr. Newman! I'm all right now. Thank you a thousand times! I'll write to Mrs. Newman. Good-bye!" With all Arden's care she could not hold the heavy door firmly enough to prevent a deep though not loud banging sound as it closed. "Arden!" gasped Terry. "I couldn't help it. Quick! Help me turn this key back. It's so stiff!" Terry gave her aid. Then the two turned to the midnight entrant in the dark precincts of Cedar Ridge. "Sim!" whispered Arden, flinging her arms about her chum. "Oh, Arden!" returned the wanderer. "Come on, you two!" Terry interrupted. "We're not safe yet. Take off your shoes, Sim, you bad girl!" Sim bent down to comply with this cautionary advice, but suddenly stood crouched, frozen with dismay. That noise could be from only one cause. Someone was coming down the stairs! Even as the three frightened freshmen realized this, a white face was outlined by a gleaming electric torch on the landing above them. A voice, high-pitched in anger, floated down to them. "What is the meaning of this?" It was the dean looking like Lady Macbeth, holding an electric candle above and in front of her, so that the gleam made curious shadows on her stern face. And above all other possible colors she was wearing a cerise robe! Perhaps deans were secretly like that. "Go to your room at once and report to me in the morning!" Lady Authority turned with all her dignity and swept away, while the girls, with consternation knocking at their hearts, crept up the stairs to the harbor of their room. CHAPTER XIII Aftermath While Sim, in the room the three girls shared, undressed with weary slowness, Terry and Arden sat like youthful inquisitors and shot question after question at her until the whole foolish episode was at last laid bare before them. "Sim, you must have had a touch of the sun, or something, to do what you did," Arden said spiritedly. "It's all over now, Arden--there's no use crying over the straw that broke the camel's back or the spilled milk that got in the eye of the needle in the haystack, or something," Terry remarked soothingly. "Thanks," murmured Sim. And then, with sudden energy: "But, oh, girls! I forgot to tell you the most exciting part! We came in as far as we could on the back road--you know, where it circles the college grounds near the orchard and finally comes out at the main highway?" She looked questioningly at her hearers. "Yes, we know," said Arden, and Terry nodded, adding: "Let's hear it all." "Well, I thought," went on Sim, "that we had better stop for a minute to see if there were any lights in this dorm before we went any farther. So we did, but I didn't notice just where we were, as I was looking so hard toward where I knew you two would be, and on the watch for me, I hoped." "As we were," said Arden. "Yes. Thanks a lot. But listen to this." By Sim's manner Terry and Arden knew something startling was to be told--something so startling that, for the moment, it drove from their minds the thought of having been caught by the stern dean. "Suddenly," said Sim, "away down at the far end of the orchard, I saw a light bobbing about!" "Ye gods, Sim! Did Mr. Newman see it? What was it?" demanded Arden excitedly. "He saw it, and so did the chauffeur, for he said something about why someone should be out in a gloomy old orchard at that time of night with a lantern. I was frozen with horror!" Sim was enjoying herself and watching the eyes of the girls widen with surprise. "Well, go on!" whispered Terry. "What did you do?" "We didn't say a word--just sat there in the car and watched the light coming closer. I felt sure it was someone looking for me." "For you?" gasped Arden. "Well, I mean trying to find out who was coming back to college so late, against the rules--afraid they'd find me out, you know." "Oh, yes," Terry murmured. "Pretty soon," resumed Sim, "we said that it was someone carrying a lantern--holding it down low so it was only shining on the ground." "Don't stop, Sim--tell us who it was!" Terry begged. "I don't know who it was. He didn't pass very close, and from the way he was carrying the lantern I could only see his legs and part of one hand, but--" Sim paused dramatically--"he seemed like a young man." "Did he see you?" Arden blurted out. "Perhaps; though if he did, he didn't seem to care. He went stumbling on his way toward Bordmust. Then I came out of my daze and told Mr. Newman we'd better be getting on our way. Of course, he thought it queer that a man should be out that hour of night near a girls' school, but I passed it off by saying it was the watchman on his rounds. But, girls, it wasn't, though even the little I could see made me feel he belonged around here. But, here's a question, a hard one, really: What do you suppose he was doing in the orchard after midnight?" "I can't imagine. It's all very queer. And," went on Arden, "I hope it just stays merely queer. But now, to be practical--much as I know you hate to be that way, Sim--I think we had all better get some sleep. We'll have to see Tiddy in the morning, and we had better have our wits about us when we do." Arden yawned. The conference was ended. The girls got into bed. The light was extinguished. Silence settled over the room. Terry, as usual, lost no time in getting to sleep. Sim, utterly exhausted, was sighing heavily as she burrowed under the blankets. But Arden was never more wakeful. All the various adventures the girls had shared in the past were as clear in her mind as though she were watching a motion-picture film of them. She tossed and turned. Through the gloom Arden fancied she could see again the face of the man described in the reward placard in the post office. Arden was still certain that, somewhere, she had seen that face before. The fright she and her chums had in the orchard, was, in some way, linked with the lantern man Sim had seen that night. Then, intruding upon that situation, it was borne to Arden that the swimming pool was in as hopeless a shape as on their arrival at Cedar Ridge. What would Sim do now? And what would happen at the morning interview with Miss Tidbury Anklon, the severe dean? Arden was desperate. She would never get to sleep at this rate. As quietly as she could, she arose, went to her bureau, and managed, by feeling, to find the bottle of aspirin tablets. She swallowed one, taking a few sips of unpleasantly tepid water from the glass at her bed-side table, and tried to compose herself again. She noticed that Sim and Terry were breathing like tired, sleeping children. Arden lay flat on her back, as she had read somewhere this was a good thing to do when one could not get to sleep. Closing her eyes tightly, she began to count: "One! Two! Three!" Suddenly the white woolly sheep leaping gayly over a black fence became huge red apples rolling toward her as she was stretched helpless on the ground. She put up her arms to ward them off, but to no avail. Soon she was covered completely by an immense pile of the fruit. Her voice, as she sought to cry for help to Terry and Sim, would not sound. She tried in vain to crawl out from beneath the heap of red apples as hard as stones. "Arden! Arden! You're dreaming! Wake up!" Sim was shaking her gently. Slowly Arden returned to consciousness. She raised herself on one elbow and stared dazedly about the dim room. "Sim--I've had such a horrid dream!" Arden took a deep breath and sat up. "Oh, dear, it's almost morning!" She had, in truth, slept nearly the night through. A gray dawn, shot with glints of the rising sun, pressed against the window. "In a few hours we'll be in Tiddy's office," Arden sighed. "I wish it was all over!" Sim had nothing to say to this. She reached over and tugged at the blankets covering the still slumbering Terry, saying: "You might as well wake up, too. It's morning." Terry grunted sleepily. "What? Oh--it's you, Sim. I remember. Today's the day. What time is it?" "Seven-thirty," supplied Arden, looking at her watch. "Let's get dressed and have it over with. We can see Tiddy in an hour." Yawning and stretching, the girls dressed and started down for breakfast. CHAPTER XIV The Dean Decides Breakfast was, if anything, duller and more gloomy than usual. So many "shining morning faces" only made the three freshmen involved in the escapade of the night before more nervous. When the meal was over and Arden, Sim, and Terry were waiting in the dean's outer office, they were almost sick with dread. "Come in, young ladies!" Tiddy opened the door to the inner sanctum herself and, with an almost imperious gesture of her lean brown hand, waved the three in ahead of her. The office was large and bright. Green carpet covered the floor to the uttermost corners. The windows were draped with neutral-toned curtains. The founder of the college, in the form of a highly-varnished oil painting of a stern-faced, dark-featured and white-haired man, looked down at the three from a vantage point over the dean's desk. Miss Anklon asked and noted down the names of her visitors, though they were quite sure she well knew them already. She began: "This prank of yours, my dear girls, is something we do not countenance at this college. You were put upon your honor when you went into New York and were expected to return as your classmates did." She looked sternly over the tops of her glasses. Then she resumed: "If I remember correctly, you two were in your night clothes and this young lady was still dressed. Is that right?" She directed her gaze specifically at Sim. "Yes, Miss Anklon," Sim answered in a weak voice. "Perhaps you will explain yourself, then." "I never thought it would cause so much trouble," Sim began. "When I learned that the sophomores didn't make as much money at the dance as they hoped to, I just decided to go to my father and ask him for it." She paused uncertainly. "I came to this college, instead of going to some other, because I hope to become--" she paused and then went on--"because the swimming pool looked so lovely in the catalog." Sim glanced shyly at the dean, whose face betrayed none of her feelings. It was no time to speak of expert diving ambitions. "That is hardly a reason for coming to college, Miss Westover. But go on with your story. Why were you returning at such a late hour?" "My father wasn't where I thought he would be, and I forgot to leave the notes I wrote, explaining my absence and--and----" Gradually Sim blurted out the whole story, Arden and Terry now and then adding a little to the telling. When Sim finally ended her recital, Miss Anklon was as stony as before. She sat behind her polished desk and looked at the girls more sternly than ever. "I believe you have told me the truth, Miss Westover, although it seems strange you should be so heedless." Miss Anklon tapped her desk with a pencil. "You other girls were almost as much to blame as Miss Westover. If anything had happened, you would have been responsible. While you are here in this college we are entrusted with your welfare." She paused a moment, looked up at the dark-faced founder as if for inspiration, and continued: "Besides the seriousness of your act, I must tell you that you three girls do not seem to be starting your college life in the right spirit. Although you have been here for only a short time, you have already attracted some, shall I say, undesirable attention? Yes, that is it. Those stories about the orchard were your doing--am I not right?" This time the dean looked directly at Arden. "They were not stories, Miss Anklon," Arden began. "We really were chased by something while we were in the garden gathering apples as a hazing stunt. And we did find the gardener's helper lying wounded on the ground." The dean bowed her head in frosty acquiescence and said: "It would have been better if you had come to me and told me of your--your experiences, instead of telling them to so many impressionable girls. Do you know I have received letters from several worried parents as a result of your spreading of this tale?" "We tried not to talk of it, Miss Anklon, but it got around in some way. I think everyone in the college would like to know what really happened in the orchard." This time it was Terry who spoke with all the dignity at her command. "As to that, Miss Landry, the gardener, Tom, fell over a tree root, so I am told, and struck his head. Anything that chased you must have been a product of your too vivid imagination." "Oh, no--no, Miss Anklon!" Arden was emphatic in her denial, but the dean held up a quieting, protesting hand. Arden looked at Sim as if to say: "I'd like to tell her how it hurt when I sat down hard upon those stones!" The dean, seeming to gather herself together for a final statement of the case, said: "All this has nothing to do with your latest escapade. I regret very much that I must take this action, but I am forced to tell you that all three of you will be campused for three weeks and lose all your privileges." Miss Anklon was stern and unsmiling. "I do not wish you to tell your classmates of your foolish experience, Miss Westover. It is best kept quiet. You may all go now." For several seconds the three freshmen stood facing the dean but saying nothing. The severity of their punishment was so great that they were stricken speechless. No going into town to shop or to the movies. No week-end guests. And not to leave the college grounds at all for three weeks! "Miss Anklon," Sim was the first to speak, "you don't know how much my swimming means to me. I realize, now, how wrong I was to go away without permission, but Arden and Terry----" "That will do, Miss Westover, I have made my decision!" Tiddy was at her fearful worst. "Good-morning!" The girls realized that the interview was over and that the decision was final. Responding with almost whispered "good-mornings," the three left the office and walked slowly toward the tennis courts. With one accord they sat on a white-painted bench and gazed moodily at a spirited doubles game. The ping of the balls seemed to find echoes in the dull throbbings of their hearts. "I suppose we were fortunate not to be expelled," Arden said timidly, after a long silence. "We might just as well have been. We can't go anywhere. We can't do anything. Added to that, we can't even swim!" Sim was quite unhappy as she answered Arden's attempted philosophy. "Don't take it so to heart, Sim," Terry advised. "We're all in the same boat. We can have lots of fun here, just the same. It will be a good chance for me to get caught up on my French." "That's the spirit!" exclaimed Arden. "We can give more time to solving the mystery of the orchard. And I'll have that pool fixed yet: you'll see!" "You mean with the reward money you're going to get for finding that missing Pangborn chap?" asked Sim. "Yes," Arden nodded. "We haven't done a thing toward that yet," spoke Terry. "We don't even know whether or not he has been found, restored to his worried friends, and the reward paid to someone else. Don't you think we had better check up on it?" "Yes, we must," Arden agreed. "And though we can't leave the campus even to go to the post office and see if that reward poster is still there, still, perhaps we can do something. They can't keep us out of the orchard, anyhow." "Except that I'm not going there again at night, not for ten swimming pools!" declared Terry. "Nor I," Sim added. "But I don't suppose," she went on, "that the mystery or the terror, or whatever you want to call it, of the orchard has anything to do with the missing man and the thousand dollars reward, do you, Arden?" "I don't know." "What a delicious mystery it would be if it worked out that way, wouldn't it?" exclaimed Terry. "If you're making fun of my well-meant efforts," spoke Arden a trifle stiffly, "why, I----" "Oh, not at all!" Terry made haste to say, Sim chiming in with a murmured denial also. "And we're going to help you all we can as soon as this horrid campusing is over. Really, there must be some reason for thinking this missing young man might be in this neighborhood, or it wouldn't have said so on the poster." "Arden has the right of it there," Sim declared, "and it's sweet of both of you not to mind this so much. But I feel very badly about it. I got you into trouble, and I got Tiddy down on all of us." Sim was impatiently kicking a clump of grass. "Well, we can't do anything about it now. So let's go back and write the real story home before our families have a chance to hear it from Tiddy." CHAPTER XV The Alarm Bell When it came to writing letters home, each girl approached her family from a different viewpoint, naturally. Arden, who was the most interesting writer of the three, was inclined to dramatize. Her missive was filled with descriptions, reflecting the fears they had felt at Sim's disappearance and their resentment at the punishment inflicted by the dean. All this was set forth vividly. Terry was diplomatic in her letter. Her mother, she knew, would worry needlessly if she felt that the girls were in any danger. So she made prominent mention of the good times they were having, culminating in a mistake they had mutually made which resulted in a curtailment of some of their privileges. Sim was writing rapidly, her eyes bright and her lips compressed into a stern, determined line. She finished first, and after closing the envelope and sealing it, she scratched on the address and turned to her friends. "I may as well tell you, before you hear it outside," Sim began and hesitated, "but I've written to my father for permission to come home!" "Sim! Not to stay! Don't leave us now, when things will be so dull here for Arden and me if you go!" Terry begged. Sim looked uncompromising. "Please don't go, Sim! Don't mail your letter. I feel as though I am to blame. Anyhow, Sim, there'd be nothing for you to do at home. Three weeks aren't so long." Arden arose and patted Sim maternally on the shoulder. "It isn't just three weeks. It's the whole school year!" Sim declared. "It will take a long time to fix the pool, even if they get the money. Besides, I was told by my math teacher that I'd probably flunk out at mid-year if I didn't improve, and I'd rather go home before that happens." "But we can help you, Sim," Terry promised. "Won't you think it over? Even if we are campused, I know of a few parties the girls have planned, and they'll be fun." Arden decided to try a new method of approach. "Sim, I wouldn't mention it if I didn't want you to stay," she said. "But you got us into this, even if you meant it all for the best, and even if you do leave, Terry and I will still be campused. There are lots of other things to do besides swimming, and, don't forget, we have a mystery here that no one dreams about but us." "I am sorry about you and Terry, but right now I don't feel like being a good sport. I'll go to Tiddy and ask her to let you two off." Sim hesitated. "But I want to go home, Arden. Don't ask me to stay." "If you feel you must go, Sim, all right. But what I ask you to do is not to mail your letter for a few days. Write another in its place, at least temporarily, and say everything is settled. And then, if you still feel the same way----" Arden shrugged and turned aside. Sim left her desk and walked slowly to a window. The peacefulness of the scene below, framed by the trees in their bright autumn array, must have had some influence on the perturbed girl. For, after a few moments of silent contemplation, Sim swung around and exclaimed: "All right, Arden. I'll think it over. You can hold this letter for three days, and I'll write another to send home. But it's only because of my friendship for you both that I'm doing it." "That's great, Sim! You won't be sorry. We'll forget about it now and----" A small shuffling noise stopped Arden in the midst of her exultation. It came from the direction of the door, and, even as the three looked, a bright blue and white envelope was pushed under the portal. Terry picked up the missive and opened it. "Why!" she exclaimed in delighted surprise, "it's an invitation for a party tomorrow in the gym. The sophomores are giving it to the freshmen, and we must," she was rapidly reading the note, "all wear some sort of a costume. Oh, how precious!" She was gleefully excited. "What fun!" With the suddenness of youth Arden closed her mind to the subject of Sim threatening to go home and she began to plan for the party. "What can we wear?" asked Terry. "We haven't much in the way of costumes," Arden admitted. "I suppose, though, we can wear riding habits or blacken our faces and slick back our hair. We'll probably have more fun that way than if we wore draperies." "Oh, yes," Terry agreed. "It will be a little break for us after what we know is in prospect," said Sim in a low voice. After lessons, the next day had been gotten through in some fashion and, following supper, the three hurried back to their room. Sim put on Terry's riding clothes, which were much too big, and Terry wore a part of Sim's sport suit with a woolly cap belonging to Arden. As for Arden, she put on a short, tight skirt and a sweater belonging to Jane Randall and knotted a scarf about her throat, Apache style. Then, using a soft eyebrow pencil, the girls adorned their lips with villainous mustaches. "How do we look?" asked Sim, trying to pose in front of a mirror that showed only part of her. "Terrible!" laughed Terry. "That's the way we want to look," decided Arden. Down in the large gymnasium crêpe paper was used to cover the steam pipes, and many streamers, in the college colors, disguised the bare whitewashed walls. The room was crowded with noisy, laughing girls. At one end a portable phonograph was playing, with the loudest needle obtainable, a popular dance tune. Arden and her two particular friends were met at the door by their sophomore tormentors, Toots Everett, Jessica Darglan, and Priscilla MacGovern. Toots came forward and gave Sim a large paper carton made in imitation of a traveling bag. It was adorned with huge purple and green paper bows. "A gift for our most widely traveled freshman!" said Toots with a laugh. "You must keep this with you until refreshments are served. Those are the rules." Sim smiled grimly and accepted the box gracefully. So her story was known all over college in spite of the dean's prohibition? Arden and Terry received large, blank exercise books in which to keep a record of their engagements: gentle sarcasm when it was evidently known they couldn't make any for three weeks at least. One by one the freshmen were given articles to show up their various faults, failings, and follies. The party was soon well under way and progressed happily. The girls who could lead were the most popular dancers that night. In fact, those girls were booked well ahead as partners. Arden was dancing with Jane Randall at the far end of the gymnasium when she happened to glance up at one of the windows. What she saw startled her so that she made a mis-step and caused Jane to exclaim: "Look out!" Arden wanted to say she was looking with all her eyes, but she did not dare call her partner's attention to what had so disturbed her. For, as she glanced up at the window, Arden saw gazing down at her with strange malevolence a mocking, smiling face. Then, in a second, it was gone, and only the black square of glass remained. Arden was almost shaking with fright, so much so that she faltered in the dance. She glanced quickly at Jane to learn whether she had noticed the face, but now Jane was smiling over Arden's head at the antics of some capering freshman. As she circled the room with Jane, Arden's fears subsided somewhat, and she resolved to say nothing about it to Jane. Then, when the record had played itself out, that dance came to an end. For a moment following the last strains of the music there was a lull in the noise of talk and laughter. Then, suddenly, breaking in on the happy, peaceful silence, as though it had been planned, came the slow and mournful tolling of a heavy bell. Dong! Ding-dong! Ding-dong! "What is it?" questioned several. "Do we unmask now?" others wanted to know. They thought it a signal. "I've never heard a bell ring like that since I've been here at Cedar Ridge," said a demure little sophomore in a low voice. "It hasn't rung--in a long time," said one girl in a low voice. "But what is it?" Arden demanded. "Why does it ring now?" Terry wanted to know. "Come on!" called the impulsive Toots Everett. "There's something wrong somewhere." "That old outside fire-alarm bell hasn't been tolled since we had the modern telephone system installed," said one of the teachers who was overtaken in the hall by a rush of students from the gymnasium. The dance was momentarily forgotten. "Oh, a fire!" gasped Terry. "Let's hurry out!" proposed Sim. They were all hurrying. CHAPTER XVI Arden's Adventure The moon looked down upon a strange party of girls a moment later, for they had all rushed out of the gymnasium after the ringing of the alarm bell. Blackened faces and slicked-back hair, some in tattered garments and others in borrowed finery, sophomores and freshmen crowded forward to that side of the building where hung the bell. But when they reached the spot nothing was to be seen. The bell rope was still swaying as though recently tugged at, but the hands that had done it were not in evidence. The bell itself still faintly vibrated from the recent violent clanging. "Well, at least here's something they can't blame us for," said Sim to the curious Arden and Terry. "We have perfect alibis and dozens of witnesses. This time somebody else can be campused." "Of course, Sim," Terry agreed. "But the point is--who did it? It's rather a childish thing to do--going about pulling bells and then running away. It doesn't frighten anyone in the least, if that's what it was intended for." "It was silly, that's true, Terry; but listen to this." Arden motioned for her two chums to come closer to her. "Come over here where the others won't hear. We don't want to have Tiddy blaming us for any more alarming stories." "Arden! You have something to tell us, I know!" Terry was pulling Sim away from a group of chattering girls. "Come over here, Sim. Arden knows something!" The three from 513 separated from the main crowd of disguised girls, and Arden began. "I was dancing with Jane Randall when something made me look up at one of the high gym windows, and there I saw a strange, white face staring in at me." "Arden--you didn't!" gasped Sim quickly. "Do you mean directly at you the face was staring?" "It seemed so." "Do you think that was the person who rang the bell?" "That, my dear Watson, is just the point. It was such a short time after I saw the face that the bell rang, it couldn't have been done by the person who looked in at me through the window." "How thrilling! For Pete's sake, don't let anyone know what you saw, Arden. If you do we'll be in more trouble!" Terry said. "She's right," Sim agreed. "We'll keep it under our hats until we find out something more. The others are going back in, now. We'd better go in." The sophomores and freshmen, so rudely disturbed at their reconciliation party, having investigated as best they could in the uncertain moonlight, and having discovered nothing more than that the evidence of the swaying rope indicated the bell had rung (which evidence their ears already testified to), were returning to the gymnasium. But before they went in, though just how it started no one appeared to know, they were all doing a sort of snake dance in the silvery sheen of the moonlight. Twisting and turning, the line of masquerading girls in fantastic figures circled beneath the old alarm bell that hung on a projecting beam out from the side of the building. It thus projected to allow the sound of its alarm to vibrate freely in all directions. Above their heads and out of reach of the hands of the tallest of the girls, dangled the weathered rope attached to the bell. "It must have been a very tall person who could reach that rope!" panted Terry as she circled with Sim. "A veritable giant," was the answer. "None of the girls could have done it." "No. That's what I thought." "What are you talking about?" demanded Terry, who had been caught in the human maelstrom by some strange girl and whirled about. "We don't quite know," said Arden. Screaming and laughing, the sophomores in the lead took the freshmen running across the campus and stopped in front of the dormitory. "Good-night, freshies!" cried Toots and some of the leaders. "And happy dreams!" "That means the end of hazing," said Arden. "It's always done this way." "Thank goodness for that!" murmured Terry. The party was over. Then the girls, sophomores and freshmen, formed a friendly circle and sang "Autumn Leaves," the alma mater song. The girls' voices carried softly through the moonlit night and even the most unromantic was impressed with the beauty of the words and melody. Then, bidding one another good-night, the happy students hurried to their respective rooms, talking excitedly. And the dean and her helpers settled more comfortably in their beds, knowing that for another term this affair was successfully over. The door of 513 shut on Arden, Sim, and Terry. For a moment they stood looking at one another, and then, as if by agreement, they began to laugh; hysterical laughs but none the less hearty. "Oh, you do look such a sight, Sim!" Terry gasped. "Why bring that up?" Sim chuckled. "But we had a lovely time," Arden said. "Even if there was a mysterious bell ringing and a face----" "Tell us more about that," begged Sim. "I've told you all I know. I saw a face--an old man's, I'm sure, staring in at me from the window. Then the bell rang." "But why?" demanded Terry. "If we could find out, perhaps we could solve the mystery of several other things that have happened around Cedar Ridge," Arden said. "But that bell," went on Sim. "I heard some of the girls talking. It seems it is an old alarm bell, to be rung in case of fires. But when the telephone system was put in the rope that originally reached close to the ground, so help could be summoned from the town and from nearby residents, was cut off. And it was cut off so high up that no ordinary person, standing under the rope, could reach it." "Why was that done?" asked Terry. "Because it was found," Sim explained, "that when the rope was left long enough to be reached, some students, thinking it fun, rang the alarm. That was long before our time. So the dean had the rope cut short." "Why didn't she take it off altogether?" asked Arden. "I asked a soph that," explained Sim, "and she told me it was thought best to leave most of the rope in place so if ever it was necessary to sound the old bell, it could be done." "But how, if the rope was high up?" Terry inquired. "By standing on a ladder, I suppose. Don't ask me, for I really don't know." With determination they began washing off the marks of the eyebrow-pencil mustaches, using cold cream, and finally they were ready for bed. "Well," remarked Arden in tones that told her chums she had made up her mind seriously, "something is going to happen, I feel sure of it." Pressed for details, she would say nothing more. But a few evenings after this, up to which time nothing of moment had happened save that the three from 513 began to feel more and more their campused bonds, a thick hazy fog enveloped the college grounds, spreading to the near-by town and villages about. Arden was walking alone from the library back to the dormitory. The fog seemed suddenly swept in from the distant sea, settling in the low places so that the upper stories of the building seemed floating in the air. Arden thrust her hands into the deep pockets of her skirt and in one felt the letter Sim had entrusted to her--the letter asking her father for permission to leave college. The excitement of the masquerade party and the mysterious bell-ringing had done nothing to lighten Sim's depression. She was still determined, it seemed, to carry out her intention. Sim didn't seem to care about anything. She was not the least bit excited by the bell-ringing nor by the strange face, and evidently had dismissed them from her mind. Arden felt there was no time to be lost if Sim was to be kept at Cedar Ridge. The strange face she had seen through the obscured window when she was dancing with Jane Randall had seemed vaguely familiar, but she had glimpsed it for so short a time that it was impossible to recognize it. No one else had seen it, of that Arden was certain, for no one had spoken of it, and there were no more stories current of mysterious doings about the college. "Sim will just pack up and go home unless something is done to make her change her mind," thought Arden as she walked along through the fog. "And I'm going to do it!" Campused or not, she would now go to the little railroad station and send a telegraph message to her always sympathetic father, asking him for the money to put the swimming pool in order. That would cause Sim to remain. Arden had everything in her favor for concealment, and she needed concealment in this risky undertaking. The fog, becoming more dense every minute, and the fact that she was alone, would allow her to reach the station unobserved. Also it was just the time when most of the students were in their rooms preparing to go down to supper in a short time. Arden ran through the gathering gloom across the campus and toward the post office. The yellow gleaming lights of the railroad station beckoned to her with their flickering rays from the other side of the tracks. There was always the chance that someone from the college might be in the little suburban station looking up trains, inquiring about baggage or express shipments, or sending a telegram. But Arden, risking the discovery of her voidance of the campus prohibition, kept on her rather perilous way. At the same time she was trying to be cautious. First, she walked with light footsteps toward the window of the telegraph and ticket office nearest the tracks. She tried to peer through this window into the waiting room beyond but could see nothing through the murky glass and the heavy mesh of wire that covered it, save the indistinct figure of the ticket agent whose duties were combined with those of baggage-man, train dispatcher, telegraph operator, and occasional expressman. "I'll try the side window," Arden determined, and through this she was able to glance into the deserted station. There was no one in the waiting room, as far as she could see: not even one of the few town taxi-drivers escaping from the heavy fog and the chilly dampness of the approaching night. "Here's luck!" Arden thought. "If I'm quick I can send the telegram and be out of here before anyone sees me. Of course, the smart thing to have done would have been to write out my message before I came here. But I think it won't take long." The dark brown door leading into the waiting room was heavy and stuck at the sill. That many feet had kicked it loose was evidenced by several dents and scratches showing at the bottom in the dim glow of an outside lamp under the station platform covering. After one or two futile efforts Arden managed to push back the door and enter. The ticket and telegraph office was faintly lighted, but as Arden looked in through the little window, protected by a wicket of brass, she could not make out the form of the agent she was sure she had seen when she peered in from the outside platform. "Oh, dear!" worried the girl. "He must have gone out, and before he comes back to take my message, someone from the college may stop in here and catch me. That's the worst of these country places. I suppose there isn't another train for some time and the agent went out for a rest. If I could only reach in and get a telegraph blank I could write the message, with a notation to send it collect, and leave it here for him. Let's see--what shall I say? 'Must have a thousand dollars at once. Can you send it? Letter follows.' Dad will probably think I've embezzled some of the college funds or stolen some jewels. Oh, where is that agent?" She drummed impatiently with a pencil on the shelf of the window and stood on tiptoes to look in. As she did so the agent suddenly emerged from where he was crouched low in a stooping position halfway into a small supply closet in one corner of his cubbyhole of an office, out of Arden's sight. The agent stood up so quickly, directly in front of the wicket window confronting Arden, that it was as if some gigantic Jack-in-the-box had popped out at her. "Oh!" she gasped, preventing herself, by a strong effort, from springing back. Then again, but less hysterically: "Oh, here you are!" "Well?" asked the agent and he smiled. Arden opened her mouth to say she wanted to send a telegram, but the sudden appearance of the man, popping up into her view in that manner, was so disconcerting that she could only stand there and stare at him. And as she stared she realized, with a shock, that she had seen the face of this man somewhere before. She stood there, silent and perplexed, trying to solve the puzzle, trying to remember. Could she have seen the man before? He stood patiently waiting for her to state her wants. But Arden went into a strange panic of fear and uncertainty. "I--I think I've forgotten something!" she gasped, backing nervously away from the window. "I--I'll come back--later." She forced to her face a rather sickly smile. "Very well," said the man behind the wicket. "I'll be open for quite a while yet." Then, turning away, Arden fled, pulled open the door, scurried across the tracks and rushed back to college. Her one thought was to bring Terry and Sim with her to the station on a strange errand. She wanted them to help her identify the man in the ticket office as the missing Pangborn heir, pictured on the placard in the post office. For that was exactly what Arden believed. So obsessed had she become with the poster picture and the reward offered for information about the original, that she was sure she was right. The man who had popped up at the wicket window was Harry Pangborn. "I'm positive of it!" murmured Arden as she ran faster. "But I must get Sim and Terry to look at him. I'll need their evidence." CHAPTER XVII In Danger With startling suddenness, the night, aided by the dense fog, settled down over Cedar Ridge. Arden was alarmed. She had not thought it was so late, though she was quite sure the supper bell had not yet rung. She ran faster, her beating heart keeping time with her pattering feet. "Oh, I hope Terry and Sim will come back with me and see this for themselves," she thought. "How wonderful that I have made this discovery! I need not wire Dad for that money after all. I'm sure," she tried to convince herself, "that I am right. Quite sure!" There was no time to be lost. Supper would soon be served and the three from 513 dared not be absent from their places at the table very long. Nor would they want to be. Appetites were remarkably keen at the college, in spite of all the mystery and excitement and notwithstanding the eating that was done between meals. As Arden approached the main building which loomed up out of the fog like some dream castle, she called on her childhood friend, the "good fairy." She murmured: "Good fairy, please don't let us get caught, and for a wish, I wish that Terry and Sim will come back with me right away!" It seemed the good fairy did not entirely desert her child, for, as Arden started up the stairs, she met her two chums coming down. "Terry! Sim! I've the most exciting thing to tell you!" Arden gulped and continued: "Come outside a moment." "Good heavens! You look as if you'd seen a ghost! Take a breath--or something--before you pass out!" advised Terry, a little incredulous. "Well, tell us, Arden!" Sim begged, wringing her hands in simulated melodramatic fashion. "This suspense is awful! It's making an old woman of me!" "I don't want anyone to hear," Arden confided. "Can't you step outside for a few seconds? You won't be cold. I want you to do something for me." Sim and Terry looked at each other. "Better humor her, Sim. She might turn violent. Come on," Terry said in an exaggerated attempt at soothing a patient. "If I get violent it will be because you two show such little natural curiosity, Bernice Westover," Arden retorted testily. "When you hear what I saw----" "How can we _hear_ what you _saw_?" mocked Sim. "Oh--you----" began Arden, really provoked now. "All right, my dear." Terry held open the main entrance door and motioned the other two out ahead of her. "If anyone wonders why we are going out when the supper bell has almost rung, we can say we want a breath of fresh air for an appetite." "As if anyone who knows the feed here would believe that!" mocked Sim. But in spite of the banter, Arden finally herded her chums down to the cinder path in front of the dormitory building. "Come along a little farther," she urged. "No one must hear!" Terry and Sim followed, now really convinced that Arden had something of moment to impart to them. She looked around half in caution, half in fear. When they were some distance from the main entrance and shrouded in the fog, Arden said in a low voice: "I was just over to the station----" "You were!" interrupted Sim. "Why, Arden Blake! If you were seen, it'll be just too bad! What if Tiddy finds out?" "Yes, I know. But there are times when rules have to be broken," admitted Arden. "If George Washington and Thomas Jefferson or some historic personages like that hadn't drafted a new constitution in Philadelphia when they had no right to do so, I wouldn't be telling you all this." "All what? That you were over to the station? It's a grand night to break rules but a better one for murders," declared Terry, sniffing the fog with her head thrown back and her eyes half shut. "If you'd stop interrupting I could tell you." Arden was beginning to lose patience. "I was over at the station, as I said, and I saw someone there: the night ticket agent, who is the very image of the missing man whose picture we saw on the reward notice in the post office! There!" Arden paused to see what effect this statement had on her friends. They seemed to take it very calmly, and Terry said, most practically: "Nonsense, Arden. If he was the man you think he is, someone else would have noticed him long ago and claimed the reward." "Besides," added Sim, "no young man, or old one either, who wanted to keep his whereabouts secret would be so foolish as to appear in so public a place as a railroad ticket office, and near the place where there was hanging a poster offering a thousand dollars for information about him." "Not necessarily," countered Arden calmly. "I have read somewhere that the cleverest criminals (not that Mr. Pangborn is one, though) always stay right in the place where they have committed a crime or are supposed to have vanished from. The trick is, that no one ever thinks of looking so near home for them. Poe has a story about a missing letter that was all the while right in the open, stuck in a rack with a lot of others." "Oh, yes, we had to read that in English lit," admitted Terry. "Well, what do you want to do, Sherlock--go over and identify the corpse?" asked Sim. "If you do, I'm afraid I can't come. I have to go to Mary Todd for a notebook." "Please, Sim, it won't take a minute, or only two or three, anyhow. You can come right back and be in time for supper. Think how thrilling it would be if----" "It most likely won't be," finished Terry. "But I'm game. I like fog. It's good for the complexion." "If you and Terry go, I'll come, too, of course. But I think you're on a wild-goose chase," declared Sim. "But I tell you he looked exactly like the poster!" affirmed Arden. "I stood here looking at him, with my mouth open like a fish, while he waited for me to speak. I was so surprised I just had to stammer something about forgetting what I came for, say I'd be back later, and run away. I don't know what he thought of me." "Maybe he can't think. Anyhow, come on, Sim. But make it snappy. I've got something else to do more important than this," said Terry. Arm in arm the three girls, a little nervous when they realized what would happen if they were caught breaking the campus rule in effect against them, started for the station. Arden hurried them impatiently, but Terry was in one of her teasing moods and refused to be hastened, pausing now and then to remark on the beauty of the night and attempting to point out, in the dense fog, places of interest on their brief journey. At the station a quick look through an end window showed the waiting room to be unoccupied except for a man standing near the big white pot-stove. "There he is--the agent!" whispered Arden. "He's come out of his coop." "You'd think he was a chicken!" chuckled Sim. "Oh, be quiet!" Arden begged. "Now you two go in and look at him." "Aren't you coming?" asked Terry. "No. I'll wait outside here. I don't want him to see me again. You two go in. Get a good look at him. Ask for--for time-tables. Oh, I'm so excited!" "Don't be so nervous," Terry admonished. "You'll be so disappointed if you're wrong. However--come on, Sim!" Terry and Sim, with none of the reluctance Arden was sure she would have experienced, marched around to the door. Arden drew back into the shadows of the fog and waited. She heard her chums enter, dimly heard the murmurs of their voices as, presumably, they asked for time-tables and caught the squeak of the door hinges again. "Where'd she go?" Terry murmured. Evidently she and Sim could not see the hidden Arden. "I hope this isn't her idea of a joke, to get us here and then run back," grumbled Sim. "No! No! Here I am!" exclaimed Arden, coming forth out of the gloom. "Did you--was he--is he----" "Arden, my pet," began Terry, flipping a damp time-table, "we fear for your reason, we, your devoted friends. That agent looks no more like the picture of Harry Pangborn than you do!" "No?" gasped Arden. "I thought he was the very image of the poster picture." "Sorry, Arden," Sim continued. "But you'll have to do better than this to claim the reward. That's that, and as I'm dripping with dampness, I'm going back where it's light and dry and warm and where I can eat." "Yes, let's go back!" agreed Terry, feeling a little sorry for Arden. Arden looked sadly at her chums. "And I was almost sure," she murmured. "Don't you think there's a small, a tiny resemblance?" "Not the slightest!" chorused Terry and Sim. "Well, then, we must get back, I suppose. But I certainly feel like a balloon that has suddenly lost its gas." Arden sighed. Slowly the three started down the station platform to the walk that led across the tracks and on to the college. As they were about to leave the shadowy shelter of the overhanging roof, Arden, who was in the lead, reached back two cautioning and restraining hands toward Terry and Sim. "Wait!" she whispered. "What is it?" they asked. "Ye gods! Here comes Henny--our reverend chaplain! He mustn't see us here at this hour! Oh, what shall we do?" Arden was in a panic of fear. CHAPTER XVIII In Hiding The tall, slim figure, like a black ghost in the white fog, was approaching with measured stride, characteristic of Rev. Dr. Henry Bordmust. The three girls, toward whom he was unwittingly walking, looked wildly around for a place to hide. The platform was clear except for some benches, now holding only dripping fog drops. "Inside--quickly! Perhaps he won't notice us!" whispered Arden. "Perhaps he will, though, and we mustn't take a chance!" objected Terry. "Don't forget, we're over here without permission." Forward stalked the tall black figure, splitting the fog into damp, swirling masses of mist as he trudged along. "Come on, girls!" hissed Sim. "He's almost here! We can hide in the baggage room at the end of the station." Quickly the girls scurried around the corner of the building toward the baggage room. Fortunately the door was open. Inside, showing beneath a small incandescent lamp, hung high, festooned with cobwebs and dust, were several trunks, valises, suitcases, and boxes. Some of the pieces of baggage and express seemed to have been forgotten, uncalled for or lost a long time. Dust was thick on them. "It isn't very bright," whispered Terry. Which was true. The high little light only made the gloomy shadows and corners more gloomy. "I wonder if there are rats here?" Terry breathed in alarm. "Oh!" gasped Arden. "Why do you have to think of things like that? Stop it!" "Hush!" cautioned Sim. "I hear footsteps coming this way." "Shut the door!" begged Terry. Arden pushed it so that it was almost tight in the frame. There it stuck. It would close no farther. "Look!" she murmured. "The light will show around the cracks and the sill. We can't shut it off. Oh, what'll we do? If he comes in here he'll be sure to see us. We were better off outside. Then we could run and vanish in the fog." "He may not come in here," spoke Sim hopefully. "Oh, but he's coming--or someone is--right this way!" gasped Terry. They were in real panic now--fluttering about seeking concealment. Once Arden and Terry bumped together in their mad race around the little room, but they hadn't a giggle among them. "Here--in here!" Sim suddenly hissed from a distant corner. "I've found some kind of a big packing box with a hinged cover like a trapdoor. We can hide in that." "Can we all get in?" asked Terry. "I don't want to be left standing outside like this." "I think we can make it," Sim answered. "We must try, anyhow. Here, Arden----" She held out her hand, and Arden grasped it. "Now, Terry! I'll guide you. It's very dark in this corner, but I can make out the box. I'll climb in first and you two follow." Terry and Arden half heard, half saw Sim partly climb and partly fall over the side of a great box in one corner of the dim room. "Come on, Arden," Sim urged. "It's easy." Arden put one leg over the side and raised herself up by her hands as if climbing a fence. As she did so there was a ripping, tearing sound. "My good stocking and part of my leg, too! Oh, dear!" lamented Arden. "Get in quickly. Never mind about that!" urged Sim. "All right. Cuddle down. Now, Terry!" "Oh, this is awful!" "Don't talk! Climb in! Shrink a little, Arden!" commanded Sim. "She thinks she's in bed and taking more than her half." "I'm not!" Arden affirmed. "But I'll shrink all I can!" "That's better," voiced Sim. "Now, Terry!" "Here I come! Oh! Oh!" Her voice indicated lamenting terror. "What is it?" Sim wanted to know. "I can see out through the crack in the door. The station agent is headed right for this place, and Henny is with him. Oh, they'll find us, sure!" "Not if we stoop down and keep still!" declared Sim. "Why don't you come in, Terry?" "I can't! I'm caught--or something." "Well, pull yourself loose! You've just got to!" "Here goes!" Again the ripping, tearing sound. "My best skirt on a big nail!" sighed Terry. Then she flopped over the side and down upon Sim and Arden. Despite the discomfort of their positions and the imminent danger of detection, Terry began to giggle. It was quickly infectious, and Arden and Sim held grimy hands over their mouths to stifle the dangerous sounds of hysterical mirth. They could hear the voices of the chaplain and the station agent just outside the baggage-room door. They were surely coming in, the girls thought, though whether to detect the culprits or for some other reason could not yet be determined. Suddenly Sim reached up and pulled down the large, hinged cover of the packing case. It was light but strongly made. "Oh, we'll smother!" protested Arden in a whisper. "No, we won't! There are plenty of cracks for air," said Sim. Hardly was the cover down, shutting the girls inside the now very dark case, than the door of the baggage room was pushed open and, through cracks in the packing case the girls could see Rev. Dr. Henry Bordmust, dressed neatly in black, step in ahead of the agent in his blue coat with brass buttons. With the two men wisps of fog drifted into the room. In the closeness of the box, Arden tried vainly to push Sim's left elbow away from her ribs. Terry was slowly settling down, half on Arden, with her legs twisted around Sim's neck. Sim had the best position, as she was the smallest. Her eyes were on a level with a crack between the lid and the top edge of the box. She squinted to accustom her eyesight to the dimly lighted room. She saw the chaplain looking at a tag on a worn and dusty trunk. The reason for his visit now seemed obvious. He wasn't after the girls. "Have you any trace of that trunk of mine yet?" asked the chaplain. "No, sir, I haven't," the agent answered, following the example of the clergyman and looking at several labels on various pieces of baggage. "But that there trunk ought to be around some place, if it was shipped when you say it was." "Of course it was shipped when I say it was!" testily replied the Rev. Henry. "Why would I say it was if it wasn't, my good man? This is the third or fourth time I've been over here looking for it. I've been expecting it over a week now. Come, be a little quicker! You ought to be able to find it for me!" "Yes, sir, I am looking. It might have got over in behind this here packing case. Lots of things get behind these cases. They are shipped up here filled with raw silk for the factory over at Tumeville. But sometimes the drivers take the silk out here and leave the empty cases to be shipped back. I'll have a look back of this case." With hearts that beat faster than ever, the girls could look through the cracks in their prison and see the agent approaching their hiding place. "Somebody musta left this case unfastened when they emptied it," muttered the agent. "It's dangerous, with the nails sticking out of the cover like the way they do. I'll tap 'em in." With an iron weight from the platform scale near him, the man hammered down the nails projecting from the lower side of the lid into the front rim of the box. He had nailed the girls in! With just a couple of whacks! Hardly daring to breathe, lest they betray their presence, Arden, Terry, and Sim listened speechless. "Nope, nothing behind this case 'ceptin' some old valises nobody ever called for," reported the agent, peering behind the big box after his nailing work. "How about this pile of trunks?" asked the chaplain, his voice, this time, coming from a distant corner of the room. "I'll help you look there, sir, but I don't believe what you want's there," the agent replied, as he shuffled away. The girls breathed more freely, and Sim hoarsely whispered: "Heavens! We're nailed in!" "Oh, Arden! What a pickle you got us into!" gasped Terry. "Hush! They'll hear us! Wait until Henry goes out," counseled Arden. "Then we'll try to force the cover up with our shoulders." There was a sudden silence as the agent and the clergyman peered at another pile of trunks. The girls could hear their hearts beating and Terry, interested in the phenomenon, inquired cautiously whether it was Sim's heart she heard or her own. "It's your own, silly!" replied Sim. "I'm almost smothered! I wish they'd go out so we could breathe! Don't hiss so; they'll hear you." "That there trunk of your'n might have got over in th' freight office by mistake," said the agent. "S'posin' we look there." "Suppose we do," agreed the chaplain, who was fast losing what little patience he had. Then the two men left the baggage room, and on his way out the agent pulled the switch controlling the dim and dirty ceiling light. The imprisoned girls were left in darkness! CHAPTER XIX Strange Talk "It seems to me," remarked Terry disgustedly, as the agent pulled the door of the baggage room shut and his footsteps and those of the chaplain died away in faint echoes, "it seems to me that we just get into one scrape after another. This is a pretty kettle of fish!" "Or something!" gloomily agreed Sim. "Can you turn around so you can be sort of on your hands and knees?" asked Arden, ignoring Terry's remark. "Try it. Sim and I will squeeze away over to one side." "Oooff!" grunted Terry as she attempted to change her position. "I'm almost over! Don't mind if you get a black eye, Sim. It will only be from my elbow." "I shall mind, though, so you'd better fold up your arms. There! She's over, Arden. Now I'll do it!" said Sim. Sim accomplished the feat more easily than had Terry, and then Arden did it. All kneeling, they braced with their legs and arms, arched up their backs, and tried to force off the nailed lid of the packing case. "Heave!" exclaimed Arden, having heard this expression used by the foreman of a gang of section men on the railroad near the college grounds. "Heave hard!" All together they raised their backs. "Ouch! That doesn't do any good! We're in here for the night unless someone comes back to release us!" groaned Terry. "Rest a minute," advised Arden. "Then we'll try it again. Once more--all heave!" But the second try only made the box shift a little on its base. "We must make some noise! Bang on the sides or yell or scream! We must get out of here!" Arden was getting desperate. "Hey! Hey!" shouted Terry. "Come back! Let us out! We're smothering! Hey!" "Hurray! Hurray!" screamed Sim. "What are you cheering for?" demanded Terry. "That wasn't a cheer. But I can make my voice carry farther that way than any other." "Help! Help! Help!" appealed Arden shrilly. They listened, their hearts beating fast from fear and the exertion of shouting. They thought they heard footsteps approaching. Then, by the rays of light streaming through the fog from the station platform, as they peered out of the cracks in the box, they could see the door of the baggage room flung open. Near it stood the agent. "He's alone, thank goodness!" said Sim. "Help!" cried Arden again. "Let us out!" shouted Terry. "Fer th' love of cats, who are you? Where are you?" exclaimed the agent, for the voices were muffled. "In this packing case! You nailed us in!" answered Arden. With a muttered expression of great surprise, the agent picked up the same scale weight he had used to drive the nails partly in, and by pounding on the lower edge of the cover he forced it up, flung it back, and let the rays of the overhead light, which he had switched on, flood upon the three disheveled girls in the big box. "My sakes!" cried the man. "What are you girls doin' in there?" "You shut us in," Sim answered, standing up and stretching, as did her chums. "We didn't want Dr. Bordmust to see us, so we hid in this box." "Then," continued Terry, "you nailed it shut." "How was I t' know you was in there?" demanded the agent, with much justification. "It's a lucky thing, after Dr. Bordmust left, not finding what he was after, that I come back here t' make sure I'd switched off the light for th' night." "Very lucky," agreed Sim. "I never could of heard you yellin' once I got back t' my office," went on the man. "We're awfully glad you came here. Thanks, so much!" murmured Terry, with much relief. "Where you from--Cedar Ridge?" asked the agent. "Yes," Arden answered, "and we're in an awful hurry to get back. Supper must have started," she told her chums. "I guess so," sighed Sim. "I only hope there's some left." "We'll explain to you another time," continued Arden. "Come on, girls!" she urged. The girls, a trifle stiff from their cramped positions, climbed over the side of the box. This time there were no ripping or tearing accidents. The agent stared uncomprehendingly at the trio as they landed on the floor of the baggage room and shook their garments into some semblance of order. Then they hurried out, Sim flinging back a perfunctory but none the less sincere "thank you," as they pushed past the agent and again went out into the cold, damp fog. As they hurried along the platform they heard the agent muttering to himself: "What'll them girls do next?" "Good old air!" breathed Terry as they ran along. "I never thought it could be so welcome, even all messed up with fog as it is." "We were very lucky to get out," murmured Sim. "Suppose he hadn't come back and no one ever found us until years later, when we'd be only skeletons! What a scandal for the college!" "Very cheerful, Sim," replied Arden. "Now we're late again and we shall just have to dash back." "I never did so much dashing in my whole life. I'm always running to some place or hurrying away from it, by golly!" complained Terry. "Tomorrow I'm going to take time out and just _sit_!" "Well, you can't sit now. It's almost supper time, if not already past it. One more last dash for dear old Cedar Ridge!" pleaded Arden. "Be a sport, Terry. I know it was all my fault. But I'll translate your French to make up for it." So the girls dashed through the pea-soup fog toward the college. They went around to the rear door, where they would be less likely to be seen. A few yards ahead of them, as they reached the college grounds, as far as they could see through the swirling mist, were two dim figures. Arden and her chums slackened their pace. "It's Henny talking to someone!" gasped Sim. "Compose yourselves, girls. Be very demure!" "I hope he doesn't stop us," Terry remarked. "Who is he talking to--or should I say 'whom'?" "You should say 'whom,'" declared Arden. "Well, anyhow, I said it," countered Terry. "I knew what you meant," responded Arden. "But look!" she whispered. "Isn't Henny talking to Tom Scott, the gardener?" "Yes, he is," said Sim. Composing themselves, the three girls walked at an ordinary pace along the shrubbery-lined path that led to the rear door of the dining hall. The chaplain and the young gardener were in earnest conversation, somewhat off the path on the edge of a large round flower bed. Just as the three reached the two men, who did not seem aware of their approach, the girls could hear the Rev. Henry ask, somewhat crossly: "How much longer are you going to keep this up? It's dangerous! I don't like it at all. I am almost resolved----" "Just give me a little longer chance," pleaded the other. "I have almost settled it. I'll see you again." Then Tom Scott faded away in the fog and darkness, and the chaplain, muttering something the girls could not catch, turned back toward his own residence near the chapel. Now he caught sight of the girls, and turning toward them, and by doing so disturbing more wisps of the swirling fog, he greeted them in his most benign manner with: "Good-evening, young ladies! Walking in the fog?" "Yes, Dr. Bordmust, we like it," answered Arden, with a great assumption of innocence. "Hum--er--yes," mumbled Henny. "Though it isn't good for old throats," and coughing raspingly, he swung on his way. "That's lucky!" exclaimed Terry as they hurried on. "What do you suppose they were talking about?" asked Arden. "As if we could guess," sighed Sim. "But I know one thing," she added as they slipped in at the door, "if that agent at the station doesn't tell anyone what happened, we're all right." "Hello, freshies!" exclaimed a voice close to them. "Rather late to be coming back from the station, isn't it? I was behind you all the way from the post office." The three whirled around. The speaker was Jessica Darglan, smiling sardonically. "I thought," she continued, "that you three were campused. But that's your worry," and she brushed past them and went into the dining hall. CHAPTER XX A Dire Threat "If Jessica Darglan tells where she saw us," said Terry, next morning, "we're sunk!" "She won't. Nobody could be so mean," remarked Arden as she combed her hair in front of the bureau. "You never can tell, Arden," supplemented Sim. "Some people take a positive delight in doing things like that." "There's nothing we can do about it, even if she does. So we won't worry until we get a notice to go see Tiddy," decided Terry. "I meant to ask you after supper last night," began Arden, "did you two think any more about what Henny was saying to Tom Scott as we came along?" "I didn't pay much attention," confessed Sim. "I was too busy being demure." "Well," went on Arden, "he said something about it being dangerous and asked Tom Scott how long he was going to keep it up." "Sort of funny," admitted Terry. "That's the second time we have heard those two talking together. I wonder what it all means?" "It doesn't worry me much," declared Sim as she pulled on her stockings. "Because I think I'll go home the way I planned in a few days. I'll leave before I'm expelled for going out while campused." "Oh, Sim! Do we have to go over all that again?" pleaded Arden. "Can't you stick it out? If we have to be expelled, let's all go home together." "Don't go, Sim," begged Terry. "We're just beginning to enjoy it here. You know, deep down in your heart, that last night in the station was fun, even if it was uncomfortable." "I'll talk about it later," answered Sim. "I have an early class this morning. See you when I get back." She gathered up her books, gave a last look in the glass, and hurried down to breakfast without waiting for her friends. Back in 513, Arden and Terry went on with their dressing. If Sim felt like being alone, it was wise to let her go. They would see her at breakfast, anyhow. But at the table Sim devoted herself to Jane Randall and seemed deliberately to be avoiding her roommates. For, as she finished her meal, Sim linked arms with Jane and started for Bordmust Hall, leaving Terry and Arden by themselves. "Sim is in one of her moods," remarked Arden as she swung along beside Terry. "But she'll forget all about it by lunch time." "I think she's awfully disappointed about the pool. And being campused, while it doesn't make a great deal of difference, just rubs Sim the wrong way. She hates to feel that she is being persecuted," observed Terry. "It doesn't bother me a bit," declared Arden. "I'm keeping occupied by trying to straighten out this mystery and get the reward money." "You have an even disposition," suggested Terry. "We are not all as lucky as you." Terry sighed deeply and shifted her books from her right arm to her left. Arden and she trudged silently along up the hill to Bordmust Hall. The fog of the night before had blown away, and the distant hills shimmered in a soft blue light. The leaves were beginning to fall, and at the steps of Bordmust the head gardener, Anson Yaeger, was raking the lawn with sullen viciousness. As the girls reached him he stopped moving the rake and looked at them penetratingly. His little beady eyes narrowed into bright slits. Resting part of his weight on the rake he shook a grimy finger at the freshmen. "You're two of them girls I seen down in my orchard!" he snarled. "You've no right there! Mark my words, no good will come of it! And don't concern yourselves with what's none of your business. There's things going on around here that nobody knows about but me. I wouldn't like to see you hurt, foolish as you are!" Terry and Arden stood dumbfounded. Completely taken by surprise, they moved on past the surly gardener and involuntarily looked back at him without attempting to answer him. The heavy, thickset man in tattered overalls and an old-fashioned, gray coat-sweater looked over his shoulder with wild eyes, as though expecting someone to come along and stop his tirade. "If I was to tell you all I know," he went on, "what with alarm bells ringing and all, you'd pack up and take the next train home. Why, last night----" Terry nudged Arden, murmuring: "Don't let's stand here like a couple of ninnies and let him talk to us this way. Come on! I think he's a little crazy!" Arden pulled away from Terry. "But I want to hear what he's saying." Anson heard them whispering. "Heedless young things!" he scolded. "You'll be sorry if you don't do as I say." Turning abruptly, he picked up the rake that had slipped to the ground and shuffled off through the rustling leaves in the direction of the orchard. "There, you see!" exclaimed Arden. "I told you there was something weird down in that old orchard!" "I've a good mind to follow him and see where he's going," said Terry. "What do you say, Arden, to a little more sleuthing?" "I'm game," Arden answered. But even as she spoke the electric bell in Bordmust Hall announced the beginning of the first classes. "We can't go now," said Terry. "We'll have to let it wait." "Yes," agreed Arden reluctantly. The two girls entered the building, having a last glimpse of the mysterious gardener still shuffling his way through the rustling leaves toward the orchard where so many strange things had happened. CHAPTER XXI A Bold Stroke With great difficulty Arden concentrated on her French literature. Daudet's "My Old Mill," seemed very silly and unnecessary. Who cared about a sleepy French town, drowsing under a provincial sun? A real present-day mystery story would have been much more interesting and to the point. Twice Mademoiselle cautioned Arden to pay more attention and finally called upon her to translate aloud. Arden arose and stumbled through two paragraphs which she had known perfectly the night before. "That will do, Mees Blake," drawled the gentle Frenchwoman. "Eet is obvious you have not prepared ze assignment. You will please geeve me a written translation, tomorrow morning, of today's work." "Yes, mademoiselle," gulped Arden and sat down. The events of the last few days were too much for even the conscientious Arden. She simply could not put her mind on the lesson but sat looking as though all that mattered in her life was the charming essay the girls were studying. In reality, however, Arden's mind was far away from the little mill town. While her classmates went on with their somewhat halting translations, Arden decided on a bold stroke. In her free period, directly after mathematics, she would go alone over to town and hurry to the police station. There she would inquire as to the latest developments of the Pangborn case. If there was nothing to be learned no one would be the wiser for her daring escapade. For escapade it was, viewed in the fact that she was campused: forbidden to leave the precincts of Cedar Ridge. Suddenly Arden felt something of a thrill go through her. "I'll do it!" she exclaimed impulsively and half aloud. Then she looked very foolish as her classmates stared wonderingly at her. "Mees Blake, you are behaving very strangely today," said the French teacher. "Please compose yourself." Arden shook her head as if in compliance and smiled weakly. "I wonder what that gardener, Anson, was talking about?" she mused. "I'm sure he knows what strange mystery is in the orchard, anyway." Mentally she reviewed the startling happenings since she and her chums had come to Cedar Ridge. It was all so puzzling. On wings of thought Arden flew over to the little stone building in town--Police Headquarters. Boldly entering, she announced to the officer in charge her solution of the baffling case of the missing heir and claimed the reward and then, in triumph, presented it to the dean for the repair of the swimming pool so Sim would remain in college. "All a daydream, though," murmured Arden. As the bell rang, marking the end of the French period, Arden recovered herself with a start. Quickly gathering up her books and papers, she hurried to her class in mathematics. This was worse than the preceding session. Now she was absolutely unable to concentrate in the least. Her poor brain whirled with visions of geometric figures punctuated with policemen in the disguise of gardeners. She flunked miserably and heard, with a sigh of relief, the ringing of the bell for which she had waited so impatiently. When the mathematics class was dismissed, Arden left hurriedly, for once getting away without Sim or Terry. She took a short cut across the hockey field and crawled through a hole in the hedge after a hasty and fearsome glance backward to observe if anyone might be observing her. "Not yet, anyhow," she sighed with relief. This route brought her much nearer her destination. Arden hastened along the peaceful main street of the suburban town still clutching her books. In front of a two-story building of mellowed red bricks, partly overgrown with dull green and bronzed ivy, she stopped. Two bright green lamps on each side of the doorway were in readiness to leap into emerald illumination of the sign POLICE HEADQUARTERS which caught and held her attention. "Dare I go in?" she mused. She dared. Gathering together all her courage, she opened the heavy door, its knob of bright brass, and entered. Inside a rather large bare room all was serene. The dark wooden floor was scrubbed immaculately clean. Behind a heavy desk of light oak, around which high lights played on a glaring brass rail of heavy proportions, a man was reading a paper. Arden could see him around one end of the desk, his two thick-soled shoes elevated and his hands holding the paper. "Ah--a-hem!" she coughed when, after several seconds, he did not seem aware of her presence. With a rustle of surprise the paper was lowered, displaying a red-faced middle-aged man who looked considerably startled. When he noticed Arden he lowered his feet from the desk and tried to look business-like. "I didn't hear you come in, young lady," he began. "What can I do for you?" "Good-morning," Arden replied. "I didn't mean to startle you." To gain time to think, she remarked about the beauty of the morning. "Very nice day," agreed the chief, for it was the head of the small country department whom Arden had intruded upon: a fact she observed when he donned his cap, officially, and buttoned his gilt braid-encrusted coat, which gaped wide open. He arose and stood at attention behind the desk, smiling as he asked: "Is there something I can do for you?" "Well--yes. That is--you see----" Arden was quite flustered. But gaining control of herself she began again: "I am at school--Cedar Ridge. The college, you know." The chief nodded helpfully, and a little look of wonder came over his face. It was seldom he came in contact with the college girls. "I saw a circular in the post office, across from the college," went on Arden. "It was about a man named Harry Pangborn, who is missing and----" "Oh, yes," interrupted the chief, very interested now. "The Pangborn poster--the place is full of them. Missing person posters. We put them up in public places and sometimes forget to take them down." Arden felt something of a chill. "Oh!" she gasped. "Are they so old, then?" "Some are. What did you want to know?" "That one about Harry Pangborn." Couldn't the chief have heard the name at first? "Yes," he answered, without much encouragement. "It says a thousand dollars reward," Arden reminded him. "Just a moment." He smiled at her from behind his heavy desk, a safe breastwork, and went to a filing cabinet. Running his fingers along the tops of a row of cards he brought out one that had a poster fastened to it. "Is this the one?" he asked, holding it out to Arden. "That's it!" she answered. "I'm sure I've seen that man's face somewhere around here--in town, perhaps. Don't you know anything about him?" "Hum! No, not much. That's rather an old and dead case. We haven't much to go on about him. I don't think you've seen _him_. If he was around here any place, you can be sure we'd have apprehended him and claimed the reward ourselves." "Oh," murmured Arden, rather dismayed. "Then you don't think there's a chance that I might have seen him?" "There's a bare chance, of course. But you want to make pretty sure before you turn a man in as a person missing and for whom a reward is offered. False arrest or detention is rather a serious charge, you know." "Yes, I know; that is, I suppose it is." Dispirited, Arden looked down at her dusty oxfords. Another of her cherished plans had fallen through. She took a long breath and, looking at the chief again, remarked: "Well, thank you--very much. I must get back to class now." She turned to leave. "Just a moment!" called the chief rather sharply. "Why are you so interested in this man?" "Oh, of course." Arden smiled disarmingly. "Only just so I might claim the reward if I found him and have our college pool repaired. The swimming pool, you know. It's broken." "Yes?" encouraged the chief. "Yes. It seemed like a good way to get the money. A friend of mine is awfully disappointed that she can't swim. I mean she can swim, but with the pool broken she can't, and so I was trying to help and--and----" Arden was at the end of her resources. She turned and fled--beat a most undignified retreat as she told herself later. But the chief was not so easily disposed of. "Just a moment!" he called rather sharply, and came out from behind the desk. "Oh!" gasped Arden to herself. "Is he going to arrest me--detain me for questioning just because I have asked about the poster? If he does--what a terrible disgrace on top of what has already happened to me!" But the chief was kindly sympathetic and soon had drawn from Arden all the story. She told him everything, about Sim's failure, her late return, about being campused and having to hide in the packing case. At this last the chief could not restrain a smile. "So that's why I wanted to find this man and claim the reward," finished Arden. "You see?" "Oh, yes, I see," admitted the chief, going back behind his massive desk. "And I'm sorry. I can't help you any. We don't know where this missing young fellow is any more than you do. But don't forget I'll always be here if you need me, and I'll help you all I can." Arden murmured her thanks, promised to remember, and, bidding him good-bye, left the building. She breathed a sigh of relief. Standing for a composing moment on the sidewalk in front of police headquarters, Arden looked up and down the quiet street. "Oh, my heavens!" she suddenly exclaimed. "Here comes Toots Everett!" And indeed it was. Toots, with her hair freshly finger-waved, was walking briskly in Arden's direction. Without waiting to greet her, Arden cut across the street and hurried back to the college. CHAPTER XXII Arden Admits It The clatter of dishes and the clink of glasses vied with the chatter of eager young voices as the girls began their evening meal at Cedar Ridge. The dining room was brightly lighted, and each table, seating twelve students, was fully occupied. Arden and her friends began passing the food among themselves. "Gold fish again!" announced Jane Randall as the waitress put a large dish of creamed salmon in the center of the table. "And boiled potatoes and beans," Terry added before that number of the bill of fare was in evidence. "What do you guess for dessert?" Jane asked Terry. "Library paste or pie?" Terry considered a moment, during which time Sim, on her left, held a heavy white plate beneath her nose. "Library paste--always on Tuesday," Sim finished, giving the college slang name to cornstarch pudding of a pale yellow hue. "I could do nicely with some extra food tonight." "Good idea, Sim," remarked Mary Todd. "What do you say we raid the kitchen later?" "Fine!" agreed Sim. "We'll get Arden, Terry, Jane, Ethel, you, and me. That makes a good-sized party." "You come for us, Mary," Terry suggested. "Knock on our door when you're ready to go, and we'll have a feast." "All right. It's settled." It was quite possible in that noisy room to be talking to one girl at the head of the table while the girl at the other end knew nothing of the conversation. So it was very surprising and equally diverting when Elizabeth Kilmore, sitting some distance away from Terry and her chums, announced forcefully: "Gather round! I have some choice gossip!" "Let's have it!" begged Sim. "Brighten up our lives a little." "I got it from an upper-class girl who got it from somebody else who had it from some other individual along the grapevine route," said Elizabeth, "that a freshman has been arrested." "No!" gasped two or three girls in a chorus. "Never!" murmured others. "Well, at any rate, she was seen coming out of police headquarters here in town this morning. What do you make of that?" asked the triumphant Elizabeth. The girls looked at one another smilingly. Such exciting rumors did not often come their way. It was fun to speculate on the fate of such a student caught in the toils of the police. Ah! Arden, as the echoes of this choice gossip went around the table, maintained a discreet silence. She had not yet told her roommates of her trip to town that morning, but she could readily understand, now, that when they were back in 513 she would have some explaining to do. But, for the time being, she decided to try to change the subject. So she remarked casually: "It was probably nothing. Lots of people in this town look like college students. See how the natives try to copy our clothes." "Always belittlin', Arden," remarked Terry. "Can't you let us enjoy the scandal? Heaven knows things have been pretty quiet around here of late." "If you ask me, more likely it had something to do with a minor traffic violation," Arden continued. "You're all very silly. Please pass the bread, Terry!" Terry reached for the bread plate but, at the same time, shot Arden a quick appraising look. Arden took a slice and innocently asked for further plans of the night raid. "We'll call for you girls in 513 about half-past ten--after lights are out," Jane said. The others nodded assent. The dishes continued their barrage of sound, successfully concealing the plans from those not included in them. As Sim had foretold, at the close of the meal large bowls of "library paste" made their appearance. Arden's particular group decided to forego it and make something else, later, take its place. Forbidden sweets were always more tasty. When the meal was at an end, the dean, suddenly and somewhat out of the ordinary, signaled for silence by tapping a bell kept for that occasional use at her right hand at the faculty table. Immediately a hush descended over the noisy room. Miss Anklon arose and stood teeteringly and frostily in her place, having pushed back her chair to make room. "A story has come to my ears," she began, "to the effect that a student of Cedar Ridge was seen at police headquarters here in town today. It seems incredible to me. However, I wish the girl who has allowed herself to cause such a horrid rumor to circulate to come to me before twenty-four hours pass and explain herself." She gave the bell another "ding," and the conversational flood was at once loosed again, but with new import. So the dean had also heard the rumor. Worse and more of it! Terry herded Arden and Sim through groups of chattering and surprised girls, at the same time whispering: "Arden Blake, you know something about this! Come upstairs!" Arden nodded silently. Sim objected to Terry's bustling about and tried to hold back. But Terry, well versed in the art of telling her friends something without being overheard by others near by, soon had Sim tractable and under control. Safe in the sanctuary of their room, Terry started in. "Well, Arden, what did you do this time?" "Oh, don't be so smart, Terry! I didn't do anything." But her face flushed. "What do you know about the college student seen coming out of police headquarters?" demanded Sim. "Come on--come clean, as the detectives say--at least, in books." "I know all about it!" calmly replied Arden. "I am that girl!" she announced in her best stage manner. "I'll tell you all about it," and she did. "Are you going to Tiddy?" Sim wanted to know. "I think not--little one," drawled Arden, still calmly but with firm decision, as her friends could tell by the look in her eyes. When Arden made up her mind, it was made up. "It would be useless to explain," she continued. "Besides, I really didn't do anything." "Well, if you're found out, it might just as well be murder--we'll all be sent home," Terry decided. "You're right, Terry," Sim agreed. "We ought all to leave for home before we suffer the ignominy of being sent." "Not tonight, at least," Arden temporized. "I may as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb. I say let's wait until something really happens. Besides, I think it will be lots of fun to raid the kitchen." "Do you think Tiddy has any real evidence?" asked Sim. "Let's try to guess what we shall find to eat in the raid," said Arden demurely. "My dear roommate," laughed Terry, "you are, without doubt, a peer in the art of changing subjects. But I do agree with you about the raid. We must all wear tennis shoes and carry flashlights." "Let's get our work done quickly, then," proposed Sim, "and wait, with what patience we may, for Jane," and she swept her chums a bow in her latest amateur dramatic rôle. With unusual willingness, the three girls began to open their books, look for pencils and paper, and soon the room was in silence as they labored at their lessons for next day. CHAPTER XXIII The Injured Chaplain The three freshmen in 513 worked diligently and with a minimum of conversation. Now and then Arden inquired about the spelling of a word, or Terry put a question as to the correct ending of a Latin verb, but on the whole their time was well occupied. At about nine o'clock the lights all over the dormitory building were dimmed for a moment, a warning that in five minutes more they would be extinguished in every room. Arden announced happily that she had finished her assignments. "I have, too!" cried Terry. But Sim sighed deeply as she said: "I just made it. But I think my math is all wrong." "Never mind," soothed Arden. "Perhaps you're a genius. Lots of them can't do math for a cent." The lights went out suddenly, and the girls threw themselves on their beds to await Jane Randall's knock, summoning them to the pantry raid. Arden and her chums must have fallen asleep, for they were startled when, some time later, Jane, afraid of knocking too loudly on their door pushed it open and tiptoed in. She groped her way to Terry's bed, shook her and hissed: "Wake up! It's time to go!" "Oh!" gasped the startled Terry, the other two echoing her surprise with their own. They had no idea that they had slumbered. Silently they took their flashlights and crept down the darkened corridor. The kitchen was far below on the same floor with the dining room. The kitchen was bright enough by day, for there were windows on three sides, but it was as dark as a cave at night. A large long table-bench ran the length of one side of the room. On this the plates were served to be carried into the dining hall by waitresses. Above the bench were racks for holding dishes. Gleaming pots, pans, and kettles hung on the wall near the huge stove, its fire now banked for the night. Shining copper tanks for hot water to make tea and boil the coffee caught and reflected the beams from flashlights carried by the marauders. Unaccustomed to the strange place, the girls all stood still for a few moments to get their bearings. Arden gave a sudden frightened squeal as a startled mouse ran across her foot. "Oh," she gasped. "The place is overrun with the little beasts!" "Hush!" cautioned Jane Randall. "That watchman may hear us. He comes in here on his rounds." "Where's the food, Jane?" whispered Terry, advancing farther into the room which, somehow, had a spooky atmosphere. "It ought to be around here some place," Jane replied cautiously. "Ah-a-a-ah! Pies!" suddenly exclaimed Terry as she opened the door of a large cupboard. "Let's take a few. They are for tomorrow, I suppose, and must have been baked late this afternoon. What do they smell like, Terry?" asked Sim. "They all smell pretty much alike to me. I'll take four, one off each shelf. We ought to get a variety that way," suggested Terry. The other girls were silently exploring, by means of their electric torches, the dark corners of the kitchen. They decided against taking bread or rolls as being too unromantic for a midnight feast. Jane convinced them that milk would do nicely to wash down the food, and it was when Arden opened the door of the immense refrigerator that she made the prize discovery of the evening. "Look what I've found!" she exclaimed. "Two roasted chickens!" "Lovely!" breathed Sim. "Come over here, kids! Arden has struck a gold mine!" Temporarily leaving their own investigations, the other girls crowded around the ice box and focused their lights on the innocent browned birds. "The sight of them makes my mouth water!" announced Sim. "But we must have enough food, now, with these as a background. Milk, pie and roast chickens! Lovely! Let's take them and go quickly before we are caught." Arden reached in and lifted out one of the doomed chickens. She turned half around to hand it to Sim, who was waiting to take it, when the whole party of girls was suddenly frozen into immobility with terror. For through the silence of the night sounded mournfully: Dong! Ding-dong! Dong! Dong! It was the old alarm bell again sonorously clanging at the mystic hour of twelve--the hour when "witches, warlocks an' lang-nebbied things" are free to roam. "Heavens! What's that?" gasped Jane Randall, though well she and the others knew. "It's that bell again," said Arden unnecessarily. She stood holding firmly to a leg of the chicken while Sim dug her fingers into the soft browned flesh beneath a wing. They laughed over it later, of course. But just now terror gripped them. Terry was holding the pies so tightly in her fright that her fingers punctured the crust and went messily into the fruit beneath. They all stood like children who had been playing "statues"; in just the positions they had assumed when that ghostly bell began to toll. It stopped for a moment and then began to peal again, if anything more loudly than at first. Then the girls came back to life, and while it was still clanging the second time, Arden had presence of mind enough to close the refrigerator door, to stave off discovery as long as possible if the authorities entered the kitchen. Then, with the other girls, who were also holding to the food they had captured, Arden ran to the low windows on the north side of the kitchen. They all crowded close to the glass casement and peered out into the night. The bell sounded more clearly from this vantage point. "Who can be ringing it?" murmured Jane. "I hate bells or whistles in the night. It always seems so--ghostly!" "Stop it!" someone implored. "I'd like to run around outside and find out about it," declared Terry. "Of course, it must be _someone_ pulling the rope. Bells don't ring of themselves." "Maybe the wind," suggested Mary Todd. "The wind couldn't ring that old bell," declared Arden. "It's too heavy to be swayed by what little breeze there is tonight. And it's high up on the wall, under a sort of canopy. No, someone pulled that rope." "But the rope is high up, out of reach from the ground," said Sim who had noticed that fact. Puzzled, alarmed, and in momentary fear of being discovered in the midnight raid, the girls stood at the window. It was in a sort of extension of the building and faced the north, so that from it a view could be had of the rear college grounds leading down to the orchard. It was at this scene the girls were now gazing, some illumination being furnished by a pale and watery moon now and then hidden by scudding clouds. Suddenly Ethel Anderson clutched Arden by the arm, so violently as almost to cause the dropping of the chicken, and Ethel exclaimed: "What's that dark thing on the lawn near the orchard?" "Where?" asked several, crowding closer. "There!" Ethel pointed at a moment when the moon came out of the clouds. "Looks like a black dog, to me," Terry said. "Or perhaps----" Terry's sentence was never finished, for Arden broke in with: "It's a man! A man crawling on his hands and knees! It is! Look!" The last wisp of cloud was wiped from the face of the moon. The form of the crawling man was seen plainly. "Oh, heavens!" "We must tell someone!" "What'll we do?" "We must wake Tiddy!" "Oh, let's get out of here!" "Who is it?" Questions, exclamations, fearsome gasps and excited advice all tripped pell-mell from the girls. Then, quickly, Arden took control of the situation. "Hush, girls!" she calmly advised. "All of you keep quiet. Now, just a moment, please." Her calm voice had its effect, and they all grew quiet, though there was not one whose breathing came naturally. Arden managed to raise the lower sash a little way. And then, through this opening, as the girls watched the black, crawling figure, came a voice feebly calling: "Help! Help! Help!" "It's Henny!" exclaimed Terry as she and the others recognized the squeaky voice of the aged chaplain. "Dr. Bordmust; and he's hurt!" CHAPTER XXIV The Dean Explains The mysteriously tolled bell had ceased ringing now. Fascinated, the girls remained at the window looking at the prone black figure of Rev. Dr. Bordmust lying on the edge of the sinister orchard. That the orchard was sinister at least Arden, Sim, and Terry were ready to testify. The last cry for help from the aged chaplain and the final echo of the tolling bell came together. "What shall we do, Arden?" murmured Terry. "We must do something!" insisted Jane. "Yes, it's sort of up to us, since we're here on the scene," agreed Sim. "The dean will have to know about this," suggested Terry. "But there's something else to do first," spoke Arden. "What?" chorused her chums. "That poor man is hurt," went on Arden. "He needs help, and we must hurry to get it. I'll tell you what. We three," she motioned to herself and her roommates, "are already campused. Whatever happens can't make much difference to us, even if we're caught now. We'll go out and see what we can do to help poor Henny, and you others go tell Tiddy." "A good idea!" assented Sim. "Jane, you and the others can take the food with you when you go to tell Tiddy. It's a wonder she or some of the others haven't been aroused already by the bell. But when you go to her, hide the food, somehow. No use wasting it after all the trouble we had getting it." "No, indeed," said Ethel Anderson. Quickly the two groups separated. Arden, Sim, and Terry hurried out of a rear door, which they unlocked, while Jane and the others, stuffing the pies, chickens, and bottles of milk under their big sweaters, hastened to take word to the dean. Arden, Sim, and Terry ran with all the frightened speed they could summon across the damp grass of the rear campus toward the edge of the orchard. By another gleam of moonlight they had a glimpse of the chaplain resuming his painful crawling after a period of rest following his cries for help. When he saw the girls running toward him, Dr. Bordmust, as if giving up the fight, now that assistance was at hand, collapsed on the leaf-strewn ground. Terry was the first to reach him. "Are you hurt, Dr. Bordmust?" she asked. "What happened?" "Do tell us! Tell us how we can help you," appealed Sim. "Are you badly injured?" faltered Arden. "My leg--I think my right leg is broken," he faltered. "It is very painful. I cannot bear my weight on it. That is why I had to crawl along." "Did you fall?" asked Arden. "Not exactly. I was struck by something--something attacked me as I was walking through the orchard. It was some great, black, rushing shape that threw itself upon me. I went down heavily--I could feel the bones of my leg snap. I--I must have lost consciousness--for a time, at least. When I came to, I found myself lying beneath a tree. I managed to get this far, and then the pain----" "We heard you call for help," said Sim. "You heard me--up in your room?" His voice was querulous. The girls did not care to go into particulars. "We have sent someone to bring help," said Arden, kneeling down beside the aged chaplain. "But can we do anything to ease you until help comes?" "Rest yourself, Dr. Bordmust," Sim begged. She sat down in the wet grass and lifted the tired white head into her lap. "You--you are very kind, young ladies," the chaplain murmured. "I shall see that----" "What's the matter?" suddenly cried Arden as she saw his head sag queerly to one side. "He's fainted, I guess," answered Sim. "Oh, dear!" wailed Terry. "The poor man! But here come the girls and the dean, I think, and two men. Now we'll be all right." "At least he will, though as for us----" Arden did not finish. An excited throng of students and others hurried toward the three alarmed freshmen surrounding the chaplain. The dean, rather neatly dressed in spite of the hurry under which she had donned her garments, was in the lead. Behind her was Miss Lucant, the college infirmarian. Then came Jane and her chums with the gardener, Anson Yaeger, and his helper, Tom Scott, bringing up in the rear. "You certainly got a lot of help in a short time, Jane," whispered Arden as the girls mingled. "Oh, the dean was quick enough once she was awake. She sent me for Miss Lucant and had one of the girls telephone to the gardener's house to rouse him. Tiddy certainly got organized quickly!" Miss Anklon, who even had the forethought to bring a flashlight with her, focused it on the pale face of the chaplain, who still was stretched on the ground, his head in Sim's lap. "Take him to the infirmary at once!" the dean ordered. "Anson--Tom--you'll have to get some sort of a stretcher to carry him. That leg, to me, looks to be broken." "It is," said Arden. The dean flashed a look and a gleam of light on her but said nothing, nor did she ask how Arden knew. "I'll have to run back and get a board--or something," said Anson. "A stretcher is what we need, but----" "We can pull a door off the old tool-shed!" suggested Tom Scott. "Do that," advised the dean. "Lose no time." Tom Scott hurried off in the darkness, before Anson could make up his mind what to do, and soon came back with a light door. On this Dr. Bordmust was carefully rolled, Sim pulling off her sweater to make a pillow for his head, and then the gardener and his assistant started on the melancholy journey to the college hospital. Having seen this procession on its way, the dean spoke sharply to the nervous girls. "Go at once to your rooms," she ordered. "We shall have something to say about this in the morning." Realizing that they could do nothing more, and feeling that they must have excited the dean's curiosity by all being dressed at that hour of the night, Arden and the others hurried into the dormitory and dispersed to their various rooms. Meanwhile Dr. Bordmust, who had recovered consciousness, was taken to the infirmary, where Anson and Tom carefully undressed him and put him in bed, with an elderly teacher, who was also a nurse, to look after him. A physician was hurriedly summoned from town and set the broken leg. This much the girls guessed from observation and rumors that floated along the corridor's grapevine route. For none of those engaged in the raid felt like going to bed at once. And as the food had escaped the watchful eyes of the dean, it having been successfully hidden under sweaters, it was available for the post-midnight feast which was soon under way. Nor was the usual caution necessary, with the excitement over the chaplain's strange adventure still seething. As the girls ate they talked, naturally, each of the two groups telling the other their parts in the affair. They all admitted it was a queer mystery. "Do you think the bell had anything to do with it?" Sim wanted to know. "It might have been rung to draw our attention away from the orchard," suggested Arden. "But no one was paying the least bit of attention to the orchard in the first place," objected Terry. "But why was Henny there in the orchard at midnight?" Jane Randall propounded. "He had no business there." "No more than we had in the kitchen," suggested Arden. "But he _was_ there," declared Mary Todd. "And something attacked him," said Sim. "And if you ask me," said Arden positively, "I think that whatever it was that came at us, the night we had to get apples for the sophs, attacked our chaplain." "Well, what was that?" demanded Ethel. "I don't know," Arden had to admit. The girls were silent a moment, and then Sim asked: "Did you have much trouble rousing Tiddy?" "Yes," Jane answered, "she sleeps like a horse. We couldn't make her understand for the longest time. She never even noticed how we all bulged with food, and I think she didn't hear the bell at all." So they talked until there was nothing left to eat though there was still much to wonder at. Arden hid the milk bottles in a closet. Jane Randall opened the door and was followed out by the other visitors to 513, who stole silently down the dark corridors and to their own rooms. In spite of all the excitement, Arden and her roommates were soon sound asleep. The next day the very walls of Cedar Ridge must have vibrated, so great was the talk. Rumors of the wildest sort were passed from girl to girl. Arden and her friends were a little afraid to tell of their part in the night's adventure and so listened to the various stories and volunteered nothing. At lunch, when the whole college was assembled, Tiddy rang her little bell, and immediately a deep hush followed the talk, laughter, and clatter of dishes. "Young ladies," began the dean, "so ridiculous are the rumors that are rife here today that I feel I must do a little explaining. Rev. Dr. Bordmust, while strolling through our orchard last night, was attacked by a huge black ram which knocked him down, and in the fall our chaplain's right leg was broken below the knee. The ram, which it is learned is a savage beast, broke loose from a near-by farm." There were uneasy twistings and turnings on the part of the girls, and many whispered comments, despite the frowning warnings of various teachers scattered about the room. "But you need have no further fears," the dean went on. "The beast has been caught and penned up securely. It will be kept under restraint from this time on. So no one need have any fears of going into our orchard--if she has occasion to go there." "So this is what the taxi-man must have been hinting at," thought Arden. "Though why he didn't dare speak of it I can't imagine. And I suppose it was the ram that knocked me down. I was lucky!" "This is the explanation of the greater part of the night's alarm, young ladies," continued the dean. "It is all very simple. It is unfortunate that Dr. Bordmust was injured, but he is now resting comfortably, and another clergyman has been temporarily engaged, so there will be chapel service--as usual." The dean smiled with dry humor, having noted flashes of joy on the faces of several students at the idea of escaping from morning devotions. "Dr. Bordmust has asked me, as a favor to him," stated the dean, "not to punish the girls who were out of their rooms against rules after hours. They kindly went to his assistance and summoned much-needed help. I am happy to accede to our chaplain's request, for I know the whole undergraduate body is extremely fond of him. I will ask no questions of those girls. In fact, I hereby publicly thank them for their great presence of mind. There is only one thing I must insist on." There was a portentous pause, and the dean ended the silence by saying: "If the ringing of the alarm bell was done as a joke--please don't repeat it." She smiled benignly. "Now you may go on with your lunch." CHAPTER XXV Arden Is Convinced Silence--a somewhat stunned and portentous silence--followed the dean's explanation and remarks. Then a buzz of talk began. It spread all through the room, for the orchard mystery had grown to greater proportions than the faculty of Cedar Ridge had believed. Arden secured the attention of Sim, who was excitedly talking to Terry, and propounded this: "Do you seriously think that what Tiddy said just now is true? Or, at least, do you think it is a logical explanation? It sounds fishy to me. If it was a ram that hurt Tom Scott and the chaplain, the beast planned his attacks with almost human cleverness." "Oh, I don't know," Sim answered. "I suppose it's possible----" "But not probable," Arden interrupted. "Oh, let's forget about it," suggested Sim. "I wonder," thought Arden as they finished lunch and walked from the dining room to the sun-flooded campus, "I wonder if Sim is going to do anything about the pool? She didn't seem much interested in the way the dean solved the mystery." "What do you think?" inquired Terry. "Aren't you satisfied, Arden, with the dean's statement?" "It satisfies me, Arden, m'sweet!" drawled Sim. "I find this sun very satisfying, too," she went on as she stretched her arms high above her head and ran her fingers through her thick hair. "You, also, Terry?" inquired Arden. "Yes," Terry answered. "You'll have to look further for doubters of the dean." She threw herself down on the warm grass and opened her Latin grammar for a last look before class. Arden stood over her chums in uncertainty, for now Sim had joined Terry on the grass. The sun was bright, the sky unclouded and of a deep blue. Arden pulled her bright red sweater down lower over her tweed skirt and adjusted a small scarf about her neck. Cedar Ridge was not a particularly "dressy" college, nor did it have a reputation for displaying on its campus carelessly dressed students. Rather a happy medium was struck. High heels were out of place. One could not make a swift last-minute dash up the boardwalk to Bordmust Hall in open pumps, as several girls had found out to their sorrow. Arden and her chums dressed in sports clothes, topped, usually, by the inevitable mortar-boards. Now that hazing was over, the college settled down to a peaceful routine, with not so much stress on the poor freshmen. "Well," Arden finally remarked, "I must say you girls show very little of the stuff which made our country the great place it is today. You have no curiosity. That's your trouble!" "My trouble is not enough sleep," murmured Sim drowsily. "Latin will be the death of me," declared Terry. "Then I'll leave you to yourselves," announced Arden, turning away. "I'm off to see what I can see." "Not mad, are you?" questioned Sim. "No, just curious." Arden was soon beyond talking distance. She was a little surprised, though she would not let Sim or Terry know it, that they took the dean's explanation so calmly and believingly. "For my part," reasoned Arden to herself, "I'm going to find out if an old black ram really caused all the scares and trouble." Once her mind was made up, Arden acted quickly. Her next class was an hour away. There was time enough, she knew, as she swung off in the direction of the orchard. She went in through the hedge entrance. It was dark and gloomy there, even with the sun shining, and for a moment the girl hesitated. But she kept on, and was soon in the grove of gnarled and fantastic trees. The sun was shining down through their twisted branches and glinting on the vari-hued apples. Arden drew in a deep breath of a tangy perfume. She picked up a red and yellow apple, wiped it off on her skirt, and bit into it. Distinctly it was good. She walked on farther. All was serene. There was no ram, no sign of a ram, though Arden did not really expect to find one roaming about. But she did think she might see the marks of the beast's feet. But she saw none. "And there's no one lying here unconscious and injured by any black beast," said Arden smiling a little at her conceit. She walked over to a corner where stood a shed in which were kept barrels and ladders for the harvesting of the apples. It was nearly time for the harvest now. The door, that had been taken off for use as a stretcher the night the chaplain had been attacked, had been replaced. The door swung open, and Arden had a glimpse inside the shed of various farm implements. "Ho, hum!" she yawned. "I guess the girls and the dean were right. There's no use trying to find anything different. I shall have to admit I was wrong, and I don't want to, for really I don't believe in that ram story. If I could only find something else to bear out my theory." She was looking around the orchard, gazing toward distant corners for something she could investigate when she was startled by a rustle of dried leaves caused by some feet pattering rapidly among them. There were a whistling snort and a loud sniff. Arden wheeled about and screamed in terror. Rushing straight at her, with lowering head and menacing horns curved in the typical design of such creatures, was an immense black ram. The animal must have been hiding behind a tree. Attracted by Arden's presence in the orchard, and perhaps incensed by her red sweater, it had come to give battle. Snorting in rage, like a miniature bull, and scattering the leaves with his pounding feet, the ram was coming on, Arden thought, like an express train. For one wild moment she felt resentful against the dean who had said the beast was now securely penned. Then Arden turned and made a jump for the tool shed. She got inside just in time, pulling the door after her. And a moment later the whole structure was shaken as the ram butted his horns against the thin portal. "Oh, my gosh!" gasped Arden. And as there followed a moment of silence and inaction on the part of the creature, she saw a hook on the inside of the door and slipped it into the staple. Then came another butting attack on the door. "He'll break it in!" cried Arden, her heart beating fast. "It isn't very strong. Oh, what shall I do? What shall I do?" The ram was snorting, puffing, and blowing outside the shed. Arden could hear him pawing in the dried leaves. Then for the third time he rushed with those heavy curved horns at the barrier which kept him from the human he wanted to attack. "No wonder Tom Scott and the chaplain were hurt with such a creature as that rushing at them!" gasped Arden. "Oh, dear! I wish I'd taken the dean's word. It's a ram all right. A terrible ram!" She wondered if a human voice in command would have any effect on the creature. She would try. "Go away! Get out of here!" she ordered through a crack in the door. She waited. She heard nothing. Perhaps the beast had gone. She loosed the hook a little, making a crack wide enough out of which she could look. The ram hadn't gone. He was balefully eyeing the shed from a little distance, and when he saw the door move again he lowered his head and butted it harder than before. "Oh, this is awful!" groaned Arden. "I guess I'll have to stay in here until he goes away or falls asleep. I suppose rams do sleep, sometimes. This is what I get for doubting Tiddy. I wonder if there is a back door that I could sneak out of while he's butting the front one?" But there was no rear exit, as Arden discovered when she peered through the jumble of ladders, barrels, and tools. Sheds aren't usually built with two doors. There was nothing to be done but to wait for a rescue or until the ram should get weary of the siege and raise it. "When the girls find out about this they'll have the laugh on me all right!" Arden ruefully mused. The ram was quiet again, but Arden thought it useless again to give any orders or to tantalize the brute by partly opening the door. Time was passing. It was getting late. She would soon be due at her class. If she did not appear, her chums might think something had happened to her and start a search. "But I didn't tell them where I was going," Arden reflected. "They don't know where to start looking, and they'll never imagine I came to the orchard after all that's happened. "'Oh, to be in England, now that Spring is there'--or any old place but in this shed," the imprisoned girl murmured. She was getting panicky. Almost without knowing what she was doing, Arden found herself shouting: "Go away, ram! Go away!" She paused and caught her breath suddenly. She heard voices outside; men talking. The sounds came nearer. Someone said: "That certainly was a mighty poor job you did on that pen, Anson. The ram got out without half trying. There he is now, down by the tool shed. And by Jove, Anson, I believe he's got someone penned in there! He wouldn't act that way unless there was someone in the shed. Look, there he goes, butting the door!" It was Tom Scott. Arden recognized the voice. And Anson Yaeger, the grim farmer, answered: "I did as good a job as I could with the wood I had. I'd like to see you or anybody else----" "Never mind that now!" interrupted Tom. "The thing to do now is to catch that ram again! He's dangerous. Come on!" Arden could hear footsteps running now, and though the ram once more butted the door, nearly cracking some of the boards, she knew that rescue was on the way. There was silence outside the shed for a moment, and then Tom Scott said: "You slip around back, Anson, and sort of hold his attention by peering out at him around the corner. While you're doing that, I can slip up behind him and get this rope around him. I'll lasso him, and we'll hog-tie him, cowboy fashion." "Very well," agreed the farmer. Arden could not see what they did, but she was told, later. Tom, who had provided himself with a noosed rope when he and Anson started out in search of the escaped ram, skillfully tossed it over the beast's head from the rear. The noose fell in a choking loop around the ram's neck, and Tom pulled tight. The surprised animal turned to charge Tom, but by this time Anson attacked him with a heavy timber, knocked him down, and both men threw themselves upon the creature. He struggled and bleated, but was soon well tied so he could not move. "Good work, Anson!" complimented Tom. "Hum!" was the grunted answer. The farmer was winded. Arden was debating with herself whether to come out and show who the ram had imprisoned or to wait until the men had taken the beast away. But she had no choice, for Tom said: "Now we'll see what unfortunate this ram was after." "I'm going out," Arden told herself and unhooked the door. Tom Scott and Anson fairly jumped with surprise as they saw her. "He chased me in here," she volunteered. "I got in just in time, but I didn't dare come out again." "No, it's wise you didn't," said Tom, smiling at her. "This is a dangerous beast. I thought he was after someone, the way he stood near this shed. Your red sweater must have attracted him. Not hurt, are you?" "No, only frightened. At least I was. I'm so glad you came." "Well, he can't hurt you now," chuckled Tom, looking at the bound ram. Anson said nothing. "He's a tricky beast. Worked his way out of the pen we shut him up in temporarily until his owner can dispose of him. I believe the dean has threatened to make a complaint unless the ram is removed from around here." "I hope he goes," said Arden. "The orchard will be safer without him and less--less mysterious." "Mysterious?" questioned Tom, somewhat wonderingly. "Yes. But I must be going. I'll be late for my class. Thank you for rescuing me." "It was a pleasure," Tom said, bowing and smiling. "Also a pleasure to choke the beast that gave me such a whack." Still Anson Yaeger did not speak. He seemed to be glaring at Arden with his little beady eyes almost hidden under shaggy brows. But Arden was looking only at Tom Scott. She could not seem to help it. And he was looking at her. Arden began to feel embarrassed. It was as if, she said later, she had met the good-looking gardener at some previous time but could not remember where. She was puzzled and annoyed. "Well, I really must go!" she announced, and this time she did, hurrying past the bound and recumbent ram that seemed to eye her with much malevolence. But he was helpless now. Arden hurried up through the orchard, turning for a final look at the scene of her latest adventure. She saw Anson bringing a wheelbarrow out of the shed to be used in taking the ram to a new prison. Then she ran to Bordmust and reached it just in time for English lit. CHAPTER XXVI The Challenge Terry and Sim were in other rooms, so Arden did not see her chums until after the last class of the day. Then she met them on the steps of Bordmust, where they usually waited for one another. If ever Arden astonished Terry and Sim, it was on this occasion, when she related her startling adventure with the ram. "No, never!" gasped Terry in disbelief. "Yes," asserted Arden. "Oh, my aunt's cat!" shouted Sim, and then she and Terry went into spasms of laughter. Though they realized Arden had been in some danger, the funny side of it was now uppermost in their minds. "Let's go over to the orchard and look around," suggested Terry as their mirth subsided. "There won't be anything to look at, now that Arden is out," said Sim. "I know," answered Terry, "but I'd like to see what the place looks like now that the danger is removed and the mystery solved." "I guess you're one of those persons who go around gathering souvenirs from houses where murders have been committed," laughed Arden. "The sort who sneaks up on the Sphinx and knocks a chip off the nose for an Egyptian tidbit," suggested Sim. "Come on," urged Terry. "We haven't anything else to do, and we can't go anywhere, as we're still campused, and it's a nice day." "All right," assented Sim. The girls were in a jovial mood as they started toward the orchard, which had been bereft of some of its peril and mystery by the dean's announcement and by Arden's rather perilous adventure. This was several days after the night of the kitchen raid, the ringing of the bell (which was as yet unexplained), and the attack on the aged chaplain by the vicious black ram. During those days the college had buzzed with talk and rumor, and among the chums of Arden and her two friends considerable was known about the midnight taking of the chickens, milk, and pies. But the bottles had surreptitiously been restored to the kitchen, the bones of the chickens had been successfully disposed of, and there was nothing left of the pies save a few grease spots on several sweaters. Whether the dean knew about the raid and chose to ignore it or whether she was still in blissful ignorance, Arden and her friends neither knew nor cared. "Sometimes I think she knows all about it but doesn't say anything because of what we did for Henny," said Sim. "Anyhow, she hasn't piled any more punishment on us, so why should we care?" asked Terry. "That's right," agreed Arden. "But though that part seems to have blown over, we still haven't found out why Henny was in the orchard at midnight." "And we probably won't until you locate that missing Pangborn chap and get the reward so the swimming pool can be repaired," said Sim, a little sarcastically, it seemed. "Don't talk about it!" begged Arden. "I guess I'm a failure as a detective. As for the pool, perhaps around Christmas we can prevail on our respective families to chip in and subscribe enough to fix it." "That's a thought!" exclaimed Sim. "I must remember that!" What the dean publicly had said about the ram was quite true in the matter of its ugliness, as Arden could testify. A farmer not far from the college grounds owned the big black brute, kept for stock exhibitions. It was larger than the average ram, with immense horns, curving back over a hard head, and when free would run to attack any persons who crossed its path. The beast was supposed to be kept secure in a barn or field but had managed to get out more than one night, roaming afar, and was said to have killed several dogs which had had the temerity to attack it. "Probably it was attracted to our orchard by the apples," suggested Terry as the three walked along, talking of the brute's acts. "It must have been attracted to me also," murmured Arden as she recalled the circumstances of the hazing and how she was knocked down by what she thought was a dark whirlwind. "Henny couldn't have been in the orchard as a hazing stunt to be attacked by the beast," said Terry thoughtfully. "What was he there for?" "Perhaps wandering under the midnight stars to think up a theme for a sermon," suggested Sim. "Maybe," said Arden, though her voice had no conviction in it. "Well, here we are," she added as they left the campus lawn and found themselves under the first row of trees in the orchard. It was the first time since the hazing they had entered it without fear or apprehension. It was very calm and peaceful this bright morning. "It was right about here," said Arden, indicating the base of a large tree, "that the ram knocked me down that night, and over there is the shed where I locked myself in," she added, pointing. "And there is where we found Tom Scott," Terry said, indicating the spot. "Here, Terry," said Sim, breaking off a twig from one of the old gnarled trees. "Here's a souvenir for you." "Thanks, darling," remarked Terry sarcastically. "What kind of apples are these, anyhow?" She picked up a fairly good windfall and gingerly took a small bite after shaking off an ant or two. "I haven't any idea," answered Arden, and then, as she remembered something, she suddenly asked: "Oh, Sim! What about that man you saw in the orchard with a lantern the night Mr. Newman brought you back from New York?" "Oh, yes!" said Sim. "Why, it must have been someone looking for the ram, who was on the rampage then. How disgustingly simple mysteries always turn out to be!" "Not so simple," Arden objected. "How about the bell and the missing Pangborn chap?" "Oh--well," Sim temporized. Then, as a distant rustle of footsteps in the dried leaves was heard, she added in a lower voice: "Here comes your hero!" Arden glanced toward where Sim indicated. Tom Scott, the good-looking young fellow who was assistant to grim and dour old Anson Yaeger, was swinging along beneath the trees toward the girls. As he caught sight of them he paused, looked behind him as if to see that a way of retreat was clear, and then, with a shrug of his shoulders as if shaking off a weight, advanced again. Not only to the eyes of Arden, but to those of her chums, it was evident a great change had taken place in Tom Scott. For one thing, he no longer wore blue overalls. He was attired in a well-fitting gray business suit. Instead of clumsy boots his feet had on neat ties well polished. "How nice he looks!" murmured Terry. "Why!" she exclaimed. "He's shaved off his mustache. I'm sure he had one when I saw him raking up leaves a couple of days ago!" "Yes, he has," agreed Sim. "But what of it? I think he looks better without it." "Hush! He'll hear you," warned Arden. She was staring in a strange manner at the young man. "He's coming right this way," went on Sim in a low voice. "Can't we do something besides standing here and staring at him as though we came here purposely to see him? Walk, talk--do something!" "Let's pretend we're after some apples," suggested Terry, stooping down but gathering only a small nubbin. Sim followed her example, but Arden appeared to be fascinated by the oncoming Tom Scott. She did not move or speak. She just stared at him in a way that would have drawn rebukes from her chums had they seen her fixed gaze. Tom Scott came on, grinning cheerfully, as he was close to the girls, disclosing white, perfect teeth. "Altogether too good-looking for a gardener at a girls' college," Sim found herself reflecting as she looked up. "We--we thought we'd take a few apples," faltered Terry. "I suppose there--there's no--objection." By this time she and Sim were aware of Arden's queer actions or, rather, lack of action, for Arden was still motionlessly staring. "Try one of these," suggested Tom Scott, reaching up and picking off a perfect apple from a branch over his head. "You'll find the flavor rather good." He handed the apple to Arden. "Thank you," she said, in a toneless voice. "What kind is it?" "Spitzenberg. A very choice variety. You'll not find many of them around here. This is the only orchard I know of where they grow." "How nice--I mean how strange," murmured Arden. She was not looking at the apple. She was looking at Tom Scott, and she asked: "Have you recovered from your--your accident?" "Oh!" He laughed. "You mean when the black ram butted me? For it was the sable beast that knocked me out. Yes, thank you, I'm all over that. It wasn't much. Too bad I didn't do for that beast before he had a chance at the chaplain. He fared worse than I did--the chaplain, I mean." "Yes, he did," agreed Sim. "But you saved Arden from the same ram." "It so happened," admitted the good-looking gardener. "Thank you," said Terry as Tom gave her an apple like the one he had handed to Arden and then passed one to Sim. "Well, I must be going," said Tom Scott. "I have an errand in town and----" "Just a minute!" cried Arden excitedly. In all this time she had not removed her gaze from the young man's face, not even to munch her apple, as Terry and Sim were doing with theirs. "Wait, please----!" The young gardener stood uncertain, his eyes roving from one girl to the other and back to Arden. "You--you----" faltered Arden. "I know! Yes, I'm certain now! You are Harry Pangborn!" "Arden!" gasped Sim. "Arden!" "What are you saying?" exclaimed Terry, dropping her half-eaten apple. "This is the man we saw in the post office!" went on Arden, her words and breath coming rapidly. "I mean he's the picture we saw--I mean he is the original of the man wanted in the police poster. You are, aren't you?" she challenged. CHAPTER XXVII A Telegram For a moment it seemed as if the young man was going to deny Arden's statement or at least flee from the scene. But again he smiled in a disarming and friendly fashion, shrugged his shoulders as though getting rid of another weight, and, spreading his hands in a helpless and surrendering gesture, said: "Yes, I am Harry Pangborn. You have found me out. I thought it wouldn't be long after I shaved off my mustache. Well, I'm just as glad it happened this way since it had to happen. I was about to end the little masquerade, anyhow." "Oh, please let us end it!" begged Arden. "I mean if we are allowed to tell----" She seemed confused and blushed. "Yes, I know," said young Mr. Pangborn. "Well, have it your way. I would rather see you profit by it than anyone else. You did me a favor the night the ram came at me." "But what does it all mean?" asked Sim. "Why did you give up your inheritance of millions to come here as a gardener's helper?" asked Terry. "It's a short story, simple enough, and perhaps you may not believe it," said Harry Pangborn, "but I just didn't want my inheritance." "Not your grandfather's wealth?" asked Arden. "Well, perhaps it would be more exact to say I was in no hurry for it. Oh, I'm not going to pass it up altogether," he laughed. "But here's the story briefly. As the poster explains, I disappeared about the time I was to inherit a large sum. But there was nothing criminal in it, and I wasn't kidnaped as some thought. All my life I have wanted to be the owner of a big farm estate, ever since I used to go to my grandfather's farm when I was a boy. I knew I could inherit the farm all right, but I wanted to know something about running one, especially an orchard, since I hope to raise fancy apples. "I figured that the best way to learn from the ground up, so to speak, would be to get a job on a farm or an orchard. I knew I couldn't do it under my own name. I'd have a lot of tabloid paper reporters after me--a millionaire apple grower and such rot. So I just quietly disappeared, as I knew those in charge of the estate I was to inherit would object, and I roved around. I finally landed here, and I may say I like the place very much." He smiled frankly at the three attractive girls. "I liked everything about it but the ram. But now the time has come to end the masquerade. I've learned what I wanted to learn. Old Anson is a good teacher, if he isn't all he should be in other ways. He taught me many secrets of the soil." "Why did you happen to come to Cedar Ridge?" asked Arden. "The poster said you might be found around here." "I know it did. I ran a risk in coming here. But I didn't just happen to. You see, my grandfather and Rev. Dr. Bordmust are old college chums. I had that in mind when I came to this college farm as assistant gardener. In case of accident I wanted someone who knew me to know where I was. So I told my story to your chaplain, swore him to secrecy, though much against his will, and then I just let matters drift along. "More than once Dr. Bordmust urged me to give up what he called my mad scheme, and he half threatened to disclose everything. But I prevailed on him to wait just a little longer. But finally, one night just before he was hurt by the ram, he came to see me in my garden residence and said he would keep silent no longer. Then, as I had gotten all I wanted to in the way of apple knowledge, I agreed to do the disclosing myself. This made Dr. Bordmust easier in his mind. It was when he was going home through the orchard, after leaving me, that he was attacked. I can't tell you how badly I felt over it." "Yes, it was too bad," agreed Arden, still gasping with astonishment. "Say," broke in Sim, "was it you who rang the alarm bell?" Harry Pangborn smiled again and said: "No! It was Anson who did it." "Anson!" chorused the surprised three. "Yes. I am on my way to the dean now, before I go to town, to tell her she had better get rid of her gardener. I can do it freely, as it can be proved I have no ulterior motive since I am giving up my place. But old Anson is a man with a warped mind and a queer sense of humor." "Why did he ring the bell?" asked Terry. "And how?" asked Arden. "He reached up with a long-handled rake and tangled the teeth in the rope," said Mr. Pangborn. "That was his method. As for his reason, well, it may have been one of several. "But slyly ringing the alarm bell with the rake and then running away wasn't all of his peculiar sport," went on Mr. Pangborn. "What else did he do?" asked Terry. "Once I caught him perched up on the ledge of one of the high gymnasium windows, peering in. He jumped down and ran away as I came along the walk, but I had a chance to see him, and also to note that he was wearing some kind of a mask, that of an evil old man." "Oh!" gasped Sim. "The face you saw at the dance, Arden!" "Yes, it must have been," Arden agreed. "Oh, then you saw that trick?" asked Mr. Pangborn. "I just had a glimpse of a face at the window," Arden answered. "Then the bell rang, and we all hurried out to try to solve the mystery." "Yes, that was the night," young Mr. Pangborn agreed. "But what could he hope to gain by such a trick?" asked Arden. "He really didn't frighten me." "I think that was to have been the start of a campaign on his part for a certain purpose," the late Tom Scott answered. "He probably thought the girls would report to the dean about a strange face peering in at them out of the night. Then Anson, very likely, might have offered to drive the Peeping Tom away, which he could easily do by just ceasing his own antics. In this way he would be commended, I think he expected." "How strange!" murmured Sim. "He must be crazy!" echoed Terry. "Do you think," asked Arden, "that he may have done it all as a joke? Perhaps he was joking the time he threatened Terry and me." Mr. Pangborn indicated his disbelief in the joke theory by shaking his head. Then he added: "He may have had very queer ideas as to what was a joke, but I really think he was building up a case for himself." "A case for himself?" asked Terry. "Yes. When he had rung the bell enough times and it had become a sort of terrifying mystery, I think he intended to have it solved in a way that would not implicate him and so gain credit and perhaps a raise in wages. That's only a theory, but it may be true. One night I spied on him, discovered his trick, and was preparing to denounce him when the chaplain forced me to give up my masquerade. So it's all over, and you are the first, outside of Dr. Bordmust, who knows my secret. And I suppose you won't keep it long?" "We just can't!" said Arden. "As soon as I saw you coming along just now I knew you were the man of the poster. I half recognized you before, but the mustache deceived me. I've done a lot of foolish things trying to remember the two faces--yours and the one on the poster." "Well, anyhow, Arden," said Sim, "it was fun doing it." "Yes, it was," Arden agreed. "But, Mr. Pangborn, will you let us notify the police or lawyers and claim the reward?" "I would prefer to have you notify the lawyers," he said genially. "We don't want the money for ourselves," Terry made haste to explain. "We are going to give it to the dean to have the swimming pool repaired for Sim." "For Sim?" "Yes," exclaimed Arden, indicating the blushing Miss Westover. "She threatens to leave college because she can't go in the pool." "Arden!" rebuked Sim. "Then you will let us notify the lawyers that you are here?" persisted Arden. "Please!" begged Terry in a way she had. "Well," he laughed, "I suppose I must. I guess my little adventure is over. Go on--tell on me!" "How wonderful!" cried Arden, while Sim and Terry looked at each other happily. "I had about made up my mind, Arden," said Sim, "not to go home after all. Now, of course, I'll stay, with the prospect of the pool. I'll stay until I'm sent home." "That's fine, Sim!" Arden declared. "Everything is coming out so beautifully!" "We can have the pool fixed, Sim isn't going to leave us, and the horrid old ram is caught," murmured Terry. "And the mystery of the bell is explained," added Sim. "Have you a piece of paper?" suddenly asked Mr. Pangborn after a vain search in his own pockets. "We nearly always carry books and papers," said Sim, "but this morning----" She looked helplessly at her chums. "Here!" exclaimed Arden. "Use the back of this envelope. It's the letter you gave me to keep, Sim. I was always afraid she'd mail it herself if I left it around," she explained to Terry, "so I've been carrying it with me." She handed the crumpled envelope to the young man, who had managed to find a pencil, and he wrote on it quickly. He handed the envelope back to Arden. "There," he said. "That's a telegram to my lawyers. Sign your name, send it, and the reward is yours." "You won't run away meanwhile, will you?" asked Arden shyly. "No, I'll stay around or go and give myself up, as you direct--just so you'll get the money." He seemed happy to comply. "Thanks, so much!" Arden said warmly. "Do you mind if we go send this telegram right away--before we have to report in class?" "Run along," he said, laughing. "I'll go telephone my people and relieve their anxiety. Though I don't really believe they were worried. I've traveled pretty much around the world alone and been out of touch with them for months at a time." "Good-bye!" chorused the three freshmen as they literally "ran along" to the main building to telegraph the surprising message to the lawyers named on the poster. Harry Pangborn, a quizzical smile on his face, watched them go. "Well, it was fun while it lasted," he murmured as he swung on through the orchard. "And I think it did me good. Those are mighty pretty girls. I wouldn't mind knowing them--after I come into my kingdom," he chuckled. "Perhaps I may. Who knows?" The girl at the college telephone switchboard was almost as excited as the breathless Arden, who asked to be connected with Western Union and then dictated the startling news of the missing heir. "This will be something for the papers!" thought the telephone operator. And it was--later. Terry and Sim waited impatiently outside the booth for Arden to emerge. Girls clustered around them, and many were the exclamations of wonder, delight, and surprise as the news was told. "Now we must go inform the dean," said Terry as she came out, flustered but triumphant. On the way to Miss Anklon's office the girls passed the college post boxes, where each girl had a niche of her own, with a dial lock, for incoming mail. Sim begged them to wait while she looked in her box. There was a letter slanting to one side. "Oh, I have one!" Sim announced as she twirled the combination and took out the missive. "Who's it from?" asked Terry before Sim had half read it. But she was quick to answer: "It's from Ed Anderson. He wants me to go to a dance during the Thanksgiving holidays. I didn't think he'd ever speak to me again after the way I disappeared at the tea dance." At this news Arden and Terry decided to look in their boxes. "You're not so much!" Terry cried. "I have a letter myself. It's from Dick Randall!" "Me too!" announced Arden, succinctly if not grammatically. "It's from Jim Todd." "What fun!" exclaimed Sim. "And the holidays begin the end of next week." CHAPTER XXVIII A Disturbing Message Hardly realizing the good fortune that had come to them so unexpectedly, and while they were rejoicing over their letters and the prospects of the Thanksgiving holidays, with dances in the offing, Arden, Terry, and Sim saw one of the college messengers making her way toward them through a throng of other students. For the messengers were young women who, like the waitresses, were working their way through Cedar Ridge by making themselves useful to the dean. "I have a message for you," said this girl, without smiling. She looked at Arden but included Sim and Terry. "A message for me?" Arden exclaimed. Could the Pangborn lawyers have sent the reward money by telegraph already? "Yes, you three young ladies must report to the dean at once." "Whew!" faintly whistled Sim. "What's the idea?" asked Terry. "I'm sure I don't know," answered the bearer of what was generally considered ill tidings. "But you had better see her at once." "Come on!" urged Arden. "Let's get it over with. I had half a mind to go there, anyhow, and tell her the news." "Maybe she's heard it already," suggested Terry. "More likely," suggested Sim gloomily, "she's heard we were trying to flirt with the good-looking assistant gardener and we're going to be expelled. If she sends us home, Arden, don't you give her a penny of that reward money!" "No!" exclaimed Terry. "Not a cent!" "Well," said Arden doubtfully, "I don't know----" and then she urged her two chums on toward the dean's office while little groups of other girls, among which strange rumors were filtering, watched the three freshmen, with a variety of expressions. "Come in," greeted Miss Anklon as Arden knocked. And when Sim and Terry had filed in behind her it needed but one look at the smiling face of the dean to let them know they were meeting her on a different footing than ever before. "For Tiddy was actually _grinning_!" Sim told some of her friends later. "Please be seated, young ladies," invited the dean, indicating chairs. "And, not to make them anxious seats for you, I may say that news of your good fortune has preceded you here. Mr. Pangborn has just left me and has told me all about it. I congratulate you, and I hope you will put the reward money to good use." In a chorus Arden, Terry, and Sim breathed audibly in relief. "And about the bell," went on Miss Anklon. "I am sorry if, even remotely, I suspected you or any of the girls of that trick. I shall make a public announcement about it. Sufficient to say now that I have dismissed Mr. Yaeger as gardener and we shall have a new one in a few days. I never realized what a strange mind he had until Mr. Scott--I should say Mr. Pangborn--enlightened me." Arden and her chums began wondering if this was all the dean had summoned them for--to congratulate them and inform them about old Anson. It was not in her nature to be thus trifling. "This is not all that I asked you to come here for," resumed the little dark-faced dean. "It was to warn you----" Her telephone rang, and she had to pause at a most critical point as she answered into the instrument, saying: "I am engaged now. Call me in five minutes." Then to the waiting three: "I want to warn you not to talk too much about this matter for publication, for I realize that it must get into the papers and I desire no unseemly publicity for the college. Also, I wish to caution you about wildly spending that thousand dollars reward which, Mr. Pangborn informs me, will soon come to you. I wish----" "Oh, Miss Anklon!" Arden could not refrain from interrupting, though she arose and bowed formally as she did so. "Didn't Mr. Pangborn tell you what we are going to do with the money as soon as we get it?" "No, he didn't." "Wasn't that nice of him?" whispered Sim to Terry. "He knew we would get a kick out of telling for ourselves." "Why, Miss Anklon," went on Arden, "we have decided, we three, for Terry and Sim will share the reward with me, we have decided to donate it to the college." "To the college?" The dean plainly was startled. "Yes. To repair the swimming pool." A momentous silence followed Arden's dramatic announcement, and then the dean said, "Oh!" and "Ah!" and "Er!" She was plainly taken by surprise and was as near to being flustered as the girls had ever seen her. But she found her voice and usual poise in a moment and said, with as much warmth as she was capable of: "Why, young ladies, this certainly is most generous of you. I cannot adequately thank you now. That will come later--more formally and publicly. But are you sure you want to do this?" "Oh, yes, Miss Anklon!" answered Sim and Terry together. "We decided that long ago," added Arden. "Well, it is indeed fine of you," Miss Anklon said, fussing with the papers on her desk and not looking at the girls. "You have shown a very laudable college spirit." The three freshmen smiled a little weakly and shifted about. "I can be generous, also, young ladies!" the dean remarked more firmly as she looked at them again. "I think your gift deserves some immediate recognition. That is--suppose we forget all about your being campused?" she asked, and smiled disarmingly. "Oh!" murmured Arden and her chums. For they had felt hampered by the campus rule even though they had not strictly kept it. Then Arden added: "Thank you ever so much! We appreciate it ever so much!" And she told herself: "Hang it, I meant to say 'greatly' in that second sentence." But the dean smiled again, held up a restraining hand as Terry and Sim evinced indications of opening up a barrage of thanks, and with a dismissing gesture said: "I suppose you will want to tell all your friends the good news. You may go now, and--I hope you enjoy yourselves!" "Really, she's human after all!" murmured Sim as the three hurried down the hall to find anxious girls awaiting them. Then such talk as buzzed in Cedar Ridge was never known before! Arden, Terry, and Sim were overwhelmed with questions, and their room resembled Times Square at a subway rush hour. "This rates another pantry raid!" declared Toots Everett who, with other sophomores, came in to congratulate the three. That second pantry raid was much more successful than the first, which had, however, ushered in the solution of the orchard secret and the ending of the peril beneath the gnarled trees. "Well, here's to our holidays!" exclaimed Arden at the midnight feast, drinking from a glass of milk in one hand. The other held a piece of pie. "Long may they wave!" chanted Sim. "Pass me some chicken," mumbled Terry. A week later, after many crowded hours, and perhaps it may be said after as minimum an amount of study as was ever noted in Cedar Ridge, Arden and her friends were waiting on the station platform at Morrisville for the train that was to take them home for the Thanksgiving recess. Jerry Cronin, the taxi-man who had first driven the three to the college, was sauntering around waiting for a fare. He smiled at the girls, and they nodded. They knew him better now, for they had frequently used his car. "I guess you're glad it's all over," he remarked, coming closer to where they stood and taking off his cap. "What?" asked Arden. "That there orchard business. You know," he was almost whispering now, "I couldn't tell you about it at first. I dassn't. But I warned you, didn't I? Here's how it happened. Now that old Yaeger is gone I can tell. I caught him up to some of his tricks once, making scares and all that. And once I saw him drive that old black ram into the orchard at night. I couldn't figure out why, but now I know. That there young gardener told me. Yaeger was planning some credit for himself. "Yep, I caught him at it, and when he saw I knew, he threatened that if I told he'd see that I didn't get any more college taxi trade, so I had to keep still. But now I'm glad I can tell." "And we're glad it's over," said Terry. The girls resumed their own talk as the taxi-man walked away. "Wasn't it thrilling when Arden gave the dean the reward check!" Sim exclaimed, her arm through Terry's. "It certainly was! And wasn't Harry Pangborn nice when he posed for those newspaper photographers?" Sim inquired. "Swell!" laughed Arden. "And the party the girls gave us last night in the gym--lovely! Everything has been just wonderful. I can hardly wait to get home to tell Mother and Dad all about it. I could write so little in my letters." "Don't forget our dance Thanksgiving eve," Sim reminded her chums. "As if we'd forget--when those nice boys are coming!" exclaimed Arden. She turned to look at the college. The buildings were outlined by a glorious red sunset. "I can understand, now, how one becomes attached to one's Alma Mater. Cedar Ridge _is_ a dear old place," she concluded. "And to think," murmured Sim, "I wanted to leave it!" "Oh, well," said Terry, "I can understand. I'd have done the same thing if I was as crazy as you are, Sim, about being an expert swimmer and diver. You couldn't help it." The girls lapsed into silence and looked at the gray stone buildings standing so bravely in the gleam of the red sun. The chapel spire seemed to pierce the blue sky and the white clouds now beginning to be tinted with rainbow colors. Bordmust Hall seemed to peer shyly at the departing girls from its distant hill. In the window of his official manse, Dr. Bordmust, recovering from his injury, looked out of a window near which he was propped up and smiled. The girls waved friendly hands at him, and he waved in return. "A jolly gentleman, after all," commented Terry. "We must call on him when we come back," suggested Arden. "I suppose we will be coming back," murmured Sim. "Of course!" exclaimed Arden. "We're going to have a lot more adventures at Cedar Ridge." "But I doubt if any will be like the ones we've just finished," laughed Terry. That remains to be seen. And those who are curious to learn may do so in the next book of this Arden Blake mystery series. It will be entitled _The Mystery of Jockey Hollow_. The girls walked on. "Look!" Sim suddenly exclaimed, pointing to the swimming pool soon to be repaired. Its windows were a glory of red and gold from the setting sun. "It's doing its best to announce the fact that it will no longer be a despised vegetable cellar. Oh, girls, I'm so happy!" "So say we all of us!" chanted Arden. The puffing train came at last and stood at the station, panting for breath, it seemed, as if to get up courage to take away so many happy, laughing, chattering, and joy-bubbling students. As it pulled out of the station along a row of bare trees, the three freshmen of 513 had a glimpse of the stone deer of the campus looking at them with startled eyes. * * * * * * Transcriber's note: --Silently corrected a few typographical errors (but left nonstandard spelling and dialect as is). --Rearranged front matter to a more-logical order. 
4945	----	Jane Allen: Junior By Edith Bancroft Author of "Jane Allen of the Sub-Team," "Jane Allen: Right Guard," "Jane Allen: Center," Etc. Illustrated by--Thelma Gooch CONTENTS CHAPTER I THE GET-TOGETHER II A SHADOW IN FORECAST III THE MISFIT FRESHMAN IV THRILLING NEWS V THREATS AND DEFIANCE VI JANE AND JUDITH VII A QUEER MIX-UP VIII TO THE RESCUE IX WHAT HAPPENED TO JUDITH X THE INTERLUDE XI A TWICE TOLD TALE XII A WILD NIGHT OF IT XIII THE AFTERMATH XIV PLEADING FOR TIME XV THE PICKET AND THE SPOOK XVI THE HIDDEN CHAMBER XVII "BEHOLD THE GHOST OF LENOX HALL!" XVIII FAITHFUL FROLIC XIX THE MIRACLE XX TOUCHSTONE XXI CRAMMING EVENTS XXII STARTLING DISCLOSURES XXIII THE DANCE XXIV KING PIN OF THE FRESHIES XXV THE DAY AFTER THE BIG NIGHT XXVI A SURPRISE IN RECORDS XXVII THE REAL STORY CHAPTER I THE GET TOGETHER. The late September day waved back at Summer graceful as a child saying goodbye with a soft dimply hand; and just as fitful were the gleams of warm sunshine that lazed through the stately trees on the broad campus of Wellington College. It was a brave day--Summer defying Nature, swishing her silken skirts of transparent iridescence into the leaves already trembling before the master hand of Autumn, with his brush poised for their fateful stroke of poisoned beauty; every last bud of weed or flower bursting in heroic tribute, and every breeze cheering the pageant in that farewell to Summer. "If school didn't start just now," commented Norma Travers, "I wonder what we would do? Everything else seems to stop short." "I never saw shadows come and go so weirdly on any other first day," added Judith Stearns ominously. "I hope it doesn't mean a sign, as Velma Sigbee would put it," and dark eyed Judith waved her arms above her black head to ward off the blow. "Is it too early to suggest science?" lisped Maud Leslie timidly. "I've been reading about the possible change of climate and its relation to the sun's rays going wild into space. I don't want to start anything, but it might be judicious to buy more furs next Summer. Also it might justify the premonitory fad." "Don't you dare," warned Ted Guthrie, puffing beneath her prettiest crocheted sweater and rolling down from her chosen mound on the natural steps of the poplar tree slope. "It's bad enough to think of icy days up here, far, far away from the happy laughing world of hot chocolate and warm movie seats," and she rolled one more step nearer the boxwood lined path, "but to tag on science, and insinuate we are to be glazed mummies, ugh!" and the redoubtable Ted groaned a grunt that threatened havoc to the aforesaid handsome sweater. "There, there, Teddy dear, don't take on so," soothed Maud, rescuing the other's new silver pencil that was rapidly sliding further away from Ted with the pretty open hand bag. "I had entirely forgotten how you despise ice sports. And you so lovely and fat for falling. You should love 'em," insisted the studious Maud. "Being fat isn't all it's----" "Cracked up to be," assisted Judith Stearns. "I quote freely. That's one of Tim Jackson's." "Where have I heard the line before?" mimicked Theodosia Dalton, otherwise Dozia the Fearless. "It has a chummy tone. All of which is as naught to the question. Where is Jane? Never knew her to miss the line up here. And I even tapped at her door. Judy, where is Jane?" demanded Dozia. "Am I my chum's keeper? Can't Jane attend to her own mortal baggage without incurring the wrath of the multitude?" and Judith sprang up from her spot on the leaf laden lawn. Also she cast a glance of apprehension along the path where Jane Allen should at least now be seen on her way. "Perhaps Jane feels we should forswear this moment of mirth; being juniors and stepping aside from all the others. They call it the Whisper you know; 'count of the whispering poplar above," with a grandiose wave at the innocent tree. "But I would much prefer a chuckle, wouldn't you Ted?" "There you go again, or rather also," flung back the stout girl. "I must take all the cracks and the chuckles and presently some naive little freshie will amble along and ask me if I happen to be one of the soap bubbles she just blew off her penny pipe," and the pneumatic cheeks puffed out in bubble mockery. "Now Teddy dear. Don't fret. Everyone is just jealous because you're so lovely and comfy looking," appeased Nettie Brocton, the dimple girl. "But I really do think this 'whisper' is awfully childish. Rather makes the strangers feel we are whispering about them." "If they only knew!" sighed Ted. "I am the usual back-stop for all frivolity. But if it comes to giving up this lovely loafing hour under our own grandmother poplar, I say girls, go ahead and knock, but spare the whisper. I'd die if I had to go tramping around seeing things and saying hello to that mob," with a sweeping wave of her one free arm, the other was around Janet Clarke's waist. "You are right, little girl, it is lovely to gather here and let the others do the traipsing. And as for the whisper, anyone within sight may also hear, for this is a shout rather than a whisper. The real point is, we are gathered together while others are scattered apart. But where is Jane Allen? I always look to her to start things, and we can't stay here all day, alluring as is the grandmother poplar. We have 'juties'; girls, 'juties'. "Dozia Dalton had risen to her full height, which measured more feet and inches than her latest kitchen door records verified, and her hair now wound around her head like a big brown braided coffee cake, added a few more inches, in spite of all the flat pinning Dozia took refuge in. It may be attractive to be tall and slender, but somehow old Dame Nature has a way of keeping her pets humble. She loves to exaggerate. The girls were grouped around the gnarled roots of the big tree. As had been their custom this contingent managed to escape the hum and confusion of the "first day" just long enough to whisper hello and buzz a few unclassified other words. Rooms and corridors were in commotion; the campus was like a bee farm, and it was only over in a remote corner, where a poplar and three hemlock trees formed a protective fortress, that the girls were safe from the first day's excitement. "I left Jane heading for the office and her head was down," announced Inez Wilson finally. "She didn't see me and her head being down, of course meant----" "Trouble," finished Katherine Winters. "When Jane Allen goes forward with her red head in advance there is sure to be a collision. What's up? Who knows?" "Come along and find out," promptly suggested Winifred Ayres. "Can't tell what we're missing. Jane may have lifted the roof when she raised her head." "Poor old roof," commented Ted Guthrie, dragging Janet Clarke down to earth again in her own attempt at rising. "I suppose we may as well fall in line," she continued good-naturedly. "Janie is still the idol of the mob; anyone can see that, even at this early date," and with a girl tugging on either side the stout one finally heaved ahoy! "'Tain't that," corrected Inez recklessly, "it's just because we are all too lazy to do the things we know Jane will do. I have been reading up on psychology, and you may now expect me to spoil every dream of childhood with a reason why," and Inez threw her head up prophetically. "Alluring prospects this year," groaned Velma Sigsbee. "What with Maud gone scientific, and Inez turned psychologist and Jane Allen traveling with her head down--well, all I can say is I still take two lumps of sugar in my tea." Velma was just that way, a pretty girl who loved sugar in spite of restrictions, high prices and the written word. A solitary figure was now outlined against the low cedars curled around Linger Lane. It was Jane at last. "Here she comes! Here she comes!" announced Nettie Brocton. "And look, girls! she isn't even whistling. Something is wrong with our sunny Jane." There was no mistake about it, something was wrong, for Jane Allen swung along the path, calling greetings to friends grouped in knots and colonies with an evident half heartedness foreign to her usual buoyant, cheerful personality. Espying her own contingent on the poplar slope she threw her arms out in a reckless, boyish sort of gesture to give force to the "Hello girls!" she called, but even that was much too mild for Jane. "We were in despair," began Judith, Jane's particular friend and school-long companion. "Janie dear, why the clouds? What's up? Let us know the worst, do. We are fortified now, whereas in an hour hence we may be weak from interviews with the new proctor. Sit down Jane. We just rose to go in search of you, and by my new watch I see there is still time before the hour to report. There," and the little spot cleared for Jane in the semi-circle was now covered with a pretty plaid skirt, "do tell us. You really look worried," "Not really?" contradicted the gray eyed Jane. "Worried, and on our very first lovely day? You surely wrong me!" she tried to get her arms around more girls than even finger tips might touch. "I'm simply bubbling with joy, as I should be. I was detained in the office longer than I wanted to stay, and you all know how mean it is to have to sit on one particular chair facing the desk while a lot of new girls ask a larger lot of foolish questions. Perhaps that made me a little cross, but do forgive me. I wouldn't spoil this initial hour for worlds. Please tell me everything in one breath. I am just dying to hear." No one answered. Ted Guthrie did gurgle a bit, and Velma Sigsbee threw a handful of leaves in Nettie Brocton's hair, but the pause was a riot. Why should Jane deceive them? Cross from delay in the busy office indeed, as if she would not have bolted out and left the whole room to the nervous new students! The girls looked from one to the other and finally Judith Stearns saved the situation by proposing that the juniors line up to help the seniors show newcomers about the grounds. On this day at least, class lines were forgotten at Wellington. "We were just waiting for you Janie," she declared adroitly, "and Mildred Manners has been whoo-hooing her lungs out across the campus. Come along girls, and see you don't waylay all the millionaires. I hear every garage in the village is bursting with classy cars, and the livery stable can't take another single boarder. Ted, you take Velma and Maud, and be careful not to divulge any club secrets; Janet, you tag along with Winifred and just gush to death over that timid little blonde who seems to have a whole bag full of hand made handkerchiefs for weeps. Jane, may I have the honor of your company?" Judith's black eyes looked into Jane's gray orbs that asked and answered so many questions. "Thanks, Judy," said Jane aside. "You're a dear. Let's go and do the honors." The next moment Wellington grounds rang with shouts and laughter, and the voice of Jane Allen defied the criticism her pretty face had so lately invited. "It's perfectly all right," she assured Judith, but the latter stuck her chin out in contradiction. "Can't fool me, Janie," she whispered between handshakes and greetings. "But I'll wait till the picnic winds up. Did you ever see so many new girls? Has some college burned down since last year?" "No, love, but our reputation has gone forth. This is a glorious day for Wellington and, Judy Stearns, it is going to be a glorious year for us. We are still juniors!" and Jane trailed off to find her place in the long line that was automatically forming around the great old elm. An extension course in special work kept Jane with her junior friends. "Wellington, dear Wellington!" rang out the then famous strain in hundreds of silvery voices. The college song was echoed from every hill into every grass lined hollow, and if the new girls doubted the spirit of comradeship they were to be favored with there, the consecration brought it home to them, like strong loving arms stretched out in the sea of school day mysteries. It was hours later, when the pattering of feet in the long corridors died down to a mere trail of sound, that Jane and Judith managed to pair off for a confidential chat. "You have got to tell me," demanded Judith. "As if I wouldn't," replied Jane. "You can't blame us for being curious, Janey. This afternoon was almost a failure, just because your eyes had a faraway look." "I'm so sorry, really, Jude. What an abominable temper I must have." "We all know better than that girlie." Judy might now have been charged with harboring a faraway look herself. "Just give me a little time," smiled Jane, "and if there's anything on my conscience I'll gladly transfer it to yours." The look in both gray and brown eyes was suddenly changed to intimacy. It was no longer faraway. CHAPTER II A SHADOW IN FORECAST I thought everyone had been supplied with the anti-tack hammer circular," remarked Jane, falling back where Judith's cushions ought to be. "Just hear that tattoo over in the wing. I'll bet it's Dozia." "She has a collection of movie queens and I doubt not that is the official coronation. Let us hope the new proctor is deaf on the left, Dozia's room leans that way," replied Judith. Then she tossed a couple of sweaters at Jane's head. "Put those under your ears dear," she ordered, "my pillows aren't unpacked yet and you may find Neddie's last year tacks in that burlap. There now, you look almost human. But the wistful whimper lingers. Jane, what has happened? You are simply smothered in the soft pedal. Tell your Judy all about it," she cooed. Feet stretched out straight in front of her and arms ending with finger tips laced over her black head, Judith looked longer than she really needed to measure up or down. Also, she looked too stiff to be comfortable, but the wooden pose was Judith's favorite. She rested that way, defying every known law for relaxation. Jane, au contraire, was curled up like a kitten, with one red sweater balled under her ruffled head and the other blue one tangled about her slim ankles. Both girls were tired--justly so, for the opening day at Wellington was ever a time of joyous activity, and the day just closed had roared and yelled itself into an evening still vibrant with bristling energy, tack hammers and movie pictures smashing rules and regulations, until the night gong sounded its irrevocable warning. Then roommates paired off even as did Jane and Judith. "Has anything happened to your baggage?" prompted Judith, as her companion failed to confide. Jane teased one small worsted tassel of Judith's blue sweater free from its tangle with her shoe lace, then she poked her dimpled chin forward saucily. "Can't ever have a secret, I suppose, Pally dear," she mocked the girl sliding slowly but surely out of her chair. "But I don't mind. Shows how truly you love me. There, you will feel better on the rug. I knew you were coming." Judith had landed. "I believe I'll sleep here," declared Judith, one end of the international carpet sample was bunched up under her ear. "Never was so tired on any other first or last day." The long legs shot out straight again. "And if your secret is really thrilling Janie, pray keep it for a more auspicious occasion. I am apt to snore when I should groan, or even sneeze when I should----" A choking spasm interrupted. "Don't tell me to take quinine, Janie. This is the end. I have had it since August and it is due to depart now, exactly now." A couple of sneezes added punctuation to this. "But get up from that floor instantly," ordered the girl on the divan. "Nothing worse for colds than rag carpet rugs. There's plenty of room up here out of drafts. Come, lovey. Do try to curl up some. I always fear you will break up in splinters when I see you go wooden." "Too comfy, Dinks, I can't move." "Sneeze then and I'll catch you. You have just got to get up off that chilly floor somehow. Besides the oil may be contagious. It still smells gooey." "Anything for peace. Give me a lift. There," Judith hung over the edge but Jane held on to the black head. "It's not so safe as the floor but I suppose it is more prophylactic. Now I will sleep. The girls seem to have died down. Strange"--yawn and groan--"how they do love to fuss up the rooms." "Temperment, my dear. Dozia wouldn't sleep a wink with her photograph gallery unhung. What do you think of the crowd this year? Spot any stars?" "A couple. Did you see that beauty with the shiny gold hair? The one who stood under the hemlock alone during the cheering? Isn't she tragically pretty?" "Exactly that. One couldn't help seeing her, although she struck me as being shy." "Scared to death, and so unconscious of her charms. There Janie, my brain is sound asleep this moment. If I say real words they must be coming from another world. This is gone." Judith ducked deeper into the pillowless couch. She plainly was sleepy. "Why Judith Stearns," called Jane severely, "you are giving me as much trouble as a baby. Don't you dare fall asleep. We have got to make beds yet. That comes of your notion not to have ready-to-wear beds in our suite. And you can just see how much fun it is to drag things out on tired nights." Jane sprang up from the divan and tried to yank the sleepy girl after her. "Come on, Pally," she implored. "I'll do most all the fixing, only I really demur at the disrobing. You know my hatred for buttons and fastenings. I wouldn't leave one snap to meet its partner. Come on Judy," the feet were again on the rug, "we will be simply dead in the morning, and we have got to be very much alive. We do miss the Weatherbee. I don't see why we let her go. Dear, prim, prompt Weatherbee! Now we know we loved her. Her successor is too young to be motherly." "Jane Allen, you're a pest," groaned Judith. "I can't hear a thing but words, and I suppose you are calling me names. Who's this guy Bed, I heard you mention? Lead me to her," and whether the collapse was assumed or real Judith rolled over twice and once more stretched out on the long runner at Jane's feet. "Have it your own way. Stay there if you insist and sneeze your head off, but I'm going to bed," decided Jane helplessly. "That's the girl. Her name is Bed. I want to meet her. Heard so much about her. Jane dear introduce me, there's a dar--link," Judith muttered. "Someone is coming and I just hope it is Prexy or Proxy. I'll open the door wide as I can," declared the outraged Jane. She stepped over the long girl but even the tap on the door did not disturb Judith. "It's I--are you up, Jane?" The voice came as the tap subsided. "Yes Dozia. Come along in. I can't get Judy to bed. Just look at her!" "Poor child," commiserated Dozia, surveying the figure on the floor very much as a policeman looks upon an ambulance case. "We ought to help her. Is the day bed translated?" "Yes, I got it ready. But Judy won't undress," Jane protested. "Why need she? If I ever slept like that I would murder a disturber. Just get hold of that rug Janie, and we'll dump her into bed." Judith was actually sleeping when the two compassionate friends picked up the rug, hammock fashion, and proceeded to "dump her into bed." She never moved voluntarily. Judith Stearns knew a good thing when it came her way, and what could be better than this? "She'll ruin her skirt," suggested Jane as they drew the rug out from under the blue accordion pleats. "What's a mere skirt compared with that?" Dozia stood aside to admire the unconscious Judy, but striking a statuesque pose she caught the critical eye of Jane and was rewarded with a most complimentary smile. "Where did you get that wonderful robe, Dozia?" Jane asked. "You simply look like--like some notable personage in those soft folds and with your hair down. What a pity we must make ourselves ugly to be conventional." "Ain't it now," mocked Dozia, abusing language to make comedy. She swung the velveteen folds about her and spun around to wind them tighter. "Like this? Do I resemble a movie queen? That's what brought me, Janie. This nocturnal visit is consequent upon a disaster. My hammer, the one I put my queens up with, fell through the mirror. Silly little hammer. You know how this house staff feels about breaking looking-glasses." "Yes, spoils the set of course. You are not insinuating anyone here might be superstitious? I am awfully sorry you broke the mirror. How did it happen?" "Sissh!" Dozia sibilated, pointing to Judith who had actually turned over. "Don't wake her, this really is a secret. Girlie," dragging Jane down into a chair, "have you noticed that ugly, fat, common country girl, with the wire hair and gimlet eyes? Well, she came in, pushed her way in really, and squatted down plumb in my best Sheraton chair. The size of her!" (This with seething indignation.) "I was so provoked--why, Jane, what is the matter? You are frightened or nervous or something. Have you seen a ghost anywhere?" broke off Dozia. "Oh no, but I am so tired," Jane edged away from the suspector. "After all I do believe Judy is sensible, see her slumber." "Jane Allen, you are a fraud," pronounced the girl in the velveteen robe. "You are smothering some mystery and I must have stepped on the spring," guessed the inquisitive caller. "Was it the tack hammer or the spindle chair or the fat girl? Not she, you have had no chance to do uplift work yet. Land knows that farmer will need your greatest skill, but dear, don't waste it on her. She's incurable." "Bad as all that?" asked Jane colorlessly. "But what happened? You did not try to hit her with the hammer I hope?" "I didn't try to hit her, I did hit her. It fell accidentally on her fat head and she tossed it through the mirror. Now what can a girl do in a case like that?" The haunted look, so foreign to the face of Jane, shaped itself again. "Is she--did you hurt her?" "I hope so," dared Dozia. "It would be a charity to send her home. Her name is Shirley Duncan and she's from some country town. But Jane, if she gets really horrid, I mean more horrid than she is now, I want you to stand by me. That's what I came for." "All right Dozia," said Jane, "but I hope it won't have to go as far as that." "Me too," responded the carefree Dozia. "But there's no telling what Shirley may do." For some moments after Dozia glided out Jane stood there, her gray eyes almost misty. "Of all the tragedies!" she was thinking. Then with a jerk she pulled herself up. "But I guess I can handle it," she declared finally, and when she succeeded in rousing Judith no one would have suspected anything new amiss. Jane Allen might have worries but they could not dominate her. Sunny Jane, with sunny hair and gray eyes, was no mope. It would take fight to conquer this new condition, she realized, but Jane could fight, and her dreams on this first night back in college were strangely confused with school-day battles. More than once she awoke with a start, as if some danger were impending, and a sense of uneasiness possessed her. Each time it seemed more difficult to fall back into slumber, and all this was new, indeed, to happy Jane. "Daddy!" she murmured. "It's because of daddy's----" She was finally sound asleep. CHAPTER III THE MISFIT FRESHMAN Yes, they were back in college and work was waiting. This thought invaded confused brains and stood out like a corporal of the guard, shouting orders into lazy ears on Wellington campus next morning. Jane Allen threw first one slipper and then another at Judith Stearns' bed across the room from her own. But still Judith's hand ignored the hair brush on the chair at her elbow. "Judy," called Jane, "the warning bell has warned. Turn down the corner on that dream and wake up." Each word of this climbed a note in tone until the last was almost a shout. Then Judith's hand moved to Jane's slipper on her own (Judith's) forget-me-nots, the little floral pieces that adorned a very dainty garment with the embroidery on Judith's chest--arms and neck ignored in the pattern. "What say?" she muttered sleepily. "Up," answered Jane. "Ever hear that little word before?" "Yep, pony riding," drawled Judith. "Up, up, one, two, three, go!" and at this Judith sprang up with such vigor and volume (in point of scope) that she sprang over the neighboring bed and swooped down on Jane's hat box! Her black hair now fell fearlessly over the embroidered forget-me-nots, and her bare feet shot in their usual skating strike. "Good thing that hat box is the new kind," commented Jane, "but even at that it will hardly serve as a divan. Still, I am glad you are up. Do you know where you are, Judy Stearns? And what you are expected to do today?" "All of those things and additional horrors are seething through my poor brain," moaned Judith, "but a moment ago I was having a fast set of tennis with adorable Jack St. John--Sanzie they call him. Have I told you about him, Jane darling?" Judith gathered herself and her feet up from the black enameled box and glided over to her own corner. "No, Judy, I do not recall Sanzie," replied Jane, who was already armed with soap and towel for the lavatory. "But keep the story. I shouldn't like to get interested in boy tennis just now. We must forget--" proclaimed Jane in tones so dramatic a poet calendar on the wall trembled in the vocal waves. "Forget! forget----" and Jane was outside the door with a sweeping wave of her big fuzzy towel and a rather alarming thrust of her fist full of soap. "Ye-eah," groaned Judith, "forget is the word, Sanzie and tennis." She glanced at the tiny clock on a shelf of the bracket type. It was Jane's idea the clock should not be cluttered with surroundings. "Gee-whiz! It is late, and this the first day. Glad the others on this corridor are all nice and punctual." In bathrobe and slippers Judith soon followed Jane down the long hall. Neither dallied long in the plunge, for Judith was wide awake now, and presently, after dressing and patting herself and belongings into place, she confronted Jane with this: "I heard Dozia Dalton last night. And I know there will be trouble about the farmer girl. Jane, tell me, is she the scholarship?" "Yes," almost gasped Jane the irreproachable. "And to think that I, in any way, should be responsible for bringing her to college!" "But you are not, Janie dear," soothed Judith. "That your father should give this college a scholarship each year is a noble thing, and how can you tell who may win it? That girl is--well, a bit raw," she ground her mouth around the word, "but we have nothing to do with that. She doesn't belong among the juniors, and just leave it to little Judy to steer her off. Don't go trying any uplift; just cut her dead and watch her wilt. From the ashes there may arise a nice little green thing, even if it is of the common garden variety of onion. Now Jane, you have got to do exactly that. Keep Shirley Duncan on her own grounds. Shoo her out of junior haunts." "You are right, Judy. I have been tortured with the idea that I would have to play fairy godmother to that--that 'hoodlum.' Honestly, did you ever see so ordinary a girl in Wellington?" "Never. But then she may be a genius. I have read such descriptions of them. There's the first breakfast bell. Smile now and disappoint the horde. They think you have been crossed in love and the old maid depression has settled upon you. You acted that way yesterday," teasingly. Jane's laugh pealed out at this. It was like ragging a down scale, that rippling crescendo, and Judith needed no other assurance of her friend's good humor. But the day's tasks left little time for trifles. College work is serious and exacting, each day's programme being carefully and even scientifically marked out to make the round year's schedule complete. Jane and Judith, juniors, with a reputation made in their previous years, "buckled" down to every period with that intelligence and determination for which both had been credited. Everything was so delightful and the autumn air so full of promise! Jane could not find a true reason for the haunting fear that seemed to follow her in the person of that crude country girl, who somehow had won the Alien scholarship. It was in free time late the next afternoon that this fear took definite shape. Jane and her contingent were leaving the study hall when Shirley Duncan brushed up through their arm linked line. She was garbed in a baronet satin skirt of daring hue with an overblouse of variegated georgette. This as a school frock! At first glance Jane almost recoiled, then the possibility of delayed baggage suggested itself and softened her frown. "Don't notice her," whispered faithful Judith. Jane's glance just answered when the unpopular freshman broke through the line, grasped Jane's hand and deliberately forced a folded slip of paper into it. Then, with a mocking smile that ran into an audible sneer, she turned and sped away. Her awkward gait and frank romping so close to Wellington Hall brought questioning glances from the line of juniors. "What's that, Jane Allen?" asked Janet Clarke good-naturedly. "I hope you are not doing uplift for anything like that this year?" "The merry little mountain maid," mocked Inez Wilson, doing a few skips and a couple of jumps in demonstration. "How on earth did she ever make Wellington?" demanded the aristocratic Nettie Brocton, disapproval spoiling her leaky dimples. "Girls, you are horrid!" declared Judith to the rescue. "You all know the freaks love Jane. It's her angel face," and Judith playfully stroked the cheek into which streaks of bright pink threatened admission of guilt--that Jane really knew the uncouth country girl. "She's a stranger to me," said Jane truthfully, "but in spite of that I must respect her confidence." The crumpled note was thereat securely tucked into the pocket of Jane's blouse. Winifred Ayres tittered outright, but the advent of Dozia Dalton furnished a welcome interruption. "Girls," she panted, "what ever do you think? Dol Vincez, our dangerous adversary of last year, runs the beauty shop beyond our gate! Can you comprehend the audacity?" "We can when you say Dolorez," replied Jane. "Do you actually mean to say she has set up the College Beauty Shop at our very door?" "She has!" declared the excited Dozia. "Who would dare trust a live and workable phiz to that--traitor?" "Not I," said Velma Sigsbee. "Nor I," from Maud Leslie. "My face must serve me this term," added Inez Wilson, twisting her features to make sure they worked well. "All the same," demurred Judith, "the temptation is not to be laughed at. Just imagine real dimples speared in," with a finger poked in Maud Leslie's cheek, "and long silky lashes tangles in one's violet gaze----" This was too much even for staid juniors and the race that followed almost justified Shirley's much criticised romp. With this difference: Wellington Hall was now out of the shadows made by the swaying stream of laughing students darting in and out of the autumn sunshine that lay like stripes of panne velvet on the sward, but Shirley's run had begun at the very steps. Recreation had its limits and that day was counted lost into which a race over the pleasure grounds had not been crowded. It might be for tennis, or even baseball, or yet to the lake, but a run was inevitable. And so they ran. CHAPTER IV THRILLING NEWS Did you read your note, Dinksy?" Judith asked Jane, using the particular pet name adopted because of its very remote distance from the original. "You know I did, Pally." This was from Pal, of course. "A bomb threat?" "Not quite." Jane's hair was rebellious this morning and just now received a real cuffing at its owner's hands. "How perfectly peachy you would look bobbed, Dinksy. That color and those smooth silky curls! How the angels must have loved you. Know this line? "'Methinks some cherub holds thee fair, For kissing down thy sunny hair I find his ringlets tangled there!'" "You would," interrupted Jane sacrilegiously. "More than his ringlets tangled here this morning," with a final jab of the strongest variety of golden bone hair-pin. "Aunt Mary always said my mood (she meant temper) affected my hair. And I am sure she was always right about it." "Well, you don't have to tell me about the note if you don't want to, Janie," pouted Judith. "But my idea is, you need counsel and I am as ever the expert." "Fair Portia, thou shalt be my counsel ever. I had no thought of hiding the little note," insisted Jane, "but it is horribly disappointing. Wait until I rescue it from the basket. There's always a charm about the original." "Don't bother, please, Jane," begged Judith. "We are almost late and I hope for a set of tennis before class. I need it every day to keep off the heartbreak. Darlink Sanzie," she sniffled. "To think he will nary again bat a ball in my black eye." "Why never again? There are other vacations." "But no more Jacks like Sanzie. He is unique and has opened a law office by now. Can't you see his stenographer kicking his shapely shins as he dictates? They always do that in the movies, and Sanzie is so up to date, even as to shins. Now, Janie dear, let's along. En route you may tell me about the bomb threat. The corridors are clear." "She simply wants a chance to talk to me, that's all----" "But she can't have it," declared Judith. "As your counsel I forbid it. Just give that girl a chance and she will bind you over, body and soul; refined blackmail, you know. Don't you dare answer that note until I dictate the reply," Judith swung her arm around Jane's waist in the most all-embracing manner. "Please, Dinksy," she almost whispered, "wait until we are free this afternoon." Thus they separated; Judith for her tennis and Jane for a turn on Bowling Green. But Jane had a deeper problem to solve than even her chum suspected. There was the broken mirror in Dozia's room and the fact that Dozia had actually hit Shirley on the head with a hammer! "A pretty record that--and made on the first night in college," Jane reflected. Undoubtedly the freshman's demand that Jane "see her at once" had to do with the outrage. And the interview would be granted, of course, that very afternoon unless Judith interfered. Incidentally Judith was turning the situation over in her own good- natured mind. "I would just like to see that gawk get Jane wound up in her miseries," she told herself, while Janet Clarke hunted for stray tennis balls in the hedge. "Jane is such a dear with sympathy that this girl's very crimes would appeal to her--in compassion. No-sir- ree!" She volleyed a vicious ball--"Jane will not see the impossible Shirley alone just yet." Meanwhile news of Dolorez Vincez's Beauty Shop had spread over the college like a holiday notice. Dolorez was the South American girl who had been expelled from Wellington the previous year because of irregularities in many things but particularly in basket ball games. As told in the book, "Jane Allen: Center," this young lady was really a teacher of athletics, and had been posing as an amateur. Being forced to leave college after opening a prohibited beauty shop she vowed vengeance, and many of the students now felt the Beauty Parlor, opened at the very gates of Wellington and widely advertised, was about to assume the dangers of a golden spider web. The girls were fairly quivering with excitement, when Dozia Dalton, herald of the sensation, condescended to tell everybody all she knew about the whole thing. Velma Sigsbee would insist upon interrupting with silly questions, such as the price of a bob or the possible pain of operating for double dimples, but eventually Dozia told the story while Ted Guthrie held Velma's hand in a compelling grip. It was over on the long low bench by the ball field where practice should have been kicking up a dust. But Dol's Beauty Parlor outrage was too delectable to forego even for a final ball game, "It's perfectly darling," confided the idolized Dozia (any girl with that story on her person would be idolized although Dozia was individually popular). "The place, I mean. It's fitted up----" "Were--you in?" gasped Winifred Ayres. "No, of course I was not in," disdained Dozia. "No one who ever knew the trickery of Dolorez Vincez would enter that place." "Why?" asked the innocent Nettie Brocton. "Would she really do something dreadful----" "She would, really," declared Jane, her tone not easy to interpret. "She could turn your hair a bright red like mine by mere chemical action of her ventilating system." "Really!" implored the dimply girl. "Pos-i-tive-ly!" declared Jane. "But don't attempt it dear. She would send your dad an awful bill for doing a stunt like that. Think of the price of hair like mine!" That suggestion brought disaster to Jane, for Ted Guthrie swayed at the very end of the bench and the whole line almost went over backwards. It was in Ted's attempt to punish Jane for her vanity that the sudden sweep, like a current in physics, jerked feet from the ground and upset balance generally. Some seconds elapsed (and each was precious) before things again settled down, including Velma's crochet balls, Janet's book, pad, and pencil, Dozia's small bottle of salted peanuts as well as other sundries and supplies. "Please finish the yarn," implored Nettie Brocton. "Do tell us, Dozia, how the place is fitted up." "First tell us, please," insisted judicial Judith, "how do you know how it is fitted up? Does our plumber plumb there?" During all this nonsense Jane cast many a furtive glance along Linger Lane, expecting the obnoxious Shirley to loom up large and lanky by the way, but as yet she had not darkened the shadowy path. If Jane could run off to the Rockery, that landmark between freshman and later college campus lines, there to meet and have done with the demands of her erstwhile tormentor. But no, Judith was openly demanding Jane's concentration on the bench, and every point made by Dozia in her tale of the beauty shop Judith flung at Jane in direct challenge for stricter attention. She was not going to escape if Judith Stearns knew it, and she surmised the intention. It had finally been told to tingling ears that the poisoned beauty shop, as Winifred Ayres, the writer, had already dubbed the place, was done in wonderful mirrors, and shiny faucets, windy wizzing hair fans and electric permanent wavers and curlers; and when the full description had been given, more girls than one sighed, groaned and grumbled. "To think it has to be taboo," spoke Ted Guthrie. "Dol was always a wizard, and now thus equipped she might have a lovely way of fanning me thin." "And fattening me nice and fluffy with the same fan," sighed Winifred. "My freckles might float away like powder from the butterfly's wings," with a weird fluttering of Dozia's long arms. "But hair!" exclaimed Judith. "Think of turning me into a golden blonde with eyes like blue-bells under dewiness----" "It cannot be! It cannot be!" moaned Dozia. "Instead we must raid the place and banish the traitor. How about that for stunt night with the sophs?" "Wonderful!" sang out Juliette De Puy. She had listened and waited with a certain reserve for which this capable Juliette was famous, but now that the story was told she deigned to add that one word "wonderful." Everyone looked at her suddenly. "And have you tell the sophs," blurted out Nettie Brocton. "Dozia Dalton you have spoiled it all. Didn't you see we had company?" "Never noticed the lovely Juliette. Never mind Julie, you may tell the crowd all you've heard," condescended the redoubtable Dozia. "We enjoyed having you and it is perfectly all right." "Thanks. Come over to our camp some night and I'll do as much for you. I just came in this afternoon, you know, to sub on the ball team." "Instead of which you subbed on the gossip club," finished Jane, jumping up. "I've got to go back to my room. Don't let me hurry anyone," she said indifferently. Then, just as a strange figure turned from the big boxwood bumper into the lane, Jane escaped. She hurried to meet Shirley Duncan. CHAPTER V THREATS AND DEFIANCE The girl approaching was not so easy to appraise as her unusual costume proclaimed her to be. Jane realized this; country girls are apt to make such mistakes, and even dinner gown tags on school day togs would hardly be proof positive of inferiority, Jane reflected. Shirley Duncan swung along with a careless stride, but even the pose might cover embarrassment. Jane sent a welcome smile out to meet her and the stranger jerked her head rather saucily in recognition. "Have I kept you waiting?" asked Jane in the best of humor. "Well, rather," replied the freshman, "but I knew better than to break in on that crowd," with an arm sweep toward the ball field. "Can we go up to your room for a few minutes?" Jane thought quickly. To go to her room might mean an interruption from Judith; also it might mean the danger from an undisciplined voice. "I have been indoors so much today," she replied, "and our lovely days are flying so, suppose we go over to the rose summer house? We won't be interrupted there and we will both have the benefit of a longer time out of doors. I suppose you feel it, freshmen usually do." They were moving toward the rustic house that looked rather desolate in its coat of faded rose leaves. "Oh, freshmen feel everything, I suppose," replied the other, "but I can't see why we should be openly abused for all that. I heard there was no more hazing allowed in colleges?" "We have never hazed at Wellington," Jane said rather indignantly, "and Miss--Miss Duncan, I am sure no one will ever attempt the least abuse even in a spirit of fun at this college." "They won't, eh?" type broke out in that challenge. "Well, that is just what I wanted to see you about. I suppose I'm not good enough to go to your rooms." Lip curled, nostrils quivered and head jerked up impertinently with that accusation. "Why, Miss Duncan--" floundered Jane. "Why don't you call me Shirley? Isn't that a swell enough name?" interrupted the other. Jane dropped down on the summer house seat with a thud. Here was a problem surely. Antagonism fairly blazed in the girl's dark eyes. Yet she was a stranger--actually Jane's guest. "Shirley is a very sweet name and I have always loved it," replied Jane frankly. "But my dear young lady, we must not quarrel. We shall never get acquainted that way." "Oh no, the juniors may do all the quarreling. We freshies must just turn the other cheek of course. But I suppose you know that long lanky friend of yours, they call some foolish name like Doses, hit me on the head with her hammer the other night?" "You mean Dozia Dalton--yes, she told me her hammer slipped--" "Slipped indeed!" more scorn and lip curling. "She deliberately dropped it on my head--" "And you threw it at the mirror," broke out Jane, weary of acting the angel without gaining the slightest return from this rude girl. "Yes, I broke it and I'm glad of it! Now what are you going to do about it?" Two hands not really pretty, dug deep into the satin skirt pockets, and Shirley Duncan towered over Jane Allen defiantly. "What am I going to do about it?" repeated Jane. But the irony was lost on her companion. "You did not ask to see me just to be offensive?" parried Jane. "No indeed, I wanted to remind you I am in this college because your father gave a scholarship, and I suppose that would mean you might be nice to me at least." "I'm sure I want to be," Jane quickly toned down. "But no girl can make friends with another when she insists on quarreling. I am willing to pay for the broken mirror--" "You don't need to trouble yourself; if it is to be paid for I'll do it myself. My folks wouldn't let me--sponge on anybody." "Sponge," repeated Jane, frowning with something like disgust. "Please don't use such horrible slang." "Oh my! I suppose a scholarship girl must be a mouse or a kitten. Well, when I took it I understood no one in Wellington was to know about it and that the scholarship girl had equal rights with every other girl." "So she has and no one here does know who wins the scholarship." Somehow Jane stumbled over the word. It was fraught with terror in the hands of this impossible creature. "Well, I don't believe it" (no regard for Jane's veracity), "but I'll hold on awhile and see." (Condescending, thought Jane.) "My folks always wanted me to go to college and I just came to satisfy them. I don't give a snap for all the high brow stuff and I might as well tell you I am nearly dead with homesickness." (She didn't look it, Jane observed.) "But I'm no quitter, so I intend to stick. Now let's get back to the girl who hit me. Can you make her apologize?" "No," said Jane flatly, "and what's more I have no intention of trying to. You brought trouble on yourself by going into Dozia's room without being invited. You should know that the younger girls, the freshmen, are not supposed to take such privileges. Then when you annoyed my friend" (Jane almost kissed the word) "she told you outright she was busy and did not want to be bothered. Next thing, you deliberately sat under her stepladder. Do you like to get in the open path of tack hammers?" "Love to," sneered Shirley. "And I'm crazy about playing ball with them when mirrors are up for back stops. All right, go ahead, as far as you like. I believe now what I heard about the Jane Alien crowd. A lot of goody goodies, too stuck up to bother with country girls." Jane jumped from her seat and gasped at an interruption but did not succeed in sustaining it. "But I've got friends around here who know the ropes. They are not freshies either, so don't bother about me, Miss Allen. I'll see about the looking-glass and the girl who hit me with her hammer." Jane let her go, was actually glad to see the last of the satin skirt as it swished out into the winding path, nor did she immediately follow it. Instead she sat there, tearing little red rose hips from the tenacious vines and tossing them away regardless of their artistic value as decorative winter berries. "Tragic," she muttered, "positively tragic. And that is what my darling dad wasted a perfectly good scholarship on." Thoughts of "dad" mercifully intervened and saved the girl's temper further violence. "But what puzzles me is how that girl ever won the scholarship?" Jane silently questioned, and in that unspoken sentence she unconsciously shaped the key to fit the mystery. How did this girl win the scholarship? For some moments longer Jane sat there. She went over again the incident of Dozia's tack hammer. That she could depend absolutely on Dozia, and knew this strange girl had done more than sit in the path of the showering tack hammer was irrefutable. "Dozia was a little bit reckless of course," admitted the mentor, "and she did seem to coddle the fact that her hammer fell on Shirley's head. I recall she even said she was glad it hit her and hoped the blow would send the freshie home to her 'maw.'" Jane wanted to laugh but she refrained. There was a strange proctor in office this year to be considered. If dear old Miss Weatherbee were still in charge it might be much easier to explain the accident. "And that girl defied me with a threat of friends! She has friends who are not in the freshman ranks? I remember she said that. Who can they be? My enemies naturally," decided Jane. How these enemies would fill that foolish head with nonsense, and how far they might urge her on to mischief if not to actual danger, Jane Allen did not venture to estimate. "But Dozia tried first shot to send her home to her 'maw!'" The humor of the situation now struck Jane like a blow on the funny bone, and she burst out laughing in the very face of the thorny rose bush. "After all it is too delicious!" she told herself. "And even if she is my dad's scholarship girl there's a heap of fun in the ridiculous situation. I'll find Judy and tell her the whole thing. Too good to keep; too funny to spoil," and the blue serge skirt that fanned the boxwood a moment later never swished a swish. Jane did not give it tune to do so. CHAPTER VI JANE AND JUDITH Oh, do tell me, Janie. I was watching behind the big elm the whole time. Couldn't hear a word of course, but I could have seen any attempt at violence. That girl, I tell you, is no ordinary 'critter.' I fully expected she would draw something from that broad satin belt. But do tell? What was it all about?" "Thank you for the chance, Judy, I was just wondering when you would take breath. It is funny--so funny I am laughing all over," and the gray eyes sent out sparks of mirth, as a senior might have put it. "Isn't it!" howled Judith, pegging a pillow at Jane's head to keep the fun a-going or the "pot a-boiling" as you will. "I don't know where to begin Judy. At first I was sort of awe- stricken. Considering the handicaps poor Shirley has loaded herself up with----" "Including the name. Have you analyzed that?" "Yes, love, I have. Some maiden aunt with a paper covered library must have inflicted her with that. It doesn't suit at all, although she seems very proud of it." "And no chance of her growing into it either. Like a chauffeur named Claude or Clarence. Her last name now would be much snappier for her. Duncan makes a topping Dunny," suggested Judith. "But the girl would never believe that," sighed Jane. "She asked me to call her Shirley and I tried to; now, Judith, listen. Here are a few difficult facts. Shirley Duncan is bound to fight. She has been brought up in the school of affectionate antagonism, and with her it is a case of getting the best of everyone and everything. I did not say getting the better, I mean best." "I savvy, as our old friend cow-boy Pedro would say. Have you heard from home lately, Dinks?" "Yes, Judith. All well and lonely. But please concentrate. This matter is serious. Shirley threatened me with friends--says she has friends here who are not freshies. Can you guess who they may be?" "Never saw a girl speak to her a second time unless she, Shirley, stepped on the other's toes or knocked her hat off. Then the conversation was naturally brief and snappy. It happened to Mabel." "I can't imagine whom she means, but they are somewhere ready to pounce on us, so let us beware. Next point is: she seems to have money: offered to pay for the broken mirror. In fact she sort of lorded it over me." "Dozia should strike for a new vanity dresser. One with three side glasses big enough to reflect her wonderful, long flowing locks. A rare chance for Dozia." "But how could a girl coming in on scholarship have money to squander?" reflected Jane. "That maiden aunt with the paper covered novels would love good looking-glasses. It might be the salvation of this Shirley girl, if she did have access to a true mirror." Judith snapped the top on her fountain pen and slammed shut her note-book. Indifferent work was worse than none, she seemed to have decided. "Had you finished your Lat? Isn't it awful to have to work off a condition? Please don't let me bother you ever, Jude, when you have that task on hand," said Jane seriously. "I have and it is, if you kept your two questions properly tabulated. You see I am straining for mental stuff. I want to improve the old condition of forgetfulness. That was what knocked friend Virgil, or was it Cicero? I loved the stories and forgot the period. But I am finished for this evening, dear, and you know we have some initiation stunts to take part in. I am glad they are so simple. It seems to me each year the nonsense gets more rational." "It really does, and I think, as you do, that shows progress. We can all enjoy better fun than that of afflicting the innocent. Of course we still have to have some ceremony or the young 'uns wouldn't think they were really in college. I just wonder how it will strike our rebel Shirley?" "That interests me too, Dinksy. Let's go and see. We have some lovely little babes this year. That ivory blonde, the timid one with a most atrocious name, Sarah Something, I just love her, don't you?" "Sarah Howland, I saw Inez marking her card. Yes, she is sweet in spite of her name. Rather a pity sponsors cannot show discrimination. Here is your sweater. Better take it; the wind whistles. I'll pull my riding cap down as a disguise. It takes in most of this-wig," Jane was struggling to stuff her bright tresses into the pocket of her black velvet jockey cap. The effect towered like a real English derby and Judith danced in delight. "I'll try that with my tarn," she declared. "One's hair is always the surest give-away. Here are the masks--hanging neatly on the nail of last year's tenants. I call that thoughtful." Mysterious calls and whistles were now creeping in under doorways and through transoms. The sophs were ready to initiate the frightened little freshmen. Tales of "they will do this and they won't do that" had little effect on the individual candidate, but served to keep up the collective nerve by way of distraction. "If they hold us under the pump I'll be glad of it," sang out Shirley the Rebel. "Haven't had a decent drink of water since I left home, and I suppose the pump has a spring." "And it's warm enough to enjoy a dip in the lake if they abduct us in canoes," added Jessie Whitely. "I'm almost suffocated in this big thing," with an impatient jerk at the criminal's black robe. "Say your prayers, say your prayers!" chanted another of the group, seconded by moans and groans. They were waiting like prisoners jammed into the gym lobby, and a guard of sophs patrolled the entrance. Noticeable in the assemblage was little Sarah Howland-noticeable because she sat on a window sill all alone and dangled her feet contentedly. She actually appeared to be enjoying the prospect of being "roughed." Shirley was noisy as usual, and for once her raillery seemed appropriate. The more timid girls had taken shelter about her, as if expecting she would easily and even gaily vanquish the attacking foe. Friends had the strong girl now if never before, and she fairly expanded under the compliment. She would show the sophs what country training did for a girl in the way of self-protection, and a few stories of real or fancied battles at High School (no town mentioned) also served to thrill her audience until Shirley came near being popular for the once. "Of course we shall have to do foolish things," mused Eleanor Meed, "but I won't mind as long as I am not forced to eat something I hate or drink vinegar--" "Don't worry on that score," spoke up Marie Coeyman. "Nothing like that is apt to be attempted. I heard some of the sophs say--" "Because they knew you were listening," discerned another. "Don't take any stock in what you overheard. They are apt to do directly contrary to loudly whispered plans." "But whatever it is to be, I do wish they would get at it and let's have it over," growled Shirley. "It's no fun being cooped up here--" "Hush, don't let the guards hear you complaining," cautioned Marie. "It's like a trial, you get more for contempt of court if you don't accept your sentence gracefully." The shuffling of many feet along the stone walk put an end to further speculation. "Here they come! Here they come!" went a tremor through the crowd of candidates, and when the doors were thrown open a masked committee confronted them. Orders, all kinds and volumes of them, poured in quickly as tag numbers could be singled out. Some were taken in little groups of four "outside to cool off." Others were commanded to hop around in circles, while still more were given such individual commands as seemed most antagonistic to their particular propensities. Shirley was still unmolested. She stood bravely awaiting her turn, now and then flinging out a wild arm to make sure its muscles were in good shape for the fray. Finally someone (we hope it was not Judith) called her number-- sixty-eight, and she sprang to the chalk line with what is usually termed alacrity, but it really sounded much more ominous. "Does your head hurt?" asked the voice, and Shirley nodded. She thought that might be safest. "What hit you?" went on the prosecutor. "A hammer!" responded Shirley. "A nice hard tack hammer?" came the query again. "Lovely," spoke the bewildered girl. "What did you do with it?" asked the inquisitor. There was no response. The Rebel was getting indignant. "Quick," demanded a second member "of the firing squad." "I threw it away," faltered sixty-eight. "What did it hit?" "A looking-glass." This reply came quickly enough. "And the glass smashed?" "Yes--" "Yes, madam," prompted a guard. "Yes, madam," repeated Shirley with a quiver. "For which show of temper you are to dust that room every day for a full week, and you may come along now and get your first lesson." Shirley straightened up defiantly. "Go on! Go on!" begged the little freshman recognized as the pretty Sarah Howland. "Hurry or they will make it worse." The leader marched out and Shirley followed. Those who had heard the sentence realized the misery it inflicted that the strongest girl should be denied the pump, the lake, tree climbing and even boxing possible or gym work, for a mean little contemptible stunt like dusting Dozia's room! Arrived at the room someone stuck something on Shirley's nose. She attempted to brush it off but was warned not to do so. Presently she realized it was a feather, and it seemed to stick in glue on the very point of her nose! We will spare the reader an account of Shirley's agony as she vainly tried to "dust" with that feather on her nose. It was too humiliating, but a freshman should not have shown such temper, and there was still the cracked mirror to accuse her! Every piece of furniture in the room had to be "dusted," that is it was brushed with the evil feather, which somehow or other did stay on the candidate's nose; and if the spectators clapped and laughed Shirley could scarcely blame them, for Dozia Dalton had a foolish lot of truck to be dusted. More than once she halted, but was promptly prodded on until finally the humiliating task had been accomplished. "Good girl!" called out a voice from behind a mask and Judith quickly stepped up to take off the duster. Juniors favor the freshman in spite of such conditions. "O--uch!" protested the culprit. "It is hard!" "Wait a minute!" cautioned Jane's voice. "This will remove it. Sit down, sixty-eight." The unhappy candidate fell into a chair, while someone applied the alcohol cloth and presently the tiny feather fell with its bit of sticky felt into the palm awaiting to catch it. "Keep your hands down," insisted someone, for Shirley never knew before the glory of a free nose and she just wanted to pet it a little. But her tormentors intended to fix up any damage they might have inadvertently perpetrated on the feature, and what coating didn't come off with the alcohol was quickly covered with Dozia's powder, until the freshman was made to look even better than nature had intended she should. This fixing up was almost as hateful to Shirley as was the abominable dusting, but she kept her temper-the lesson seemed profitable already. Jane was arranging the disordered hair, and as she attempted to stroke it with a wet brush Shirley put up a detaining hand. "Please don't wet it," she begged in a whisper, and Jane stopped short with her brush raised for action. "Not wet it?" she thought quickly. "That must mean treatment, and treatment meant the forbidden beauty shop!" This girl had been visiting that shop. More danger ahead, decided Jane, as she lay down the brush and proceeded to finish the dressing dry. Judith had overheard the request and pinched Jane's arm to admit it, but a loud demand for the freshman from the group rounding up candidates saved further delay and when Shirley left Dozia's room the latter patted her affectionately. "Don't worry, dear," said Dozia, "I'll be careful not to raise too much dust next week." But her sentence was not the most serious thing in prospect for the rebel Shirley Duncan. Not even the good times prepared for the candidates served to allay the dread she struggled against, and only her natural delight in the rollicking fun, and the really fine spread served them by the juniors, helped bring the girl back to a happy frame of mind. Woe unto the freshie who shows ill will at an initiation! She may be obliged to walk in the gutter for the full first half year, or wear a baby blue ribbon under her chin! But Shirley had heeded the warnings. CHAPTER VII A QUEER MIX-UP "Jane, the girls are frightened to death. Can you imagine ghost stories having that effect in this staid, solid, absolutely reliable old college?" asked Maud Leslie. "It is absurd," admitted Jane, "but Maudie, all students are not scientifically inclined as you are. What about the ghost? Who is he and who saw him?" "He is the usually uncanny weird noise, nothing even original about him. One would expect more of a college ghost. And just as trite and commonplace is the fact that these nocturnal howls come at safe hours when we cannot be expected to go through a fire or panic drill. I call the whole thing disgusting." "So do I," assented Jane. "But don't worry, Maud. If there is one line of action I like better than another it is that of laying ghosts. Whizz, whack, bang! I'll make the bones rattle if they come my way." Jane was punching a bag in the gym when Maud unfolded the story of the ghost scare. It was not really news, for Wellington had been buzzing the spirit's ears for days and not until some of the younger students appealed to the older girls did Jane and other juniors give heed to the fear epidemic. "I'm glad you're still a junior, Jane," commented Maud, taking breath after vaulting a horse or two. "We should never dare to bring such trivial troubles to you were you a senior." "And I'm glad to be a junior still," replied Jane. "Judith and I decided on this extra year to specialize. But even were I a senior, Maud, I would be happy to hear your heartbreaks," with a twist of her mouth that took care of the paradox. "Thanks a lot." Blanco, the wooden horse painted white on a former "sorority spree," was cleared by Maud the scientific, and she came up to Jane, a question in the sudden jerk of her bobbed head. "Jane, will you help us organize a ghost raid? We cannot have the freshies all scared blue by someone's nonsense, and Dozia, Inez, Winifred and I have done all we could in the way of investigation. That's a trick ghost, Jane, I am convinced of that much, and it will take a double trick to lay it." "Certainly I'll organize a raid squad, Maud. I'd love to lead the charge myself. Do we have outposts, and pickets, and-trench companies? Or would a bathrobe drill answer as well?" "Jane, I am serious," Maud pouted. "I tell you some of the girls are asking to have their quarters changed, and if all were given transfers I am sure Lenox Hall would be abandoned to the ghost. Rather shabby of him to choose the babes' quarters." "Spooks are cowardly as a rule," replied Jane. "And Maudie dear, I realize you are serious. But I can hardly organize a raiding squad instanter. I must at least have time to round up a few reliable girls. No use going after the 'sperit' with a band of cowards. You know yourself what fun that would be for his spookship." "Oh yes, of course, Jane. I did not mean to be impatient, but the girls just begged me to enlist your leadership. You have always been such a-- successful leader." "Thanks again, girlie. But failure is sure to come to him who tries once too often. Not that I should mind failure, except for the sake of those excited children. Really I hate to think how the ghost will feel when we get through rattling his bones." A sudden dash at a pair of ceiling rings set the whole line dangling along the gym and served to illustrate a possible way of rattling spectral dry bones, although Jane's graceful figure, as she swung to and fro, did much to soften the effect. "When can we make the raid?" persisted Maud. "I have promised to bring a definite answer." Jane dropped to the mattress and sat with hands clasped over her knees. "Is this ghost a person of regular habits? Does he take exercise every night?" "The noise was perfectly dreadful last night, and Velma Sigsbee was visiting Lenox night before and she almost went into hysterics when the rattling began. You know what Velma is for signs. Won't wear a thing green and all that." "And I suppose she attempts to explain it all on purely reasonable grounds of modern thought. The brand that credits the dead with all power, and limits the living with a very flexible and convenient practical faith. The two work together beautifully, of course, for what we can't understand we must put down to faith, and what we want to believe we are inspired to by our friends on the other side. Dovetails perfectly, sort of a fidele de convenance. Well, Maudie, you may tell the babes that we juniors, their natural guardians, will take care of his ghostship if possible this very night; if not tonight then tomorrow at M. I suppose midnight is the time of clangs and rattles?" "Yes, the girls say it is always midnight. And I just want to say, Jane, that the big country girl, Shirley Duncan, is the only one not terrified. But I suppose country girls are accustomed to wild things." Everyone seemed loath to add further criticism to Shirley's rather unenviable reputation. "Oh yes; haunted wells and spooky attics, to say nothing of barnyard 'sperits' that roam about to scare the cows into giving buttermilk and cream cheese," replied Jane. "It might just be--" she hesitated, then jumped to her feet with a little gleeful bounce--"it might be a ghost from Shirley's own home town. Strange we never had one at Wellington before." "Velma said something like that," admitted Maud. "She said Shirley was so--so antagonistic that her presence here might disturb some friendly communication, and--" Jane's laugh finished the hypothesis. "How delicious of Velma!" she exclaimed. "But we must be careful not to bring any more trouble upon poor Shirley. She's only a freshman and has apparently enjoyed few home opportunities," finished Jane. "But why does she tell the girls such horribly weird stories?" objected the scientific Maud. "She seems to delight in getting an audience for the wildest sort of yarns. And just now naturally they go to the youngsters' heads. Honestly, Janie, no less than three freshmen have begged me to crowd into their quarters tonight. They seem to think a soph might keep off this animated Jinks." "I can just imagine Shirley telling country ghost stories," reflected Jane, "and I agree with you, dear child, she is very inopportune with them, but it would be worse than useless for me to attempt to interfere. In fact, I think if I did so she would take up Irish Folk Lore to keep stories going. Running out of ghosts she might fall back on fairies. She really seems the queerest girl we have had in a long time." "Except Dolorez Vincez, she was still more curious," recalled Maud, referring to the South American character in Jane Allen: Center, who still kept within the shadow of Wellington by now running that protested beauty shop just outside the college gates. "But Dol is something of a foreigner, while Shirley seems to be all American," replied Jane. "Just fancy Americanizing an American born and bred! But this Shirley girl surely needs some sort of treatment. Her week of dusting Dozia's room is up today. I hope the lesson brought down her hoity-toity a peg or two. There come the girls from the village. Be prepared for more ghost stories for I see Ted Guthrie gasping, even at this distance. And behold the windmills-- Dozia's arm! Something very exciting must have happened." "Jane! Jane!" shouted Janet Clarke, the advance guard of the line of girls marching in from the village. "Oh, you missed it! Hello, Maud," seeing Jane's companion. "You girls will stick around a stuffy old gym, will you? Well, then, you have got to miss things. Come on in, children, and watch Jane's hair shoot sparks. Inez, you take the first two paragraphs while I get my breath, and, Winifred, don't forget those adjectives you hit me with under the oaks." "Do tell?" begged Jane. "Whatever has happened and where is Judith?" "Arrested!" gasped Inez. "What? What are you talking about?" demanded Jane. The girls really seemed frightened. "Yes--she is gone--gone with an officer," panted Inez. "There, you have had your two paragraphs," interposed Janet. "They were short but complete and I have recovered my breath. It is so exciting, Jane, and so confusing--" "If you will just be coherent enough to tell me where Judith is we might wait for the emotional details," snapped Jane. "If Judith is in any trouble we have no right to stand around gasping." "Right, Jane," assented Dozia. "But I did not want to take all the responsibility from Inez. This is what happened. We were coming along Cobble Lane when Judith espied two messenger boys on the rail fence. They were apparently squabbling about something, and just as we came along by the wild cherry tree, a few hundred yards from them, the big fellow gave the little fellow a punch and sent him sprawling in the bushes. Then the big fellow took to his heels--" "He had something--a package he grabbed from Tim, the little fellow," interrupted Inez. "Yes, I know, but that is not essential now, we must get to Judith," declared Dozia, showing irritation. "Judith ran--" "But the policeman darted out from the elderberry clump--" "Winifred, please!" implored Dozia. "I will not forget to tell that, but if you think you can do it all more intelligently or quickly--" "Pardon me, Dozia, please, I am just too excited--" "Did Judith go to help the officer?" demanded Jane impatiently. "No," fired back Dozia. "It was old Sour Sandy, who always declares we are up to mischief, and when the big boy ran, Judith chased after him while Cop Sandy ran after both. We stood still--" "He was muttering and threatening so," ventured Janet. "Were you afraid of him?" charged Jane. "No, but we could not decide instantly that we should run after Judith. It was all so sudden," said spokesman Dozia. "And of course we realized any more commotion would really get us all in trouble; that old officer is such a crank." "But to let Judith face it all alone," challenged Jane. "I really haven't told the one important detail," Dozia vainly attempted to explain. "I was walking with Judith and two other girls were just a little ahead. They were Shirley Duncan and that pretty little thing, Sarah--something--" "Howland," Jane flung in. "Yes," went on Dozia. "And Judith seemed so intent on watching them she hardly answered me intelligently." "There is something up between those two," declared Winifred Ayres. "I know it, and I guess Judy knows it too." "But what have they to do with the fighting messengers?" demanded Jane, now utterly bewildered from the snarled account. "The messenger, who got the package from Tiny Tim, shouted at Shirley and she waited. Then, when he could get near enough he threw the paper box to Shirley and she raced off toward the Beauty Shop. When we saw the last of it we couldn't tell whom Judith was chasing, but she ran right into Dol Vin's shop," declared Dozia, "and of course Cop Sandy was not long in doing the same thing. We knew we would be helpless to do anything there if Dol were in, so we came back to see what you would suggest," ended Dozia with a trail of relief in the last few words. "I suggest that we go after Judith," promptly ordered Jane, and if precious time had been wasted in the recital, the loss was atoned in the pace taken by that rescuing squad as they followed Jane in her race toward Dol Vin's Beauty Shop. CHAPTER VIII TO THE RESCUE The Beauty Shop was presently besieged by an excited crowd of girls, and to give due credit to the purely human element it must be admitted the girls were delighted to be there--at the forbidden post. "Thrilling!" whispered Velma Sigsbee, and she "said it" for all the others. The redoubtable Dol Vin (short for Dolorez Vincez) appeared at the quaint square paned door. She was gowned in a very close fitting and striking black satin "clinger" gown. Her hair was done in the most modern of styles, like a window show for her hair dressing parlor, and her foreign face, with its natural olive tones, was very much fixed up with many touches of peach and carmine, as well as darker hints under the eyes; and her lashes--well, perhaps Dolorez had been crying inky tears; that was the effect one gathered from a glance at the vampish make-up. "Is Miss Stearns here?" asked Jane authoritatively. She and Dol had clashed glances before, and Jane had no idea of condescending to the apostate of Wellington. "Miss Stearns here!" repeated the highly colored lips. Then shoulders shrugged and scorn fairly sizzled through an indescribable sneer. "I do not check up the patrons. She may be in a chair within. Will you enter?" The girls surrounding Jane tittered audibly. Since when had plain Dol Vin become so foreign? "En--ter!" drawled Dozia. "Yes, let's," to Jane. This little hiss was intended as a reactionary simper. "Miss Stearns would not be here on professional business," retorted Jane. "And she would never occupy one of your treatment chairs." Jane hated to dignify anything in the beauty shop with that description, but acid terms were elusive just then; and besides Jane was now getting anxious about Judith. "Oh, indeed!" more shoulder shrugging and a futurist pose of the black satin "clinger," "What else, then, might the Lady Stearns be doing at my place?" "Dol Vincez, you just stop that nonsense," flared Dozia Dalton, stepping up to the fancy little door defiantly. "We saw Judith Stearns run in here after Shirley Duncan, and you know very well that old officer Sandy came in after her. Now where is Judith?" "Isn't it lovely to have you all here? And begging me for something?" Hands on hips, then a shift of the right hand to a very black ball of hair bunched out where the human ear usually reposes. "I am delighted I am sure with this visitation, and I'd love to ask you all in only I'm busy. You will have to excuse me," and with a very Frenchy bow, the Queen of the Beauty Shop got behind the squared glass door and pushed it shut till the latch clicked. "Shut the door in our faces," growled Velma, as if everyone had not seen the insulting act. Jane stood for a moment, thinking seriously and swiftly. She was not concerned with the girls about her; neither had she any of their curiosity about the interior of the shop. She was wondering what it all meant, and how she could trace Judith. A brilliant thought captured her. Why not go inside for a shampoo? She turned to her companions. "I suppose it is perfectly proper under the circumstances to go inside--somehow. I'll apply for a shampoo!" "But the rest of us?" wailed the curious Velma. "Ask for something else," suggested the resourceful Jane. "Perhaps she won't answer the ring," parried Janet. "Then we'll knock," threatened Jane, as she pressed the little button over the "treatment hours" sign. They waited. There were Jane, Dozia, Velma, Winifred, Janet and Inez, six palpitating girls, each taking inventory of her possible beauty spots that might need touching up. Even Dol Vin would succumb to such an onslaught of orders, but-- "Suppose she charges us some dreadful price--like five dollars each?" gasped Velma. "Can't do it," declared Jane. "We'll go by her price list. But no one seems to answer." "Peeking out, I'll bet," whispered Janet. "Ring three times, Jane, and she'll know we mean business." Jane followed that advice, but still no answer. "There's a side door," suggested Dozia, critically inspecting the long, low old stone building that had been put up originally as a rendezvous for Wellington faculty who might want to get away from the buzz of girls and college. It seemed no one had that sort of disease, however, and the rest cure "went to the wall" for want of patronage. Just what company was now financing the rather expensive venture of Dol Vin no one knew, but it must have taken a lot of money even to buy the window scrim, the porch cretonne and the gold lettering on window and door glass. These details were visible from the exterior, and what, oh, what might the interior look like to correspond? "The side door," agreed Jane, "for all but one or two. Then perhaps we'll get an answer here." The ruse worked beautifully, for hardly had the tread of feet--eight of them, four pairs--passed down the steps than in answer to a very lady-like ring of Jane's a colored maid drew open the door. "May I get a shampoo?" asked Jane sweetly, stepping inside as she spoke and covertly motioning Dozia to follow. "This way, please," said the white-capped and white-frocked, black- faced maid. And behold! Jane and Dozia were within the mysterious parlor! Neither spoke. Both were listening. Someone was sobbing in the next room and Dol Vin's voice was remonstrating. As if suddenly realizing the situation the colored maid hurried out. The sobbing ceased instantly and so did the talking. A step through the hall indicated the coming of Dolorez. "What does this mean?" she demanded angrily, stepping up to Jane with blazing eyes. "How dare you force your way in here?" "Is not this a public shop?" fired back Jane, equally angry. "Have you not openly solicited Wellington patronage?" "As if you came for that! If you do not leave at once I shall phone the police!" "Do," dared Jane. "And I shall demand that they search the place. Someone is hidden here." A laugh, empty of mirth but bursting with scorn, followed Jane's accusation. It ran down a falsetto scale like pebbles off a tin roof. Then Dolorez turned to summon her maid. "Yolande!" she called. "Show these persons out." The perplexed darky muttered, "Yes'm," and proceeded to obey, but Jane and Dozia never moved. They were listening now to noise of another sort. The girls on the side porch seemed to be having a good time of it. "Come," demanded the inexorable Dolorez. "My time is precious and I must have this room. If you do not both leave I'll phone the college." "How perfectly absurd you are, Dolorez," said Jane, more alarmed now that no hint of Judith's whereabouts had leaked out. "You know perfectly well we can explain all this, and you also know we are here to find Judith Stearns and we will not leave until you have told us where she is or where she went? May I use your telephone?" "Judith Stearns is not here," snapped the South American. "And what's more I don't know nor care where she is. I can't spend my time with wild college girls who try to run down poor messenger boys." "Very well," said Jane, deciding no more time could be wasted in argument. "But I warn you if our friend has been placed in any compromising position, or has been misrepresented to that hateful officer, we shall hold you responsible, for our girls saw her come here." Jane and Dozia turned to the door. The maid was evidently well pleased with the move, for she showed glittering teeth in an inopportune smile. Dolorez had gained a very high natural color that cut in streaks through her make-up. She was breathing hard, and Dozia, usually fearless, thought it best not to anger her further. She followed Jane without even throwing out a look of defiance or challenge, and when the door closed on their heels both Jane and Dozia felt and really looked pale. The situation was growing more complicated every moment, and now the girls from the side porch pounced upon the others with frivolous inquiries about that beauty shop. "Hush," ordered Jane. "Do you realize Judith may have been taken to that horrible old station house? You three go back to college and make sure she has not returned. We, Dozia, Janet and I, will go into the town hall. You can phone us there in twenty minutes. Now hurry and be prudent. Don't spread any sensational stories." Jane acted like a senior now, but the emergency was sufficiently exacting to demand such forceful means. Where was Judith Stearns and what was the meaning of Dolorez Vincez' sinister statement, about running down poor messenger boys? Also who could have been sobbing in the room back of the parlors? "Look!" exclaimed Jane as they left the tanbark walk. "Who is that running from the back driveway?" "Little Sarah Howland," replied Dozia in amazement. "Whatever can that innocent little thing be doing around here?" "I--wonder," sighed Jane as they hurried off to the old town hall. "Jane," murmured Dozia, halting her companion for a moment as a sudden calling was heard through the fields, "do you think that baby can be implicated with those unscrupulous shop keepers?" "She was in there, and we saw her run," replied Jane. "I would like to doubt my own eyes--" Dozia grasped her arm and again they hurried on. "Find Judith!" That was their slogan. CHAPTER IX WHAT HAPPENED TO JUDITH In that mysterious way peculiar to girls, the students knew, without the facts being apparent, that something strange and perhaps even desperate had happened to Judith. They had not been told any of the details, but when the party walking in from the village was suddenly broken up, first by the incident of the messenger boys' quarrel and then by Judith's disappearance into Dol Vin's beauty shop, with officer Sandy twirling his club and "gum-shoeing" after her, the whole situation was as clear as if the pieces had been patched together on a movie screen. Judith, fighting for justice, had been ranged with the culprits! There was no possibility of her return to the college grounds without her companions' knowledge; neither was it probable she had gone to take a youngster's part at the emergency court in the Town Hall without first having notified Jane or some of the other girls. She would have dragged them along with her, for Judith believed in team play for all things, even at trials and courts of alleged justice. So it was that the girls' anxiety was not so thinly supported as the mere record of events might have indicated; they knew there was something wrong, knew it instantly and knew it positively; and they were right about it, too. The outstanding fact was a weighty argument. Dolorez Vincez had been expelled from Wellington the year previous; she had vowed vengence against Jane Allen and her friend, Judith Stearns (although both girls had actually interceded for the culprit with the college faculty), and now was the time and this was the place to wreak her vengeance. In a shorter time than occupies this explanation Jane and Dozia and Janet reached the Town Hall. The ancient building of dingy brick filled a conspicuous spot facing the Square; its carriage stone was a revolutionary relic and two reliable cannon set off the much trampled green diamond in front with something of a stately significance. It was fast growing dark in the early autumn evening, but the excitement of an arrest had drawn a crowd from the few business offices and from the passersby at the supper hour, flanked and reinforced by boys, boys who seem to go with excitement--always, at all times and in all places. The students made their way into the hall with its sputtering gas light, and while Janet went to the telephone booth, Jane and Dozia hurried to the office of the chief of police. "Judith!" Both girls had uttered the name and both now elbowed their way through the curious crowd up to the rail, where stood the disconsolate Judith. "Keep back, keep back," ordered an officer. He was the second and only other active member of "the force" besides Sandy Jamison, he who had "taken Judith in." Jane and Dozia urged forward in spite of orders, however, and now Judith saw them! She flashed a look first defiant then hopeless. It had defiance for the charge, but was hopeless to make that country court understand. Jane and Dozia answered the code with unwavering determination fairly emitting from their every feature. But the chief was talking or muttering, and he had been pompously rapping for order. Officer Sandy was trying desperately to tell his story, but between twirling his club and chewing tobacco he was sorely pressed for a chance to say anything. "This here girl," he mumbled, "was racin' after a boy with a package of joo-ell-ry. It was joo-ell-ry I know, for them boys from the city store was called to deliver----" "Never mind about the boys," interrupted the chief, "tell us what the charge is against this girl." Jane and Dozia exchanged a look complimentary to that chief. He had some sense they privately admitted. "Yes, yer honor, I'm comin' to that," defended Sandy. "She ran first after a boy, then after a girl, and I seen the package go through the air----" "Flyin'? Had it wings or was it a toy balloon?" Chief Hadfield was not a man to disappoint his audience, and the laugh that thanked him for this quip set Sandy twirling and chewing more vigorously than ever. "It was pegged, throwed, fired," shouted Sandy, and his club just touched Judith's sleeve, electrifying her into open indignation. "Keep that--stick down," ordered the chief, while Judith's indignation subsided. How pretty she looked standing there in those sordid surroundings! Contrast, the maker of all standards, outlined the tall dark-haired girl in her brilliant red junior cap and definite red sweater, like the central figure in some old time country picture, where urchins and queer men gave her the middle of the stage and plagiarized the scene, "At the Bar of Justice." "You caught this here flying joo-ell-ry?" demanded the chief. "Oh no, oh no," parried Sandy. "Someone else caught that," and he waddled his head from side to side in amplification. "Who? Where is it?" The chief was not playing the gallery now. "The propri-e-tor of that there beauty institooshun has it, and it's hers. It had her name and address on it." A sneering titter from the audience followed that foolish statement. Old Sour Sandy had balled things up considerably this time. "Then what's the charge and who makes it?" shouted and rapped Chief Hadfield. "Loiterin' and disturbing and I make th' charge!" Sandy put his cap on in the excitement of that speech but quickly yanked it off again in respect to the court. Jane and Dozia could not remain longer silent. Evidently Judith had been educated in the absurd proceedings before they came. Janet was now in from the telephone booth and stood beside her companions, while Jane attempted to interrupt. "May I speak?" she called out in the most musical tone her voice would accept. "Certainly, miss," replied the chief. He evidently did not share the opinion of his subordinate on Wellington girls' character. "This arrest is an outrage--a frame-up," declared Jane, glad to recall the vernacular. "There are three witnesses here who saw the trouble and we'll find others if you want them. The fact is Officer Jamison is always cross with us students" (she put it mildly), "and he was, perhaps, too willing to listen to our enemies. The proprietor of the beauty shop is a former Wellington student who was asked to withdraw last spring" (again the modification), "and this afternoon she saw her chance to retaliate--to get even." Jane made sure of being understood and now suddenly ceased speaking. She had learned the maxim, "When you say a good thing, stop." The chief stroked his beard lines (no beard showed just now), then pushed his cap back officially. Judith slid her white hands along the brass rail playfully and even smiled at the man behind it. He was a man if also an officer, and he must know by her manner that Judith Stearns was just a very nice little girl being dreadfully imposed upon. "Sit down, young lady. We'll be through in a few minutes," said the considerate chief; and Judith dropped to the bench beside Jane, Janet and Dozia. All three could not squeeze her hands at once, but all three managed to do something affectionate, if Janet did have to be content with a mere pluck at the white sweater sleeve. "Now see here," spoke the chief in a tone of irritated finality. "Sandy, what do you mean by disturbin' and loiterin'?" "By loiterin' I mean that racin' after them little boys who was going about their business, and by disturbin' I mean--I mean that-- that them college girls is allus raisin' a rumpus." "Discharged!" sang out the chief and he did sing it. The tune of that single word embraced at least three whole tones and suggested several more. A tumult followed the announcement but the chief rapped again for order. "I want you people and Officer Sandy to listen to me," he thundered. "Because girls go to a college ain't no reason why they should be pestered" (his errors were truly elegant), "and next time I hear any such fool complaint there'll he some shiftin' of badges. Clear the court!" And could you blame the Wellingtons present for shaking hands with Chief Hadfield? Making their way out finally the girls smiled to those in the curious throng who waited to sympathize or congratulate, and just at the end of the dingy hall Judith felt a small, warm hand grasp her own. "I want to thank you, miss," spoke a hesitant voice. "You saved me from that 'guy' this after-noon, but I'm awful sorry you got into a scrape." It was Tiny Tim, the messenger boy. "Oh, that's all right," declared Judith heartily. "I was glad to be on hand and that doesn't matter. Did you manage to deliver the box safely?" "I got it into the shop but the right one didn't sign for it. I know that 'cause that black haired one has a queer name and the box was for some Sarah Something. But I guess she'll get it all right," he finished with a professional air of certainty. "She comes there a lot." "A box of jewelry for little Sarah Howland," said Jane to Dozia. "And the sobbing in the back room," whispered Dozia in answer. "That was she who ran out the back way," concluded Jane while Judith and the others were busy taking leave of the messenger boy. "Some experience!" exhaled Judith, stronger and braver for her recent incarceration. "That, and something else," paraphrased Jane. "But someone please run to that phone and tell the proctor we are coming. They may send the guards out after us. It wants only ten minutes of tea time. Run!" The command was followed out to the letter. CHAPTER X THE INTERLUDE Talk about antagonism," glowered Janet. "I call the whole proceedings an outrage, and if you want to know what I would do about it, I would ask a Wellington official to sue this dinky little town for damages." She snapped out the words as if each syllable were a blow on the very heads of the offenders. "Don't you get excited, Janet," cautioned Jane. "We have our lady- like hands very full at the moment, and to run into more trouble would be positively rash. Besides, here is Judy, unrumpled as a babe from its cradle; seems to have enjoyed the whole thing and I can guess why." "So can we," quickly followed Dozia. "She will put the experience down in her field work for Social Service. This extra year promises to turn out at least two stars in that course." They were in the lavatory hastily fixing up for tea, almost late but thankful to be within the gates before the gong sounded. The adventures of that afternoon had been thrilling indeed, and a few of the girls shared with Jane the suspicions now settling upon the two freshmen, Shirley Duncan and Sarah Howland. Their presence at Dol Vin's shop, the sobbing heard behind doors, and that wild run of the girl who tried to get away from the place by actually scaling a back fence, and who was recognized as the demure little Sarah, all this furnished plenty of material for a mystery story. But it was the innocent remark of the grateful messenger boy, that put the climax in at the very peak of interest. "I know the right girl didn't sign the slip," he had told Jane and Judith, "because that black haired one has a queer name and she isn't Sarah Howland." So the precious package was for little Sarah Howland. And it was being sent to her, care of Dol Vin. Also, and more important than either particular, the delivery of that message had landed Judith Stearns in court. Was it any wonder ghosts had been crowded out of the day's or night's programme? "Don't worry," calmly advised the heroic Judith. "What happened this afternoon is only an introduction. The real thriller is yet to come." "When?" anticipated Velma. "Oh, it threatens to be a serial. I may be able to give you a reel or two tonight after study hour." "Come down to my room," begged Janet. "I have such a big couch and a whole raft may pile up on it." "That's a good idea," agreed Jane as the last towel was tossed into its basket. "Besides, we haven't a thing to eat in our quarters and what's a good yarn without grub? Land sakes, hear the crockery! We'll miss the hash, I fear me," and only the restraining influence of Miss Fairlie in the lower hall saved a third rail flight via ballustrades. Sweeping into the dining room Jane's eyes seemed attracted to a corner in freshmen's quarters. It might have been her excited imagination or pure incident, but she did look straight into the frightened blue eyes of little Sarah Howland. For the fraction of a second there was something like a clash. Jane's look was one of indignant question while the other unmistakably showed fear. Then Shirley Duncan said something to Sarah and the connection was severed. Hash may have been served or even real lamb chops, but no power of special dishes served to distract the students from their delicious excitement. "What in the world are you watching that door for?" Jane asked Dozia, who seemed hypnotized by a brass door knob. "Cops," replied Dozia cryptically. "I should hate to go out again tonight." "That's a fork," Winifred Ayres prompted Judith as the latter pierced her pretty sherbet with a prong. "I know," answered Judith, "but this mound is so pretty I don't want to spoil it at one gulp. A fork is daintier." "And leakier," finished the critic. Altogether the air was charged and surcharged with thrills, but it was Maud Leslie who broke the spell. "Jane," she whispered as they passed out, "don't forget tonight at Lenox. The girls are depending on you." "Tonight at Lenox, what for?" puzzled Jane. "Ghosts," said Maud. Then Jane remembered she had promised to raid the ghosts at Lenox Hall and to bring to the frightened freshmen a whole company of braves with their resistless reinforcements. And she had not yet been able to do a single thing about it! "We will all be finished with our work by 8:15, Judith," Dozia Dalton announced authoritatively, "then you may recite the adventure of a Wellington in Distress. I'll be prepared to take you down verbatim, in case your counsel should need the confession." "Janet, please have plenty of cheese, crackers and a few nuts. I'm losing weight," implored Winifred. "And Jane, will you be so good as to bring a few sample apples that came in that last parcel post from Montana?" suggested Ted Guthrie. "I missed things this afternoon but I don't intend to be overlooked this evening." Jane clutched Judith's arm to disentangle her from the others. "I have got to speak to you alone, Judy," she whispered. "It's about the noises and the ghosts. The babes are scared blue, threatening to desert the camp. Get outside the door and we can vanish for a few minutes before study hour." They waited at the foot of the stairs until Janet and Winifred ascended, then Judith nearly fell over Jane as they both tried to go through the door at once, but the escape was successful in spite of too much noise from the loose old brass knocker. Instinctively the two chums turned from the broad stone steps into the left path that ran away from a brilliant arc light into Elm Shadows. Silently both girls exchanged confidences, for Jane's arm around Judith's waist was comprehensive, and each little hug told a story of its own. "Dear heart!" breathed Judith. "I would just have died if you hadn't rescued me when you did. And I know the others--ran away." "Judy, love," returned Jane, "they didn't know where you were, really. And those country officers have threatened us before, you know. I suppose they are a little bit jealous that we girls and not their boys, are scattered over the landscape with yells and other appropriate noises. Sit down" (they had reached a birch bench), "I must tell you about Lenox Hall." "I know about the noises and I do believe they are really uncanny," said Judith, "but what can we do away over at this end of the campus?" "Go over to the other end, of course," said straightforward Jane, "and I have promised to lay those ghosts tonight." "Tonight!" sighed Judith, dropping her head on Jane's shoulder. "Not you, of course. You shan't come," protested Jane. "I only wanted to plan things with you. A warm bed and a nice cup of malted milk will be about all for you this night, Judy dear." The head, as black as Judith's own in the shadows, tried to fold itself on a cheek if no closer, but the attempt scarcely felt comfortable, and Jane just blew a kiss into Judith's ear, then straightened up again. "As if I would miss that!" murmured Judith. "I am dog-tired, Dinksy, but ghosts! Oh, boy! Lead me to 'em!" and the courage of youth defied that day's record for Judith Stearns. "We must hurry; see the lights in the girls' rooms, and you know they are bound to slight work tonight. This is what I suppose we will have to do. A few of us--you, if you insist, Dozia and Winifred, and I will somehow get out after Miss Fairlie has made the rounds. I don't know how we'll do it, but we have got to try. Then over at Lenox we may hide in the shrubbery and wait for the ghosts. I am perfectly sure they will come along the path from the gate keeper's cottage. Either they are inside or permitted to enter, and it isn't likely that ordinary spooks come through such walls as ours." "All right. I'll be there if I don't fall asleep over my trig. But I do think being arrested is awfully wearying--I could dream here in spite of the howling winds. Jane Allen, do you realize this is a cold, bleak, dreary night, and you are tempting ghosts to parade in- -bathing suits or nighties?" "It is cold; take an end of my scarf and hurry in. May a kind thought prompt us how to elude the wary Fairlie. Take care you don't seem sociable when she taps. It would be fatal if she should enter for a 'cozy little chat.' She has done it, you know." "Do I know it? Do you think I shall ever forget the cozy little chat she dropped in for, when my alcohol lamp thrust under the couch threatened to burn down the place? I have never been friendly with the inspector since." Judith ceased speaking suddenly and Jane clutched her arm as voices were heard somewhere. Yes--two girls were leaving Headley Hall and now came close enough to Jane and Judith to send even their subdued voices ahead in the darkness. "You're a baby," one said. "And you nearly spoiled it all this afternoon." "I never thought it would be this way. I'm so sorry I--" said the second voice. "Goodness sake, stop whimperin'. Aren't you satisfied? Hush, there's someone on the bench." "Shirley and Sarah," whispered Jane in Judith's ear. But the two figures on the path had turned, and were now lost in the darkness along the lonely hedged-in walk. "Imagine!" said Judith indignantly. "Those two little freshmen away over here instead of being at their books!" "And did you notice Shirley was blaming little Sarah for whimpering? I tell you, Judith, there is something queer about that Shirley. She has money yet she came in on a scholarship. Then, there was the registered package of jewelry that brought disaster upon you and the messenger boy, Tim. He said it was addressed to Sarah. She surely shows a woeful lack of luxury, yet someone was sending her jewelry." "And Dol Vin was receiving their mail, including the box," Judith summed up. "I am sure it was Sarah I heard sobbing in that back room," insisted Jane. "There are the girls looking for us. We will have to plead headaches and need of fresh air, for you know I promised them the real story of my incarceration," sighed Judith, following Jane's lead toward the group of searchers who came down the path calling and whistling for Jane and Judith. "Do tell it to them, they have been so splendid," pleaded Jane. "Besides, we have a night's work before us if we can escape on the ghost hunt, and a good yarn will do a lot to settle all our nerves. Remember, you are not to come unless you simply can't stay in bed, and if you remain in our building you may be able to allay suspicion when Fairlie comes snooping. 'Lo girls!" to the whistlers. "Here we are! Judy needed the air." With an all star cast and such headliners as were scheduled for Jane and her constituents on that particular night, it was not easy to anticipate the outcome. If the ghosts would only do their part and appear on time! CHAPTER XI A TWICE TOLD TALE Judith tried to beg off on her story of the great adventure, but the girls were insistent. "Just tell us what happened when you got inside the Beauty Shop," begged Velma, who had secret dreams of C. O. D. dimples and longed to hear of such possibilities. "It was like a screen comedy," replied Judith, who had been beautifully pillowed up and otherwise made comfortable on Janet's solo-couch. The audience was scattered around on cushions, on the floor, on chairs, and even on the one narrow window sill. Queening it from her pillows Judith looked quite Romanesque, with Jane perched on a cretonne pedestal above the divan's level, waving her riding crop regally. The pedestal really was a specially favored trunk of Jane's which had escaped storage quarters and served many useful and practical purposes, the present being one in point. "You were saying," Jane reminded Judith, placing a firm hand on the heaving breast solemnly, "that the rush in was like a movie scene." "I said comedy, dear; there's a difference. First, Dol opened the pigeon holed door, then Sarah Howland tumbled in howling--she was honestly very much frightened, next went Shirley Duncan. She seemed wild to get under cover. Then I tripped along--" "Not scared or anything?" from Nettie. "Not a bit scared but mad as fury," declared Judith, "for there was old Sour Sandy at my heels taking such long and such big steps I felt every next foot would crush me into the brand new door mat." "Poor Judy," soothed Jane. "And no one to say thee nay!" "Say me nix," moaned Judith. "I would have had thee say other things than that. But to the tale. Have you ever seen a mouse run from a cat and a dog after the cat and a boy after the dog? You know that famous picture, I see. Well, when the messenger boy got away somewhere about Dol's establishment, and Sarah went next, then went Shirley and, Little Me, followed by that giant Sour Sandy! Well, girls, I have to admit that for a few minutes I couldn't see a thing but Dol Vin's eyes. She had me hypnotized," and Judith paused to make sure of the dramatic impression. "I can see her glare!" declared Jane. "Dol's eyes were made for nobler tasks than matching hair shades." "And mixing flesh tints," contributed Dozia, who just then managed to purloin a sample of the fudge. "Are you girls sure that keyhole is sealed and the door still impregnable?" demanded Judith the narrator, with a sweeping glance about the room. Winifred Ayres dropped to the door sill and spread herself across it while Dozia moved her chair to the jam in order to plank her shoulders over the keyhole. "Air tight," announced Jane, "and every girl here is pledged, Judy. You may proceed with absolute safety." "The responsibility is yours, Jane, for we had an awful time for a brief interval under the doughty Dol's roof. Things flew--" "Hair brushes and sponges?" prompted Janet, eager for sensation. "Can't say as to the missiles," replied Judith, showing signs of relaxing into indifference, "but the way that black head yelled, and Sarah sobbed, and Shirley--I guess she shouted. I know her noise was next loudest to Sour Sandy's and that was some racket!" "But what was it all about?" demanded Janet. "About the precious box--jewelry or something valuable. When I saw the big boy take it from Tiny Tim and heard Tim yell, I knew there was mischief brewing if nothing worse, but I never expected to see Shirley Duncan jump into it. She aided and abetted the thief, for she caught that box on a fly and would have escaped if little Judy Stearns had not been right there Judy-on-the-spot." "But why did old Sour Sandy lay hands on you?" asked Jane, somewhat bewildered by the maze into which Judith was leading her audience. "Oh, there was such a perfectly wild time of it," replied Judith, "and of course Dol and Shirley had it all their own way--two to one, you know." "But didn't--little Sarah try to help you?" pressed Jane. "Little Sarah was having a fit out in the kitchen, and the black maid wanted to pour water over her, said she was in hysterics, only the word she used was somewhat impaired." "What a perfectly rip-roaring time you must have had," commented Dozia, eyeing the fudge. "And I suppose you were taken in by Sour Sandy because you seemed easiest to convey to the Town Hall. Just like the old detective stories, arrest someone, anyone, and depend upon the evidence to do the rest." "Yes, I was handiest, nearest the door and dry eyed. Besides, I kept kicking around on a jog trot all over the place because I could not make any other sort of noise. Honestly, girls, it was too funny for words!" and Judith doubled up in the pillows like a human jack- knife. "I am suspicious, Judy Steams, that you tempted old Sour Sandy to do his worst; sort of defied him," suggested Jane, dragging a Columbia cushion from Judith's convulsed arms. "Did you really want to be arrested?" "I did not!" shouted Judith, springing up straight and almost upsetting the entire scene. "It was Dol Vin who insisted that we Wellingtons were spoiling her business, interfering with her customers and--she said this--'now this creature actually tries to steal my parcels from a messenger boy!' Can you fancy that accusation on this poor head?" "But you didn't have the box?" asked Janet. "Certainly not. Dol knew that, but old Sandy didn't. I could easily have escaped when he ordered me to 'come along, girl,' but I knew to resist arrest might bring real trouble upon us, whereas now the whole thing is a farce, and whisper!" (she put her finger to her lips) "it must never be told of within this campus. News from the village rarely gets in here unless we bring it, and it would be a shame to worry prexy with that sort of thing. She would never understand it." Applause, silent but visible, followed this. Heads were wagged, arms waved and even feet waggled in approval, but no unseemly sounds escaped the secret chamber. "Never a word!" prompted Jane in a whisper with both hands uplifted. "Never a word!" repeated the conclave in appropriate response. "And that will be about all," finished Judith. "I am too tired to move but I can't allow you to carry me. No, don't, please" (no one had offered). "I'll just toddle along--it's lots better than keeping step with Sandy." "But the treat," wailed Janet. "I have fudge and cheese sticks." "Please deliver mine," drawled Judith. "I am unable to collect in person--I simply am--tired." "And you should be," agreed Jane, glad that Judith had been wise enough to break up the party early. In fact Jane was not sure whether genuine fatigue or possible ghost hunts, had inspired the heroic Judy to leave that buzzing bevy of students. At any rate Janet counted out four squares of fudge and measured three ink wells of cheese tid-bits (the well was glass and only used for refreshments), all of which was folded in a paper napkin and handed to Jane. "Sorry you must leave," murmured Janet, "but Judith has had a trying day. Come again and I'll treat you better." "We had a perfectly lovely time," insisted Jane, "but I must put Judy to bed. She is apt to walk in her sleep when overtired. Come, dearie, toddle along. Good night, girls. Pleasant dreams," and those who were not too interested in the fudge and tid-bits responded appropriately. "Oh," moaned Jane, when the two finally reached their own quarters, room 19, "wasn't that an ordeal?" "Rather," replied Judith, kicking her shoes off. "How did I make out?" "Wonderfully. You tied them all up in knots without leaving an end to follow. Neither clues nor climax--just a jumble of sounds, but thrilling for all that. I was so fearful they would ask more about the unfortunate Shirley but you veered them off beautifully. Now, Pally dear, tumble in, and I'll slip out and get Dozia. Lenox seems far away just now, and those babes are trembling while we dare to enjoy ourselves." "Jane dear," interrupted Judith, "I do not believe you should risk going over there tonight. Really I am getting nervous of the whole thing." "Just reaction," said Jane, her own eyes sparkling. "You have gone through enough today to give you nerves, and I want you to shut your eyes as soon as ever you can. After all I may just--do something else. Leave it to me and Dozia the Fearless. You know what a brave she can be in an emergency." "And I know what a star you can be in a pinch. But Lenox at midnight--" "Hush, dear, and let me put out your light. There, you will be asleep before the party winds up. There's the honor ring. Ten minutes more to all lights out. I love an honor system with a warning gong and an inspection. So complete." Judith required little coaxing to enter dreamland, and when Jane heard Miss Fairlie's step in the hall, on that tripping little inspection tour, the light in room 19 was out. Also, Jane under the coverlets was fully dressed for her ghost raid at Lenox Hall. Miss Fairlie's step paused at the door! Jane tittered, but Judith breathed the regular tones of sleep. For a moment it seemed the inspector would knock! She must want something! Someone else came along the corridor and directly at that door they chose to whisper! Jane felt her hour had come, but it was merely the fear of a troubled mind, for presently Miss Fairlie laughed lightly, and the pair journeyed on. It was a full hour before the coast was safely clear for Jane's venture. CHAPTER XII A WILD NIGHT OF IT It was a beautiful night, with the Hunter's Moon set high and bright in its ocean of flickering stars, like nothing else than moon and stars in the same old blue canopy, brocaded and embossed with incorrigible little gray clouds, ducking in and out of lacy paths and shadowy skyscapes. Beneath, on Wellington campus, the dormitories stood up like tiny cottages here and there, the more important building, Madison Hall, towering pompously over the smaller flock. It was in Madison that Jane and Judith as juniors were housed, while over in a west corner grouped about the big walled entrance was, among the lesser landmarks, Lenox, one of the first erected of the Wellington buildings; quaint, roomy and just now decidedly "spooky." The scene was fascinating in its silence, for only the dimmest of path lights seemed alive over the big place, and not a breath of wind stirred the tenacious oak leaves or other rugged foliage, too sparse to be counted, now that winter had given warning and was on his ruthless way. The two figures creeping along like some elfin prowlers were Jane and Dozia, and they made straight through that bold moonlight for Lenox Hall. "Doesn't it seem silly?" Jane took time to remark. "The very idea of expecting trouble on such a night." "It's all your doing, Lady Jane," Dozia retaliated, "and if I don't see a ghost after all this I'll never forgive you." "There was no guarantee, Dozia. But I did promise to appease the fears of those youngsters. What time is it?" "When I left my nice cozy room for this, it was twenty minutes to twelve. I believe you were on time at the fire escape, so I would say it is now about ten minutes of. Hold my hand, Jane. This may be thrilling but it's awfully weird." "Don't you like it? Look at that moon, and all the sparklers!" "But think of those hedges, ugh! I'm wobbly at the knees already, and we're not half way across. Never knew a campus could be so-- oceanic. I shall be striking out with my arms presently, feet seem unable to carry all the responsibility," and the tall girl cuddled into Jane's cape as far as the garment would accommodate her. "You are not really nervous, Dozia the Fearless," Jane rebuked. "Why, I'm just tingling with the spirit of adventure." "You may, and the spirit of adventure is a lot more attractive than the spirits we're out gunning for. Do you expect to get off scot- free if you smash anything with that golf stick? What do you think Miss Rutledge will say?" "I shan't bang unless there is nothing else to do, and then I'm sure I can explain. A Montana girl from a real ranch ought to have some credit for field work." Jane was twirling her capable brassie with rather a dangerous swing and the odd weapon now seemed formidable indeed. "What's that?" exclaimed Dozia, as a shadow almost tripped them. "It's an animal I know but--" "A frightened little rabbit," replied Jane. "They have a lovely time when the thoughtless girls are safe behind doors. But, Dozia, honestly I think I do see something else--bigger than--a rabbit!" Both girls stopped suddenly and drew back in the shadow of a tall lilac bush. They were well across the campus and now, at the end of the path, near the gate and not far from Lenox Hall, something moved in and out of the moonlit way. It seemed to cross from the big stone wall and glide into the grove of magnolia. Jane dropped Dozia's arm and stepped out to peer after the shadow. They were scarcely near enough to hear footfalls even had the padding of leaves and heavy grass not actually deadened that possibility. "Lively ghost!" she whispered. "Let's head it off through the grove." "But, Jane, it may be some dangerous prowler--" "How could he get in here? Besides we are protected." She had the golf club firm in her right hand and seemed to depend on it to lay ghosts or prowlers. "Come on, Dozia. Of course that is not a bona fide ghost but it may be the noise maker." Dozia followed Jane, although she did hang on to an end of the blue cape and pulled back whenever the darkness seemed too uncertain of penetration. The little thickets of ornamental evergreens suddenly loomed up into proportions of veritable forests, and every baby Christmas tree was swelled out like a circular blue fir, thick and prickly. But Jane headed straight as the foliage allowed, across the campus to the magnolia grove, where the eucalyptus trees shot up bare and leafless, ghostly, spectral in the searching moonlight. A crisp snapping of some dry brambles sent out an alarm from the hedges close to Lenox Hall and the girls listened anxiously. "Human," whispered Jane, "and rather dainty. Hardly a masculine foot to that light touch. Don't be alarmed, Dozia. We are two to one and evidently that other one is a female." She said this with assumed confidence, for she feared Dozia might turn and run at any moment. They were almost in the little grove and it was between there and the boxwood that touched the side porch of Lenox that this hidden thing must be. Jane was by no means as brave as her carefree manner indicated, and every time she held a bush from brushing Dozia's face she took occasion to listen intently for vagrant noises. Stumbling over low underbrush in their rubber soled tennis shoes was not like walking out in the open, and just as Dozia breathed a sigh of relief that the landscape gardening went no further, a wild scream, shrill and piercing, cut the night like an arrow! Speechless, the girls stood terrified, while the wail seemed to linger suspended somewhere! "Oh, what was it?" gasped Dozia, but Jane clung to her arm in silence. The next instant a clanging of chains and rattling of metals broke out from Lenox Hall. "Quick," exclaimed Jane, almost dragging her companion forward, "we must locate it, we must reach the dormitory!" But before they could even gain the pathway, the big fire bell pealed out its alarm and; suddenly every window in Lenox Hall blazed with light at a single flash--the answer of that electric button pressed by the matron, who now swung open the big oaken door and stood summoning her frightened charges to "come out" in the order of fire drill. "Don't hurry, be calm!" she called out in the voice of authority, and by now the freshmen who lined the halls and stairways, had recovered their composure and even courage in the face of rescue. Jane and Dozia rushed up to Miss Gifford, the matron, and asked about the outside alarm. At her word Jane jumped to the fire box, smashed the glass with her golf club and then turned the key. By this time the students were outside the building, and in their night robes the seventy-five freshmen shivered from fear and exposure, while Miss Gifford, Jane and Dozia tried to reassure them. "Where's the fire?" asked Jane, as the local brigade of volunteer citizens dashed in the grounds through the main gateway. "Where is it?" demanded Miss Gifford of the students. There was no smoke, no blaze, not even an odor of things burning could be distinguished. "It must have been in the big attic," someone said, "for it was the old brass bell that rang first." "Who gave the alarm?" demanded the matron. No one answered this, and the momentary pause was broken now by the wild rush of the fire department along the roadway. First the hose cart, the "hook and ladder" jerked up to the porch where the girls waited, breathless but calmer now that men and means had come to their rescue. "One side! One side!" shouted the chief, and to the credit of that department it must be said his men stretched their line of hose along from the hydrant and up those steps, even through the crowd of trembling students, in regular fire drill time. Jane stepped inside the hall and was sniffing audibly. "Wait a minute!" she commanded. "We haven't located the fire yet and it may not be very much. The house is equipped with extinguishers," she informed the alert chief. "They may answer without water." The rubber coated men held their hose high and were ready to shout in signal to the man at the hydrant, while Jane took the chief upstairs. He never spoke but tramped ahead as if a word would imperil the dignity of the Wide Awake Hose Company. Neither did Jane venture further remarks for she was "gunning" for the fire and thinking of ghosts! Doors to right and left were promptly pushed open but no evidence of fire could be found. "Try the attic," said the chief finally, "rubbish might catch from a flue." At his order Jane turned into the narrow box stairway, lighted only by a flash in the hands of Chief Murry. The actual panic of that yell and its subsequent fire alarm was now subsiding in Jane's mind, and instead of Fire the whole situation assumed an aspect of Ghosts. In spite of her courage she was very glad the chief was at her heels, and when she finally reached the last narrow step and stood under the rafters, Jane Allen sent a sweeping eye over that dark attic. "Not here!" declared the fireman before she could see more than the inky blackness of the old garret, with only that one spot of moonlight pasted on the slanting roof by an invisible window. As he turned Jane felt obliged to follow, although she would have been glad to go further in and see what it was that moved over by the patch of moonlight. Something did move--she was sure of that, but a fireman and a chief could not be asked to investigate anything but smoke or flame, and neither element was discernible, so she followed down the box stairway to confront the waiting brigade. "Who pulled that box?" demanded Chief Murry, angrily. "I did," replied Jane. "But the alarm came from within and the students were out before I did so." "Well, there's no fire here!" he announced witheringly. "And you young 'uns better get indoors. Been in all the sheds and corners, Ben?" to his assistant. "Every inch, and there being no kitchen here, 'tain't likely a fire would be tucked away in a closet, though we looked thoroughly. Queer how the thing happened." Miss Gifford was now trying to march her charges back, but a good sized contingent refused flatly to comply with her orders. They answered her quietly but firmly. "They would never sleep another night in Lenox Hall. If it wasn't haunted it was surely queer." With the courage of juniors Jane and Dozia attempted to laugh the whole thing off, but the freshmen were determined. "How did YOU get over here?" suddenly demanded little Nellie Saunders of Dozia. '"I thought it was a rule to stay in your own dorm when a first alarm fire gong sounded in another building?" "'We were visiting," replied Jane so quickly Nellie thought the reply meant something, and was too absorbed in the crisis of the situation to further press her question. "But you children will be ill!" wailed Miss Gifford helplessly. "You simply must come indoors." "Come into the recreation room," insisted Jane. "We won't ask you to go back upstairs yet." "We just wouldn't go," declared Daisy Blaire. "If I can't sleep in another cottage I shall telegraph mamma to come and take me home this very night or day, whichever it is." This resolve met with hearty approval, for it was seconded from many quarters until open revolt or general mutiny seemed imminent. The firemen were driving out with the jog trot of a false alarm, and ghosts or no ghosts, Jane, Dozia and Miss Gifford, each and all realized that those frightened children must be persuaded to go indoors. Their bare feet alone made the matter imperative, if bath robes did somewhat lessen the danger from a cold night's exposure. The sudden tingling of the telephone shot another bolt of terror through them. "There, that's the hall," said Miss Gifford. "At least make it possible for me to report you are all safe in Lenox." Jane and Dozia wound arms around a few leaders and this with the matron's appeal firmly broke their deadlock and a thin stream of frowzy heads and pretty boudoir robes dripped into the old walnut hall. Miss Gifford used the telephone at the foot of the circular staircase. She was giving a very tactfully worded account of the incident to the president, and it was very evident the whole occurrence would be conspiciously free of sensation if the matron's verbal report were embodied in official records. A long drawn out and happily intoned reply floated from Miss Gifford's lips as she half turned from the telephone and surveyed Jane and Dozia. "Oh, yes indeed, they are both here, perfectly safe," she announced, "and I don't know what I should have done without their assistance." So the raiders had been "found missing" at Madison Hall! CHAPTER XIII THE AFTERMATH There was another panic over in Madison," explained Miss Gifford, after leaving the telephone; "when Miss Allen and Miss Dalton were found missing it is a wonder someone over there didn't send out a second fire alarm. Miss Fairlie was much relieved to know her charges were safe and sound here, and I obtained a leave of absence for you for the remainder of the night," she finished. The very much perturbed matron had no idea of being left alone with a flock of obstreperous freshmen. "Lovely!" exclaimed Jane, dancing around with a group of barefoot girls who threatened to turn the occasion into a Greek playlet. "Scrumbunctious!" sang out the ballet de chambre, dancing in wild glee now that danger of ghosts and firemen had actually passed. "But girls," spoke Dozia, "did you notice the little fat fireman who held that big hose nozzle? I do verily believe he was so disappointed he wanted to hit someone. Just see where his old hose scraped my best silken hose. I don't mean that for a parody, but honestly, girls, these were the last and final gift from mater. She has condemned me to wear ordinary lisle hereafter, and just look at that--stock!" "Only dry dust, it will brush off," soothed Jane. "But I say, girls, how about beds!" "Beds!" shrieked a chorus. "Not a bed!" spoke Nellie Saunders for her entire class. "We wouldn't mind cuddling up here on blankets and cushions, but I for one shall not mount those spooky stairs, this night." "Silly child," scolded Dozia, her own eyes heavy with the ordinary common garden variety of sleep. "Would you expect company to do all the lugging? Who's to set up the billet?" "Volunteers?" called Jane, and from somewhere not before observed stepped out little Sarah Rowland. "I shall be glad to help," she said timidly, and instantly a volley of eyes challenged her. "Oh, Sally!" exclaimed Dolly Lloyd. "Don't you dare! The spooks would just eat you up. You look exactly like a cream puff." Laughter of the most chummy sort followed this, and it was evident Sally, in her cream and white striped robe with her yellow hair flowing over her shoulders, was a popular girl with her companions. Jane noticed, however, that her face, usually prettily flushed with pink, was now deadly white, and also that the child's eyes shifted in a peculiarly nervous manner. "It's lovely of you, Sally, and we'll just set a good example while Miss Gifford is searching for that miscreant fire. Come along and get the swaddling clothes for these babes. Aren't they an unruly lot?" and she tossed off her blue cape preparatory for the lugging of couch quilts, pillows and whatever else might seem useful. Sally tripped up the stairs and Jane was after her. "Do they really mean to sleep in the recreation room?" asked the freshman, waiting at a landing for Jane. "Land knows," replied Jane, "but I thought we had best humor them at least past the pneumonia point. I am thankful they did not all break away over the campus to some other building. We will probably shame them into going back to bed when they see how much trouble they are giving. Where might we find the bed clothes storeroom?" "Just here to your left. But wait until I switch that light." She reached a button and gave the side light its current. Then she stepped back to Jane. "Miss Allen," she began in more subdued voice, "I just wanted to tell you it was I who rang--the fire bell!" "Oh, did you?" said Jane lightly, following the hushed tone of voice, "but where did you think the fire was?" "I knew there was no fire," she confessed, "but I had to do it to cover those other noises." Jane was mystified, but she realized by Sarah's manner that a complete explanation was not possible just then. Here and there a step or a voice threatened the snatched confidence. "Did you hear that scream?" whispered Jane. "Yes, and I--had my room changed to over at the foot of the attic stairs just yesterday, but--but--oh, Miss Allen, it is too dreadful!" she gasped, dropping into a window seat and bursting into tears. "Don't, dear! Don't, Sally!" begged Jane. "You are all unnerved. Tomorrow you can tell me your fears, if you wish," Jane qualified. "But now let us get back to the girls. They will think something dreadful HAS happened to us." "But I can't tell you, Miss Allen. If I did I should have to leave dear old Wellington and this--opportunity means so much to me," and again she sobbed convulsively, while Jane put an affectionate arm around the little stranger. Clapping of hands and calling out foolish warnings from below checked Jane's flow of sympathy, and presently she stumbled back to the recreation room propelling a mountain of blankets and comfortables. "There. Just see what you have done," she charged the students who were instantly struggling for the blankets to the extent of practically disrobing the accommodating Jane. "Leave me my blouse, please do. It's the only real Jersey I possess. But aren't you ashamed to treat juniors this way?" "Dreadfully!" drawled a girl already rolled like a cocoon in a pretty blue "wooley" and coiling up on a rug in the farthest corner. "Jane Alien, you're a perfect lamb, and I hope you'll stay with us forever." "I am sure I have a congestive chill," chattered a fraud of a girl who almost upset Jane in the blanket rush. "Give me the pink one. It's my color," and another tug freed "the pink one" from its company of neatly folded coverlets. "It is a shame," confessed someone else. "Come on upstairs, girls. Let's defy the ghosts. I have always heard they shun a crowd. Where's the crowd? Let's make them shun us." "Second the motion and hurrah!" added Nellie Saunders. "Also we should put a price on that ghost's head--offer a reward for the capture. I'm willing to chip in, although as usual I'm a little short this week." Dozia had been going over the house with Miss Gifford and just then both returned to the recreation room. "Does anyone know where Miss Duncan is--Miss Shirley Duncan?" asked the matron, keeping her pencil at that name on her report pad. Jane started involuntarily at the question. She had been secretly wondering where the rebellious Shirley was during all the excitement. "Oh, yes," spoke up Margie Winters. "She is outside visiting with her folks. She told me this afternoon she had obtained permission." "Not from me," declared Miss Gifford. Then as if fearing complications she added more tactfully, "But of course I might not have been within reach and someone else may have given permission. Will you just step in here, dear?" to Margie. "I want to note what you say of Miss Duncan's absence," and while the reclaimed mutineers were being actually driven up the stairs by Jane, Dozia and the braver element, Miss Gifford was obtaining what clue she might as to Shirley Duncan's whereabouts. Herded successfully to second floor the visiting juniors set about distributing their charges into beds--any beds in any rooms but "under covers" was the order. "I can just about picture the parade trooping into the infirmary tomorrow," said Dozia. "Here, Betty, this solo cot for yours. It is just your cute little size. And those tosies," with a playful thrust at a pair of shivering feet, "I think nervous freshies should wear slippers about their necks at night--like we used to have our mittens on a tape, you know. There," finished the querulous Dozia. "You would have to roll down stairs if another alarm sounded. You're a perfectly sealed packet." Just the tip of Betty's head stuck out of the package. Somehow all were finally settled and it was Sally--Sarah Howland, who came to the rescue of the visitors. "But you must rest," she insisted, only a tell-tale pink rim around her blue eyes betraying the hysterical collapse she had so lately experienced. "We are not the least bit afraid," declared Dozia. "In fact, we are rather anxious to meet said spook. Which room might be one in proximity? Where does the big noise seem to come from?" "No more shows tonight, Dozia," spoke Jane before Sally could answer. "How much do you want for your money? Isn't a fire and a volunteer fireman's comedy enough?" "But I am dreadfully keen on spooks," she was pinching Jane's arm cruelly, "and I thought it was--something weird that set off the original alarm." Sally winced. "Here is a nice big bed," she told them nervously, pushing back a door and disclosing a tranquil untrammelled room, all neat and orderly as if nothing unusual had happened in old Lenox. "We call it the guest room but rarely have company to occupy it. I am sure Miss Gifford will want you two juniors to make yourselves at home in it," finished Sally with a quaver. She could not entirely hide the fact of her anxiety to get Jane and Dozia behind a closed door. Jane might have understood but Dozia was perplexed. "It's a lovely room," faltered Dozia, "but I feel more like camping out. What time is it, anyhow?" "About two-thirty A. M.," said Jane, "and since the youngsters are safely tucked in, I believe we should take Sally's advice. This is quite sumptious," folding down the extra white shams and coverlet. "Rather a pity to spoil it for such a sliver of sleep." Miss Gifford was at the door when Sally glided off. "I am so glad you girls are getting to bed," she commended. "What a night we have had? And what a mercy you happened to be within call? I'm sure I don't know how you got here but I am not worrying about the details. Sufficient unto the day is the evil, etc., and"--with a readjustment of her glasses and a closer fold into the soft night shawl--"this condition is dreadful. I have tried to fathom the mystery without troubling the office, but I know now I should have reported it before." (She referred to the nocturnal disturbances, of course.) "Don't fear any further alarm, midnight is always the chosen hour." "Yes," blurted Dozia, "we know about it, Miss Gifford, and my friend Jane inveigled me into this midnight raid. That is really how we got over here, but I can't say we have to report progress--'stampede' would be more accurate." "But this is only one night," Jane insisted, "and our fire brigade spoiled every possibility of investigation. But, Miss Gifford, since we have undertaken the task, I should like to propose that you give us an opportunity to try our skill at it. Suppose" (Jane had in mind the tearful face of little Sally) "you give us one more night before you turn the alarm in to Miss Rutledge? I am sure we can control your girls and get them to agree to our plan. In spite of everything, you know, they just adore the fun and sensation of it all." "Well," faltered Miss Gifford, weakening, "of course I could not risk a repetition of this night's experience; at the same time I do like to keep my records free from appeals to headquarters. It is so much more efficient to manage each cottage independently, subject to a general system. Well, go to bed children and thank you for your moral and physical support. We shall discuss future plans on the morrow," she said sweetly. Truth to tell Miss Agnes Gifford was a very sweet girl--woman, and at the moment both Jane and Dozia fell loyally under the spell of her charms. "Say, Dinks!" whispered Dozia from her side of the big double bed, "what do you think Judy will say to all this?" "Judy had her own fun and shouldn't complain. Wasn't she all nicely arrested and tried at a regular police court? What's a spook and a fire to that!" But Jane knew better. That night at Lenox was a "thriller" indeed, and Judith Stearns might well envy her chums its experiences. Then while Dozia slept Jane wondered. What did little Sally Howland mean about taking a room at the attic stairs? And how was that charming little thing implicated with the ghost of Lenox Hall? The plot was thickening. Sally did not in any way answer to the deceitful type, but some mysterious force seemed to overshadow her. "Pretty little thing, with such appealing eyes and so honest--" Jane slept. CHAPTER XIV PLEADING FOR TIME It's a very large order, Jane, but you're the merchant. How on earth do you expect to obtain permission to stay at Lenox without giving the whole thing away?" "I haven't an idea, but depend on old friend Circumstances to bob something up. It is wonderful how very simple it is to flim-flam a philosopher. They never seem to suspect intrigue and walk right into the trap. I've tried it before with Rutledge! she's a lamb if you watch your ba-as." It was "the morning after" and that trite phrase surely fitted the occasion. Jane had dragged Dozia from her dreams in spite of threats and defiance, and now both juniors were on their way back to the dining hall at Madison. "Rather different from the last tramp we took over this prairie," said Jane, "but as a thriller you can't beat midnight moonlight." "Not that I'd care to," Dozia answered witheringly. "I can't see that the adventure 'got us anywhere' as brother Tom would say. I haven't any brother, you know, Jane dear, but it always sounds better to blame one's slang on him, don't you think?" "I'm positive," said Jane, "but I have a trick of blaming mine on Judy. Wonder will she sleep all day because I, the faithful alarm clock, did not go off at her ear. There's the bell! I'm not very hungry. As an appetiser I think a night such as the last rather a flivver." "Isn't it? I have that widely advertised gone feeling myself. Here's a chance to duck in without being noticed." "We were out for early exercise," prompted Jane significantly, "and don't be too intelligent about that fire when they ask." "'Deef' and dumb," quibbled Dozia. "Thank you for the party, Jane. I had a lov-el-ly time." "Don't mention it," whispered Jane, as the line of students swallowed the two adventurers. But the day was "fraught with questions," as Judith Stearns put it, deploring her own inability to obtain any "intelligent account of the whole performance." It became known early that the two juniors who had been searched for during the night, were not others than Jane and Dozia, but even a veritable grilling at the hands of a picked corps of sophs brought nothing more definite from the wayfarers than "they were over visiting Lenox and the 'fire' was a false alarm." "And of course we couldn't put our heads out, for fear of panic," grumbled Nettie Brocton. The day passed somehow, and it was conspicuous by an entire absence of freshmen from the usual intermingling between periods. Even to Jane the reason for this was not clear until, in a burst of confidence with Judith, she outlined her plan of staying over at Lenox "until the ghost business was disposed of." "Oh, I know," she explained while Judith pondered. "Miss Gifford is keeping them home to prevent them gabbing. That's darling of her. She wants to give me--the newly discovered spook sleuth--a decent chance. Are you coming over with me tonight, Judy?" "Cables couldn't hold me back. Dinksy, you bribed me into staying home last night but I'll never again 'list' to your blarney. But it wasn't goblins I believe; however, we'll decide that when we trap 'em. Your benign influence has worked well thus far. I promised to help a freshie with some Latin prose and she never came to collect. Now I suppose I have to spoil my pretty hands with basket ball. Don't you wonder how it was we used to love that unladylike game?" Judith assumed a most sedate attitude, but did not succeed in hiding a forlorn rent in her skirt even with a very broad palm plastered over it. "'Ye strangers on my native sill tread lightly for I love it still,'" quoted Jane. "Seems to me you take about as much pleasure in the big game as you ever did, Judy. But let's away! We need it. I'm all stiffened up with--" "Your night of terror," finished Judith. "I don't wonder. Anyone might be sore and achey from running that Bingham Fire Brigade. I would love to have seen Dozia at the spigot," and Judith went through some fire antics. "Come along, Jane; we'll give the recruits a try-out," she decided the next moment, "but don't ask me to put them through the paces again tomorrow, for that's to be an afternoon off, if I can arrange it." "Oh," said Jane tritely. "Yes, oh," repeated Judith most impressively and with a grimace that supplied more than mere punctuation. Jane laughed and pushed the big girl ahead of her with sudden playful force. "Choo-choo! the fire is out and we're going home," she laughed. "This is just about the speed of the little red hose cart." "Wait a minute!" called Judith, halting so suddenly she almost threw Jane. "I would rather be the driver if you don't mind." "Young ladies!" protested one of the faculty, Miss Roberts, she who taught English and looked the part. "Is not that rather boisterous for indoor play?" The culprits choked an appropriate reply and resumed the usual "indoor" behavior. "One thing I hate knowledge for," remarked Jane, "it makes one so inhuman." "Yes, doesn't it? We may break our precious necks in the gym and be buried with military honors but we 'dassent' skin a shin anywhere else. System, of course," witheringly from Dozia. "Quick!" exclaimed Jane. "There are Nettie and Janet heading this way. They'll want me to tell the whole of last night's experience over again. Let's get at practice and preclude the recitation. I feel like singing the story to the tune of the 'Night Before Christmas,' it's getting so monotonous." "You have no appreciation for thrills, Jane Alien," eluded Judith. "That yarn will stand telling for months to come. I've noticed your variations, however, and can see the effort wearies you. But say, Dinksy, tonight is the night and Lenox is the place. After that, if you like, I'll take up the thread of your famous ghost story, and you may refer all inquiries to me." The last word of this peroration was all but lost on stone walls, for the oncoming horde seized Jane and, exactly as she feared, demanded further details of the big night. "And did you really see a ghost?" begged Winifred Ayres with a perfectly flagrant relish of the sordid details. "Packs of 'em," evaded Jane. "Safety in numbers," remarked Nettie Brocton. "That's my mother's argument for large gatherings. All right, Jane, we'll let you off, but we have our opinion of such utter selfishness. There's the scrub team all lined up outside the gym. I suppose they also are waiting to hear the story." "Save me from my audience!" wailed Jane, falling into convenient arms. "Why not install a ghost in Madison if you are all so keen on it? I can't see how you expect one paltry spook to cover the entire campus." "Oh, Jane! Miss Allen, Jane!" called the girls from that basketball line. "We've decided to beg off from practice this afternoon, if you don't mind. We all want to go to the village to see the sights." It was Inez Wilson who acted as spokesman and Inez was quite capable of organizing "a lot of fun" in seeing the village sights. "What's new?" demanded Judith. "Oh, something," insinuated Mabel Peters. "Are we debarred? Too old and cranky or something like that?" teased Jane. Her hair was bursting from her cap like an over-ripe thistle, and her cheeks were velvety in a rich glow of early winter tints. She hardly looked too old even for skipping rope just then. "Of course everyone may come who wants to," Inez condescended, "but juniors usually don't enjoy henning (shopping)." "I adore it," insisted Jane. "Do let us tag on and we'll buy the peanuts. But this really was to be an important afternoon at the baskets. However do you children expect to maintain the honor of Wellington if you do not keep fit? Now when I was center--" "Hear! Hear! Hear!" interrupted Mabel. "Remember that famous song, 'I know a girl and her name was Jane'!" "A rebold ribald rowdy!" shouted a chorus. But Jane was escaping--running down the walk with hands clapped over her ears to shut out the memories of her earlier years when that refrain was quite too popular to be enjoyable. Outside the big gate an auto horn honked, and the students drew back to give the big car approaching full sweep of the country roadway. Then another horn sounded, and from the opposite direction a smart little run-about was seen cutting in at high speed. Both drivers saw their danger and both jammed brakes. The big car rolled to the gutter while the runabout picked up speed and shot by safely. This brought the touring car to the curb where the Wellingtons stood watching, and a glance at the seats showed these occupants: Dol Vin driving, Shirley Duncan at her side, and a rather elderly country couple spread over the big back seat. "Shirley's folks!" whispered Inez. "We heard they were in town seeing the sights, and hoped we would run across them." This was evidently the "something" hinted at in the soph's outline of the "henning" party. Dolorez Vincez was too clever to show embarrassment, and Shirley Duncan was too cruel to hide it. She plainly was urging the driver on. "That's your college, darter, ain't it?" the girls could hear the elderly woman ask Shirley, but they did not hear the latter's answer. Dolorez called, "Hello, girls," as she swung her car out again in the dusty roadway, and the "darter" deprived that little woman of her coveted information. "She said hello!" announced Judith. "Sweet of her," remarked Jane, but she was thinking of Shirley's absence from Lenox on the night of the fire, and wondering if the indifferent freshman had been absent during all the day as well? "Hurry, hurry!" begged Mabel Peters. "What a lark to meet them at the drug store. They'll be sure to want hot chocolate." "I would guess at tea," drawled Judith, "but it's sure to be some sort of drink. Come along and we may get a chance to return that cordial hello." "I'm not going," suddenly determined Jane. "All go along if you like but I'm not going to lap up any more of that sickening chocolate. I've taken the pledge until next allowance day," and she turned back to Wellington entrance. Judith, quick to interpret Jane's moods, knew the excuse covered a more serious consideration and stepped back to ask "why?" "That daughter is ashamed of those country parents," Jane made chance to answer Judith, "and it would be horrid to spoil their opinion of us. Delay the girls a while and Dol will have gone through town safely." "But isn't it dreadful she has such influence over that rebel freshman?" commented Judith, slowly following the flock of students headed for the village. "How are we going to stop it?" "I don't know," confessed Jane, "but we must stop it some way. Just because she has a claim on my--patronage is no reason why she should disgrace Wellington. You go along with the youngsters, Judy, and I'll go right up to the office now and unburden my conscience." Jane's red haired disposition was asserting itself. "Think of the hair bleaching, then the police farce, and now out riding with that traitor. I'm going to tell Miss Rutledge the whole thing!" and no argument of Judith's could dissuade her. She turned back into the college grounds and struck a gait calculated to bring her up to that office in short order, and was more than half way through the campus when a small voice called out her name. "Miss Allen!" She turned to a side path, following the call, and faced Sally Howland. "Just a minute, Miss Allen, please," pleaded the strange little freshman. Jane waited till she reached her, then smiled into the serious face of Sally. "Hello, girlie," Jane greeted her. "What's the excitement?" "You were so splendid last night, Miss Allen," panted Sarah Howland, "and I am so ashamed to have to deceive you as you must see I am doing." A flush suffused her pale face and she dropped her eyes in pained self-consciousness. "But just--now--for this little while--I can't see what else I am going to do!" she stopped and her hands twitched miserably at her knitted scarf. Evidently the attempt at confession was more difficult than she had anticipated. "Don't distress yourself, dear," Jane soothed. "I realize you know something of the queer happenings at Lenox, and I can see you have some strong motive for withholding the explanation. There is a reason, of course, and I have faith in your sincerity. After all, Wellington is quite a little city in itself, and we are bound to meet queer problems here. I am on my way to the office now to get one off my mind." "Oh, please, Miss Allen, don't report--Shirley Duncan," she stumbled and stuttered over the name. "I know she is doing queer things but she is such a--a country girl, and has never had any chances--" "Did you know her before she came to Wellington?" asked Jane directly. "No, yes, that is I knew her just before we came," replied the girl, very much confused and plainly embarrassed. "I have noticed you seem to be friends," Jane pressed. "Yes, sort of. But I do not agree with her in her attitude toward college life," replied Sarah hurriedly--markedly so. She was trying to shift the subject, Jane saw that plainly. "It's good of you to plead for her," commented Jane, "but you see, my dear, juniors are quite grown up and are expected to uphold the college traditions. We really can't consider an individual where a college principle is concerned." Jane had her eye on Madison and was shifting to move that way. The freshman laid a detaining hand on her arm. "If you could just--be persuaded to wait until after mid-year," she said, "perhaps then--things might look differently." "But Sally, you know I saw you run out of that prohibited beauty shop, and you must know we Wellingtons in good standing do not patronize that place!" This accusation startled Sarah. She dropped Jane's arm and all but gasped: "When did you see me there?" "The day of that absurd police business when my friend Miss Stearns was so humiliated," Jane said severely. "Oh, Miss Allen," and tears welled into Sarah's eyes. "I can't explain, and I am so miserable. Perhaps--perhaps I should not try--" Tears choked the wretched girl, and Jane relented at sight of her misery. "Really, Sally," she changed her tone, "I do feel awfully sorry to see a freshman in distress, and I am sure I do not want to add to it. I won't go to the office now, if that will make you feel better, but I simply must do all I can to solve the mystery of the horrible night noises at Lenox. Here come the girls from their hike; dry your eyes and try to look pleasant." Jane did not relish yielding; she had passed that childish stage, when "to give in" seemed noble; it was now a question of expediency, which was best? Should she go on and unburden her own conscience just because she had decided to do so, or should she follow the pleadings of this girl without having an intelligent reason? Something stronger than psycho-analysis (Jane's new field of study) forced her to look deeply into the tear-stained blue eyes of Sarah Howland, and that same mystic power, older and surer than theory, compelled Jane to reply: "All right, Sally. I'll wait a while. It's all very queer but even queer things are sometimes reasonable," and she threw an affectionate arm about the little freshman as she turned her back on the judicial office in the big, gray stone building. CHAPTER XV THE PICKET AND THE SPOOK Not going to bed at all, Janey?" queried Judith, letting her hair fall over her shoulders and shaking her head like a happy care-free Collie. "This bed is too inviting to slight that way. I never knew that old spooky Lenox was so gorgeously equipped." Judith was testing the comforts of the big double bed in the guest chamber of Lenox Hall, the same that welcomed Jane and Dozia on the night previous. "I am not going to run the risk of missing anything," Jane answered from her place in the big cushioned steamer chair. "This is very comfortable and I am all dressed ready to dive after the least suspicious sound. Besides, I'm not a bit sleepy--gone past my sleep, as Aunt Mary would say." "I don't want to desert you," volunteered Judith, "and it doesn't seem just the thing for me to turn into this downy bed while you sit there like a sentinel. But truth to tell I am shamefully human and just counting on thirty winks before the ghost walks. Be sure to call me at the very first hint. Of course you will want to bag him personally, Jane, but I'll be glad to help you pull the draw string." It was drawing close to the tainted hour, and Jane sat there wondering how one single day could seem as long as that just past. She had no idea of admitting what part actual fatigue can play in one's perspective, neither would she have owned to nerves as the cause of her unnatural wakefulness; nevertheless these were both factors in her almost painful alertness. "At least now I have a chance to think," she temporized, "and I wish I could solve the mystery of Sally Howland's peculiar connection with Shirley Duncan." They were so unlike, so foreign in disposition and character; not relatives, and Sally even disclaimed any previous acquaintance with the country girl. Then Sally's attempt to forestall the midnight noises by taking the shunned room at the very foot of the dreaded attic stairs--what could that mean? Jane pondered feebly, and feeling just the least bit drowsy she left her place in the steamer chair to get a drink of water in the lavatory. It would not do to actually fall asleep "at the switch." Voices from the end of the hall near Sally's room forced their way into the corridor as she glided past, and the unmistakable tone of Shirley Duncan riveted Jane's attention. "You're too silly," she was insisting, no doubt to little Sally. "Don't I give you enough? Here's something daddy gave me. You may have it. Now do be a good, sensible little girl." A pause, perhaps a remonstrance, for the voice took up its cue again. "Of course you must have plenty of use for it. Don't be a goose, Kitten. You know how much I care about the old moldy college. But I'm bound to get something for my money." Jane was at the lavatory door now but she did not at once enter. Surely, under the circumstances it was permissible to listen to the unguarded voice of Shirley Duncan. And she called Sally "Kitten!" "For mercy's sake don't start to howl," it came again. "I can stand anything but that. It is all working beautifully and I guess before I quit I'll be able to show them that a country girl isn't such a simp as they imagine." "Miss Allen is here tonight," Jane next heard Sally say, "and you know what that means, Bobbie." "As if I care for her," and a scornful laugh made the meaning clearer. There were other words but Jane had heard enough. The mention of her own name seemed to charge her honor, and the belated drink of refreshing water was quickly drawn. Back in the steamer chair Jane had new cause to ponder. What was the threat or power Shirley held over little Sally? And to bribe her with money? Also the affectionate "Kitten" and "Bobbie"? The wind was stirring, but everything human now seemed withdrawn from activity around Lenox. Jane was waiting, listening for what? The frightened freshmen seemed secure tonight in their dormitories, assured of protection by Jane and Judith, two of the bravest girls in all Wellington. Also they had been promised a solution of the noise mystery and was not that in itself sufficient alleviative? The clock in the hall tingled a chime, sweet almost playful music for the elves of midnight and a challenge to baser intruders. Jane must have dozed when she suddenly became conscious of something-- Was it a noise? She listened, alert and all but quivering in anticipation. There never had been any question of actual danger surrounding the weird happenings, but now that she faced the mystery something very like panic seized her. Yes--again! That was surely something metallic! "Quick, Judy!" she roused the sleeping girl on the bed. "Follow me. There it is--beginning." "Where! What!" Judith sat up and snatched her robe. "I'm going to the attic. I am sure it is up there!" and Jane flew out quietly, in fact noiselessly, into the dimly lighted hall. A queer rumbling sound came from somewhere. Jane could not locate it for it seemed shut in, walled up! It was mechanical yet muffled! Judith reached Jane as she stood listening. "Where is it?" she whispered. "I--can't tell," Jane replied. "Pass around the turn into the linen room. We can reach the stairs that way." "Not--going up alone!" breathed Judith. "Why not? It's some lark of the girls, you may be sure, and I'm going to find out what it is now." "But it's dark," cautioned Judith. "I have my flash. Listen!" "Oh," groaned Judith, clutching Jane's arm, for a rattling of something like chains was now distinctly audible. "Hush!" breathed Jane, laying her fingers lightly on the door knob of the boxed in stairway. The next moment there was a crash and both girls darted up the stairs. "It was over that way!" insisted Judith, but in the darkness, with nothing but Jane's flash to guide them, it was impossible to tread safely through the attic, which was stored with all sorts of discarded materials. "Wait a minute," whispered Jane, her heart pounding and nerves almost jumping. They stood breathless, but not a move answered the silence. "Come down; do, Jane," begged Judith, shivering in actual fear. "Wait a few minutes," insisted Jane. "Whatever it is they know we are here!" "Jane!" breathed the other, "I am honestly ready--to faint." "Nonsense, just a few minutes." Jane could feel her companion tremble as she clung to her arm. But not a sound nor a move rewarded their brave defiance. "If only this place had a light," Jane whispered. "I suppose there is a bulb somewhere." She remembered that the fireman found none, however, and tonight even the patch of moonlight was not there. It really would have been foolhardy to attempt to go further into the low-beamed room, at the risk of running into attack, and evidently the noise had not been heavy enough to arouse anyone else in the Hall, for no sound of moving about came from the lower floors. "Do come down," begged Judith again, taking two steps herself on the stairs. "No, I shan't," insisted Jane. "I can wait as long as they can." As if that gave a cue for action a rope--surely it was a rope-- creaked and groaned and the rumbling heard first sounded again-- somewhere, it seemed from the very roof. "There!" said Jane. "They're gone and they went by that rope. Come on down. We can't do anything in this darkness," and, now satisfied that the "ghost" had been scared off, she followed Judith's precipitous escape down, and into the lower hallway. "What was it? Did you catch him? We heard it? Where is it?" To the astonishment of the two juniors the halls were dotted with heads thrust out of half closed doors, and the alarmed freshmen opened this volley of questions before Jane and Judith had recovered their breath. "No, we did not get it," replied Judith, "but we scared it off, and I have my opinion of a ghost afraid of two unarmed juniors." Judy was very brave now, and rather proud of it. "Young ladies! Young ladies!" Miss Gifford was expostulating. "You promised to stay in your rooms tonight." "Oh, they are very good girls, Miss Gifford," Jane attested, "and I can assure them that friend spook is a rank coward and has gone by way of a pulled rope. Any pulleys loose around this place?" "No, we have looked for such things," declared the matron. "But please, girls, go back to bed, and if anything else happens I promise to call you." This was a rash promise for Miss Gifford to make, but she felt the urgency of getting those questioning heads back on their respective pillows and so was willing to make concessions. "Come in my room," she said aside to Jane and Judith, and they both followed her to the open door. "That certainly is a noise made by someone who gets up to that attic," insisted Jane without waiting for inquiries, "and I am sure the sounds are made by metal chains." "That's the weird part of it," interposed Judith. "Why are chains more formidable than ropes?" asked Jane. "And in an old place like this is it would not be hard to pick up a chain or two, and you know, Judy, one old chain could make a fearful noise." "Yes--but--how does anyone get up there?" demanded Judith. "That's the mystery," admitted the matron, who had insisted on the girls remaining while the students quieted down and were safe once more until daylight. "We have looked all over the place, of course, and have not been able to find any hidden way of making ascent to that attic." "Airship," suggested Judith foolishly. "See how quickly the noise ceased," remarked Jane. "Someone recognized us, Judy, and has flown before our vengeance." "Be that as it may," added Miss Gifford with a smile of assurance, "I am convinced this thing is being done out of jealousy or even revenge. You see, I am a new matron here, and when I came I put into execution such rules as I have been trained to follow. That made changes in our staff and a few dismissals. Such action is sure to stir up the wrath of someone, but even with that as a basis, and with all the detective skill I have been able to operate, I must confess I am baffled. This very minute our janitor would be found in his quarters over the stables, for I have phoned him there. And for the past week I have gone over the ground with him personally, he and his wife when they lock up. She is one of the day workers here," explained Miss Gifford. Jane felt urged to tell of the shadowy figure she and Dozia had seen creeping about the evergreens, but quickly decided the indefinite detail would add little actual explanation. Instead she said: "We could do nothing in the dark, but just wait until daylight. I have to sleep, of course, we are getting ready for our midyear exams, but just wait until two-thirty tomorrow afternoon after logic. Then expect me over here with perhaps a shotgun if I can find such a weapon on the premises!" "But what would you shoot in daylight?" asked Judith, half jokingly, "Even suspicion," replied Jane, "but my chief concern would be to find the way friend spook gets up into that attic and where he comes from. Good night, Miss Gifford, we will follow the freshies now, and I'm so sleepy it would take more noise than that first bombardment made to arouse me." "Good night, my dears, and thank you so much for your wonderful support," said Miss Gifford. "Support!" repeated Judith, back again in the guest room. "I suppose she considers the ghost her opponent?" "I don't," said Jane cryptically. "I consider it the opponent of all Wellington." "And I suppose, Janie, you are blaming me for holding you back in the attic?" sleepily from Judith. "No, I'm not, Judy. You have no idea what a coward I am at heart; but somehow you girls have taken a notion I should do things and I can't bear to disappoint you. I must admit this is fascinating. I like it better even than golf, and will also give up my canter on Firefly this afternoon to see it through." "Oh Jane, don't do that!" objected Judith. "We were all going out to Big Rock and have the horses engaged." "I'm sorry, Judy, but I've gotten into this thing and I have just got to get out of it or I'll begin to believe in real spooks. I simply can't let it drag me down another twenty-four hours." She brushed her wavy red gold hair viciously. "You may take Firefly. He knows your saddle and will behave, I'm sure. That will give someone else your horse." "Maud Leslie is crazy to ride but has no habit here," commented Judith significantly. "Help her to mine," responded Jane promptly. "She isn't far from my size." "But I wouldn't want to go galloping for nuts while you stay here alone hunting for spooks," Judith said loyally. "Better let two girls take our places if you insist on staying out." "Oh, no, dear. I'm only going to look around for some sort of trap entrance to Lenox. Besides, you know Dozia doesn't ride, and she'll be here." "All right, love, I'll leave you with Dozia if you insist. She's big enough to take care of you at any rate. Do you imagine Miss Gifford has materialized some domestic enemy in her change of staff? And that this super-conscious fired janitor or furnace man is operating against her?" "I don't know, Judy," sighed Jane. "Looks to me more loosely organized than that. Besides, even a fired furnace man would keep union hours at one fifty per. No, I think you'll find the eternal female back of that racket, it's too temperamental for masculine action." CHAPTER XVI THE HIDDEN CHAMBER Was this Wellington and was Jane Allen, the darling of the gym and the record maker for basket-ball, now so prone on solving a perplexing noise mystery that her games were cancelled and even her riding hours filled in with mundane matters, while her companions flew away to gather mountain nuts and wonderful complexions? Jane's defiant laugh answered this very personal question. She was proud and she was fiery, and someone had been trying to discredit her father's scholarship. Of course that "someone" was Dolorez Vincez, the expelled junior of the previous year. Every clue pointed its accusing finger at Dol Vin. She it was who brought those two freshmen, Shirley and Sarah, together at her beauty shop. It was she also who "took care" of Shirley's folks when they came in to see the "darter," and everyone who knew Dol knew, also, that these little attentions must have been rather costly to the country folks, for Dol always made things pay. In the back of Jane's mind there was growing the germ of suspicion toward that same triangle in the spook alarms. Dol, Shirley and Sarah must be somewhere in that demonstration, but Jane had to admit the clues were not developing with such speed as she usually counted on in college mysteries. But perhaps this one more day would unearth something tangible. At any rate, the parties and teas and sorority dances were getting into swing, and even a fascinating ghost would soon have to be turned over to the proper authorities, thought Jane, if he did not quickly become more co-operative with the juniors. Work was serious and exacting. Every period had a record of its own, and while Jane was specializing in sociology she was also keeping up with the regular college course for her A. B. degree. Promptly after logic dismissed, at two-thirty, she sought out Dozia. "Come along, Doze," begged Jane, "don't let us waste a moment. The girls are all busy now, and perhaps we can make a survey without having a ballet de follies dancing around." Dozia made her notebook safe and swung into Jane's trot for Lenox. Warburton Hall, one of the larger buildings, was just emptying a class from lecture but Jane and Dozia made a complete detour of it to escape attention. Lenox was deserted, but in less than half an hour it was sure to be swarmed with freshmen running in after classes for a change of blouse, or some other requirement of the day now three-fourths spent. "Let us get a line on that old tower," suggested Jane, surveying the secretive old building. "I know the racket was in that wing, and see how the round tower begins here and shoots up past all that outside plumbing? I know Lenox was one time a show building here, but freshies have got to have some place to sleep, hence the retrogression." "Things are pretty well trodden down around here," reported Dozia, sending a critical eye over the little terrace that supported the old stone tower. "Squirrels do not usually wear French heels. See those footprints, Jane?" In the strong sun a film of soft earth showed the impress of something quite like the pivoted French heel. This was in a small space from which floral bulbs had been removed and where the sheltering round tower had kept off the early winter frosts. "Seems to me," said Jane, "there is some sort of cubby hole under here." She was poking around the vine-roped foundation. "Oh, you see they take cellar stuff out that window," explained Dozia. "It saves steps. See the trail of ashes over there?" "Yes, but that doesn't come from this point, that does come from the window. But I mean this spot here," she was tapping on a frame in which the squares formed the foundation of the building, and where the wooden arches had been originally painted a contrasting color for the sake of trimming. "You can always push those lattice pieces in," said Dozia. "That was the charmed spot for hide and seek I'll guess, when Wellington was in rompers." "Just look here!" ordered Jane in a very definite tone of voice. "This is more than a cubby hole." She was pulling at a piece of rope strung through a broken staple. Nothing remained but the iron loop over which the old time outside padlock was usually snapped. Jane pulled so vigorously she opened the hidden door and toppled over backward with the broken rope in her hand. Dozia was in front of the opening before Jane could get to her feet. "Well, of all--things!" she drawled. "If here isn't some sort of old elevator!" "A dumb-waiter!" cried Jane. "There are my groaning ropes. Pull, Doze, and let's see if it carries a car." A couple of jerks at the big cables and the car came down to earth with a bump. "Now!" exclaimed Jane gleefully. "There's the mystery. This airship goes right up into that tower!" "But don't you dare ask me to make the ascent," warned Dozia. "The tower may be thick with ghosts as a chimney with swallows." "But think of it," rattled on Jane. "That old hidden dumb-waiter! Why have we never discovered it before?" "Didn't need it," said Dozia. "Wouldn't have a bit of use for it now except to save you from getting gray headed and daffy over spooks. Come along indoors and look at the tower from the other end. This elevator must have a 'last stop, all out' platform some place," drawled Dozia, as calmly as if a great part of the mystery had not just been successfully cleared up. "But I'm not afraid to go up," declared Jane, almost dancing with excitement, "and the elevator works by pulling the ropes from the inside." "Don't you dare, Jane Allen!" cautioned the imperturbable Dozia. "You might get half way up and stick in a smoke stack, or a rope might break or anything of a large variety of possibilities might occur. I can't be a party to your suicide pact. Walk right up the red carpeted stairs with little bright-eyed Dozia, and view the tower from the objective." She took Jane's arm and dragged her around to the side door, which stood invitingly opened. By way of the red carpeted stairs they went as far as the attic flight, and from that point tramped plain unvarnished and well worn "treads" which Dozia took two at a time. In the attic, daylight dispelled many of the night's fancies. For instance, the big black things in the corner were only stored trunks, those shadowy forms hanging from rafters were Miss Gifford's best summer togs in their tailored moth bags, and the thing that glistened in the moonlight like horrible eyes in a ghastly face, were almost that very thing, for some hallow'een trappings hung right under the window, a veritable trap for spectral moonlight. Jane smiled. "These things had Judy and me scared blue last night. They actually seemed to point long bony fingers at us, but behold! nothing more sinister than a lot of storage stuff." Dozia was over in the other end of the low raftered room looking for the dumb-waiter "objective," but there appeared to be nothing of the sort either in bricked chimney wall or along weather-boarded partitions. "I can't see where that tower ends," she said, "See, Jane, this is nothing but a straight wall, and the tower surely is built round." Jane surveyed the brown boarded wall. "But this is not all the attic," she exclaimed. "See how narrow this room is and gauge the size of the building. There must be another attic back of those boards and that fire brick wall. Now, how do you suppose one reaches the other side?" "Via dummy," said Dozia. "But no little jaunt in that flivver for me. No indeed, Janie, not even to bag a real, live, active, untamed spook." They were both tapping along the boarded partition but had found no evidence of an opening. "Say, Jane," whispered Dozia, her brown eyes wide with pretended fright, "suppose some awful creature is hidden in there and that she has her meals served from the old dumbwaiter?" Jane howled at this and danced around in cruel imitation of a possible "awful creature." That she tore a hole in her skirt from contact with an unfriendly nail mattered little, for the dance took in the length of the attic between trunks, boxes, disabled chairs and even dodged an ancient sewing machine. "An attic party is attractive under certain conditions," Jane repeated. "I thought once I saw something move over this way. Let me look there more carefully." "Look away," replied Dozia, falling limply into a very uncertain old willow porch rocker. Jane pulled aside some curtain stretchers, then pried from its corner an old Japanese screen. "There!" she yelled. "There's the door, now we're getting to it. Dozia, look, a real door into the other attic," and she paid no attention to the noise of falling articles swept aside in her wild rush to open the low door, so completely hidden by the old Japanese screen. "Jane! Jane!" begged her companion. "Really do go carefully. How can you tell what's in that other place?" "I can't till I see," insisted Jane, her hand on the iron latch that held the door in place. "At least wait until I get a club or something," begged Dozia inadequately. "I've heard of queer animals being shut up in such quarters and they have often made splendid ghosts of themselves, too." But Jane had no ears for warnings, and while Dozia held on to the blue plaid skirt Jane yanked away into the great unknown! "Oh, look!" she cried in that tragic way girls discover things. "Just look!" They had opened up a big storeroom forgotten and abandoned, and in it--were all sorts of college paraphernalia, such as is used in theatricals. The room literally groaned with the stuff, and from the mass one object stood out boldly and significantly: It was a suit of Japanese armor! Jane yelled in delight at the discovery and pointed it out to Dozia. "Don't touch it!" whispered Dozia. "It may be inhabited!" "Bosh!" roared Jane, laying hold of a dangling armlet. As she did so the chains rattled! The metallic clangings clanged and the whole array of ghostly noises sounded out in the unholy hour of three o'clock broad daylight! "The ghost! The ghost!" boomed Jane. "Dozia, see, this thing is hung so it goes off at a touch. Oh, isn't it delicious! To have found it and this way." "I'm nervous watching that disappearing door," whined Dozia. "Suppose we should get walled up in here, just two babes in the tower?" "I'm going to get this thing down and show it to the girls," defied Jane. "Oh, Dozia, look there--a companion. One for you and one for me. Let's get into them and go down stairs. The girls will be there and--" "Say, little girl!" drawled Dozia. "Do you expect me to get in under that scrap iron works?" "It's all padded," interrupted the excited Jane. "Here," she had the armor off its big hook and simply made Dozia hold the tumbling parts. "There's the helmet, the visor and these---" "The trunks," said Dozia. "Cute little rompers, aren't they?" "Called tonlets," said the intelligent Jane, sighing under the weight of the outfit she was trying to shift to a trunk and a couple of boxes. "I'd hate to have to get in that for a fire," remarked Dozia. She was, however, trying on the scaly breastplate, and attempting to poke her head into the helmet. "Are you sure this stuff is no world's war relic? I wouldn't care to rub shoulders with some old Prussian guard." "Why, girlie, aside from bagging the ghost, I think we have made a great discovery. Think of this acquisition to Wellington!" and then Jane proceeded to dress up. But things rattled and fell off almost as often as they were put on, and it was not an easy matter to get inside of anything pertaining to this dilapidated costume. When an old sword dropped from its hook on a rafter, Jane danced in glee and declared "a ghost did it," although Dozia insisted she had cut a piece of cord on that very hook. Finally Jane was "canned," as Dozia described the state of being inside of tin things, and an attempt was made to move. "If we should fall--" suggested Jane. But they didn't. CHAPTER XVII "BEHOLD THE GHOST OF LENOX HALL!" Dozia insisted on carrying the "tin rompers" down stairs in her hands and donning them in a convenient place to avoid possible disaster. "Yours are shorter and jauntier than mine, Jane," she argued. "Besides, you have a better figure for tonlets. Come along, I'll stop at the landing and buckle into the things. Give me a couple of chains. Don't they chime beautifully?" "Wait a minute," Jane ordered. "I just discovered the usual slip of paper." She was extracting it from an armlet. "It's quite new and very modern, in fact regular typewriting kind--" "Oh, tuck it away and come along," Dozia moaned. "I hear the horde howling and the sooner I get this stuff off the better I'll feel. Pickles! but it's heavy." Jane folded the slip of paper and made it secure some place, then they proceeded to forge their way into the recreation room on the second floor, whither the students had been hastily summoned by the matron. "Now I know how the baby tanks felt in the big war," panted Jane, who was valiantly leading the way. "I mean those big human machines that rolled over the earth and ploughed things down, as they went." "Say, Janie, just wait a minute," begged Dozia at the first landing. "This looks a little like a joke but who is the joker? Who got up in that place and rattled these nightly? Also, who let out that wild scream we heard on that first night?" She was talking quickly and in a subdued voice. "We may be breaking the spell by raiding the secret chamber, but suppose the old spook breaks out in a new spot?" "I've thought of all that," confessed Jane, her smile threatening to unhinge the visor. "But we must give the youngsters their show first. The details will be lost in their joy of rescue." "They come! They come!" called out Miss Gifford in an uncertain treble. She had been waiting to give this signal. "Land, I'm losing the panties," groaned Dozia, trying to hold up the tonlets with one hand while she made wild grabs all over the outfit with the other. Dozia's artistic effect was surely in jeopardy. Majestically the two big, black walnut doors swung back, and the crusaders passed between them. "Behold the ghosts of Lenox Hall!" cried out Jane tragically. "Behold, behold!" echoed Dozia, raising her arm in its chained gusset and attempting to salute at the peak of her helmet. Shouts from the girls spoiled further efforts at the theatrical, and presently it was no longer a question of holding the old armor in place, but rather that of getting out of it safely, for what those freshmen didn't say and do to those ghosts! "Nothing but strung up dishrags," sneered Maud Leslie. "They must have looted every hardware store in town for these. Look!" She sacrilegiously yanked from their wire strings the metal dishcloths such as are used for scouring purposes, and truth to tell there was indeed a big collection in the string of armor. "Let's try the breastplate," begged Nellie Saunders. "I've always longed to be a Joan of Arc." And she got her pretty hair inside the head cage with the mouth trap under her chin, then she corseted on the breastplate. "And THAT'S the ghost?" scoffed Margie Winters, sitting far off in the corner safe from "spiritual" infection. "Disappointed?" asked Jane. "Of course I am," growled Margie. "I expected a holiday at least to fumigate, and here we have nothing but a lot of perfectly sanitary junk." "And I thought we would find a beautiful maniac walled up there," sighed Velma Sigsbee. "It's a perfect shame to have the thing end so unromantically." "Hard to suit you youngsters," commented Jane. She had fully divested herself of the trappings, and now stood aside while the freshmen surveyed the wreck. Someone suggested getting up surprise theatricals and bringing before the whole college the "ghosts of Lenox," This was a fuse to the bomb of excitement, and presently the roll was called, secrecy pledged, and a committee of arrangements appointed. Prompt freshmen! "Give Sally Howland a part," called out Ruth Lawrence. "She's just suited for something angelic." "We'll transpose Othello and sprinkle it with cherubs," said Nellie Saunders, who had been made chairman of the cast. "But the one thing to remember, girls, is secrecy," she announced loftily. "No one outside of Lenox must know what the ghosts are, or anything about the show." "You'll find tons of stuff up there to fit out the entire performance," Jane informed the excited students. "It seems to me the things have been stored there for ages, and perhaps were the remains of some very grand affair in the early history of Wellington. Now, girls, are you fully satisfied the ghost is annihilated?" "Perfectly," spoke up Nellie. "And we just don't know how to thank you juniors. Cheers, girls, for our rescuers." They cheered with the freshmen's dirge. "One, two, button my shoe; three, four, knock at the door" (they knocked at everything). "Five, six, pick up sticks" (wild grabs). "Sticks, sticks, freshies can's mix." "Rawr! rawr! freshies all sore" (moans and groans). "Gore, sore, r-o-a-r" (and they roared)! "Thanks," responded Jane when the roar died down, "and we're glad to be initiated in your sorority. Have a lovely time and be sure to let us know if you need help with the spook revue." Dozia chimed in feebly and slipped out after Jane. "They were actually disappointed," she remarked. "I believe they hoped for real gore." "To tell the truth," admitted Jane, "it did seem a bit commonplace after all the symptoms. But I almost forgot the little note. Did you ever yet meet a case in which the written word played no part? Where did I put that piece of paper?" "In your shoe?" suggested Dozia as Jane exhausted all other possibilities. "No, here it is in my sleeve. Sit down and we'll decipher it." They dropped to the nearest bench and smoothed out the paper. "It's part of a letter," said Dozia, "and written by a boy! Oh, joy, now we will have some fun--a love letter!" and she pored over the torn page. "Neither the beginning nor the end," said Jane, "but the climax." She read: "'You are a brick if not a wizard, and oh, boy! how that two hundred dollar check did look to me!'" "Two hundred!" Dozia repeated. "No girl around these diggings ever handled that tidy little sum. Read on, Jane, it may be a will or something, and we may come in for a share--reward, you know." "Here's our clue," announced Jane. "The name Shirley! Read that." She did so herself. "'Shirley, however did you do it, I know you neither stole nor borrowed, so it is all right and'--wait," interposed Jane, "that's torn." She lay the paper on her knees and fitted in the damaged parts. "Here it is. 'I'm back in college and in the big dorm, after the scare, and it's wonderful to have a little sis like you.'" "Sis!" groaned Dozia. "The lover's only a big brother!" She slumped in her seat dejectedly. "Shirley's brother," reasoned Jane, "and we have been blaming that girl! She helped her brother to get back to college!" The voice reeked with dismay and incredulity. "Can you imagine college running in her family?" questioned Dozia the incredulous. "I suppose we should hardly have read the letter--" "Why not? Should we have risked our precious lives up in that attic and then turned down this important clue? Indeed I'm all for asking Shirley to introduce me," and Dozia strutted off to show her height if not to display the "runs" in her hose and the "threadbares" in her sweater elbows. "But it does sort of take one down," mused Jane, following her companion toward Warburton Hall. "I hate to feel I have so misjudged Shirley." "Pure personal pride on your part, Jane. I have proof positive of the girl's perfidy. Every single day I must paste anew the paper decoration that hides her work. I mean that crack in my mirror. More than once it has done dreadful things to my poor face. If I move just one inch to the left the crack gashes my right cheek. You know how a glass reflects. But this brother. May I see the paper, Jane? His name might be between the lines." "Oh, it's Ted," said Jane innocently. "See the signature here, but no address, of course. And from that immature hand, Doze, I am sure Ted is a junior." "But, Jane!" almost gasped Dozia. "What can you do with that letter? It would be positively dangerous to let Shirley know you found it. It would mean, logically, that she rang the ghost chains, and that you knew she had helped her brother financially." All the nonsense had now died out of Dozia's voice, and she compelled Jane to stand while she proclaimed this ultimatum. "But how could she get up there, Dozia, when we know positively she was not on the campus the night of the big alarm?" "And little Sarah is innocent, I am sure," went on Dozia, "for she handled that trash with an interest too keen for previous acquaintance with the stuff. Each piece gave her a little spasm of surprise. I watched just how it affected her." "Queer, I noticed that also," said Jane. "Yes, I'm sure she never saw the armor before. But Shirley is never around in any excitement. I am afraid she spends a lot of time in Dol Vin's." "But how could she ever get two hundred dollars for brother Ted?" "I--wonder, Dozia, could she be in partnership with Dol?" "She might, but wouldn't that mean an outlay?" "Of course. There'll be little profit there--and two hundred!" The amount was appalling to Jane's practical mind. Voices broke in on the soliloquy. "Here come the girls from their ride, and what a shame you didn't go, Jane. Laying a ghost is all right, but if I rode a horse as you do, I'd assign the ghosts to others. 'Lo, girls! Break your necks or anything?" chirped Dozia. Judith hurried to gain Jane's arm and squeezed it affectionately as she fell in step. "Such a glorious ride, Jane!" enthused Judith, "and we all missed you so much. Firefly was good, but he knew you were not on his back." Judith looked "nobby" in her riding togs. "And whom do you think we saw out with a stable horse and instructor?" asked Janet Clarke. "The Rebel Shirley Duncan! And you know, Jane, what a price Clayton asks for his horses." Jane was amazed. A riding instructor, horse and hired outfit for Shirley Duncan! What was the secret spring of her prodigious income? CHAPTER XVIII FATEFUL FROLIC Excitement subsided with a thud at the discovery of the cast-iron ghost, and for some days a round of studies and basketball completely absorbed the girls of Wellington. Whatever the restless freshmen had in hand was not evident to the other classes, and only Jane, Judith and Dozia shared the interest, and possible anxiety, following the clues and suspicions in the undertow. "It's a dreadful thing to be proud," confessed Jane to these companions after a rather too vigorous hour in the gym on Saturday afternoon. "Somehow, when I think of my own darling daddy's scholarship being dragged in the mud this way, I feel--dangerous." "Don't blame you," acquiesced Judith. "The very impudence of a girl like Shirley breaking into college that way, then boasting she doesn't care a whang what happens! What do you suppose WILL happen at mid-year?" "A neat little note, 'unable to keep up with her class,' I suppose," said Jane. "And while I don't wish that girl any more harm than she's bent on, I am bound to confess I would sigh in relief at her departure." "But that lovely brother Ted," mourned Dozia. Judith had been made fully acquainted with the fragmentary letter recovered in the ghost raid. "That would be hard," agreed Judith. "And I'm sure there's a sweet little mother--but we saw the mother!" Jane broke off suddenly. "How incongruous that those two country folks should have a son at college like our Ted!" "Our Ted," echoed Judith, allowing her head to droop on Jane's shoulder impressively. "Awful!" moaned Judith. "Turrible," groaned Dozia. They were walking leisurely up from the gym, and the clouds of young Winter wrapt the gay sunset in fleecy blankets, while capering elves picked up every frightened little leaf and tossed it cruelly from its hiding place. "It seems to me," said Jane, influenced by the spirit of her surroundings, "that this year has been rather unsatisfactory. Not that I want to shine by the reflected glory of dad's winner, but it would be consistent to have the scholarship always won by good students." "Rather a jolt," agreed Judith, "to have the romp come in on merit when she can't prove it. It really looks like a trick somewhere, Jane." "But the exams are very severe and I've seen the report. Nothing 'foohey' about that. Yes, I have known girls to sail along beautifully in school and flunk everything in college. It really can be done." "But two hundred dollars can't be done that way," Dozia interposed, "and no one seems to be missing her change purse." "Beyond me," Jane owned up, "and I've almost ceased to wonder about the dumb-waiter tenant. Wish you would agree to my ascent in that car, Judith." "Yes, you want a party to your folly. You don't feel free to break your pretty neck without fastening the crime on poor Judy Stearns. No, Jane, dear, you don't ride in that Ferris wheel while I'm your side partner. You know scorpions are deadly and love dark corners. Ugh! How could you think of going up in that beastly cage!" "Don't get excited, dear, I have promised not to try it," acceded Jane. "Although I have felt there might be some clue in the old derrick. Don't go indoors yet, the air is--" She stopped to watch two girls on horseback gallop along the bridle path. "Shirley Duncan and some stranger," exclaimed Judith. "And how they are going--oh, mercy!" "Oh, oh!" screamed all three, for at that moment both riders were vainly trying to check their horses in a sudden dash down one of the steepest grades, straight over a hill almost perpendicular in its slope. "The horses have left the path," breathed Jane, watching with fascinated gaze the two mounts galloping down at a speed surely disastrous. One, the taller girl, seemed to have some control, but poor Shirley! "Heavens!" screamed Judith, "she's gone!" The horse had stumbled and its rider was rolling headlong down the hill, while the frightened animal pawed the earth in a wild attempt to regain its feet. The girls, terrified, started swiftly for the spot, but even as they ran the unfortunate rider went over a sharper turn and struck. Then--she lay in an inert heap against a jagged rock! In a moment they were at her side. "Her head!" exclaimed Jane, frightened at the deathly face she now stared down at. "Can we carry her? This is so far from a building," gasped Judith. "Oh, Jane, see the blood!" "I can easily carry her," answered Dozia quickly. "Let me pick her up, and take her or my shoulder." "Wait," Jane cautioned. "It might be dangerous. We must stretch her out flat so that her head is down. There, she may soon regain consciousness. I wonder if one of us should run up to Madison?" "I'll go," volunteered Judith, evidently glad to escape from the horror of the scene. "See, the other rider is still galloping! She can't stop her horse. Oh, how terrible if the runaway gets out among the autos." "Hurry, Judith," Jane begged. "Have them bring a stretcher. I am sure we shouldn't lift her head; her face is bloodless." "She appears to be recovering," Dozia whispered. "Poor Shirley! How dreadful that this should happen!" "If only she lives," moaned Jane, contrition in voice. Somehow it was unbearable that this country girl had been so severely censored by Jane and her companions. As she lay there, all the horrors of her unhappy school days seemed to fly up and strike Jane in a charge of bitterness. "I'm sure she is only stunned," Dozia said consolingly. "See, Jane, there is a tiny streak of color coming. She will soon react." Yes, the pallor was melting into a film more lifelike, but the heavy eyelids looked so deathly! How awful to gaze upon that mockery of death-complete unconsciousness'. "Her horse is walking off quietly, Jane," again Dozia spoke. "I believe the animal is wise enough to know he should not go without his rider." Even the riderless horse, with his solemn clip-clapping, echoed a terrifying note to the scene. It was all so appalling. "Shirley! Shirley!" whispered Jane, close to the ear of the stricken girl. Then "Shirley?" repeated the blue lips in a questioning answer. "Where? Oh, my head!" and a spasm of pain struck across the white face. "You are all right, Shirley, dear," Jane comforted, relief in her voice. "You just fell from your horse. Lie still until we can take you to the infirmary. Do you feel a little better?" How wonderful to hear the stricken girl speak again! "The awful noise in my ears!" she gasped. "Like a torrent rushing--" "That's only the returning circulation," said Dozia in the same quiet monotone Jane had used. What a relief! To know her mind was clear! And the blood streak on her neck seemed now only from surface scratches--the briars had torn her flesh cruelly as she dashed down that hill. Over the same hill, but not by the same route, could now be seen the stretcher bearers. With four seniors were also Miss Rutledge, the dean, and Miss Fairlie, the matron of Madison. They were hurrying and silent, only the light tread of crackling leaves on the bridle path accompanying the grave little procession. Jane and Dozia were chafing Shirley's hands. At the approach of the litter they stood waiting to lift with gentle hands the prostrate girl. It seemed so strangely pathetic: the big country girl in that gay riding habit, the glaring red coat such a contrast now to the helpless wearer. Her little velvet jockey cap still held on with its chin strap, and the new chamois gloves hiding her untamed hands were so strikingly new! Few words were spoken as the rescuers met. Miss Rutledge gave quiet orders and these were carried out with intelligent care. Finally Shirley was on the canvas stretcher, and Jane was holding a restorative close to her nostrils. "There, dear. It's all done and you won't move another bit now to hurt your head. See how steadily the girls carry you?" Dozia held one hand opposite Jane's side and the older students moved, over the uncertain hill, tense and powerful against a possible jolt or jarring movement of the patient. Once down on the path the task was less difficult, and as the corps turned back to take the path from the gateway into the grounds again, Shirley's horse, standing by the post, whinnied after them. No one spoke, but Shirley put a gloved hand over her strained eyes, and it was plain she feared even the sound of the faithful animal's call to her. At the infirmary Dr. Pawley was waiting, and quickly as they reached the big white room the students were dismissed, while he and his nurse took charge. "Judy," Jane gulped, but before they could reach a secluded spot her tense nerves gave way. "Judy! Judy!" she cried. "Why didn't we try to save her from those reckless strangers? Why didn't we beg her to give up the company of Dolorez Vincez?" "But we did, Janie. We tried every possible way," consoled Judith. "This accident could happen to anyone--to a skilled rider as well as to a beginner. Besides--she will be all right. See how quickly she became fully conscious!" "But to think--" Jane's words were lost in choking sobs, and for the first time Judith saw what genuine grief could do to sunny little Jane Allen. Wisely her companion allowed the storm to beat itself out. That sort of hysteria is always best spent unchecked, and Judith Stearns merely stroked the red gold head that had buried itself in her lap, while the shoulders pulsed and throbbed under Jane's continuous sobbing. At last she raised her head and smiled piteously. "I feel better," she said. "It's awful to have that sort of thing clutch at one's throat. Now my weakness has passed, let us see if there is anything wanted. Hereafter I shall not trust dad's scholarship girl to strangers' handling." And she meant every word she said. Quickly the news of the accident spread, and gust as quickly came the keen suspense and wave of suppressed excitement. Rumors were whispered: first that the victim was in danger of death, next that her injuries were not serious, until even the most sensational among the many pupils realized the importance of withholding their opinions. Hushed voices around that part of college where the infirmary was situated bespoke an active sympathy, and the weight of oppression that comes with dread had suddenly changed the whole atmosphere into a cloud of gloom. Dear, thoughtless, headstrong Shirley! CHAPTER XIX THE MIRACLE The days of watching and anxiety that followed the accident left no time for the lesser interests among Shirley's group at Wellington. For that awful uncertain period there was grave danger of brain concussion, and in the fear of that it must be said every girl in Lenox, besides many outside the freshmen's quarters, showed their loyalty to the untamed country girl. No messages could be sent, no flowers even allowed to attest to their kindness, as in the critical time absolute solitude was imperative. Then, like a flash of that robust country vitality, the patient rallied and all danger was pronounced past. One particular, however, caused Jane keen annoyance. All messages to Shirley's folks had been passed out through Dolorez Vincez, who claimed to be a personal friend of the family. Not even a mother would have been allowed to see the patient, and as Shirley begged that this plan of Dolorez' agency be carried out, no objection was made to it by the very much alarmed dean, Miss Rutledge. Another puzzling detail was the fact that Sarah Howland begged Jane not to interfere with these arrangements, as any such interference would undoubtedly shock the stricken girl, she argued. Sally and Jane had just left Lenox and were discussing these details. "And I'm so glad now," breathed Sally in her entreaty to Jane, "that you listened to me and did not report that matter to Miss Rutledge." "So am I," said Jane in bewilderment. "I am glad of anything I may have done to make her path smoother here. I can't see why Dolorez should step in at this critical moment, though, but I do know she took Shirley's folks around when they were here, and as you say, Sally, to suddenly change the whole line of communication with her family might not only shock Shirley, but also terrify her folks. What a relief that she is now out of danger!" "I felt like running away at first," confessed Sally, "it was so terrifying. But I realized I might be the very one most wanted here- -if anything serious should happen." Jane cast a quick inquiring glance at the younger girl following that statement, but was not rewarded by a further gleam of confidence. "I'm afraid I have neglected her," said Jane, "and I mean to make amends. The juniors usually help backward freshmen, but Shirley seemed to resent my attempts even at friendship." "Miss Allen," said Sarah in a compelling voice, "you may not know it but--that girl is gifted at mathematics. She can solve the most difficult problems and is always ahead at geometry and trig. Other studies seem to confuse her, and she just laughs at the languages, but she's a perfect gem at math." "Is that so? I'm so glad!" exclaimed Jane, "for if she is capable at math she ought to pull through her other work. How strange I never heard anyone mention her talent?" Sally shook her head and smiled. "She is so odd and defiant, but under it all I believe the girl is just a big-hearted, untamed creature. That is why, Miss Allen, I have kept as near to her as she would allow me to come. She is too honest even to affect changes." "Capable at math?" Jane repeated, trying to believe it. "I am so glad, Sally. I can't tell you what it means to me that this student is not wholly--dull." "I can guess," replied Sally simply, and Jane wondered then if she knew about the scholarship. "Why did the girls abandon their plans for the ghost show?" asked Jane suddenly. "I thought they were all so keen about it." "Perhaps I am to blame," faltered Sally timidly. "But you see, Miss Allen--well, there was a complication there--and--" she stumbled piteously. Jane tried to rescue her. "But it would only have been a lark, and the freshmen have had no Barnstorm this season!" "I know," said Sally helplessly, "but Shirley was so sick and--we have given the idea up." Jane had to be content with that, but the veiled explanation only whetted her curiosity. Few accidents were recorded in Wellington's history, and the mishap of Shirley ran its course in intense interest. Then presently the patient was again defending herself just as before, scorning even the humblest sympathy offered. "Served me right," she insisted, talking to Sally. "I know how to ride and can handle any old farm horse that ever pulled a plough, but I want my hands free and my horse must be unchecked. Stylish togs, gloves, saddles and trappings get in my way, and that hill!" So the accident had served as a lesson, and the fallen pride was not wasted in its effect upon the ambitious equestrian. Thanksgiving had passed with few of the girls leaving college, as special permission was required for that privilege, and now the holiday season was imminent. Even basketball had lost some of its power to enthuse, and the fact that Shirley was not considered well enough to go into the rough game, and also that Sally Howland was too small and light to be eligible, served to lessen the interest of Jane and Judith in the personnel of the teams, for as juniors in a second extension year they felt a little too grown up to go themselves generally into the big games. Jane was chosen and acted as referee, and Judith was forced to play center in the Breslin game, but even winning over the neighboring academy somehow had lost its thrill. Golf was the popular game now with Jane, Judith, Dozia and Janet Clarke; Ted Guthrie, too, toddled around the links, and golf permitted such opportunities for confidences and was so independent of stated hours and limits of endurance that time was given on the course to talk many things over. The girls had covered the frosted field and were returning before the first period of study, and that magic beautifier, the air of early morning, left little undone in his art of tone and tonic for Jane and Judith, when they dropped their bags and hurried to the day's tasks in mental exploits, "This very afternoon I am going to talk with Shirley," Jane decided. "And wouldn't it be wonderful, Judy, if she turned out worth while after all?" "No, it wouldn't," glowered Judith. "Any girl who can be as sick as she was and not have her brother Ted come to see her--well, my interest lags at that point and I don't intend to 'rouse it." "I still have that letter," Jane reflected. "Never seem to get a chance to turn it in. And I didn't want to destroy it." "Give it to me, Janie, do," teased Judith. "Next to knowing the darling Ted, having his letter in installments might serve. Tonight we'll read it over again. It seems so long since we found it with the ghost." "Doesn't it? And even the play was given up when Shirley was stricken." "But they used the armor the other night in their pageant," said Judith, "and everyone thought it wonderful. What a shame they expunged the ghost story." "Freshmen are so unreliable," sagely commented Jane. "But I'm afraid outside influence spoiled the plot for the spook tragedy. I hope my things come today for the prom. I feel rather in need of a first class time under the beneficent influence of a real orchestra and prudently shaded lights." "Me, too," agreed Judith promptly if inelegantly. So the gay season advanced apace, and it was soon one round of trying on gowns and fussing with sample hair dressing in all the "dorms" of Wellington. For the one big function known simply as The Dance all students were eligible, and it was just in advance of this that Shirley "broke loose." She openly and unqualifiedly "cut loose" from Dol Vin's "interference," as she called it. "I'm through with her," she told her companions; but it was to Sally she confided the details. The girls had been planning their dance costumes and Sally was insisting she did not care to go to the dance, when Shirley took another spasm of revolt. She would never again go into that hateful place, she declared, and more than that, she threatened exposure to the beauty shop methods if its proprietor did not soon return some of the "loans" long over due to her (Shirley). "Kitten," she exploded without warning, "I've had my lesson. Do you know that Dol Vin is actually sending bills to my innocent dad for her entertainment of the country folks? Imagine all she's begged and borrowed from me to meet 'emergencies' in her business, and then to ask my dad to pay her dinner bills! Of course she thinks I'm helpless, and that she has me in her power, but I am not such a 'greenie' now. And we will both be free soon!" The deep-set eyes took on a look more confident than defiant, and even "Kitten" did not fail to observe a marked improvement in the speaker's manner and appearance. Shirley was powerful and forceful, with that unruly aggressiveness conspicuous in young children, when the weakness is classified as "having their own way" before twelve years, and as "being capable" after that--the latter faculty true fruit of the former germ. So it was with this country girl; her very crimes were molding into virtues, and that again proves a world old philosophy. "Your hair is very becoming that way," ventured the blonde Sally, whose own hair was always a most exacting halo--Sally had to live up to it. "And you don't mind being called Bobbie?" "I like it," answered Shirley. "I suppose you know what a time I had to get the wig back to hair after the treatment. I am positive that east side French woman was trying an experiment on my poor head. But among other things the accident did for me, it gave my hair a chance to shoot." She ran her long fingers through the rather stubby growth that had taken on a decided unruliness in splendid imitation of curl. "You see it was rubbed every day, and that charitable nurse rubbed curl right in it. I just love it and wouldn't interfere with it for anything. Curling hair artificially, I know, simply makes it cranky." "Yes, spoils its temper and breaks its character. Just like twisting a tender vine and forcing it to turn away from its chosen paths. How are you getting on with your cramming? Can I help you?" asked Sally, diverging suddenly. "Hopeless," replied the other. "I don't believe I'll wait to face the music." "Oh, you must, Miss Allen is so interested----" "That's the hard part of it now. I can't face Miss Allen. She's such a good sport." The bobbed brown head was suddenly dropped into her cupped hands reflectively. "You see, at first, Kitten, I was just a rebel; satisfied to get in here and to have the name of it. Then, these girls whom I so despised were so fine to me," again the look of dejection, "and, girlie, when I lay on my back at the foot of that hill and Jane Allen whispered 'Shirley' into my buzzing ears-- it did something to me." Her companion allowed the pause to act without venturing to interrupt it. It was the working of the miracle! "Yes, and she meant it, too," went on Shirley reflectively. "No silly stuff just because she feared I was done for. She and big, brown-freckled Dozia just seemed to drag me back to earth, while the other!" her eyes blazed. "Do you know why I have never spoken of my companion on that hateful ride?" "No--I've wondered?" "I've been ashamed to," declared Shirley, "and thankful the juniors who helped me did not torture me with questions. Well--she was that foreign element with a name like a crocheted alphabet and a face like a week old Easter egg--running its colors, you know. Dol has her down from New York to practice for the stage," this thought revived Shirley's spirits and she gave a gay howl. "I can see why she needs the woods to practice the yells she's cultivating," a foot was kicked out at the thought. "But I'm through with them, Kitten, but please don't think I've reformed," she gasped. "I despise turncoats and--traitors." Shirley wore an angora tarn, leaf green sweater and big plaid golf skirt just then. No one in Wellington could have criticised her outfit. Even her attire seemed benefited by the miracle. "Bye-by, little sister," she addressed Sally. "This experience has done something else for me other than opening my stupid eyes--it has given me a real chum." And she got away before Sally could answer. CHAPTER XX TOUCHSTONE "Have you noticed, Judy," asked Jane, "what a miraculous improvement is manifest in our two pet freshies? To wit: Sally and Shirley." "Yes," snapped Judith, "and I've noticed something else. You are apt to fall in love with the rebel." Jane laughed. She was looking so lovely after a wild time in the pool, and a girl who can look well after a swim is surely very pretty. But Jane's hair loved the water, and a flash of sunshine after it just whipped the little ringlets into flossy tangles. Then her eyes always danced from excitement, and her agile form just vibrated energy. Don't blame Jane for this description--it is given through Judy's eyes, whose hair went stringy, whose eyes went blinky, and who actually turned "goose flesh" from a pool swim in December. "No," said Jane, "I couldn't really love a girl who has been so temperamental, but I could tolerate her, and that's a concession." "If I don't rub down quickly I'm afraid these goose fleshings will freeze into pebbles. I fee like a big stone as it is," said Judith, shivering, chattering and turning bluer. "Wait for me in the run; I want to talk to you." The "run" was that part of the gym kept clear for free exercise and was used especially by such students as demanded a substitute for the "beach run in the sand" after swimming. Also, it gave space for track work, although the open season for cross country runs was rarely closed at Wellington. Jane was dressed and out before Judith appeared. It was Saturday again, a free day; free from study but simply crowded with other contingencies. Students were knotted together, ready for basketball, golf, handball and all other forms of exercise, not to omit the dress rehearsal at dancing already well under way in a corner clear of apparatus and ropes. Here girls were dreamily dancing who knew how to dance well, while others were showing steps to companions and comparing notes on new dances, as applied from various sections of the country. What Boston had last year, Chicago was disclaiming as too old; and again there was Maud Leslie from Jersey actually teaching Nellie Saunders from Buffalo the Drop Step. Inez Wilson was endangering her life and limb "toeing" and each time she pirouetted on those toes, without the usual padding of the oriental shaped supports, a perfect flock of other dancers slid from danger of her avalanche. "You'll skid, Ina!" yelled Nellie Brocton. "Besides, this dance isn't going to be for soloists," and Nettie swung away with Janet, crooning and humming to the imaginary orchestra. Judith came out from the lockers, a challenge now to the effects of her long swim. True, her hair was wispy, and every snap on her blouse had not joined its partner, but taking her all in all Judith Stearns "looked dandy" and said she felt just like that. "I'm too lazy to run," she told Jane, "besides, my shoe laces would trip me. I'm plenty warm and proof positive against getting cold. Sit down while I tie my shoes." "See Shirley and Sally practicing," remarked Jane indifferently. "I don't want to!" retorted Judith. "Jane, I'm alarmed and I know your sinister motive. You have heard Teddy is coming to the dance!" "No!" gasped Jane, unable to hide her surprise. "There, I knew you would take it that way. But be warned! Teddy is to be my partner for as many dances as his sister can spare," and Judith tucked a wad of shoestring in at her ankles as if the pocket were in a commodious knitting bag instead of a tennis shoe. "I hope he's fat and awkward and red headed and clumsy," snapped Jane, tearing off the qualifications like coupons. "And I know he's tall and graceful and has chestnut hair," fawned Judith. "I've loved Ted from the moment I saw how he curls his cross letters like a riding crop. That's always a sign of originality and genius." There was a hint of strut in Judith's ordinarily graceful motion, and tiny drops of pool water flicked her eyelashes unnoticed. When Judith Stearns professed to "love a boy" she did so heroically, though he be myth or just an ordinary "full back." Jane made her way over to the dancers' corner. Shirley was howling over her own failure at the Drop Step. She choked back her uproariousness as Jane came along. "Can't do it," she confessed. "Guess I shall have to stick to 'One Steps.'" "Every fault is an art at the big dance," said Jane. "It's the one chance we have to stand by our home towns; we all seem to dance so differently. But that's very good, Shirley. I wouldn't give it up if you really want to get it. There's just a queer little knack this way." She threw her arm around the novice and led her off. Judith had condescended to follow Jane up and was now talking to Sally. For the length of the "arena" Jane and Shirley struggled along, chatting and smiling without restraint or self-consciousness. Girls "made eyes" in criticism, but none ventured to shape their criticism into words, for the rebel Shirley was doing pretty well in everything these days, and why should not a junior take her up if she wished to? At the turn Shirley drew Jane aside from the dancers and said in an undertone: "Miss Allen, I do wish you could persuade little Kitten--I mean Sally, to come to the dance. First, I was determined not to go and she persuaded me. Then I found she herself had no idea of attending. Of course it's always a question of clothes!" "Surely we must insist on her coming," said Jane decisively. "But it is awkward to get around clothes. You know her so well, can you suggest a way?" Jane dared not hint that she would ask nothing better than providing the dance dress for little Sally herself. "She is so proud, and then lately she has had reverses," said Shirley gently. "But if she doesn't go I simply won't. Nothing could induce me to," and she flashed through with her old time defiance. "But this one dance is counted the real get-together of the whole year," argued Jane. "When a girl absents herself it usually sort of disqualifies her for all the other affairs. Besides, it is really a benefit and we do so need a new dormitory." "If we could smuggle a box to her and pretend---Here she comes! I'll think it over and come for advice if I may," said Shirley quickly. Jane stepped back to the dancers' whirling rim. She was almost deciding that the country girl was charming! But like the country girl herself, Jane detested "reformers" and was unwilling to admit that a change of heart is something wholesome and even commendable. She knew naught of the miracle. More puzzled than ever at Shirley's proposal that they "smuggle a box to Sally," Jane became anxious lest Shirley might be getting funds from some unusual, if not unlawful, source. The malicious influence of Dol Vin was ever a disturbing factor to be reckoned with, and as yet Jane had no way of knowing that the confidential relation between the two freshmen and the beauty parlor proprietor had been broken off. Later that day Jane confided in Judith. "What would I do if I had no Judy to tell my troubles to," she said with a show of sincerity. "You may talk about new loves, but there is, and only will be, one darling Judy." "Don't kiss me," protested Judy, although Jane was on the other side of the room and gave no hint of any such intention. "I can't bear being babied--makes me homesick." Then she laughed and blew a substitute over to Jane. "Have you seen my dance frock? I know Ted will adore it. Even the box is pretty and has violets on the cover," she sniffed. "I'll try it on tonight--not the box--and make believe you're Teddy." "Judy, if some of the girls were to hear you rave that way they might take it seriously----" "And they would be perfectly justified in so doing," mocked Judith. "Please hear me. I want to talk seriously and started off with such a lovely preamble," interrupted Jane. "It's this way, Judy. Shirley shows the earmarks of wealth, I mean money. Now, where does she get it, and after that poor boy's letter?" "If I only knew," pursued Judith, refusing to be serious. "How I'd love two hundred!" "Well, we have got to find out where it comes from," fired back Jane, flushing with determination. "I am not going to be fooled by a change in manner and an improvement in style. If beauty shop money is beginning to flow in here it must be stopped." "Bravo! We haven't had a real lively little scrap since the ghost fell, and I'd love it." "You may joke, Judith, but----" "Calling me by my baptismal name settles it," said Judith, with assumed finality. "I'll apologize, Jane Allen. What do you propose to do, and when are you going to do it? May I act as your honorable secretary?" "Yes, come with me tonight and pay a visit at Lenox. I want to talk Sally into going to the dance. The girls are so fond of her and she happens to be one of our pets. I really don't know how it happens but it has, and it would look shabby if we were to leave her out. So she must come." "Got to," agreed Judith. "She's so smart, every freshman is envious. Did you hear Miss Roberts, the real Noah Webster of Wellington, rave about her thesis?" "Clever girls are so apt to cut dances," said Jane. "We must assume the missionary spirit---" her voice trailed solemnly. This was too much for the turbulent Judith, as Jane intended it should be. "I'll go, I'll go!" she cried out in protest. "Although I hate to think of Teddy having to choose between me and daffodilly Sally; still I'll go, Jane, to save you another spasm like that. Where's the Logic? Do you suppose Ethics will be easier? Or perhaps worse-- likely worse," she was slamming book pages violently. "Now don't speak to me for one half hour. Then do your worst." But while Judith was studying Jane slipped out of the room ostensibly for a breath of fresh air. All her chum's hilarity was appreciated, but just now things were assuming a serious turn and Jane felt some responsibility for the swing of the turntable. "Judy's a dear, but she hasn't a daddy's scholarship to fight for," Jane told herself. "And the marked change in my rebellious Shirley may only be a preliminary to another outbreak. I've just got to see the girls before the lecture," and she flew from the inopportune mirth of Judith Stearns. Shirley and Sarah were together in Shirley's room--not at the foot of the attic stairs now, but a tiny "nest" under the artistic eaves, chosen for effect on the purse, as well as on the eye. "I can't do it," Shirley was arguing, as Jane came to the door. "I simply am through at mid-year." Surprised at this statement, Jane knocked quickly to forestall further disclosure. Both girls answered, and Jane found them glad-- even anxious to see her. "You are both surely coming to the dance," she began, falling into Sally's prettiest cushions. "I came over just to make sure." "Oh, Miss Allen," wavered Sally. "I can't go----" "Now, Sally," Jane began, "please don't consider it is at all ignoble to be financially embarrassed. In fact, more than half of our girls are continually 'rationed,' as they call a cut in allowance. And if it is only a matter of a pretty little flowered gown----" "No, that isn't it," interrupted Sally. "The fact is, Miss Allen, we are both getting ready to--escape," said Shirley, with a double-edged laugh. "Escape?" "Go home and desert!" Jane showed her astonishment. "You couldn't mean anything like that!" she gasped. "Oh, you wouldn't be so disloyal!" The girls looked at each other, puzzled, neither seeming to know what might be best to reply. Finally Shirley said: "You must know, Miss Allen, I am totally unprepared for exams, and I see no reason why I should face them. I plan to stay home after the Christmas vacation." "Shirley!" exclaimed Jane. "If you ever knew my dad you wouldn't treat him like that," her voice quavered with excitement. "He seems to think more of the record of his scholarship girl than of his own daughter's achievements. Oh, you can't mean you are going to cut!" "Your daddy!" repeated Shirley. "I didn't suppose he cared a snap for his--beneficiary." "Beneficiary indeed! He called you a very different name. He is a great, big western man, with a heart as fine as the hills and a soul as true as their granite." Jane did not pause to note the effect of her words, although Shirley was almost gasping. "He has what some might call a deep personal interest in the girl he sponsors at Wellington, but it's more than interest," she was almost breathless, "it's affection; my dad just naturally loves the girl he sends here, and if she fails him utterly---" "Stop! Miss Allen, please do," Shirley entreated. Her face was flushed and her breathing plainly audible. "I had no idea it was like that. Your dad would care? And I would be a coward?" Sally stood like one shocked into deadly silence. Not even her lips parted, and the color left her face sickly white. "Don't you know, don't you understand what it means for a student to deliberately flunk? Not even to try?" demanded Jane. "Bobbie!" said Sally to the big girl who was trying to find words. "We have got to try--you cannot--go." Then Jane knew why the girls had been calling Shirley Bobbie. It was her companion's affectionate name for her. "Yes, Kitten," Shirley said. "We have got to, but now, how can we do it?" The situation was becoming more difficult each moment, and when presently Jane Allen left the two freshmen, she had taken on the weight of a new mystery. Those girls were in a conspiracy to desert before exams. Why? CHAPTER XXI CRAMMING EVENTS "Now, what can we do? However are we going to get out of this?" Sally asked Shirley. They seemed desperate. "I don't know. How differently things have turned out from our expectations? I wouldn't mind anything but that darling dad of Jane's. The thought sickens me," and the bobbed head drooped dejectedly. "But I am more at fault than you," sobbed Sally. "I feel like running away from everything." "So do I, but we neither will do it. That's the trouble with reformation. I told you I should hate to be reformed--it tags on so many responsibilities. But we are both in for it. And the dance and Ted wanting to come!" "Yes, isn't it just dreadful? What shall we do?" "He has got to come, of course. Couldn't disappoint that boy. Oh, I'll tell you, Kitten! Let's write and tell him he must play cousin to both of us. We'll give him a name, say Teddy Barrett, and then all the girls will be crazy about him, and he will be sure to go in for a lark!" "That might do," agreed Sally. "It would seem cruel to keep him away. But how about our mail? We can't have it come to Dol's box any more." "Don't want to; won't have anything to do with her," snapped Shirley. "I have a box of our own, and don't see why we didn't think of it before. She is writing me all sorts of apologies, of course, just wants more money, but I know now we might have done this whole thing differently if it had not been for her interference. It was she who scared us so of Jane Allen and her friends. And they would have been such a help if I had not been--so mulish." "Never mind," Sally tried to console her. "We could not possibly foresee--although I should like to foresee how to get out of it all without scandalizing Jane." "Trust one step to lead to the next," said Shirley, and that sounded like a proverb of Jane's. (Queer how much Jane and Shirley were alike fundamentally.) "Write to Ted and we'll have one 'whale' of a time at the dance." "But I haven't decided to go?" "Oh, yes, you have, Kitten. Wait until you see the old fairy godmother unload her pumpkin. Or did she carry the dress on a broomstick? I forget the details. At any rate, while I'm thinking of a way to appease the wrath of Jane's father by not dishonoring his scholarship, it is the very least you can do to get ready for the dance. I know where you can hire a love of a dress--lots of girls do it--" as Sally drew up a little, "and it only costs five dollars. Let me give you that for Christmas. Write your letter, or shall I do it? Bamboozle Ted until he won't even guess our real meaning, but insist we are his cousins, with first names only." "But he would have to introduce us to his boy friends?" objected Sally. "Well, that's all right. He can do that and we'll just tell him we are playing a joke. College boys adore jokes, don't they?" "Pretty much of a muddle, but I'll try it," assented Sally finally. "And I suppose I could spare that five dollars." "I can at any rate. And did you see Miss Allen stare when you called me Bobbie?" "Yes, but many of the girls have taken that up. It goes so well with your bobbed hair. Don't mind do you?" "Not a bit. Call me Pickles if you like--that would go well with my disposition." Shirley was hurriedly gathering up books and papers from the little table both girls used as a desk in Sally's room under the eaves. "Do you realize we have spent one hour talking? It's all very well for you, Kitten; you can have a recitation prepared or write a theme as easily as I can fail. If I had your talent I would never leave this college without an A.B.," she declared emphatically. "I wonder, Bobbie, did we make a gigantic mistake. If we had not been so influenced by Dol Vin's idea, perhaps we might have managed some way without all that hateful pretense. I can't help blaming myself dreadfully. And to think Miss Allen is so kind without being patronizing---" "Look here, Kit," demanded Shirley. "I know YOU could have come here without that plan, but what could have put ME through? Nothing but the scholarship. So please don't be getting morbid. We may have been foolish, but we did what seemed right, and Dol Vin was a mighty convincing friend, I'll admit. The question now is the dance, then Ted, and then--I don't know, maybe I'll escape in the night," and the old time rebel spirit danced in the sharp, dark eyes. Sally piled up her notes and followed Shirley out to recitation. It was not easy now to finish the task which at first seemed almost alluring. It was like trying to uproot some gentle affection to plan to actually leave Wellington. The girls' secret was spreading poisonous tendrils over every other act and thought; nothing now seemed untouched by that malicious deception, and the very crisis now imminent--was ugly! And this was what both had planned and worked for--to leave Wellington at midyear? They had not reckoned on the power of girls' love for girls, and of education's influence on sentiment. Sally Howland had been steeling herself against "growing fond of things" and that very repression made her its victim; Shirley Duncan defied these conditions and was punished with a "true case" of the epidemic called Environment. So that both now seemed all but helpless at the crisis. A day or two before the dance, when arrangements were running as smoothly as the little lake that dripped through the big grounds of Wellington, a general hike was planned. Each department, freshmen, sophs, juniors and seniors, arranging to go out tramping over the wonderful hills of upper New York state, touching quarries, testing rocks, hunting nuts and cramming into the one pre-holiday jaunt such various needs of outdoor work as were found in the studies then being under test in all grades and classes. Thus far it was an open winter; no snow, flurries failing miserably to do more than make the air look pretty for a few minutes, and even brooks had kept up their rippling music, chattering away over rock and rill, blissfully unconscious that Winter's deathly breath must soon paralyze every little vein and artery into a rigid, frozen crystal surface. The December hike was a fixture at Wellington, and as many of the faculty as could do so went with the classes, to urge, to inspire, to prompt and to supervise; not to omit the more enjoyable function of chumming with the students. Troopers they all were, dressed in imitation of the Girl Scouts as far as khaki went around, the others sporting golf togs and carrying water bottles or even "grub" in the convenient golf bags slung over sturdy young shoulders. No need to dwell on the glories of that day, for a hike on paper carries little sport and usually less material of vital interest. A hike must be "hiked" to be real, the "grub" must be munched by the side of a stream, and the wild things venturing out for crumbs must be "seen to be appreciated," as the "ad" says; so that it would seem unreal to attempt to put into words the glories of a day in the woods with the Wellingtons. What if Ted Guthrie, the fat, funny, facetious Ted, did slide down a hill and take most of the hill with her? or if Nettie Brocton climbing a tree for dogwood berries attempted to fly by the merest accident? She had no choice but to drop into an ugly hole otherwise, so she spread out and gave a flying leap to the side of safety and made it. No one tried to keep track of "Bobbie," as the country girl was now popularly known, for she ran, climbed, crawled and burrowed, until Jane and Judith had cause to step lively indeed to keep up with her. Jane, accustomed to the great fastnesses of the Northwest around her Montana home, fairly glowed with the spirit of contest, and being Jane it must ultimately be set down that Bobbie lost a point or two in the final scoring. What a day and what scratches, bruises and blisters recorded it! "No bones broken!" was the guide's slogan, and they were well satisfied to have the precept fulfilled without undue court plaster. Coming home the gay groups fell into their usual lines, and separated into such little parties as suited best the confidences of their members. Ted Guthrie chose to take a ride in the big car of Temple Gaitley, the sponsor of Wellington who lived at its gates and shared her prosperity with any student worthy of the name. Ted would rather ride than walk, after her sliding tournament, and along with her there piled into the car as many foot-sore hikers as the big open car could possibly hold, stretching the word at that. It was almost evening, the day turned so quickly, when Jane, Judith, Dozia and the two freshmen, Sally and Shirley, cut across the golf links to touch town for some drug store supplies, before going into the college grounds. The little village always seemed kindly at this hour, for folks going home from work formed its chief feature of public interest, and the tan bark streets were now being fairly well utilized. "I'll get some stamps," said Shirley, "while you girls hunt for your soaps. Let's round this corner---" She stopped short, for as they cut suddenly from the side street into the main avenue they almost stumbled into a crowd! "What's up?" asked Shirley tritely. "An arrest," answered a man pushing his bicycle. "And I guess old Sandy ain't made no mistake this time. He's caught the banshee!" "Yes, sir," snapped an overgrown boy. "That's what she is. Keepin' folks awake howlin'!" Sally clutched Shirley's arm. "See, it's Dol's friend, the actress!" "Sure enough, the foreign element with a name like crocheting," said Shirley. "I always knew she would come to grief with that howling. Girls!" to Jane and the others. "Could we go to the Town Hall and find out what happens? That's the ghost of Lenox Hall, the woman who screamed at midnight." Too astonished to offer comment the girls drifted along with the crowd, and a break in the ranks afforded just a glimpse of Officer Sandy with a very tall, fancifully dressed, but very much disheveled prisoner. She walked along with the officer as if he might have been a creature of a lower order of creation, but as the boys said, "Sandy did have her goin'." And she was the "foreign element," the obnoxious visitor at the beauty shop, who was so sorely and fatally stage struck that she had seriously disturbed the peace of decorous little Bingham! "She would yell right out in the night, like a hoot owl only fiercer!" insisted one of her followers. "And she ain't safe to be loose with a habit like that." "Defyin' the law and disturbin' the peace," growled Sandy. "I've had a warrant for that noise ever since it scared old Mrs. Miner into fits and she was took to the horspittal on account of it." "City folks is all right in their place," squeaked a thin little woman, one of the very few women in that crowd, "but if that kind is allowed to run wild over our quiet home towns, I say what is Bingham comin' to?" Queer noises without words gave answer. The Wellingtons, with other followers, were now almost in front of the Town Hall, when the victim of this country prejudice espied Shirley. "There is someone who knows me!" she cried out. "Ask that young lady and she'll tell you I'm a legitimate actress, and that I came out here to have room to practice!" Shirley "ducked," as Judith put it, but Sally, more sympathetic, offered to interfere. "Don't," begged Jane. "We were at this court only a short time ago. We don't want to wear out our welcome. Come along, girls; I, as junior, am responsible for getting you back on time. Come along." "Yes," said Shirley bitterly. "Do come along, girls. That's about the way this lady left me when my horse threw me off on the hill. She was not anxious about me then and I guess she isn't as much in danger now as I was at that time," and when Officer Sandy piloted his charge in before the recorder, the doors were closed and the hearing was made private. CHAPTER XXII STARTLING DISCLOSURES Once more Shirley had the center of the stage--a position she loved when it entailed the telling of a thrilling story. And at last the ghost story "was ripe," as Jane expressed it. "Tell us," she demanded, without regard for the race to college during the telling, "who is that woman and what do you mean by calling her the ghost." "She's an actress," declared Shirley, "that is, she thinks she is, and she has lots of money and a poor head for managing it. In fact, I have always thought her erratic. You see," went on Shirley, supporting herself by "linking" into the accommodating arms extended, "Dol Vin fetched her out here from the city so that she could practice her howling. She was cast for a part with a wild scream in it, and every time she attempted to practice someone interfered, the police usually." "No wonder," interrupted Jane. "Why couldn't she stick to the theater for rehearsing?" "Her own idea," went on Shirley, importance of the occasion echoing in her tone. "She wanted to get it down pat and startle her manager into starring her. It seems a great deal depended on that frightful scream and she kept at it every chance she got." Here the girls threatened to outdo the "lady of the scream," but rough walking checked the attempts. They also realized her fate. "But how did she get the chance to go up in Lenox attic?" asked Dozia when her voice could be heard. "As I suppose it was she who ripped out that terrifying yell---" "That I rang the fire bell to cover," put in Sally gleefully. "And that the fire department wanted to turn the hose on," chimed in Judith. "Now let me tell it," demanded Shirley. "Please do," insisted Jane. "Well, she had more than a scream to put in her important part, so she said! She had also to do some wild acting and Dol Vin is responsible for the idea of Madam Zwachevsky---" "Oh, spare us," cried Jane. "That sounds like an epidemic." "It's the name she wastes ink on, but I will spare you girls. Hereafter she shall be Madam Z," agreed Shirley. "Oh, hurry! Shirley," entreated Dozia. "Here we are at the Cedars, and we never could wait for the rest of that story until after supper." "I'll rush it through, but Sally, do stop pinching me," she teased, just to make Sally run on ahead in contradiction. "Well, Dol Vin didn't want that racket around her shop, so I suppose she told Madam Z to try it on Lenox," continued the raconteur. "They both insisted it would be a wonderful hazing stunt, and that no college freshman's life was complete without a lively ghost scare. I didn't think it would be more than a lot of fun, so I promised not to tell," admitted Shirley. They were at the very gate now where the girls had no choice but to separate in preparation for the evening meal, but it was wonderful how quickly the food was disposed of and how soon they were back again in Jane's room for the conclusion of the ghost story. Jane and Judith could not but notice satisfaction glowing in the freshmen's manner when they were invited into the junior's room. This had been one of Shirley's ambitions, and she did not hide her pleasure at its fulfillment. And if she and Sally felt any qualms of conscience for their own small part in the tragedy of Madam Zeit was entirely covered by the eagerness with which the girls hailed the recital. "We both insisted at first that she should not dare come on the campus---" began Sally. "Now, Kitten, I'll take all the blame," interrupted Bobbie. "Land knows, you made fuss enough. Cried---" "Oh please---" "Well, you did," insisted Bobbie, "even went into hysterics. But I thought it would be a lark, although really I had no idea the creature would ever find her way up there. I don't see how she did. We had no part in her getting in," she explained eagerly. "Dol Vin knew all about the attic," declared Janet Clarke. "She was always prowling about there for theatrical stuff; don't you remember, Jane, how she frightened the girls one night with some foolish prank when she was dressed like a bear or something worse?" "Oh, yes, of course I do," recalled Jane. "And she did continually hunt around Lenox, although she belonged with the sophs." "That accounts for it then," finished Bobbie. "I am willing to confess that I conspired to hide the crime, but I took no part in planning it. Little Kitten almost died of fright during the whole thing, but I thought it a lot of fun to hear the chains rattle, and I hunted up stories to match. But I was not in Lenox the night of the grand finale when she actually tried out the big scream." "Well, no wonder the poor babes were scared blue," said Judith. "And Jane, you can now tell all about your discovery of the old dumb- waiter under the tower. That will make the story complete." "Don't let any more girls in here," ordered Dozia, for knocking at the door gave warning of an influx. "There is no need to give everyone this private hearing. We might want to make a real story of it for the 'Blare'--our holiday edition just needs a live feature like this." So the taps were "deflected" and Jane recounted her story. She told it so graphically that by the time she reached the "big, black hole, and the groaning ropes of the old dummy" the girls were howling and tumbling around in a pretty good imitation of Madam Z herself. They shuddered, acted the spook, and Judith proclaimed something like the old "Curfew shall not" in her swing out the window that she imagined went with the wild night's terrors. This detail of Judith's upset things some, for she fell off the couch (her pedestal for the tragic act), and although she rebounded quickly there were squeals and protests from "toes and fingers." Sally's eyes were like two twinkling blue stars during all this. Jane and Judith, more than any of the others, guessed correctly what a relief this hour of fun had brought to her tortured mind. And to think there was no blame, not even criticism! What is there more delightfully elastic than the mind and the heart of the young college girl? "And I'll tell you how this same lady induced me to put on those foolish togs and hire the friskiest horse at Clayton's," further volunteered Shirley. She evidently thought if that much had been good a lot more would be a lot better. So she allowed herself to rock a little in Jane's cozy chair while she told of a bet--yes, she had actually fallen so low--she did bet five dollars that she could ride any horse in that stable. Again the girls applauded--there was danger now in their generous approval. "And so I could have done it safely if old Zeezie had kept to the roads. But she wanted to show off on the hill in front of Warburton Hall," flared Shirley, "and you all know how I made out at that." Howls, groans and wails answered this. "And what happened to the five?" asked practical Dozia. "She never had the courage to collect," replied Shirley, and Jane then felt the obligation of quickly shifting the subject, for just a hint of gloom crossed the country girl's face at this point. "But what about this last episode?" asked Jane. "How do you suppose Zeezie came into Sour Sandy's clutches?" "I know how that happened," spoke up Sally, doing her part to relieve Shirley of the embarrassment that seized her at mention of her accident. "This so-called actress is really not right mentally. I know it, but, as Bobbie says, she has lots of money, so of course- -" "Dol Vin snapped her up," said Judith. "Yes, and you know the Rumson place? That old stone mansion right in the heart of the country folks settlement?" (They all knew the Rumson.) "Well, I believe she has been going out there every afternoon to rehearse. She would drive out in a hired car and dismiss the man. Then she raved around and did so much loud talking to herself, and even screaming, that the whole neighborhood was up in arms. I heard the other day the folks around Rumson had called on the police to stop the nuisance." "No wonder they would," agreed Jane. "The children must have been frightened out of their senses." "They were," went on Sally. "So I suppose old Sandy just set his trap for her--" "And snapped it tonight," concluded Jane. "Well, I must say she was a character. And to think we all missed the open air performance!" "And to think you and I let her escape from Lenox, Jane, the night of the alarm." "What a shame we didn't know she was making her exit by way of the dummy?" "But in that awful dark place," put in Janet with an appropriate shudder. "Oh, she was just armed to the eyes with flash lights," Shirley told them. "I never saw such an outfit as that tragedy queen sported." "Oh, woe is us!" cried out Judith, so loudly that a pair of hands, one from Jane, the other from Janet, was clapped over the unruly mouth. When she promised to speak lower she was allowed to proceed. "But think of missing the court room scene! I am sure she went through a Lady Macbeth act and tried to stab poor old Sour Sandy!" Again the spontaneity of Dozia illustrated the talk, and she made a jab at Jane with the latter's riding crop. "And then think of the fun of actually hearing her give the famous screech as exhibit A?" put in Jane. "What a pity they made the hearing private?" "I'll explain that," condescended Janet, who, having no story to tell, needed some outlet. "You see, they arrest people here in Bingham just to keep things going, and have the officers do something besides draw their pay envelopes, so Sandy took in Zeezie as his quota of service for December." "And I suppose I filled that requirement for November," recalled Judith, with a disdainful pucker. "Take care YOU are not listed next, Dozia," warned Janet. "You do talk very loud at times. Woke me up last night." Shirley arose and glanced at the little gilt clock. "I guess we little 'uns will have to cut this lovely party," she said politely. "We really have a lot of things to do tonight. And who hasn't for the dance?" "We will walk over with you," volunteered Jane. "Judy and I always take a stroll before we start cramming." "Which is just about equivalent to saying we may vamoose," said Dozia. "All right, stroll along, the ghost is safe tonight, at any rate." "And if she gets off with a fine I suppose she will be on a train for New York before morning," concluded Sally, with a satisfied quirk of her yellow head. Outside the hall Shirley and Sally almost smothered Jane with protestations. "I thought I would die!" cried Shirley, "but the steely fire of your eyes, Miss Allen, kept urging me on. And now I have at least told all that hateful story!" "I could hardly sit still," gasped Sally, holding tightly to Jane's friendly arm. "It was like a play, but I was so ashamed--" "Ashamed! I was never more proud of two girls in all my life," declared resourceful Jane, with unmistakable sincerity. "Why, you both had the girls fascinated--" "You had them hypnotized," insisted Sally. "It is really wonderful to be popular among such a set of girls," and her voice just touched a tone of regret. "Indeed, we all have to share honors with you two entertainers," said Jane positively. "You see, the girls first of all want a good time, and if you help provide that legitimately, of course, you can count on polling a heavy vote in any popularity contest." "Jane Allen is no monopolist," said Judith significantly. It was obvious Jane was determined to share honors with the two bewildered freshmen. That was her way of making things pleasant. "Now run along and get your togs ready for the dance," said Jane, "and be sure to give me a lot of dances with Teddy!" "Teddie!" sang out the two freshmen. "Why yes, your nice brother, Ted," said Judith innocently. "We heard he was coming--" "And we found a piece of paper long ago," added Jane gently, "that bore the name Ted. It was in the attic, and we dug it out of the ghost's breastplate." "You didn't!" exclaimed Shirley, in a tone that meant "You don't say so!" She stopped short in her tracks. "And that was the letter we never got, Kitten. Zeezie had been entrusted to deliver it and she claimed she lost it." Shirley could hardly speak distinctly--emotion seemed to choke her. "Oh, can we have it?" asked Sally, her trembling lips telling on the jerky sentence. "Right here," replied Jane indifferently, taking a small white slip from her blouse. "I have wanted so much to give it to you, but there never seemed to be a real opportunity." It was Sally who put out her hand. "I think it is for Shirley," interposed Jane. "Give it to Kitten," said Shirley. "We have no secrets from each other now." "But Ted and the dance?" asked Judith, not to be put off on that score. "Oh," faltered Sally. "Of course we will hand Ted around." She had not quite recovered from her surprise at the finding of the long lost letter. "And, Miss Allen, please, whatever happens, don't let anything spoil tonight--" "I won't, certainly not," replied Jane, as the freshmen broke away towards Lenox. CHAPTER XXIII THE DANCE The night of the dance had come, than which Wellington could produce no more momentous occasion. For days the students had been decorating Old Warburton Hall, stripping their own rooms to the point of desolation to pile their banners, their flags, and even their mandolins around the big hall, in artistic and effective settings from ceiling to the smallest nook around the chimney corner windows. Judith and Jane were responsible for the "Bosky Dell" created around the Inglenook. Here the mandolins were cluttered, and about the walls were such artistic woodiness as branches of bright red berries, then sprays of dark gray bayberry, glowing sumac, deep brown oak leaves, and this applied foliage provided the "Bosky" for the juniors' pretty dell. All college departments shared the honors of decorating, each depending upon its originality to outshine the others, so that now when all was finished and the students drew apart to decorate themselves the atmosphere fairly vibrated with expectancy. Under the eaves in Sally's room she and Bobbie were putting on finishing touches. Too full of youth to give place to regret, these two freshmen were keyed to the full pitch of the big, jolly, gleeful occasion. "Can you imagine us going, and bound for such a good time?" said Sally, while Bobbie fluffed the maline butterfly from her companion's shoulders. "Like a jolly time at a funeral," replied the other, her tone of voice softening the comparison. "Dear me, must we really leave?" sighed Sally. "I have been hoping for a miracle." "So have I, Kitten, but we have had a couple of miracles lately and it wouldn't be fair to overwork the fairies. There, you look just like a golden butterfly. Oh, really, Kit, you--are--a dream!" Bobbie was responsible for the color scheme adopted by her chum, and its success was just now rather inadequately reflected in the conventional mirror that formed a door to the narrow wardrobe. Sally was gowned in gold and white, and the gold of her hair completed the "dream." A big yellow butterfly she was indeed, with the sleazy, clinging, white draperies wound around her slender form, then the wings of golden maline pinioned on either softly rounded shoulder. Sally was a perfect little beauty, and also possessed that whimsical manner so attractive in this delicate, fragile type. "How do I look, anyhow?" asked Bobbie, and the "anyhow" betrayed her hopelessness. "Don't you really know you are stunning?" replied Sally. "Bobbie, your height and figure are in such splendid accord with that American Beauty! Whew, girl! I can see who shall charm the partners tonight." "Do I honestly look--well?" persisted the other. "I wish my hair were long enough to turn up." "I don't. It is so becoming in that halo just as round as a crown, and more curly every minute. If all misfortunes really have their compensations, then, Bobbie, put down the curls opposite your accident." The big girl peered closer to the mirror. She never could be vain but just now she might be pardoned a flicker of satisfaction. She did look well, the American Beauty satin made such a startling background for her peculiarly true American type. "Now, if we are all primped and preened, suppose we rehearse," said Bobbie, powdering the last finger of her left hand to a finish. "You are sure Ted has his lesson all clear and that our--masquerade will not be spoiled?" "He was just wild about the lark, and wrote a whole page of effusions such as boys always indulge in," replied Sally. "He says he may stick to Barrett for a name, it has such a twangy sound, whatever that may mean; and he also promised to be led by us even to the extent of breaking his own gay heart." "Nice boy. I hope our little skit won't spoil his fun. It is just for that, you know, little chum, I have agreed to postpone my flight. But be sure of one thing--I shall fly before I ever face that wonderful crowd of girls we were with last night, after the discovery." "Does it all seem so hideous still?" asked Sally. "I have felt as if some of the black horror were wearing off." "Mine is turning green--a dark, dark moldy green of envy. Why didn't I know four months ago just a few of the precious things I see so vividly now?" Bobbie sat down at the risk of spoiling some of her preening. Also she ruffed her long (now well cared for) fingers through her short hair with distracting indifference, but not a ringlet showed any ill effects, each fell back on her broad, low forehead in its original place, without a kink of disorder in the line. "I have learned more than the Wellington course offered," said Sally, "and one thing I am now sure of. Our small towns may offer advantages in freedom and security, but they restrict us in a choice of friends and companions. How could we possibly have guessed that the very girl and her group we expected to antagonize should be our deliverers?" "I don't quite get your flow of words, Kitten, but I do agree with their meaning. Yes, small towns can turn out gigantic specimens of conceited ego. And that conceit is like a paraffine coating; air tight against personal progress, absorbent for the poisons of jealousy and envy. There, that sounds as if I have learned a little English, doesn't it? But it isn't enough to face Miss Robert's exams." "It's after eight. There are the girls slamming doors in the first jazz number," said Sally. "Come along, Bobbie, and smile your warmest. Then we shall defy fate for a few more happy hours at least." Swallowed up immediately in the swirl of young students heading for the dance "Kitten and Bobbie" were presently on the high road to defying fate as per schedule. The music from the dance room was just feeling its way out of brilliantly lighted windows, and the grand old campus seemed very proud of itself indeed, as it stretched out and made a background for the entire picture. Flocks of automobiles were nestling along the drives, and many a Wellington heart skipped its regular beat at the preliminary thought: "I wonder if he came yet?" From companion colleges the boys were making their way into old Wellington, and the students of Yorktown were apt to be especially plentiful. It was from this big college that Ted Barrett--alias Ted- -somebody's brother, was expected. In contrast to the usual line for receiving, such as so often makes a farce of the formal social event, the seniors and juniors had formed themselves into a ring that surrounded the entrance, and through this ring each guest was forced to pass in at one end and out at the other in initiation to Wellington. Jane was chosen to form one "clasp" of the circlet, with two tall seniors at her side. She gave the welcoming pass-word for the juniors, and in her hand clasp delivered the secret sign. As the girls from Lenox entered, the eyes of our two special friends immediately sought out Jane. Not even the possible presence of Teddy offered a distraction, for it seemed now as if their fate rested more fully than ever in the hands of the girl whose father had given them the much abused scholarship. "How sweet!" breathed Sally. "Like a pansy." "Exactly," answered Shirley. "Did you ever see anything prettier?" Jane's appearance supported this flattery in every detail. She wore a flowered frock, georgette with pansies sprinkled over it, and in her coppery hair a small bunch of the same velvet flowers was clustered. Among all the others this flowered gown seemed distinctive, although Dozia in her ruffles (to cut her height), and Judith in her sea foam green (to give her color), were indeed highly attractive. The indescribable jazz music was see-sawing in and out of harmony, and if there were anything actually shy on the score it was more than plentifully supplied by the "ukes," mandolins and banjos of the visiting college boys. Sally and Shirley had scarcely crossed the circle and were melting into the crowd, when someone tapped Sally on the shoulder. "Teddy!" exclaimed both girls at once. "The same, your obedient coz," replied the good looking young fellow, eager to show at once how well he had learned his lesson. "Come over here," breathed Sally. "I am just dying to speak to you." "No fair," cautioned Shirley. "Don't forget your lines, Kit." "Say, girls, tell me," implored the youth, letting his critical eye scale the crowd of pretty girls, "what's this your name is? You're--" to Sally. "I'm Sally," she replied, twinkling prettily, "and this is Shirley," indicating Bobbie. "Shirley?" he echoed increduously. "Yes, and please don't ask any more questions just now, Cousin Ted. I have promised to introduce you to half of Wellington." This was said so that more than one girl standing near overheard; one was Nettie Brocton and she quickly took the cue. "Just look at that?" she said to Ted Guthrie. "Sally acts as if the Teddy were her especial cousin." "Yes, and Shirley is all but blushing." "Queer," commented Ted Guthrie. Presently the music suggested a One Step and without waiting for further coaxing Shirley and the handsome Ted floated out among the assembling dancers. He was handsome, and, although that fact seems trite just here, it may better be known and reckoned with. He was tall, light, nimble and flexible as a young birch, as he swayed in and out leading the excited Bobbie. "Guess I'll have to call you Bobbie, too," he said in his partner's ear, after more than one girl had pointedly called out, "Hello, Bobbie!" "Yes, do, please," replied Bobbie. "I am getting so accustomed to it I rather feel it is really mine." "Suits you splendidly," said Ted, with a boy's idea of compliments being put on thick at dances. "And I am sure I would give the game away if I ever tried on the Shirley." Bobbie acquiesced just in time to feel Judith Stearns' black eyes demanding to know Teddy. The dancers stopped, and after an introduction Bobbie was swept off her feet by a new partner, while Judith glided off with Teddy. "Where is Sally?" asked Judith, not seeing the little butterfly on the floor. "Sally?" repeated the bewildered Ted. Then he recovered himself. "Oh, yes, Cousin Sally. She's just over there," pointing to Jane's "Bosky Dell" in a far corner. "Your cousin?" repeated the shrewd Judith. "Yes, little coz, I allus calls her," he lisped, to cover any possible attempt at piercing his disguise. "But she said she was not related to Bobbie?" persisted the irrepressible Judith. "She isn't," frankly offered Ted. "She is only related to me. Oh, I say, Miss Stearns," he broke off. "Who's the golden girl over by the punch bowl?" "I knew it," trilled Judith. "No one could possibly miss her. She's Jane Allen." "Jane Allen!" he almost interrupted. "She whose pater is a benefactor of Wellington?" "Yes, the only Jane," answered Judith glibly. "Come over and meet her. I know you will like her even better on acquaintance. I don't mind being generous, for Jane and I started together here, and from present appearances we seem liable to end it together." While she spoke they had ceased dancing, and Judith fancied she just caught a look of question on the young man's face. This coupled with his inquiry about Jane's father, Judith at once assigned to his knowledge of the scholarship Bobbie had obtained. But even that was not just a correct guess, and it seemed the actual presence of this good looking boy from Yorktown threatened to add new complications to those already surrounding the mysterious freshmen. Both reached Jane's side as Judith and her partner came up. Judith presented the much talked of "lovely Ted" and perhaps a part of Jane's ebullition was attributable to the code shot out from Judith's flashing eyes. It said plainly: "Now isn't he lovely? I told you so!" While Jane remembered her own wish: "I hope he's big, clumsy, ugly, etc.," and of course he wasn't. He claimed the dance and presently swept the Golden Girl from her place in the little circle. "Your cousin?" questioned Judith with a very comprehensive smile. "Bobbie, I never saw a girl blush as you did when a coz whispered into her dancing ear." Wise, discerning Judith! Bobbie blushed again, but she was not going to be tricked into telling her secret. Her eyes flickered until they rested on Nettie Brocton. "I must ask Net for a dance," she said. "I suppose it is perfectly proper for a mere freshie to do so?" "Absolutely," replied Judith, "but you are not slighting me?" "Not for worlds, Judy. May I have the next?" "What's your hurry just now Bobbie? Trying to duck me?" But a sly glance of challenge gave Judith answer, as Bobbie hurried away to dance with Nettie Brocton. CHAPTER XXIV KING PIN OF THE FRESHIES Music and laughter, youth and happiness! What a splendid affair the dance turned out to be! Even the staid faculty, acting as patronesses, looked on with generous smiles of absolute approval. As if to add to the gentle flame of curiosity in Jane's circles, she accepted a number of dances from Teddy--in fact the big fanciful "T" which Jane remembered so well in the spook letter, was scribbled all over her dancing card, while Judith accepted Ray Mann, a chum of Ted's, in complacent substitution. Ray was a capital fellow, with such a stock of chestnut hair he might have matched up pretty well with Bobbie, if her spare time had not been so filled in with Dave Jordan, also a "Yorktown man." Wellington had a reputation for this one big social event, the invitations for which were always censored by a committee of the officials, each boy accepted being socially vouched for by the patronesses. This was as near as the old college would go to co-ed functions, and perhaps the fact that these young girls were always left to themselves for good times (except at the big dance) gave added zest and novelty to the pre-holiday event. All went merrily indeed, except that Jane was almost lost in bewilderment before she and Teddie had finished out two dances (halves) and one "sitting out" in the Bosky Dell. Who was this boy's relation? she wanted to know. And why did Sally so promptly surrender him to all other partners? Sally danced so gracefully, and they seemed to step together as dancers do who have learned at the same functions, yet she did surrender him willingly. Jane dragged Judith out of the din, and after fortifying herself and her chum with two drinks of fruit punch, she dragged her further into semi-seclusion in the cloak room. "What do you make of it?" asked Judith fairly twittering with suppressed excitement. "That is what I wanted to ask you," replied Jane, swirling her scarf over her shoulders to tame down a frolicsome little breeze that danced to the jazz music stealing in the cloak room. "There is a positive mystery about all this. Can't you see how much Ted Barrett looks like Sally Howland?" "Of course I can," replied Judith. "But surely that letter said 'sister' and was written to Shirley." "And he is not in any way like Bobbie." "No, and Bobbie is as shy as a baby when speaking with him." Jane bit her lip in serious reflection. "But isn't he very nice?" "Lovely manners and a very takable boy," admitted Jane. "And say, Judy, I love this mystery, but we can't let the freshies beat us at it. Be sure you keep your eyes and ears open and report anything-- suspicious." "Glad to," Judith accepted the commission. "But don't you like my Ray?" "Couldn't help it," said Jane affably. "Of the two boys I like Ray's hair best. It's so--smoky." "And Jane! Have you seen who Dozia is lugging around? That awfully big boy, the football giant of Yorktown." "Makes Doze look small by comparison, and that's an achievement," said Jane. "There's my dance with Nettie Brocton. It would be dreadful if we forgot to take care of our own little playmates. Isn't everything going lovely?" "Nothing could be improved upon unless it be Miss Robert's hair. That's a bit lopsided." "But her feather fan is a gem," said Jane, moving toward the dance floor. "So is her back comb," laughed Judith, as the chums drifted apart among the dancers. A waltz encore was just then being demanded. The dancers stood about clapping and insisting upon a repetition of the number. Jane and Judith waited a moment before their partners espied them, and as they lingered they heard the girls commenting on Sally. She was, indeed, a charming figure as she stood out there with her partner, who happened to be Ted; and it was Inez Wilson who most particularly noticed the two dancers in the center of the floor. She seized Jane's hand and whispered: "Oh, Jane, just see how much Sally looks like her partner!" "Yes," put in Janet Clarke, "they even have the same pose." "Cousins," said Jane simply, as she and Nettie swung out into the repeated waltz. The resemblance was very remarkable and standing with the tall boy in his "Tux" the girl in her butterfly gown made quite a charming little picture. Their isolation at the moment, standing well out on the floor almost alone at the end of the "first half," gave them somewhat undue prominence, but it also gave everyone a splendid opportunity of seeing Ted and of admiring Sally's evening frock. When the number ended a group of freshmen cornered themselves in a window arch and promptly set about whispering some plans. Nellie Saunders was leading, and she declared Sally was the one to make the presentation. Presently a committee of seniors joined them, and the purpose of the secret session became evident. Miss Rutledge, dean of Wellington and beloved mother of the entire flock, was to be presented with a glorious bouquet of golden chrysanthemums and Sally Howland, the pet freshman, had been voted by her class the one to do the public honors. "Where is she?" asked Anne Morley, the senior, waiting to complete the details. "Just finished dancing," volunteered Nellie. "I'll go get her." "When the orchestra plays 'Wellington,' that's your cue," said Miss Morley. "The senior class president will make her speech and you freshmen then send up the flowers. Be sure you do it promptly, as the speech has the flowers planted in it," finished the tall, capable senior, leaving the younger girls to carry out her orders. Nellie was back with Sally immediately. "Here she is, and doesn't her gown go wonderfully with the golden ball chrysanthemums?" panted Nellie. "Just like a picture," exclaimed Dolly Lloyd. "Be sure you carry them like a bride's-maid, Sally. Maybe a long time before you get another chance." "But what is this all about?" gasped Sally, a little bit frightened at the importance of the great sheaf of yellow blooms propped up in the corner. "You are to present the flowers to Deanie," said Nellie. "You see, the girls always give her something at this dance, and they choose the freshies just to act in the capacity of page. You don't have to say a word," as Sally showed reticence. "A senior makes a speech and you just walk up prettily with this corn shock." "Oh, girls, I couldn't," exclaimed Sally tragically. "You couldn't! Why not?" came a chorus. "Because--oh, I can't just explain, but won't you please excuse me?" "No, indeed we will not," declared Nellie. "Just another touch of that timidity we fought out when you first came. This is an honor, Sally, and we know whom to choose for it. We know how you stand in the half year's record," and she proceeded to straighten out the maline butterfly on Sally's shoulders--no one could seem to resist that temptation. "I do appreciate the honor," faltered Sally, "but there is a reason- -a serious reason why I feel I should decline." "Wait a minute! I'll persuade her," said Dolly, and in the time specified she was back in the corner again and had Jane with her. "She simply has got to deliver those flowers," explained Nellie. "She matches as if she were dressed for the part. See her yellow head, her yellow and white gown, the dear little golden slippers; then the great huge, gigantic bunch of chrysis--we all chipped in for those--" "Miss Allen, please let me off," begged Sally, turning two blue eyes, overflowing with meaning, full on Jane. "I cannot go back on a sorority order," said Jane, wondering why she should. "There's your cue, and Sally, here are the flowers. Bun along, little girl. There's a dear." Sally was "running along" in the freshmen's glide, almost hidden behind the shock of golden balls, before she could further protest. "Wellington, dear Wellington!" finished the chorus; and then the senior who was on the little platform by the orchestra, called the dean forward and in "a few well chosen words" told Miss Rutledge how much every girl in college loved her. Dear, gentle, beloved Miss Rutledge! Her cameo beauty was not lost even in that group of glowing students. She wore her stately heliotrope brocade, and her perfectly white wavy hair just framed a face soft as damask, with enough natural warmth of color to defy any record of years. Sally glided along with the bouquet, while the dean spoke softly, gently, in that strangely far-reaching voice peculiar to those who train for such concentration. Directly Sally placed the flowers in her extended hands applause broke loose. What music can compete with the simple inspiration of hand clapping? And these students knew that score in jazz perfectly. Finally, Sally turned back again in the little aisle made for her through the assemblage, and before she had proceeded more than a few paces Bobbie rescued her. "Kitten!" she whispered, putting her strong arms about the now trembling Sally. "How perfectly lovely! Here's Ted. He is too excited to speak. I have just been trying to restore him." "King Pin of the Freshies!" Ted managed to orate, seizing Sally's hand in congratulation. "That stunt is something we fellows miss. If it were our old 'Shuffles' now, likely we would treat him to a soft little ball on his renowned pate." "King Pin of the Freshies!" took up Bobbie. "Splendid! I'll tell Nellie that and she can chime it in her new class song. Here they are claiming you, Kitten. Come on and see what's doing in the rear. Boys"--to Teddy--"not allowed." "Never are when there's anything good in sight," replied Ted pleasantly. "Where's that pretty girl--my dance--oh, here she is," and he seized Judith for the Drop Step just being inaugurated. In another hour--how short a time it seemed--the dance was over. University boys were piling into their cars, and the girls of Wellington would presently be back again in that cozy, if limited, little world, all their very own. What a glorious success it had been! Even the night was perfect, and now at the happy shouting of "good-byes" the stars blinked down mischievously, and a busy old moon took time from his science to send out a couple of searchlight flashes to greet youth on its merry way. Ted "Barrett" was saying good-bye to Jane. He made opportunity for this, although his companions were honking their horn recklessly, bidding him "come now or stay as long as he pleased." "Miss Allen," said the Yorktown boy, "I can't help telling you personally how fine this has been. To have--the girls here, I know is due to your--special generosity, and some day I hope I'll have a chance to tell you what it has meant to me. Just now," he smiled broadly, "those freshies have me bound in their riddle game and I can't talk intelligently; tongue-tied," he finished. "I understand," spoke up Jane, smiling herself. "They are a wonderful team--and I am much interested in both." "So am I," called out the chivalrous Ted, as he answered an ear- splitting honk from his chums and rushed out to the big waiting car. Sally and Shirley were at the steps to see him off, and now Jane joined them. Ted tossed back a freshman's cap, snatched from the head of a luckless "stude" who must go all the way to Yorktown uncapped. He threw the "inkspot" out high in the air, and as it came down, somehow it managed to come within reach of Jane's outstretched palm. Promptly she donned it, of course, and the trophy instantly became an object of excited interest among the retiring dancers. It was only a very small black cloth cap, and a poor freshman was now going home with his inadequate hand on a cold head in lieu of it, but somehow when Jane stuck it on the wall between two Wellington pennants, the juniors' and freshmen's, it seemed a symbol of her mystic relationship with the girl who carried the Allen scholarship. "I'll leave it here until we can clean up," she said looking affectionately at the small black spot on the wall. "Then, of course, it goes to my room." "Of course," echoed Judith dolefully. "I suppose the ownership of that puts you in a Yorktown frat." "Hardly, but it will be a little souvenir of this wonderful night." Both Sally and Bobbie were beside her now. Their cheeks blazed still with excitement, and eyes continued the dance even now echoing through those beam-bedecked walls. "Wasn't it wonderful?" exclaimed Sally. "I never thought I could have such a perfect time," sighed Bobbie. "That's Wellington," commented Jane loyally. "We do everything just right under that banner," and picking up her little party bag she was ready to leave for sleeping quarters. "And do you know what Ted called Kitten when she came down from presenting the flowers?" teased Bobbie. "What?" asked Jane merrily. "King Pin of the Freshies!" replied Bobbie. "Doesn't that sound like a class yell?" "I hope it will be some day," said Jane. But Sally's blue eyes were proclaiming something--something far removed from the honor and glory promised by her junior sponsor. And even Bobbie's insistent joking could not dispel that strange foreboding. "Sally!" charged Jane, noting her sudden preoccupating, "are you seeing things?" "Why?" A flush suffused the face just showing the tell-tale lines of fatigue. "I sometimes think you two girls are base deceivers," Jane joked. "You change your cast of countenance as quickly as--" "Now Janie, you leave our little star alone," ordered Judith. "Seems to me any girl would be flustered after a first night of this kind." "Of course," dimpled Jane. "Here, children, please take these things. I will be held responsible for them and there's no telling who might take a notion to cover her couch with that lovely silk scarf." They gathered up the precious trophies, flags and scarfs. Then the lights were out at last. CHAPTER XXV THE DAY AFTER THE BIG NIGHT. The flush of success invaded old Wellington. As a whole the place seemed suffused with a pardonable pride, and as individuals each girl seemed justly proud of the small part she played in making up that grand total. Even the big city papers sent out reporters to get a "good story" of the mid-year dance, and more than one scribe waylaid the popular girls, pleading for pictures. Judith Stearns, as sub-editor of the Blare, the college paper, had a part in giving out this general publicity, and what a joy it was to describe the gowns of Jane, Bobbie, Doze and lists of others! Jane was busy dismantling the dance room--the big assembly room in Warburton--and no classes were to be called for any work during the morning, so that conditions and students might just slide back into orderliness and thence to the serious work of finishing the last semester. Party dresses were packed away by reluctant hands, boxes tied up and labelled hopefully for the next dance, while heads that had been curled for the big occasion bore testimony to the skill of many willing fingers (not a few of the fingers bearing blisters to still further testify to such achievements), and altogether the atmosphere was distinctly and decidedly that of the small day after the big night before. Sally was ruefully tieing up her finery in rather compressed packages and Bobbie was begging her not to spoil the stuff outright. "Don't act so suicidal, Kitten. Be brave today for tomorrow we fly!" she misquoted. "I can't see how you can joke about it," whimpered Sally, bruising her fingers with a jerk at too strong a piece of bundle cord. "Really, Bobbie, if I ever dreamed it would be as hard as this to go, I don't believe anything would have induced me to come." She bit her bruised finger as well as her trembling lip. "You don't mean that, Kitten," drawled the indifferent Bobbie, who had agreed to help pack, although she much preferred "firing things in trunks" and utilizing packing time out of doors. "You would never have known the fun we have had here, if you hadn't come, and isn't it heaps better to pay now than never to have known it?" "Nothing seems better now--everything is worse, coal black, pitch dark, bitter, worse," snapped the usually complaisant Sally. "If I had your talent, wild horses couldn't drag me from Wellington," said Bobbie seriously. "And I do hope, little Kitten, that I am not wholly to blame for your unhappy predicament," her voice dropped to seriousness. "Now, Bobbie," and the good-natured little Sally smiled through, "never forget that you really made it possible for me to come here, and that you--" "Now, that's enough, Kitten. If you start going back we shall find ourselves in each other's arms with awfully red eyes--first thing you know. I still think the miracle will save you, but poor me!" and she affected a most juvenile boohoo. "I am surely doomed." "Why don't you try it, Bobbie? You might get through--" "Not in a thousand years. And suppose I did, where would it land me?" "In your proper place, in class, of course." "And have every one know--I couldn't, Kitten. I talk bravely, but I'm a rank coward at heart. There, the boxes are tied, I hope to your satisfaction, and it's sweet of you to do the tags. No one would be able to read the addresses if I wrote them. Oh, me, oh, my! somehow today reminds me of old Polly Jenkins' funeral. Her abandoned bedroom looked just about like this," surveying the disorder of the little room under the eaves. "Well, you run along and attend to the outside errands; I must hide the evidences of our flight," said Sally, with something between a laugh and a sigh. "You may pay all my bills, just say we want to settle things so we can run off home when the holiday is proclaimed, then, if you don't mind, just hand this music to Dolly Lloyd." "Couldn't I kiss a few of the girls for you so as to save time later?" asked Bobbie in naive sarcasm. "I am so sentimental today I could hug the very old trees, I do believe. All right, little sister, I'll go out and do the financial chores, but my head and my heart are still at the dance," and she hummed herself out with a feeble dance step--to do the aforesaid chores. Left alone the blonde little freshman dropped her hands in her lap and ceased her nervous activity. "Really going!" she kept thinking, "and I thought the half year would be endless in its days and hours!" A newly painted calendar- sample just finished by Nellie Saunders and offered as a model for Christmas gifts--focused the girl's attention. How dainty, yet how rugged the deft bit of water color! Trees and landscape all melting into that big flourish "W" for Wellington! It seemed like that; everything attractive just now was blended into the college opportunities, and Sally was about to turn her back on them, for what? The housemaid tapped at her door and announced a caller. Hurriedly gathering up trifles to put the room in a semblance of order, she hurried down to the reception room, there to confront Dolorez Vincez! "Oh, good morning," said Sally, trying to cover her surprise. "Bobbie has just gone out." "I met her," replied the visitor, without returning the salutation. "But I would like a few words with you--if we could be alone." Sally glanced about at the open doors and continually flapping draperies: whatever Dol Vin had to say could certainly not be said in that public room. A coat tree at the door held Sally's tam and Mackinaw. She got into these and suggested a walk outside. There was no denying it, Dol Vin was a striking looking girl, and even her flashy clothes could not altogether disguise her rather handsome foreign type. Today she wore a big black velvet tam jabbed rakishly on her black head, a flame colored coat that buttoned around her tight as a toboggan ulster, and only the deep olive tint of her face in any way withheld the eye from a criticism of "too much color." Today Dol's cheeks were not tinted, and the way her deep set black eyes flashed, further told how angry she was, and how reckless. Scarcely had the girls from Lenox gone far enough to be out of hearing than she started in on helpless little Sally. "What are you two thinking of?" she demanded angrily. "Do you think you can kick out and leave me without warning? Don't you know how short I am--" "Miss Vincez," interrupted Sally, "I don't see what possible claim you have on either of us. The fact is we both feel you have very much overworked your alleged claim as it is." "Oh, you do!" and she gripped Sally's arm viciously. "Well, I'll just tell you, sissy, I fixed it so you both could get in here." (Sally pried her arm loose and kept at a safe distance.) "I helped you along, played all your tricks--" "Stop, please," demanded Sally indignantly. "You know perfectly well it was against any wish of ours that you brought that crazy creature in here to frighten the girls sick in the name of sport, hazing," declared Sally, her voice rising at each word. "And then, you turned the same foolish creature loose to frighten all the other children who might hear her wild voice. How can you dare say to me that such a trick was ever countenanced by us?" "Oh, my, really!" sneered the foreigner. "How we have grown! Please don't bite me with your sharp tongue. As you say, yes, I did turn her loose, and do you know that now she has been sent away? Put in a hospital! Bah! It is in an asylum for the crazy" (Dol was very foreign now), "where the state, this great big powerful state, shall take all that poor harmless woman's money! Could I not allow her to live a little when she paid me? But they will kill her and get paid for the murder! That's the way they treat the poor crazy folks in their big stone prisons!" she alleged angrily. "She has been declared insane?" "Declared insane!" she mocked. "You call it that? Yes, I call it kidnapped, and poor old Zola was so harmless if they would but let her scream and play at acting." Sally was dumbfounded. The woman who had played ghost was really a lunatic, and this unprincipled adventuress had dared allow her to get into a place like Lenox, and to go about the countryside without restraint! Sally felt almost sick at the thought, and having walked the full length of the hedge-rows she attempted to end the unpleasant interview. "If you will excuse me--" she began feebly. "But I shall not," almost shouted the angry South American. "I know what this place can do! I know how your spiteful Jane Allen and her chums got me out--" "Stop!" cried Sally sharply. "Jane Allen is my friend, and I will not hear her spoken of in that manner." "Your friend!" and she sneered like some animal snorting. "She may make of you a cat's paw to play at her feet, but she shall never be your friend. If she just knows what you are--" But Sally turned and deliberately fled from her persecutor. She could no longer stand the tirade, and nothing that she seemed able to do or say had any softening effect upon the angry young woman. Suppose she did meet some of the girls and attempt to tell what she knew of Sally's secret? Would anyone stand by and listen? Was not this expelled pupil actually trespassing even to be upon Wellington grounds? It was getting close to the noon hour and studies were to be resumed after the luncheon period. Students who had taken advantage of the morning recess to be out at some favorite sports were now returning in flocks, and Sally quickened her steps to reach Lenox before the rush of late comers. She turned just once to see if Dolorez was going through the grounds to leave at the opposite gate, but the blazing red coat was not in sight. "She probably knows some other way of leaving," thought Sally, recalling the uncanny knowledge of the campus secrets that had been responsible for the entrance of the eccentric Madam Z--. In the hall Sally met a very much excited Bobbie. "Oh, did she eat you up? Or put horns on you? Or turn you into a goat?" she began. It happened that the hallway was clear just then. "Wasn't she furious? I am so glad I escaped! Come in and tell me all about it." "Not much to tell," replied Sally, "except that I just turned on her and defied her. I felt the time had passed for intimidation, and I told her so." "Good for you, Kitten," and Bobbie demonstrated her approval. "I always knew your spunk was just smoldering, ready to burst into flame at the right moment. Now, I saw the cause of Dol's disquietude. Her shop is closed, shut up tight, barred windows and a cute little white sign tacked right under the former artistic door. The sign reads 'To Let' and it is easy to imagine the crepe hanging from the knocker." "She told me she lost a lot--by the arrest of Madam Z, and do you know, Bobbie, that woman was a real lunatic?" "Of course I know it. Didn't I ride horseback with her? But they are all gone now and as the poet says: 'Good riddance.' Come along, Kitten, and eat grub. That's a function I decline to omit, Dol Vin or any other threat hanging over my poor bobbed head. Come on, dear, cheer up! The worst is yet to come!" "Wait a minute, please do, Bobbie. I just can't think straight. You know every afternoon now there is an open forum or a class meeting and I wish we could go before we run into a further danger." "Oh, no, dearie, don't think of that," cheered Bobbie, strangely irrepressible ever since the big dance. "You can't tell yet what may happen. Stay on the burning deck until the fog horn blows, then take to the life-boats, is my plan of action. I hope we have a substantial meal right now, for paying up bills and collecting receipts is painfully appetising. Come on, dear, and smile while the smiling is good." "But just suppose Jane or Judy should drop in on us this afternoon and see the things packed up?" "Tell them I am eloping, break the news gently and blame it on me. I feel as if I could stand for any monumental conspiracy that was ever conspired. I am that experienced in intrigue. Perhaps I'll apply for a government position in the diplomatic corps. I believe I could carry it off beautifully, brass buttons, plumes and all. There's Dolly. Just look at her hair! Like an escaped watch spring." "Did you meet any little fairy in your walk? Some one who has promised immunity? You seem tragically jolly?" "No, not a fairy, nor yet a ghost. This is just my natural reaction. And while I think of it, Kit," she let the door slam violently, "don't forget I have not reformed. I positively refuse to be any better than I ever was; I have simply developed, and outgrown the antagonistic influence of some defunct ancestors. Oh, how good it all seems here today? I believe I am glad Dol came and went and took her particular influence with her. Wasn't it lucky I had called in my head and that she didn't leave me with one side done and one side undone? Wonder if we will notice any painfully deserted blondes in her wake?" It might be the reaction, but Sally could not help wondering why Bobbie was in such high spirits. Then she recalled the old saying, "Too much joy is sorrowful," and hoped her chum's joy would not be thus rudely transformed. Judith and Jane were waiting for them at the dining hall door. "Truants," said Jane, "where have you been? We have been planning to send a bell boy after you. My famous dad has just written he is coming through New York and wants to take me and my stepsister home with me. You know who he thinks bears that relationship to me, of course?" They knew she referred to the scholarship girl, and Sally looked dumb while Shirley looked startled. "Oh, that would be lovely," said Shirley with marked evasion, "but-- " "My dad never entertains a but," said Jane, "so I hope, Bobbie, you will hurry up your plans to come out and ride a real horse on a real ranch in Montana. Won't she look stunning on a bronco, Sally?" But the invitation, alluring as it was, did not seem to add zest to the appetite of Bobbie. It had simply swept her off her trustworthy feet, and Sally seemed little better. Another corner to escape from! CHAPTER XXVI A SURPRISE IN RECORDS Holidays, holidays! The air was full of them, and it seemed all the girls in Jane's group were to spend the big Christmas event away from Wellington. Jane's letter from her father, that which suggested she bring "the little country girl" back to Montana with her for the holidays, seemed like an answer to her own secret wish. She wanted to bring Bobbie home with her, but very much preferred the invitation would come from headquarters. Jane, like Bobbie, did not wish to appear too ingratiating, also she did not want to make the girl feel she was in any way patronizing her. The bulletin boards in all "dorms" bore the notice of special assembly in the study hall, and thither the students were now progressing. "This is where we get all that is coming to us," said Bobbie more literally than elegantly. "I believe the idea is, we are to know before we leave, where we will be put when we come back." She was talking to Sally as they walked out from Lenox. "Yes, and I wish, Bobbie, we might have escaped it. Think of hearing all the reports read and not being able to take up our exams?" "If only we didn't have to take them I would feel better. Of course you are safe," said Bobbie ruefully. "Perhaps it is better to have this one last spasm of courage," replied Sally, although her whimsical expression did not register anything "better"; it bespoke the condition as "worse." The assembly was well filled up when the two conspiring freshmen took their places as near the door as seats could be found. The biting wintry air permeated the big auditorium, and when the restless shuffling of feet had finally come down to a murmur of soft sporadic shiftings--some girls never could keep their feet still-- then the dean, Miss Rutledge, made her annual announcement. No girl was ever dropped from Wellington without having first received due warning, she told the classes; also she announced that ratings given at this time would afford students opportunity to make the next half year's plans while at home with their families. It is easy to guess that many hearts fluttered wildly in anxious anticipation during this trying moment. But Wellington was always fair, and no one would be denied a chance to "pull up" if native ability seemed equal to the trial. The seniors, almost all self-reliant and assured of their standing, had little to speculate upon, and their report was quickly disposed of. In the juniors were many whose standing held interest, but almost all got off favorably. Ted Guthrie had worked off "conditions," as had Inez and Janet, one in math and the other in Greek, but the first half year was pronounced satisfactory for almost all the students whose names have figured in this little tale. Jane and Judith were always counted among the lucky number. It was in the freshmen's ranks that things were sure to happen. Here were girls just trying out college; some sure to be found unsuitable for pursuing the higher branches of education, others evidently capable as to intellect but poorly prepared, and were thus handicapped with too heavy a burden of "conditions." Again there were those who had drifted through "High" without much effort, and relying on this pace had mistaken the very serious work of college for that of the rather indifferent preparatory work. Much of this explanation was embodied in Miss Rutledge's statement to the assembled pupils. "There is also this to be considered," she said. "Some pupils show remarkable aptitude in certain studies, and when this is found in the exact science of mathematics we have reason to feel that the student will eventually make up other deficiencies, and so keep up with her class." "That's for you," whispered Sally to Bobbie with a very broad nudge, but Bobbie's eyes answered with that look pet animals throw out when in doubt of a master's exact meaning. Then, there were cited the highest averages, and the first name called was that of Miss Sarah Howland! As Miss Rutledge read the name she looked up from her reports. "I feel I should add," she said gently, "that Miss Howland has covered more than the work required, and has the peculiarly well balanced intellect that seems to feed from one subject to another. I must congratulate Miss Howland upon her splendid record as a first- year student." Jane Allen's hands led the applause that followed this, but it was not ended until the ranks of the freshmen had paid ample tribute to their star member. Sally was dreadfully embarrassed. She shook her head in continual protest, but her objection had only the effect of increasing the acclamation. Finally the dean proceeded. Bobbie was all but biting her nails in sheer nervousness. After all, this had required an amount of courage. Her nails pressed into her palms fiercely. Perhaps it would have been simpler to have avoided the final reckoning? The girls' names being read gave to her tingling ears merely a blurred murmur. Yes, Dolly Lloyd would pass: and there was Margie Winters--Margie was a star in English. Next-- "Miss Shirley Duncan," came the dean's voice, and then she paused. "Here is a student who has shown exceptional work in mathematics," she continued, "and while her preparation for college has been undoubtedly faulty, her teachers recommend that she continue her work and apply herself with special tutors for those studies in which she has been especially deficient." Shirley was all but gasping, when again from Jane Allen's seat came the approval of applause. "She made it," the girls were whispering. "I always knew she was a wizard at math," insisted Nellie Saunders. "Bobbie is perfectly all right," declared the wise little Margie Winters. "It was all on account of her country ideas--" "Hush," whispered Dolly Lloyd. "We are all more or less from the country. Do you want to claim the Grand Central Station?" This set Margie back in her seat--and presently all the "freshies" had been given their ratings. A few very sharp warnings were administered, and that a great deal of cramming would have to be done by some before the mid-year exams, to take place early in January, was made especially plain by the dean. No one would be dropped without warning, but the standards of Wellington would have to be maintained, she concluded. Little reader, if you expect to get to college begin your "cramming" now in high school, and let each day's record be such as will surely make a satisfactory total in preparation. If more students could only realize this in time! Assembly was dismissed and the girls surrounded Bobbie and Sally. Jane and Judith seemed personally responsible for these two freshmen, and no one could discount the gleam in Jane's eyes when she squeezed Bobbie's clammy hand. "Why so--frightened?" she demanded. "Isn't it just wonderful to know you couldn't break away even though you tried so flagrantly?" There was a twinkle thrown in with this, and Jane next piled compliments on Sally. Never were there two "satisfactory" students so manifestly unhappy. No one could miss the nervous manner Sally tried so hard to hide, nor yet the heightened color in Bobbie's cheeks when she flatly refused to comment on the surprise. "Queer," observed Dolly Lloyd. "If I turned out satisfactory when I just waited for my little return home notice, it seems to me I would at least emit a smile." Freed from the scrutiny of their companions at last, Sally and Bobbie bolted for Lenox. It had been a trying ordeal and both felt its effects too keenly to throw it off at once. "It's over," eulogized Bobbie, slamming down her hat on Sally's camp chair and promptly sitting on it. "Yes, and you ought to be the happiest girl in all Wellington," declared Sally, standing limp before the dresser that reflected a sad little face unobserved. "I ought to be happy!" repeated Bobbie. "How about you? Ted knew his guess when he called you King Pin of the Freshies. Sallylun, why don't you try to finish? Couldn't I help you?" "You know the conditions, Bob? We went into this together and together we quit--" said Sally, rather crudely for her. "It's a shame," grumbled Bobbie. "I just love it all now." "But you can remain! Even your conditions are assured." "And as you said we went in together, etc.," said Bobbie. Jane Allen was at the door before they heard her step. "Now," she called out in announcement of her presence, "Bobbie, you have no excuse. Even dad will be delighted, but he couldn't feel as I do about it. Bobbie, I'm just proud of you!" The dry lips moved but did not answer. "Why don't you trust me?" asked Jane flatly. "I know you are planning something, of course." "Oh, we do trust you, indeed," declared Sally with quivering lips, "and we both are too grateful to frame words in expression." "But you are not quite--confidential," pressed Jane. Her eye was checking up the hat boxes and other evidences of "house cleaning" scattered around. They had positively decided to write her a full explanation to be delivered after they left. This was finally agreed upon as the one practical plan and neither would attempt to violate it now. But this moment, with Jane's affectionate manner as a lure, was indeed a strong temptation! What might have happened did not happen, however, for a team of girls burst in at that very minute and put an abrupt end to the developing confidences. They descended upon the serious ones with such exhilaration that even the neatly tied-up boxes were threatened with violence. "We are going to give a 'Dingus' tonight," shouted Betty, "and you are not going to spoil it as you did our ghost party. Sally, this time you two will be left off the committee, then perhaps we can have our fun without your interference. Not that we wouldn't love to have you," she hastened to temporize, "but we know how you do duck our sports, and this time we are bound to put one through. We merely dropped in to invite you, and if you are not on hand be warned!" "Be warned that we will drag you from your lair!" threatened Nellie Saunders. "This is going to be one grand final rally, and we want above all the two famous members of the clan." "You may wear your kilts and whitewash brushes," conceded Nellie. "You should wear a laurel crown, Sally. I suppose next half you will jump right in junior and skip us poor little sophs, at least I hope we'll be sophs," said Margie Winters. Jane managed to hide her impatience, but she was disappointed. She had expected to draw out the confidence of Sally and Bobbie, realizing she might help them if she but understood the mysterious predicament. But there was no chance of further pressing that point, so she turned and fled, to leave the freshies to their own particular little affairs. Judith was anxiously waiting to hear the outcome of her visit, as it had been planned between them. "No wiser than when I left you," confessed Jane. "Whatever those two youngsters are up to I can't sense it nor get them to own up. But, Judy, just keep a sharp watch out. If they run off it shall be our joyful ju-ty to run them back. Some of the old Dol Vin nonsense is still brewing in their childish brains I fear, and it behooves us to eliminate it." "But why should they want to go now?" puzzled Judith. "I have admitted I cannot even guess," replied Jane, "but whatever it is it began long ago and it just ripened now. Keep a watch on Lenox, that is all I can advise. I hardly know now which of the two fascinating little creatures I am most in love with. Sally is as dear as ever, and Bobbie more--compelling. If I had a brother I should imagine him just about as deliciously rebellious as Bobbie." Which was saying a good deal for Bobbie when it came from Jane. "Do you really think they will attempt to run away?" queried Judith, deeply perplexed. "There is every evidence of it." "After everything turning out so beautifully--" "That's just it. There is some secret behind it all," reasoned Jane. "I am just as much in the dark as ever." "Didn't you--couldn't you ask them outright Janie? How dreadful if they should spoil everything, by acting so horrid! To run away!" "But we must not allow them to do so," argued Jane. "Surely now that we are both warned, we ought to be able to forestall any such attempt." "You know now how hard it is to keep track of things over at Lenox," faltered Judith. "Not that I wouldn't be willing to sit up nights to watch those babes, but even at that they could slip off," she reasoned. "The freshies are having an affair tonight, that will mean we must be doubly watchful during the excitement." "Why not tell some of the other girls, and get them to help us?" "I should hate to do that," replied Jane. "After all we have only suspicion; it would never do to start a story like that." "I suppose you are right," sighed Judith, "but if I thought Dol Vin- -" "There is nothing you can't think about Dol Vin, if that helps you any. But just the same, she still acts the adroit meddler. When I recall how she tried all last year to spoil our time here--yours and mine--and now when I see she is making tools of these two innocents- -" Jane paused from sheer indignation. "I don't believe the girl is fully civilized," blurted out Judith. "Of course she isn't, if you mean by 'civilized' being human and kind and American. I would rather be hot headed and fiery, and have all the other bad traits I plead guilty of, than to be as smart and business-like as she is, but have no heart. I honestly believe Dol Vin has a human motor in place of a flesh and blood heart." Jane was getting excited now, and she paced up and down quite like a regular stage person. "My poor noodle just thumps with the thinking," confessed Judith. "Of course I am not willing to take the responsibility of policing Lenox Hall all night Jane. There must be some other way." "I positively decline, Judy, to tell the office or ask for official help. That would be too silly if we have made a mistake," decided Jane falling into a convenient seat. Judith did not speak directly. She was loath to cross Jane further, yet unwilling to shoulder this rather serious responsibility. "Why not invite both Bobbie and Sally over here and have them remain all night?" she suggested. "That would be a treat for the--" "You forget the Lenox girls are having a party," Jane interrupted. "Then let us break in on the party," followed Judith quickly. "I agree, Judy, we must keep as close to them for a day at least, as it is possible to do without actually locking them up. Dear me, Jude! Look at the time! And I've got to get in some gym practice. My joints are as stiff as sticks, and I had congested headaches just from laziness. Coming to the gym?" "No, not today. My head aches from activity. You have me all swirled up. Don't mind if I take a rest, do you? Suppose we have to go on picket duty?" Jane laughed, defying her fears for Sally and Bobbie. "When I have anything important to do I must be alert," explained Jane. "Go to sleep if you like Judy, but be ready if you hear me whistle. It may be a race between the freshies and juniors you know." "Oh--hum!" groaned Judith as Jane raced off. CHAPTER XXVII THE REAL STORY It was just before six o'clock that same evening when Dolly Lloyd burst into the gym where Jane was exercising. "They're gone!" she exclaimed. "Sally and Bobbie have left Lenox, and are rushing to get the six-thirty train. Why do you suppose they have sneaked off like that?" "Gone? Are you sure?" asked Jane. "Positive, we have a note and--" But Jane heard no more. Snatching up her sweater, she jabbed her arms into it as she ran, and hardly stopped until she hammered on the door of the stable where her horse, Firefly, with others were kept. Jim, the stable-boy, answered immediately, but seemed unable to comprehend the unseemly haste, as Jane dashed in, loosened the headstall of her intelligent mount, led him to the path and then sprang up bareback to overtake the runaways. Jim stood speechless. That a student should romp off like that in bloomers too--and without a hat! And how she was a-going it! Her hair flew out in a cloud about her head, while Firefly, who was plainly wildly excited at his unexpected caper, just did as Jane told him without the slightest regard for lack of bridle or saddle. Wasn't he from Montana and didn't his mistress train him to go as she chose without foolish restrictions? Students along the way looked in amazement at the racing girl, but being Jane Allen some allowance was made for the caprice. At the cedars a shrill train whistle warned Jane she had but a few seconds more to make the little Bingham station, and she promptly imparted the same message to Firefly. "We'll make it, boy," she whispered. "Take Janie to the station, careful--careful--" in that droning, even voice a horse always knows how to interpret. There, she touched the back platform, told her horse to wait, and threw his strap over the livery post; then she hurried to the front to find her freshmen. There they were! Bags in hand, standing now as the train was pulling in. Jane saw them some seconds before they espied her, and quick as a flash she had a hand on each of the others. "Girls," she called, "drop those bags. Where are you going?" Sally dropped her bag from sheer surprise, but Bobbie had a firmer grip. "Oh, please, Miss Allen," begged Bobbie tearfully, "don't detain us, we must go. This is our train." "If you go you must take me with you--and this way," she included her gym togs in the statement. "Just be reasonable and rational. There, let the train go" (it was going). "There are others. But you just come over to that bench and tell me. What does all this mean?" There was no time for recrimination. The story so long bound up in the hearts of these two girls sprung freely to their lips. "You will hate us both, Miss Allen," stumbled Sally. "But we never meant to deceive you for so long a time." "We were silly geese," retorted the impetuous Bobbie, "and I suppose now, outside of Wellington grounds, we may as well try--to confess. We have both deceived you! There is Shirley Duncan and I am Sally Howland." "What!" gasped Jane, unable to understand the shifting of names from one to the other. "I never won your father's scholarship," went on Bobbie, her voice trailing evenly over every incriminating word. "Shirley won it and-- " "I sold it to her," sobbed the other, eager to have done with the hateful admission. "Sold it?" "Yes, there was no other way. Ted--my brother Ted--had to have two hundred dollars to get back to Yorktown, and everything seemed gone when uncle died. I had won the scholarship, to come to Wellington, but I couldn't leave Ted stranded in his junior year," choked the little freshman. "That was it!" exclaimed Jane, leading the girls away from the tracks, now cleared of the New York express, and guiding them to the back of the station where Firefly waited proudly. What a relief! "You rode--that way?" gasped Bobbie. "Without a saddle?" "Why certainly. It was the best gallop I've had in months. Now, naughty girls, wait. Sit down. I'm too excited to stand up. You" (to Sally) "are Shirley Duncan, and you" (to Bobbie) "are Sally Rowland?" "Yes," replied both miserably. Then she, whom we must know as the real Shirley, spoke. "I know it must seem despicable, Miss Allen, but there was dear Ted, so disappointed, and he was such a splendid student. I could come here, but he simply had to have that two hundred dollars to go back to Yorktown." The voice took courage with its tale of loyalty. "And you are simply a wonderful little girl to have managed it all," declared Jane, showing not a single trace of resentment. "It is actually fascinating--to think you actually exchanged identities!" "But I had no such laudable excuse," moaned Bobbie. "My folks just wanted me to go to college--any old college in any old way--and we always thought dad's good honest money would pave the way. But it didn't, and I never could pass the exams, so I simply fell into this from sheer vanity." "That is not so," expostulated the new Shirley. "Bobbie would never have dreamed such a thing if Dol Vin did not happen along with her wonderful plan. You may imagine she was the real brains--of the plot." "Dol Vin--" "Yes, she taught--a summer gym class at our place," explained Bobbie, "and when she heard my wail about not being able to get into college she offered the scheme. At first it did seem abhorrent, but she glossed it over so--" "And obtained such a generous commission--" put in the real Shirley. "Then you see, Kitten here was passed right in on her second exams, while I sailed in on the exams she took for the scholarship," confessed Bobbie, digging her heels in the cinder path recklessly. "And you both thought this an unpardonable offense?" "Certainly, we knew every moment we were both hypocrites," blurted Bobbie. "Kitten has been fairly blistering under the stigma." "The train is gone," said Shirley the original. "And, Miss Allen, you are not dressed for this. We will have to go back, I suppose." Jane had been thinking quickly, in fact her brain had been fairly churning with the new turn in events. She jumped from the bench and confronted the downcast freshmen. "I have it!" she exclaimed. "It is just perfect. Here you two girls both came in on dad's scholarship, have both made good and are both now eligible to finish the course. Don't you see how magically it has all turned out?" "We don't," admitted Bobbie. "That's because you don't know how generous Deanie Rutledge can be. We will go right back and tell her the whole thing and she will, I am positive, think the matter one inspired by the noble effort you made" (to Shirley) "to keep your brother in college. Bobbie, you did want to come to college, that is always a laudable ambition, and think of the thousands who fail every year?" "But they don't come," persisted the still doubting Bobbie. "But you did. And if you WERE a little rebel at first, doesn't that explain it? Your preparation was all wrong--you heard Deanie say so. Come on, now, I'll walk and let you lead Firefly, Bobbie. I know it will be a treat to you to even lead him. Sorry you can't ride in that tight skirt." "Wait a minute," demanded Bobbie, stopping short, "do you mean to say, Miss Allen--" "Jane--" "All right," with a smile. "Do you mean to say, Jane, that the dean would ever understand and condone all this?" "What are deans for?" asked Jane, the miracle worker. "I'm just wild over the whole thing and daddy will want to adopt you both. It is simply thrilling! You have doubled the value of the scholarship." "But if we did come back and the girls knew it? Our change of names?" queried the real Shirley, apprehensively. "Don't you see how simple it is? We will just explain that you exchanged identities to try out how one girl could work on another girl's reputation. That you both intended to go back to your real selves at the half year--" "So we did," declared Bobbie. "Shirley was to be transferred to Breslin and I expected to--withdraw." "But you don't want to?" "No," hesitating, "but I can't see--" "I can. The whole thing is a wonderful story and when we give the girls the one fact, that you simply exchanged places for a lark, and then didn't know how to get out of it, that will be enough for them. Come along there, Firefly, meet my two college chums. And now, Bobbie, talk to him once in a while, so he will remember you when you dash over the hills of Montana." "Sort of--fairy story," breathed Shirley, a little tragically. "And Teddy is your brother?" asked Jane. "However did he keep the lark up at the dance?" "He thought it was only a lark," replied his sister. "And so it was," suddenly declared Bobbie. "Jane Allen has made it so and I'm for a full A.B. course at old Wellington! Let gossips do their worst," and she capered ahead to the playful clip-clap of Firefly, every step indicating the relief she was experiencing. "If Bobbie feels that way I am sure I should not hold out," relented Shirley. "In fact, both Ted and I have our own incomes now. We only had to wait for an adjustment, but at the time we were simply panic- stricken. I wanted to pay Bobbie back last month, but have not succeeded in getting her to take the money as yet." "I think it is all perfectly delicious!" declared Jane. "Won't Judy and Dozia just howl? Of course no one need know about the loan. That is purely a personal matter." (More miracles.) "Jane," called back Bobbie, "don't you remember how you used to question that name Shirley? Didn't seem to think it fitted me. Well, you see how you were right. I should have been plain old-fashioned country Sarah." "Nevertheless," insisted Jane, "you have proven how well you can act. Take care we don't cast you for a leading role in some of our masquerades!" They turned into the campus again, happy in their new-found security, for what Jane undertook she was sure to accomplish, and even this complication melted away into a fascinating story under her skillful guidance. "Hurry! Hurry!" she prompted, "we must account for this little race. There's Judy. Run on ahead and tell anyone you meet--tell them we're coming," she ended foolishly to Bobbie. "Your turn to think." "Tell them we had a race, and with a good handicap, Kitten won," suggested Bobbie, responding quickly to Jane's suggestion. "But what about all our things? Our hats and coats?" demurred the real Shirley. "They'll be too interested to notice that detail," said Jane. "I'm so happy, happy, happy! Run along Firefly--there's Jim waiting. Now, come girls, after we deliver Firefly to his keeper we are going right up to the hall--Judy! Judy!" she broke off, for Judith evidently had not seen them come in the gate. "Over here Judy!" she shouted again, and this time Judy responded. She rushed up to the culprits and likewise confronted Jane. "Don't you three dare to deceive me!" she stormed with good nature sufficient to hide the girl's evident embarassment. "Where have you been and what have you been doing?" "I wouldn't attempt to deceive you Judith," said Bobbie bravely, "we were running away!" "Why?" the question was put seriously. "Because we have both been deceiving you all, and no matter how generous you two friends try to be, I am at least going to set that matter straight before the whole college. I am Sarah Howland and this is Shirley Duncan." She placed her hand on little Shirley's arm. Judith was dumfounded! They expected she would be, naturally, but she now stood there speechless. "Be a good sport Judy," urged Jane, "and help us stage a real happy ending. Don't you want to jump on Firefly and ride him over to the stable?" "I don't. Why has Shirley become Bobbie?" Jane wanted to laugh, but Bobbie's face was very serious, and Shirley's lip was quivering. Jane released her horse and watched him canter over to the stable. "We'll all be late for tea, but never mind," she said. "Let us tell Judy all about it. She'll die of curiosity if we don't. Look at her poor face." "Jane Allen if I knew a big secret I'd tell you," declared the abused one. "Here's a seat; there, now listen," began Jane. "Shirley Duncan exchanged places on the scholarship certificate with Sally Howland, that's Bobbie, because Sally couldn't get in otherwise, and Shirley- -" "Needed the money," confessed Shirley, insisting on having a part in the confession. "But it was for her brother Ted, you know," interrupted Bobbie loyally. "Is that Teddy your brother? And Bobbie you blushed so when you danced with him, and I accused you--" It was Judith's turn to talk quickly now, and she made good use of the opportunity. Finally something like order was restored. "You must help us Judy--" pleaded Jane. "I insisted the girls should come right along and simply tell their story frankly to Deanie. You know how splendidly she came to the rescue of our friends last year." "You need not be afraid to tell her your story girls," agreed Judith. "In fact I think she'll be just tickled to death to have two such little Trojans in our midst. But what about the others?" "Oh, I don't want to face it," faltered Shirley nearly in tears. "Why can't we withdraw and do as we planned, Bobbie?" "Because we won't let you," insisted Jane. "Just now you are bound to feel a little frightened, but if you could see it as I do; as Judy does," she hurried to add. "I tell you girls the others will just want to carry you around on their shoulders, they'll be so proud of you," finished Jane a little breathlessly. "Carry us around?" questioned Bobbie. "If you hadn't caught us we would be making pictures of ourselves with our faces pressed to the damp window panes of that train you hear whistling now," she declared, with a flash of her natural humor. "Kitten's face wouldn't be pretty either, if she puckered it that way." Jane knew the battle was won, now that Bobbie joked and smiled, so she jumped up quickly and urged them along. "Come on everyone, there's a light in the office," she said. "We will just have a few minutes to talk to Deanie." The girls went back, and when the holiday finally came both freshmen were hailed as the particular friends of Miss Allen and were to spend their vacation at her father's ranch in Montana. * * * * * * The next volume of this series will sustain Jane's reputation for unmatched personality in her Wellington record as "Jane Allen: Senior." THE END 
43482	----	of the Digital Library@Villanova University (http://digital.library.villanova.edu/)) A BOOK OF BRYN MAWR STORIES EDITED BY MARGARETTA MORRIS AND LOUISE BUFFUM CONGDON [Illustration] =PHILADELPHIA= GEORGE W JACOBS AND COMPANY =ANNO DOMINI MCMI= Copyright, 1901, by GEORGE W. JACOBS & CO. A Book of Bryn Mawr Stories Preface In compiling a volume of Bryn Mawr stories, the editors have been conscious that such a book could never adequately represent the college life. Its strong subtle character that commands the devotion of every Bryn Mawr student is something difficult if not impossible to depict. Yet there comes a time in the life of a college, as of an individual, when self-expression is inevitable. Such a time, the editors believe, has come for Bryn Mawr. And this conviction has induced them to bring out the present volume. Until now the literary efforts of the students have concerned themselves with external matters rather than with introspection. Perhaps this is due to an instinctive reticence we Bryn Mawrtyrs have wherever our feelings are deeply stirred. We can joke about ourselves and our traditions as we do in _The Fortnightly Philistine_. But when we come to speak seriously to the outside world, as in _The Lantern_, we confine ourselves for the most part to subjects of general literary interest, practically ignoring the college atmosphere. At last, however, the ice is broken, and Bryn Mawr talks about herself. In the earliest days, when the college had only two buildings and forty-four students, even in that first year it had a character and a spirit all its own. And fifteen years of rapid growth have seemed but to strengthen its individuality. To show the college unity in diversity the editors have carefully chosen authors from the older and younger alumnæ and from the undergraduates. They hope that in this way a truer impression of the college life may be given than would be possible if the whole book were written by one person. Some readers may ask which of the many heroines in these tales is the typical Bryn Mawr girl. The reply is no one, but all. Bryn Mawr students come from all parts of the country, from all sorts of different surroundings, and on entering college they do not, popular prejudice to the contrary, immediately drop their individuality and become samples of a type. We have among our number the pedant, the coquette, the athlete, the snob, the poser, the girl who loves dress and prettiness, and she who affects mannish simplicity, the all-round girl, the serious-minded, and the frivolous. Yet none of these is the Bryn Mawr girl _par excellence_. That mythical personage can be known only by comparing and contrasting her various incarnations. This book is an attempt to show some of her incarnations and some typical scenes of Bryn Mawr life. College life is not dramatic and college stories have no great dramatic interest, unless they introduce elements foreign to the campus. Those who look to these stories, therefore, for entertainment may be disappointed, since most of them are serious in tone, and in their appeal to the reader depend largely upon the charm of local colour. If in the mind of any one the spirit portrayed in this book is unworthy, if it falls short of the ideal of what college life should be, let it be remembered that this is a first attempt, and let the expression be blamed but not the Bryn Mawr spirit. All of the following stories are new, and were written for this book, except _Studies in College Colour_, which are reprinted from _The Lantern_ of 1893. One of these studies, the description of Chapel, has appeared also in _Cap and Gown in Prose_. For permission to use this last the editors are indebted to the courtesy of Messrs. L. C. Page & Company. _M. M. 1900._ _L. B. C. 1900._ Contents HER MASTERPIECE, _Marian T. MacIntosh, '90_ IN MAYTIME, _Anne Maynard Kidder, 1903_ WITHIN FOUR YEARS, _Elva Lee, '93_ FREE AMONG THE DEAD, _Georgiana Goddard King, '96_ STUDIES IN COLLEGE COLOUR, _L. S. B. S., '93, and G. E. T. S., '93_ EPOCH MAKING, _Cora Armistead Hardy, '99_ A REMINISCENCE, _Clara Warren Vail, '97_ CATHERINE'S CAREER, _Harriet Jean Crawford, 1902_ THE APOSTASY OF ANITA FISKE, _Ellen Rose Giles, '96_ A DIPLOMATIC CRUSADE, _Edith Campbell Crane, 1900_ _HER MASTERPIECE_ I For the first time in many years Ellen Blake was conscious of inability. Of course she could not have expected that her good fortune would last forever. And yet, it must be confessed, that her helplessness coming, as it did, when she had every reason to feel confident, had been altogether a surprise, had, indeed, taken her at a cruel disadvantage. She was the more disconcerted at finding herself unable to do what she had promised when she thought of the serious responsibility resting upon her. It was wholly natural that she should be looking at the predicament with the eye not of an ordinary being but of a personage, whose failure would be a public calamity,--no mere personal misfortune. Intellectual distinction, natural eloquence, and the personal charm that made her so marked and attractive a figure, had brought her into prominence as a leader among progressive women. If she seemed inclined to take herself a trifle seriously, no one could wonder, for the demands made upon her were neither few nor slight. And while a more selfish person might have shown a nice discrimination in the choice of duties, Ellen, in her gracious readiness to be of service, accepted as obligations all the greatnesses thrust upon her. Constantly importuned for utterances, she felt bound to answer all requests for opinions, till at last, her sense of humour grew weak in conflict with her strenuousness, she had become an oracle on all matters that were or ought to be of interest to women. And so it happened that when she had been asked to make a speech at the Women's Convention in Indianapolis, on _The Educational Value of College Life_, she had unhesitatingly consented. But in this instance her fame and her conscience had brought her face to face with failure, for on a subject peculiarly suited to her, she could find no words for feelings or ideas. She was in despair, for not to make the speech would be to play the traitor to the cause of Woman, and to show the basest ingratitude to Bryn Mawr, the place that had fitted her for her life work. Taking herself to task had no effect. She wrote some sentences, read them over, found them vague and inaffective, gushing indeed. She continued to write almost feverishly only to reject sheet after sheet. At length she decided that she had no exact information, neither facts nor figures. That was the trouble. In the discussion of so weighty a matter both were important. Then, almost as an inspiration, it seemed to her, came the thought of Katherine Brewster, also a Bryn Mawrtyr, also interested in woman. "She is certainly just the person," said Ellen, and she was soon standing on the Brewsters' doorstep. A very systematic maid opened the door and showed Ellen to a small room at the end of the hall. Katherine's quarters had always met with her approval,--the little room in which she waited, communicating as she remembered with a larger room beyond, had about it an air of business and privacy. Though it had for seats only the stiffest of chairs, and for reading matter only the dullest of reports, Ellen's mood led her to envy the uncomfortable and repellent atmosphere. By force of contrast it reminded her of many miserable occasions, when she had tried to feel at ease, while interviewing some ardent reformer in the presence of her humourous if sympathetic family. She forgot for the time being, what she could not but perceive in her less absorbed moments, that the distinction and notoriety of Katherine was the distinction and notoriety of the Brewster family; and that, in sacrificing the general comfort to the convenience of one, they were exchanging insignificance for importance; while she, however conspicuous personally, was also the daughter of Chief Justice Blake, and was "the image of her mother, the beautiful Polly Meredith." "Not so good-looking though," sighed many an old gentleman, as his thoughts reverted to the triumphs of that beauteous maid in the days when girls broke hearts, rather than conventions. Wealth and social distinction, good-breeding and beauty were hers without an effort, without a college education; yet she knew well that there was something in her that was due to Bryn Mawr. In striving to express this she had come to Katherine Brewster, sure that from her she would get the explanation. She had hardly sat down before the door between the rooms opened energetically and the brisk young owner appeared, cheerful and businesslike in manner. "Oh, Ellen! How do you do? I shall be at leisure," drawing out her watch and considering a moment, "in six or seven minutes." Without waiting for an answer, Katherine turned back to the other room. She left the door behind her open and Ellen could not but see what was going on. Her disused sense of the ridiculous stirred slightly as she took in the details. Katherine was talking, or rather giving facts, to a young man who was dotting down her words in shorthand. From the scraps of the conversation that reached her, Ellen received a confused impression of myriads of facts marshalled in excellent order. She congratulated herself that she had indeed come to the right person and would find valuable assistance in the clear brain of Katherine Brewster. At length she caught the words, "I have now given you all the information at my command, and shall trust you to make it interesting to the general public and so prepare the way for our reform." The young man could not linger in face of the finality in her manner, and before he was well out of the door Katherine had turned to her next visitor with brief friendliness. "I'm glad to see you, Ellen, and can just fit you in between the Committee of Councils and the reporter, who was anxious to get my opinion on the new system for the disposal of garbage. I should like to tell you all about it. It is so absorbing." "I am afraid I shall have to hold you down to another subject. I need enlightenment as well as the reporter. I have to tell the Women's Congress the value of life in a woman's college. I was sure this subject was one on which I was well informed, till I came to think what I might say,--and lo! commonplaces are all I can utter. I was at a loss what to do,--loath to break my promise, and helpless in my stupidity. Now, can't you give me an idea? I hate to bother you, you are so busy. But it isn't for myself only." "Well, Ellen, I think I can help you," answered Katherine with the utmost seriousness, "but you will need pencil and paper," rising to get them, "or suppose you sit here," sweeping aside the papers littered over the desk and pointing to the chair in front of it. "I shall have to deal in figures and you might not remember them all." Then followed a maze of numbers reeled off with surprising readiness, now and then authenticated by a glance at one of the many pigeon-holes. Ellen felt somewhat dazed; but she was conscious that the bewilderment was her contribution for the figures were arranged with precision,--_Health of College Women_, _Matrimonial Prospects of College Women_, _The College Woman and the Problem of Domestic Service_, _The Economic Results of College training for Women_. Valuable facts were quoted from them, facts bristling with suggestions for the capable young woman so utterly mistress of them, but a trifle unmanageable for Ellen till she should have time thoroughly to conquer them. She was not altogether ungrateful when the servant announced the Committee of Selectmen, and she hastened to show her deference to the fathers of the city by immediate withdrawal. Katherine's good-bye took the form of advice, "I should certainly deal with the practical value of college life, taking up some line of thought that will show its power to make women effective citizens in the broad sense of the word." There was no use in going directly home, for she could make nothing of facts so dull, Ellen decided, as she left the house. Besides she had no time to get down to work. It was now four o'clock, and she had promised to be at Edith Warrington's for tea at five. She could go directly there; or, better still, she might find Sara Ford and Augusta Coles at home. Their flat was near by. They would be sure to give her some ideas. Sara was alone when Ellen reached their rooms, and gave her a warm and ready welcome, of the sort that tempted to friendly chat rather than to weighty discussion. Sara was slight and frail in appearance, and made an immediate appeal to most persons by the wistful expression of her eyes. But for all her seeming delicacy, she was full of nervous strength, and was besides very earnest, almost anxious in her devotion to her duty and in her attitude toward the responsibilities of a college woman. There was in the room an effect of collision, of an effort to combine the possessions of a gentle, ease-loving nature, with those of one given overmuch to austerity. The room itself, sunny and old-fashioned, went far to reconcile the hostile elements, and the result was inviting, if not harmonious. Sara had settled Ellen comfortably on the broad window-seat, and was solicitously tucking pillows behind her back, apologizing the while for Augusta's absence. "She has gone to see an authority on labor," Sara explained. "She wanted his opinion on public ownership. She won't be gone long, though." "How does Augusta excite herself over such questions?" wondered Ellen. Sara smiled absent-mindedly, and then as though pondering, without a shade of remonstrance in her manner, said, "Augusta has the keenest insight into everyday subjects, and the most wonderful grasp of them that I have ever known. I never dare to be amused at Augusta. I can do nothing but admire her. But now, Nell," she continued, drawing her chair nearer the window where Ellen was sitting, "tell me about yourself. You are always doing interesting things. Certainly the world ought to be convinced of the value of college education by the work of such women as you and Augusta." Ellen's mind was so firmly fixed on the object of her visit that she was unembarrassed by the flattery lavished upon her, and noted only the sympathy in the words. When she had explained her difficulties to Sara, she met with instant comprehension. "Why, Nellie dear, I know just how you feel," was the prompt response to Ellen's statement. "You are conscious of an overwhelming desire to honour Bryn Mawr, of a responsibility to woman's education, and you would not by a word injure the one or retard the other." "Of course, I feel that. But what am I going to do? I've thought and thought till I haven't an idea left. Katherine Brewster has loaded me down with statistics, but I need something more. Can't you give me a hint? There is so much of the picturesque in the college life that is not at all frivolous, and yet when I put pen to paper it is gone." "I am always conscious of just that state of mind," assented Sara, "when I try to express my feeling about college. The beauty of the place, the glamour over everything! One can't describe it." It was becoming evident to Ellen that Sara was but echoing her own words, was giving sympathy rather than advice. She had just made up her mind to be off, when the door opened to admit Sara's room-mate. A cursory, modern greeting was all that Augusta Barneson Coles vouchsafed her visitor. "Is there anything I can do for you?" asked Augusta, drawing off her gloves, and with the greatest precision pulling out the fingers. When she had finished this operation she laid the gloves on the table. Augusta maintained, against all comers, that neatness alone was to be considered in dress, and showed herself consistent by appearing at a formal dinner party in an immaculate shirt waist and short skirt. In the obtrusive simplicity of the shapeless coat, the uncompromising hat, the well-hung but skimped skirt, the severely arranged tie, the colourless hair smoothed in defiance of the wind, the stout shoes and correct stockings, you perceived the care of one who had a character to preserve. Ellen straightened herself and assumed a thrifty exactness in her speech, setting aside preamble and apology; for in talk with Augusta she felt that the amenities of life were worse than wasted, they were insulting. "Yes, Augusta, tell me what you can say for women's colleges, as distinguished from other modes of training." "They will redeem the world from its present deplorable condition by teaching women to live by ideas," was the succinct if sweeping assertion. "I am afraid I don't understand," murmured Ellen. "By removing them from the sordid pressure of the practical," Augusta went on, "and that at a critical period in the mind's development and bringing them into an atmosphere of pure ideas, till the concrete no longer exists for them." This statement seemed somewhat nonsensical to Ellen, but she had come for information and persisted. "That's all very well, but to make it more personal. I can't express what my college education has meant to me. What has it meant to you?" "Experience meetings of any sort are distasteful to me," answered Augusta brusquely, "they make impossible abstract thought and result in commonplaces of undisciplined sentiment. They bend the idea to the individual, not the individual to the idea." There was no doubt that Augusta had given all that was in her power and that Ellen would only lose time by urging her to closer definition. So far she had received opinions almost irreconcilable one with the other, the practical views of Katherine and the abstractions of Augusta. She was indeed amused rather than disappointed at the failure of her visit. How absurd she had been to expect fertile suggestions from Sara, always ready to reflect the mood of her companion--a quality often soothing and endearing but hardly useful in moments of perplexity;--or from Augusta with her futile theories and ridiculous jargon. She had still one hope, Bertha Christie, who had gathered about her a group of Bryn Mawr graduates, all anxious to indulge the scholastic passion. Research and literature occupied them for the most part; but, in the intervals of study, they cultivated self-consciousness and held dress-rehearsals that they might perfect themselves in the parts selected. Phrase-making was their pastime and tricks of face and manner their delight. Their duty to themselves led them to withdraw from their families, thus liberating themselves from the exigencies of an unappreciative society. So sedulous were these artists in life to free themselves from tyranny to the individual that they regarded all outside demands as impertinent intrusions. They courted criticism and experience and craved æsthetic satisfaction. The only one of the band at home when Ellen was shown in, was Bertha Christie. Had she been seen in the midst of commonplace surroundings, dressed in a less studied fashion, she would in all likelihood have passed unnoticed. But the clinging folds of her dress, exquisite in colour and texture, the deliberately loosened hair, the poise of the head, and the languid grace of motion as she moved forward to greet Ellen, suggested something of the romantic, something of the ascetic, with just a seasoning of coquetry. She had the artistic temperament, but abilities critical rather than creative. She read poetry but measured life by her intellect. Hers was a disposition susceptible to impressions, but cruel in the analysis of them. Her expression of indifference became one of scornful amusement as she listened to Ellen's earnest setting forth of her errand. A skilled fencer in words she succeeded in parrying the insistent queries, without revealing the triviality of her ideas. The impression left on Ellen's mind by this conversation was really disturbing. Up to this point she had no doubts about the value of college life, but now she wondered if there were not more to be said against it than for it. Was it not responsible for the selfishness and affectation of Bertha Christie? She looked at the clock on a near-by steeple and saw that she was already late for her engagement with Edith. In her annoyance at her wasted effort she was not sorry to think that at her next stopping-place she might dismiss business from her thoughts and enjoy the consolation and diversion she was sure to find. It was significant of her attitude that, although she had meant all along to drop in on Edith, on her way home, and knew besides that she was certain to find one or two more of her college friends, she had no thought of them in connection with her speech. She had unconsciously drifted into imagining, as did all outsiders, that Augusta Coles and Bertha Christie were the types and her own friends the anomalies among college women. Her friendships and her activities were no longer brought into contact. So long as Ellen was looking for companionship, she still showed herself capable of appreciating wisdom as well as cleverness, good sense as well as originality; but just so soon as she desired enlightenment, she forgot that her own friends might hold opinions worthy of consideration, and singled out the eccentric or visionary among her acquaintances. In doing so she was not consciously seeking singularity, she was rather showing her instinctive reverence for experience. Having become something of a doctrinaire, she went for her instruction to those more advanced than herself. Had Edith Warrington been true to what seemed to Ellen the best in her, she might have been set among the sages, but Edith had voluntarily forfeited all right to be considered really earnest, for after she had determined to devote her life to study, she had been turned aside by a mere trifle. In the second year of her post-graduate study, she had had a call from an old lady whom she had always found most entertaining and had been bored with the random gossip so delightful hitherto. "It's the last straw," she said, in talking to one of her friends of the occurrence, "when Mrs. Astruther bores me there's something the matter. I've noticed an indifference to everything but my work growing upon me of late, but have ignored it. This shock has brought me to my senses and shows me that I prefer people to things." She was urged not to generalize too hastily, by the friends who were eager to see her fulfil her promise as a scholar. She had now been married about five years, and, because the memory of her scholarship was still fresh, she was spoken of as one lost past recovery; for, though she never lost her student ways, she was no longer called a student. When Ellen came within sight of the house, she heard some one tap on the pane and on looking up saw Edith signalling to her not to ring. "Here you are at last, Nell," was her greeting. "I was looking for you. What kept you so late? Some old committee?" "Oh, I'm dead tired. I have had a miserable afternoon." "You poor thing! Come along and be amused. Louise and Evelyn are here. They're having a heated discussion about matrimony. It's a bit personal and very funny." "Louise and Evelyn? It must be absurd." "Yes, they think they're talking on broad general principles, but they're just talking about Dick Fisher and Mr. Brandon." "You know him?" asked Ellen. "I've never met him and since Evelyn's engagement was announced I've been curious about him." "Oh, he is a very nice fellow--really charming." "But not good enough for Evelyn, I'm sure." "They never are, are they, Nell?" and Edith turned with an amused smile. "No, not even Mr. Warrington," laughed Ellen. "I don't agree about him yet." When they reached the little study, Ellen nodded to the two girls sitting near the window and flung herself into an easy chair by the tea table, glad to rest her mind with a counter distraction. She knew the disputants well and felt as much at home with them as with Edith. Louise Fisher had been her room-mate at college, distinguished for her common sense and independent ways and a warm advocate of the business career for women, all women married or single. Many a satirical picture had Ellen drawn in those days, of Louise's ideal of domestic happiness. But Louise had become engaged before she graduated, to a man immeasurably her superior in mental ability, and she had settled down to echoing his opinions. Ellen often wondered if no ghosts sat opposite to Louise at the breakfast table; but she could not disturb her by any amount of banter. Evelyn Ames, the other disputant, had been an enigma at college. She had attracted many on first acquaintance; but had baffled them at the point where acquaintance ripens into intimacy. No one dared call herself Evelyn's friend, except such as were content with the formal graciousness of her ways. And yet she had been a force in college life, had shown both courage and enthusiasm at critical moments. She had recently announced her engagement, and was naïve in her disclosures of her own feelings in the present discussion. She was thoroughly at her ease with her companions; for since she had left college, she had surprised many, whom she had before held at a distance, into very real friendships, taking them unawares by her affection for Bryn Mawr and its associations. These three had discovered that her inaptitude for fellowship at college was the result of a former starvation of her affections. The daughter of a widow, a woman of small means, of cold nature and social ambition, Evelyn had not been allowed to find out the softer side of her nature, till she had been sent to Bryn Mawr by a rich and domineering relative. When Edith and Ellen joined them, Louise was saying, "The only way is to try to divert his mind from his work." "But that doesn't seem to me at all the nicest way," said Evelyn. "I think you ought to be able to help a man in his work." "At that rate," said Edith, as she poured out a cup of tea, "Ellen should marry a public man and help him write his----" "Yes," sniffed Louise contemptuously, "like Mrs. Jones, Dick says----" "Oh, Nell," and Evelyn turned quickly to Ellen, "somebody told me about the speech you're to make. What a splendid chance you've got." "I don't know about that," answered Ellen, "it's the hardest thing I ever had to do. I can't for the life of me----" "But just think," interrupted Evelyn, "it means Bryn Mawr. That's what we think of when we think of college. Oh! I wish I could just for once say what I think of the dear place. But I never can talk about it in a sensible way." "Just as well," put in Edith, "it's one of the things it doesn't pay to be sensible about." "Edith, what do you mean?" interjected Louise, "when you speak in public you can't talk twaddle. Dick says, common sense is the only thing that holds people." "He's faithful to his opinions anyway," answered Edith with a friendly nod, "you've just as much as ever." "But, Nell," asked Evelyn, leaning forward in her interest, "what are you going to say?" "That's what I don't know. I've gone from pillar to post trying to find out and----" "No wonder you're weary," said Edith, "wasting your time that way. Why on earth didn't you ask us? Please tell us where you did go." "Oh, to several places," answered Ellen evasively. "I never thought of bothering you people, you have so many outside things to attend to." "Yes to be sure, husbands and children and all the----" "You know that isn't what I mean," objected Ellen, setting down her teacup. "You always say you aren't interested in movements." "Oh, no!" corrected Edith, "not movements."-- "Well, anyway I didn't succeed with the other people. 'College training fits us to be citizens'; 'college teaches us to live by ideas'; 'college is of value to none but those gifted with a susceptibility for the exquisite refinements of the intellectual existence.' What am I to do with that?" Edith and Evelyn exchanged amused glances, while Louise looked scornful. Ellen continued, "I have to think how my words will affect Bryn Mawr, and also how they will strike my audience." "Don't forget yourself," said Edith. "You've a way of leaving a bit of yourself behind when you get to work." "Oh, it will come to you, don't fear," broke in Evelyn. "You do all that sort of thing so well, you'll be sure to make a hit. You couldn't help it talking about Bryn Mawr. If only I could do it. My four years there made life worth living." "Come now, Evelyn," said Edith teasingly, "it will never do for you to say things like that, and you just engaged. Please think of poor Mr. Brandon. He'll get to hate Bryn Mawr, and I won't blame him a scrap. You must----" "That has nothing to do with it," protested Evelyn, looking embarrassed, "but I know nothing could have been at all as it is if I hadn't gone there. With me the trouble wasn't so much a dearth of resources as a lack of opportunity for devotion. When I got to college I found that the thing demanded of me was devotion to Bryn Mawr. Every one expected it and I gave myself up to serving the first thing that needed me." "But that wasn't anything in Bryn Mawr," objected Louise, "that was you." "Don't you think," interposed Edith, "that the personal romance of our lives takes the place of all impersonal romance of that sort in time?" "Perhaps," assented Evelyn slowly, "but it is the one romance that hasn't to rub up against realities. We lived there in a world of our own creation--a land of dreams. Our dreams for Bryn Mawr may always be realized; they are never shown to be impossible." "Well, really," exclaimed Louise, "you seem to be getting very high falutin, all of you. My feeling about college is that if it hadn't been for my friends it would have been a hateful place--all hard work and nothing else. It's the friendships you make there that count." "To be sure they count," said Edith, "but you might say the same of boarding-school. I know what it is. It's the student government." "Now just listen to that," cried Ellen, "you're as bad as other people, you don't agree at all. You, Edith, talk of self-government, but that isn't general. And I can't tie myself down to Bryn Mawr. We all think Bryn Mawr the best of----" "Twenty years hence this weather May tempt us from office stools; We may be slow on the feather, And seem to the boys old fools. But we'll still swing together And swear by the best of schools," sang a merry voice in the doorway and with one accord the girls sprang to their feet to welcome the singer. But she continued serenely,--"The same idea may be found in the lines of another well-known song: "'When the cares of life o'ertake us--'" The last lines were lost in the vehemence with which Ellen and Edith greeted the newcomer. "You piece of absurdity," urged Edith impatiently, "stop your mimicry and tell us how you got here." "Without adventure, my excitable Edith, till I came upon this strange gathering, perhaps the strangest gathering ever known to the scientist,--for as Leuwenhoek says----" The change of voice in the last words, and the immediate response from her listeners showed a traditional joke. But she went on immediately, "I'm on my way to Bryn Mawr and I dropped in to remind you that you've all promised to bear me company. I was afraid you might forget. A trip there from Philadelphia is less of an undertaking than one from Emmonsville, Montana. And I'm going to pass the night with you, fair Ellen. I wrote to you warning you of my intention about two weeks ago. My trunk is already at your house, and I have been there; but was sent to bring you home. Your mother was afraid you would forget you were to dine with Mrs. Boughton and help her with a Dean or a Bishop,--something architectural and impressive." "I had forgotten all about it and I haven't a minute to lose," said Ellen, as she and Marjorie hurried off amid the protests of the others. Ellen begged Marjorie to come upstairs with her and amuse her while she dressed; but Marjorie refused to talk, insisting on hearing all about Ellen's visits of the afternoon. She passed her comment on the characters in the narrative, comment genial, friendly, sympathetic, till Ellen came to Bertha Christie's part. On a sudden Marjorie's indignation blazed out. "Ellen, is it that you have failed to understand Bryn Mawr, or that you have willfully misunderstood? You have accepted the judgment of the outside world and have treated those freaks as representatives of Bryn Mawr. Have you forgotten how they were ignored, jeered at, anything but accepted by everybody but a few freshmen? They defied college spirit, mocked at common sense and still do. And the world sets them down as types! Bertha Christie with her menagerie of intimates intolerant of the commonplace! I could pity them if people like you didn't make them of so much importance." "Intolerant, maybe I am," in answer to a feeble protest from Ellen, "I'm rather proud of being intolerant of a set of sophisticated hermit-crabs, a few puling nuns who've gone to school to the melancholy Jacques. No wonder I hear queer things about Bryn Mawr when you go to them for ideas and pass by Edith and Evelyn and a host of others. It's enough to make one turn cynic. Tolerance! Tolerance of evil, breadth of mind it calls itself, is the most discouraging thing I meet with. And yet how absurd it all is. You, so well-balanced, so lofty in your aims, going to those geese to learn wisdom----" "They're not geese," protested Ellen at length, "they're unusually clever girls." "'A goose,' please remember," quoted Marjorie, regaining her temper with the reassertion of her sense of humour, "is none the less a goose, though sun and stars be minced to yield him stuffing! You'd better be off or you'll have to apologize to the Bishop for keeping him from his dinner." II Greatly to her astonishment Ellen found that she had fallen to the Bishop's care at dinner. She was not, however, easily appalled by distinguished people, and she chatted lightly to the stranger. His beautiful face, benignant and merry, set her completely at her ease,--the secure ease of the American woman, it seemed to him as he made mental notes of the effect produced by the exquisite dress, the vivacity and readiness, the almost boyish frankness, the worldly wisdom. And all the time he wondered why there recurred to him the thought of a serious nature, an intellectual nature, free from worldliness and triviality. Ellen was giving herself up to the enjoyment of the moment, giving her best to a listener so responsive and stimulating and she was all the more ready to do so because of the concentrated thought of the day. But she was not to escape for long, for she heard her companion say, "You have been a student at Bryn Mawr, they tell me, Miss Blake, and I have been greatly interested in hearing so; for I think it a most lovely spot, quite an ideal sort of place. Its airs of age are very clever too, very deceptive. It impressed me as an old place. An almost reverential feeling stirred me, so marked was the sense of dignity. It is in a word academic. Everywhere one may see that bewildering mixture of history and aspiration." "We can't help feeling a little proud that after so few years of existence it should begin to be impressive as well as beautiful," said Ellen, who hardly welcomed the return to the subject that had engrossed her thoughts so long, though she could not resist the enthusiasm of one familiar with the English universities. "Of course, in this country one never wonders at rapidity of growth, but I must confess that æsthetic charm does not always accompany it. That delightful president of yours has secured both." "She is a worker of wonders. She has plans for the place now that exceed all our dreams." "Of course years may mellow the ugliest spot and association endear it, but after all 'virtue is loveliest in lovely guise.' The gift of beauty is not to be despised. Even the most casual visitor must acknowledge a spell in that college of yours altogether independent of the mysterious charm that you who know it intimately find for yourselves,--to some degree what I am sure people would find in my own university were they to go there ignorant of its wealth of history. But they are outsiders," he continued musingly, almost as though he had forgotten the existence of the girl to whom he was talking, "they see only the outward show, they are forever shut out from a share in that spirit that is the immortal part of the university, that persists in spite of change." The old man's memories awoke at these words, and in his reminiscences he unfolded for Ellen picture after picture of that old world school, and flattered her with a sight of the thing her Alma Mater might become. For she listened to tales that made distant things seem real and present to her, stories of the frailties of men whose names had been beacons to her intellect. Her emotions were stirred by the tender humour that summoned up for her the personalities that had touched his own boyhood, and had left their impress on the life of Oxford. The bishop's attention was challenged by a gentleman across the table with a question on South Africa, and for the rest of the evening Ellen shared her friend with the other guests. Before she left she found a chance to tell Mrs. Boughton how delightful her companion had been. "Well, Ellen, to be candid," with an indulgent smile at the girl whom she liked in spite of her brains, "I should not have honoured you so much had he not asked to have you for a neighbour. But you needn't lay the credit to your attractions. I was running over the people he would meet this evening and when I came to you, that he might not expect an angel, I mentioned your only faults,--that you had been to college and spelled woman with a large W. But I told him that as a rule you kept these peculiarities in the background. However it was your having been to college that interested him, for he wanted to see what sort of women Bryn Mawr turned out. Of course I told him he couldn't judge by you--you were an exception--that he would have to see a few specimens like your friend Miss Christie or Augusta Barneson Coles." As she drove home Ellen's thoughts turned to Marjorie Heywood and her plans for the next day. The talk at dinner had decided Ellen to go with the others. Though she lived so near, she found little pleasure in going out to Bryn Mawr nowadays, for everything seemed changed and she felt nothing but resentment that the past should have been so easily forgotten, its ways so quickly superseded. Her careless reading of Marjorie's letter had made her arrival a surprise, and Ellen experienced a sense of relief at Marjorie's appearance. Her relief showed how apprehensive she had been of the changes possible in ten years' time, and above all in a ten years so trying as those that Marjorie had passed through. Just when she had seemed well started in her chosen work she had had to give up everything and care for a worthless brother. She had had to fight poverty for herself and him, and for him disease and evil. The cheerful letters that had come to Ellen now and then, had brought her little satisfaction, they were so impersonal. It had been in vain that Edith reminded her that Marjorie had always been impersonal, reticent. Putting herself into everything she did and said was her way of talking about herself. It had been in vain too that Edith contended that Marjorie's enthusiasm for righteousness and humorous freshness of mind were her safeguard against old age. "Marjorie will be just the same," she maintained, "when she is a hundred years old." To-night for the first time, Ellen believed her. Ten years! Could it be ten years? And Marjorie still the same, the old spirit of raillery gleaming in her eyes, the irresistible quiver at the corners of the mouth? Ellen found her mother and Marjorie in the full swing of a good talk. They had been linked in their sympathetic understanding of one another since early in freshman year, when Marjorie had spent a Sunday with Ellen. And to-night they had no remembrance of the interval that had passed since they had last been together. Ellen longed to throw herself into one of the easy chairs and share in the ardour of conversation; but she remembered her speech. "If I am to fall in with your plan, and I am afraid I am too weak to defy your indomitable will, I must write that wretched speech to-night. I don't dare trust myself to write it at Bryn Mawr with you to beguile me," was her answer to Marjorie's entreaties that she should stop and tell them all about her evening. "Oh, sit up all night, if you'll get to Bryn Mawr by doing it," answered Marjorie with a nod to Mrs. Blake who was about to remonstrate. "I'll assist you by the subtle influence of my presence and read the while. "What do I want to read? Oh, anything at all, thank you, Mrs. Blake,--something that will keep me from interrupting Ellen. Yes, that's just the thing," and she took the book that Mrs. Blake handed her and started upstairs. As the girls reached the room Ellen said, "I've a good mind to give the whole thing up. I'm perfectly hopeless about it." "You'll do nothing of the kind," asserted Marjorie. "You'll just sit down there and write." "It will be a perfunctory business at that rate," objected Ellen, "I don't feel as though I could write a word." "Never mind that," retorted Marjorie, "but just see that you get through with it to-night. A body can't get any good of you with it on your mind. And that's one of the things I came on for." With that Marjorie opened her book and Ellen sat down to her task. It went slowly at first. She wrote little and that with constant reference to her notes. But after a time she seemed to find the thoughts coming more quickly. Marjorie's book did not seem to hold her attention. Her thoughts seemed borne beyond it, and her eyes wandered about the room, noting the restfulness of the golden brown on the walls, the preponderance of etchings--landscapes for the most part--the low bookcase stretching the full length of the wall, the ornaments, obviously the choice of one more susceptible to form than to colour. There was in the room nothing brilliant, nothing conspicuous. Taking in the details, her glance came at length to rest on Ellen herself as she bent over the old-fashioned desk. She was turned so that Marjorie could see a little more than her profile. And Marjorie's expression was one of affectionate amusement as she watched the serious, almost stern lines of the face, the gravity in the eyes, when they were occasionally raised. For some time Marjorie observed her closely and then broke in upon the silence with,--"I'm drifting irresistibly to conversation or drowsiness, I don't know which, but in any case I'd much better away to bed. So good-night and good luck." Then just as she reached the door she turned laughingly to Ellen and said, "Your hair is just as nice as ever; but I'm afraid you've got the world tied to your little finger." But Ellen merely nodded and smiled at the sound of Marjorie's voice, not hearing one word of the taunt. III Marjorie had had her way and the five friends were now spending the last day of their visit to Bryn Mawr, as they had spent the others, picking up old threads and discovering new ones. The changes since their day were many and to Marjorie, seeing them for the first time, they seemed like personal affronts, rousing in her that passion of resentment which is the lunacy of the graduate. The old gate was done away with. The old road no longer existed. A long stretch of buildings struck her eye unfamiliarly. Taylor had shrunk itself among the trees and its dear ugliness was retired from the gaze of approaching visitors. But the alterations were so skillful that the alumnæ soon felt an admiring ownership in them and quickly embraced the changes. Almost the only familiar figures to be seen were those of college servants there since the beginning, one of whom, William, once well-nigh universal in his activities, was now so highly differentiated that he seemed to do nothing but carry the mails. He was a repository of traditions, and he delighted forlorn alumnæ by his air of proprietorship in the past as well as in the present. Small wonder that, when they found their doings sunk into a mere tradition and marked the shortness of memory and self-importance of the undergraduates, they turned for cheer to William's flattery and refused to consider its ambiguities. "No, no, miss, none of our young ladies now are like the young ladies when you were here. In your time they certainly was young ladies. "And your name, miss? It's the same I suppose, I'm afraid to call any of you by name, there's so many married, you see, and they might be offended if I didn't remember the gentleman's name, you see. I keep track of you all by reading the list of names and who's dead and married. Talking of marriages, miss, so Dr. ---- is married. Well, he's the last of our professors I'd a thought of marrying. Well, changes is changes, miss, when all's said and done." On this their last afternoon, Susan Everett and Beatrice O'Hara had joined the five where they were sitting under the cherry tree in front of Taylor. Their talk was of the undergraduates and the zest with which they listened to tales of those first days. "Their seeming disregard of us and our doings is the result of ignorance, not of indifference," Edith was saying, "but their curiosity is now thoroughly aroused." "Oh, yes indeed," groaned Marjorie, "they've decided they'll collect the traditions and if you've the age of Methuselah and the memory of Macaulay, they wind you up and you can be doing nothing at all but telling them stories. And you've to stop and explain to them who the Polyglot is and the Gifted, and even I can't quite make clear to them those treasures of individuality. All you get for your pains is, 'Oh yes! one of the professors.'" Her plaint seemed to be justified, for across from Pembroke some girls came running and when they saw the group under the tree, one of them called out,--"Oh, here you are, Miss Heywood! May we not come and learn some more history?" And as though Marjorie's consent were a foregone conclusion, they sat down on the grass at her feet and settled themselves as children will for the treat in store. "Come, Tommie, tell us a story and play the fool for us, as you used to do," said Susan Everett lapsing into the old name and desirous that Marjorie should assume her old character. "I should have drifted naturally into my accustomed rôle, had you kept still a moment; but introductory remarks are death to spontaneity. And, like Amanda Jones, I want my little fun spontaneous. "Now, you never knew Amanda Jones," she continued to the undergraduates, "but by that historic utterance she deprived you of a custom. Did you ever think why you never had a class-day at Bryn Mawr? You know you never have had one, and if you ever do the ghost of Amanda Jones will haunt the campus. "It was the year we graduated, and we," indicating her companions, "had been sitting up into the small hours arranging for a class-day. The first class had gone out in solemn dignity, but we craved something more; we would have a class-day. We had an elaborate program made out, amusing, but academic, without doubt the cleverest entertainment that has ever been or ever will be. We had written an inimitable parody of the _Clouds_,--so funny, so much funnier than anything Aristophanes ever did. Humour so subtle was never heard. We couldn't read it ourselves without weeping with laughter. Well, the parts were assigned, the costumes half made, the invitations sent out, when of a sudden a class meeting was called at Amanda's request. As soon as preliminaries were over she arose, made a telling arraignment of class-day, referred touchingly to former graduations at Bryn Mawr, and then she, who had never even gone to an entertainment, much less invented one, paused dramatically, and slowly enunciated, 'we've always had our little fun spontaneous!' She carried the day, and still carries it, and there is no such thing as class-day at Bryn Mawr." "Amanda wasn't about when we were practicing for our comb-orchestra," laughed Beatrice. "Poor Amanda! She didn't know that the deliberations beforehand were half the fun." "Do you remember," asked Ellen, "the evening we spent sitting in the trunk-room in Merion, helping Alice Marston write the _Professor_?" "Dear me, I had forgotten," sighed Louise, "and I don't think anything has ever seemed really funny since that." "The sad part of it is," continued Evelyn, "that the warning in the motto we used would now be a necessity. Who but ourselves would understand those jokes? What was the motto?" to an inquiring freshman, "Quae jocum suspiciet, eam oportet ridere; Quae non, oportet aliis ridentibus ridere. Ne lacrima! Quot intellixistis?" "Don't apologize for talking Latin, Evelyn," said Marjorie, with a comical glance at the group, "it's like our mother tongue." "That was the way the Latin lecture used to begin," explained Ellen, for the benefit of the undergraduates. "You see we used to have lectures in Latin as a sort of elective." "That sounds impressive; it did to me when I first heard it," responded Marjorie, "but those Latin lectures were the most humorous things you could imagine. You watched the Polyglot's face, and you knew when to laugh and when to weep, and you were a little dull if you didn't understand enough to raise your hand when he called out 'Quot intellixistis?' "Do you remember the one on Irish bulls? In your honour wasn't it, Pat?" turning to Beatrice O'Hara, whose vaunted Irish blood was evident in her speech. "I wish I'd kept a record of Pat's bulls," remarked Susan. "I often feel as though one of them was just the tonic I needed." "Never mind," answered Beatrice, good-humouredly, "I once saw through one all by myself. That time I told you I was carrying a stool with me because I had to stand up." "I often think of the way the Gifted chuckled, because you would say 'whenever a man died,'" added Ellen. "I didn't deserve his ridicule; for I was the only person capable of understanding what he meant by his favourite 'on a mutual hand,' or of appreciating the beautiful idea of his 'tell all that you don't know about this subject.'" "Oh, Marjorie," exclaimed Edith, "have you forgotten how you disgraced yourself just because you thought you noticed the joke introducing expression on a learned lecturer's face? You would go to the German lecture on Ulfilas, thinking it wise to make the most of all opportunities for getting up your German for your orals." "Not a bit of it," interrupted Marjorie, "I came to myself to find the distinguished guests and the members of the Faculty gazing at me as though I were crazy, and you pinching me black and blue. And all because I had worked myself into hysterics of laughter over the Lord's Prayer in Gothic." "Wasn't it queer in those days when everything was new?" inquired one of the audience. "My dear child there never was a time when everything was new, and I know what I'm talking about, for I was the first freshman that ever spent a night in Bryn Mawr, and I then learned that Bryn Mawr already had a history that was venerable, customs that were inviolable. That first night I learned the Manus Bryn Mawrensium and the Maid of Bryn Mawr. I was early taught the tradition of the sacredness of the Harriton family cemetery, taken there by two sponsors, who felt the necessity of impressing us, the newcomers, with the past. "In that stretch of woodland," here her voice took on a sentimental tone, "known as the Vaux woods, and still frequented by Bryn Mawr students, there lies nestling among the trees a secluded burying ground. Grey walls of ancient date bound it within narrow compass. The masonry sturdily defiant of time, has been mellowed by a growth of moss and lichen. To any eye a picturesque spot! In its calm but cheerful solitude, no inhospitable resting-place! You feel in a sense possessors of that place; you are aware that in some subtle manner it belongs to you; but fully to comprehend your own feelings you must hear the droll, though sentimental reminiscence of the first class of Bryn Mawr; you must picture to yourselves a group of students on the worn steps and the nervous, enthusiastic figure of that 'learned doctor,' as he walks up and down in front of them, declaiming ore rotundo and with all possible expression, the parting of Hector and Andromache. Yes, he taught us Horace," answering a question from one of the groups on the grass. "Oh, you have no such classes now. I couldn't imagine college without his Horace class." "How we had to work in it, though," sighed Louise. "Oh yes, but you know we always had his permission to shirk all other work that we might do his," came from Beatrice. "And at last we had to protest," continued Edith. "Had we done all that was expected of us, we should never have gone to bed. Our protests passed seemingly unheeded, till one day just before Thanksgiving, the Polyglot entered the room, one shoulder heaved on high with the great pile of books he held under his arm. Having as usual begun his lecture in the corridor, he was saying as he came inside the door, 'I have with me a most interesting find, a manuscript Latin poem, unexpectedly come into my possession. I shall write it on the board and then ask some one to volunteer with a translation.' Then standing on tiptoe, at times jumping so that he might write at the very top of the blackboard, he began to copy some verses, but long before he had finished, the class was convulsed with laughter. For it was a graceful little apology for overworking us." "When I think of Bryn Mawr," said Marjorie, "few things have left so vivid an impression on my mind as his class-room. I was under the spell of literature from the moment I heard him give out his first parallel passage. There was in his classes a magical exhilaration never to be forgotten. And to think you poor things don't know anything about it! "It must seem very different to you now," put in a senior, sympathetically. "To be sure it does, and I think nothing strikes me more than the light-hearted way in which you do things that we didn't dare to do for fear of bringing down rules on our heads. Like our ancestors we were constantly 'snuffing tyranny.'" "Hadn't you self-government then?" asked a freshman in amazement. "We had no government of any sort, and no despotism could have been more compelling than the nameless fear that hung over us, that we might some day do something that would lead some one to take away our liberty." "I have always regretted the establishment of self-government," said Elizabeth Gordon, a graduate who was to receive her Ph. D. the next day. "Not at all, not at all," Marjorie hastened to declare. "You were always so immersed in work that you never bothered with other people; but those of us that thought it our duty to keep an eye on the freshmen found our hands full. Why the trips that I have made with my Memorabilia under my arm to administer sugar-coated pellets of college-spirit have cost me many a good mark." The reminiscences had filled the afternoon, and now the college-bell rang out, warning the various groups that dinner-time was at hand. With an apologetic laugh Marjorie started up, saying as she walked along, "Six o'clock, and I've talked almost all afternoon! Well! Well! 'Tis but a sign of age." "Age, you goose," laughed Edith, "weren't you always the 'garrulous particle'?" "Well, weakness then, and a mistaken notion that there is no place like Bryn Mawr." IV The beauty of the long June evening was not to be resisted, and as soon as dinner was over, the students hurried out of doors. An air of relaxation was everywhere noticeable. Those fagged out by examinations gained cheer and liveliness from the more careless, or loitered about in unregarded lassitude not disturbed by any sense of obligation as contributors to the brimming talk of their companions. It was the perfection of easy intercourse where every sentence is a free-will offering. However far the little knots of good company might wander, they sooner or later gathered about the steps of Taylor Hall to listen to the senior singing. The effect was almost like a stage setting in its perfection, the grey buildings, the intense green of the grass, the blossoms on the trees, the dresses of the girls, the group upon the steps, with the rays of the setting sun falling full upon it. This custom of singing on the steps was an innovation on the manners of the first years, but an innovation picturesque and pathetic. Its pathos touched the group of alumnæ standing at a little distance from the steps. Throughout the afternoon they had almost fancied themselves students again; now they had stepped aside and had become mere spectators, while the seniors were making the most of their last days. Before the singing stopped darkness had crept upon the scene. Taking advantage of it Ellen slipped away unnoticed and wandered down the hillside. As she heard the strange voices singing the old songs, she suddenly perceived how far she had drifted away from her college days--from all that had been revived by the chatter of the afternoon. She could not but feel that Marjorie's power of awakening those trifling memories, and Edith's quick response to her whims and sallies, her humorous allusions indicated not a less, but a greater share in all that was vital and permanent than any she could claim for all her seriousness. A passionate regret rushed over her, aware now that in her hurry, her business, her very faithfulness, she had lost, almost past recovery, many of the privileges that had been hers; that, in her pursuit of ends, worthy enough to be sure, she had made no demands on the really precious things in her experience at college. For in this moment of reflection, those trivial and petty reminiscences, mere accidents in their student-life, became for her the summons to an act of recollection. She had strolled across the daisy field and was standing on the brow of the hill looking out toward the west. The moon had risen. Seen in its light the sweep of landscape seemed to her more picturesque, fuller of appeal to the imagination. Details were lost sight of, contrasts of light and shade emphasized. The slope before her lay in the full moonlight. Beyond it a clump of trees showed dark against the lucent sky. In the farther distance the hills were wrapped in a soft mist, brightened here and there by the gleams from the clustered houses. The familiar scene was full of remembrances, but remembrances for the most part of her friendship for Marjorie and Edith. Long tramps across those hills had been their favourite exercise through the winter. The daisy field, the haunt of idle moments in the warm days of spring or autumn, had also been for them a special sort of study, reserved for choicest reading. Toward it too they had always wandered after the Sunday evening meeting. As they walked along their talk would drift from the subject of the evening to things more personal, closer to their hearts, their individual perplexities, their individual faiths. Each one was then at her best, in the light of sympathy, showing herself as good or as noble as she really was. Those conversations, assumed to her kindled imagination, an actuality, a power, hitherto unperceived, becoming not only the record of their preferences in all matters great or small, their criticism of the activities and the thoughts of their own little world, but also the measure of their share in it. The little world thus recalled to her, had, she was beginning to remember, its care for holiness, for truth, for courage, and it had too its care for orderliness and beauty in its very frivolities--and there had been a discipline really stimulating even in that. The genius of the place expressing itself in this care showed itself in light-hearted frolic no less than in scholastic endeavor, for it determined the way in which things were done rather than actual achievements, thus uniting in voluntary submission to its influence those whom individual powers separated from one another, informing them with its spirit, till it became a part of them, not to be changed without the loss of something individual. How vivid it all was, how persistent, yet how baffling its secret! Why could she not penetrate this secret and possess it? But as before she could neither arrest nor depict the ideas that were passing to and fro in her mind. Her thoughts flew to her speech. In it she had ignored everything but the definite, the tangible, and in so doing she had failed. Yet, even if she could seize the sentiment and translate it into words, she dreaded misapprehension--she could not forget her audience. "Oh, here you are, Ellen," Marjorie broke in on her reverie, "I've just been singing your praises. It seems there are difficulties in the way of self-government, and I thought I'd help them by giving them a bit of our experience. So I told how you brought us through that bitter time, when we so nearly lost our liberties. As I told them I realized as never before how impossible it is to pass on experience. I could see before me the faces of the girls so drawn, so stern, with that pitiful sternness that only young faces catch; and then I seemed to hear Dr. Rhoads in chapel that next morning, reading to us that chapter about Grace and Law; and I could remember just how he stopped and looked at us after he read the words,--'_For sin shall not have dominion over you; for ye are not under the law but under grace. What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid_,'--and then went on to tell us that he believed that those words expressed our spirit and that as long as that spirit guided us we could be trusted to govern ourselves. It seems strange that while the impression of that time will never fade from our minds, we can pass on nothing but the tradition. There is no Dr. Rhoads now," she continued after a pause, "and I think I miss him more than I do any one else. He always used to gather up the events of our life here and put them into their proper relations." "Yes, he entered with all his heart into the college spirit just as though he were one of us," agreed Edith. "And for that very reason," said Ellen, "no part of his influence is lost. That spirit is the touchstone for all of us. However variable it is the one thing that persists and, so far, it has been as he understood it. Each student, whatever her gifts, must make it her own if she is ever to be anything but an alien here." "It always needs Ellen to give the finishing touch," said Edith. "If it had not been for you and Marjorie," insisted Ellen, "I should still have taken counsel of the cynical outsiders." "Listen a moment," interrupted Marjorie, "that's it after all." A band of girls was coming toward them through the moonlight and as they came they sang: "_Thou Gracious Inspiration Our Guiding Star, Mistress and Mother, All Hail Bryn Mawr._" V One morning some days later, Ellen was looking out upon a delightful garden in Indianapolis. The day was fine, if warm, and in the garden the roses were in full bloom. She was in the highest spirits; but her gayety of mood was a thing of the past five minutes and had nothing to do with the sunshine or the flowers. She was reviewing the occurrences of the last week and entertaining herself greatly. Her speech had been made the day before with really brilliant success. It had been the most important event in a series of notable meetings and had been received in a way that might well have roused her to fresh endeavour. Yet in the moment of her greatest success she had shown herself strangely indifferent to her manifest duty. This was the result of her having discovered, just as she had begun to accept the fact of her triumph and the rewards that lay before her, that it was all due to a surprising mishap, something altogether beyond her control. She showed that she felt the importance of the occurrence by thinking of it steadily for the rest of the day and well on into the night. This was not because she wanted to think of it particularly; indeed she had made every effort to dismiss her preoccupation; but she could not rid herself of the idea that an accident was responsible for her triumph. In her perplexity she went over the whole thing time and again. There had been an inspiring audience, so much she acknowledged, casting her mind over it. She had observed it in the moments before the meeting was called to order. Looking at the impressive throng she had been annoyed to think that she might have to use her notes. As she rose and moved toward the desk there had been a sudden hush and concentration of attention upon the platform, of so much she had been distinctly conscious. She had felt too that after she laid her notes on the table and began to speak, the intelligent interest which had greeted her opening sentences soon gave way to an eager, fixed intentness and breathless silence. Then all was a blank, till the restrained enthusiasm broke forth. As soon as the meeting was over she had been overwhelmed by congratulations. Her one desire had been to escape, and she felt it difficult to be gracious to her admirers. She had managed at length to get away, and handing her notes to a reporter, had hurried to the door. There she had been stopped by an old gentleman, who, though an utter stranger to her, greeted her as an old friend. "Now, Miss Blake, you'll come home with us. You'll not stop another minute at the hotel. No, I'll not hear a word. I won't take a refusal. Nobody has as good a right to you as I, your father's old friend, Ned Cartwright." Then he had grasped her warmly by the hand, exclaiming delightedly,--"My dear young lady! My dear young lady! It was your father over again, Harry Blake, Prince Hal we used to call him. And is that the way you girls feel about college? Bless me, I'd never have believed it. I have heard so much solemn nonsense talked about what you do and say and think. But I'll never believe it again. Why, you might have been talking about my own college days, and your father's too,--Prince Hal we used to call him. I'll never forget how we stole the clapper, he and I. And they do it still, my dear, just as we used to, and you steal your clappers too, and, bless me,--I'll send every girl I can to college, if that's the way you all feel about it. That's education! It isn't all books,--never was and never will be. Just ask your father and he'll tell you so too. Yes, I give you my word, every one of them shall go. I'll see to it. I'd as soon shut them off from fairy stories and Walter Scott, and falling in love, because they were girls. It's romance, that's what it is and they've a right to their romance; for I'm an old man, my dear, and perhaps you'll take my word for it, it's the romance of life that counts,--for the girls as well as the boys." While he was still talking Mrs. Cartwright had come up with a welcome as hearty as his. Their hospitality had been irresistible, and Ellen, powerless before it, was soon walking with them to the carriage. But just as she had been about to get in she had been stopped once more. "Pardon me, Miss Blake," some one had said, and there had stood the reporter with her manuscript. "I think there must be some mistake," he had gone on to say, "the paper you gave me deals with the practical value of college life and you talked this morning on what you called 'the Poetry of College Spirit.'" Then, as in a flash, Ellen had seemed to understand the sense of something strange and bewildering in the experience of the past hour, for she then remembered that when she had stood facing her audience in the moment before she began to speak, she had seemed to forget her notes, her listeners and herself, and to apprehend the meaning of her four years at Bryn Mawr so clearly that it came to have for her a sort of personal identity. Carried beyond herself by her delight in the assurance of something actual, she had spoken unpremeditated thoughts. One might almost say, she thought, that the memories revived by the visit to Bryn Mawr, then crowded out by her intense preoccupation in the business of the convention had, as in revenge, taken possession of her, forcing all other thoughts from her--had almost as it were expressed themselves. Much that had puzzled her in Major Cartwright's criticism was now explained. A trick of memory accounted for all--even her triumph. But she could recall nothing of her speech. The words were forever lost. She had been overwhelmed by the strangeness of it all, and, do what she would, she could not keep her thoughts from wandering from the Major's eager questions of her father's doings to her own perplexing experience. At one moment she had seemed to be on the point of remembering the speech, to have the words on the tip of her tongue; the next to lose them more surely than ever. Though the Major was constantly bringing it to mind she was none the wiser for his references. That he had thought well of it she could not doubt, but she wanted to know what she had said. Long after she had gone to her room that night she had sat thinking. The poetry of college spirit! What had she said about it? Perhaps she had said something absurd, had made her subject ridiculous. It hardly seemed so from what she had heard. And yet,--could she think that the inspiration of that moment of discovery had lasted through an hour of unconsciousness? How much more probable that the shadowy something she had tried to define had been so real to the memory or the imagination of her hearers that the mere mention of it had for them an instant fascination. And now this morning, finding herself the first downstairs, she had picked up the paper. She would find out at last. A few moments ago she had finished reading, and throwing the paper aside with the impatience of disappointment, had stepped out on to the porch. In those five minutes she had come to view the whole thing with a lively enjoyment. There was a column about it in the paper, but no outline, nothing but praise and the hope that she would make her speech fully effective by publishing it. Was there perhaps a touch of malice in that suggestion? Had the reporter grasped more of the situation than she had chosen to tell? With that thought amusement overpowered her,--amusement at herself above all. That she of all persons should be at a loss to know how she had done precisely what she desired to do--please everybody--seemed to her the perfection of irony. Her comic imagination, once kindled, swept everything before it, her self-importance, her views, even her curiosity. Then a delightful feeling of irresponsibility came upon her. The speech was none of hers. "Well now, what an early riser you are. I hope you are not used up by the excitement of yesterday," came in cordial tones from the doorway and Major Cartwright came out to bid her good-morning. "What, all alone!" looking about him. "Haven't you seen Mrs. Cartwright yet? She's been down a long time. I suppose she's out among the roses. We'll go on without her if you don't mind. She likes to take her time and cut all the roses before the sun gets hot, but it worries her to think she is keeping me waiting. So I humour her and myself too." "Well, you'll not be asked to wait this morning, my dear Edward, I've got them all gathered." And Mrs. Cartwright came up from the garden with a basket of roses on her arm. "Come away to breakfast now. I'll arrange these afterward," leading the way to the dining-room. The Major picked up the paper in passing, and looked at it. "Oh here's all about your speech!" he cried, "I hope they didn't garble it very much." "Far from that," laughed Ellen, "they don't attempt to tell what I said." "What? You don't mean it. Nothing at all about it?" "Oh, yes, compliments enough to turn my head. But the thought was evidently too much for----" "Just listen to this, Lucy!" interrupted the Major after a glance at the criticism. "I don't believe you know what a distinguished young lady we have with us this morning,--'Indianapolis has heard much of the eloquence of Miss Blake, but Indianapolis was not prepared for the glowing words of yesterday.'" He read to Ellen's great amusement. "'It would be folly to attempt an abbreviated report of that splendid piece of oratory. Instead we take pleasure in printing extracts from an article on a more practical phase of college life, confident that any words on woman's education from so able an exponent will be of the highest interest to our readers. "'The speech made yesterday we predict, without hesitation will never be surpassed by Miss Blake,--it will be remembered as her masterpiece.'" While he was reading Mrs. Cartwright had been watching Ellen and had decided that she had been blind the night before, for she had missed much of the attraction in her face. Just now Ellen's eyes twinkling with fun were fixed on the major's face, and Mrs. Cartwright watched her with a pleased smile. "Your masterpiece he calls it," she exclaimed, as her husband finished; "isn't that just like a reporter? How does he know you'll never surpass it?" "Bless me, I don't see how she could surpass it," ejaculated the Major, "I'll not call the fellow a false prophet yet." "I don't believe you'll have the chance--ever," retorted Ellen. "I haven't an idea what I said and by the time I make my next speech no one else will remember." "What do you mean, my dear young lady?" he asked astonished. "It was never in the world extempore." "That or nothing." And Ellen, sensitive to a genial change in herself, though, perhaps but dimly conscious of it, told the whole story with so keen a relish for the satiric elements in it, that her listeners were delighted. Her unconcern met with no protest from companions too unfamiliar with her ways to reproach her for not being quite herself. Elsewhere she might not have dared to disregard the imperious demands of what was expected of her; but here she was not coerced by any preconceived notions of what she was likely to do. "And it's all gone from you?" said Mrs. Cartwright. "Yes, just as completely as if the thing had never happened. It's just as though you had done something very clever in a dream, and found when you tried to do the same thing after you were awake that you had forgotten the most important part of it." "But the fellow ought to have attended to his business better," said Major Cartwright. "What was he there for if not to report?" He took up the paper again. "The man's a fool. A plea for the higher education!" "That's what it was meant for," murmured Ellen. "It converted you, anyway," contended Mrs. Cartwright, nodding at him. "Never heard anything so absurd," he went on disregarding them. "Where did he get all this stuff about the practical value of the higher education?" "From me, I am afraid. You see when he found he couldn't have the best, he decided to take the next best, and asked me for the notes of the speech I intended to make. I tried very hard indeed to catch my thoughts about Bryn Mawr and pin them down for inspection as my views on college life. But they escaped me, I'm glad to say." "I can't believe it of you. Why when you got through you had stirred in me afresh the enthusiasms of years ago." "That's not so much of a compliment as it seems, my dear," interrupted Mrs. Cartwright. "His enthusiasm on some subjects is perennial. It needs only the word 'college' to set him going. But come along and help me with the roses. If we go on like this, we'll begin to think you just made an ordinary speech after all." "And I do want to think it my masterpiece," said Ellen, rising to follow her. Then she turned to the Major with a humorous diffidence that hid a feeling too strong to show itself. "Perhaps it is just as well that I have to stand on my attainment. If it were down in black and white some critical person would be sure to discover how much I owe to the eloquent ears of my audience." _Marian T. MacIntosh, '90._ _IN MAYTIME_ I Timothy Trask was an eminently correct young man. His dress, his speech, his manners were all the most correct of their kind. If he discovered that anything was the proper thing to do, he always did it, even to the extent of playing very poor golf in an irreproachable pink coat. He was a great lover of the antique, which is in itself a very correct thing to be at the present time, and he possessed a collection of ancient armour, which was hung about on the walls of his wide front hallway, a grim line of swords and battle-axes, and great round shields. Large as this collection was, in the mind of the fastidious Timothy it was incomplete without a certain Crusader's dagger, exposed to view in a New York dealer's window. Timothy had stood looking at this dagger with longing contemplation, for once unconscious of his pose before the public gaze. His imagination had conjured up an enticing scene in which Timothy Trask figured as the centre of an admiring throng of acquaintances, all watching with breathless eagerness while he told the story of the ancient dagger and pointed out its jewelled hilt and the fine gold chains attached to each end. Then he had counted over his railway stocks, his mortgages and government bonds, and had sadly taken the train back to Philadelphia. The dagger continued to fill an unobtrusive place in the New York window, and an altogether too prominent place in the mind of poor Timothy. All his antiques grew tiresome and commonplace in comparison with this one little jewelled hilt. At last one evening he decided that he must have it if it ruined him. With a sudden burst of confidence he told the whole story to three friends in his smoking room, and announced his intention of going to New York the next day. Unlucky confidence for Timothy! A look of subtle meaning passed from one to another of the friends. One of them, in spite of warning glances from the others, picked up a copy of the _Ledger_ from the table, and nonchalantly pointed to a full-page account of a May-day fête, reviving the Elizabethan plays and dances, to be given the next day at Bryn Mawr. "Here's a lot about the learned ladies. Going to give some sort of show or other. Elizabethan! Hm! Reading extracts from history, I suppose, perhaps all dressed up, like a Dickens reading. It says something about 'correct costumes.' I wonder if Tim's cousin is to be in it. Look here, Tim, when are you going to take us out to see that pretty cousin of yours?" "I have not seen Marion Hall since she was a child, and have no desire to make her acquaintance," said Timothy icily. Because Timothy was so correct, he particularly detested and disapproved of college girls. They represented to his mind a mixture of spectacled phenomena of learning, and of cheering, basket-ball playing New Women. In either capacity he found them peculiarly objectionable. He often said of them, with a fervent horror he might have expressed towards wild Indians, "I sincerely trust it will never be my misfortune to meet one." His feeling towards college girls was well known to these friends and it had occurred to one of them that it would be delightful to see Timothy at the May-day festivity, surrounded by hordes of college girls on their native heath. The incongruity of the picture was so pleasing to the others that the idea had been instantly seized upon, and they determined, by some hook or crook to get Timothy to Bryn Mawr. Now the avowed trip to New York gave them their opportunity. One of them could meet him at the station and manage in some way to lead him astray. The victim serenely played into their hands. When the conspirators appeared Timothy was just in the agony of trying to hide his near-sightedness and at the same time discover which was his gate. All the officials seemed occupied at that moment, and he had no time to go back to the bureau of information. "Hello, Jenks, where are you bound for? I have just two minutes. Can you see which is the New York gate?" "Over there," replied Jenks, unblushingly pointing to the sign "Bryn Mawr special," under which was a hurrying crowd in holiday attire. Timothy noted the throng and bustle of an express, and pushed through the gate just in time to get a seat. II "To the May-pole let us on, The time is swift and will be gone!" The blue sky, the green campus, the laughter, echoing on every side, repeated the invitation of the song, while the sun poured gayly through the windows, and the voices without mingled with those within. A breakfast party was in progress on the fourth floor of Merion. It was not the first time such a function had been held there, but this morning the fantastic costumes of the guests, the piles of gay cheese-cloth heaped in a corner, the swords and plumed caps lying on top of notebooks, gave the party an unusually festive and holiday appearance. A herald clad in yellow and white, adorned with rampant lions before and behind, was scrambling eggs by the window-sill, and a forester in a brown jerkin was making coffee in one of the egg-shaped coffee-pots so apt to turn upside down when least expected. A marshal had just set fire to her blue and red coat-of-arms, and was kneeling in front of the divan, engaged in carefully pasting on a patch. Every now and then a knock announced a newcomer whose costume was greeted with laughter and eagerly examined. Presently a forester appeared, in Lincoln green jerkin and smock. Her arms were full of many-coloured banners, which she proceeded to hang out of the window, flaunting an expanse of purple lions and gilded dragons upon the spring breeze. Then she procured a plate of eggs and potatoes, and a cup of coffee, and sat down on the floor. "We have been indulging in a little archery practice this morning," she said, laughing softly at the remembrance. "It is going to be very picturesque shooting down that avenue of trees, but it is singularly fortunate that the target is safely out of sight!" "Don't be discouraged! Wait till you hear the heralds striving to sound their horns," said the sword-dancer, who was sitting on a perilous rocking-chair without a back, while her hair was being turned up beneath her collar. "There, listen to them now!" There came through the open window a feeble noise, ending abruptly in a squeak, followed by shouts of laughter. Looking out they saw a herald standing with her head thrown back and her trumpet raised to her lips, her tall, young figure, in its white and yellow, silhouetted against the green campus. A motley but appreciative audience paused in the task of putting up May-pole streamers to applaud her. While the others were so engaged, the forester came and sat down on the floor by the marshal, and watched her put the finishing touches to the damaged costume. "Will you do something for me?" she asked, a trifle shyly. "With pleasure," said the marshal, outlining her coat-of-arms with black paint. "Don't say you will so quickly. I had a letter from some one, the other day, saying he was coming to May-day. I wrote him that I didn't want him, but--I am afraid he will come anyway, and I don't want to see him." "Oh!" said the marshal, looking up. "I can't make up my mind," said the other girl. "I wish I could, but I can't, and I simply won't see him till I do." "Oh!" said the marshal again. "I suppose you want me to keep him out of your way?" "If you only would," assented the forester, with a pleading gaze. "But my dear young innocence, there are going to be a few thousand people here, more or less. How am I to find one unattached young man?" "Oh, I only mean, in case you happen to hear of his asking for me. People will come to you, you know. Don't have him too much on your mind." "I will try not to," said the marshal, dryly. "If you will hear my advice, I think you had better see him for yourself, and settle it, yes or no, one way or other." "You don't know how hard it is," murmured the forester, with a little sigh. The marshal rose to her feet with a grim expression, which indicated that she would like the chance of settling it. And with an inward remark upon the nuisance of having men mixed up with college functions, she went to the oval mirror and put on her coat-of-arms. "The rehearsal is at ten," she announced. "Now, please be on time, every one, so that it need not take _quite_ the whole morning to form the procession. Don't forget the cloaks for the band, Elizabeth,--and do all of you remember that _no one_ is to wear patent leather shoes!" She seized her marshal's staff and departed. III When Timothy arrived at the Bryn Mawr station, that afternoon, he found himself in the centre of a dense crowd, which was surging up the road. He had no liking for crowds, and avoided them on all occasions. It annoyed him intensely to be surrounded by indiscriminate numbers of chattering people, pushing against him, and pressing him along with them. In spite of his efforts to maintain his usual dignified carriage, he was swept along at a fairly rapid pace, through a gateway, and up a long path to the side of a low stone arch; through which appeared a vista of gleaming white road and green trees. At Haverford when the familiar Cricket Club came in sight, Timothy had come to a sudden realization of the trick his friends had played him. And when every one trooped out of the train at Bryn Mawr, he had decided to yield to curiosity and make the best of a bad situation. But it was in no genial mood that he approached the college. And now he almost wished he had taken the next train back, to vent his anger on those three friends. He was sandwiched in between two stout ladies, one of whom poked him in the neck with her parasol, while the other explained the details of Mary's costume, just completed the day before, by the maternal sewing-machine. Timothy correctly protected his necktie from the parasol's advances. Taking out his eyeglass, he assumed his most extreme expression of bored indifference, hoping to indicate to every one around him that he, at least, was not here willingly for a day's holiday, and anticipated no diversion whatever from anything forthcoming. The thought of himself, Timothy Trask, inside a woman's college, waiting by the roadside for a circus procession, was enough to make him grit his teeth, and swear at the three idiots who had been instrumental in sending him there. Suddenly a hush fell upon the expectant crowd. With a blast upon their shining trumpets, eight heralds appeared in Pembroke archway, dressed in white and gold, with the Pembroke coat-of-arms emblazoned upon their breasts. Behind came lumbering along four oxen, great, patient beasts, decked out with leaves and branches, dragging the May-pole. Some mighty forest-giant had been sacrificed to these revels. It was painted white, and festooned with garlands. A line of flower girls trooped along on either side, flowers in their arms, on their short gay-coloured skirts, and adorning their wide hats. Laughter rippled down the line of spectators, as through the archway came nine donkies, one behind another, solemnly bearing the famous _Nine Worthies_ of Old English pageant. Odds, my life, we find ourselves in high company! Here is Julius Cæsar, clad in scarlet, with a truly Roman nose, and behind him King Solomon, in all his purple glory, while Sir Godfrey de Bouillon, that virtuous knight, brings up the rear on a most restive steed. Next, mounted on a high cart, came the maidens of Spring, fighting their old battle with grey-coated Winter. That is right, pelt him with flowers, and cover his snowballs. He has no place to-day. It seemed as if Pembroke Arch were a gateway to the past, and jovial Old England were pouring through it. Now came the ring of horses' hoofs upon the stone paving. Make way, there, for Maid Marian, the Queen of the May, with Robin Hood, that gallant and sturdy rogue, riding by her side! There followed all his merry men, come from the shades of Sherwood to join in the revels, for what true yoeman will not trip a measure with a pretty maid, when the sun shines on May-day? Behind came the fool, in motley red and yellow, bells upon his two long ears, bells upon every point of his skirt and cape, bells upon the sceptre which he shook above his head. Happy fool, with light feet and lighter heart! Treading close on his heels the Hobby-horse was showing his paces. For the most part he walked along, sedately enough, saving his breath to curvet and prance, later on, in the _Revesby Sword Plaie_. With music and laughter the pageant moved on, a train of shepherds with softly bleating sheep, milkmaids, peddlers, ballad-mongers, and last of all, mounted upon a float, a strange company indeed. They were dressed in classic Grecian folds prepared to act in _The Excellent Pastoral of The Arraignment of Paris_. Cupid is proverbially abroad on May-day, but here he stood, in actual guise, and Pan, too, playing his pipes, and stately Minerva, with her snaky shield. The pageant wound in and out, around the grey stone buildings, a long thread of living colour. Before Timothy well knew what he was doing, he found himself pressing eagerly on with the crowd to the May-pole green. The flower-crowned pole was loosed from behind the patient oxen, and borne upon eager shoulders to the centre of the green. It was raised aloft in the air, tottered for an instant, a great cheer went up, and it sank into its socket. Then struck up the fiddles and pipes, the dancers hastened to their May-poles, and holding aloft the gay streamers began the dance with a bow and a courtesy. "All fair lasses have lads to attend 'em, Jolly, brave dancers who can amend 'em." They wound the coloured ribbons about the four poles, while the rest of the merrymakers danced at will and to the lilt of the gay tunes, in twos and threes, as their fancy led them. Timothy watched two flower-girls, tripping a measure with a forester, smiling at him over their shoulders, and finally giving him each a hand and dancing away into the crowd. He felt his pulses beat the time as they had never done in a ballroom. It was the open air, and the gay costumes, and the spirit of Old England, which had somehow taken possession of him. Here was nothing but sunshine and feasting and dancing all day; and after sundown, rest under a hawthorn bush. Timothy even longed to give a hand to that dainty shepherdess and join in the dance. "Come together, come, sweet lass, Let us trip it on the grass." Presently the music ceased and the dancers scattered to their separate plays. Timothy suddenly bethought him of his cousin. For the moment his desire to claim acquaintance with an Old Englander got the better of his hatred of college girls, and he asked one of the nearest groups where he might find Miss Hall. A tall marshal standing near heard the question, and turned around with a start. "Did you ask for Miss Hall?" she said. "I will be glad to direct you if you will come with me." Now Timothy was unaccustomed to having young women, with golden hair, and shining, eager eyes, hold out their hands to him, and say, "Come with me!" He was so taken by surprise that with a mumbled, "Much obliged, I'm sure," he followed her meekly through the crowd towards Dalton Hall. "It is most unusual," he told himself with misgiving, "for her to address me, a complete stranger, in this way. It must be the policy of the college to propitiate outsiders. I wonder if she would do it to every one." Then, quite irrelevantly, he wondered if he had on his most becoming shape of collar. For some reason he felt very tolerant towards this girl's naïve eagerness. Presently she turned back to him, and said: "Would you not like to come over here and see _The Ladie of the Maie_? It is such a pretty little play." "After all," thought Timothy, "no one knows me here." He followed her submissively to the very front row of spectators, and sat down on the grass, a thing he had not done before for at least ten years. While they watched, the marshal explained that these shepherds and shepherdesses were all grave seniors, and in one more month would be Bachelors of Arts in fur-trimmed hoods. She told him all the old oral jokes, and Timothy, to whom they were quite new, was much diverted. In return he raked up his almost forgotten college tales. They were not new to the marshal, but she appreciated them so sweetly that Timothy thought they must be even more amusing than he had fancied. The shepherds departed with their flocks of white, softly-bleating sheep, but before the audience had time to wish them back, a gay, rollicking ditty struck up, and the chimney-sweeps came running in, Jack-o'-the-Green leading. They joined hands and danced around him in a circle, still to the same rollicking measure, while Jack-o'-the-Green, peering through his covering of branches and leaves, bowed to each one in turn. The music stopped with a quick chord, the chimney-sweeps dropped to their knees and pointed their brooms at the figure in the middle. Then the music began again, and with their brooms in front of them, they ran out. Timothy and his guide stood up, and moved onward with the crowd. He began to feel that there was no immediate necessity of finding Marian Hall. He could just as well take a later train back to town. The marshal was very courteous, and he did not wish to appear rude by leaving her too unceremoniously. He even wished something would happen to detain him. "I want to take you to the _Saint George Plaie_," said his guide. "It is very funny, and the grads. do it with a great deal of spirit." Timothy's heart beat fast as he suddenly realized that the marshal was purposely lengthening her task, that she was no more anxious to find Miss Hall than he was. Yet she had known him but half an hour! It made him feel strangely humble. "Do you know," he said, "I have not even been introduced to you?" "Let me introduce myself," said the girl, gaily. "Sir Marshal, at your service." "And I am Sir Lancelot," he declared, modestly, "just returned from the Crusades, and glad to be back in merry England." "Then, fair Sir Knight," said the marshal, "let me guide you to where Saint George is slaying the unbeliever in sport, as you have so often slain him in reality." With more of such agreeable foolery, they made their way to where Saint George was indeed slaying every one around him, to the diversion of the spectators. For years afterwards the thought of the Dragon, with rainbow snaky locks, writhing in the throes of death, would bring to Timothy a smile of retrospective amusement. It was a staging fit for _A Midsummer Night's Dream_. Pembroke was in the background, its grey walls overhung with ivy. A green elm spread its branches on one side of the open space, and on the other was a cherry-tree, a mass of pink blossoms, its soft petals carpeting the grass beneath. There was no further question of finding Marian Hall. Sir Knight and his guide wandered about everywhere, and Timothy's friends would surely have doubted their eyes, could they have seen him taking in everything with the air of a happy child, while he stated his theories on Old English dances, and masques, and costumes. At last he said: "Where is that fellow, Robin Hood, whom I saw in the procession? He must be shooting his arrows somewhere about the green." "I believe he is," said the marshal, without enthusiasm, adding to herself, "How vexatious if I cannot keep him away from there. He will see her, of course, and my day's work will have gone for nothing." "I should like to see him immensely," observed Timothy. "It is a long walk," objected the marshal. "Not _too_ long, surely," said Timothy, with a glance, adding persuasively, "I should hate to go alone." "I should hate to have you," cried the marshal, with unmistakable sincerity. "Ah!" said Timothy, intoxication mounting to his brain. He wanted to grasp some one by the hand and tell him what an altogether pleasing and agreeable world this was. "Ah!" he said again, "we will go together." The marshal flushed and murmured, "Idiot!" Then she grew pinker than ever with vexation, while Timothy watched her confusion with an agreeable thrill. "If he _will_ go," thought the marshal, "I must certainly go too, to see that he doesn't get within speaking distance." So they walked on, past Taylor Hall, and across the May-pole green, down to the hill below Radnor, where Robin Hood's men were holding forth. The crowd of people surged and eddied past them. All the wide expanse of campus was covered with moving throngs, and dotted with the brilliant May-day dresses. Banners of purple and gold and crimson were flaming from every window. "I have stepped right out of America," remarked Timothy. "This place must be rather like a May-day fête, even on ordinary occasions." "I hope not," thought the marshal, wearily. "Those grey stone buildings, with all that ivy, are like feudal castles. I should think that the girls wandering about must be rather decorative, if they wear their caps and gowns." "Thank you," murmured the marshal. "I feel like a trespasser," continued Timothy. "The place just suits your costumes. We have no business here. Why did you let us in?" "I don't know what object there would have been in getting it up, if we didn't let you in," said the marshal, striving not to be bored. Timothy was still in the clouds as they pushed their way into the inner circle of the crowd, just in time for the finish of a bout at quarter-staff between Robin Hood and Little John. Then Robin Hood ran to the top of the hill, and blew a shrill blast upon his horn. A shout answered him, and his band of merry men, all clad in Lincoln green, came pouring over the brow of the hill. Long ago, when Timothy was a child, Robin Hood had been his hero. He had procured a bow and arrow, and was wont to strut about the back-yard, pretending to shoot the dun deer. Here he was face to face with the famous outlaw, and the old glamour gathered about him. After the familiar scene of Little John's christening, the drinking-horns were filled, and the band threw themselves down upon the soft grass, covered with violets. All listened while the minstrel touched his harp, and the beautiful voice of Allan-a-Dale sang the plaintive old ballad _Islington_. Timothy was still hearing the echoes of the song when his guide said to him, "It is all over. That is the last of the day." "I should like to see it over again," sighed Timothy. The girl laughed impatiently. "If you are going back to town to-night, I am afraid you will have to go at once. The train leaves in about ten minutes. Good-night," and she held out her hand to him. "Good-night," said Timothy. "Do you know," he said, "I have to thank you for one of the pleasantest days of my life." "I am very glad," said the marshal, not knowing what else to say. "I am going home to write a love-story," declared Timothy, "all about Old England and May-day, and you shall be the heroine!" "Thank you very much," said the marshal. "It is getting very late, Sir Knight. I must really say good-bye." "Good-bye, good-bye, Sir Marshal--till next May-day," cried Timothy. He stood still, looking after her tall, erect figure, as she made her way through the dwindling crowd. Darkness had fallen quickly, and the space about him was almost deserted. The great grey buildings loomed up dimly in the twilight. A group of girls strolled past him, singing _Islington_, and the wind brought back the sweet, plaintive notes. Timothy still saw beside him the quaint figure of the marshal, the curls flying out from beneath her rounded cap, her eyes looking up at him as she explained the May-day sights and sounds. It seemed hardly possible that she was not a reality, that he could stretch out his hand and not touch her. But he would see her again; Philadelphia and Bryn Mawr were not far apart. The distant train whistled, and gave a few warning puffs, which rapidly increased in number as it drew out of the station. Timothy leaned against a tree and indulged in dreams. Two foresters were standing near by, talking eagerly. But it was some time before Timothy realized the purport of their words. "It was the funniest thing you ever heard of," one of them was saying. "Poor Eleanor! I saw her with him some time ago, and now she has just told me what happened. You see I asked her to take care of Jack for me, and keep him from finding me--why, yes, of course I had my reasons--and somehow she got hold of the wrong man. She has kept this creature with her all the afternoon, _all the afternoon_, my dear, thinking he was _Jack_! And she says he is the most awful stick, and has bored her to death, poor dear! Isn't it a joke on her? It is a good joke on me, too, because I was so sure that Jack would come. I wonder why he didn't!" Lights were beginning to twinkle in the windows. The chorus of _Islington_ still came back on the breeze, but it sounded quite different to Timothy. Somehow everything had suddenly become commonplace. "I think," he said, with a deep breath, "it was a pretty good joke on me." Then he pulled down his hat, buttoned his coat, and set off towards the station, with all possible speed. _Anne Maynard Kidder, 1903._ _WITHIN FOUR YEARS_ In the dry, warm darkness of a May evening two girls lay on the grass near the tennis-courts north of Taylor. It was in the days when the present athletic field was only a roadway and a damp hollow where dog-tooth violets grew. Radnor and Merion loomed across the campus, their few lighted windows betraying how little the spirit of study possessed the hour. All the light and brilliancy of the college seemed concentrated in Denbigh dining-room, whence, through wide open windows, came the laughter and songs of the supper the juniors were giving the seniors. There were sound and movement, too, in the obscurity under the windows. Now and then a hand and arm, or a head, rose from the shuffling, murmuring mass, and for a brief moment came into relief against the bright oblong of the window, the hand in its withdrawal seeming always to carry with it something very like a cup or a plate, which was received below with shrieks or even some boldly distinct remarks. One of the girls on the grass sat up suddenly, a stiffness of disapproval apparent in her attitude, even in the dim light from the library windows. "That is all a disappointment to me." She supplemented her remark by a quick movement of one arm in the direction of Denbigh. "Why?" The other girl turned, resting her head on her curved arm. "To think that college girls can be so frivolous, so silly. It isn't at all what I expected before I came." "You didn't suppose we talked in Greek all the time, did you, Lilian?" "Of course I didn't think absurdities, Clara. But I did think college girls would be dignified and serious, and wouldn't act like a rabble of street boys. And _that_, I think is immoral." She rose with her back to Clara, as from Denbigh came, full and strong, reënforced by the voices of the freshmen under the windows, the chorus: "Then here's to Bryn Mawr College, Drink her down, drink her down----" Clara West clasped her arms around her knees and rested her cheek on them, murmuring in a sort of ecstasy, "I love it all." Clara West was a quiet girl with odd impulses. One of these had been to ask Lilian Coles to sit with her for a while on the campus, as they happened to leave the library together. The oddity in this case was not that Clara was a sophomore and Lilian a freshman--class lines were then very loosely drawn. But Lilian was not the sort of girl every one would choose to sit on the grass with under the stars and listen to college songs. Lilian had accepted only because she was waiting for a reference book she wanted. It was this she now went in quest of, after bidding Clara a rather impatient good-night. As she stopped by the half-open door of one of the first floor studies in Merion, a tall girl with smooth, red-brown hair parted in a straight white line, swung herself around from her desk and smiled. "Oh, Miss Coles! You have come for the 'Augustan Poets'? I have just finished." She wore a pretty organdie gown, for she was as scrupulous in maintaining the tradition of dressing for dinner as in every other detail of her well-ordered existence. The study seemed rather bare, but there were a few rich rugs on the floor and on the flat couch, and large photographs of Greek sculptures on the walls. A tea table by the hearth was loaded with cups and saucers, cakes and sandwiches; and thin steam was beginning to come from a kettle hanging on an iron tripod. "Won't you stay and have some tea?" Edith Dareham asked, as Lilian turned away with the book. "Some of the girls are coming in to talk over our play for the freshmen next fall." "No, thank you, I don't drink tea, and--I don't believe in plays." With this bomb-like deliverance Lilian disappeared. Edith looked bewildered and rather pained. "The people evidently don't want your 'panis et circenses,'" mocked a voice close at hand, and a pretty head thrust itself beyond one of the bedroom portières. "Oh, Blanche dear, are you there? Won't you come out and help me make the tea?" Lilian hurried out of Merion, meeting groups of freshmen and sophomores. A few of them nodded indifferently to her, but the majority seemed not to heed her. As she crunched over the gravel toward Radnor, where more lights were appearing, she had a sharp feeling of discomfort, unrelieved by any sense of heroism. She was well constituted for martyrdom, but just now the performance of duty seemed a very ungracious task. Lilian was a victim of a world-old opposition, taking form in her in a conflict between a habit of thought imposed by training, and certain essential, though still latent, qualities of her nature. She was in a stage of intense admiration for Edith Dareham, unconsciously influenced by much in Edith that appealed to the undeveloped side of her character, though attributing her admiration wholly to the obvious traits revealed in Edith's fine conscientious work. Yet she felt an antagonism toward the fact that Edith gave encouragement, or at least tolerance, to certain features of college life that seemed very reprehensible to Lilian, according to the peculiar tenets of the religion in which she had been trained. Her father was a member of a small religious sect, most numerous in the West, whose creed would seem, to the uninitiated, to be wholly negative, in its exclusion of all that makes for the brightness of life. The sect, though small, was vigorous in proselytism, and Lilian's father had been sent out as a missionary, first to Germany, then to Switzerland. Here had been for Lilian a vast increase in the chances for education; and with a natural aptitude and a child's facility she acquired a good knowledge of French and German. The leaders of this sect had established a small so-called college--really a school for the study of the Bible, with their doctrinal interpretations--because, in the anticipation of an imminent ending of the world, they deemed time too short to be spent on any other line of study. At about the time of Lilian's return to America, the school had been placed in charge of a man of good academic training, but of a difficult temper that had driven him from place to place till he had accepted this position as almost a last resort. When Lilian was placed in the school he quickly discovered the possibilities of her mind, and for three years gave her a rigorous training. He then advised her father to send her to college. Mr. Coles was not blind to some of the advantages shrewdly presented by the little instructor. He laid the matter before a committee of elders of the society, and consent was finally given. Before her departure, Lilian was called into the presence of the elders, and her opportunities for witnessing to the "light" in a new field, her duty of non-compliance, were solemnly, almost threateningly impressed upon her. The college was chosen by the instructor. The question of money presented difficulties at first, but was finally arranged, and Lilian went on for the examinations with a confidence born of her teacher's encouragement, and justified by her success. To-night, as she went through Radnor, she could hear laughter, singing, rustling and skurrying,--all the relaxations of a Friday night, with festivity in progress. There was something almost greedy in the haste with which she lighted her lamp, closed her door, and drew down the window shade. Her unworded thought was that others might so waste their time if they chose; she could not afford to. Something of Lilian's reaction to her present environment might have been divined from her face. The forehead was of good shape, but too full for the thin, refined lower features. At her temples the veins were very distinct. She studied until after the seniors and juniors returned from their supper. Her thoroughness in work was largely temperamental. She still looked upon her opportunities in college simply as means to greater efficiency in the missionary work she had been chosen to do--work that was in fact the propagation of certain peculiar theories. To her simple thinking, it was a sacrifice of herself to make the world better. Her anxiety over the approaching examinations was great. The next morning she would gladly have gone to the library immediately after breakfast, but it was characteristic of her that she went instead for a two mile walk which she did not in the least enjoy. The Gulph road, behind the college, was a green cathedral aisle, starred with the white flowers of the dogwood. She did not know it. The rhododendrons were in brilliant bloom on the well-kept lawn of a country-place near the pond. She did not see them. But when she came in she was sure that she could not fail on Grimm's law. Lilian's marks at the mid-year examinations had been good, but not high enough to be striking, and as she left college as soon as the May examinations were finished and thus escaped the inevitable comparing of marks, no one knew how high were the grades she received. The excellence of her work, however, unperceived during her first year, save by very few, could not fail of notice as her sophomore year went on, and after the result of the February examination was known, aroused a dim uneasiness among some very devoted friends of Edith Dareham's. The general rough grading of the members of the class during the first year is apt to be accurate, and, with a little shifting, is accepted as permanent in the second year. Edith Dareham was now the recognized European Fellow of the class of '9--. "You don't suppose there is any danger, do you?" was the query put to a group in a cozy Denbigh study one February afternoon before dinner. It was growing dark with a gathering storm, and the wind was whirling clouds of snow across the campus. In the room the gas was lighted, a coal fire was glowing in the grate, and two alcohol lamps were steadily burning. The querist was Katherine Leonard, "a junior by courtesy," she frankly qualified herself. Indeed a degree for her did seem at least problematical, not so much through neglect of hard work as through a perverse inclination to interest herself ardently in courses of reading quite foreign to her majors. She was absorbed in literature and philosophy while painfully struggling with mathematics and physics, and as these latter subjects scarcely permit a divided allegiance even to minds most gifted in that direction, the issue threatened to be disastrous for Katherine. But when urged to change her majors she simply shook her head. She needed the discipline, she said. "Danger of what?" demanded Blanche Merrill, Edith Dareham's roommate, with an abrupt turn to Katherine. "That Lilian Coles may take the fellowship from Edith." "Of course not! How absurd!" replied Blanche superbly. "Don't be too sure, Blanchette, dear," interposed a tall girl who was writing at a table under the gas. She was copying a lecture from her hostess's notebook into her own, and kept on while she was talking. "Don't use that absurd name, Clothilde, any one would think I was a Trouville donkey. You might as well say 'Papillon.'" "Thank you, I will. But _revenons_--the fellowships are very uncertain certainties, and who can say what will happen with a girl who gets high credit in the gym." "Then Edith may as well give up." Katherine's small form yielded to a spasm of laughter at the recollection of Edith's doing two hours a day in the gymnasium in order to avoid a condition. "Yes," commented Blanche, "when Edith went to the gym before breakfast, Katherine would go and hold Thucydides up before her, so that Edith could put a last polish on her translation while she was doing chest weights and quarter circle." "That isn't really true, you know," Katherine coolly joined in the laughter of the others. "That is, it's true only to the spirit, not to the fact. I would have done it if it had been necessary. But really it would be unjust to the college to give the fellowship to a girl who won't go to a tea." "Is Miss Leonard here?" In response to a low rap some one had opened the door to Lilian Coles who stood a little bewildered at the contrast between the still unlighted hall and the bright room. Katherine freed herself from the group on the floor. "Oh, you have brought that book. I wish you hadn't. I'll have to read it now. Come up, and I will give you the other. I haven't read it. I have been skating all the afternoon. Mabel, please hand me my skates." "Won't you come in and have a cup of cocoa? It is so cold outside," Lilian was temptingly urged by the fair-haired girl who was nominally mistress of the study, though both she and her roommate were usually obliged to work in the library, so thoroughly did a reputation for hospitality characterize their room. Lilian wanted to go in, but without hesitation declined and started away with Katherine. "Wait a moment," Katherine touched Lilian's arm and turned back to the open door. Two girls had begun to sing, in response to the guitar of a third, "Drink to me only with thine eyes." While Katherine listened to the song, Lilian's eyes rested curiously first on the sensitive face, then on the black sweater, short corduroy skirt and heavy boots that made up Katherine's skating costume. "I am glad I am not so conscientious as Helen Arnold," Katherine said, at the close of the song. "When her aunt wanted to take her to Bayreuth last summer, she wouldn't go, because, not having an intellectual appreciation of music, she couldn't, forsooth, permit herself so much emotional enjoyment." Lilian looked puzzled yet stern. She could not but approve the action, though the motive seemed to her unnecessarily refined. Katherine's rooms were on the second floor. When the two girls entered, the study was in the shadowy dimness of grey twilight cheered by a warm fire. Katherine lighted an old Venetian lantern and some red-shaded candles, then drew the sash curtains which were of dark red silk with arabesques of fine gold lines. Above the mantel hung two carbon photographs of Fra Angelico angels in vellum frames; and at one end stood a bronze of the Flying Mercury, at the other a cast of the Olympian Hermes. On the walls were photographs of Matthew Arnold, Christina Rossetti, and Cardinal Newman; also some prints that Katherine fondly believed to be original Dürers. These objects had not the interpretative value for Lilian that they might have had for another; but the whole suggested luxury to her, and her eyes turned away disapprovingly to fall with a sort of startled horror on the recess left between two bookcases, where, against a dark background, hung an exquisite ivory crucifix. Lilian's attitude toward Catholicism was of the original Puritan inflexibility, strengthened by the exaggerated hatred of the class of people among whom she had lived. And she knew nothing of any concessions due to the opinions of others. The crucifix represented merely a sympathy, not a tendency on Katherine's part. But this fact, even if it had been known to Lilian, would have served none the less to intensify in her a feeling of radical difference between Katherine's governing ideals and her own. When she entered Radnor on her return, two girls were coming slowly down the stairs, absorbed in confidential chat. They smiled at Lilian as she passed, but she knew that she had no share in the friendship expressed even by the touch of Clara's hand on Ethel's shoulder. She drew herself up sharply, remembering her longing to enter Florence Baker's bright, gay study. Her way to her room took her past the single suites. The door of one was open, and within were trunks and signs of packing. "Are you going away?" she paused to ask. Gertrude Elbridge, a pretty little freshman, came forward and drooped against the door. "Yes, you know I have been ill since the examinations, and papa has sent for me." "I am sorry." This was true, as Lilian had a mild fondness for the child, despite the fact that, through evenings of loud and prolonged hilarity, Gertrude and her friends had made life a burden to Lilian, and with direct consequence, to the members of the Executive Board of Self-Government. Lilian went on to her room, indignation possessing her. She knew why Gertrude was going away. Before each examination Gertrude had studied all night, her head bound in a wet towel. The towel really bothered her, but she knew that was what her brother did. She had kept awake on strong tea and coffee supplied by sympathizing friends. But evidently even these frantic efforts had not proved redemptive. "Why," Lilian asked herself, "did not the stronger girls of the college bring a pressure of sentiment to bear against these follies, instead of encouraging them by their own customs?" Was it not her duty to make some protest? An unavailing one it would doubtless be, but surely it is only a lukewarm reformer that considers results rather than principles. She had returned to college in the fall with a strengthened antagonism to what her father called the worldliness of college life. His influence was still dominant with her. His vision was crude, and he denounced, with a solemnity appealing to the girl's native earnestness, all the joyous innocent froth of amusement that danced over the current of the real, serious life of the college. In truth, Lilian had departed further from her father's beliefs than she realized. She had already gained an historical perspective and a certain habit of cool unbiased judgment that were forcing her to see in what ignorance and narrowness of mind those beliefs were conceived and accepted. At the same time the studies that had modified her views, tended to increase her sense of the preciousness of time, of the seriousness of life. Her loyalty to her father's teachings was stirred by an unanalyzed appreciation of the change in herself. And now, in the failure of Gertrude Elbridge she seemed to find a justification of the rigidly prohibitive lines her father would throw around all conduct. She could not see, yet, that the weak have their hard lessons to learn in the opportunities of the strong. Unfortunately opportunity was not lacking Lilian Coles for that word of protest she felt bound to utter. She always attended the Sunday evening meetings, though little in sympathy with their spirit. The next Sunday she went early. Into the dimly lighted gymnasium came the girls, eyes sparkling and cheeks red from the clear cold air without. Nearly all were wrapped in shawls, but one girl wore a hat and coat and carried a bag. There was a big bunch of violets on the lapel of her coat, and she smiled rather consciously at some comments of the girls she joined. In the first row of chairs were some dignified seniors whom Lilian rather feared, and a junior who at once attracted and repelled her. She was, in spite of herself, fascinated by a cleverness that manifested itself in every department of the college, that would be a force in literature some day, so every one said; and at the same time she had a feeling that there was nothing the girl would not sacrifice to ambition. At last Helen Arnold, who was to lead the meeting, came in accompanied by Edith Dareham. Helen was the girl who had refused to go to Bayreuth. She busied herself with great care in arranging the books and lamp on a little table. Her friends knew that she was embarrassed. She was a frail-looking girl, one who set a high value on things that were still unapprehended by Lilian, in their real nature. She began with a short quotation and took, as a point of departure, the lines: "That thread of the all-sustaining beauty Which runs through all and doth all unite." With well-chosen words she modestly brought out her thought of the duty of each one to seek for this thread of beauty in all things. Then she spoke, with a little more insistence, of the beautiful in art and in nature, which, she believed, demanded for its true appreciation the highest cultivation not only of mind and age, but of soul as well. After a short silence, Elizabeth Carrington, Helen's roommate, spoke, weaving Helen's thought into the larger one of that endeavor toward perfection sacredly enjoined upon us. With an impatience born of the incomprehension of her mood, Lilian had listened to Helen. She did not hear Elizabeth, who had scarcely finished speaking, when Lilian rose. The girls looked surprised; but after the consecrated formula--"It seems to me"--various expressions replaced the surprise. Some of the listeners looked coldly bored or contemptuous, a few were amused, but the majority sat ill at ease with pained faces. Lilian was arraigning them for so much time spent in idle conversation, and in "feasting"--she fiercely put it. She denounced them for their plays, their dancing. In her excitement she assumed the tone and phraseology of the denunciations she had been accustomed to hear from childhood and she went farther than she intended. She said their pursuit of knowledge was only for its vain shows. The nature of the silence into which her words fell should have warned her, but some confused association of ideas carried her on to a bitter allusion to Catholicism. She was recalled to herself by the indignant protest on Helen's face. Clothilde and one or two others present were Catholics. Lilian choked and stopped. "Shall we not sing?" suggested Helen. Clothilde started the hymn. There was no more speaking. Lilian was the first to leave the meeting. She went out with unseeing eyes and hot cheeks, alone. There are times when even the kindest hearts are cold, and for the moment there could be nothing but alienation from one who had found tongue against the college spirit--for they felt that the attack was really against this vague, shadowy, stern, beloved thing of many hues and many forms--the spirit of the college. Outside, the moon had risen in a clear star-powdered sky, and was silvering the crusted snow and the ice sheaths that rain and frost had left on every twig and branch of the trees. The sparkle and splendour of the night only smote Lilian as a part of that whole body of beauty which, it seemed to her excited thinking, had been presented that evening as of equal importance with goodness and morality. There is little tea drinking on Sunday evening. Many girls are away. It is the time for writing home letters, or doing a little quiet reading. The rooms never seem so warm or the lights so bright as on other nights. The halls are still and everybody goes to bed early. But this night there was a little more excitement as girls stopped to talk with indignation, amusement or indifference of Lilian's outburst. Katherine Leonard found several girls in Edith's room when she stopped, after an errand in Radnor. She sought each face questioningly, then dropped on the couch. "How awfully _funny_--how dreadful it was!" "I can't understand the state of mind that would lead to that," said Alice Warburton. "Where has such narrow-minded egotism been fostered? Such injustice! What an arid life she must have known." "I admire her!" said Elizabeth Carrington decisively. "I was near enough to her to-night to see how tightly she clung to the chair in front of her. Her knuckles were all white and shiny. It was real heroism. I doubt if any one of us will ever show as much." "I should hope not!" Blanche commented energetically. There was a girl lying on the couch who had been reading _Diana of the Crossways_, all this time. She occasionally made notes on the margins. Now she looked up. "For my part, I prefer goodness to cleverness," was all she said. Then she went on reading again. The girls all laughed a good deal. Then there was silence, and some of them laughed again--a little. Some of them were very much of Lilian Coles' opinion in regard to this girl, who was the junior Lilian had noticed in the gymnasium. "She has greatly relieved my mind, at any rate," said Katherine. "She can never hope for the fellowship now." "You have no right to say that." Edith was a little sharp. She was somewhat troubled within herself. She liked the serene state of mind that her usual conduct of life granted her, and hated a mean feeling with an intensification of the disgust that any contact with uncleanness gave to her physical fastidiousness. In the dissatisfaction that she had occasionally felt of late, it had occurred to her that she might settle issues with herself by some plan involving sacrifice on her part. But injustice was no dearer to her than selfishness. She fell asleep that night with the healthy resolve not to be troubled by what she could not help. Meanwhile Lilian Coles was lying on her bed, in the dark, with wide-open eyes. She was restless with a shamed sense that she had violated her finest instincts. She continually wondered how she _could_ have done such a thing. Then all the questionings that had been forming in her deeper consciousness for nearly two years, came forward, insisting on a hearing. Helen Arnold's talk that evening passed through her mind with a new meaning and force, but she was too much exhausted then to come to any conclusions. She finally fell asleep, hoping that every one would be too busy to remember her speech very long. One Saturday morning in the spring Lilian started downstairs. It was late, she was tired and vexed at her slothfulness. She had gone to bed the night before so tired that one night's rest was wholly insufficient. As she reached the foot of the stairs a girl came out of the bathroom with a kettle of water. She nodded to Lilian, went on, then turned. "Miss Coles, you are sure not to find anything hot for breakfast. Won't you come into my room? We are going to have breakfast there." Lilian hesitated. Something, perhaps an animating suggestiveness in the spring air that was sweeping through the windows, perhaps the mere yielding of tired flesh to kindly human influences, moved her to accept. Hester Grey's room looked over the fields and low hills. Two study tables had been put together and were covered with white embroidered cloths. A bowl of violets was on one table and a dish of strawberries on the other, while the more substantial provisions for the breakfast were on a side-table. This separation was due to an arbitrary distinction of Hester's, food taking precedence in her ideas according to its appeal to the eye. There were two girls in the window-seat and another in a steamer-chair. This one sprang up and insisted on giving Lilian the chair, tucking the pillow behind her with an unceremonious friendliness very grateful to Lilian. Then she began cutting bread, urging that some one else pass Lilian the olives. "Do you think you will want more sugar in your cocoa?" Hester asked Lilian. "Of course she will," said one of the girls in the window, without looking up from her book. "You never make it sweet enough." Lilian thought this was very rude, but Hester didn't seem to notice it. She carried a cup to Lilian, who looked at her curiously. Lilian had always had a thought of scorn in her opinion of this girl, whose erratic work, spasmodic brilliancy and general idleness were known to the whole college. Lilian knew that she would sit for hours on the stone wall of the Harriton burying ground doing nothing, even if examinations began the next day. No one ever seemed to be able to foretell whether she would get High Credit or a condition in any examination. Lilian had seen her absorbed in _Treasure Island_ the day before the English essays were due. Hester's essay on Keats was written in one night, so rumour said. It received the only High Credit. Lilian had read it, with something like astonishment at the feeling aroused in herself by the revelation of another girl's mind. She had come to have a feeling like reverence for this girl, realizing at last that some gifts of the spirit are not to be measured by so many hours of study, so many hours of exercise. And now this same girl was apparently concentrating her whole mind on the amount of sugar to be added to each cup. Then Lilian had to think a little about the other girls in the room. They had always seemed to her commonplace, doing but indifferent work. At least they had won no distinction. She knew that the five were close friends, that they couldn't have the fullest enjoyment with her in the room, yet they were unaffectedly genial and hospitable to her. While she, with a perversity which shocked her, did not care if they did enjoy themselves a little less on her account. She wanted what they were giving her. It is a truism that some actions most important to ourselves or others often seem but pure whim. Hester could have given no reason--in fact, it was not her habit to await reasons--for asking Lilian Coles to take a walk with her that morning. And Lilian, to whom even tying her shoe was often occasion for a mental inquisition, did not care to explain to herself why she accepted the invitation with eagerness. She had intended to spend the morning in making a tabulation and synopsis of some second year English reading. But the pain of that unforgettable Sunday evening had wrought in Lilian a distrust of her own valuations, and she went with Hester willingly. The morning freshness was still in the air. Hester took Lilian through the woods where the starting leaves wreathed the grey tree-trunks and slim branches like trails of green smoke; to a wide bed of spring beauties; past the pond fringed with willows; across the fields to a stream that flung itself over the rocks with a sparkling abandon to the joy of spring. Lilian saw all these things; and she saw, too, the contrast between the rich black of new ploughed fields and the vivid green of winter wheat. She heard a bluebird singing above them. They went on to an old ruined mill, shadowed by tall dark pines whose roots were washed by a wide, shallow creek. Across the stream, there were woods. Here the girls sat under the pines and Hester read aloud from _Undine_. Gradually the wash and splash of the creek were transferred from Lilian's outward to her inward hearing and seemed to be singing to her of a spirit that was in the water. Suddenly she had a vision of the meaning of the old pagan ideals. She lay back on the grass and let her eyes look very far into the blue above the pines. It occurred to her that she would take some books home in vacation and read all the poems noted on the margins of her Horace. She understood now, she thought, something of the delight in that year's work which all the others in the class had expressed and which she had, in some way, missed. They stopped to rest again on the stone wall of the old burying ground in the woods, and Hester read from Chaucer following her own liking wholly. Lilian went back to her room with a new sense of the beauty of nature, and of the dignity of free, wholesome joyous human life. There was no time before luncheon for the intended tabulation of ballad poetry, and in the afternoon she turned at once to the assigned reading in Wordsworth and Coleridge. Before coming to college Lilian had been allowed to read very little. Even her study of the Bible had been scarcely more than a search for texts and illustrations in support of the beliefs of her sect. All through this year the reading presented to her had been stimulating her imagination and perception. But partly from habit and partly from the fact of having detected a pleasure in the exercise of these faculties, she had continued to read mechanically and blindly. Now for the first time she permitted herself to read with something more than a desire to go over so many pages in a given time. As she finished the _Hymn of Chamouni_ she caught her breath as one whose spirit has been lifted to an unknown height. The twofold process of growth, of putting off the old and acquiring the new went on in Lilian with alternations of pain and pleasure, the latter increasingly predominating. When she entered college and for sometime after, she had her father's contempt for what he called "mere learning." But she was led to a very different way of thinking by a better understanding of what scholarship means--of its untiring zeal and care for truth, and of its outlook beyond the fact to the including law. She even came to accept an opinion that, later on, she found thus expressed: "... our deeper curiosity. There is a sense in which it is all superfluous. Its immediate results seem but vanity. One could surely live without them; yet for the future, and for the spiritual life of mankind, these results are destined to become of vast import." Lilian's nature was such, however, that she must always care chiefly for the immediate practical application of the idea. During her junior year she did some elective work in sociology which completely revised her ideas of philanthropy. She saw how very inadequate were the measures that she had once thought essential to doing good in the world. Her hope of being a missionary was too much a part of herself to be given up easily, yet she knew that she could not represent her former views. She became greatly interested in college settlement work but she found no time to give to it, for she gave to tutoring all the time that she could spare from her regular work. The mental submission and the claim upon her future involved in the arrangement by which her expenses were paid had become impossible to her, and she wished to become self-supporting as soon as possible. One Saturday morning she was sitting in the biological laboratory, carefully correcting her drawings of nitella, when Miss Hardy, a graduate student with whom she had done some work in sociology, came in and bent over her. "Should you not like to go into town with me this evening to one of the social meetings of a working-girls' club which has been organized recently? I think you would be interested." After a moment's thought Lilian decided to go. A girl whom she tutored every Saturday afternoon was ill and that time could be given to the usual Saturday evening work. When they reached the Broad Street Station, Lilian was surprised to find Helen Arnold, who had been spending the afternoon in town, waiting for them. The clubhouse was in the lower part of the city. After their arrival there, Lilian spent an hour in eager inspection of the small library, the schedule of classes, and the furnishings of the rooms. Helen had disappeared. Lilian asked for her, and Miss Hardy explained, "She comes every Saturday if she can find any one to go to and from the station with her. She is teaching two or three girls who can have better positions as soon as they can write and spell better. This is the only time they have." Then they went into a large, brightly-lighted room with a waxed floor. There was a piano at one end, and some one was beginning to play. The girls, most of them neatly and prettily dressed, were gathered near the piano, while a few young men, with very smooth hair and rather conspicuous ties, stood in stiff self-consciousness near the door. "Young men of good character are invited in once a month," whispered Miss Hardy. A half-grown girl, in heavy shoes, a crumpled red dress, with a soiled ribbon knotted around her neck, crossed the room and stood in front of Lilian. Her open scrutiny was beginning to be embarrassing when Helen came in. She touched the girl on the arm, and was soon leading the clumsy shoes lightly through a waltz. After two or three turns Helen sought some one else, and the girl returned to Lilian. "Say, ain't she sweet?" she said, looking after Helen with eager eyes. "She teaches somethin' here, and I'm go'ne to learn it. And I want some white ties like she wears." It was still early when they started for the station, but on the streets Lilian saw one or two things that made her glad to think of the many girls they had left in the simple pleasures of the carefully-guarded clubrooms. A slight delay caused them to miss their train, and they had to spend half an hour in the waiting-room. Miss Hardy found some evening papers. Helen declined the one offered her, and drew a book from her shopping-bag. "What reading is this, Helen?" Miss Hardy laughingly questioned. Helen blushed a little. "It is really only the third." On the train the book happened to lie for a moment in Lilian's lap. She noted the title. It was _Marius, the Epicurean_, and at her earliest opportunity she procured the book and read it. She read it with intense interest. Here were a care for life--for its pleasures--and a consecration of time that found no necessary detail too small for perfection. The charm of the book was upon her--its flawless form, its sanity, its strenuousness. There was something of the old defiance in her attitude toward this epicureanism, though the character of it was so exalted and pure. But at the close, when Marius simply puts himself aside and accepts death that his dear friend may live--happy in a love denied Marius--she put the book down very softly. By the profound stirring of her sympathies she felt how absolute was her acceptance of the whole character--as consistent with itself in sacrifice as in æsthetic enjoyment. The constantly increasing deference given Lilian because of the quality of her work contributed much to her contentment. The freer play of her intelligence was making itself felt. By the beginning of their senior year Lilian Coles and Edith Dareham were undoubted rivals for the European Fellowship. But the real excitement over the fellowship was not apparent until after the mid-year examinations. Then the strain began to be wearing on the two girls and their friends. "I wish the Faculty would come to a decision," said Katherine Leonard one evening in Clothilde Barry's room. She was on the window-seat between a big palm and a pile of notebooks. "If they don't very soon, I'll not get a degree in June. I love this place but I don't want to stay here all my life. It would be hard to fix my affections on another class. But I can't study till I know." "I think that possibility would stimulate them, if they only knew--" began Blanche. Just then the door was flung open and Alice Warburton came in impetuously--her usual manner, but some dramatic quality in this present haste must have made itself apparent, for the other girls assailed her breathless silence with questions. What she finally said was: "There is a Faculty meeting in Taylor." After a moment of comprehending silence, Blanche went out quickly. Katherine followed her. "Blanche, if you find out before the doors are locked, won't you come and tell me?" "I don't know how it will be." Blanche looked anxious and wouldn't stop. Katherine went back to Clothilde's room, and after she had tipped over the palm and broken the jardinière was advised by Clothilde to go home and go to bed. In her own room she took a physics laboratory book and made a feeble attempt to put order into its chaos, but only succeeded in dropping ink over two important calculations. Then she took down a volume of Mazzini's writings in which she had lately become much interested. At the end of half an hour she became aware that she had not turned a page. She left her room and went down to the parlour. All the lights were out, even in the rooms. Over in Taylor there was a dim light in a second floor window. It had no connection with the Faculty meeting, but she chose to consider that it had, and crouched, shivering, in the window until it went out. Then she went stiffly to bed and slept badly. The next morning Blanche came to her soon after breakfast. "Edith wants to see you." "Oh, Blanche?" But Blanche was already backing out of the door. "I can't tell you anything. Edith hasn't told me anything." Every line of her face was non-committal. Edith was sitting at her desk writing when Katherine entered. She looked over her shoulder and smiled, but she was very grave. "I have it, Katherine." Katherine sat down on the window-seat, and bending over pressed her forehead down on Edith's shoulder. Edith turned about and lifted Katherine's face. She was crying--Katherine, in whom the repressions of stoicism had been the least fleeting of many moods. After a while Katherine said, "We were afraid at one time, Blanche and I--that you might do something--rash." It was not necessary for Edith to ask what she meant. She hesitated before speaking. "I have felt troubled. It isn't reasonable, but I haven't been able to get rid of an uncomfortable feeling about Lilian Coles. I _could_ go to Europe without the fellowship, and I suppose she can't. But--I wanted it. I did try to think of some way of helping her when I heard last year that there was danger of her having to leave college. But even if I had had the money--that's a sort of thing it is almost impossible to do. It might have seemed a generous thing for me to let my work go a little, but I could not be sure that she wouldn't do better than even my best. And," Edith gripped the desk hard, "it would have seemed to me a simply wicked sentimentalism to do poor work deliberately for any reason whatever." Katherine released the sleeve of Edith's gown that she had held crumpled in her hand. "I am so glad you felt just that way." Blanche came in then to gather up her notebooks. "How did you find it out, Blanche?" Katherine asked. "Oh. I found the note under her door when I came down from Ethel's room last night"--Ethel was Blanche's sister--a freshman. "We had been sitting up watching. But Edith was sleeping like a baby. I lit a candle and roused her and gave her the note. I must say she was rather excited until she got the note open and read it." Blanche stopped. "Did she tell you then?" prompted Katherine. "She hasn't told me yet. That honour was reserved for you. She lay down again and I kissed her and covered her up and told her to be a good fellow. Then she laughed and so did I, as silly as two loons. She went to sleep. I went upstairs and awakened Helen and Elizabeth. I did not tell them anything, but they understood, and we talked until two in the morning. Imagine Elizabeth and Helen sitting up till two!" Katherine was popular enough in college, but that did not account for the way numerous groups, from seniors to mid-year freshmen, obstructed her going from Merion to her own room, and thence to Taylor. They asked her unimportant questions, and eyed her curiously. Her face was impassive. The chapel was unusually full. Edith's friends had gathered around her in her usual seat, well forward. "But that doesn't mean anything," whispered a high freshman voice, "they'd be there just the same anyway." Lilian's chief supporters were among the graduate students. Those from other colleges looked rather defiant. A few members of the Faculty came in and sat in the back seats. After the short exercises, the announcement was very quickly made. During the storm of applause that greeted Edith's name Lilian sat apparently unmoved. Her hands were very cold, but no one knew that. And no one would ever know how much she had wanted that fellowship. She had been having a very bad quarter of an hour since Clara West, who was back as a graduate student in Greek, managed to find out and let her know that the decision had been made. Three times before, Lilian had heard a similar announcement made, and each time she had thought that the applause would have been just as loud if the other possible girl had been named. Now she knew that there would not have been the same gladness on the faces or the same heartiness in the hand-clappings if she had been the one instead of Edith. She could have made more friends, she believed, but she had thought that she knew a better use for her time. A keen heart-longing was mingled with her disappointment. A few weeks later the presence of the students in chapel was again specially requested, and more announcements were made, among them, that the Fellowship in History had been given to Lilian Coles. "I am so glad!" repeated Clara West that evening, strolling with Lilian about the campus. That Lilian was strolling was not without its significance. It was a misty evening after a rainy day. All about them were the tender, yet vivid, colours of early spring--the fields beyond the edge of the campus, and the distant uplands, were veiled in green mist. Near Taylor the Judas-tree was in purple bloom, and further away the Japanese cherries lifted pink sprays against a soft grey sky. Lilian was moved to an appreciation that did not exclude a quality the picture received from the dignity of the buildings, or even from the well-kept condition of turf and walks. She turned to Clara. "No one can ever know," she said, "how glad I am to come back." It was the day before commencement. Lilian Coles was in the library, selecting some books to take away for the summer. She went to a window that looked toward Rosemont and Villa Nova. She had come to have a sense of wide distances from this window. For the moment, with a swift, scarcely-conscious recognition of new ideals, new standards of life, she felt in herself something of the triumphant onward rush of the Winged Victory dominating this end of the library. This morning the sky was deep blue with a few white clouds. The air was fresh, the trees and grass very green. The slope beyond the tennis-courts was white with daisies. Some professors, in white flannels, were playing tennis on the nearest courts. Girls in white duck or fluffy muslins were moving toward the gymnasium. The college breakfast was to be there at twelve o'clock. Lilian was going. She had refused all invitations until her examinations were over. Then she went to several teas, to a picnic luncheon and to the class supper. She intended to go to the alumnæ banquet Thursday evening. Lilian found her place at one of the long tables in the gymnasium beside Clara West and opposite Hester Grey. The balustrade of the running-track had been transformed into a frieze of mountain laurel. Laurel and ferns decorated the tables. The breakfast was nearly over, and the black waiters were serving the ices. "Can you see Lilian Coles?" Blanche bent around an intervening neighbour to ask Katherine. Katherine, happy in the fact that she would get a degree on the morrow, looked across the tables just as Lilian touched glasses with a freshman, her lips moving in the chorus, "Here's to Bryn Mawr College!" It was Hester Grey who saw a solemn look on Lilian's face as they rose to join in "Manus Bryn Mawrensium." But at that moment it seemed to Lilian herself, that of all the "lætissimæ puellæ" she, in her way, was the most joyful. _Elva Lee, '93._ _FREE AMONG THE DEAD_ I A quick step came down the hall and stopped. There was a rustle of silk; the step died away in the direction from which it came. Esther raised her head, carefully laying her little clay tablet on its bed of jeweller's cotton as she wheeled around an instant to smile: "They're a bit shy of us to-night, Sydney. Haven't you finished with Marius?" Sydney Lodge, who had swung round also and met her eye, answered: "No wonder they are; I know I'm shy of myself. If only for once we lived in Denbigh! Then we might at least see the Faculty coming down past the staircase window and the lights going out in Taylor and know when the meeting was over." The castors complained as she pushed back her chair, then the sash went up and the breath of the night that came in and rattled Esther's papers tasted like deep well water, wonderfully pure and cool and dark. Esther wrapped her gown about her, for since dinner she had been working in the library, and crossing the study with the very light step of a very strong person leaned out the window behind her friend. There was no moon, and the enormous star-sown hemisphere whose horizon fell below their feet, was tonight a faint blur of pearl-grey. Almost as faint and illusory was the ground, and the other halls were denoted by pinkish spots and splashes. From many of these, and in especial from the great windows of the library, ran bands of moonlight-coloured light, like a search-light seen transversely, but filmier. A step rang along the board walk, crunched the gravel, dying away muffled and uneven on grass; voices blew up to them from somewhere and a far-off singing that sounded sweet. Sydney Lodge shivered a little and was drawn in to the fire. "Lie down and scorch your fuzzy head, young Shelley. The ten o'clock bell hasn't rung and they won't agree for hours yet." "They never take long over the graduate fellowships,--they put them off, as last year; still, I admit the senior one is hard to settle," acknowledged Sydney, mischievously. Esther answered with joyful appreciation: "This is quite the most picturesque situation we were ever in. If you don't get it I shall be comforted by its being Hilda----" "--and if Hilda misses it we've all three the satisfaction of knowing the honour is yours--all three, mark you; for it is an honour, you know. And one of us must get it," finished Sydney with conviction. At the door a knock made both girls turn pale, but as it opened appeared a mermaid-head with knotted and dripping tresses, just from the swimming-pool, to beg Sydney's company and her violin below on the second floor. The invitation declined, the two were silent awhile. II Sydney, on the grey furry rug, trailed her slim length closer to the fire like a pale-green enchanted caterpillar. "Did you hear Hilda on Marius at dinner?" she inquired drowsily. "She said if he hadn't stopped to bury his dead----" "She's quite right. He is very beautiful but all wrong, you know. The supreme end of living----" "Is fullness of life," cut in Sydney. "That's an axiom, like the being of a feeling is its being felt, and that other, about the _esse_ of a thing's being _percipi_. Anyway, he had it, fullness of life. But it lands you in the Uebermensch, all the same, and _he_ is a fearful brute." Mechanically Esther murmured: "Nonsense, the Uebermensch is the Magnanimous Man, essentially." "He's not a bit. Anyway, I don't believe you can work equations like that," replied Sydney, stretching up one hand pink against the fire. "I don't think the Magnanimous Man is the opposite of Marius and I know he isn't the same as the Uebermensch, even temperamentally. He risked greatly for great ends: Marius of course never risked at all but the Uebermensch is always chancing it for no particular reason. He doesn't go in for final causes, does he? Please, between them I prefer the Aristotelian,--but not to know personally. It's bound to end in hardness." "In the last analysis, your soul's your own," declared Esther with a habitual gesture of wrapping her gown about her, but the other broke in with a little cry: "Ah, but it isn't! It's every one's else, in the last analysis." "But it is not really so good in the long run even for the other people, that _Tristem Neminem Fecit_. Remember Jane Barry, what she gave up for her people; they hadn't a thing against the man, but they couldn't spare her. Now they have an invalid, and when I was there at Christmas I noticed a very real hardness, which wasn't in the least pretty." Sydney answered with a candour almost noble: "Really, of course, one should only make great renouncements on one's deathbed." "Do you suppose that if Marlowe came by to-morrow and said: 'Chuck the degree, chuck Sydney there on the hearthrug, and come for a walk around the world,' I shouldn't go?" "I suppose you would go, 'still climbing after knowledge infinite.' But then you've no ties," finished Sydney, strong in the recollection of a father, a mother and several brothers and sisters. "Don't you call yourself a tie?" laughed Esther. "I believe you would go," Sydney repeated with a note of regretful admiration. "Now I pray I should have grace to reply: 'Thank you kindly, sir, but I'm bespoke.' I mean, if you had broken your back, for instance, or gone blind." In an old oval mirror on the opposite wall Esther Lawes regarded for an instant her own fair strength, and the large grey eyes a little too clear and bright and round; from year to year they used to give out. "I believe you would," she echoed, gazing down with her usual pleased sense of Sydney's beauty. Never did girl better match than Sydney Lodge her gracious name, radiant, the very sound of it, with sylvan and romantic suggestions. Her slimness had the graceless grace of Shakespeare's disguised heroines; her curls, of hair the most golden red, prompted the quaint Elizabethan epithet of "gold wires"; and her academic gown sat as straightly on her as the Oread's coat of sycamore bark. "God forbid," said Sydney Lodge solemnly. "The Powers have a trick now and then of taking us at our word, and our answered prayers are fruit bitter in the eating." While she spoke they became conscious that the great bell was ringing, with strokes that sounded now near, now far distant, from every quarter, rhythmic in their pulse; the first distinct enough yet echoing familiarly, as though it were the second or third, the last in like manner seeming a faint intermediate one, whose successors the ear had lost. And like the wind awhile before, so the bell had a tang of darkness and the great spaces outside. III In the house there were movements, and voices cut short by banging doors. Sydney had picked up a lamp and disappeared into her bedroom in a sphere of radiance, like a glow-worm. The dimmed room, which seemed yellower, took a new look: the whole Italian Renaissance, very adequately represented by the pictures on the walls, withdrew into itself and darkness. Esther stared absently from the long steamer chair at the faintly yellowed walls, at the pink bed of coals, and two Tanagra figurines above,--the lady who binds up her hair and the other lady carrying a wide basin in her slender hands, who forever bends over it to watch her own reflected face. The girl was disturbed more by this fellowship business than even to her close friend she could betray. Not wanting the fellowship for herself, she did crave it for Sydney. Moreover, they could then go abroad together. She had longed that day to hint as much to a professor that was, she thought, disposed to overvalue her own rather advanced work along a very narrow line as against Sydney's all-round brilliancy. And while she heard the other opening drawers and rustling in her wardrobe, Esther pursued her misgiving a step further than it had ever before taken her, although at no time was she a fancier of illusions. Their alliance, hers and Sydney's, ran back at least a dozen years, away into childhood, and was rooted in all sorts of mutual dependencies. Both moreover were fastidious and constant in their personal affections, making indeed few acquaintances but giving up fewer, and although Sydney had besides what the other called the goose-brigade, a succession of waddling and hissing creatures of both sexes that passed for swans, yet these never got farther than, so to speak, the common outside her windows. Esther herself, without near relatives and secure of a tiny income on which one could starve at least comfortably, having come to college in the interest less of culture than of pedantry, had in the interest of amusement supplemented her Greek with English, and her Hebrew, by way of serious study, with Assyrian and kindred tongues. But Sydney, positively, had gone through as many stages and as well-defined as a silk-worm. Once her violin was the be-all and the end-all; her masters had advised a professional training, urged the expediency of having a career up one's sleeve. Esther felt that it was she who had unconsciously lopped off that possibility, in her own enthusiasm for the college which she was then about to enter, to which she whirled off her friend, plumping her down mentally breathless in a field of Latin and Greek. For the past year or two years, however, the classical prepossessions had been yielding to a keener preoccupation with English and a kindling ambition along the line of what the Sunday papers call literary work. This was furthered partly by Esther's own growing delight in the same matters and partly by the influence of other members of their class, notably Hilda Railton. It was in the _argot_ of their own vanishing here and now, of course, that they had been talking, using counters precisely as the poker-player does, to stand for an immense amount, or at any rate for an indefinite amount. Sydney was wonderful at catching not merely the turn of a phrase, but a turn of thought: she was _simpatica_. "Do you know," said the voice from the inner room, "I can't get that Japanese thing of Hilda's out of my head. Don't you think I might look for one at that same Fifth Avenue place when I am at home at Easter, and try it over my table?" Hilda's Japanese print! There you were. After all, one did recognize the type; it wasn't the superficial nor yet the parasite, but there was about it something of the chameleon nature. It was the ominous unruffled pool that brought Narcissus to his death. With all her brilliancy, all her charm, she was in essence simply the magical mirror. Esther was convinced that neither Sydney herself knew this, nor any of her neighbours. She was far and away too clever. There was just one pathetic chance that somebody in the Faculty might be of so inconceivable a cleverness as to have spied the unscholastic fact. For the third time that evening steps came to the door, and a knock. Esther waited for Sydney and the girls moved together to the threshold, opening on the mistress who held out an envelope. She offered it to Esther. IV Is there any place in the world, Esther Lawes often in graduate days asked her friends, where the evening light lies so long and so delicate as at Bryn Mawr? The campus, snow-piled, prolongs a pale dusk at tea-time; in spring the afternoons grow longer slowly until they are forgotten in the softness of the lengthening evenings; the great cherry-tree, black against grey Pembroke but afoam and aflutter with exquisite whiteness, merges its sharp perfume into the softer odour of the crowded flushed apple-trees and the pungent flavour of their neighbours the green-tufted larches. The misty woods back of Merion become denser aloft and under foot; and beyond the Roberts Road the meadow fills up across the brook with pale shapely violets striped at the heart by threads of purple; the long avenue of maples shakes out its heavy leafage under which all day the girls with their rugs and cushions make yellow and scarlet splashes. After dinner, on the dense short turf in front of Denbigh, she would watch the undergraduates quadrilling--comely figures in faint blues and lavenders, ribbons and ruffles all afloat. She stopped awhile on one of these bland nights in a late and sudden spring, to scan the half-familiar types, the sleek heads and white arms, in the waxing twilight, smiling to herself at her content with them and with the swirl of voiceless swallows about one of the high stone chimneys of Taylor Hall. Gathering up her own filmy dress she moved through the deep-green grass that began to dull and chill her slippers, to the shadowed postern door in the graduate wing and up to her own study. She had not dreamed of such content, she remembered, her first night in the room. V All the days on the steamer she had misdoubted the return to college after two years' absence, and the surprise and foreboding that sprang up when her closest gaze at the dock failed to show her Sydney Lodge, increased the mistrust. There was nothing for which to stay over in New York since Sydney, according to the friends who did show up to greet her, was still twenty miles off at the seashore, and since Esther had cabled to engage the graduate suite of rooms for themselves at college there was a place prepared and probably a letter awaiting her there. Tired with the bustle of the custom house, she scarcely noticed the sunburnt country north of Philadelphia, but from the moment of pulling out from the city westward, found vague forgotten recollections stirring like indistinguishable odours. Strong enough at last even to satisfy her was the sense of a glad home-coming and the sudden contraction of her throat at particular perceptions: the first glimpses of the bell-tower above the trees, the stillness of the wind-swept air, the fresh and quiet beauty of the grey buildings and green turf. As a simple mood she welcomed the feeling, prompt of course to pass, but equally prompt to return and supplant in time inevitable regrets for the other life now finally renounced. It looked very gay, soft, desirable, that other life, while she surveyed the ungarnished and spotless emptiness of the bare study. On one table lay a pile of letters, the topmost directed in Sydney's hand so oddly like her own: a letter puzzling for the first sheet, then plain enough in its shamefaced announcement that the writer was engaged to be married--had been, indeed, for a month past but for some inexplicable reason had not wished Esther to learn before sailing. "H'm," thought Esther, "pity I didn't know this!" She looked around at the two study-tables, two lamps and two armchairs, almost the whole furniture of the room, and began to laugh. The stupid chair butting its nose against the table as maids always will leave study chairs, taunted her with the unnecessary assurance that Sydney would never occupy it. The man in question, curiously enough, Esther had once known rather well. Her brother had been in the same class at Harvard, since whose death some years before she had scarcely seen him. But she had not heard of his meeting Sydney. He was a politician by trade, a lawyer by profession. He belonged in the Middle West. Esther felt rather sick and very angry; Sydney at least needn't have made a fool of her! Still, she _could_ see the comedy. "Hello!" rang up a fine, strong voice below, and turning in the window-seat she saw on the grass brown sturdy Hilda Railton springing off her bicycle, rather warm and very pleased to see her. "I'm coming up. My room is down the hall. Let's have some tea!" When the kettle had boiled Hilda remarked, as she shovelled in the tea: "So you're going in for the Ph. D. after all? I had dreamed you were strong-minded enough to resist the prevailing superstition. O Ichabod, Ichabod!" Esther, laughing, echoed the _Ichabod_ so sincerely that Hilda was prompted to change her ground and while she cut cool odorous slices of lemon to ask: "So Sydney came back after one winter? I knew she would." Esther answered rather dryly: "Yes, her family couldn't spare her." "Sydney's family!" laughed Hilda, recognizing the object of hostility. "We all know it. 'Twas a pretty good year, wasn't it?" "Ah, a golden year!" "I had a notion from your letters last spring you were staying over there indefinitely. Then wasn't there a plan about Sydney's going back?" "Yes. I needed more time. Last year my eyes played me a horrid trick and I couldn't work at all. Not even write letters," said Esther grimly. She had fancied it was because of her inability to answer that Sydney had written so seldom. "I had in another way almost as good a year idling about Berlin and Paris. My dear girl, you've no notion of the possibilities of idleness! So I quite thought of staying at the British Museum this winter, even alone, and finishing what I was at." "Assyrian cylinders still?" "Always cylinders." This with a sudden sense of coldness. "The Deluge, and others. But I changed my mind." Never should any one, her former roommate least of all, know what had changed her mind. Actually this was a letter from Sydney Lodge, written in July and saying in effect, "I need you rather badly. How soon are you coming?" She had explained on a post-card that certain bricks and cylinders ought first to be deciphered and in the meantime had cabled for the rooms. She knew--it was one of the discoveries of this extraordinary afternoon--she knew Sydney's ways even to the point of prediction; that if she should say: "But my dear child I wrote you I had engaged the suite for us both," the young lady would answer with a brilliant smile of privilege and a new note--was it the sentimental?--in her voice: "Did you really? Well, I must have been thinking of something else when I read the letter." It was impossible not to laugh, but Esther covered the laughter with a sudden inspiration: "Oh, I say, don't you want to share my study?" "But Sydney?" cried poor Hilda, setting down her flowered teacup. "Sydney's engaged. One Lewis Mason." "Oh, dear!" Hilda answered flatly. "I'm rather sorry. I always believed in her, you know. She might have done things." "Presumably one can do things with a husband. He is supposed to help," replied Esther, throwing forward her general convictions in the grotesque struggle for loyalty. "Ah, she can't. And," added the girl, conclusively, "he won't." "How's that?" Hilda returned violently: "I know the beggar. She stayed a Sunday with Helen when I was there this summer and--he called in the evening. He's in politics, but quite respectable. I don't know why I shouldn't come, if you really want me: I'm taking my Ph. D., too, you know. Think it over. He's what they called," said Hilda with an explicit vagueness, "'_le parfait gentleman_.'" VI Esther looked around, when she went back to the emptiness, almost with a little shiver. This was the end then: _après tant de jours: après tant de fleurs_. She had just for a little while known the unacademic world, people who had seen something different in her face, something rather sweet and rather sensitive. How far all the things seemed and all alike how dim: the socialist meetings in Berlin, the cheap dinners at a droll _crêmerie_ in Paris frescoed all around with the history of the Queen of Hearts and the immemorial tarts; even the soft after-dinner hour when she was staying with her cousins down in Leicestershire; even a delicious painter-boy who had just got into the Salon--all alike out of reach. The life before her looked poor and thin: books to be sure were at hand and one could hurry up to New York two or three times in a winter for the opera, and go abroad every summer with a companion chosen, like Hilda, expressly for her impersonality, one year to Greece, another time for the French cathedrals and _châteaux_. Hilda--"she's impersonal as a Velasquez," she had written in the first week--proved for the aggrieved young woman the Griselda of companions. Even to herself Esther would only admit a few grounds of grievance. Sydney did well to marry, though there were elements of pain in the shock and the strangeness of her elected husband, but she, or somebody else, might have sounded a note of warning. That faint sigh of amorous trouble and the consequent precipitate response! Esther found herself in the position of one running at full speed who stops short, consciously red-faced and rather blown. The picture made her angry and undigested anger made her sick and spoiled her work. There was even a sense of participation in Sydney's guilt, a secret confession of some dawdling in Paris, some philandering, that provoked to wholesome laughter. She had moments of saying to her inward interlocutor that it was rather absurd to chafe at the loss after all of only a few months, in June she would go back to London, to Paris, to the great glad world. But these conversations shared more or less the chimerical character of the thoughts when one lies awake at night and in the bodily warmth and darkness and the inner blaze of the overheated brain, one's perceptions, one's values are all monstrous. At last she saw that she had in truth been only playing with the thought of the straight, brown-bearded young artist in his little round cap like a Holbein drawing. Him she had not left behind without annoyance, though certainly she would not have wished to bring him along; but she could not even for Sydney have left behind her lexicons and manuscripts, and comical little bricks done up in pasteboard jewel boxes. VII The moon plainly was coming up in a hurry behind Dalton as Esther paused at the entrance to her room, for though still invisible it filled with light the air outside all the windows. Against this pale-blue background Hilda on the sill was making coffee in a tall green porcelain pot. The air was full of the spicy steam. "_Dégenérée!_" laughed Esther. "Didn't you have coffee for dinner?" "Dinner was a long time ago," replied Hilda sententiously. "Besides, I didn't have enough. Where have you been? Your frock is clammy." "In the Harriton family graveyard, first, sitting on the steps over the wall and listening to a woodthrush. Did you ever have enough?" Esther added, lighting a lamp as she spoke, while the brass teakettle winked in the soft light and the outside earth vanished. "Hilda, it's a good world." "A well-enough world," answered Hilda crossing the yellow patch to get the delicate cups. As she returned with them Esther studied her black serge skirt and caught it up. "Cat-hairs!" she affirmed. "How was Helen?--I've not seen her for a long time. And how was Pasht? He has a black soul." "He's uncommonly beautiful. If you go to Chapel to-morrow," said Hilda irrelevantly, "you will hear the President announce that I am appointed a Reader in English for next year. Pretty good, isn't it, for a Canadian who is Scotch?" "That's all right, Doctor Railton," murmured Esther congratulating her and adding, "Then I'm sure of you here next year." This was before the days of Low Buildings, and Readers lived in the Halls where and how they could. Esther lay back in her chair, admiring the tarnished frame of a quaint oval mirror that reflected a really admirable Japanese water-colour of Hilda's. She was glad the study would be unchanged another year, and quiet. She thought, too, with a little shudder of the hot bad air of crowded rooms, the loud noise of voices, the indecorous bustle of a life made up of many acquaintances. "I am going to Spain this summer to look at some Arabic manuscripts," she said at length. "You'd better come too. If we cross cheaply and don't travel we can live on nothing. Berenson says the Spanish galleries are full of wonderful pictures, practically unknown." "My dear, I've a family," laughed Hilda ruefully. "Didn't you say last night that they were going to the winds of heaven this year and that you didn't know what to do? Represent to them, moreover, that one shouldn't lose so superb a chance of _doing_ me. Seriously, I shall take a whole stateroom, not having forgotten the seasick German girl I came home with last time, and you'd much better occupy the other berth. Indeed, I can't travel alone in Spain, you know." Her eyes were fixed on eighteen square inches of pinkish brocade pinned against the wall--her Christmas present to Hilda and a ruinous extravagance. A chance word, from a lecture, she had caught up and fancied once, came back: "Nobody frames the multiplication table and hangs it on the wall." But surely that was because the multiplication table was shallow and petty and strikingly untrue: there were tracts of knowledge infinite and unfathomable where one would never tire. The things, she realized, which one does not ask too much of--and the people--are the things which are forever surprising one with unguessed possibilities. "Curiosity, after all, is the only insatiable emotion," said Esther out of her experience, and there were always more little bricks: one might even in time when one had read all the rest, go and dig some up with one's own hands. _Georgiana Goddard King, '96._ _STUDIES IN COLLEGE COLOUR_ The great bell clangs out through the morning air--through the snowflakes that thicken it, sending its summons over the white-crusted campus. The slippery walks are crowded with black figures moving towards Taylor Hall, single, in groups of twos and threes, wrapped close with shawls and hoods, half of them umbrellaless. Voices fall as they enter and amid friendly jostling around the bulletin board and in the cloak-room whispered greetings are exchanged. Then upstairs to the silent chapel, with its white windows made whiter by the frost; a stillness seeming to fold it round. The black mortar-boards nod their tassels in cheery greeting; subdued talk between neighbours fills the room with a low hum. A sudden hush; the talk stops; the heads are still; a moment's pause and the service has begun. All are together for once in the day, with no distinctions of class or grade. All are alike children, and children of Bryn Mawr. At the close of the prayer another moment's silence. Then a sudden movement. The bell clangs out again. A general rush to classes, to the office, to one's room. The day has begun. * * * * * The sunlight is streaming in through the broad windows. It dances among the leaves of the red geraniums on the window-sill and falls upon the carpet in bright spots and bands. The bookcase and the two shelves of the little mahogany desk are crowded with a confusion of much worn, many-coloured volumes. Over the Dresden inkstand and disordered files of papers and pencils a small brass dragon mounts guard. Dainty cups shine on the white tea-table, which bears for its motto the words of the March Hare: "_It's always tea-time, and we've no time to wash the tea things between whiles._" On the Turkish scarf which drapes the mantel stands a ginger-jar full of yellow roses. Across the rocking-chair is thrown a college gown, while tennis balls and rackets strew the floor. The divan is filled with flowered cushions innumerable, and half-buried among them is the mistress of all this colour and confusion. She is reading "The Republic." * * * * * It was a warm afternoon in May. The shadows were lengthening on the campus, and the air had all the stillness of midsummer. On the grass near the gravel walk a robin was hopping and pecking. Two black-gowned figures had just passed slowly by, and now all was still again. A sparrow who had been hovering for several minutes over head alighted close by the robin. "Ah!" said the robin, "could you but fancy what you have lost! Two seniors conversing together. Did you not perceive them?" The sparrow would gladly have concealed his ignorance on such classic ground, yet, constrained by curiosity, with hanging head he asked, "What may seniors be?" "Seniors," replied the robin. "Do you not know, then, that seniors are the sovereigns of this place? Indeed, I assure you, it is true. We have their own confession for it. Listen while I tell you the words of these two as they passed by. "'Well, it is almost over,' said one. 'And next year what do you suppose will become of the college?' "'It is too dreadful to think of,' said the other. 'Some of our class may come back as graduates. That is the only hope.' "'And even then they cannot help the Undergraduate Association. And they will be too few to manage Self-Government. Oh, this dear old college! It is too terrible to think of leaving it to go to rack and ruin. And just when everything is in the best condition possible! Imagine the Editorial Board without some member from '93! And the standard of class work is sure to fall next year.' "'And the gymnasium, too. To be sure most of us are making up conditions in the gym, but then----' "'Oh, there is no help for it! The college is sure to go down now. And it has been rapidly rising for four years! It is too cruel!'" The robin paused. Then he hopped confidingly towards the sparrow and, cocking his head on one side, whispered, "If you will take the trouble to listen you will hear conversations like that every spring on this campus. Now you know what seniors are." _L. S. B. S., '93; G. E. T. S.,'93._ _EPOCH MAKING_ The morning after the freshman play found the gymnasium looking somewhat forlorn. The portable stage had lost part of the discreet drapery that masked its front below the footlights, and now recklessly displayed its crazy supports to the public eye; the footlights themselves were a mass of blackened tallow in their battered tin sockets; the faded green canton-flannel curtains which had served as a forest background for the last act of _Prince Otto_, and been torn from half their rings at its end when Seraphina and the prince tried to make a simultaneous entry in response to applause, trailed limply from their remaining supports, and seemed to beg for the friendly shadows of the property-room to hide their rents and tatters. In the corners of the stage, the groups of branches which had simulated the primeval forest drooped their withered heads in mournful wise against their too evident props, and like the grey cambric rocks and tin-foil rivulet which occupied the centre of the scene, were hardly recognizable as parts of last night's fairy woodland. Even less recognizable, but scarcely so forlorn, the actors in the performance soon began to drop in, at first one by one, and then in little groups of two or three. They came in fresh and smiling and full of misdirected zeal for the work of clearing up; most of the later arrivals came from the basket-ball field, and flung down their gayly-coloured golf-capes just where they would be most in the way; and all of them, as they went about pulling down the decorations, and piling borrowed properties into bewildering heaps for return to their owners, chattered incessantly of last night's great success. The November sunlight fell in yellow, dusty shafts through the high windows above the running track, spilling its pale brightness on the cluttered floor and stage, and spread even into the alcove where the horizontal bars jostled the horse and the rowing-machines in ignominious confusion and with a general shamefaced air of being huddled out of the way. The position of the yellow rays indicated ten o'clock, and the busy workers, having accumulated rugs, curtains, costumes, bric-a-brac, a number of potted plants, and the fragments of a pasteboard fireplace, in heterogeneous piles on every side, were beginning to wonder if they could ever straighten them out again, when the arrival of three or four fresh recruits gave them an excuse for resting while they reported progress. Their labours, indeed, spoke for themselves. Peggy Dillon, the class chairman, who headed the reinforcements, opened her round blue eyes aghast at the dusty chaos which greeted her, and found herself bereft of speech by the look of modest pride which beamed from all the faces before her; but one of her companions, a handsome girl with a certain air of authority about her, was equal to the occasion. "Dear me, how enterprising you all are!" she exclaimed, coming forward with a comprehensive smile; "there is really a great deal accomplished already. (Don't look so utterly overcome, Peggy, if you can help it.) You must have worked like beavers to get all those curtains down." The workers, hot, dirty, and dishevelled, beamed with redoubled brightness upon the speaker, and upon the havoc they had wrought, and tasted all the sweetness of being appreciated. Pauline Van Sandford was a tall girl who carried her head rather high, and spoke with a good-humoured imperiousness. Perhaps these things added weight to her remarks. With a very creditable show of gratification, she went on, "And nearly all the properties in piles!" Here a gasp from Peggy, who had just discovered her pet cast in one of the said piles under a section of the stage-steps, warned her to hasten her climax; she worked up her remarks to quite an enthusiastic close, and then, apparently consumed with anxiety for the workers' fatigue, she fell upon the helpful band, and fairly swept them from the gymnasium upon a wave of appreciative solicitude. "Do go home and lie down, all of you--no, it's really too much to expect--no, don't think of staying, we can do all the rest--no, you are too good, and we are awfully grateful, but--there!" She slammed the door upon the bewildered objects of her gratitude, and then, falling back against it, exchanged looks of despair with her companions. "Who would ever have thought they'd get at it so early!" wailed Peggy, on her knees beside a particularly hopeless-looking heap of articles; "will some one help me to rescue my poor Clytie? Shirley, lend a hand with these steps." Shirley Nairn, a slender girl with a big, soft, dust-brown pompadour, brown eyes, and a firm little chin which half contradicted their gentleness, began cautiously to lift away the boards. She had a fluttering grace in all her movements like that of a bird just lighting. "Rescue is the word," she said; "there is still hope for most of the things, but unless we do a lot before lunch, those Vandals will be back again, and next time there will be nothing left but chips." In spite of the discouraging outlook, an hour or two of hard work did wonders. Curtains and costumes went to the property-room, the faded forest hid its head in a corner, the borrowed chairs and rugs and rubber-plants found themselves grouped in something like order, and the rescue party sank at last upon a mattress in the alcove to wipe its heated brow, and survey results. "There is less damage done than you would think," observed Katharine Holland; she was a girl of that ineffectual type that must always appeal to some one, and she now turned her long brown face and mournful eyes towards Shirley. "Except for Peggy's Clytie, and a few smashed pots, and that long tear in Miss Meredith's leopard-skin, most things seem to have been miraculously spared. There is a special Providence that watches over idiots." Still inspecting her very grimy hands, Shirley said, "They aren't really idiots, but you can't leave them to themselves. We should have had a committee." "It's all my fault; I neglected it," began Peggy meekly. "We are all just as bad," Pauline interrupted in a decided tone; "Louise is stage manager, and I am business manager, and look at our behaviour: we have both been wasting valuable time on our essay appointments when we should have been attending to business." As self-accusation seemed the order of the day, each of the small party came forward to blame herself, and did it thoroughly and at some length. When a soothing pause came at last, Shirley said meditatively, "I heard Miss Meredith say the other day that women couldn't work together effectively, because woman isn't a political animal." Charlotte Meredith's masters degree and undisputed cleverness gave no small weight to her opinion among the undergraduates, but Pauline, as her cousin and protégée, stood less in awe of her than most of the freshmen; she had even dared to christen her, quite openly, "the Cynic." It was Pauline, therefore, who now voiced the meeting's dissent from Miss Meredith's dictum. Woman could be a political animal, if she chose, and was properly directed. All that the class of '9-- needed was to be taught to think before they acted. Louise Ferguson, a small bustling girl with red hair, wanted to know how you were going to teach them to think. They might be able to do it separately, but when you took them in the mass, they were just like a flock of sheep, and class meetings merely a game of follow-my-leader. No matter how clever and sensible the individual girl was, a class of sixty-three girls was capable of any idiocy on the spur of the moment. "Look at the number of classes who elect their presidents, and then hate them ever after. Look at the case of the class who barred out their temporary chairman, and then spent the rest of their college career wishing they had elected her. They never know what they want, or if they do, they don't know enough to get it." "Thanks awfully," crowed Peggy; "all the bouquets are coming my way. '9-- made me chairman, therefore they did not want me. Q. E. D. Thanks ever so much!" As Louise and Peggy were roommates, their differences could be left for private settlement. Louise therefore took no notice of this interruption, beyond a threatening scowl at the speaker, and, sticking bravely to her point, appealed to Pauline for support. In Pauline's opinion class politics were usually unintelligent, but she did not agree that there was no help for it. When the spirited discussion which this remark brought on had run its rather ineffectual course to no conclusion, the two disputants fell silent, and four of the little group found themselves looking shyly at Shirley Nairn. Three of the girls had come up together from the Airlie School in New York, and Pauline Van Sandford was their leader; Peggy Dillon was a Philadelphia girl who had chanced upon a room in the "Airlie corridor" of Pembroke East, and whose short-lived ascendency in '9--'s affairs had declined, very early in her chairmanship, into dependence upon Pauline; but Shirley Nairn lived in Merion, and the four knew very little about her, except that her schoolmates from the Briony School of New Haven counted on her to win the class presidency from the Airlie candidate. So now they eyed her sideways, and waited for her views on class politics as expressing class intelligence; and the pause was just beginning to be uncomfortable when she lifted her head. "We might try to better things in our own case," she said tentatively; "there ought to be a way to make class politics intelligent, but we can only prove it by doing it." "How?" asked Louise, while Pauline rapidly decided that Shirley Nairn did not have that square chin for nothing. Then, taking the floor herself, Pauline opined that the whole trouble lay in too hasty action. "We women," she said, rather grandly, and with her usual air of decided conviction, "we women make up our minds before we think; we look at a few arguments, listen to our friends' opinions, leap to a conclusion (usually all wrong), and score another foolish vote." Peggy's groan of mock despair, which followed this speech, and was meant to preface a lively protest, was robbed of effect by the sudden sound of Taylor bell, ringing for lunch-time; and the parliament of five forthwith dissolved. But as they dispersed, Pauline pledged them all to come to her room that evening for further discussion of the subject. They met there accordingly, with a few other high souls who were ripe for reform; they discussed; and from their discussion there grew a plan. When the class of '9-- assembled a few days later in Denbigh Students' Parlour, they expected to nominate and forthwith elect their permanent officers; but on the latter point a considerable surprise was in store for them. After the nomination votes for president were cast and counted, and the result announced--Shirley and Pauline far in the lead, and very close together, Peggy a modest third, and a few other names straggling hopelessly in the rear--the chairman rose to tell them that a change in the usual order of proceedings was proposed. The nominations for president were now before them; the election was postponed, by order of the chair, until that day week, in order that during the interval the class might weigh well its measures before taking the final--Peggy's tone almost implied, the fatal--step. In the stupefied silence which followed this announcement, she went on to give the arguments in favour of the new course. It would give them time to look into the qualifications of the candidates and form their decision intelligently; it would prevent mistakes which they might deplore hereafter; and--superbly--it would mark the beginning of a new epoch in class politics. The candidates were bound in honour not to canvass for themselves, or to allow others to do so, and the final ballot was to be cast according to each voter's conviction of what would be best for the class. No haste in deciding, no prejudice, no regard to personal influence; but careful consideration, and final action on the highest and most disinterested grounds--that was the idea. When the other nominations were in, and the meeting adjourned, the class of '9-- went its various ways homeward sorely bewildered. It does not do, as a rule, to call upon a freshman class for too much disinterested consideration when it is just recovering from the effects of a freshman play; but the undergraduate mind will usually rise to a hook that is baited with the word "epoch-making." So the members of '9-- eager to make an epoch, fell very earnestly and ardently to work at the business of weighing and comparing the two chief candidates before them; Peggy's name was very little under discussion, for her chances were hardly to be considered seriously, and, as interest centred in the presidency, the candidates for other offices got very little attention. But concerning the merits and demerits of Shirley and Pauline, the course of debate ran high and warm; during the seven days assigned them, the freshmen talked of little else, and strove hard to prove, by quite a heated exhibition of partisan spirit, that they were political animals after all, while the two principal nominees affected an Olympian indifference to the result, and used a dignified reserve when greeting each other in the corridors of Taylor. And amused upper classmen made laughing guesses as to the outcome of the campaign. But the new plan did not work exactly as its framers had expected, and in a day or two there were rumours that things were going wrong. By the middle of the week these rumours had gathered such strength that Charlotte Meredith, M. A., and Fellow of Bryn Mawr College, felt called upon to visit her freshman cousin, and hear the news. Accordingly she knocked at the door of 39 Pembroke East on the afternoon of the fifth day following the nominations. Charlotte Meredith, whom Pauline called the Cynic, was a tall, slight girl, pale and clean-looking, with quantities of very black hair; she had bright, near-sighted grey eyes behind her glasses, and walked with a stoop; her usual expression was one of whimsical boredom. There was probably no one in the world whom Pauline would have cared less to see at her door that afternoon, but she welcomed the unexpected guest with almost her usual readiness, and tried to cover the real hollowness of her greeting by eager hospitality in the line of tea and jam. Peggy was there, too, spreading crackers with a worried air; and both girls seemed somewhat harassed by Charlotte's questions as to the outlook for the election, delivered with her habitual slight drawl and air of fatigued politeness. "I take a lively interest in it," she told them, in a tone expressive of anything rather than liveliness, as she stirred her tea; "and I hope you won't let the fact that you are both candidates embarrass you. This impersonal campaign of yours is highly novel, and your effort to elevate class politics into a thing of moral beauty smacks delightfully of altruism, but may I ask how the thing is likely--in the vulgar phrase--to pan out?" She nibbled her cracker appreciatively, and gave the discomfited pair a questioning smile. Peggy squirmed a little, and said nothing; but Pauline burst out, "The whole affair is too miserable and humiliating for words, and has panned out like--like--Charlotte, it is literally past speech! I am ashamed of belonging to such a small-minded sex, for the girls have acted abominably." Charlotte smiled benignly. "As I understand that your reform is in part a crusade against a statement of mine that woman is not a political animal, would you mind telling me whether their abominableness throws any light on that point?" "Political animals?" cried Pauline; "I should say they were! If we have a rag of reputation left by the end of the week, I shall be surprised." "And by 'we' you mean----" "Shirley Nairn and myself; Peggy seems to have been spared." "Yes," Peggy assented with the utmost affability, "they are after bigger game, thank Heaven!" And then, the flood-gates being opened, Charlotte was favoured with a full, if not very coherent account of '9--'s enormities. Events had taken a course which was not to be wondered at. In the ranks of '9--, deliberation had brought on discussion, discussion had led to dispute; and in the clash of warring factions, each side had brought so many charges of unfitness against the opposing candidate that Pauline declared her own character, as well as Shirley's, blackened for life. "That is doing fairly well for a purely impersonal campaign not yet five days old," was Charlotte's grim comment; "I suppose you do not lack for friends to keep you posted on the state of public opinion." "My dear Miss Meredith," responded Peggy genially, "the only reason that the door is not at this moment besieged with news from the seat of war is that the rest of the class are at freshman drill, which Pauline and I are sinfully cutting. Only think, Polly, how their tongues are wagging even now! And how----" A resounding knock at the door cut her short. "There!" she groaned resignedly, "drill must be over. Come in!" And as the three turned towards the door, Pauline said savagely, "Here come all my dearest friends!" But it was Shirley Nairn who pushed the door open, and at sight of Charlotte stopped doubtfully on the threshold. Over her shoulder, they saw the frightened face of Katharine Holland. Shirley was looking at Pauline. "I have something rather important to say," she said; "it concerns us both, and"--she hesitated for a barely appreciable second--"and no one else. Except Miss Holland," frigidly, with a glance over her shoulder. "Oh, come in, come in!" cried Pauline, "and if it is about this wretched election, let us have it out. Charlotte and Peggy know the worst, I think. Come in." Shirley advanced, and Katharine shrinkingly followed her; the uneasy air of the latter, and her apprehensive looks, made Charlotte sit up with an expression of interest. "The plot thickens," she soliloquized to her teacup; and Pauline, hearing her, knit her brows impatiently. "Well?" she said rather shortly to Shirley. Her tone brought a flush to the other's cheek; she hesitated for another moment, and then said coldly, "Miss Holland will explain." Upon being brought thus abruptly into prominence, Katharine Holland silently besought them all for mercy with her shamed eyes; then, urged by a monitory look from Shirley, who leaned beside the table in frozen silence, she brought out a foolish and pitiable tale. It was simply an account of various silly slanders, some directed against Shirley, and others against Pauline, with which she confessed she had regaled a company of upper classmen, apparently only to amuse them; and she interrupted her confession with weak excuses, like a guilty child. In her humiliation she made an uncomfortable spectacle, but Shirley said sternly, "Finish." "Oh, let her be!" cried Pauline, impatient of the scene; "who cares to hear all this? We know it already." "There is one thing yet," said Shirley, "but I will tell it myself; I made her tell all the rest, so that you might know whether you ought to take her word against me. She has accused me of going about to ask for votes." The speaker's tone was stout enough, but she leaned heavily on the table, "so I brought her here to retract it." Stung by a generous indignation, Pauline sprang to her feet. "Would you have believed that of me?" she cried. "She need not trouble to retract it." Then, turning to Katharine, "That is quite enough, Miss Holland," she said, and the penitent stumbled to the door. As the door closed upon her, Charlotte, who had finished her tea in silence, put down her cup with an air of decision, and turning to Shirley, said suddenly, "Wasn't it a little hard on her, Miss Nairn?" "To punish her for telling a campaign lie?" demanded Shirley. "Please leave the campaign out of the question for a moment. She doesn't seem particularly venomous; don't you think she deserved a little mercy?" "She is a poor creature," said Shirley setting her lips, "and deserves nothing." "She is a poor creature," Charlotte assented in her easy drawl, "whom you have made poorer by the loss of her self-respect. Why?" "Because she lied about us," retorted Pauline, rushing in to defend their joint position. "Would you even have given her lies a thought," asked her cousin with a little more animation, "if they hadn't interfered with your precious campaign? You have just made her pay for your own mistake in attempting the impossible; you began by trying impersonality in politics, and you have ended by humiliating a classmate for indulging in a few exaggerated personalities at your expense. Is it very consistent?" Struck dumb by surprise at this attack, Pauline did not answer, but Shirley broke in, with hot cheeks, "It was a case of self-defence, Miss Meredith." Charlotte, as she rose to go, smiled complete comprehension into the younger girl's troubled eyes; it was easy to see that the rivals already valued each other's good opinion beyond the votes of the class, and she scented fresh developments. "They won't be a bad team," she decided on her way home. Her departure left the other three somewhat at a loss for words, but Shirley, with an evident effort, broke the uncomfortable silence. "We've made a mistake somewhere," she said hopelessly, "and everything has gone miserably wrong; but I hope you will believe that I meant well, even in bringing Katharine Holland here." And she turned towards the door. "Don't go," said Pauline; "sit down, and have some tea." Then seeing that the other hesitated, "You know that I don't care a rap about those tales, and I know that you don't either," she said, stoutly. "I am glad that you came. Won't you please stay?" Peggy, who had been absorbed in circumventing the treacherous tendencies of her jam-sandwich, emerged victorious from the struggle to say soothingly, "Nobody ever believes campaign lies, anyway." "Except the voters," was Shirley's dry response, as she dropped into a chair. During the next half-hour, both Pauline and Shirley announced their unalterable intention of withdrawing from the race; each declared that, for the good of the class, the other ought to be president, but neither would consent to her rival's retiring, so that, as Peggy said, the only way out was for both to stay in. The debate ended in a decision to abide the issue, and ignore the slanderous tongues, whereupon they parted much uplifted in spirit, and were very solemn at dinner that night, as befitted noble-hearted victims who suffered for their efforts to elevate their kind. On the evening before the election, Charlotte Meredith caught Shirley in the act of waylaying an Airlie freshman in the hall. Her victim, in gymnasium dress, with her mask and foil, was evidently overdue at a fencing-lesson, and anxious to be off, but Shirley was pitiless, and pinned her to the spot, while she discoursed at length. "The impersonal campaign is still on, I see," murmured Charlotte, as she passed. Shirley's face blazed. "I was telling her the truth as to some lies about Pauline," she flashed out, and then looked as if she could have bitten her tongue for speaking. The freshman, grateful for an interruption, escaped. "You needn't have told me that you were canvassing for Pauline, any more than Pauline needed to tell me this morning, when I met her coming out of a Briony girl's room, that she was canvassing for you. A fine consistent pair you are! But it won't make any difference," she added, darkly, with a return to her usual whimsical manner. The evening of the election buried the reform fathoms deep; for Peggy was elected president. When the little band of reformers entered the students' parlour, where the class was already assembled, they received the impression of a huddled flock of sheep, with lowered heads at bay. The evening's proceedings deepened this impression. The class of '9-- was worried and bewildered and disgusted; it had travailed in the throes of indecision until it sickened of both alternatives, and fell, like many another, upon the middle course. That course was the choice of Peggy, astonished Peggy, by an overwhelming majority in the good old follow-my-leader fashion; while Pauline and Shirley watched their airy fabric of reform topple to ruin, and then talked of other things during the counting of the votes. Charlotte Meredith laughed over the result with the rest of the on-lookers, but, rather surprisingly, took the part of the would-be reformers, after a subtle fashion of her own. "After all," she remarked, with an air of elaborate deference to a loudly critical sophomore, "even you and I, Miss West, were freshmen once." And Miss West turned a slow red, and refrained from speech. It was Charlotte's custom to have her freshman cousin at most of her small teas, so Pauline found nothing remarkable in the appearance, about this time, of a small card on her table, reading, "Tea at five. C. M."; but it was embarrassingly unusual to find in her cousin's study, not the expected circle of graduates, with a senior or two, but only Charlotte herself and Shirley Nairn. The two guests were duly regaled with tea and bonbons by Miss Meredith, who, ignoring late events, tried to put them at their ease. In her whimsical way, she liked them both. There was, however, a spark of covert amusement in her eyes as she passed the teacups; and Pauline, writhing inwardly under this satirical observation, finally came out with: "I suppose you were pleased with the result of our campaign." "Naturally," said Charlotte blandly. "One likes to have a guess confirmed--and I was sure of the result; in that way I was pleased. And you?" Pauline, playing with her teacup, remarked that people weren't usually pleased with having made fools of themselves. Her tone asked for a contradiction, but it did not come, and the three sat silent, listening to the singing of the kettle over the spirit-flame, until Shirley said abruptly: "Miss Meredith, you were right about the political animals." Charlotte raised her eyebrows enquiringly, but was perhaps not surprised by what she heard; she may have already reflected that defeat, always hard to bear, comes in its most unbearable form when it makes its victims ridiculous. Shirley and Pauline, having been baulked by very small means in a project of mighty import, had a galling sense of the absurdity of their position, and were bitterly ready to turn on their ungrateful classmates. Therefore Charlotte had the satisfaction of seeing them come over to her point of view with exaggerated enthusiasm. They could not put too strongly the impossibility of any attempt to educate women politically; they thought that a few--a very few, they sadly added--might be trusted for public-spirited and disinterested action; but the mass of women were not large-minded enough to rise above personal considerations. "What other considerations did the poor things have, in your case?" asked their hostess. "A class president's duties are not so weighty that she needs any distinguished qualifications, and the choice is simply a matter of personal liking. You insisted on a week's analysis of personal likes and dislikes, and the natural result was exaggeration and slander." The freshmen sat in crestfallen silence. They had acknowledged their defeat; must they now acknowledge that it was deserved? Putting down her plate and leaning a little forward in her chair, Charlotte regarded them earnestly. "Let me tell you something," she said; "I have not lived in college six years for nothing; I have learned a great deal in that time; but it did not take me six years to learn not to waste my energy on trifles. In this campaign of yours, you have used up an amount of force which would have accomplished wonders in a serious cause. Has it paid?" "I'm afraid not," they said. "It is an odd thing, too," said Charlotte, in a casual tone, "to notice that in nine cases out of ten the popular instinct is a safer guide than the popular reason. Your class reasoned itself into a frenzy, and then, by instinct, did the right thing." At this unexpected tribute to their conqueror, the two vanquished leaders looked a bit blank; perhaps they had nursed a faint egotistical hope of some day seeing the class brought to a realizing sense of its mistake in electing Peggy, and Charlotte's view was a blow. She saw the effect of her words. "They did the right thing," she repeated, "in choosing a girl who will be an excellent figurehead for--a coalition--" Charlotte smiled, a little self-complacently; she rather prided herself on the sensitiveness of her feeling for things that were in the air--"a public-spirited, disinterested----" "Oh, don't!" pleaded Shirley; "I am sick of it. We have been talking awful cant, haven't we?" "Suppose we talk about that," said Charlotte. And they did. They talked about it until the late sunlight faded, and twilight came down on the little study; and then, in the gathering gloom, they talked about it still, and all the more freely. The older girl, who had tilted with windmills in her time, opened her heart to these young Quixotes, fresh from their first fall, on the difference between cant and college spirit; and the two freshmen, sitting in the twilight with tingling cheeks, pledged themselves silently to the larger vision. As they wended their way homeward across the dusky campus, they were very silent; when Pauline spoke once, it was only to say, "I am sorry I called her the Cynic." And Charlotte, watching their dark receding forms as she leaned from her open window, hoped that she hadn't been preaching. It was the old, old antithesis between enthusiasm and experience; and after all there was much to be said for enthusiasm. Those two youngsters had brought something out of their mischance, if it was only their liking for each other. "I wish I were a freshman again," sighed Charlotte to the stars. _Cora Armistead Hardy, '99._ _A REMINISCENCE_ We had met, after two years or so out in the "wide, wide world" of which we had sung so dolefully, the last weeks of senior year. I discovered that Evelyn had substituted soft "fluffs" for the stiff collars she had clung to tenaciously through four years of college, and she admitted that after the first shock she quite liked the new way I did my hair. Later she also admitted that she made a practice of carrying a parasol, or even of wearing a hat, when it was excessively sunny. Emboldened by the confession, I ventured to produce some embroidery and went to work as if such femininity had always been my pose. Then we talked, and exchanged various bits of news about the members of the class who had wandered so far since our separation. "Wasn't it sad about Janet?" I asked at last. And then as Evelyn kept silent, I went on, "you knew, didn't you?--She died last November just a little while after her engagement was announced. It was typhoid fever. I thought you knew, of course." "Yes, I knew," said Evelyn, and went on examining the bookcase. "I think I'll tell you about it," she exclaimed at last. "It won't do any good. But I think I'd like to tell you. You know Janey and I were awfully good friends while she was at college. We even thought of rooming together, but we were both so well satisfied with our single suites that we decided not to. We were almost like roommates, though. Janet always saw that I was registered when I went home and I always stole rolls for her when she was locked out from breakfast. We wore each other's clothes indiscriminately. I have one of her handkerchiefs yet. You know how it was. We were just awfully good friends." "I know--Janet would do anything under the sun for any one she liked--go on." "Well, then she left college. She didn't like it--one bit. She was perfectly frank and said she wanted to come out before she was twenty. Do you know how it is in those western towns? They think a girl is antique when she's twenty-one. She came out and was a great success, I believe. You know how she stopped writing to first one, then another of us, and we were all rather hurt about it." "Well, she _was_ a disappointment. I had always thought her so superbly loyal, and we heard that she said college was 'such a bore.'" "Yes, I believed that too, but not until I had written several letters after she had stopped. Finally I gave up and thought I'd never hear from her again. I felt pretty bitter about it. At last she wrote me and told me of her engagement. Just the real old Janey, it was--called me by some absurd nickname she'd invented, confessed that she'd been horrid about not writing, and then said that although the engagement wasn't to be announced immediately, she wanted me to be one of the first to know, and would I congratulate her?" "When was this?" I asked, after a pause. Evelyn had seized my scissors and seemed to be too much interested in snipping ends of embroidery silk to remember Janet or me, or any one else. She dropped the scissors and took up a book of college kodaks. I repeated my question, just to remind her that I was still there. She turned her back and went on. "That was some time in May. It came to me at a most unpropitious time. Some member of the family had been ill and I was tired and cross and feeling unjustifiably righteous. So I sat down then and there and told poor old happy Janet how nice and high-minded I had been about writing and how unfriendly she had been. I said of course I hoped she would be happy and all that but of course after this long hiatus we could never be friends in the same old way. Oh, it was an icy letter, just as politely nasty as I could make it! I sent it off and afterwards I felt just exactly the way I used to when I was a small child and had been naughty and wanted to make up. But I didn't. I tried to forget it. I was very busy and had a lot of people visiting me, last summer. So the thought of Janet didn't come into my head very often and when it did I mentally changed the subject. Of course I never heard from her again. "One day, after we came back to town I was reading, not thinking of anything but the book--Janey least of all. Nothing in that book could have reminded me of her. I read it over afterwards to see. I looked up all of a sudden, thinking of Janet--thinking of her as if I had been with her an hour before. I dropped the book and felt as if I had just seen her, standing at the door in a familiar kimono, and heard her addressing me for the first time by that ridiculous nickname that she had just invented. I had heard through some people from her town that she was going to be married soon. My pride simply vanished. I dashed up and wrote her in the good old friendly way, told her what a nice lady she was and how often I thought of her, what I had been doing, and all sorts of natural old things, as if I had been writing to her regularly for years. I sent that letter off wondering if she would answer. Two days later I heard somehow that she had typhoid fever, but I thought that if she got my letter she would surely answer somehow, though she had been ill for days then." Evelyn turned and showed me a photograph of herself and Janet laughing and entwined in an attitude of exaggerated affection. "The next thing I heard of Janey," she continued, "was the news of her death and I shall never know whether she received my letter." _Clara Warren Vail, '97._ _CATHERINE'S CAREER_ "Now, Jack, please don't be sentimental. You know how I hate it. Besides you have interrupted me just when I was convincing you that education will solve the race problem, and that is annoying." Poor Jack! Catherine little imagined what courage that interruption had taken. Nor did she realize how unheeding he had been as she rolled forth her arguments. (She had just been reading an article in _The North American Review_.) "But, you know, I have been wanting to speak for..." "I thought you knew better, too," Catherine continued a little sorrowfully, "a person of my ambitious aspirations" (Catherine lived for ambitious aspirations), "isn't going to be happy settling down into a general entertainer and housekeeper for mankind, always sweet and pretty and dainty, standing every evening on the little porch all tumbling over with honeysuckle, dressed in white with a red rose tucked in my belt (that's your ideal, isn't it?) and a hand stretched forth in undulating curves to welcome you. This way." Catherine stood up, balanced herself and nearly fell down. "No, I can't even do it. And then I'm not 'sweet and lovely.' I hate 'sweet and lovely' girls. Why, every girl who hasn't any looks, or any brains, or anything else, is considered 'sweet and lovely.'" "I never said you were 'sweet and lovely.'" "Oh! then you consider me horrid and disagreeable, do you? Well, that's flattering. No, I can't marry you. Such a catastrophe has never once entered my head." Catherine grew pensive. "I can't imagine anything more frightful than playing the piano, arranging flowers, and being charming, to eternity." Jack had jumped up from his seat by the piano and stalked over to the window where he stood biting his lips and beating the floor with one foot, gazing out into the black night with an impatiently reflective air. When Catherine finished, he spoke half to himself and half to the night. "Just what Charlie Dickenson warned me would happen. 'See here, old chap,' he said, 'if you don't want to be the laughing stock of the whole club you'd better steer clear of Catherine Neville. Those college girls are chock full of notions. I suppose she does like you in a way, because you listen to her theories. But it is a ticklish business. Remember poor Harry Cockran, the trouble he had!' ... I thought she liked me. But I see now that one can't expect anything sensible from them." Catherine did not appear to listen. She was playing a series of changing chords on the piano. But the chords grew louder and louder and gradually passed into the minor key, until at the last word she spun round on the stool. "Sensible?" she exclaimed. "That depends upon the point of view. I think we are extremely sensible. For we can be reached only through our minds, not through our emotions. Any girl can fall in love. But few have the strength of mind to see that they are needed for loftier careers. We have ideals, aims, purposes." "Exactly. You long to be strong-minded, to take to platforms, stand up for poor oppressed womankind, and generally make a lot of trouble. Why all the men say that nothing would induce them to marry college girls. They think it's ruination of a nice, pretty, sensible girl to send her to college, and let her head get filled with all sorts of ideas. I tell you it ruins them with the men. But I had rather hoped you were an exception, or at least above the average." "You men are too exasperating. You inherit from your grandfathers poor, foolish, worn-out ideas that stick in your stubborn, narrow-minded little brains. No amount of eloquence on my part could convince you of anything else. I might talk myself blue in the face, and there you would sit, placid and serene in the error of your judgment. Nothing could change you, except, perhaps, a change of grandfathers. I suppose you consider it woman's place to--bask in your radiance. Well, I sha'n't argue with you. What's the use? I hate a quarrel. Why don't you go? Don't you see that I have had enough of you? Don't you see that I am annoyed with it all?" Catherine was walking impatiently up and down the room, tearing the roses at her belt--his roses--and flinging the petals on the floor. "I hope I shall never see you again." Then, in a lower tone, "(No, I can never love him. I am thoroughly convinced of that.) What are you waiting for? No, I shan't say good-bye. I shouldn't feel it. I am thoroughly miserable. I thought you were such a good friend of mine, too. I can't be polite. I'm tired of being polite when I feel rude. I am tired of hearing all this twaddle about marrying college girls. I think you might have had more tact." Catherine rushed from the room and upstairs. Jack Livingston heard the door at the top of the stairs shut, not quite gently. Catherine Neville was a junior at Bryn Mawr. Most people considered her proud because of a certain haughty reserved exterior, but her intimate friends who had pierced the reserve knew her to possess a really genial nature, and on occasions to become quite mellow and entertaining. But it was only with a favoured few that she descended to jocosity. She was conceited, too. There is no doubt about it, but who that ever amounts to anything isn't? at least just a little bit. Perhaps she was spoiled. But if that was the case, it was scarcely her fault, because she was an only child, and had always been pampered and praised and led to consider herself a really remarkable young person. As a small child her mother had looked upon her as a budding genius, and had cherished and retailed to forcedly enthusiastic friends her various idiosyncracies--undoubted signs of genius. But when she grew a little older, and scorned dolls and "_The Five Little Peppers_," things had gone too far. "A little genius is all very well, but a great deal is so conspicuous," Mrs. Neville used to say. (The Nevilles belonged to a very old Philadelphia family.) The last straw in a long line of disappointments came, however, when Catherine announced her intention of going to college. "A daughter of the Nevilles in college! Preposterous! It is all very well for a girl who has her own living to make. But a Neville!" And Mrs. Neville and Mrs. Neville's friends held up their hands in indignant, old-fashioned horror. Catherine had also indelicate aspirations toward a career. But she kept these to herself until she was safely launched upon her freshman year. Even then her plans were very misty. She thought perhaps she would consent to being considered a second Mrs. Browning, or possibly a George Eliot. It was a dreadful blow to Mr. and Mrs. Neville when Catherine passed all her examinations. Up to that time they had kept themselves happy with the thought that Catherine might fail. Of course Catherine was very clever, but they had always heard that it took a monstrosity to pass the Bryn Mawr entrance examinations. Mr. and Mrs. Neville were especially vexed because their plans had all been upset, and they had formed such delightful ones, too. She was to have a "coming out" tea in November, followed by a series of dinners, culminating in a ball early in January--with a possible wedding at Easter. What more could a girl wish? But Catherine was undoubtedly peculiar. She refused to be trotted out at teas and put through her paces at the Monday evening dancing class. She said that dinners bored her, and balls were a frightful nuisance, and she didn't want to be married off. And so it was that Catherine never "came out," but passed into that atmosphere of social depravity and advanced ideas that old-fashioned conventionality has associated with a woman's college. Is it to be wondered at that Catherine had lost her self-control just a little bit this evening? College with her was a very tender subject. Nevertheless as she stood upstairs with her head near the crack of the slammed door waiting to hear the front door latch, she felt desperately ashamed of herself. But how could she be expected to give up the pet dreams of her youth--all at once and for a man? She didn't like him much, anyway, and she still longed for her career. In fact she quite expected it and such an emergency as falling in love had never once entered her mind. Of course she had seen a great deal of Jack, but he had never been anything to her, at all. Yet he was quite nice, infinitely nicer than the rest of the men. They bored her. The conceited little idiots thought every girl they saw in love with them, and that all they had to do was to sit and be adored. But Jack somehow was different. He had so much more to him. He was so big and fine, so noble looking. He had such good-looking shoulders. Somehow she liked to see them around. She might have stood him for his shoulders, at least, until the end of the Christmas vacation. But it did make her furious to hear men run down college girls and say that they didn't want to marry them. Just as if the college girls were pining for them! Men would be much nicer if they didn't consider themselves charmers. "Still it will be frightfully dull now for the last few days at home," Catherine thought as she fixed her hair. She was used to seeing him about. And now no one would ask her to go skating. She didn't want to go skating with any one else. And they used to have such interesting talks together too! Well, it was all over now. She might as well go to sleep. So she snuggled up in the down comfortable and said she would make her mind a blank. But there was always a little something there, edging her on to the forbidden subject with most annoying insistence. Jack was always mixed up in her thoughts, and she kept wondering if he really cared for her. Of course it was nothing to her. But it is nice to be liked, and somehow it worried Catherine dreadfully to think that perhaps he didn't care for her. "Oh, but he must care or he never would have spoken as he did," Catherine exclaimed out loud. And then, frightened at her own voice, she muffled her head in the bedclothes. * * * * * Catherine's thoughts wandered off to her freshman year and that afternoon early in spring when she had received the telegram from her father-- "Mr. Livingston will call at eight o'clock. "W. D. NEVILLE." Catherine had read it slowly for the second time and wondered who on earth "Mr. Livingston" was and what she had done that deserved this punishment. She finally decided that Mr. Livingston was a friend of her father's, some nice old gentleman who took an interest in the higher education of women, and wanted to be taken around the college. "Night's a bad time," she reflected, and speculated happily on the chances of $10,000 toward the library building. Nevertheless she did not feel quite comfortable until she was safely at dinner with the doors closed. One never knows what elderly men interested in the higher education of women may do. They are always so intensely interested. He might come out in time for dinner, just for the beneficial experience of seeing how this strange product of the human race eats, and whether or not, as has been said, it lives exclusively on fish. "He is probably of a deeply enquiring nature and will want statistics," Catherine mused. "I must review mine. Let me see. There are sixty-seven 'grads,' one hundred and nine freshmen, and----" But, alas! these were all she knew. Well, she could at least explain the "Group System." A complexity of that sort would be something for the old gentleman to gloat over. She knew it quite well now. She had just had some lessons on it from the sophomore next door. And then, of course, there was the seventeen per cent. statistic. How stupid in her to forget that! She had heard it often enough, at least twice a month since she entered. "Yes, that will make a very good beginning," and Catherine sprinkled her beef so vigorously with salt that she was forced to send for a second supply. Dinner had just reached the salad stage, when the maid whispered to Catherine, in mysterious tones, that there was a gentleman in the hall who wished to see her. "Mr. Livingston!" she gasped, and rushed out. "How fortunate that dinner is almost over! But perhaps the poor man is starving. Oh! but I can't have him in. I'll be hard-hearted. I'll hope that he had a chicken sandwich and a glass of milk at Broad Street Station. But what a strange man for father to send!" Catherine thought as she cordially grasped the hand of a beery object in the dark corner of the hall. "I beg yir pardin, miss, but I'm Jim Maloney, and me wife as does yir laundree is very poor, en has siven childrin en wants to be paid." The man held toward her a soiled, rumpled half sheet of lined paper. "One dollar and twenty-nine cents," Catherine read between the blots, and remarked to herself that there were only five children last week. But supposing there had been twins, she ran singing upstairs and munificently raised the amount to one dollar and thirty cents. "The dollar and a quarter is easy, but four cents is such a difficult amount!" she said, excusing her extravagance, while taking her seat at the dinner table again. "One always has to hunt through all one's coat pockets, stamp boxes, and various trays and receptacles on the bureau, and do at least fifty cents' worth of nervous worry and scurry, perhaps even then not finding the four cents." Catherine was happy again, for she still had forty minutes of liberty, ample time in which mentally to run through a possible conversation with an inquisitive elderly gentleman and arrange all her material in paragraphs with a suitable introduction and conclusion. She felt as if she were going to make an address, and had a wild desire to begin. "Esteemed elderly gentleman, it gives me great pleasure to expound to you this evening the--etc." But of course that would never do. At exactly five minutes after eight Mr. Livingston's card was handed to Catherine. "Elderly and investigating gentlemen are exasperatingly prompt," she murmured. "He has evidently taken the 7:15 train from the city and has killed time about the campus or been lost for ten minutes," she thought, as she glided downstairs, settling the bow of her ribbon collar primly in front. "Yes, Mr. Livingston," she rehearsed, "the freshman class contains one hundred and seven girls, average age, eighteen; average height, five feet five inches; average weight---- Oh, dear me! I've forgotten my average weight, and that was to have led to such interesting discussions of the comparative amount of nutriment in the different preferred foods." Just at this moment Catherine reached the door of the reception-room, gave her belt a last little twitch straight and walked in. From the least brilliantly lighted corner of the room arose a tall, broad-shouldered man of twenty-five. Poor fellow! He had shrunk there from pursuing pairs of eyes! "Dear me, it isn't the inquisitive, elderly gentleman after all," Catherine pouted disappointedly as she and Mr. Livingston took their seats at the extreme ends of a long sofa. "Now, my plans are all upset." Catherine wanted to say, "Who are you, anyway? Why aren't you inquisitive and elderly? That type is so interesting!" But that didn't seem polite, and he looked harmless, so she spoke of the weather, and the walk from the station, the ride out in the train, and the people one sees in Broad Street Station, and hoped that time would unfold the mystery. Just then the top of a head and two eyes rose perpendicularly above the window-sill in front of them, remained stationary for a few seconds, and then sank slowly, followed by a suppressed giggle and the sound of fleeing footsteps. They both saw the eyes, and both being interested in proceedings outdoors, forgot for a moment the absence of conversation. "Yes, Mr. Livingston," Catherine finally droned forth absent-mindedly. "There are one hundred and seven in the freshman class, average age, eighteen, average height, five feet five inches, average weight, two hundred and eighty pounds, and only seventeen per cent. will marry! At least----" "How extraordinary!" interrupted Mr. Livingston, while Catherine awoke with a start and wondered if a little fresh air would not be beneficial to both of them. Another pair of eyes arose above the window-sill. There was a second pause and Mr. Livingston said that he thought it would be delightful to look at the grounds. They waited a moment just to satisfy the curiosity of a third pair of eyes and then wandered out on to the campus. It was deliciously balmy, but as it was nine o'clock on a moonless night their horizon was limited. Still by peering industriously they could distinguish a few dark objects that Catherine explained to be trees, and by means of her descriptive powers (she never knew she had any until that night), Mr. Livingston was enabled to enjoy the distant prospect of Rosemont and the rolling hills beyond. When they returned to the reception-room, Catherine felt quite recovered from her little attack of absent-mindedness and hoped that the air had been equally beneficial to her uncommunicative visitor. "I have been talking too much," she thought as she watched the careful descent of eyes number four. "Poor Mr. Livingston has not had a chance to enlighten me on the subject of his personal history. I must be silent." A fifth pair of eyes appeared at the window, and the silence was unbroken for such a long time that Catherine in desperation launched forth upon Political Economy theories. (Political Economy and History were her majors, and she always turned to them in times of need.) And so it continued all evening. Catherine was still ignorant of her visitor's history, but she had counted twenty-seven pairs of eyes. She wondered if Mr. Livingston's and her count agreed. She had counted hers on her fingers, but had a dreadful feeling that she had made a mistake of a hand somewhere and was five too many. Mr. Livingston looked mathematical. She longed to ask him how many he had seen. Finally the witching hour of ten arrived. There was a scampering of footsteps through the hall and a long tolling of Taylor bell. A maid wandered uneasily up and down before the reception-room door. Catherine knew it was time to put the lights out, but somehow said nothing, for she had noticed certain symptoms of uneasiness in her visitor, and felt they were about to culminate in the "good-bye" that had been worrying him since half-past nine. They did culminate, at twenty minutes after ten, when he at length departed. Catherine wondered why men stay two hours and a quarter when they come for a half-hour call. Perhaps they think that they don't appear to be enjoying themselves if they leave before their two hours and a quarter is up. The substance of the letter that Catherine had mailed to her father that night briefly stated would read: "Who on earth is Mr. Livingston? Please restrain him from calling again." * * * * * Gradually Catherine returned to the present. She didn't see how Jack could care very much. Then she bounced over on to the cold side of the bed and held her eyes tight shut. Still her thoughts rambled on. The next day Catherine looked pale and wan. Her mother thought she had better stay in bed and rest because there were only four days left of the vacation and she mustn't go back to college all worn out. But Catherine thought she needed air. The house oppressed her, so she decided to go for a walk in her most becoming clothes. Jack always went to the office between nine and half-past. Perhaps she might meet him. But what could she do if she did meet him? Bow stiffly? That would not be especially satisfactory, but what else could she do? She couldn't appear sorry for what she had said last night. And yet she would like to have him find it out--indirectly. No, she wouldn't go to walk. It wouldn't look well. She would take her mother's advice after all, and go to bed. Jack in the meantime felt like a culprit. He had spoiled everything by his inane lack of judgment. He ought to have known better. He should at least have remembered the career. It was all up with him now. But he felt sure she liked him. If he had only made a few pretty speeches, complimented her a little and broken the ice gently! He feared he had been a little abrupt. But it wasn't his fault if he couldn't talk. He meant a lot more than the other fellows who have it all at their fingers' ends. But girls never can appreciate fine men. Anything does, if it is only well-dressed. And yet Catherine had really shown a great deal of discretion. In fact she had openly preferred him to the other men. Somehow she had always evinced much pleasure in his conversation. Perhaps it was because he listened to her theories and the other men wouldn't. Oh, but it couldn't have been that! Anyway, he had enjoyed hearing her talk. He couldn't bear the chatter of most girls. Yes, she was a fine girl, always well groomed and a thoroughbred, the kind of girl with whom a man liked to be seen walking down the street. Perhaps she hadn't meant it all. He thought he ought to call again, but he didn't exactly care to go where he wasn't wanted. Still he decided to throw aside his pride and call that evening at the Nevilles, just as if nothing had happened. But all his hopes were shattered when the maid informed him at the door that Miss Catherine could not see any one that evening. "A polite way of asking me not to call again," thought Livingston, as he hurried off. He was really annoyed now and vowed never to go near the place again. The maid forgot to tell Catherine about the call. John Livingston had recently been admitted as junior partner into the firm of W. D. Neville & Co. His rise had been rather phenomenal. Five years ago, in the summer time, three weeks after receiving his A. B., he started out bravely to work his way up in the world from the very beginning, and having entered the steel and iron works as an ordinary labourer, he had come to be a foreman of the shops. It was then that he attracted attention by his remarkable industry and popularity among the workmen, and thus came to Mr. Neville's notice. Mr. Neville at once appreciated his clear business head and knack of getting along well with men and pushed him on, so that he passed from one position of trust to another until he was finally admitted into the firm as a junior partner. Worldly people might have imagined that Mr. Neville had designs when he sent Jack Livingston out to call on his daughter at Bryn Mawr, and when he encouraged his coming to the Neville house, especially during the holidays. Frequently--two or three times a week--Jack was asked to dine until it became such an expected event that he always stayed to dinner without being asked. But any one who knew the family at all well would laugh at the worldly idea, for Mr. Neville well knew the fruitlessness of forming designs upon Catherine's future. In fact no one realized so well as Mr. Neville that Catherine had no time for anything except her career and that she didn't care for men. All she wanted was peace and a name for herself. Perhaps Mr. Neville was dubious about Catherine's ability to become a Mrs. Browning or a George Eliot. (He was an exceedingly practical man.) "Of course Catherine is exceptionally clever," he used to say. Nevertheless he felt or at least hoped that her mind was well balanced, and doubted the arrival of those expected bursts of genius on which she built so many castles in the air. During the four days that remained of the Christmas vacation, Jack persistently refused to come to the Neville house to dinner. He was always busy packing or something. This was a bad sign. To be sure Jack was going to Chicago in a week, but every one knows that a man never starts his packing until eleven o'clock on the night before his departure. He goes into the first store he sees on the day of his arrival, buys all the things he has forgotten and never again mentions the subject. Therefore Mr. Neville was a little worried, but he kept quiet and reassured himself by thinking that Jack's shunning the Neville house was merely a phase in an ultimately satisfactory love affair. He did not tell Mrs. Neville his plans or his woes. He knew her too well, and never confided delicate little matters like this to her kind-hearted, bungling management. Poor Mrs. Neville! with the best intentions in the world, she always ruined everything. Catherine, in the meantime, was not at all like herself. She moped, scolded, and was generally irritable and unpleasant. Her mother could not imagine what had happened. Catherine was so changed; she sat around and looked mysterious and gloomy and absolutely refused to go anywhere. To be sure she had never been riotous in her pursuit of pleasure, but still she had always gone about a good deal, and had really seemed to enjoy things in a characteristically unbending way. But now all was different. Mrs. Neville was in despair and promptly jumped to the conclusion that Catherine was suffering from nervous prostration brought on by overwork at college. Mrs. Neville had always said she would have it, and really there was nothing else that could make her act so queerly. "Catherine is so energetic," she told her friends when they came to console. (They all felt sorry for Bessie Neville. Her daughter was such a disappointment. Their own daughters all did embroidery in the morning, and went to teas with their mothers in the afternoon.) "Catherine must be in everything," she said, "and never is satisfied to do things half-way. No wonder the child has broken down. I shan't let her go back. No," and she set her mouth firmly, "health after all is the first thing to consider." Nevertheless their old family physician persuaded her that there was nothing like work for nervous prostration, so Catherine, in spite of the firmly set mouth, appeared at college just in time to register. However, she was loaded down with pills, tonics and strict injunctions to write all developments of symptoms. Catherine was glad to get back. She had never spent such a disappointing holiday. Yet though she felt horribly mournful and wandered about with the gloomy, tragic expression of a person with a past, she hoped she could fight it down, work and forget everything. She would either have to do that or be wretched always. For she knew Jack would never come near her again. Of course she did not want to see him. She was simply annoyed at his neglect. Why, from what her mother said, it seemed as if Jack had absolutely planned his "good-bye" call at the house to miss her, and had then apologized as if he hadn't known. Well, everything had happened for the best. She was really becoming too much interested in Jack Livingston. But now she could forget it all, and work and make something out of her life. With mid-years, a twenty-four page essay, Latin and English private reading and all sorts of unfinished odds and ends of labour, one's previous misfortunes vanish behind the rapidly accumulating wretchedness of the four weeks after the Christmas vacation. This is the period at Bryn Mawr when one wonders what on earth became of the first part of the semester, and one firmly resolves this time at least to keep good resolutions and never again be guilty of such improvident idleness; this is the period when one wakes up on bright, crisp mornings to the wretched realization that an examination is due next day in a subject of which one knows or feels that one knows absolutely nothing; this is the period when, after struggles too painful to describe, one turns up on the fatal morning pallid but resolute, armed with a pen and scraggy blotter and with Tennyson's immortal words "theirs but to do or die," ringing in one's ears; this is the period when after seizing the examination questions one thrills or congeals in proportion to the number of intimate friends, bowing acquaintances or total strangers there enrolled. Nevertheless one survives even the worst, though in a more or less battered condition, and after two weeks punctuated with these periods of violent searching thought and despairing drains on the imagination, one at length emerges into the happy serenity of the middle of February. So Catherine having passed through the wear and tear of mid-years had almost recovered from her attack of nervous prostration. One day she was sitting on the floor in her study chatting happily with some friends. They had finished their chocolate, and the empty cups had been pushed just wherever it was most convenient to put them and most inconvenient for them to be, when Emily Ashurst broke into the general talk with, "By the way, Catherine, I had a letter this morning from a friend of mine in Chicago, which I think will probably interest you. You know Jack Livingston, don't you?" Catherine nodded, and grew a little pinker than usual. "You know, he went to Chicago early in January on business connected with some steel works out there. Well, he was quite popular and taken around a lot and now they say he is engaged to a girl there, a Miss Lyla--oh, bother!--well she is exceedingly pretty--just the sweet, piquant marrying kind that a man adores. They say it was a most romantic affair. Sort of love at first sight. He is perfectly devoted and her friends are delighted with the match. Mr. Livingston has taken them all by storm." But Catherine was not particularly enthusiastic, so the conversation drifted on to basket ball possibilities for the spring. Catherine, however, was not in the least interested in basket ball now, though she was considered one of the most promising forwards. She felt awfully tired, and was secretly relieved when there was a general uprising from the floor and all her guests departed in a flock. Then she was left to her own unhappy thoughts and the concentration of chocolate cups in the one spot that always appealed most strongly to the naturally sympathetic disposition of the maid when she came to straighten up in the morning. "Jack didn't care at all then," she said, and swallowed a pill. She felt that her nervous prostration was returning, and the pills were the least objectionable of the medicines. "If he had cared he never would have become engaged within six weeks," she sighed. But she didn't see why _she_ should care. He was nothing to _her_. But her father would be so disappointed. He was interested in Jack and didn't approve of men under thirty getting married. And then it really was most inconsiderate after the way he had spoken to her. "I suppose I shall have to write and congratulate him. That's a bore! I never know what to say to engaged people, anyway. Yet I should like to write to him, just to show that there is no ill-feeling, and that I am really quite pleased to hear that he has at last persuaded some one to take him. I'll make the letter rather stiff and formal. Yes, I must write. But suppose he isn't engaged after all, wouldn't it seem as if I were forcing myself into a correspondence with him? No, it wouldn't appear well to write, at least, until the engagement was confirmed." Catherine glowed with newly awakened hope. She was glad she had decided not to write, for she dreaded to involve herself in any more awkward predicaments. They were so wearing on the mind. In the meantime the day was drawing near when Catherine's story must be handed in for _The Lantern_. But nothing seemed to have developed. On several occasions she had sat down, well provided with white receptive sheets of paper, ready to pour out her soul. She had gnawed her pencil and looked bored for half an hour, and then had jumped up and rushed outdoors for some fresh air. Each time she had been expectant and eager to jot down the ideas she thought would crowd into her mind. (One never knows what may happen when one is actually provided with pencil and paper.) But somehow nothing had come, and she really felt now that she was altogether too wretched for ideas. In desperation she decided to prune and nourish a little love story based on her own affair. It would amuse her, and no one need know that it was not purely imaginary. You can make things so much more real and vivid when drawing from your own feelings and experiences. Of course she would exaggerate a great deal and make it more interesting. And in her story the heroine could write a letter of congratulation to the hero in Chicago, a letter meant to be cold and formal, but into which had crept, in spite of herself, a plaintive, sorrowful strain. (Catherine thought that part quite romantic.) The hero on receipt of the letter could be very much mystified. He was not engaged and had no intentions of becoming engaged, though there had been a rumour. But reading between the lines he should see the heroine's love for him--this part of course could be entirely imaginary--pack his dress-suit case and take the first train for Philadelphia. He should then rush out to Bryn Mawr and throw himself at the heroine's feet, and all would end happily. (Catherine sighed deeply.) The end, however, presented difficulties, for where should she have the hero throw himself at the heroine's feet? The reception-room was such a public place. (She thought of the pursuing pairs of eyes that hunt one out of the darkest corners of reception-rooms.) Finally she fixed upon the Vaux woods. It was such a picturesque spot, she knew Jack would have liked it. "Yes," she said to herself, "he must restrain his feelings until the heroine has bowed him into a portion of the Vaux woods, where they will be uninterrupted by giggles." The story was handed in, and toward the end of May made its appearance in the pages of _The Lantern_. * * * * * In the meantime Jack Livingston, on the shores of Lake Michigan, was becoming desperately tired of going to dinners and looking out for the Chicago interests of the firm. He wanted to see some one who really cared for him, some one who would ask him out to dinner, even if he did not represent W. D. Neville & Co., of Philadelphia. He wanted to be asked out, fondled and admired a little for himself. Perhaps he was homesick. At any rate he decided to shirk social duties and spend an evening quietly with the Hammersleys. There was such an air of homelikeness and happiness about their evenings. Charlie Hammersley had been an upper classman of his at college, who had married a Bryn Mawr girl a few months before. And now they had a cozy little box just within the margin of respectability of the North End. They were still at dinner when Jack arrived. So he threw himself into an armchair by the library table and reached out for a magazine. The first he threw aside; he was tired of actresses' pictures, and hated novelettes. But something prompted him to investigate the next, though it was unfamiliar. "_The Lantern_, Bryn Mawr," he gasped in pleasant surprise, while he ran his eye eagerly down the table of contents for a certain well-known name. Before long he was buried in Catherine's little love story. When the Hammersleys came in from the dining-room, they found Jack standing with one arm against the mantelpiece and a far-away expression in his eyes. He started when he saw them with an, "Oh! ... awfully glad to find you in ... You see I've just dropped in to say good-bye before starting for Philadelphia, to-morrow morning." "Philadelphia?" Mrs. Hammersley asked in surprise. "You're an old fraud. I won't believe a word of it. You know you said you never wanted to see the place again. Besides you sent word by the maid that we mustn't hurry because you had come to spend one of those old-fashioned eight-to-eleven evenings with us. Shall it be whist or hearts to-night? Lyla, you'll make a fourth? ... Let's have hearts to-night. I don't feel strong enough for whist." "No, really, I can't. You know, I should like it above all things. But I have my trunk to pack and arrangements to make. I'm going rather suddenly. You see I've just decided." Jack wished he was not clutching _The Lantern_ so tightly in his left hand. * * * * * At Bryn Mawr finals were over and the "'Varsity" had been picked, so that all excitement was now centred in the alumnæ game. After years of success, the undergraduates had got into the way of looking upon this game as a walk-over. (It is hardly the fault of the alumnæ if one or more years of leisure do not add to their agility!) But now that the alumnæ had the last year's seniors, the champions of the college, to choose from, the under-graduates secretly trembled. For this reason there was unusual excitement over the game, and the greater part of the college was sitting cross-legged around the basket ball field cheering excitedly, while a few rushed importantly up and down, flourishing lemons and towels. It was the beginning of the second half, and neither side had scored. The undergraduates felt weak, while the small group of alumnæ at one corner of the field were clutching each other excitedly. Every one was too much interested in the game to notice a tall, broad shouldered man who had just joined the outskirts of the crowd and was anxiously following with his eyes every movement of the 'Varsity's most graceful forward. But two minutes of play remained, the ball seemed rooted in the alumnæ territory and the undergraduates were pale and heaving with suppressed woe, when the alumnæ lost the ball and it passed quickly down the field into the hands of the 'Varsity's tall, graceful forward. For one silent second she aimed, and then amid shrieks of joy the ball spun cleanly into the basket, while, with a little gasp of pain, Catherine Neville, the 'Varsity's pet forward, sank fainting upon the ground. Her ankle was badly sprained. When Catherine recovered consciousness, the tall, broad shouldered man from the outskirts of the crowd, was leaning over her, a most distressed expression in his eyes. In spite of her pain, Catherine gave a little gasp of pleasure. "He does care for me after all," she murmured under her breath. Her eyes grew dim and she felt herself going off again into unconsciousness. Another summer had passed by and the juniors were now seniors, but one of the most popular members of the class was missing. Catherine Neville was to be married in November. As she said to one of her friends, she was satisfied, and Jack was satisfied, and they didn't see why they should wait. Anyway, Jack was awfully lonely out in Chicago, all by himself, and it was her duty to go out and cheer him up. Catherine had decided upon her career. She had found her purpose in life. _Harriet Jean Crawford, 1902._ _THE APOSTASY OF ANITA FISKE_ I Anita Fiske was no longer wholly absorbed in the student life. This was all she herself understood. Any one else would have seen only generosity on the part of the Fates in the pleasant passing for her of busy days; that is, were it not customary to refer to the interposition of the Fates chiefly on occasions of dire calamity or of some especially flagrant instance of human incompetence or indolence--and indolent or incompetent Anita was not. The right to be described by very different adjectives would have been granted to her by the most captious critic in her college world. There is a lack of finality in the judgment of this world; even members of it could be brought to agree, if you specifically raised the point, to the truism about the test through the larger issues in the world outside. They could indeed justly claim that their estimate of capability was a very decently fair one; also their estimate of capacity for enjoyment; but, unfortunately for the final value of their opinion, sometimes later on the fortunate possessor of these excellent capabilities and capacities may insist on turning to pursuits calling for another set of capabilities which she does not possess; on the other hand, since she is obviously very young, her capacity for enjoyment may remain as great and yet insist on a change of diet and she remain hungry while trying to satisfy herself with once fancied dainties. Such a double falling away as this from the true faith may even occur before the close of her college days. But--there are some perversions merely temporary of the true and correct inclinations. This fact might comfort the critic in certain cases, perhaps in that of Anita Fiske, should any of the above considerations be held to apply to her. Her world would certainly have dismissed summarily such foolish speculations. For where, it would say, could you find one more obviously and conspicuously fitted to the grave charm and still, harmonious activity of the student life? Anita was the daughter of a clergyman who, after years of conscientious if not over-successful care for the spiritual welfare of a country town, was accused of ultra-liberal tendencies and to avoid vain discussion had resigned his pulpit and moved to New York. The family migration had occurred but a few months before Anita entered college; she was a New Yorker in name only,--she avowed this somewhat sadly, for a passionate affection for this city of her adoption was one of the anomalies in her character. So at least her friend Isabel Oakley felt, for Isabel was a born New Yorker, a younger member of the most light-hearted of families. The Student and the Gayety Girl their companions nicknamed the two friends, calling them after characters in a play given two years earlier. One grey February afternoon Isabel roused Anita who sat looking out with wide eyes on the still winter country. "Come, you lazy object, you dream too long. Is it of the life history of a root?--a Gothic root, I fear--with due respect to your preference for mould over mere modern earth. I insist upon--well, not snow-balling," as she looked from her goodly height down on the slender figure, "but at least on a race when we have left the proprieties of the village behind." "Very well--but I scorn your insinuation in regard to roots. Look at this." She drew her friend down beside her and pushed the yellow curtains more wide apart. The pale light of a winter afternoon fell across long stretches of snow and on burdened trees, bending down heavy branches as though to rest their weight on the firm earth; and sometimes a little mass of feathery snow slipped noiselessly from its uncertain bed and roughened where it fell the smoothness of the white ground. In a few minutes the two were going down the walk and out through the old entrance between low walls, now mere shapeless mounds in their covering of tangled, snow-laden vines. Anita seemed even more slender, though perhaps a trifle taller, than one would have imagined seeing her crouched on the window-seat. She had quick mouselike movements and walked with sudden little starts as if she feared to lag behind, and from her grey eyes all dreaminess was gone. The other girl moved smoothly and easily with the swinging gait of a strong young animal and held her head high to the cold wind that came over the open valley from the hills in the west. Strands of bright hair blew over her forehead and were tossed back as they threatened to blind her quick brown eyes. On the bridge over the railroad the wind cut sharply. It poured along the black road below, between high banks the whiteness of which was beginning to grow dim in the unequal contest with smoke and cinders. A woolly St. Bernard leaped from a neighbouring garden to greet Isabel as the two hesitated for a moment; when they started again he fell in behind and trudged patiently on, with only an occasional gambol which resulted in much floundering, the snow being deep and his paws at their clumsiest age. Beyond the last houses of Rosemont village the girls bent to a long, slow hill and, in spite of quickened breath, refreshed themselves after the long silences of the morning and early afternoon, and the ordered speech of the classroom, by wandering remarks, quick question and answer and an admiration for the fretwork of trees against the sky more freely expressed but less interjectional than is perhaps the custom among other more frankly emotional girls. Their talk instinctively drifted back to the work they cared for, though with avoidance of detail of necessary drudgery or the friction in routine. Truly original work only Anita had; but Isabel's interest in original work was as deep as her own and perhaps more free from the jar of conflicting desires. This interest of hers would have been another cause of perplexity to a self-appointed critic of the two. Isabel was a society girl by birth and tradition, and at college, through the impetus of all her previous associations and also through the adaptability which gained her immediate wide acquaintance, she was confirmed in her destiny--popularity. But, though the instinct for much intercourse with one's kind and the superabundance of animal spirits may close to their possessors the gates within which the still scholar lives, yet even such may truly care for those quiet places and look almost with reverence on the things which there stand first. In this fashion Isabel regarded the work in which Anita was already noteworthy--in their small world--and in which it was possible that she might stand above the rank and file even in the world of research outside, if the promise of these first years should be fulfilled. The talk turned to an Icelandic saga on which Anita was working. "Have you tried doing it in verse as that bit was done in an English magazine last winter?" Isabel asked, "or did it ring better in prose--but I am afraid of the excellences of prose. Of course the original I can only respect from afar,--but that German professor's version--what was his name?--had, I know, sacrificed the real spirit to a monumental accuracy. Now please don't tell me you too prefer his version, as you do the Revised, for that same sordid reason." "Most excellent Churchwoman! you object to change in the Authorized nearly as much as you would to a change in the Prayer Book. But really that piece that came out lately--of the saga, not the Prayer Book,--was quite inaccurate," Anita musingly added. "I am puzzled. I should care immensely about doing the whole thing as you have wanted me to. Bits go well. I confess I have done several when the spirit moved too hard. I could go on now I know." She raised her voice to be heard in a sudden gust. "It was written, or sung rather, to such a tune,--but up in the Seminar room the passion for accuracy falls on me and a sense of pride comes when I detect the accurate Professor Wirthau in an error. I quite despise that piece in English you spoke of. But now, come, I am in the other mood. Let us go into partnership. You have a turn for verse. I supply dry fact and you transform it into poetry. Let a few of your friends work for you and drop from some one committee--or will this have to wait till next year?" "Next year!" Isabel smiled at her friend. "You are an institution here, Nita, no one would dream of breaking your work off, but mine, such as it is, comes this year to its natural end in an A. B. and next year I shall be disporting myself among--well, not Norse sea kings. My little sister is to come out with me, you know, and as mamma is not strong I believe my superior age and learning are to serve all but the formal needs of a chaperon." "You a chaperon!" And Anita looked with amusement at her friend. "I assure you I should make an excellent one. You mistake my character. It is almost portentously tempered with gravity. Will you race me from the church," she looked up at the deserted and lonely Church of the Good Shepherd they were then passing, "to the other, the cathedral?"--to St. Thomas of Villa Nova, she meant. "Poor Mr. Clumsy-paws," Anita stopped panting, "he is far behind." After the tired dog had caught up with them, looking reproachfully, they left behind the bleak church which lifts its golden crosses with uncompromising directness to the winter sky. Through the fantastic snow twilight an hour later, they climbed the winding hill road to the college. Yellow lights shone steadily in ordered array--a few dark figures passed by somewhere--then a bell rang out suddenly and they hurried in. Yet before turning to the serious duty of preparing for dinner Anita let herself again be caught by her more alert friend idling at the window. "Another problem, is it? in addition or subtraction?" "Subtraction," she turned from the cool stars and rushing wind to the staid greeting of books and manuscript, "but what I am subtracting is, perhaps, no such loss after all--an unknown quantity, you see." II Anita had just received her father's answer to her letter. Letters are notoriously liable to different interpretations according as one confines oneself to the desires and emotions expressed therein or to those not expressed therein,--not to the uninitiated, that is. Parents are not likely to be the initiated: they have dealt too long in obvious literalness with their children. So, when Anita in her letter laid undue stress on her father's need of her and several other needs classed as domestic, he saw only an overdevelopment of the female conscientiousness in matters household--and a spirit of sacrifice which he duly admired. "Quite heroic, for her heart is set upon staying on at college," the old gentleman had remarked half aloud as he smoothed out her letter. She read his answer as she sat before a cheerful little fire, a quaint figure in a red and blue flowered kimono. It was the interval between dinner and the time to dress for a college reception. Gay little noises came from the corridors as, by bright coloured screens, soft pillows and stiff potted plants, these were changing from mere means of communication into places of refuge for those who preferred to satisfy their social needs with a lesser degree of illumination and crowding than the large dining-hall, now reception-room, afforded. Anita fingered her letter. She found it conclusive. She also found herself uncertain as to just the sentiments with which to regard it. His need of her was quite ignored. That annoyed her; but obviously in this she misunderstood him as completely as he had misunderstood her. The letter spoke of the vocation of the scholar and the sacrifice to it of the lesser things. To this she agreed, or thought she did, but had any one seen the grey eyes as they looked fixedly into the fire, he would have seen in these eyes a hunger which was not perhaps wholly for scholarship. Anita had, at the time with full conviction of sincerity, suggested a plan for going on with her work in New York. There were libraries there for the books needed--if one travelled a good many miles. Her father, most wisely and clearly, as she recognized somewhat wearily, spoke of the difficulty of concentrating one's mind on serious work among the distractions of a great city. He himself had once dreamed of a scholar's retirement. She watched a blue flame curl over the edge of an unburned coal and die down again. She well understood this desire and had even felt it herself. A few years before in Oxford, where she had stayed a month during her one trip abroad, she had longed for just such a life. She remembered how, on one of those summer afternoons in the long vacation, she had sat on the coping of a deserted quad and looked across the tall sunlit grass to a flowering white rosebush which clung and climbed over the grey stone tracery, and then had turned back to the worn inscriptions on the wall behind her in memory of those who had worked there many years before. For her the oak stairways up from the cloisters led to anchorites' cells where men worked through endless, still, summer days. She was very young then and only in Oxford during the long vacation. On her return she first saw Bryn Mawr and then she said, with entire conviction, that to be there would be very well. The long low buildings half covered with creepers suggested, as she saw these also deserted and on a summer day, her dream of life at Oxford. Disillusionment, since then, of course there had been. She had objected, more than a healthy girl with steady nerves should object, to the sounds of girlish talk and laughter, to the many mechanical details of college life, and only found the dream again when night had long come down in quietness and she saw the outline of halls and campus trees soft and still in the moonlight, all signs of newness gone and only a few lights here and there to suggest the silent student. Of late she had shrunk less from the rush and gayety of noise, her objection lying now more against a certain crudity in enjoyment which seems unavoidable at some stages--in either sex. And now as she sat in the bright kimono and watched the little flame curl and die and half heard the sound of gayety outside her door, Oxford was no longer her dream city. The bored dweller in towns who echoes the praise of rural life and poses a martyr to the weariness endured in the city, may smile at her for a foolish maiden, yet true it was that now she longed for nothing more vague and unknown, nothing more romantic and delightful than simply New York. She longed not merely to see it as now occasionally for a few brief days but to live there, to breathe its heavy air, whether that be tainted or pure, to hear the clamour of its streets. To watch it there, would give for her an added charm to the coming spring, to see it as it touches the city square making this fresh and green in a frame of busy walls with patterned beds of daisies and pansies or early blooming crocuses and a springing fountain in the midst. Here every one knew her. She wished the wish most familiar, but for that as urgent, to go day after day down in the streets, one in the changing mass of passers-by, and watch strange faces till the sense of personality was swept away and forgotten. She wished to feel again at night the fascination of a city then most spectacular yet most itself, as one watches it perhaps from a train and, along side streets, one sees in sudden long flashes the streaming white lights. What these lights were, lights of restaurant or theatre or lights of music hall--where she might go or where she might not,--she cared little now, she wanted the picture and the sound. In time she would want more, the dinner, the play,--this, however, was all she now saw in the fire; but of this she wanted her fill. A voice, she knew it for Isabel's, spoke just outside the door. She would never tell her all these idle wishes, for Isabel had, or at least would soon have, herself the reality of all of them and seemed to hold it lightly. She, Anita, had once spoken with a bit of impatience of some excellent phase of college life and Isabel's eyes had grown troubled as though the light words were almost a sacrilege. How very much mistaken their little world was in its opinion of the two! Anita's lips curled up in a little satirical smile and Isabel entered the room. "Not ready, Nita? A kimono, however charming, is unfortunately not the recognized costume for social occasions in this benighted land,--except for our fellow-students of Japanese persuasion, so haste you into frills and furbelows." * * * * * There was a party like any other,--bright lights, gay dresses, a little music and a Distinguished Person,--only a little more movement, groups of girls drifting about together and watching rather than making a part of it; a party taken, perhaps, not very seriously; one, also, which broke itself up into many little ones, these, in some cases, subdued groups of victims gathered in for the amusement of another person's unfortunate importation,--in other cases, guests discreetly chosen from those not utter strangers to each other; and one heard, here the accents of a southern town, there the soft "thee" of those who, small in number, have yet made their own a city's nickname; a party on the whole not homogeneous, restless and shifting, with a disproportion even greater than usual between the lightness of pale fabrics and the sombreness of men's dress, a disproportion tending, even, it might seem, to social joy--to judge by the greater gayety in purely feminine groups. On a stiff settee under the broad stairway Anita was established in the midst of a group of Isabel's friends. It was one of the wisely chosen little parties. All included in it belonged, in effect, to one set in the city that counts numberless sets courting recognition and as many more courting the opposite. There was among those around Anita a lady with presence, also a man who had, curiously, refused to be a slave to his bank account and, at forty-five, was causing many misgivings to his friends--and much solid content to himself--through this emancipation. The lady with presence was not his wife, else the emancipation would still have been unaccomplished. There were several strong clear-eyed young men who were still revelling in the untroubled joy of the first years of an independent income; and they took life too seriously to enter quickly into the serfdom which follows after. Now they were preoccupied with buying much pleasant experience in this country and others. A few of them might, in addition to pleasant living, do something worth while, one had already done it, all were rather worth knowing. Anita's face was a little flushed and she was talking more than usual, though the air of habitual stillness yet clung to her and her hands lay quiet on her lap, half covered by the soft deep ruffles of her blue gown. That she was a student of excellent promise was not known to those about her and Isabel, from long experience, avoided, when within earshot of her, the smallest reference to even the least of her friend's attainments. They did see only a very pretty girl who was talking gayly of all sorts of things in New York with a delight which was charmingly out of place, it seemed to them, among these surroundings; for they could not forget behind the mask of party dress the fact, almost a menacing one to them, of its being a woman's college. As they were New Yorkers by inheritance and much more by education Anita was unconsciously giving them subtle flattery, especially as what she asked about and evidently cared for was not merely the teas and dances uptown but the work and play down among the tall buildings. Isabel sat smiling at Anita's beauty--she gave the word unreservedly that evening--and wondering at her animation among these people who she had feared would bore her friend sadly. An allusion, a name, suggested a plan for the following winter and they turned to Isabel. "You are to be with us then?" "Yes," she answered, "I leave here in a few months." The note of regret was almost evident. "And Miss Fiske?" "Ah! she is fortunate," Isabel answered quickly for her. "She has other things to fill her days. No, I refrain from untimely allusions but we all envy her life next year and the year after--for it is all planned, is it not?" "Yes," Anita replied after a little pause, "I shall only be a few days in New York. I am to be very busy." The flush died off her face and, as she herself was silent, the talk drifted away from her: when Isabel looked at her next she saw again the quiet face as she knew and liked it best with a gravity which well avoided seriousness,--the eyes a little larger and darker than usual under the bright lights. _Ellen Rose Giles, '96._ _A DIPLOMATIC CRUSADE_ Sunday after Mid-Years. A grey biting February afternoon, with a promise of snow in the eager air, was darkening over the deserted campus. The examinations, which had finally dragged their slow length to an end on Friday, seemed to have left a peculiar haze in the mental atmosphere; for throughout the college, whence all who could possibly do so had departed for a brief rest, there was a subdued and slightly melancholy air, as though no one had yet realized that another four months must elapse before the agony of having her knowledge investigated would again rack mind and body. Eleanor Mertoun, deep in the comfort of her cushioned window-seat, alternately mused on the contrast between her busy Thursday self and her lazy Sunday self, and wished for the return of her roommate, who was spending the Saturday and Sunday in Philadelphia. It was certainly the time and place in which to enjoy the retrospect of work done. The red glow of a quiet little coal fire in the grate mingled pleasantly with the fading cold light from without, and lit up warmly the dark green walls of the study, and its polished floor. An antique oval mirror in a dull old gilt frame dimly gave back the double of a graceful sword fern which spread its long fronds over the end of a well-filled bookcase below. Eleanor, being in a contemplative mood, stared hard at the fern and reflected that _it_ toiled not and was very beautiful. Before she could go on to the philosophic consequences of her meditation, the door was swung open vigorously, and in came a tall figure in hat and ulster. "Why, it's Marjorie Daw herself," exclaimed Eleanor, springing up to greet the longed-for roommate. "I thought you weren't coming back till to-morrow? You're just in time to save me from acute melancholia, but I can't believe you had any premonition of that!" "I'm _gefrohren_--give me a cup of hot tea, for the love of--Me, and then I'll tell you," answered Marjorie Conyngham, as she threw off hat and coat, sat down on the rug by the hearth, and held out both hands towards the fire. Eleanor dashed out to fill the kettle, and soon had a steaming cup and a "jammed" cracker ready for Marjorie. Then she put a "Busy" sign on the outside of the door to guard against too attentive friends on borrowing bent, sat down beside the newcomer, clasped her hands around her knees, and commanded, "Go on." "I had an unusual and severe attack of piety that prevented me from cutting Pol. Econ. in the morning. It was brought on, I think, by the idea of having to copy six pages of lecture notes on the social state of the indigent Indians." Eleanor interrupted her. "Oh, I don't in the least care what brought you, now that you're here. I meant, I want to know all about the Atkinsons, what you did and said,--and how many times you upset your glass at table." Marjorie passed over this insulting thrust, and irrelevantly remarked: "Isn't it a pleasant thought that exam. time is over, and so Betty Hall no longer goes down the corridor warbling 'Earth is my resting place, Heaven is my home,' or 'I'm a pilgrim and I'm a stranger, I can tarry, I can tarry but a night'?" Eleanor laughed at the remembrance. "It is, surely. Poor old Betty! Doesn't she suffer more from the fear of being flunked out than any upper-classman you ever saw?--and she makes elaborate preparations for going home at every exam. time. But come back from this digression and stick to the manuscript. Marge, conversationally you're a tramp!" "About the Atkinsons? They're very well, thank you.--Oh, don't break my head with the tongs and I will be good! I have a lovely tale to tell you, really, Eleanor. I met a man----" "Impossible!" interjected Eleanor. "Who's digressing now?" demanded Marjorie. A meek small voice from the gathering darkness said "Little Ellie," and then Marjorie went on; "a man whom you know quite well in the general if not in the particular--a handsome, well-groomed, middle-aged man with iron grey hair, serenest confidence in his own judgment and estimate of things, and--here you may perceive the rub, Lee--unconquerable prejudice against the essentially modern woman--in the abstract." "Ah!" breathed Eleanor, scenting the battle from afar. "In the concrete, I confess, she shows him to be 'not impregnable as a bulwark of archaism,' as Dr. Phillips would say." Marjorie was smiling at the fire, which was only half lighting the corner of the dim study. "Eleanor, from the moment that I first heard that man speak and open fire on the kind of thing the modern girl is going to become, I marked him for my prey. Oh! it was lovely," laughed she suddenly, rocking back and forth in an ecstasy of delighted amusement, "it was lovely to see the mighty fall." "Do tell me how it happened! What did you use on the poor man?" asked the eager Eleanor. "It wasn't force, hardly even force of argument. He did not know I was a Bryn Mawrtyr at first, and so he was led into jesting with me just as he would have with any mere society girl who was ready for badinage. When he fathomed my real character his face was an entertaining spectacle--a mixture of regret, astonishment, and--well,--annoyance, such as one is not always privileged to see. I saw he was preparing for driving me out of college by hot argument, so I got out my strategic tools and turned the conversation. "You know we have threshed this all out before so many times, and raged to each other about the quarter of the population who take us, without looking, for mannish boarding-school girls, as empty-headed as the women of ten centuries ago, but more silly because we pretend to be what we are not; and about the other quarter, who look upon us as grinds and blue-stockings, star-gazers impossible and undesirable to touch with a pole of any length! This man had a smattering of both those ideas, and was--is--bringing up his daughter on principles impossible to classify. He told me all about his plans for her before I quite got the conversation turned from the explosive topic, and I feel sure the poor child will find herself an anachronism in ten years. "I knew it would shock him fearfully if I talked politics; but besides being anxious to shake him up a bit, I really wanted to do battle with Mr. Atkinson (as usual) about England's policy in South Africa. And so I launched on that perilous undertaking, making as gallant a defence of Oom Paul and all Boerdom as I knew how. To my huge delight, the man (his name is Ballantyne) had to acknowledge that he disagreed with Mr. Atkinson and agreed with me! Point No. 1. "Just then Teddy Atkinson began talking music. You know he is very enthusiastic--goes to the Symphony concerts, all the operas, and that sort of thing. He asked about the Glee Club at college, and wanted to know if I were still Leading-Grand-High-Soprano-in-Alt, or something equally foolish. You should have seen Mr. Ballantyne's face--looked as if he thought music and political science mutually exclusive terms. I plunged in at once and talked 'technical' all I knew how. Don't think me a horrid _poseuse_, Lee, though I was playing to the gallery in a way. I didn't pretend to very much more than I knew, and besides it was all a part of my deep-laid plot for bringing down that man." "You! posing!" was Eleanor's sole comment. "Go on." "You see my scheme? To let no subject of conversation escape; whether it was anything Mr. Ballantyne had ever heard of or not makes no difference. The point was to convince him, as thoroughly as was possible in one short evening, that I, in the character of college woman, was neither a bit of thistle-down nor a fearful prig. The next thing was--oh yes!--domestic affairs. Mrs. Atkinson, without knowing it, helped me immensely there. She began the topic, and though my knowledge of it was so theoretical that if I had been an angel I should have feared to tread on that subject, I rushed in. Fortunately, I had gathered enough information from running the house last summer while mother was away to talk without utter nonsense. I told them about the cook who said, when I went down and criticised some of the products of her skill: 'It's yersilf I'll set on the stove if yez do be afther interferin' in _my_ bisnis!' And I thought Mr. Ballantyne's amusement rather excessive for one who disapproved so heartily of me and my college. Perhaps he took it as a welcome proof that I couldn't manage cooks. It proved a good transition anyway; for Mr. Atkinson was reminded of one of his delicious stories, which made me think of some lovely tales we heard from Betty Hall and the frivolous-minded Dorothy at the fudge party after Philosophy exam. on Friday; and then of course the Ballantyne had one to tell, so that the table cheered up markedly. I could see now that he began to think me amusing if peculiar, and I gained an inch whenever I could. "After that we went on talking about all sorts of things, for Teddy Atkinson couldn't have played better into my hands if he had been an accomplice, and suggested the most diverse known subjects. College settlement was closely followed by wireless telegraphy, yacht races, and golf, especially at the Merion Cricket Club; and though I had to be wary of terms sometimes when it came to the second and third, I didn't back down once--not once. Then Mr. Ballantyne and I had a bit of a talk together, in which I tried to introduce 'a current of new and fresh ideas' into his mind, and gently remove some others already there. I think his capitulation would have come very soon if he had stayed longer, for when he rose to go he said that he did not know whether he would find it best for his daughter to go to Bryn Mawr, but he hoped she would prove as many-sided as he had found a college woman might be. Wasn't that worth working hard for?" Eleanor, leaning over and spanning Marjorie's forehead with her hands, murmured "Undue cerebral enlargement----" "Lee--you idiot!" cried Marjorie, "do you imagine for one moment that I would have spent a laborious, uncomfortable, self-conscious evening to make any living person like me on my own account? I didn't care what Mr. Ballantyne thought of _me_--I wanted to make him like the college girl in me, and show him how utterly he was mistaken in his baseless notions of what college makes a woman." Marjorie was roused now, and in earnest, and the light carelessness was gone out of her manner. Her wide grey eyes, Eleanor could see by the fire-glow, were shining with an eager light and her usually pale cheeks were richly flushed. She rose from the hearth rug, and leaning with one arm along the mantel, forcefully punctuated her words by tapping her finger-tips upon it. "Lee," she said in her clear voice, "we're at a sort of crisis now, I think--not the same ring that there was, well, about twenty years ago, when the question was, shall women go to college? That has been answered, and the answer is, yes, because they _will_. But now there are quantities of people, just like Mr. Ballantyne who think the fact that women will do it adds a most unfortunate complexity to modern life; and the burden of proof that college is the right thing for us lies with us. I don't mean that we are to claim more for it than it can do, or pretend to more than we have, but to be so broad-spirited and alert and interested in everything, that we shall simply convince these people that college training is the best thing that ever happened to women--especially Bryn Mawr training. _I'm_ going on a crusade against all infidels of the genus Ballantyne. Will you go along?" Eleanor took Marjorie's outstretched hand and laid her other on her roommate's shoulder. "Of course I will, Marge, as far as I can. But I'm not capable like you, and can't do half----" "Yes you are--yes you can," was Marjorie's confused answer. And she went on dilating upon Eleanor's being "a shark at Major English" and many other delightful things, until that embarrassed young woman sought a brief respite in a tour of investigation for the match box, an article of furniture which seemed bent upon disproving the theory of the conservation of matter, for it was rarely to be found. This evening, by some strange chance, it was discovered on the bookcase, and Eleanor seized it with alacrity. Just then it was useful to her as a diversion rather than as a light-producing agent, but she struck a match from it, lighted a candle, and handed it to Marjorie, saying, "There, take that and go to your room. Your hair looks frumpish with so much excitement, and if you don't hurry to do it you will be locked out, for the bell rang ages ago. Think what it would be to miss Sunday evening supper!" Marjorie vanished behind the portière and continued her flow of flattery, which Eleanor by singing "Ancient of Days," rendered inaudible. Then they discovered they had but one minute in which to get to the dining-room, and fled down the corridor with other late stragglers to reach the goal of their desires before a dark and cruel hand should bar them thence. Marjorie's cause could have found no better champion, no one more fitted to illustrate her theory of the influence of college training on women, than herself. She was one of those healthy inspiring people, becoming ever more numerous especially among college women, who do everything well, if not all things equally well; and who show how invaluable is the discipline which has given them largeness of view and a certain ready grasp of affairs often lacking in those who have missed the same training. She saw life steadily, this senior of twenty-two, (though she could not as yet see it whole) and therefore she was neither scatter-brained nor priggish. The ideals of balance, proportion, symmetry, self-control, had been growing clear and attractive to her all her four years, but they had crystallized in her thought only in the last. As she had said to Eleanor, they had "threshed it all out before," and the occasion of their so doing had been this: Marjorie, aspirant for athletic as well as academic and social success, practiced basket-ball at every opportunity; and after winning her class numerals by playing as substitute in a match game in junior year, was in a fair way to make the senior team. One rainy November afternoon, Marjorie, in default of an outdoor game, was throwing and catching ball in the gymnasium with the senior captain and a junior. As she ran across the floor after a muffed ball (which brought down upon her much reviling by the captain) she noticed a spellbound freshman standing in the doorway--a freshman whom she knew slightly. It was a friend's friend whom Marjorie had been asked, as upper classmen are every year, to "look up"; and when she had done so had found a rather repressive young person, of serious-minded intent to study, and do nothing else. When Marjorie saw her "little freshman friend," as Eleanor called Marian Coale, with her eyes glued to the white numerals on Marjorie's dark basket-ball suit, she nodded to her, and later, when they all stopped playing, walked off with Marian, as she had to stop at Radnor Hall, where the latter lived. "I didn't know you played basket-ball," the freshman had said suddenly. "Too awkward?" asked Marjorie with a quizzical expression in her shining grey eyes. "Or a weakling--which?" The freshman was visibly embarrassed. "I didn't mean that, you know," she stammered, "but I didn't think you belonged to the set that cares for--that sort of thing." She was gaining confidence now, and went on somewhat loftily, "It's rather a waste of time, don't you think? just as so many teas and plays and things of that sort are. I think we come here to work." She glanced at the senior stealthily as she delivered this startling opinion, and was a little annoyed to find her smiling broadly. "Of course that's what we come here for," cried Marjorie, "but you'll find that you do your work about forty times better if you do something else as well." Then she had spent a few moments expounding her views to the serious-minded freshman, leaving her slightly bewildered and semi-convinced that there were some things she had not fathomed in her month of college life. Marjorie had met before several girls who had gone through and out of college with similar aims; but she had not found the type a prevailing one, for, happily, at Bryn Mawr there exists not only strong adherence to the high intellectual standard, but likewise a healthy tendency towards general culture and breadth of interests. Marian Coale was one of that minority whose ideal is only knowledge, not wisdom. She bade fair to become a bookworm--of high order, it is true, but yet a bookworm, and a bookworm, as a factor in life, is, by common consent, less desirable, admirable, and useful than a woman. Marjorie's attack upon her theories, coming as it did from so well recognized a student, was from the right quarter, and was well-timed to give the freshman a new outlook even in her first year. "I hope I didn't inculcate too much frivolity," said Marjorie as she was telling Eleanor of this _rencontre_. "I tried to make her see that I did not mean quite being a Jack-at-all-trades, and missing the kernel of college by running every organization to the exclusion of lectures. But I toiled to show her that the opposite sort of mistake is nearly as fatal in the end. I am hopeful of having her try to make the Glee Club, and perhaps write for the 'Philistine'! If she turns out a swan in the literary line shan't I deserve a vote of thanks from the editorial board?" "You won't get it unless you warn Caroline Brandes beforehand that 'M. C.' signed to any copy means Marian Coale as author and Marge Conyngham as inspirer and motive power," answered Eleanor in her dry unsmiling way. "What started you ramping like a lion against the greasy grinds, Marjorie Daw?" "I shouldn't have done it before the end of senior year anyway, Lee, and probably not then if I had not come across so very inviting a grind as Marian. You see she is one of the Coales of Hampstead, who are friends of the Dorsets, and so I have heard of her very often. There is so much possibility for all sorts of fine things in her that I can't bear to see her shutting everything but one out of her life, even though that one be books. Be a good friend to her, Lee, by showing her that even the president of Self-Government and the next European Fellow----" Eleanor's strong hand shut off Marjorie's speech, for not even by her roommate would she suffer her chances for carrying off this, the highest of undergraduate honours, to be discussed. She now informed Marjorie that if she wished to go on telling about her schemes for Relieving Socially Indigent Freshmen, she (Lee) would listen with joy; but approaches to any other topic would be instantly punished. And so Marjorie returned to her tale. It was _à propos_ of this episode that Marjorie and Eleanor had "threshed it all out," as the former said in discussing Mr. Ballantyne; and during the process had been half-formed in Marjorie's mind the idea which, though growing slowly during the long winter, reached its full maturity only later when warmed and ripened by that gentleman's noble rage against women's colleges. Marjorie saw that her crusade must be carried on both within college and beyond its peaceful campus. "You see, Eleanor," she said, "all the Marian Coales in the freshman class (I am afraid it is too late to work with hardened upperclassmen) ought to be given a good broad point of view on the question of what they are to get out of college: and _then_ all the Ballantynes in the world outside are to be convinced that such a point of view exists--is more common than they think. What gives me most hope about the second half of the work is that the Ballantynes of the world are nearly always people who have met no college women, or few and unfortunate specimens of the race." With a strong sense of the need of instructing people of the Coale and the Ballantyne type in the way they should go, Marjorie began her last Semester in college. That, however, was only one of a number of conflicting ideas behind that broad, white brow of hers. For a senior's last Semester, by reason of her desire to do her remaining work at least well enough to merit that coveted title of Bachelor of Arts, and her intention to spend more time than she has hitherto spent with the soon-scattered members of the dear old class, (tramping with them about the country to the Gulph, Valley Forge, and the Red Rose Inn, or gathering congenial spirits about the hospitable chafing-dish)--by reason of all this, a senior's second Semester is a time of great physical activity and some confusion of mind. Marjorie worked indefatigably at her beloved political science, took part enthusiastically in Sheridan's _Critic_ when that delightful drama was given for the benefit of the College Settlement Chapter, and when basket-ball training began in mid-March, cheerfully forswore all sweet things and "eating between meals," that she might, when the time came for the inter-class match games, help to win the silver lantern for the class of ----. And as she worked and played her thoughts were never far from the crusade she and Eleanor had undertaken. They told no one of their efforts, but they were often amused by the way in which their friends unconsciously forwarded their plans. Carroll Mayo, dubbed by Marjorie the "Versatile Virginian," was a gallant supporter; for though her record for scholarship was not so high even as Marjorie's, it was high enough not to be despised by the respecters of intellect only, in estimating her total strength. As for her power in other directions, Carroll was considered by this somewhat remarkable group of seniors the best "all round" girl among them. If Marjorie chanced to have a guest of the Ballantyne type, (and it must be confessed that she laid traps for many such by inviting them to dine or have afternoon tea) she generally contrived that Carroll should sit on one side of him or her, and by her unconscious charm help Marjorie banish the prejudice that was waiting to be justified. Then there were Betty Hall and Anne Aldridge, both of whom were excellent though unconscious abettors of Marjorie and Lee. Betty, in spite of the self-distrust that put her into a very real agony of apprehension whenever examinations stared her in the face, and caused her to announce beforehand that in a few short days she would be "flunked out," was no mean student; and ever since freshman days of Minor Latin had done clever work in the classics. She was likewise a good actor of what she called "heavy female parts," and the owner of a fund of most delightful stories. And Anne? Everybody knew Anne. Underclassmen gazed upon her with awe and rapture--for was she not captain of the senior basket-ball team, whom as juniors she had led to the championship? Merry, kindly, black-eyed, sweet-tempered, saucy, loyal, unassuming Anne Aldridge, overflowing with infectious humour, and having a good word for every one--never was any one so justly popular as she. And to describe her yet further with a wild flight of far-fetched metaphor, she was one of the brightest jewels in the crown of the biology professor! Less considerable than the help given the two crusaders by these three was that which Marjorie and Eleanor received from another unwitting senior--Kate Murray. Kate, if she had not been thrown with such girls as Marjorie, Eleanor, and her own roommate, Dorothy Van Dyke, might have turned out pure grind; but the constant contact with the good friends had bred in her a wholesome sense of the value of a well-rounded college experience. Now, in senior year, although she had at times to be forcibly dragged from work by the frivolous Dorothy, she was heard to deliver herself spontaneously of the opinion that people ought to play daily,--afternoon tea with the six, after a long tramp or basket-ball being preferred as the form that play was to take. And so when outside influence was used to make Kate take her own advice, she was an admirable example to the delinquent freshman Coale. That clever young person whom Marjorie had found so problematical, was now, by the end of the second Semester, working herself out to a satisfactory solution. The slight change which had already, under the energetic training of Marjorie, taken place in her was remarked by many who had known her in her freshest freshman days, even though they did not know of the influence that had wrought it. She was more alert, more sympathetic than she had been when first the senior started her upon a course not laid down in the college program; but not being of an introspective nature, she was hardly conscious of the utter difference between her former and her present points of view. Her attitude towards the question of the next European Fellow, (that annual earthquake whose rumblings so agitate the entire college with increasing violence until the shock of the final announcement rends it) was a delightful index to Marjorie of her own success in crusading, and of what she considered Marian's improved mental condition resulting therefrom. They talked it over, as do any two Bryn Mawr girls who are together for more than five minutes at this period of the year; and Marian, somewhat diffidently because she was a freshman talking of seniors, said she very much hoped that Carroll Mayo would be the choice of the Faculty. Why? Oh, because she was the sort of person the college might for every reason be proud to have represent it at a foreign university. Didn't she think other people were as promising candidates? Marjorie had inquired. Oh, yes, but personally she wanted to see a girl as charming and as "all-round" as Carroll win. She thought Eleanor Mertoun another great person for the honour,--supposed Kate Murray had a show, but she wasn't very enthusiastic about _her_. In the meantime, the senior class, with the best possible right, was in a state of ferment that was not to be relieved save by the knowledge of which one of them was chosen for such well-nigh crushing honour. As March advanced, all other topics of conversation at breakfast, lunch, and dinner, during long walks, or strolls about the campus on the way to lectures, or from the athletic field, were relegated to the forgotten corners of the mental attic; and "who do _you_ think will have the fellowship?" was the incessant question. When the bulletin boards at last displayed the announcement that all the students were requested to come to chapel on Tuesday morning, March 20th, like a leaping prairie fire spread the news that the European Fellow's name was to be made public. At once discussion waxed the more violent, that every one might say all she thought before the need for speculation in regard to the chosen one should be past. Monday afternoon, when the final Faculty meeting for deciding the matter was in progress, was spent by the senior class in a state of restlessness that kept them vibrating in a distracted manner between that portion of the campus immediately under the windows of the President's office (as though forsooth any information could trickle, like a welcome stream, down to the thirsty ones below) and the rooms of different members of the class who were so fortunate as to live facing that august building where the fate of several people was being decided. Pembroke East, being nearest Taylor was the favourite place for these indoor gatherings, and Marjorie's and Eleanor's study, which faced the President's office windows, was filled with a constantly changing crowd of eager seniors. In the course of the afternoon, practically every one in the class was suggested; for human nature, in such cases, does not thoroughly like being surprised, and there was abroad a hardly culpable longing to be able to say, "I told you so," in case some dark horse should prove the winner. When the Faculty meeting was over, they knew would come, in some mysterious manner, the official notice from the Secretary of the Faculty to the chosen candidate. Then, in accordance with a wise provision which prevents the spontaneous combustion of the new-made fellow, she might tell one of her friends. And every one longed to be sharer in the secret that was to be kept over-night. As it happens every year, so too when the class of ---- were seniors, the efforts at discovering the recipient of the Faculty note failed utterly, and all but two seniors were therefore ignorant of the long-desired name when the morning came on which the public announcement was to be made. Speculation was rife, and breakfast, contrary to its usual sleepy moroseness, was nearly as animated and "discussive" (Marjorie's word) as dinner was prone to be. At last Taylor bell begins to ring for chapel, and hardly has the first stroke melted into the clanging monotone of the succeeding ones when on all sides is displayed an unwonted eagerness for attending divine service (not compulsory). From every hall flow long lines of students, the black gowns of the more eager ones streaming straight out behind them in the fresh March wind, like Alice's hair when the Red Queen ran with her "faster! faster!" Followed by the slower comers, they hurry into Taylor, up the staircase and into the chapel. There they scatter to the excited though somewhat subdued groups that occupy the sections set apart by unwritten law for different classes. In the middle front writhes the senior class, forgetful of its usual stony impassiveness in the face of anxiety. They are excited, for is it not one of themselves that has been chosen? They are supported on the left by the loyal juniors, who, because they have known the Fellow (whoever she may be) three years, longer than any other class in college, are in turn justly thrilled. The right flank is held by the devoted sophomore class, excited because those from among whom the Fellow comes were once their champions, when in freshman year they needed such. And behind the choir, which is the rearguard of the seniors, sit the freshmen, excited because they have never before come within hailing distance of the honour. The clock is anxiously watched as the hands approach, oh! so slowly, towards 8:45. Every probable, nay possible, candidate is being pierced to the soul from all sides with glances compared to which a hawk's would be careless and cursory. Now and again the wave of whispering and laughter rises suddenly, until some conscience-pricked proctor silences the throng. It begins again--a low bubbling noise that is alive with anxious, suppressed excitement, and that threatens to engulf the decorous Chapel in the rise of its un-religious tide. The nervous twisting about to survey the crowd, the buzz of talk, the ripple of laughter, cease suddenly. Then as the President and the College Preacher, in their academic robes, enter the two upper doors and ascend the platform, the mass rises, and led by the choir breaks into a vigorous processional hymn. Then very quiet is the room while the words of the strong King David are read, and it is only when the last sentence of the prayer brings the students upright that the excitement breaks forth again. Across the rustle of readjustment, subduing it momentarily as a great wind flattens the waves for an instant only to toss them the more wildly, comes the voice of the President. "Before we come to speak of the purpose for which we are gathered here this morning," she begins, her smile expressing perfect appreciation of the suspense that racks her audience, "I should like to make some announcements of general interest to the students." The strained attention of her hearers all over the Chapel breaks in hardly audible catches of the breath. Those unheard announcements give time for further speculation as to the candidate. Marjorie is eagerly leaning forward, too impatient-looking for one who knows the Thing--so it can't be Eleanor, decide the sagest critics. Kate Murray is abnormally flushed, Carroll correspondingly pale. It must be Carroll--she looks so subdued--so unexcited. Those announcements are over. The President unfolds an innocent-looking bit of paper. The honour list of ten, from whom the Fellow has been chosen, is read. "Is it she?" is the tacit question of the crowd at each name. Then---- "The decision has been difficult," says the President impressively. "After long and earnest discussion the Faculty has nominated to the Board of Trustees, as European Fellow for the coming year----" A pause. The weighted silence seems to stifle one. "Eleanor Whitcomb Mertoun!" A roar shatters the air--or is it the roof?--a shout of generous gladness mingled with the hearty clamour of hand and heel. The pent-up eagerness to know is changed into the longing to honour the chosen candidate, and it bursts forth and swirls tumultuously about Eleanor like the Fundy tide. It rises, falls, rises again, twenty feet at a leap. Marjorie is meantime pounding Eleanor's knee, and exclaiming to every one within reach, "I knew it! I knew it!" as though some especial credit were due her for having been told the secret. Kate Murray, on the other side, was dragging Eleanor down by the neck, as if she would unseat from its firm base the head whose market value had risen 100% in five minutes. Decorum returns for a moment when the President dismisses the students with the request that they sing the college hymn; and they sing it as can only those that have felt the "gracious inspiration" of our "Mistress and Mother." When it is over, there is a rush for Lee Mertoun from all sides, for it is _de rigueur_ to shake the new Fellow's hand very nearly to the maiming of that revered member. For ten minutes she clasps hands, hardly recognizing their owners in the press; and then gradually, as the bell rings for first lectures, the crowd melts out of the chapel. As Lee, Marjorie, Kate, and Carroll left the room Marjorie ran her arm through that of the warm and red recipient of blushing honours and facing her quickly about, pointed tragically with her pen at the almost deserted confusion of chairs helplessly awry. "There, woman," she said, "a picture of that might with great plausibility be labelled 'Charleston after the Earthquake.' That is all your fault, and it is what you have got to live up to." Eleanor laughed. "If that were all!" she said. "You are right--there is more," retorted Marjorie, putting her own construction upon Eleanor's words. "You have to live this thing down as well as live up to it. And that means you will have to work hard to convince the infidels that you are still in the crusade, and that you stand for something besides the midnight oil. Now if you have yourself well in hand after all this agitation, let's go to Latin." So the four seniors wended their way through the small groups that were still "talking it over," Marjorie declaring that she simply must cut her own lecture and go with Lee to Major Latin, in order to see how to treat a Fellow. As they passed into Room E closing the door behind them with the peculiarly irritating, undecided rattle that particular door always gives, suspended animation woke again in the lingering underclassmen, who had ceased their talk to gaze after the person who had suddenly become a Personage in the college world. A knot of freshmen talked in low tones. "Marian Coale is embittered for life because Marjorie didn't get it," suggested one teasingly. "I'm not," protested the literal-minded accused. "Marjorie doesn't deserve it----" "Tut, tut, how disloyal!" murmured the tease. "--so far as scholarship is concerned," she finished. "What else would you base the choice upon?" was the astonished inquiry from another. "That is the first thing to consider, of course; but it is not all." And Marian waxed eloquent upon the subject of the ideal European Fellow. "Who told you all this?" asked she of the insatiable desire to annoy, when Marian paused. "You didn't have it with you when you came to college." Marian's dark face reddened. "I am learning a few things in college," was the slow answer. "One is to value something beside pure intellect, and to estimate people at more than the amount of grey matter they happen to possess." This was quite true. Marian's face-about was a matter of great astonishment to the few who had known her at all well when she entered. Most of them traced the change to her friendship with Marjorie, but no one, least of all Marian herself, suspected that design on the part of the senior had brought it about. As to Marjorie, she hardly believed in the transformation of the freshman, and kept furtively watching her convert for some signs of flagging energy. But watch as she might she never saw in Marian any indications of departure from the way into which she had been drawn. As the spring advanced, and one was greeted upon going out of doors with the faint, exhilarating scent of new-sprung grass, and the sight of a green patch, like the broadcast promise of the prodigal summer, here and there on the brown campus, Marjorie began to feel that the first part of the "crusade" she had placed before herself that February day had been carried out. The second part, which concerned the extra-college world of men and women she had in the meantime not neglected. Here, her efforts, though not confined to Mr. Ballantyne, were yet centred in him. She dated her spring, as do most Bryn Mawrtyrs, by the changes in field and tree, but in this particular year she counted time also by her progress with the "genus Ballantyne," and especially with him from whom it took its name. In the time of cherry blossoms, when the black old trunks flung over them a white splendour woven by the wind and the sun, she had broken through the outer wall of prejudice that had been so weakened by her first attack. When the wind began to whirl from the apple-trees the full-blown petals, she felt that she was actually gaining ground, and faster than she had hoped; and when finally the daisies whitened the country-side, Marjorie received proof of complete triumph. This pleasant reward for the labour of a Semester came to Marjorie one Saturday afternoon in the latter half of May. The days had been warm and, as the work piled up in its inevitable way towards the end of the year, wearisome also. Dorothy Van Dyke, to celebrate the passing of the week, persuaded Kate Murray that they two should give a "Ball" to the other five under the big cherry-tree by Pembroke West. So it came about that lemonade flowed freely there that afternoon, and every one of the seven friends returning from a shopping expedition in town, from work, or what not, was welcomed to rugs, cushions and the cool clink of ice under the hospitable boughs. Marjorie was there, of course, helping every one in her own particularly helpful way. It was restful, sitting there in the golden-green afternoon shadows, while the breath of the lilacs drifted along to them with the lazy air. The beauty of it all silenced the little group more than once, and their love for campus and halls rose breast-high--throat-high, and choked them oddly as they thought of going away. Dear grey, ivy-clad halls! curtained in April with rich, tender green that is pierced to the heart with glorious sunlight, and that undulates, rippling, in the sweet spring wind; reddened by your vines that burn, lit by the sunset, in October; standing bare, proudly silent when the shouting north wind whirls the white snow about you; roofed with silver when the high moon dapples the grey road with the soft dim shadows of your trees; stately but never cold, always beautiful and beloved; if you but set upon your children as they go forth from you (groping their way because their eyes are clouded) your hallmarks of strong intellect, high honour, broad sympathy, and quick insight--who of all _Almæ Matres_ may more truly rejoice in her noble race than Bryn Mawr? A mood of contemplation could not but soon pass with such a group. The irrepressible Dorothy shattered it now. "Here's a man coming up the walk," she announced. "Does he belong to any of you? Daughter is with him." Every one turned to see if he "belonged" to her, and Marjorie seized Lee's arm as she recognized the stately figure. "Mr. Ballantyne--and Louise. What do you think that means, Lee?" "Suppose you go to find out," suggested Eleanor. "He probably wants to see you at all events." And Marjorie went. When she came back half an hour later, after showing the delighted father and daughter as much about college as was possible at that unpropitious time of day, her face was glowing with pleasure. "Marge," called Dorothy, as she came running across the grass from where she had been speeding the parting guests, "we've decided to cut dinner and stay out here until it's time for the Glee Club to sing on the steps." "Jolly," answered Marjorie, "who cares for dinner anyway?" She dropped down beside Eleanor and seized her firmly by the shoulder. "Lee Mertoun, Mr. Ballantyne brought Louise out to see her future Alma Mater. She goes to Miss Stevens's school next fall for the last two years of prep. work--then here to college. _Was denkst du?_" Eleanor clapped her hands delightedly. "Good work, Marge! I knew it would come about. Why, at this rate there won't be any of the genus left in the city of Philadelphia--not an infidel to crusade on----" Betty Hall's voice broke across the stream of congratulation. "Of course, Carroll, I wouldn't mention it to her, but I think it shows just a _little_ lack of breeding to discuss something we know nothing about!" The laugh that followed this expansive hint was joined in by Marjorie and Lee. "Do tell them about the crusade, Marjorie. It is time now, I think, especially as you have met the enemy and made him yours, poetically speaking. You don't know how I have been burdened by this ghastly secret!" And while the sun sank and the shadows melted into the one deepening shadow we call twilight, and the circling bats flickered against the sky, Marjorie told of the problem that had presented itself to her that winter, and of her plans and efforts for its solution. "Of course," she finished, "I don't mean to have it take all my time. There are other things more important, and besides it is not the sort of thing that can be done by constant conscious effort. But it seems to me so very well worth while to convince people at large of the value of college training, that I am willing to go out of my way sometimes to do it. And if we _are_ going to do it, we have got to take care that we are broad and sympathetic, and not merely 'cold, learned, dehumanized'----" By senior year one's friends never let one's statements go unchallenged. Kate Murray as might have been expected, now took up the case for a hypothetical defendant. "I don't agree with you at all, Marjorie. That's a one-sided way of looking at the matter. You leave out of account, absolutely, the point of view of the people who devote their lives to one particular side of intellectual work, and accomplish the greatest masterpieces of the world. Specialization is the only thing that brings about great results in many cases; and where would be the great works that are above the horrible level of mediocrity, if your doctrine of--of--universal versatility (stop giggling. I'm not trying to be poetic or funny either) were accepted by everybody?" "See here, Kate," broke in Carroll, "it's you that are getting one-sided now. I see what Marjorie is after and I think she is quite right. Getting bloodless and thin-lipped _is_ one of the dangers of the college woman." Anne Aldridge's quick voice answered Carroll. "That's all very well for the world at large, Carroll, but I think Kate has made a very good point in bringing up the case of the great minds of the world. I believe that genius is 'an unlimited capacity for hard work' in more cases than you think. Now if people who have power of that sort should let themselves be turned aside by a desire to be open to impressions from all sides, the world would certainly be the loser by it. I haven't genius even of the hard work description, and so I shall never deny myself the pleasure of as much of your society as I can get, merely to go on pegging away at the regeneration of the pharynx of the earthworm! But if anybody has the power of doing something really great, for the world's sake, don't preach versatility to that person. There are few enough of us that can add to the sum of knowledge." "That's a part of what I mean, Anne," struck in Marjorie eagerly. "There are few of us that can do that, but there are quantities of people who will never be able to do more than grind, and who yet abstract themselves from the world of actual life as though they were hermit geniuses. I say they have no right to do it, and that they owe as much to their fellows as to their own brains. Don't you see that the existence of such people among us is what gives people like Mr. Ballantyne their opportunity to misjudge the college woman? I've thought a good deal about both sides of this, and I think I have good grounds for carrying on what Lee and I have called, rather as a joke, our crusade. Please don't misunderstand me to mean that the women of really great intellectual power are to let their remarkable work be interfered with by turning that power aside to every little thing." "So far as we ourselves are concerned," said Kate, "I think we may agree with you, Marjorie; for probably none of us is a genius except our European Fellow--of course she is. And so if we may be allowed to let alone all those bearing the marks of genius, we may join the crusade too. I am willing anyway to help in the attack on the large and flourishing Ballantyne species, and convince it that not all college women consist solely of massive intellect." "And I too," said Anne. "So am I," came from each of the others. "Good children," said Marjorie gaily, as she threw an arm across the shoulders of Anne and of Kate, on either side of her. It was all she said but her satisfaction was deep. Silence fell among them as it will when good friends sit together. A late robin-song floated over to them from the apple-trees. The evening star, like a sanctuary lamp, swung above the dying altar-fire of the sunset. The cool, nameless fragrance of a spring night filled the air. There under the old cherry-tree sat the seven with no word, until at last the silence was broken by snatches of melody, vague talking, and the laughter from strolling groups. Then, drawn back from their dreaming, they rose and went away to join the singing on the senior steps. _Edith Campbell Crane, 1900._ Transcriber's Notes: Italics are represented with _underscores_, bold with =equal signs=. Eliminated duplicate title headings before stories. Normalized some inconsistent italics. Some inconsistent hyphenation (e.g. roommate vs. room-mate) and contraction (sha'n't vs. shan't) retained from original. Retained some archaic spellings (e.g. "yoeman"). Page 87, changed "hawthorne" to "hawthorn." Page 109, added missing close quote after "thine eyes." Page 125, changed "philanthrophy" to "philanthropy." Page 212, changed "insistance" to "insistence." Page 233, removed unnecessary comma after "alumnæ." Page 290, changed "recognzied" to "recognized." Page 295, moved misplaced quote from behind "said Anne." 
6858	----	Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College By JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A. M. PHILADELPHIA HENRY ALTEMUS COMPANY Copyright, 1914 [Illustration: The Door Was Cautiously Opened to Mrs. Elwood.] CONTENTS I. Overton Claims Her Own II. The Unforseen III. Mrs. Elwood to the Rescue IV. The Belated Freshman V. The Anarchist Chooses Her Roommate VI. Elfreda Makes a Rash Promise VII. Girls and Their Ideals VIII. The Invitation IX. Anticipation X. An Offended Freshman XI. The Finger of Suspicion XII. The Summons XIII. Grace Holds Court XIV. Grace Makes a Resolution XV. The Quality of Mercy XVI. A Disgruntled Reformer XVII. Making Other Girls Happy XVIII. Mrs. Gray's Christmas Children XIX. Arline's Plan XX. A Welcome Guest XXI. A Gift to Semper Fidelis XXII. Campus Confidences XXIII. A Fault Confessed XXIV. Conclusion LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS The Door Was Cautiously Opened to Mrs. Elwood. "It Is My Theme." Each Girl Carried an Unwieldy Bundle. The Two Boxes Contained Elfreda's New Suit and Hat. Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College CHAPTER I OVERTON CLAIMS HER OWN "Oh, there goes Grace Harlowe! Grace! Grace! Wait a minute!" A curly-haired little girl hastily deposited her suit case, golf bag, two magazines and a box of candy on the nearest bench and ran toward a quartette of girls who had just left the train that stood puffing noisily in front of the station at Overton. The tall, gray-eyed young woman in blue turned at the call, and, running back, met the other half way. "Why, Arline!" she exclaimed. "I didn't see you when I got off the train." The two girls exchanged affectionate greetings; then Arline was passed on to Miriam Nesbit, Anne Pierson and J. Elfreda Briggs, who, with Grace Harlowe, had come back to Overton College to begin their second year's course of study. Those who have followed the fortunes of Grace Harlowe and her friends through their four years of high school life are familiar with what happened during "Grace Harlowe's Plebe Year at High School," the story of her freshman year. "Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School" gave a faithful account of the doings of Grace and her three friends, Nora O'Malley, Anne Pierson and Jessica Bright, during their sophomore days. "Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School" and "Grace Harlowe's Senior Year at High School" told of her third and fourth years in Oakdale High School and of how completely Grace lived up to the high standard of honor she had set for herself. After their graduation from high school the four devoted chums spent a summer in Europe; then came the inevitable separation. Nora and Jessica had elected to go to an eastern conservatory of music, while Anne and Grace had chosen Overton College. Miriam Nesbit, a member of the Phi Sigma Tau, had also decided for Overton, and what befell the three friends as Overton College freshmen has been narrated in "Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College." Now September had rolled around again and the station platform of the town of Overton was dotted with groups of students laden with suit cases, golf bags and the paraphernalia belonging peculiarly to the college girl. Overton College was about to claim its own. The joyous greetings called out by happy voices testified to the fact that the next best thing to leaving college to go home was leaving home to come back to college. "Where is Ruth?" was Grace's first question as she surveyed Arline with smiling, affectionate eyes. "She'll be here directly," answered Arline. "She is looking after the trunks. She is the most indefatigable little laborer I ever saw. From the time we began to get ready to come back to Overton she refused positively to allow me to lift my finger. She is always hunting something to do. She says she has acquired the work habit so strongly that she can't break herself of it, and I believe her," finished Arline with a sigh of resignation. "Here she comes now." An instant later the demure young woman seen approaching was surrounded by laughing girls. "Stop working and speak to your little friends," laughed Miriam Nesbit. "We've just heard bad reports of you." "I know what you've heard!" exclaimed Ruth, her plain little face alight with happiness. "Arline has been grumbling. You haven't any idea what a fault-finding person she is. She lectures me all the time." "For working," added Arline. "Ruth will have work enough and to spare this year. Can you blame me for trying to make her take life easy for a few days?" "Blame you?" repeated Elfreda. "I would have lectured her night and day, and tied her up to keep her from work, if necessary." "Now you see just how much sympathy these worthy sophomores have for you," declared Arline. "Do you know whether 19-- is all here yet?" asked Anne. "I don't know a single thing more about it than do you girls," returned Arline. "Suppose we go directly to our houses, and then meet at Vinton's for dinner to-night. I don't yearn for a Morton House dinner. The meals there won't be strictly up to the mark for another week yet. When the house is full again, the standard of Morton House cooking will rise in a day, but until then--let us thank our stars for Vinton's. Are you going to take the automobile bus? We shall save time." "We might as well ride," replied Grace, looking inquiringly at her friends. "My luggage is heavy and the sooner I arrive at Wayne Hall the better pleased I shall be." "Are you to have the same rooms as last year?" asked Ruth Denton. "I suppose so, unless something unforeseen has happened." "Will there be any vacancies at your house this year?" inquired Arline. "Four, I believe," replied Anne Pierson. "Were you thinking of changing? We'd be glad to have you with us." "I'd love to come, but Morton House is like home to me. Mrs. Kane calls me the Morton House Mascot, and declares her house would go to rack and ruin without me. She only says that in fun, of course." "I think you'd make an ideal mascot for the sophomore basketball team this year," laughed Grace. "Will you accept the honor?" "With both hands," declared Arline. "Now, we had better start, or we'll never get back to Vinton's. Ruth, you have my permission to walk with Anne as far as your corner. It's five o'clock now. Shall we agree to meet at Vinton's at half-past six? That will give us an hour and a half to get the soot off our faces, and if the expressman should experience a change of heart and deliver our trunks we might possibly appear in fresh gowns. The possibility is very remote, however. I know, because I had to wait four days for mine last year. It was sent to the wrong house, and traveled gaily about the campus, stopping for a brief season at three different houses before it landed on Morton House steps. I hung out of the window for a whole morning watching for it. Then, when it did come, I fairly had to fly downstairs and out on the front porch to claim it, or they would have hustled it off again." "That's why I appointed myself chief trunk tender," said Ruth slyly. "That trunk story is not new to me. This time your trunk will be waiting on the front porch for you, Arline." "If it is, then I'll forgive you your other sins," retorted Arline. "That is, if you promise to come and room with me. Isn't she provoking, girls? I have a whole room to myself and she won't come. Father wishes her to be with me, too." "I'd love to be with Arline," returned Ruth bravely, "but I can't afford it, and I can't accept help from any one. I must work out my own problem in my own way. You understand, don't you?" She looked appealingly from one to the other of her friends, who nodded sympathetically. "She's a courageous Ruth, isn't she?" smiled Arline, patting Ruth on the shoulder. At Ruth's corner they said good-bye to her. Then hailing a bus the five girls climbed into it. "So far we haven't seen any of our old friends," remarked Grace as they drove along Maple Avenue. "I suppose they haven't arrived yet. We are here early this year." "I'd rather be early than late," rejoined Miriam. "Last year we were late. Don't you remember? There were dozens of girls at the station when we arrived. Arline and Ruth are the first real friends we have seen so far. Where are Mabel Ashe and Frances Marlton, Emma Dean and Gertrude Wells, not to mention Virginia Gaines?" "If I'm not mistaken," said Elfreda slowly, her brows drawing together in an ominous frown, "there are two people just ahead of us whom we have reason to remember." Almost at the moment of her declaration the girls had espied two young women loitering along the walk ahead of them whose very backs were too familiar to be mistaken. "It's Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton, isn't it?" asked Anne. Grace nodded. They were now too close to the young women for further speech. A moment more and the bus containing the five girls had passed the loitering pair. Neither side had made the slightest sign of recognition. A sudden silence fell upon the little company in the bus. "It is too bad to begin one's sophomore year by cutting two Overton girls, isn't it?" said Grace, in a rueful tone. "Overton girls!" sniffed Elfreda. "I consider neither Miss Wicks nor Miss Hampton real Overton girls." "They should be by this time," reminded Miriam Nesbit mischievously. "They have been here a year longer than we have." "Years don't count," retorted Elfreda. "It's having the true Overton spirit that counts. You girls understand what I mean, even if Miriam tries to pretend she doesn't." "Of course we understand, Elfreda," soothed Anne. "Miriam was merely trying to tease you." "Don't you suppose I know that?" returned Elfreda. "I know, too, that you don't wish me to say anything against those two girls. All right, I won't, but I warn you, I'll keep on thinking uncomplimentary things about them. Last June, after that ghost party, I promised Grace I would never try to get even with Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton, but I didn't promise to like them, and if they attempt to interfere with me this year, they'll be sorry." "Oh, there's the campus!" exclaimed Arline as, turning into College Street, the long green slope, broken at intervals by magnificent old trees, burst upon their view. "Hello, Overton Hall!" she cried, waving her hand to that stately building. "Doesn't the campus look like green plush, though! I love every inch of it, don't you?" She looked at her companions and, seeing the light from her face reflected on theirs, needed no verbal answer to her question. A moment later she signaled to the driver to stop the bus. "I shall have to leave you here," she said. "I'll see you at Vinton's at six-thirty." Grace handed out her luggage to her, saying: "You have so much to carry, Arline. Shall I help you?" "Mercy, no," laughed Arline. "'Every woman her own porter,' is my motto." Opening her suit case she stuffed the candy and magazines into it, snapping it shut with a triumphant click. Then with it in one hand, her golf bag in the other, she set off across the campus at a swinging pace. "She's little, but she has plenty of independence and energy," laughed Miriam. "Hurrah, girls, there's Wayne Hall just ahead of us." It was only a short ride from the spot where Arline had left them to Wayne Hall. Grace sprang from the bus almost before it stopped, and ran up the stone walk, her three friends following. Before she had time to ring the door bell, however, the door opened and Emma Dean rushed out to greet them. "Welcome to old Wayne," she cried, shaking hands all around. "I heard Mrs. Elwood say this morning you would be here late this afternoon. I've been over to Morton House, consoling a homesick cousin who is sure she is going to hate college. I've been out since before luncheon. Had it at Martell's with my dolorous, misanthropic relative. I tried to get her in here, but everything was taken. We are to have four freshmen, you know." "I knew there were four places last June, but am rather surprised that no sophomores applied for rooms. Have you seen the new girls?" Emma shook her head. "They hadn't arrived when I left this morning. I don't know whether they are here now or not. I'm to have one of them. Virginia Gaines has gone to Livingstone Hall. She has a friend there. Two of the new girls will have her room. Florence Ransom will have to take the fourth." "Where's Mrs. Elwood?" asked Miriam. "She went over to see her sister this afternoon. She's likely to return at any minute," answered Emma. "Do you think we ought to wait for her?" Grace asked anxiously. "Hardly," said Anne, picking up her bag, which she had deposited on the floor. "Come on, I'll lead the way," volunteered Elfreda, starting up the stairs. "Won't Mrs. Elwood be surprised when she comes home? She'll find us not only here, but settled," laughed Grace. But it was Grace rather than Mrs. Elwood who was destined to receive the surprise. CHAPTER II THE UNFORESEEN Following Elfreda, the girls ran upstairs as fast as their weight of bags and suit cases would permit. Miriam pushed open her door, which stood slightly ajar, with the end of her suit case. "Any one at home?" she inquired saucily as she stepped inside. "Looks like the same old room," remarked Elfreda. "No, it isn't, either. We have a new chair. We needed it, too. You may sit in it occasionally, if you're good, Miriam." "Thank you," replied Miriam. "For that gracious permission you shall have one piece of candy out of a five-pound box I have in my trunk." "Not even that," declared Elfreda positively. "I said good-bye to candy last July. I've lost ten pounds since I went home from school, and I'm going to haunt the gymnasium every spare moment that I have. I hope I shall lose ten more; then I'll be down to one hundred and forty pounds and--" Elfreda stopped. "And what?" queried Miriam. "I can make the basketball team," finished Elfreda. "What is going on in the hall, I wonder?" Stepping to the door she called, "What's the matter, Grace? Can't you get into your room?" "Evidently not," laughed Grace. "It is locked. I suppose Mrs. Elwood locked it to prevent the new girls from straying in and taking possession." "H-m-m!" ejaculated Elfreda, walking over to the door and examining the keyhole. "Your supposition is all wrong, Grace. The door is locked from the inside. The key is in it." "Then what--" began Grace. "Yes, what?" quizzed Elfreda dryly. "'There was a door to which I had no key,'" quoted Miriam, as she joined the group. "Don't tease, Miriam," returned Grace, "even through the medium of Omar Khayyam. The key is a reality, but there is some one on the other side of that door who doesn't belong there. Whether she is not aware that she is a trespasser I do not know. However, we shall soon learn." Grace rapped determinedly on one of the upper panels of the door. "I'll help you," volunteered Elfreda. "And I," agreed Anne. "My services are needed, too," said Miriam Nesbit. Four fists pounded energetically on the door. There was an exclamation, the sound of hasty steps, the turning of a key in the lock, and the door was flung open. Facing them stood a young woman no taller than Anne, whose heavy eyebrows met in a straight line, and who looked ready for battle at the first word. "Will you kindly explain the reason for this tumult?" she asked in a freezing voice. "We were rather noisy," admitted Grace, "but we did not understand why the door should be locked from the inside." "Is it necessary that you should know?" asked the black-browed girl severely. Grace's clear-cut face flushed. "I think we are talking at cross purposes," she said quietly. "The room you are using belongs to my friend Anne Pierson and to me. During our freshman year it was ours, and when we left here last June it was with the understanding that we should have it again on our return to Overton." "I know nothing of any such arrangement," returned the other girl crossly. "The room pleases me, consequently I shall retain it. Kindly refrain from disturbing me further." With this significant remark the door was slammed in the faces of the astonished girls. A second later the click of the key in the lock told them that force alone could effect an entrance to the room. "Open that door at once," stormed Elfreda, beating an angry tattoo on the panel with her clenched fist. From the other side of the door came no sound. "Never mind, Elfreda," said Grace, fighting down her anger. "Mrs. Elwood will be here soon. There is some misunderstanding about the rooms. I am sure of it." "See here, Grace Harlowe, you are not going to give up your room to that beetle-browed anarchist, are you?" demanded Elfreda wrathfully. A peal of laughter went up from three young throats. "You are the funniest girl I ever knew, J. Elfreda Briggs," remarked Miriam Nesbit between laughs. "That new girl looks exactly like an anarchist--that is, like pictures of them I've seen in the newspapers." "That's why I thought of it, too," grinned Elfreda. "I once saw a picture of an anarchist who blew up a public building and he might have been this young person's brother. She looks exactly like him." "Stop talking about anarchists and talk about rooms," said Anne. "I must find some place to put my luggage. Besides, time is flying. Remember, we are to be at Vinton's at half-past six." "I should say time _was_ flying!" exclaimed Grace, casting a hurried glance at her watch. "It's ten minutes to six now. It will take us fifteen minutes to walk to Vinton's. That leaves twenty-five minutes in which to get ready." "There is no hope that the trunks will arrive in time for us to dress," said Miriam positively. "Come into our room and we'll wash the dust from our hands and faces and do our hair over again." "All right," agreed Grace, casting a longing glance at the closed door. "We'll have to put our bags in your room, too. I don't wish to leave them in the hall for unwary students to stumble over." "Bring them along," returned Miriam. "No one shall accuse us of inhospitality." "I wish Mrs. Elwood were here." Grace looked worried. "We mustn't stay at Vinton's later than half-past seven o'clock. There are so many little things to be attended to, as well as the important question of our room." Arriving at Vinton's at exactly half-past six o'clock, they found Arline Thayer and Ruth Denton waiting for them at a table on which were covers laid for six. "We've been waiting for ages!" exclaimed Arline. "But you said half-past six, and it is only one minute past that now," reminded Grace, showing Arline her watch. "Of course, you are on time," laughed the little girl. "I should have explained that I'm hungry. That is why I speak in ages instead of minutes." "Your explanation is accepted," proclaimed Elfreda, screwing her face into a startling resemblance to a fussy instructor in freshman trigonometry and using his exact words. The ready laughter proclaimed instant recognition of the unfortunate professor. "You can look like any one you choose, can't you, Elfreda?" said Arline admiringly. "I think your imitations of people are wonderful." "Nothing very startling about them," remarked the stout girl lightly. "I'd give all my ability to make faces to be able to sing even 'America' through once and keep on the key. I can't sing and never could. When I was a little girl in school the teachers never would let me sing with the rest of the children, because I led them all off the key. It was very nice at the beginning of the term, and I sang with the other children anywhere from once to half a dozen times, never longer than that. I had the strongest voice in the room and whatever note I sang the rest of the children sang. It was dreadful," finished Elfreda reminiscently. "It must have been," agreed Miriam Nesbit. "Can you remember how you looked when you were little, Elfreda?" "I don't have to tax my brain to remember," answered Elfreda. "Ma has photographs of me at every age from six months up to date. To satisfy your curiosity, however," her face hardened until it took on the stony expression of the new student who had locked Grace out of her room, "I will state that--" "The Anarchist! the Anarchist!" exclaimed Ruth and Miriam together. "What are you two talking about?" asked Ruth Denton. "About the Anarchist," teased Miriam. "Wait until you see her." "You have seen her," laughed Grace. "Elfreda just imitated her to perfection." Thereupon Grace related their recent unpleasant experience to Arline and Ruth. "What are you going to do about it?" asked Arline. "We will see Mrs. Elwood as soon as we return to Wayne Hall, and ask her to gently, but firmly, request the Anarchist to move elsewhere." "Why do you call her the Anarchist?" asked Arline. "Elfreda, please repeat your imitation," requested Miriam, her black eyes sparkling with fun. Elfreda complied obediently. "You understand now, don't you?" laughed Grace. "I should be very stupid if I didn't," declared Arline. "Of course she's dark, with eyebrows an inch wide. You can't expect me to give an imitation of anything like that," apologized Elfreda. "I think I should recognize her on sight," smiled Ruth Denton. "We are miles off our original subject," remarked Grace. "Elfreda hasn't told us how she looked as a child." "All right. I'll tell you now," volunteered J. Elfreda graciously. "I had round, staring blue eyes and a fat face. I wore my hair down my back in curls--that is, when it was done up on curlers the night before--and it was almost tow color. I had red cheeks and was ashamed of them, and my stocky, square-shouldered figure was anything but sylphlike. I was not beautiful, but I was very well satisfied with myself, and to call me 'Fatty' was to offer me deadly insult. That is about as much as I can remember," finished the stout girl. "Really, Elfreda, while you were describing yourself I could fairly see you," smiled Arline. "Now it's your turn," reminded Elfreda. "I imagine you were a cunning little girl." Arline flushed at the implied compliment. "Father used to call me 'Daffydowndilly,'" she began. "My hair was much lighter than it is now, but it has always been curly. I am afraid I used to be very vain, for I loved to stand and smile at myself in the mirror simply because I liked my yellow curls and was fascinated with my own smile. No one told me I was vain, for Mother died when I was a baby, and even my governess laughed to see me worship my own reflection. When I was twelve years old, Father engaged a governess who was different from the others. She was a widow and had to support herself. She was highly educated and one of the sweetest women I have ever known. When she took charge of me I was a vain, stupid little tyrant, but she soon made me over. She remained with me until I entered a prep school, then an uncle whom she had never seen died and left her some money. She's coming to Overton to see me some day. Overton is her Alma Mater, too." "You are next, Grace," nodded Ruth. "There isn't much to tell about me," began Grace. "I was the tomboy of Oakdale. I loved to climb trees and play baseball and marbles. I was thin as a lath and like live wire. My face was rather thin, too, and I remember I cried a whole afternoon because a little girl at school called me 'saucer-eyes.' There wasn't a suspicion of curl in my hair, and I wore it in two braids. I never thought much about myself, because I was always too busy. I was forever falling in with suspicious looking characters and bringing them home to be fed. Mother used to throw up her hands in despair at the acquaintances I made. Then, too, I had a propensity for bestowing my personal possessions on those who, in my opinion, needed them. Mother and I were not always of the same opinion. I wore my everyday coat to church for a whole winter as a punishment for having given away my best one without consulting her. With me it was a case of act first and think afterward. I don't believe I was particularly mischievous, but I had a habit of diving into things that kept Mother in a state of constant apprehension. Father used to laugh at my pranks and tell Mother not to worry about me. He used to declare that no matter into what I plunged I would land right side up with care. I was never at the head of my classes in school, but I was never at the foot of them. I was what one might call a happy medium. My little-girl life was a very happy one, and full to the brim with all sorts of pleasant happenings." "I never heard you say so much about yourself before, Grace," observed Elfreda. "I'm usually too much interested in other people's affairs to think of my own," laughed Grace. "I have never heard Anne say much about her childhood, either. She must have had all sorts of interesting experiences." "Mine was more exciting than pleasant," returned Anne. "Practically speaking, I was brought up in the theatre and knew a great deal more about things theatrical than I did about dolls and childish games. I was a solemn looking little thing and wore my hair bobbed and tied up with a ribbon. I never cried about the things that most children cry over, but I would stand in the wings and weep by the hour over the pathetic parts of the different plays we put on. Father was a character man in a stock company. We lived in New York City and I used to frequently go to the theatre with him. My father wished me to become a professional, but my mother was opposed to it. When I was sixteen I played in a company for a short time. Then mother and sister and I went to Oakdale to live, and the nicest part of my life began. There I met Grace and Miriam and two other girls who are among my dearest friends. Nothing very exciting has ever happened to me, and even though I have appeared before the public I haven't as much to tell as the rest of you have." "But countless things must have happened to you in the theatre," persisted Arline, looking curiously at Anne. "Not so many as you might imagine," replied Anne. Then she said quickly, "Miriam must have been an interesting little girl." "I was a very haughty young person," answered Miriam. "In the Oakdale Grammar School I was known as the Princess. Do you remember that, Grace?" Grace nodded. "Miriam used to order the girls in her room about as though they were her subjects," she declared. "She had two long black braids of hair and her cheeks were always pink. She was the tallest girl in her room and the teachers used to say she was the prettiest." "I was a regular tyrant," went on Miriam. "I had a frightful temper. I was a snob, too, and looked upon girls whose parents were poor with the utmost contempt." "Miriam Nesbit, you can't be describing yourself!" exclaimed Arline incredulously. "Ask Grace if I am not giving an accurate description of the Miriam Nesbit of those days," challenged Miriam. "It isn't fair to ask me," fenced Grace. "You always invited me to your parties." "There, you can draw your own conclusions," retorted Miriam triumphantly. "I don't object to telling about my past shortcomings as I have at last outgrown a few of my disagreeable traits." "Were you and Grace friends then?" asked Arline. "We played together and went to each other's houses, but we were never very chummy," explained Grace. "We were both too headstrong and too fond of our own way to be close friends. It was after we entered high school that we began to find out that we liked each other, wasn't it, Miriam?" "Yes," returned Miriam, looking affectionately at her friend. In two sentences Grace had effectually bridged a yawning gap in Miriam's early high school days of which the latter was heartily ashamed. "Every one has told a tale but Ruth," declared Elfreda. "Now, Ruth, what have you to say for yourself?" "Not much," said Ruth, shaking her head. "So far, my life has been too gray to warrant recording. That is, up to the time I came to Overton," she added, smiling gratefully on the little circle. "My freshman year was a very happy one, thanks to you girls." "But when you were a child you must have had a few good times that stand out in your memory," persisted Elfreda. Ruth's face took on a hunted expression. Her mouth set in hard lines. "No," she said shortly. "There was nothing worth remembering. Perhaps I'll tell you some day, but not now. Please don't think me hateful and disobliging, but I don't wish to talk of myself." Arline Thayer eyed Ruth with displeasure. "I don't see why you should say that, Ruth. We have all talked of ourselves," she said coldly. Ruth flushed deeply. She felt the note of censure in Arline's voice. "I think we had better go," announced Grace, consulting her watch. "It is now half-past seven. We ought to be at Wayne Hall by eight o'clock. You know the Herculean labor I have before me." "Herculean labor is a good name for our coming task," chuckled Anne. "The Anarchist will make Wayne Hall resound with her vengeful cries when she is thrust out of the room with all her possessions." Jesting light-heartedly over the coming encounter, the diners strolled out of Vinton's and down College Street in the direction of the campus. Arline was the first to leave them. Her good night to the four girls from Wayne Hall was cordial in the extreme, but to Ruth she was almost distant. A little later on they said good night to Ruth, who looked ready to cry. "Cheer up," comforted Grace, who was walking with Ruth. "Arline will be all right to-morrow." "I hope so," responded Ruth mournfully. "I did not mean to make her angry, only there are some things of which I cannot speak to any one." "I understand," rejoined Grace, wondering what Ruth's secret cross was. "Good night, Ruth." Elfreda, Miriam and Anne bade Ruth goodnight in turn. "Now, for the tug of war," declared Elfreda as they hurried up the steps of Wayne Hall. "On to the battlefield and down with the Anarchist!" CHAPTER III MRS. ELWOOD TO THE RESCUE As Grace approached the curtained archway that divided the living-room from the hall she could not help wishing that she might have settled the affair without Mrs. Elwood's assistance. She was not afraid to approach Mrs. Elwood, who was the soul of good nature, but Grace disliked the idea of the scene that she felt sure would follow. The young woman now occupying the room that she and Anne had re-engaged for their sophomore year would contest their right to occupy it. Mrs. Elwood would be obliged to set her foot down firmly. It would all be extremely disagreeable. Grace reflected. Then the memory of the Anarchist's glaring incivility returned, and without further hesitation Grace walked into the living-room, followed by her companions. Mrs. Elwood, who was sitting in her favorite chair reading a magazine, looked up absently, then, staring incredulously at the newcomers, trotted across the room, both hands outstretched in welcome. "Why, Miss Harlowe and Miss Nesbit, I had given you up for to-night. Here are Miss Pierson and Miss Briggs, too. I'm so glad to see you. When did you arrive? I thought there was no train from the north before nine o'clock." "Didn't Miss Dean tell you we had arrived?" asked Grace, as Mrs. Elwood shook hands in turn with each girl. "I haven't seen Miss Dean. She went out before I came home," replied Mrs. Elwood. "Wait until we catch the faithless Emma," threatened Anne. "She promised to be our herald. We arrived here at a little after five o'clock. We did not stay here long, for Miss Thayer, of Morton House, invited us to dinner at Vinton's." "How do you like the way I fixed your room this year?" asked Mrs. Elwood. "We haven't been in it yet," answered Grace. "That is, we went only as far as the door." "Oh, then you must see it at once," said Mrs. Elwood briskly. "I have had it repapered. There is a new rug on the floor, too, and I have put a new Morris chair in and taken out one of the cane-seated chairs." "No wonder the Anarchist refuses to vacate," muttered Elfreda. "What did you say, my dear?" remarked Mrs. Elwood amiably. "Oh, I was just talking nonsense," averred Elfreda solemnly. "I won't keep you girls out of your rooms any longer. I know you must be tired from your long journey. Come upstairs at once." Mrs. Elwood had already crossed the room and was out in the hall, her foot on the first step of the stairs. The girls exchanged glances. There was a half smothered chuckle from Elfreda, then Grace hurried after their good-natured landlady. "Wait a minute, Mrs. Elwood," began Grace, "I have something to tell you before you go upstairs. This afternoon, when we arrived, we went directly to our rooms. The door of our room was locked, however. We knocked repeatedly, and it was at last opened by a young woman who said the room was hers and refused to allow us to enter it." During this brief recital Mrs. Elwood looked first amazed, then incredulous. Her final expression was one of lively displeasure, and with the exclamation, "I might have known it!" she marched upstairs with the air of a grenadier, the girls filing in her wake. Pausing before the door she listened intently. The sound of some one moving within could be heard distinctly. Mrs. Elwood rapped sharply on the door. The footsteps halted; after a few seconds the sound began again. "She thinks we have come back," whispered Elfreda. "So we have," smiled Grace, "with reinforcements." Her smile was reflected on the faces of her friends. Mrs. Elwood, however, did not smile. Two red spots burned high on her cheeks, her little blue eyes snapped. Again she knocked, this time accompanying the action with: "Open this door, instantly. Mrs. Elwood wishes to speak with you." "Do not imagine that you can gain entrance to this room through any such pretense," announced a contemptuous voice from the other side of the door. "I believe I stated that I did not wish to be disturbed." "And I state that you must open the door," commanded Mrs. Elwood. "You are not addressing one of the students. This is Mrs. Elwood." A grating of the key in the lock followed, then the door was cautiously opened far enough to allow a scowling head to be thrust out. The instant the Anarchist's narrowed eyes rested on Mrs. Elwood her belligerent manner changed. She swung the door wide, remarking in cold apology; "Pray, pardon me, Mrs. Elwood. I believed that a number of rude, ill-bred young women whom I had the misfortune to encounter earlier in the day were renewing their attempts to annoy me." "There are no such young women at Wayne Hall," retorted Mrs. Elwood, who was thoroughly angry. "The majority of the young women here were with me last year, and not one of them answers your description. Really, Miss Atkins, you must know that you are trespassing. This room belongs to Miss Harlowe and Miss Pierson. It was theirs last year and they arranged with me last June to occupy it again during their sophomore year. How you happened to be here is more than I can say. I believe I gave you the room at the end of the hall." "The room to which you assigned me did not meet with my approval," was the calm reply. "I prefer this room." "You can't have it," returned Mrs. Elwood decisively. "But I insist upon remaining where I am," persisted the intruder. "If necessary, I will allow Miss Harlowe or her roommate to occupy the other half of the room." "I have told you that you can not have the room," exclaimed Mrs. Elwood, eyeing her obstinate antagonist with growing disfavor. "If you do not wish to take the room at the end of the hall, then I have nothing else in the house to offer you. No doubt you can find board to suit you in some other house." "I wish to stay here," returned the Anarchist stubbornly. "Let Miss Harlowe have the room at the end of the hall." Sheer exasperation held Mrs. Elwood silent for a moment. The Anarchist peered defiantly at her from under her bushy eyebrows. She made no move toward vacating the room of which she had so coolly taken possession. "We'll go for our bags and suit cases, Mrs. Elwood," suggested Grace wickedly. "We left them in Miriam's room." "Very well," returned the intrepid landlady. "Your room will be ready for you when you return." "That is what I call a stroke of genius on your part, Grace," remarked Miriam, as they entered her room. "Mrs. Elwood can deal with the Anarchist more summarily without an audience." "It must be very humiliating for that Miss Atkins," mused Anne, "but it's her own fault." "Of course it's her own fault," emphasized Elfreda. "She doesn't appear to know when the pleasure of her company is requested elsewhere." "Shall we go now?" asked Anne, lifting her heavy suit case preparatory to moving. "Not yet," counseled Grace. "We must give her time enough to get out of sight before we appear." Elfreda boldly took up her station at the door and reported faithfully the enemy's movements. After a twenty minutes' wait, the stout girl closed the door with a bang, exclaiming triumphantly: "She's gone! She just paraded down the hall carrying her goods and chattels. Mrs. Elwood stalked behind carrying a hat box. She looked like an avenging angel. Hurry up, now, and move in before the Anarchist changes her mind and comes back to take possession all over again." Grace and Anne lost no time in taking Elfreda's advice. Five minutes later they were back in their old room. "Stay here a while, girls," invited Grace. Miriam and Elfreda had assisted their friends with their luggage. "How nice your room looks," praised Miriam. "I like that wall paper. It is so dainty. Your favorite blue, too, Grace. I wonder if Mrs. Elwood knew that blue was your color?" "I suppose so," returned Grace. "Two-thirds of my clothes are blue, you know. I must run downstairs and thank her for championing our cause. I won't be gone five minutes." "We must go," declared Miriam. "We are going to begin unpacking to-night." Running lightly down the stairs, Grace thrust her head between the portieres that separated the living-room from the hall. Mrs. Elwood sat reading her magazine as placidly as though nothing had happened within the last hour to disturb her equanimity. "Thank you ever so much, Mrs. Elwood," said Grace gratefully, walking up to the dignified matron and shyly offering her hand. "Nonsense, child!" was the reply. "You have nothing for which to thank me. You don't suppose I would allow a new boarder to infringe upon the rights of my old girls, do you?" "No," admitted Grace. "I'm sorry that things had to happen that way," she added regretfully. "Don't you worry about it any more, Miss Harlowe," comforted the older woman. "It's nothing you are to blame for. You had the first right to the room. I gave this girl Miss Gaines's old room. Her roommate is to be a freshman, too. She hasn't arrived yet. Miss Atkins decided to pick out her own room, I imagine. Evidently she took a fancy to yours. As soon as you girls had gone, she gave me one awful look, gathered up her belongings, and went to the other room without another word. I picked up two or three things she dropped and carried them down for her. I wouldn't be sorry if she went to some other house to board. She looks like a trouble maker." Grace was of the same opinion, but did not say so. Always eager to excuse other people's shortcomings, she found it hard to account for the feeling of strong dislike that had risen within her during her first encounter with the young woman Elfreda had laughingly named the Anarchist. She had hoped that the four freshmen at Wayne Hall would be girls whom it would be a pleasure to know. She had looked forward to meeting these newcomers and to assisting them in whatever way she could best give help. Now at least one of her castles in the air had been built in vain. "Perhaps we may like Miss Atkins after we know her better," she said, trying hard to keep the doubt she felt out of her voice. Mrs. Elwood shook her head. "I hope she will improve on acquaintance, but I doubt it. It isn't my principle, my dear, to speak slightingly of any student in my house, but I am certain that this is not the last time I shall have to lay down the law of Wayne Hall to Miss Atkins." At this plain speaking Grace flushed but said nothing. She understood that Mrs. Elwood's words had been spoken in confidence. "I'm so glad to see you again, Mrs. Elwood," she smiled, bent on changing the subject. "And I to see you, my dear," was the hearty response. "I have missed my Oakdale girls this summer." After a few moments' conversation Grace said good night and went slowly upstairs. In spite of her satisfaction at being back at Overton she could not repress a sigh of regret over the recent unpleasantness. "The unforeseen always happens," she reflected, pausing for a moment on the top step. "I hope the Anarchist will 'stay put' this time." She laughed softly at the idea of the Anarchist standing stiff and stationary in her new room. Then the ridiculous side of the encounter dawning on her, she sat down on the stairs and gave way to sudden silent laughter. "What did Mrs. Elwood say?" asked Anne as Grace entered the room. "I am afraid Mrs. Elwood is not, and never will be, an admirer of the Anarchist," said Grace. "Seriously speaking, she is half inclined to ask her to leave Wayne Hall. She believes she will have further trouble with her. Perhaps we should have waited. We might have tried, later, to gain possession of our room," added Grace doubtfully. Anne shook her head. "We would be waiting still, if we had attempted to settle matters without Mrs. Elwood." "But it seems too bad to begin one's sophomore year so unpleasantly. All summer I had been planning how helpful I would try to be to entering freshmen, and this is the way my splendid visions have materialized." Grace eyed Anne rather dejectedly. "Never mind," soothed Anne. "By to-morrow this little unpleasantness will have completely blown over. Perhaps the Anarchist," Anne smiled over the title Elfreda had bestowed upon the disturbing freshman, "will discover that she can make friends more quickly by being pleasant. She may reform over night. Stranger things have happened." "But nothing of that sort will happen in her case," declared Grace. "You said just a moment ago if it hadn't been for Mrs. Elwood we would still be out in the hall clamoring for a room, didn't you!" "I did," smiled Anne. "That was equivalent to accusing the Anarchist of stubbornness, wasn't it?" "It was." "Very well. If she is half as stubborn as I believe her to be, she won't be different to-night, to-morrow or for a long time afterward." CHAPTER IV THE BELATED FRESHMAN "The first thing I shall do this morning after breakfast is to unpack," announced Grace Harlowe with decision, as she gave her hair a last pat preparatory to going downstairs to breakfast. "Last year I was so excited over what studies I intended to take and meeting new girls that I unpacked by fits and starts. It was weeks before I knew where to find things. But I've reformed, now. I'm going to put every last article in place before I set foot outside Wayne Hall. Do you wish the chiffonier or the bureau this year, Anne, for your things?" "The chiffonier, I think," replied Anne, after due reflection. "I haven't as much to stow away as you have. It will do nicely for me." "There goes the breakfast bell!" exclaimed Grace. "Come along, Anne, I'm hungry. Besides, I'd like the same seat at the table that I had last year." Outside their door they were joined by Miriam and Elfreda, and the four friends stopped to talk before going downstairs. "Were you haunted by nightmares in which glowering Anarchists pranced about?" asked Miriam, her eyes twinkling. "No," replied Grace. "I slept too soundly even to dream." "I dreamed that I went into the registrar's office to get my chapel card," began Elfreda impressively. "When she handed it to me it was three times larger than the others. On it in big red letters was printed, 'The Anarchist, Her Card.' I thought I handed it back to her and tried to explain that I wasn't an anarchist because I had neither bushy eyebrows nor a scowl. She just sat and glared at me, saying over and over, 'Look in your mirror, look in your mirror,' until I grew so angry I threw the card at her. It hit her and she fell backward. That frightened me, although it seemed so strange that a little, light piece of pasteboard could strike with such force. I tried to lift her, but she grew heavier and heavier. Then--" "Yes, 'then,'" interposed Miriam, "I awoke in time to save myself from landing on the floor with a thump. Elfreda mistook me for the registrar. She was walking in her sleep." "Of course I didn't mean to," apologized Elfreda, "You know that, don't you, Miriam? I can't help walking in my sleep. I've done it ever since I was a little girl." "I forgive you, but you must promise not to dream," laughed Miriam. "Otherwise I am likely to find myself out the window or being dropped gently downstairs while you dream gaily on, regardless of what happens to your long-suffering roommate." As they entered the dining room several girls already seated at the table welcomed them with joyful salutations. It was at least ten minutes before any one settled down to breakfast. Grace observed with secret relief that Miss Atkins was not at the table. The three freshmen who were to fill the last available places in Wayne Hall had not yet arrived. During breakfast a ceaseless stream of merry chatter flowed on. Everyone wished to tell her neighbor about her vacation, of what she intended to take during the fall term, or of how impossible it was to get hold of her trunk. Then there was the usual amount of wondering as to why the four freshmen hadn't appeared. "One of them is here--that is, she's in the house," remarked Elfreda laconically. "She is!" exclaimed Emma Dean, opening her eyes. "I didn't see her yesterday." "You were consoling your homesick cousin, so how could you know what went on here?" reminded Grace. It had been decided that nothing should be said regarding the events of the previous day. "So I was," said Emma. "She made me think of Longfellow's 'Rainy Day.' She looked so 'dark and dreary.'" "What a unique comparison," chirped a wide-awake sophomore. "That will be so appropriate for the freshman grind book." "It is our turn this year," exulted Elfreda. "I shall be on the lookout for good material, too. I know one freshman who will be a candidate for honors." "Who?" inquired Emma Dean curiously. Grace looked appealingly at the stout girl. A slight shake of the head reassured her. Elfreda abandoned her intention of mentioning names, and parried Emma's question so cleverly that the latter became interested in something else and forgot that she had asked it. The instant she had finished her breakfast, Grace reannounced her intention of unpacking her trunk and rose to leave the table. Anne followed her, a curious smile on her face. The majority of the girls rose from the table at the same time, or immediately after, and went their various ways. "Now," declared Grace energetically, "I am going to begin my labor." "What did you say you were going to do?" asked Anne innocently. "Unpack my trunk. I--why--I--haven't any trunk to unpack!" exclaimed Grace in bewilderment. Then catching sight of Anne's mirthful face, she sprang forward, caught Anne by the shoulders and shook her playfully. "Anne Pierson, you bad child, you heard me make all my plans for unpacking, yet you wouldn't remind me that my trunk was still at the station." "I couldn't resist keeping still and allowing you to plan," confessed Anne. "What a joke that would be for the grind book!" "Yes, wouldn't it though?" agreed Grace sarcastically. "However, we are not freshmen, and as my roommate I strictly forbid you to publish my stupidity broadcast. Having the unpacking fever in my veins, I shall console myself with unpacking my bag and suit case. I'll keep on wishing for my trunk and perhaps it will come." Grace walked to the window. She leaned out, peering anxiously down the road. Then, with a cry of delight, she exclaimed: "Come here, Anne." Anne walked obediently to the window. "'Tell me, Sister Anne, do you see anything?'" quoted Grace. "You are saved, Fatima," returned Anne dramatically. "It is an express wagon." Grace darted out of her door and down the stairs, meeting the expressman on the veranda, her trunk on his shoulder. Anne, having notified Elfreda and Miriam that the trunks had arrived, went downstairs to look after hers. "Now I can carry out my plan, after all," declared Grace, with great satisfaction. "'He who laughs last, laughs best,' you know," she added slyly. "Before unpacking, first find your trunk," retorted Anne. "Thank goodness, we don't have to think about entrance examinations this year," said Grace, as she knelt before her trunk, fitting the key to the lock. "Yes, it does make considerable difference," returned Anne. "We shall have more time to ourselves. Besides, we won't have to worry our heads off the first week about whether we survived or perished." The sound of an automobile horn caused Grace to run to the window. "It's the bus!" she cried. "Three strange girls are getting out of it. Evidently our freshmen have arrived. That tall girl looks interesting. One of them is as stout as Elfreda. The little girl is cunning. I think I like her the best of the three. Oh dear!" she exclaimed ruefully, hastily drawing back from the window, "she looked straight up and saw me standing here. What will she think of me?" "You shouldn't be so curious," teased Anne. "I know it," admitted Grace. "I'm not over curious as a rule. I hope the tall girl is to room with the Anarchist. She looks capable of keeping her in order." "That task will, no doubt, be handed over to you," said Anne, who had been making rapid progress in unpacking, while Grace had been occupied in looking over the newcomers. "You'd better get your unpacking done, so that you'll be ready for it--the task, I mean." Grace sat down before her trunk with a little impatient sigh. For the space of an hour the two girls worked rapidly, almost in silence. Both trunks had been emptied and the greater part of their contents stored away when the sound of an angry, protesting voice outside the door caused them to look at each other wonderingly. "What can have happened?" asked Anne. Even as Anne spoke a never-to-be-forgotten voice said impressively, "What you prefer is immaterial to me, I prefer to room alone." The emphatic closing of a door followed. There was a sound of hurrying footsteps on the stairs, then all was still. CHAPTER V THE ANARCHIST CHOOSES HER ROOMMATE "It's the Anarchist, of course," said Anne, turning to Grace. "I wonder who she left roomless in the hall this time," speculated Grace. "Shall we go and see?" "Do you think we had better?" hesitated Anne. "Yes," returned Grace boldly. "To a certain extent we are responsible for the welfare of the freshmen." Opening the door, she looked up and down the hall. Then, with a sudden air of resolution, she walked downstairs. On the oak seat in the hall, looking disconsolately about her, sat the "cunning" freshman that Grace had admired. At sight of Grace she sprang toward the sophomore with an eager, "Won't you please tell me where I can find Mrs. Elwood?" "I believe she has gone to market," replied Grace. "She usually goes at this time every morning. Can I help you in any way?" "No-o," replied the other girl doubtfully. "I wished to see Mrs. Elwood, because--" Her lip quivered. A big tear rolled down her cheek. "Oh, I hate college," she muttered in a choking voice. "I wish I hadn't come here. I'd go back to the station and take the next train west, if I hadn't promised my brother that I'd stay. I hate the east and everything in it. I know I'm going to be unhappy here." With the smile that few people could resist, Grace sat down on the seat beside the tearful little stranger. "I think I know what is troubling you," she said gently. "I could not help overhearing Miss Atkins a few moments ago. I also heard you running downstairs, so I came down, too, to ask you if there was anything I could do for you." "You are very kind," faltered the stranger. "I must wait to see Mrs. Elwood, but will you tell me your name, please?" "Oh, I beg your pardon for not introducing myself," responded Grace contritely. "I am Grace Harlowe of the sophomore class." "My name is Mildred Taylor," responded the newcomer. "I came from the station in the bus a few minutes ago. There were two other freshmen with me. They seem to be more fortunate than I. The maid showed us to our rooms. I supposed, of course, that I would have to room with another girl, but I didn't think--" she paused. "I know," sympathized Grace. "I heard what was said to you; at least a part of it. Won't you come upstairs to our room and meet my roommate, Miss Pierson?" "It is very thoughtful in you to take so much trouble for me," replied the freshman gratefully. "That is part of our plan here at Overton," laughed Grace. "When I was a lonely, bewildered freshman, several of the upper class girls made it their business to look out for my comfort. Now it is my turn to pass that kindness along." "What a nice way to look at things!" exclaimed Mildred Taylor. "If I thought the rest of the girls in the college were going to be like you, I'd be ready to love Overton." "Oh, you will love Overton," was Grace's quick reply. "You can't help yourself." Anne received the forlorn newcomer with a sweet courtesy that quite charmed her. "We are in the midst of our unpacking," she explained. "Our trunks came only a little while ago. Won't you take off your hat and coat?" "Anne, I will leave Miss Taylor in your care," declared Grace. "Please excuse me, I'll be back directly," she nodded encouragingly to their guest. At the door of Miriam's room Grace knocked softly, then in answer to the impatient, "Come in," entered to find Elfreda standing in the midst of an extended circle formed by her possessions. "Isn't this enough to discourage the most valiant heart?" she declared, with a comprehensive sweep of her arm over the scattered contents of her trunk. "But I am going to clear everything away. I promised Miriam that my half of the room should be kept 'decently and in order' all year. It is one of my sophomore obligations." Grace listened in amusement to the stout girl's earnest assertion. "I haven't finished unpacking either," she said. "I came for advice. The freshman who was to occupy the other half of Miss Atkins's room has arrived, and Miss Atkins won't let her into the room. I just brought her upstairs to my room. "Last night I talked with Mrs. Elwood. She isn't particularly anxious to have Miss Atkins in the house. When Miss Taylor, that is the name of the freshman who just came, tells her about what happened she will ask Miss Atkins to leave Wayne Hall. This girl has brought with her to Overton the worst possible spirit in which to begin her freshman year. Of course, we don't know whether she is rich or poor, or whether her success or failure in college means anything to any one besides herself. We can not know under what circumstances she has been brought up. Perhaps she has some one at home who is straining every nerve to send her to college. Perhaps there is a father, mother, sister or brother who has made untold sacrifices to give her a college education. Perhaps there has been no lack of money, only a desire on the part of parents or a guardian to get rid of her by sending her off to school. I believe we ought to try to help this girl in spite of her rudeness to us. Will you go with me to her room? I want to talk to her. We may find her in a better humor than she was in last night. While Anne entertains Miss Taylor you and I will venture into the domain of the Anarchist." "I'll go," agreed Elfreda, secretly flattered because Grace had chosen her. Grace led the way down the hall to the end room. A sulky voice responded to her knock, and throwing open the door the two girls stepped inside. The belligerent freshman sat bolt upright in a Morris chair, forbidding and implacable. "How do you do?" said Grace politely. "I hope we are not intruding." The young woman merely scowled by way of answer. "I wonder how I'd better begin," pondered Grace, looking squarely into the hostile eyes. Elfreda stood calmly surveying the scowling girl. "You might ask us to sit down," she observed impertinently. The young woman glanced at the stout girl with an expression of angry amazement. Elfreda's rudeness was equal to her own. "I beg your pardon," she said satirically. "Won't you be seated?" "Oh, no, I just wanted to hear you say it," flung back Elfreda. Ignoring this retort, Miss Atkins turned to Grace. "What do you wish?" she asked with cold precision. "I am sorry to be obliged to tell you that if you do not allow Miss Taylor to occupy her half of the room, you are likely to be asked to leave Wayne Hall," said Grace gravely. "Mrs. Elwood was displeased over what happened last night, and I know that when she learns of what has happened to-day she will not overlook it. We do not wish to see you leave Wayne Hall, and besides, the various college houses are filling fast. You might have difficulty in securing a desirable room elsewhere." "Is there any reason why I should not occupy this room alone?" "None whatever, if you arranged for a single beforehand," interposed Elfreda shrewdly. "If you did, I can't see why Mrs. Elwood consented to take Miss Taylor." "I did not arrange for a single room," was the stiff response. "Then you haven't any case, have you?" queried Elfreda cheerfully. "Now, see here. I am going to tell you a few things. You are beginning all wrong. It is just what I did last year, and I had a pretty disagreeable time, you may rest assured. The best thing you can do is to tell Miss Taylor to come and claim her half of the room before anything happens to you. If you leave Wayne Hall, sooner or later the whole college will hear of it and it won't help you to be popular, either. It is easy enough to do as you please regardless of whether or not it pleases others, but you are bound to pay for the privilege. If you don't believe me, just wait and see." A flush mounted to the defiant stranger's cheeks. "Public opinion is usually a matter of small importance to me," she said, but her tone of lofty indifference was not convincing. "There is, however, a certain amount of wisdom in what you have just said. I should not care to appear ridiculous in the eyes of the really important students at Overton. You may inform Miss Taylor that I have altered my decision. I shall raise no further objections to her as a roommate." With a pompous gesture of dismissal this self-centered young woman rose and walked majestically to the window. Turning her back squarely upon Grace and Elfreda, she appeared to be deeply absorbed in watching what went on in the street, and, divided between vexation and laughter, the two girls left the room. Elfreda hurried back to her unpacking and Grace to her own room. "It is all right, Miss Taylor. Your roommate is prepared to receive you," Grace announced. "I shall be glad to have some place I can call all my own," sighed the little girl, "but I know I shall never like her," she added resentfully. "On the contrary, you may learn to like her very much," returned Grace. "Now I'll help you with your things." Picking up Miss Taylor's heavy suit case, Grace escorted her to the door of the end room. "How did it happen?" greeted Anne, when five minutes later Grace returned alone, smiling and triumphant. "Don't ask me," laughed Grace. "Ask Elfreda. She wrought the miracle." "What did she do?" asked Anne. "She won the day, or rather the half of the room, by plain speaking." Grace recounted to Anne what had taken place in the belligerent young woman's room. "She made more impression on the Anarchist in five minutes than I could have made in a week," finished Grace. "Elfreda has a remarkable personality," was Anne's thoughtful answer. "Her very frankness makes an impression where diplomacy counts for little. However, I am not surprised that history repeated itself so soon. I hope this is the last time we shall be obliged to thwart the Anarchist and administer justice to the oppressed. "I don't envy Miss Taylor," said Anne. "I wish every girl in college had as nice a roommate as I have." "Beware of flatterers," laughed Grace. "And also of Anarchists," added Anne. "But of the two," smiled Grace, "I prefer flatterers, especially if they happen to occupy the other half of my room." CHAPTER VI ELFREDA MAKES A RASH PROMISE "How does it feel to be a senior, Mabel?" questioned Miriam Nesbit, glancing smilingly over where Mabel Ashe, gowned smartly in white, her brown eyes dancing with interest in what went on about her, sat eating her dessert, and obligingly trying to answer half a dozen questions at once. The seven other girls at the table looked expectantly at the pretty senior, who was their hostess at a dinner given by her at Martell's that Saturday evening. "Oh, just the same as it did last year," she replied lightly. "I feel vastly older and a shade more responsible. To tell you the truth, I hate to think about it. I don't know how I am ever going to get along without Overton. I think I shall have to disguise myself and come back next year as a freshman; then I could do the whole four years over again." "The question is, What are we going to do next year without you?" remarked Grace mournfully. "Let us forget all about it," advised Mabel. "I refuse to have any weeps at my dinner. You may shed your tears in private, but not here." "What are you going to do when you finish college?" asked Miriam Nesbit. "You girls will laugh when I tell you," replied Mabel solemnly, "but really and truly there is only one thing I care to do. I have warned Father that I intend to be self-supporting, but I haven't dared to tell him how I propose to earn my living." "What are you going to do? Tell us, Mabel. We won't tell." "Frances knows already. She thinks it would be fine, don't you, Frances?" Frances nodded emphatically. "I hope to become a newspaper woman," solemnly announced Mabel. "A newspaper woman!" cried Constance Fuller. "Why, I think that would be dreadful!" "I don't," stoutly averred Mabel. "I'd love to be a reporter and go poking into all sorts of places. After a while I'd be sent out to write up murder trials and political happenings and, oh, lots of big stories." Mabel beamed on her amazed audience. "I never would have believed it of you, but I'm sure you could do it," predicted Leona Rowe confidently. "Good for you!" cried Mabel, leaning across the table to shake hands with Leona. "I have one loyal supporter at least." Mabel's declaration having brought to the minds of the little company the fact that sooner or later the choice of an after-college occupation would be necessary, a brisk discussion began as to what each girl intended to do. Aside from Anne, who had fully determined to stick to her profession, and Constance, who was specializing in English, with the intention of one day returning to Overton as an instructor, no one at the table had a very definite idea of her future usefulness. "We seem to be a rather purposeless lot," remarked Miriam Nesbit. "The trouble with most of us is that we are not obliged to think about earning our own living after we leave college. We look forward to being ornaments in our own particular social set, but nothing more. I'm not sure, yet, what I am going to do with my education. I intend to put it to some practical use, though." "So am I," agreed Grace. "We'll just have to keep on doing our best and find ourselves." "I suppose that is the real purpose of going to college," said Anne thoughtfully. "I think we are all growing too serious," laughed Mabel. "By the way, Grace," she went on, "who is that curious looking little freshman with the perpetual scowl that lives at Wayne Hall!" The four Wayne Hall girls exchanged significant glances. "Stop exchanging eye messages and tell me," ordered Mabel. "Her name is Atkins," returned Grace briefly. Then a peculiar look in her eyes caused Mabel to say hastily, "I just wondered who she was," and changed the subject. As they left Martell's, walking two by two, Mabel fell into step with Grace. Slipping her arm through that of the Oakdale girl, she said in a low tone, "Come over to see me to-morrow evening. I have something to say to you. I almost said it before the girls; then I caught your warning look in time. Come to dinner to-morrow night and stay all evening. I promise faithfully to make you study." "I have a theme to do," replied Grace dubiously. "Do you think there would be any prospect of my getting it done?" "Oceans of it," assured Mabel glibly. "I'll be as still as a mouse while you do it. If you need a subject perhaps I can furnish the inspiration. As long as I intend to become a newspaper woman I might as well begin to sprout a few ideas." "All right, I'll come," laughed Grace. "Did I tell you I was taking chemistry this year? I find it very absorbing." "I liked it, too," agreed Mabel. "I am more interested in psychology, though I like my essay and short story work best of all. I'm going in for interpretative reading, too. All that sort of thing will help me in my work when I leave here." "I wish I knew what I wanted to do," sighed Grace. "I'd love to begin to plan about it now." "It will dawn upon you suddenly some day," prophesied Mabel, "and you will wonder why you never thought of it before." The diners strolled along together as far as the campus. There, Constance Fuller, Mabel, Frances and Helen Burton left the quartette from Wayne Hall. "It's early yet," said Elfreda, consulting her watch. "What time is it, Elfreda?" asked Grace. "Half-past eight," answered the stout girl. "We have plenty of time to study. I, for one, need it. My subjects are all frightfully hard. I tried to pick out easy ones, but did you ever notice that the schedule is so arranged that you can't possibly pick out two easy subjects and recite them both in the same term? One always conflicts with the other." "Long experience, crafty faculty," laughed Miriam. "They know our weaknesses and how to deal with them." "The last time we were out to dinner in a body we talked about the past. This time it was the future," remarked Elfreda. "That reminds me, what has become of Arline and Ruth? I haven't seen either of them this week except at a distance." "Arline and Ruth haven't been on friendly terms since the night of Arline's dinner at Vinton's," Grace remarked soberly. "It isn't Ruth's fault. She is heartbroken over the estrangement. This is the first difference she and Arline have ever had." "Such a ridiculous thing to quarrel over," sniffed Elfreda. "I could see that night that Arline was cross because Ruth didn't want to talk about herself." "I hope they will be friends again before the reception," said Grace. "It would be awkward for all of us if they are not." "Oh, dear," sighed Anne, sitting down on the top step of the veranda. "I'm too lazy to look at my books to-night." The four girls had reached Wayne Hall and the beauty of the autumn night made them reluctant to go into the house, where an evening of hard study awaited them. "I'd like to stay out here for hours and look at the stars." "And have stiff neck and a cold of the fond, clinging type, to-morrow," jeered Elfreda. "How disgustingly practical you are, Elfreda!" exclaimed Miriam. "I'm only warning her," persisted Elfreda. "It doesn't seem as though we'd been back at Overton for three weeks, does it?" asked Grace. "It seems longer than that to me," said Miriam Nesbit. "The freshman dance happened ages ago, according to my reckoning, and nothing, absolutely nothing, has happened since." "Never mind, it won't be long until the sophomore reception," comforted Grace. "I never suspected that you had such a rabid craving for excitement, Miriam." "The freshman dance was a tame affair," averred Miriam. "I think our class was more interesting in its infancy than is this year's class." "I think so, too," agreed Grace. "Still, we don't know what genius lies hidden in the bosoms of 19--'s freshmen." "This year we shall be the hostesses," exulted Elfreda. "Who are you girls going to invite?" "I'll ask Miss Taylor," volunteered Anne. "I'll ask Miss Wilton," said Miriam. "That's two from Wayne Hall," counted Anne. "There are two freshmen left." "One of us could invite that nice tall girl, Miss Evans," planned Grace. "That leaves only one girl uninvited." She hesitated. Her three friends read the meaning of the hesitation. Elfreda sprang loyally into the breach. "I'll ask Miss Atkins," she declared stoutly. "You notice, don't you, that I am not addressing her by her pet name? I'll conduct her to the reception and back, if she'll accept my manly arm, and buy her flowers into the bargain. So go ahead and invite Miss Evans, Grace." "J. Elfreda Briggs, you can never manage that Miss Atkins," protested Miriam. "In the first place, she won't accept you as an escort, and if she should happen to do so, it will be a sorry evening for you." "I'll take the risk," replied Elfreda confidently. "I managed her once before, didn't I? You girls go ahead and invite the others. Leave Miss Atkins to me. I'll escort her in triumph to the reception, or perish gallantly in the attempt." "Do you really believe she will accept your invitation, Elfreda?" asked Grace doubtfully. "I can tell you better after I have asked her," was Elfreda's flippant retort. "I have an idea that she will feel dreadfully hurt if no one asks her to go." "Hurt!" exclaimed three voices in unison. "Yes, hurt," repeated Elfreda. "The Anarchist isn't half so savage as she pretends to be. That blood-thirsty manner of hers isn't real. She puts it on to hide something else." "But what is it she wishes to hide?" asked Miriam. "Your deductions are quite beyond us." "If I knew I'd tell you. I don't pretend to understand her, but I can see that she isn't as fierce as she seems. Time and I will solve the riddle, and when we do you'll be the first to hear of it." CHAPTER VII GIRLS AND THEIR IDEALS Directly after her last class the next day, Grace hurried to her room to change her gown. She looked forward with eager pleasure to her evening with Mabel Ashe. She was deeply attached to the pretty senior, who was the best-liked girl in college, and Grace could not help feeling a trifle proud of Mabel's frank enjoyment of her society. Anne, knowing Grace was to be away, had accepted an invitation to go down to Ruth Denton's little room, help her cook supper, and spend the evening with her. "Oh, dear," sighed Grace, as she tried vainly to reach the two hooks of her dark blue charmeuse gown that seemed only a sixteenth of an inch out of reach, "I wish Anne were here. I can touch these two hooks with the ends of my fingers but I can't fasten them. I'll have to ask Mabel to hook me up when I get to Holland House." Giving up in disgust, Grace slipped into her long, blue serge coat, carefully adjusted her new fall hat that she had just received from home, and catching up her gloves ran downstairs. Mabel Ashe's graceful, welcoming figure leaning over the baluster waiting for her was the first thing that attracted her attention as she stepped inside the hall at Holland House. "Come right up," invited Mabel. "We'll have a little while together before dinner. Did you bring your notebook?" "Yes," replied Grace. "Remember, you are to help me choose a subject for my theme. You volunteered, you know." "Not until after dinner, though, if you don't mind. Sit down here and be comfy. This is my pet chair, but I insist on letting you have it because you are company." She gently pushed Grace into a roomy leather-covered armchair. Seating herself opposite Grace, Mabel fixed her brown eyes almost gravely on her. "Now, Grace," she said earnestly, "please tell me about this Miss Atkins of Wayne Hall." "There isn't much to tell," replied Grace. "Did you ever see her?" "Once." "We had a little trouble with her our very first day back," continued Grace. "She took possession of our room and refused to give it up. Then when Mrs. Elwood came to our rescue, she went to the room that had been assigned to her like a lamb. She felt anything but lamblike toward me, you may believe, and when later Mrs. Elwood brought up her new roommate, she refused to allow her to enter." "Refused to allow her to enter," repeated Mabel wonderingly. "What sort of girl is she, Grace?" "I don't know," answered Grace doubtfully. "She is an enigma. She speaks the most precise English, with absolutely no trace of slang. But she looks as though the whole world were her natural enemy. Elfreda named her the Anarchist. I am rather ashamed to say we call her that behind her back." Mabel smiled slightly, then asked, "What did the girl do--the one she wouldn't room with, I mean?" "She went downstairs to wait for Mrs. Elwood. The reason I know all about it is because I happened to hear her tell Miss Taylor, that's the freshman's name, that she would have to go elsewhere. I knew Mrs. Elwood was out, so I went down to see if there were anything I could do for her, and she told me all about it. I knew Mrs. Elwood would be out of patience with Miss Atkins and ask her to leave Wayne Hall." Grace paused. "What happened next?" asked Mabel interestedly. "I told Miss Taylor I would try to fix things for her. I went upstairs and plotted with Elfreda. Then she and I bearded the dragon in her den. After I had finished telling her that it would be better to take little Miss Taylor without further bickering, Elfreda rose to the occasion and gave her a much-needed lecture. She is very shrewd, I think. She evidently realized she had gone too far. She objected to Miss Taylor because it is her nature to object to everything. When she saw that we had taken up the cudgels in Miss Taylor's behalf, and that she was likely to get into hot water, she decided to accept her as a roommate without further opposition. That's the whole story." "She must be eccentric and very disagreeable," commented Mabel. "What made you go to such pains to save her from the wrath of Mrs. Elwood?" "I suppose I felt sorry for her," confessed Grace. "She is beginning her freshman year in the worst possible spirit. But as I said to the girls not long ago, we do not know what lies back of her disagreeable manner. Why are you so interested in hearing about her, Mabel?" "She is making herself the subject of considerable censure among the juniors and seniors by snubbing the girls of her own class and calmly announcing that she wishes to make only powerful and influential friends in college," returned Mabel. "You know, of course, the attitude of the old students toward freshmen. This Miss Atkins is either laboring under the impression that she is an exception to tradition, or else she has no sense of the fitness of things. At first, I am sorry to say, a few of the seniors looked upon her as a joke, but the reaction has set in, and, like Humpty Dumpty, she is going to take a great fall. When she does, all the king's horses and all the king's men won't be of any assistance to her in getting her back from where she tumbled. I don't believe she realizes that she is making herself ridiculous. "I was at Vinton's last Saturday afternoon. Jessie Meredith invited another senior and me to luncheon there. Imagine our surprise when a prim, precise little figure marched up to our table and seated herself as calmly as though she were the president of the senior class. There is room for four at those tables, you know, and we had not reserved ours. Still, there were plenty of other tables at which she might have seated herself. It was rather embarrassing for all of us, but it was worse when she tried to break into the conversation. She insisted on expounding her views on whatever we discussed. We were compelled to cut short our luncheon and flee to Martell's for our dessert. We escaped at the moment the waitress was serving her luncheon, so she couldn't very well rise and pursue us. If I had been alone, I might have stayed, but Jessie was disgusted, and I was Jessie's guest." Grace had listened to Mabel's recital with troubled eyes. "I never before knew a girl quite like Miss Atkins," she said slowly. "What is it you wish me to do for her, Mabel?" "Wise young sophomore," laughed Mabel. "How did you guess it?" "You are not given to footless gossip," replied Grace quietly. "Besides, I live at Wayne Hall." "Cleverer and cleverer," commented the senior, in mock admiration. "This is my idea. I had hoped that, being in the same house with her, you might be able to guide her gently along the beaten trail made by girls like you. However, after what you have told me, I am afraid you are not the one to do it." "I haven't a particle of influence with her," said Grace soberly. "You must know that from what I have already told you." "Yes, I do know it," answered Mabel. "Is there any one at Wayne Hall who would be likely to have the right kind of influence?" "No-o-o." Grace shook her head doubtfully. Then she suddenly brightened. "There is one person who might help her. Elfreda is going to invite her to the sophomore reception. She doesn't wish to do it, I know, although she hasn't said so. Please don't think me conceited, but Elfreda would do anything for me. She fancies herself under obligation to me on account of what happened last year," Grace added in an embarrassed tone. "Grace Harlowe!" exclaimed Mabel delightedly, "I believe we have solved our problem. J. Elfreda is the very one to make Miss Atkins wake up to what is expected from her at Overton. Will you talk with her about it, and ask her if she is willing to try?" "I'll tell her to-night," promised Grace. "I'm sure she'll try. She is not afraid to tackle Miss Atkins, either, or she wouldn't have invited her to the reception." "Then that's settled for the time being at least," declared Mabel jubilantly. "Just in time for dinner, too. There goes the bell." After dinner more conversation followed. It was eight o'clock before Grace remembered her theme. "What shall I write about?" she demanded. "You promised to supply the inspiration." "So I will," returned Mabel cheerfully. "Why don't you write about--" She paused, frowning slightly. "After all my vaunted promises I'm not able to suggest anything on the spur of the moment," she confessed laughingly. "Why don't you take some incident in your own life or that of your friends and write a story about it?" she proposed after a moment's silence. "I don't believe I could ever write a story," confessed Grace. "I think I'll write a little discussion about girls and their ideals." "That sounds interesting," commended Mabel. "Go ahead with it. You may sit at this table, if you like." Grace seated herself, nibbled at the end of her fountain pen reflectively, then began to write. Mabel busied herself with her own work. At last Grace shoved aside the closely written sheets of paper. "It's done," she cried, in a triumphant voice. "Now we can talk." "May I read it?" asked Mabel. "Of course, if you wish to," laughed Grace. "It isn't worth the trouble, though." Mabel picked up the theme and began to read. Grace rose, and strolling over to the bookcase fell to examining the various bindings. Her friend's flattering comment, "It's splendid, Grace. I had no idea you could write so well," caused her to look up in surprise from the book she held in her hand. "I don't think it is very remarkable," she contradicted. "It hasn't a shred of literary style." "It's convincing," argued Mabel. "That is because I felt strongly on my subject. When it comes to anything that lies near my heart I am always convincing. Father says I put up the most convincing argument of any one he knows," smiled Grace. "He always declares he is wax in my hands. I hope you will make me a visit and meet my father and mother, Mabel," she added. "I surely will," promised Mabel. "We must correspond after I leave college. I wish you could go home with me for one of the holiday vacations. Can't you manage it?" "I am afraid not this year," returned Grace doubtfully. "Father and Mother wouldn't object, but they miss me so during the year that I feel as though my holidays belonged to them. I am an only child, you know." "So am I," returned Mabel. "I am also extremely popular with my father. If I can tear myself away from him to make you a visit, surely you ought to be equally public spirited." "I'll think it over," laughed Grace. "Oh, dear!" she exclaimed a moment later, glancing at the little French clock on the chiffonier, "I must go. It is twenty minutes to ten. How the time has slipped away." "Thank you," bowed Mabel. "Such appreciation of my society is gratifying in the extreme. I'll invite you again." "See that you do," retorted Grace. "Have you any engagement for Saturday afternoon? If you haven't, then suppose we have luncheon at Vinton's; then go for a long walk. We can stay out all afternoon, stop at the tea shop for supper and come home on the street car, or walk in, if we choose. We might ask Frances and Anne to join us. Miriam and Elfreda are going out for a ride. Miriam has a horse here this year. She had her choice between a horse and a runabout and she took the horse. The moment Elfreda found out she had one, she wrote home about it. Now she has a riding horse, too." "I had my own pet mount, Elixir, here during my freshman and sophomore years. The latter part of my second year I didn't take him out enough to exercise him. So I ordered him sent home. He is a beauty. Jet black with a three-cornered white spot in the middle of his forehead. He's an Arabian, and Father paid an extravagant price for him. He shakes hands and does ever so many tricks that I taught him. When you go home with me, you shall see him." "I'd love to have a riding horse," confessed Grace, "but Father can't afford it. I've never asked him, but I know he can't. We have no car either." "Make me a visit and you can ride Elixir every day," bribed Mabel. "I'd love that!" exclaimed Grace fervently as she slipped into her coat and settled her hat firmly on her fluffy hair. "Good night, Mabel. Come and see me soon. Don't forget our Saturday walk." "I'll go to the door with you," announced Mabel. "No, I won't forget our walk. I'll tell Frances about it to-morrow, before she has a chance to make any other plans. She is a popular young person, and elusive in the matter of dates." "There are others," retorted Grace, with a significant glance at her friend. "So there are," agreed Mabel innocently. On the way home Grace wondered if there were any way in which she might help Laura Atkins. True to her promise, she went at once to interview Elfreda on the subject of the eccentric freshman. She found Miriam and the stout girl busily engaged in trying to put together a puzzle that Elfreda had unearthed in the toy department of one of the Overton stores that afternoon. Puzzles were the delight of Elfreda's heart. But, once put together, they immediately ceased to be of interest. "This is a wonder!" she exclaimed at sight of Grace. "It is worth having. Neither Miriam nor I can put it together." "I have a harder one for you to tackle," smiled Grace. Then she recounted her conversation with Mabel Ashe. "You have altogether too much faith in my powers of persuasion," grumbled Elfreda, secretly pleased, nevertheless. "But that is much better than if we had no faith at all," reminded Grace. CHAPTER VIII THE INVITATION The next morning Grace made a startling discovery. It was directly after breakfast that she made it. Having fifteen minutes to spare before going to her first recitation, she decided to reread her theme. What one wrote always read differently after one had slept over it. What seemed clever at night might be very commonplace when read in the cold light of the morning. Grace reached for the book in which she had placed her theme. It was not there. Going down on her knees, she looked first under the table, then under the chiffonier, then turned over the books on the table, then, darting to the closet, searched the pockets of her long coat. "Where can it be?" she cried despairingly. "I am sure I had it when I came into the hall last night. I couldn't have lost it on my way across the campus. I'll run down and ask Anne. Perhaps she picked it up and put it away for me." Grace hurried downstairs as fast as her feet would carry her. To her low inquiry in Anne's ear she received a disappointing answer. Anne, who was just finishing her breakfast, replied that she had not even seen the theme. She rose at once to accompany Grace upstairs. The two girls searched in every nook and corner of the room. "I wanted to hand it in this morning," lamented Grace. "Now I'll have to write it all over again. I don't believe I can remember much of it, either. I'll have to explain to Miss Duncan, too, and ask her to give me until to-morrow to write it." "Perhaps it will be found yet," comforted Anne. "No danger of it, unless I lost it in the street. Then there's only one chance in a thousand of its turning up," declared Grace gloomily. "I don't see how I happened to be so careless." "When must it be handed in?" questioned Anne. "This morning," answered Grace dolefully. "I'll have to rewrite it to-night and from memory, too." "Why don't you choose another subject?" was Anne's advice. "No." Grace shook her head positively. "I can do better with the old one. I'm not going to bother about asking if any one has found it. My name was on it. If I made a fuss over it some one might say it was only an excuse, that I hadn't really lost it, but just wished to gain time. I hope Miss Duncan won't think that." "No one in this house would say so," contradicted Anne loyally. "But suppose Alberta Wicks or Mary Hampton heard of it? They might circulate that rumor. I hate to seem so suspicious, but an ounce of prevention, you know. I will write it over and say nothing further about it." Having made up her mind on the subject Grace promptly dismissed it from her thoughts. Miss Duncan did look rather suspiciously at Grace as she related her misfortune. Grace's gray eyes met hers so fairly and truthfully, however, that she was forced to believe the young woman's statement. She gave the desired respite rather ungraciously and Grace took her place in class, relieved to think she had got off so easily. That night she rewrote the theme. It did not give her as much trouble as she had anticipated. She laid down her fountain pen with alacrity when it was finished and carefully blotted the last sheet. "Now I can begin to think about the reception," she announced. "What are you going to wear, Anne?" "My new pink gown," said Anne promptly. "As long as I was extravagant enough to indulge in a new evening dress I might as well wear it. The sophomore reception is really the most important affair of the year, to us, at least." "I'm delighted to have an opportunity to show off my pale blue chiffon frock," laughed Grace. "I've been in ecstasies over it ever since it was made. Have you seen that white gown of Elfreda's? It's perfectly stunning. I stopped in her room for a minute last night. She was trying it on. It's the prettiest gown she's had since she came here. Ask her to show it to you." "I'm going over there now," said Anne. "I'll be back in a minute." It was precisely four minutes later when Anne poked her head in Grace's door. "Come on into Miriam's room, Grace," she called. "She has just made chocolate. She has some lovely little cakes and sandwiches, too. And Elfreda has something to tell us." Grace rose from her chair, lay down the notebook she had been running through, and hastily followed Anne. "Have a cushion," laughed Miriam hospitably, throwing a fat sofa pillow at Grace, who caught it dextrously, patted it into shape and, placing it on the floor, sat down on it Turk fashion. Elfreda poured another cup of chocolate, then seated herself on the floor beside Grace. "Pass Grace the sandwiches, Anne," she ordered. "We made these ourselves. We bought the stuff at that new delicatessen place on High Street." "They are delicious," commented Grace, between bites. "I'm hungry to-night. I didn't like the dinner very well." "Neither did we," responded Miriam. "After dinner we went out for a walk to see what we could find, and we brought back what you see spread before you." "I shall pay a visit to the delicatessen shop," announced Grace. "To-morrow night you must come to my room for a spread." "I'll come to your room with pleasure," retorted Elfreda, "but not to eat. One spread a week is my limit. Now for my news. The Anarchist has accepted my invitation to the reception." "Really!" exclaimed Grace. "Do tell us about it, Elfreda." "I delivered my invitation after dinner to-night," began Elfreda. "I waited and waited, thinking some one else might invite her. I am not yearning for the honor, you know. I went to her door and knocked. Her roommate, Miss Taylor, opened it. The Anarchist sat over in one corner of the room, studying like mad. By the way, I understand she is a dig and stands high in her classes." "Is she?" asked Anne, opening her eyes. "Then that is one thing she has in her favor. Perhaps we shall discover other good qualities in her that we've overlooked." "Perhaps," echoed Miriam dryly. "Mustn't interrupt me," drawled Elfreda. "I may become peevish and refuse to talk." "All right," smiled Grace. "We accept the warning. Continue, my dear Miss Briggs." Elfreda grinned cheerfully. "I inquired with deferential politeness if Miss Atkins were busy. Then the Anarchist looked up from her book, glared like a lion, straightened her eyebrows and said in that awful voice she owns, 'Did you wish to speak to me?'" Elfreda unconsciously imitated the belligerent freshman. Her audience giggled appreciatively. "I replied in my most impressive English that I did wish to do that very thing," continued Elfreda. "Then I inquired tactfully if I was too late with my invitation to the sophomore dance. Without giving her time to answer I put in my application for the position of escort. Then"--Elfreda paused, a slight flush rose to her round face, "then she looked me in the eye and told me a deliberate untruth. She said she had refused one invitation because she had not been interested in the reception, but that she had changed her mind. She thanked me and said she would be pleased to go. I bowed myself out without further ado, but Miss Taylor gave me the queerest look as I went. Her face was as red as fire. It was she who told me that the Anarchist had not been invited. She was afraid I might think she hadn't told the truth, but I knew better. Now, don't ever tell any one what I have said." "I'm sorry she didn't tell the truth," said Grace disapprovingly. "Why couldn't she say that she had not been invited?" "False pride," commented Miriam. "She evidently isn't so indifferent to the opinion of others as she would have us believe." "She is a strange girl," mused Anne. "Perhaps she is not altogether to blame for her odd ways." "'Odd' is a good name for them," jeered Elfreda. "I wouldn't call it 'odd,' I'd use a stronger word than that. It's contemptible. I'm sorry I asked her to go to the reception." "Then recall your invitation and tell her your reason for doing so," advised Miriam Nesbit bluntly. "Don't take her to the reception in that spirit. You will make yourself and her equally unhappy." "Hear the sage lay down the law," retorted Elfreda impudently. "She's right, though, only I won't withdraw my invitation at this late date. I'll try to give the Anarchist the most exciting time of her young life, but if she balks please don't blame me. You can lead an Anarchist to a reception, you know, but you can't make her dance unless she happens to feel like dancing. Still, I am going to do my best, and no sophomore can do more." "That sounds like the Elfreda Briggs I heard talking last night," said Grace, smiling her approval of the stout girl's words. "So it does," agreed Elfreda. "Hereafter I'll try to be more consistent. As for the Anarchist, she shall reap the benefit of my vow. I hope she knows how to dance. If she doesn't I shall have to constitute myself a committee of one to furnish amusement for her. If on the fatal night you see me, my arm firmly linked in that of her majesty, parading solemnly about the gymnasium with a fixed smile, and an air of gayety that I am a long way from feeling, don't you dare to laugh at me." "We won't laugh at you, then, even though we can't help laughing at you now," said Grace. "We shall be only too glad to do anything we can to help you entertain her." "I know that. Maybe you can help and maybe you can't. But if she doesn't enjoy herself it won't be my fault." CHAPTER IX ANTICIPATIONS The day of the sophomore reception was a busy one for the members of the sophomore class. To them, it was the event of the year, and the desire to make this dance outshine all its predecessors was paramount in almost every sophomore breast. Of course, there were the digs, who never thought of festivities, but spent all their time in study. No one counted on their help. The greater part of the class, however, was properly enthusiastic over the music, decorations, gowns and dance cards. Grace and Miriam, who were on the decorating committee, had spent the greater part of their day in the gymnasium. Under the skilful direction of the committee the big room blossomed out in strange and gorgeous array. There were the masses of evergreen so convenient for hiding unsightly gymnasium apparatus, which made the gymnasium a veritable forest green. Strings of Japanese lanterns added to the effect, while the freshmen and sophomore colors impartially wound the gallery railing and were draped and festooned wherever there was the slightest chance for display. The sophomores had put forth their best efforts in behalf of their freshman sisters. When it came to sofa cushions and draperies they had surrendered their most highly treasured possessions for the good of the cause. "I think we may congratulate ourselves," commented Gertrude Wells as she stood beside Miriam Nesbit, surveying their almost completed task. "Look at my hands! I have scratched and bruised them handling those evergreens. My dress is a sight, too," she added, pointing first to the green stains that decorated her white linen gown, then significantly to a three-cornered tear near the bottom of the skirt. "I don't care. It will be out of style by next summer, at any rate." "I'm not much better off," declared Miriam. "You can't be a working woman and keep up a bandbox appearance, you know." "I should say not," laughed Arline Thayer, who had come up in time to hear Miriam's last remark. "Does any one know the time?" asked Grace, standing back a little to view the effect of the bunting she had been winding about a post. "I can't see the gym. clock from here. It is so swathed in green boughs and decorations that its poor round face is almost hidden, and I'm really too tired to go close enough to find out." "It's five minutes past four o'clock," informed Gertrude, glancing at the tiny watch pinned to her waist. "Good gracious!" exclaimed Arline Thayer, "I can't stay here another minute. I have a hundred things to do before to-night." "Where's Ruth?" asked Grace. "I haven't seen either of you lately except at an aggravating distance." Arline's baby face hardened. "I haven't seen Ruth for over two weeks," she said stiffly. "You haven't!" exclaimed Grace, who, stooping to tie her shoe, had not noticed Arline's changed expression. As she straightened up her surprised gray eyes met Arline's defiant blue ones. Like a flash she remembered. "Then you don't know who she has invited to the reception?" "No," responded Arline shortly. "I don't know anything about it." Grace was about to say something further when, overtaken by sudden thought, she turned her face away to hide the smile that hovered about her lips. Meanwhile, Gertrude Wells had engaged Arline in conversation, and Ruth's name was not mentioned again. "This is positively my last appearance this afternoon as a decorator," declared Emma Dean. "I'm going home to beautify myself for the great moment when I shall stand in line with my sophomore sisters to greet the infant freshmen." "I'm going home, too, but without bursting into language," drawled J. Elfreda Briggs. "I pounded my thumb with a hammer, scratched my nose on an obstinate hemlock bough, and lost a bran span new pair of scissors. I think it is high time to leave this place. I'm not on the reception committee, 'tis true, but I have weighty matters to consider and am on the verge of a perilous undertaking." She uttered the last words in an all too familiar undertone, shooting a mischievous glance at her friends which caused Grace, Anne and Miriam to laugh outright. "What are you girls laughing at?" demanded Gertrude Wells. "Elfreda is so funny," explained Grace enigmatically. Then, fearing to offend Gertrude, she said hastily, "What she said was extremely laughable to us, because she was imitating some one we know." The knot of girls separated soon after, going their separate ways. Anne, Grace, Miriam, Elfreda and Emma Dean turned their faces toward Wayne Hall. "I wonder if Ruth is going?" remarked Grace, who walked behind Anne. "I thought we'd see her this afternoon." "I noticed how sharply Arline answered you," said Anne significantly. "Poor Ruth, I haven't a minute to spare or I'd run down there. We must go to-morrow afternoon, Anne. We'll take Ruth to Vinton's for dinner and, oh, Anne! let's invite Arline and make them be friends!" "Splendid!" admired Anne. "I'll take charge of Ruth and you can look out for Arline." "If you don't hurry, you'll be ready for the reception some time to-morrow," called Elfreda derisively. The two quickened their steps. The three girls ahead looked back, then mischievously began running toward Wayne Hall. "We can catch them, Anne," exulted Grace. "You mean you can," laughed Anne. "Run ahead and surprise them." Grace was off like the wind. Although the three girls ran well they were no match for the lithe, slender young woman who ran like a hunted deer. She soon passed her friends and running on to the hall sat down on the steps with no apparent traces of exhaustion to wait for them. "Let me see, what track team did you say you belonged to?" quizzed Elfreda, with open admiration. "If I could run like that I'd be happy. Where did you learn to run?" "Back in Oakdale, where I was the prize tomboy of the school," laughed Grace. "Have you seen to your flowers for your freshman? I ordered pink roses for Miss Evans. Anne chose violets for Miss Taylor, didn't you, Anne?" "I ordered violets for Miss Wilton, too," said Miriam. "I tried to get snap dragons," giggled Elfreda, "but it's rather late in the season for them. Instead, the Anarchist will flourish a nosegay of blood-red roses. I can't imagine her parading around the gym. bedecked with violets." "Elfreda, you are anything but a chivalrous escort," commented Anne. "I am at least sincere," returned Elfreda, with an affected simper. "I hope those flowers haven't loitered along the way. I must call on my fair lady and see if she has received hers. I'm beginning to feel excited. I'm going to eat my dinner post haste. I want to get dressed and practice my bow before the mirror ere I enter the sacred precincts of her majesty's boudoir. Then I shall sweep into her domicile, arrayed in all my glory. She will be so overcome at sight of me and my splendor that she will follow me down to the carriage like a lamb. I ask you, ladies, after seeing me in that new white silk gown of mine, what Anarchist could resist me?" "Of whom did Elfreda remind you just then, Grace?" asked Miriam. "Hippy," laughed Grace. "She looked exactly like him." "Never saw him," stated Elfreda laconically. "But you gave a fine imitation of him just the same!" exclaimed Grace. CHAPTER X AN OFFENDED FRESHMAN At dinner that night excitement reigned. Every girl in the house was going to the reception. To dispose of one's dinner and hurry to one's room to begin the all important task of dressing was the order of procedure, and Mrs. Elwood's flock rose from the table almost in a body and made a concerted rush for the stairs. "She got them," Elfreda informed the others as they stopped for a moment in the hall. "I went to the door to ask her. She even thanked me for them." "Wonderful," smiled Miriam. "Come on now. Remember, time flies and that your new white frock is a dream." An hour later Elfreda stood before the mirror viewing herself with great satisfaction. "It certainly is some class," she declared. "There I go again. I haven't used slang for a week. But circumstances alter cases, you know. Just pretend you didn't hear it, will you? I think I'll wear my violets at my girdle. I don't look very stout in this rig, do I? You look like a princess, Miriam. You're a regular howling beauty in that corn-colored frock. Where are my gloves and my cloak? Oh, here they are, just where I put them. Now, I must go for her highness. Br--r--" Elfreda shivered, giggled, then gathering up her cloak and gloves switched out the door. Miriam smiled to herself as she went about gathering up her own effects, then fastening the cluster of yellow rosebuds to the waist of her gown she hurried out into the hall in time to encounter Grace and Anne. "We are fortunate in that our ladies live under the same roof with us," laughed Anne. "It certainly saves carriage hire," returned Grace. "Here comes Elfreda and Miss Atkins. What on earth is she wearing?" "I think I'll go for my freshman," said Miriam, her voice quivering suspiciously. By the time Elfreda and the Anarchist had reached the head of the stairs, the three girls had fled precipitately, unable to control their mirth. Elfreda's face was set in a solemn expression that defied laughter. As for the Anarchist herself, she might easily have posed as a statue of vengeance. Her eyebrows were drawn into a ferocious scowl. She walked down the stairs with the air of an Indian chief about to tomahawk a victim. Her white silk gown, which was well cut and in keeping with the occasion, contrasted oddly with her threatening demeanor, which was enhanced by a feather hair ornament that stood up belligerently at one side of her head. "If she wouldn't wear that feather thing she'd be all right," muttered Grace in Anne's ear. "She looks like Hiawatha. She has made up her mind to be nice with Elfreda. She's wearing her flowers. I wonder if I'd better ask her to dance to-night. Shall you ask her, Anne?" "I think so," reflected Anne. "I can't lead very well, but perhaps she can." "I don't believe I'll ask her," said Grace slowly. "Humiliating one's self needlessly is just as bad as having too much pride." "Hurry," called Miriam, who was already on the stairs. "The carriages are here." It was a ridiculously short drive to the gymnasium, but, a fine rain having set in, carriages for one's freshmen guests were a matter of necessity. Elfreda and her charge occupied seats in the same carriage with Anne and Mildred Taylor, who, in a gown of pink chiffon over pink silk, looked, according to Elfreda, "too sweet to live." "How are you getting along with Miss Atkins?" asked Grace an hour later, running up and waylaying Elfreda, who was slowly making her way across the gymnasium toward the corner of the room where the big punch bowl of lemonade stood. "Don't ask me!" returned Elfreda savagely. "I managed to fill her dance card and supposed everything was lovely. She dances fairly well. If she'd only keep quiet, smile and dance calmly along. But, no, she must talk!" Elfreda's round face settled into lines of disgust. "She says such outrageously personal things to her partners. I know of three different girls she has offended so far. What will become of her before the evening is over?" she inquired gloomily. "She told me I was too stout to dance well, but I didn't mind that. Stout or not, she will be lucky to have even me to dance with at the rate she's going. Let's drown our mortification in lemonade." "Poor Elfreda," sympathized Grace. "I wish I could help you, but, honestly, I feel as though it would be hardly fair to myself to make further advances in that direction." "Don't do it," advised Elfreda, quickly, handing Grace a cup of fruit lemonade. "I'll manage to steer her through this dance. But next time some one else may do the inviting. The two classes make a good showing, don't they?" "Beautiful," commented Grace. "The gymnasium looks prettier than it did last year. That sounds conceited, doesn't it?" "It's true, though," averred Elfreda stoutly. "Doesn't Miriam look stunning to-night? I think she is the handsomest dark girl I ever saw, don't you?" "With one exception," smiled Grace. "Show me the exception, then," challenged Elfreda. "I will some fine day," promised Grace. "She's in Italy now." "You mean the girl you speak of as Eleanor?" asked Elfreda curiously. Grace nodded. "She is one of my dearest friends and belongs to our sorority at home. At one time she was my bitterest enemy," she continued reminiscently. "She was so self-willed and domineering that none of us could endure her. She entered the junior class in high school when Miriam, Anne and I did. For a year and a half she made life miserable for all of us, then something happened and she turned out gloriously. I'll tell you all about it some other time." "Was she worse than the Anarchist?" asked Elfreda sceptically. "There is no comparison," replied Grace promptly. "Still, the Anarchist may have possibilities of which we know nothing." "I wish she would give a demonstration of them to-night then," muttered Elfreda. "I suppose I'll have to get busy and look her up. It is dangerous to leave her to her own devices. She may have offended half the company by this time." Elfreda strolled off in search of her troublesome charge. Grace crossed the gymnasium, her keen eyes darting from the floor, where groups of daintily gowned girls stood exchanging gay badinage, and resting after the last waltz, to the chairs and divans placed at intervals against the walls that were for the most part unoccupied. Everyone seemed to be dancing. Grace remembered with a start that she had seen nothing of Ruth Denton. She had waved to Arline across the room on entering the gymnasium, and had not caught a glimpse of her since. "I must find Ruth," she reflected, "and tell her about to-morrow. Perhaps Anne has told her. She promised she would." Espying Mildred Taylor, Grace remembered with sudden contrition that she had not asked the little freshman to dance. "I suppose she hasn't a single dance left," murmured Grace regretfully. "At any rate, I'll ask her now." Approaching Mildred she said in her frank, straightforward fashion, "I'm so sorry I overlooked you, Miss Taylor. I intended asking you to dance first of all." The "cute" little freshman turned her head away from Grace's apologetic gray eyes. "It doesn't matter," she answered in a queer, strained voice. "My card was full long ago." "I hope you are not hurt or offended at my seeming neglect," insisted Grace anxiously. "Not in the least," was the almost curt rejoinder. "I do not think I shall stay much longer. I have a headache." "I'm so sorry," said Grace sympathetically. "Can I do anything for you?" Mildred Taylor did not answer. Her lip quivered and her eyes filled with tears. She brushed them angrily away, saying with a petulance entirely foreign to her, "Please don't trouble yourself about me." "Very well," replied Grace, in proud surprise. "Shall I tell Miss Pierson that you are ill?" "No," muttered Mildred. Grace walked away, puzzled and self-accusing. "I hurt her feelings by not asking her to dance," was the thought that sprang instantly to her mind. Then she suddenly recollected that she had not yet found Ruth. A little later she discovered her in earnest conversation with Gertrude Wells at the extreme end of the room. "Dance this with me, Ruth," called Grace, as she neared her friend. Ruth glanced at her card. "I have this one free," she said. A moment later they were gliding over the smooth floor to the inspiriting strains of a popular two step. Long before the end of the dance they stopped to rest and talk. "I suppose we ought to devote ourselves strictly to the freshmen," said Grace. "They all appear to be dancing, though. Where have you been keeping yourself, Ruth?" "I've been busy," replied Ruth evasively. "Will you be too busy to have dinner with us at Vinton's to-morrow night?" persisted Grace. "No-o-o," said Ruth slowly. "At what time?" "Half-past six," returned Grace. "We'll meet you there. I must leave you now to look after Miss Evans. I brought her here to-night." It was late when the notes of the last waltz sounded, and still later when the gay participants left the gymnasium in twos, threes and little crowds trooping down the broad stone steps to where they were to take their carriages. The rain was now falling heavily, and to walk even across the campus was out of the question. Every public automobile and carriage in Overton had been pressed into service, and many who had braved the fine rain early in the evening and walked were obliged to negotiate with the drivers for a return of their vehicles. The carriages to Wayne Hall carried six girls instead of four, and the merry conversation that was kept up during the short drive showed plainly that the evening had been a success. Even the Anarchist indulged in an occasional stiff remark with a view toward being gracious. When Elfreda humorously bowed her to her door and wished her an elaborate good night, an actual gleam of fun appeared in her stormy eyes, and forgetting her dignity she replied almost cordially that she had enjoyed her evening. "I am surprised to think she did after the way she made remarks about people," commented Elfreda to Miriam, who was busily engaged in unhooking the stout girl's gown and listening in amusement to Elfreda's recital. "She has as much tact as a guinea hen. You know how tactful they are?" In the meantime Anne and Grace were discussing the night's festivity in their own room. Grace had slipped into a kimono and stood brushing her long hair before the mirror. Suddenly she paused, her brush suspended in the air. "Anne," she said so abruptly that Anne looked at her in surprise, "did you notice anything peculiar about Miss Taylor? You were her escort, you know." "No," responded Anne, knitting her brows in an effort to remember. "I can't say that I noticed anything." "Then I am right," decided Grace. "She is angry with me because in some way I missed asking her to dance." "She said nothing to me," was Anne's quick reply. "She is offended, I know she is," said Grace. "I'm sorry, of course. I didn't pass her by intentionally. I didn't know she was so sensitive. I think I'll ask her to go to Vinton's for luncheon on Saturday." But when Grace delivered her invitation at the breakfast table the next morning it was curtly refused. Mildred Taylor's attitude, if anything, was a shade more hostile than it had been the night before. From her manner, it was evident that the little freshman, whom Grace had hastened to befriend on that first doleful morning when she found her roomless and in tears on the big oak seat in the hall, had quite forgotten all she owed to the girl she now appeared to be trying to avoid. Finding her efforts at friendliness repulsed, Grace proudly resolved to make no more overtures toward the sulking freshman. She had done everything in her power to make amends for what had been an unintentional oversight on her part, and her self respect demanded that she should allow the matter to drop. She decided that if, later on, Mildred showed a disposition to be friendly, she would meet her half way, but, until that time came, she would take no notice of her or seek further to ascertain the cause of her grievance. CHAPTER XI THE FINGER OF SUSPICION That very morning as Grace was about to leave Miss Duncan's class room she heard her name called in severe tones. Turning quickly, she met the teacher's blue eyes fixed suspiciously upon her. "Did you wish to speak to me, Miss Duncan?" Grace asked. "Yes," answered Miss Duncan shortly. She continued to look steadily at Grace without speaking. Grace waited courteously for the teacher's next words. She wondered a little why Miss Duncan had detained her. "Miss Harlowe," began the teacher impressively, "I have always entertained a high opinion of you as an honor girl. Your record during your freshman year seemed to indicate plainly that you had a very clear conception of what constitutes an Overton girl's standard of honor. Within the past week, however, something has happened that forces me to admit that I am deeply disappointed in you." Miss Duncan paused. Grace's expressive face paled a trifle. A look of wonder mingled with hurt pride leaped into her gray eyes. "I don't understand you, Miss Duncan," she said quietly. "What have I done to disappoint you?" Miss Duncan picked up a number of closely written sheets of folded paper and handed them to Grace, who unfolded them, staring almost stupidly at the sheet that lay on top. A wave of crimson flooded her recently pale cheeks. "Why--what--where did you get this?" she stammered. "It is my theme." [Illustration: "It Is My Theme."] "You mean it is the original from which you copied yours," put in Miss Duncan dryly. "Is that your hand-writing?" "No," replied Grace, in a puzzled tone. "Is this your writing?" questioned Miss Duncan, suddenly producing another theme from the drawer of her desk. "Yes," was Grace's prompt answer. "I handed it in to you instead of putting it in the collection box. You remember I told you I had lost the first one I wrote and asked for more time." "I remember perfectly," was the significant answer. "Is this theme," pointing to the one Grace still held, "the one you say you lost?" "The one I say I lost," repeated Grace, a glint of resentment darkening her eyes. "What do you mean, Miss Duncan?" Her bold question caused the instructor's lips to tighten. "You have not answered my question, Miss Harlowe," she said icily. "No, this is not my theme," answered Grace; "that is, it is not in my hand-writing. I do not recognize the writing." Grace ceased speaking and stared at the theme in sudden consternation. "Some one found my theme and copied it." Her voice sank almost to a whisper. A flush of shame for the unknown culprit dyed her cheeks anew. "It would be better, perhaps," interrupted the teacher sarcastically, "if you admitted the truth of the affair at once, Miss Harlowe." "There is nothing to admit," responded Grace steadily, "except that I lost my theme on the evening I wrote it. When I found it was gone I came to you at once and asked for another day's time. That same night I rewrote it as well as I could from memory and handed it to you the following day." An ominous silence ensued. Then Miss Duncan said stiffly: "Miss Harlowe, the young woman who wrote the theme you have in your hand dropped it into the collection box of another section during the very evening you would have me believe you were writing it. It was brought to me early the next morning." "How do you know that it was dropped into the box the evening before?" flung back Grace, forgetting for an instant to whom she was speaking. "Your question is hardly respectful, Miss Harlowe," returned Miss Duncan, coldly reproving. "I will answer it, however, by saying that I sent for the young woman and questioned her regarding the time she placed her theme in the box, without letting her know my motive in doing so. Her frank answer completely assured me that she was speaking the truth. At the same time she explained that she had been late with her theme on account of mislaying it. She had written it two days before and placed it in her desk. Then it had mysteriously vanished and suddenly reappeared in the same pigeonhole in her desk in which she had placed it. She assured me that directly she found it she took it to the box. Your theme is so suspiciously similar to hers that it is hardly possible to believe it to be merely a coincidence. In the face of the circumstances it looks as though you were the real offender." Grace regarded Miss Duncan with mute reproach. She could not at once trust herself to speak. "Have you anything to say to me, Miss Harlowe?" was the stern question. "Only, that what I have previously said to you is the truth," answered Grace, fighting down her desire to cry. Then, seized with a sudden idea, she said in a tone of subdued excitement, "Will you allow me to look at that theme again, Miss Duncan?" Miss Duncan picked up the theme from the desk where Grace had laid it and handed it to her. A strip of paper had been pasted over the name in the upper left hand corner. Grace scanned each closely written page attentively. "This is my theme," she declared finally, "and I have thought of a way to prove that I wrote it. I did not steal it from another girl. I would not be so contemptible." "I shall be very glad to have conclusive proof that you did not," commented Miss Duncan rather sarcastically. "Appearances are not in your favor, Miss Harlowe." "I am sorry that you doubt my word, Miss Duncan," said Grace with gentle dignity, "because I am going to prove to you how utterly wrong you have been in suspecting me of such contemptible conduct. I wrote this theme in the room of a member of the senior class. She read it after I had written it. I feel sure that she can identify this as mine because when I rewrote it I could not remember a word of the original ending which she had particularly commended. I did the best I could with it, but it wasn't in the least like the other," Grace ended earnestly. "Will you tell me the name of the young woman in whose room you wrote your theme?" asked Miss Duncan, her stern face relaxing a little. "It was Miss Ashe," returned Grace frankly. Miss Duncan raised her eyebrows in surprise. "I should say you had strong evidence in your favor, Miss Harlowe." "Will you ask Miss Ashe to come to your room after your last class to-day, Miss Duncan?" she asked eagerly. "I should like to show her the theme without explaining anything to her at first. I give you my word of honor I will say nothing about it to her in the meantime." Then, realizing that her word of honor was at present being seriously questioned, Grace blushed painfully. Miss Duncan, understanding the blush, said less severely, "Very well, Miss Harlowe." She scrutinized Grace's fine, sensitive face for a moment, then added, "You may come at the same time if you wish." Grace brightened, then shook her head positively. "Please let me come to see you to-morrow morning instead." She wished to give Miss Duncan perfect freedom to ask Mabel any questions she might find necessary to ask. "To-morrow morning, then," acquiesced Miss Duncan graciously. Grace turned to leave the room. At the door she hesitated, then walking back to the desk she said almost imploringly: "Please don't punish the other girl now, Miss Duncan. I do not know who she is, but I am sure she must have found my theme and copied it on the spur of the moment. I can't believe that she did it deliberately. If she did, then being found out by you will be lesson enough for her." "I have not as yet exonerated you from this charge, Miss Harlowe," declared Miss Duncan stiffly, her brief graciousness vanishing like magic. "If the other girl is to blame, then she must suffer for her fault. Until I have seen Miss Ashe I shall say nothing. After that I can not promise." Grace bowed and left the class room, her feeling toward the unknown plagiarist entirely one of pity. She had vindicated herself at the expense of exposing some one else without intent to do more than assert her own innocence, and she now wondered sadly if there were not some way in which she might persuade Miss Duncan to change her mind. On her way from Miss Duncan's class room that morning Grace found herself walking directly behind Emma Dean. She was sauntering across the campus, her near-sighted eyes fixed on a small, hurrying figure just ahead of her. "Hello, Grace," was Emma's affable salutation as she turned at the touch of Grace's hand on her shoulder. "I was watching Miss Taylor. What a disappointment that girl is. The first week or two after her arrival at Wayne Hall I thought her delightful, but she has turned out to be anything but agreeable. She barely nodded to me this morning. I believe she is developing snobbish tendencies, which is a great mistake. Deliver me from snobs! We have very few of them at Overton, thank goodness." But Grace could not help thinking that somewhere in the college community lived a girl who possessed a fault far greater than that of being a snob. CHAPTER XII THE SUMMONS The prospective dinner at Vinton's at which Ruth Denton and Arline Thayer were to be guests of honor drove the unpleasant incident of the morning from Grace's mind for the time being. She had determined to keep her interview with Miss Duncan a secret from her friends. If it had involved only herself, she might possibly have told Anne of it, but since it concerned some one else, Grace's fine sense of honor forbade her making even Anne her confidant in the matter. She could not help speculating a little concerning the identity of the other girl. She had not the remotest idea as to who she might be. Whoever she was, she could not have realized what a dishonorable thing she had done, was Grace's charitable reflection. She wondered what Mabel would think when Miss Duncan asked her to identify the theme as the one Grace had written during that evening in Holland House. "I'm going to stop thinking of it for the rest of the day," declared Grace half aloud, as she dressed for dinner late that afternoon. She started guiltily, glancing quickly to where Anne sat mending a tiny tear in her white silk blouse. Anne, who was fully occupied with her mending, made no comment. She was so used to Grace's habit of thinking aloud that she had no idle curiosity regarding her friend's thoughts. Whatever Grace wished her to know she would hear in due season. "Miriam and Elfreda are not going with us, you know," said Grace as they were about to leave their room. "I didn't know it," commented Anne. "Why did they change their minds?" "Miriam thinks you and I can do more toward restoring peace without her and Elfreda. She suspects that Ruth will satisfy Arline's curiosity and at the same time appease her wrath by telling what she refused to tell that other night, provided there are not too many listeners." "What a wise girl Miriam is!" exclaimed Anne admiringly. "I never thought of that." "Nor I," admitted Grace, "until she mentioned it. Then I saw the wisdom of it." "Where are we to meet Ruth and Arline?" asked Anne. "Suppose both of them arrive at Vinton's before we do?" "I thought of that, too," chuckled Grace, "so Arline is to come here, and Ruth is to wait for us at Vinton's. They can't possibly meet until we are there to manage matters. Arline ought to be here by this time. Shall we go downstairs and wait for her?" "There's the door bell now," said Anne. "That must be Arline." Her supposition proved correct. Just as they reached the foot of the stairs the maid admitted the fluffy-haired little girl. "Hello!" she called merrily. "I'm strictly on time, you see." "So are we," smiled Anne. "Shall we start at once?" "Yes, indeed," emphasized Arline. "I'm starved. I wasn't prepared in Greek to-day, and rushed through my luncheon in order to snatch a few minutes' study before class. I had my trouble for my pains, too. The bell rang before it was my turn to recite. Wasn't that fortunate?" "I should say so," agreed Grace. "If it had been I, Professor Martin would have called on me first. You were born lucky, Daffydowndilly." "I don't think so," replied Arline gloomily. "I have all kinds of miserable, unpleasant things to bother me." Anne and Grace exchanged significant glances behind the little girl's back. There was a chance for the success of their scheme. Arline was evidently unhappy over her cavalier treatment of Ruth. During the short walk to Vinton's all mention of Ruth's name was tacitly avoided. Arline chattered volubly about the reception. She had not enjoyed herself particularly. She had taken a freshman by the name of Violet Darby, who lived on the top floor of Morton House. She was considered the freshman beauty. "Oh, I remember her!" exclaimed Grace. "Gertrude Wells introduced me to her. I asked for a dance, but her card was full to overflowing. She is beautiful. She has such wonderful golden hair, and her brown eyes are in such striking contrast to her hair and fair complexion. She is awfully popular, I suppose." "Yes, the Morton House girls are all rushing her. I was surprised to think she accepted my invitation," returned Arline. "I don't think that was so very surprising," declared Grace bluntly. "Arline Thayer is also a Morton House favorite." "Violet is the reigning favorite just at present," rejoined Arline. "It's her fatal beauty. She is a very nice girl, though. Not a bit snobbish or conceited. Everyone in the house likes her. You must become better acquainted with her." "Here we are at Vinton's," announced Grace. "I ordered one of the alcove tables reserved for us." As they made their way to the alcove a girl rose from her seat in the shadow to greet them. It was Ruth, and as Arline caught sight of her her baby face grew dark. "How dared you?" she asked accusingly, turning toward Grace. "You know we are not friends. I don't wish to see her. I'm going straight home. I suppose she planned all this. She has tried to make up with me, but I shall never again be friends with her." "Please listen to me, Arline," began Grace, taking the angry little girl by the arm and pulling her gently toward the alcove. Ruth had risen from the table, a look of mingled pain and bewilderment on her face. "I didn't know Arline was to be here," she said tremulously. "Please tell her I didn't know it." She turned appealing eyes toward Grace. "Suppose we sit down at our table and talk over this matter," suggested Grace, in her most casual manner. Her calm gray eyes rested first on Ruth, then traveled to Arline, who hesitated briefly, then with an angry shrug of her shoulders seated herself in the nearest chair. Grace motioned Anne and Ruth to their chairs, then seating herself she said gently: "Now, children, suppose we clear up some of these doubts and misunderstanding by holding court? I am going to be the prosecuting attorney. Anne can be the counsel for the defense. Arline can borrow her first, then Ruth can have her. When all the evidence is in I shall appoint myself as judge and jury. It means a great deal of work for me, but the law must take its course. I, therefore, summon you both into court." CHAPTER XIII GRACE HOLDS COURT In spite of her displeasure, Arline giggled faintly at Grace's impromptu session of court. Ruth's sad little face brightened, while Anne listened to her friend with open admiration. She could have conceived of no surer way to settle the difference that had made them so unhappy. "You must remember," Grace said solemnly, "that there can be no dinner until the court has disposed of its first case. This is a murder trial, therefore the chief object of the court is to find the murderer of one friendship, done to death in cruel fashion. I wish I had Emma Dean's glasses to make me look more imposing. I wonder what kind of voice a prosecuting attorney would have. Dearly beloved," went on Grace impressively, "they don't say that in court, I know, but then I'm going to be different from most prosecuting attorneys." "There isn't the least doubt of that," interposed Anne slyly. "Silence," commanded Grace severely. "I shall have you arrested for contempt of court. Then there won't be any counsel for the defense. The first witness, that's you, Arline, will please take the stand. You needn't really move, you know. We will take a few things for granted. Sit up straight and be as dignified as possible. Fold your hands on the table. That's right. Now, state where and when you first met the defendant. Ruth can be the defendant until I question her. Then you'll have to play the part." "Over a year ago, at Morton House," stated Arline obediently. "What was your opinion of the defendant?" "I liked her better than any other girl I had ever met," confessed Arline. "Defendant number two, what did you think of Arline Thayer?" quizzed Grace, eyeing Ruth expectantly. "I liked her as much as she liked me," replied Ruth promptly. "When did your first disagreement occur?" probed Grace, turning from Ruth to Arline. "Here, at this very table," returned Arline in a low tone. "Whose fault was it?" inquired Grace wickedly. "Mine!" exclaimed Ruth and Arline simultaneously. "Thank you," returned Grace soberly. "Such spontaneity on the part of the defendants is very refreshing. It also simplifies the case and saves the court considerable trouble. There is hope that the court will be dismissed in time for dinner. As prosecuting attorney I will now deliver my charge. I shall have to deliver it sitting down or attract too much attention to the case. Gentlemen of the jury, you have heard the evidence. You think, no doubt, that murder has been done. This is not so. The friendship between Defendant Number One," Grace bowed to Arline, "and Defendant Number Two," she made a second bow to Ruth, "received a blow on the head which rendered it unconscious for some time. It had no intention of dying, but both prisoners treated it with extreme cruelty, not allowing it to hold up its poor crippled head. I ask you, Gentlemen of the jury, to consider well what shall be the penalty for assaulting and battering friendship with intent to kill. Gentlemen of the jury, are you ready for the question?" "We are," Grace answered for the jury in a deep voice that elicited little shrieks of laughter from her companions. "What shall be the fate of these malefactors?" demanded Grace in her prosecuting attorney voice, after the jury had rendered a verdict of guilty. "Be deliberate in your decision, but don't be all night about it." "They shall be made to shake hands across the table or suffer the full penalty of the law," stated the judge. "What is the full penalty of the law?" "No dinner," was the prompt answer. "Counsel for the defense, have you anything to say? I should have asked you before sentence was pronounced, but it doesn't matter. The prosecuting attorney always tries to fix things to suit himself, no matter what any one else thinks." "The counsel for the defense is a mere blot on the landscape in this trial," jeered Anne. "How did you guess it?" beamed the prosecuting attorney. "Prisoners, the sentence will be executed at once. Shake hands." Ruth's hand was stretched across the table to meet Arline's. "I'm awfully sorry, Ruth," said Arline, her voice trembling slightly. "I should never have asked you to tell what you wished to keep secret." "And I shouldn't have been so silly as to refuse to tell," declared Ruth bravely. "I'm going to tell you now, and you mustn't stop me. I was brought up in an orphan asylum. That's why I didn't care to tell you about myself that evening." "You poor, precious dear!" exclaimed Arline. "How can I ever forgive myself for being so horrid? Won't you forgive me, Ruth? I never supposed it was anything like that. I was angry because you called me your best friend, but wouldn't trust me. I'm so sorry. I'll never speak of it again to you." Arline looked appealingly at Ruth, her blue eyes misty. "But I want you to think of it. I had made up my mind to tell you. Then you passed me on the campus without speaking, and somehow I didn't dare come near you after that." "I've been perfectly horrid, I know," admitted Arline contritely. "I've been so used to having my own way that I try to bend everyone I know to it." "I don't mind telling you girls about myself now. At first I was ashamed of my poverty," confessed Ruth. "After I went to Arline's beautiful home I hated to say anything about it to any one. Then Arline grew angry with me. I realized afterward that I had been foolish not to tell her my story. There isn't much to tell. I was picked up in a railroad wreck on a westbound train when I was four years old. I can just remember getting into the train with my mother. She was burned to death in the wreck, but by some miracle I was saved. I knew my name, Ruth Irving Denton, my age, and around my neck mother had tied a little packet containing some money, a letter and a gold watch. A woman who lived near where the wreck occurred took charge of me, and as no one came for me, in time I was sent to a home. I lived there until I was fourteen. The matron was good to us, and considering we were all homeless waifs we fared very well." "And the letter?" asked Grace. "It was from my father to my mother, giving all the directions for our journey west. With it had been enclosed a money order for four hundred dollars, which my mother had evidently cashed. I still have the letter. "Then a man and his wife took me. They were good to me and sent me to school. I studied hard and finished high school when I was seventeen. Then I won a scholarship of one hundred dollars a year. I was determined to go to college, but the people with whom I lived thought differently. So I left them a year ago last fall and came to Overton, resolving to make my own way. They were so angry with me for leaving them they would have nothing further to do with me. So you see I had not a friend in the world until I met you girls." "But you have me now," comforted Arline, patting Ruth's hand. "I'll never be so silly again. Poor little girl!" "And you have Anne and me," added Grace. "Don't forget Miriam and Elfreda, either." "I am rich in friends now," said Ruth softly. "Perhaps your father isn't really dead, Ruth!" exclaimed Grace. "He must be," said Ruth sadly. "I have only one thing that belonged to him, a heavy gold watch with his full name, 'Arthur Northrup Denton,' engraved on the inside of the back case. It is a valuable watch, but I have always declared I would starve rather than part with it." "Perhaps it may help you to find him some day," suggested Grace thoughtfully. "Don't you know the name of the town in Nevada where he first lived?" asked Anne. "He went to Humboldt, and from there into the mountains," replied Ruth. "Since that time all trace of him has been lost. I never knew my own story until on the day I became fourteen years of age. Then the matron told me. It was at the time that I was getting ready to go to live with the man and his wife of whom I have spoken. After that it seemed as though the whole world changed for me. I didn't mind being poor, nor having to work, for I had the glorious thought that perhaps my father was still alive and that some time I should see him again. I wrote several letters to him, sending them to Humboldt, but they always came back to me. "After a while I gave up all hope and stopped writing. I couldn't bear to think of having more letters come back unclaimed. I tried to forget that I had even dreamed of seeing my father again, and began to put my whole mind on going to college. Now I am so thankful that I persevered and won the scholarship. There were times when I was very unhappy over leaving the only home I had ever known, outside the orphanage. Still I could not rid myself of the conviction that I had taken a step in the right direction. Later, when I met you girls, I was sure of it. Even though I didn't find my father, I found true and loyal friends who have crowded more pleasure and happiness into one short year than I ever had in all my life before." "I'll lend you half of my father, Ruth," offered Arline generously. "He is almost as fond of you as he is of me. You remember he said so." "Weren't you green with jealousy when he admitted it?" teased Anne. "Not a bit of it," protested Arline stoutly. "I only wish Ruth were my sister." "I'd like to be the one to find Ruth's father," mused Grace. Anne smiled. "Even college can't uproot Grace's sleuthing tendencies. She has an absolute genius for ferreting out mysteries." "No, I haven't," contradicted Grace. "If I had--" she stopped. She had been on the point of remarking that she would have known who had stolen and used her theme. "If you had what?" asked Arline curiously. "If I had the genius of which Arline prattles, I'd be at the head of the New York Detective Bureau," finished Grace. And Anne alone knew that Grace had purposely substituted this flippant answer to conceal her real thought. CHAPTER XIV GRACE MAKES A RESOLUTION "What do you think has happened?" demanded J. Elfreda Briggs, bursting into the room where Anne and Grace were busily making up for lost time. They had lingered at Vinton's until after eight o'clock. Then the thought of to-morrow with its eternal round of classes had driven them home, reluctantly enough, to where their books awaited them. It was almost nine o'clock before they had actually settled themselves, and Elfreda's sudden, tempestuous entrance caused Anne to lay down her Horace with an air of patient resignation. "We might as well begin saying 'unprepared' now, and grow accustomed to the sound of our own voices," she announced. "I think so, too," agreed Grace. "Well, Elfreda, why this thusness? What has happened? Have you been elected to the Pi Beta Gamma, or did you get an unusually large check from home?" "Catch the P. B. Gammas troubling themselves about me," scoffed Elfreda. "As for a check, I've written for it, but so far I've seen no signs of it. When I do lay hands on it we'll celebrate the event with feasting and merrymaking." "Then I can't guess," sighed Grace. "You'd better tell us." "Well," began Elfreda, her eyes twinkling, "I have a dinner invitation for to-morrow night at Martell's." "That is nothing startling," scoffed Anne. "We've just come from Vinton's." "But the rest of my news is remarkable," persisted the stout girl. "I am invited to dine"--Elfreda paused, then finished impressively--"with the Anarchist." "You don't mean it!" Grace looked her surprise. "Of course I mean it," retorted Elfreda. "I wouldn't say so if I didn't. She delivered her invitation on the way over to chapel this morning. I'd give you an imitation of the way she did it if I hadn't accepted." Grace shot a quick, approving glance toward Elfreda which the latter saw and interpreted correctly. "I wouldn't have thought about that last year, would I, Grace?" she asked shyly. Grace laughed rather confusedly. "How did you guess so much? The way you stumble upon things is positively uncanny." "Observation, my dear, observation," returned Elfreda patronizingly. "One can learn almost everything about everybody if one keeps one's eyes open." "You seem to carry out your own theory," admitted Grace smilingly. "Have you finished your work for to-night?" "Years ago," declared Elfreda extravagantly. "Miriam hasn't, at least she was still studying when I left the room. I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll make some fudge. Mrs. Elwood will let me have some milk and we have the rest of the stuff in our room. I'll send Miriam in here. Then I can have the whole room to myself. When it's done, I'll call you." With a joyful skip that fairly jarred the furniture in the room Elfreda bounded through the doorway and vanished. Two minutes later Miriam appeared, an amused look on her dark face, several books tucked under one arm. "Driven from home," she declaimed, posing on the threshold, her free hand appealingly extended. "Will no one help me?" "I will." Grace reached forth her hand, dragging Miriam into the room. "Hurry through your lessons and we'll have a spread. I'm sorry you weren't with us to-night, but Anne and I weren't sure as to just how successfully our plan would work. Everything went smoothly, though." Grace related briefly what had taken place at the dinner. "I am glad Ruth and Arline settled their differences," commented Miriam. "We all knew that Arline was at fault. She is such a dear little thing, one hesitates to say so." "She was very sweet to-night," interposed Anne. "She asked Ruth's forgiveness and took the blame for their little coolness on her own shoulders." "I don't wish to cause dissension in this happy band, but we really must stop talking and study," warned Grace. "I haven't made a satisfactory recitation this week, and I vote for reform." "All right, my dear Miss Harlowe," flung back Miriam. "'Work, for the Night is Coming.'" "You mean going," giggled Anne. After this interchange of flippant remarks silence reigned, broken only by the sound of turning leaves or an occasional sigh over the appalling length of a lesson. The three girls were fully absorbed in their work when Elfreda poked her head in the room to announce that the fudge was made. "I've a bottle of cunning little pickles, and a box of cheese wafers. I made some tea, too. Hurry, or it will be half-past ten before we have time to eat a single thing." "I can't possibly finish studying my Latin to-night," sighed Miriam. "Every day the lessons seem to get longer. Miss Arthur hasn't a spark of compassion." "Don't stop to grumble," commanded Elfreda. "Come along." The half-past ten o'clock bell rang before the fudge was half gone. In fact, it was after eleven before the quartette prepared for sleep. During the evening all thought of the troublesome theme had left Grace's mind. It was not until after she had turned out the light and gone to bed that it came back to her with such disagreeable force that for the time being all idea of sleep fled. For the first time since her entrance into Overton College she had incurred the displeasure of one in authority over her, and through no fault of her own. As Grace lay staring into the darkness the recollection of that bitter time during her junior year at high school, when Miss Thompson had accused her of shielding the girl who had destroyed the principal's personal papers, came back, vivid and complete. Eleanor Savelli, now numbered among her dearest friends and a member of the Phi Sigma Tau, had been the transgressor, and Grace had refused to voice her suspicions. It had all come right in the end, although Miss Thompson's displeasure had been hard to bear. Perhaps this affair would end happily, too. Suppose the other girl had chosen the same subject? Grace gave vent to a soft exclamation of impatience at her own supposition. She wished she dared believe that it were so, but common sense told her that she could not hope to deceive herself by any such delusion. "Who could the girl be?" Grace asked herself over and over. Surely, no one of her intimate friends. Nor any girl at Wayne Hall, either. Whoever was guilty would be severely punished, perhaps sent home. Overton prided itself on its honor. Its children must be above reproach at all times. Mabel's evidence would clear her. But what of the other girl? "Whoever she is," speculated Grace, "by this time she is probably sorry for what she did. I suppose she is frightened, too. I'm going to make Miss Duncan let her off this once, and if I can find out who she is, I'm going to stand by her so faithfully that she'll never again care to do a dishonest thing as long as she lives." It was a long time before Grace fell asleep that night. Her perturbed state of mind over the stolen theme had served to make her wakeful, and her thoughts flitted from one subject to another, as she lay waiting for the sleep that refused to come, always returning, however, to that of the unlucky theme. When, at last, it came, it brought disturbing dreams, in which she figured as the transgressor. The theme did not belong to her, but to J. Elfreda Briggs. She had stolen it from the pocket of Elfreda's brown serge coat, and Miss Duncan had seen her take it. During the morning exercises in the chapel, Miss Duncan had mounted the steps of the platform, and, standing beside Dr. Morton, had shouted forth her guilt to the whole college, while she had endeavored to creep out of the chapel unnoticed. CHAPTER XV THE QUALITY OF MERCY The next morning Grace felt singularly dispirited as she went down to breakfast. It had been raining, and the dreary outlook caused the gloomy lines, "The melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year," to run through her head with maddening persistency. "What's the matter, Grace?" inquired Emma Dean. "That chief-mourner expression of yours is doubly depressing on a day like this. Did you eat too much fudge last night, or have you been conditioned in math?" "You are a wild guesser, Emma," returned Grace, smiling faintly. "My troubles are of an entirely different nature. But how did you know we made fudge last night, and why didn't you come in and have some?" "I never go where I am not invited," was the significant retort. "Nonsense!" declared Grace. "You are always welcome, and you know it. The spread was in Miriam's room, but you know who your friends are, don't you?" "Don't worry, I'm not offended," Emma assured Grace good-humoredly. "I came in just before the ten-thirty bell last night and heard sounds of revelry as I passed by." "There's plenty of fudge on our table," put in Miriam Nesbit. "Help yourself to it whenever the spirit moves you." "Where is Mildred Taylor this morning?" asked Irene Evans, glancing toward Mildred's vacant place. "Miss Taylor is ill this morning," answered a prim voice from the end of the table. With one accord all eyes were turned in the direction of the voice. The Anarchist had actually spoken at the table! It was unbelievable. What followed was even more surprising. The Anarchist swept the table with a defiant look, then said, with startling distinctness, "If she has not fully recovered by to-night I shall send for a physician. In the meantime I shall remain with her to care for her." "That is very kind in you, I am sure," ventured Emma Dean. Surprise had tied the tongues of the others. "Not in the least," contradicted the Anarchist coldly. "As her roommate, common humanity demands that I assume a certain amount of responsibility for her welfare." "Oh, yes, of course," agreed Emma hastily. "Please let us know when we may run in to see her. Excuse me, everybody. I must run upstairs and study a little before going to chapel." Several freshmen followed her lead and filed decorously out the door with preternaturally solemn faces that broke into smiles the moment the door closed behind them. The Anarchist, however, went on eating her breakfast, quite unaware that she had created the slightest ripple of amusement. When Elfreda rose to leave the dining room the strange young woman rose, too, and walked sedately out of the room in the stout girl's wake. "Elfreda has evidently made a conquest," remarked Miriam to Grace. "See how tamely the haughty Anarchist follows at her heels." "It's astonishing, but splendid, I think," said Grace decidedly. "Isn't it strange how much influence for good one girl can have over another? For some reason or other Elfreda knows just how to bring the best in Miss Atkins to the surface. Shall we run up and see Miss Taylor for a moment?" "You go this morning, Grace," urged Miriam. "I'll stop and see her at noon. I haven't the time just now." "I'll go with you," volunteered Anne. Grace knocked gently on the slightly opened door, then, receiving no answer, opened it softly. She paused irresolutely on the threshold, Anne peering over her shoulder. Laura Atkins had left the room, but Mildred Taylor, fully dressed, sat at the window looking listlessly out. If she heard Grace's light knock she paid no attention to it. It was not until Grace said rather diffidently, "We heard you were ill and thought we'd come in to see you," that the girl at the window turned toward Grace. Her piquant little face was drawn and pale, and her eyes looked suspiciously red. She eyed Grace almost sulkily, then said slowly, "It was kind of you to come, but I shall be all right to-morrow." Under Grace's serious glance her eyes fell, then, to her visitors' amazement, she burst into tears. Grace crossed the room. Her arm slid across the sobbing freshman's shoulders in silent sympathy. "Can't you tell me what troubles you?" she asked softly. Mildred shook off the comforting arm with a muttered: "Let me alone. I can't tell you, of all persons. Go away." "Why can't you tell me?" persisted Grace gently. "Because I can't. Won't you please go. I don't wish to talk to any one," wailed Mildred. Grace walked toward the door, her eyes on the weeping girl. Anne, who had kept strictly in the background during the little scene, stepped out into the hall, Grace following. "That was hardly my idea of a cordial reception," was Anne's dry comment as they entered their own room. "That young woman has something on her mind," declared Grace. "Her illness is not physical. It is mental. Either some one has torn her feelings to shreds or else she has done something she is ashamed of and remorse has overtaken her." "Unless she has had bad news from home or has been conditioned," suggested Anne. "I don't believe it's either," said Grace, shaking her head. "I believe this is something different. Of late she has been acting strangely. Ever since the reception she has avoided me. Anne Pierson, do you see the time? We'll be late for chapel!" gasped Grace in consternation. With one accord the two friends gathered up their wraps, putting them on as they ran. After chapel Grace left Anne at the door of Science Hall and went on to Overton Hall. She wished to see Miss Duncan before her first class recited, and learn the latest developments of her case. Until chapel exercises were over, Grace had refused to allow her mind to dwell on her trouble, but now, as she climbed slowly up the broad stairway to Miss Duncan's class room, the whole unhappy affair rose before her. Miss Duncan was sitting at her desk as Grace entered. She looked at her watch, smiled frankly at Grace and said in her usual businesslike way, "I can give you only ten minutes, Miss Harlowe." The teacher's friendly tone made Grace's heart leap. She recognized the fact that Miss Duncan no longer looked upon her with suspicion. "Your innocence was clearly proven by Miss Ashe," said Miss Duncan in her blunt fashion, coming at once to the point. "I recognize your claim to the authorship of the theme. The other young woman was the real plagiarist. It was a contemptible trick and not in keeping with Overton standards." "What will happen to this other girl, Miss Duncan?" asked Grace apprehensively, her eyes fixed on Miss Duncan. "What do you think she deserves?" inquired Miss Duncan quizzically. "A chance to redeem herself," was the prompt reply. "No one except you knows who she is. I don't wish to know her identity, and I am sure Miss Ashe doesn't. Couldn't you send for the girl and tell her that it would be a secret between just you two. That you were willing to forget it had happened if she were willing to start all over again and build her college foundation fairly and squarely. It wouldn't be of any benefit to her to place her fault before the dean. No doubt she would be dismissed, and that dismissal might spoil her whole life." "You are an eloquent pleader, Miss Harlowe," returned Miss Duncan. "As this is strictly an affair of one of my classes, I consider that I am at liberty to do as I think best about placing this matter before the dean. If I did see fit to do so I hardly think it would mean dismissal, particularly if I took you with me to plead the cause of the offender. Come to me this afternoon after my last class and I will give you my answer." Grace left the class room far more cheerfully than she had entered. Her own vindication had not impressed her half so deeply as Miss Duncan's apparently lenient attitude toward the girl who had been false to herself and to Overton. CHAPTER XVI A DISGRUNTLED REFORMER Grace was not disappointed. Miss Duncan graciously agreed to let the culprit off with a severe reprimand. Grace ran joyfully down the campus to Holland House. She wished to tell Mabel Ashe the good news. "Horrid little copy-cat! She doesn't deserve it," was Mabel's unsympathetic comment as Grace related what had passed between Miss Duncan and herself. "You know who she is, don't you, Grace?" Grace shook her head. "I haven't the slightest idea," she said soberly. "I can't believe it was any one at Wayne Hall. You don't suspect any one, do you?" "No," returned Mabel. "I haven't become very well acquainted with the freshmen this year, so far. I suppose you did right in not exposing this girl. I don't know whether I should be quite as charitable as you. If you hadn't had a witness who saw you write the theme, you would now be under a cloud. What I can't forget is the fact that she went so far as to try to make Miss Duncan believe that you really copied it. Miss Duncan said she insisted that the theme had disappeared from her room. Think how foolish she must have felt when Miss Duncan confronted her with the truth yesterday afternoon and made her confess!" "Oh, Mabel!" Grace's distressed tone caused the pretty senior to rise and stand in front of Grace's chair. "What's the matter, Gracie," she said, taking Grace's hands in hers. Grace raised her gray eyes to meet the inquiring brown ones bent on her. "I'm so sorry," she said sadly, "but the girl who took my theme does live in Wayne Hall." "How do you know?" asked Mabel quickly. "From what you said," returned Grace. "If she accused me of taking her theme from her room, isn't it highly probable that her room is in Wayne Hall? I wouldn't be likely to go into one of the campus houses to steal a theme, would I? I must have dropped it in the hall or on the stairs that night, and she must have come into the house directly after I did and picked it up. I don't like to believe that one of our girls did it," Grace concluded sorrowfully, "but I am afraid it's true." "Some day you'll stumble upon the guilty girl when you least expect to find her," prophesied Mabel. "Now forget her, and tell me what you and your chums are going to do over Thanksgiving. I am going to a dance on Thanksgiving night with a Willston man. His fraternity is giving it." "I don't know any college men in this part of the world," sighed Grace regretfully, "therefore I never have any invitations to man dances." "Wait until my cousin comes up here. He is a Columbia man and you will like him immensely. I know a number of the Willston men, too. Why don't you go with me to the football game Thanksgiving Day? You are not going away, are you? It is only a four days' vacation, you know." "No, we haven't any particular place to go. Last year we spent our Thanksgiving vacation with the Southards in New York. You knew about that." "You lucky things," laughed Mabel. "I envy you your friendship with Everett Southard and his sister." "Some day you must meet them," planned Grace. "They are delightful people. Mr. Southard is appearing in Shakespearian roles in the large cities this season, and Miss Southard is in Florida visiting friends. If they were in New York they would insist on our going to them for the holidays. I must run away now. It is almost dinner time and I promised to hook up Elfreda's new gown. Miriam went over to Morton House with Gertrude Wells, and won't return until late, and Elfreda is going to dine with the Anarchist." "Really!" exclaimed Mabel. "Elfreda seems to be coming to the front this year, doesn't she!" "She is turning out splendidly," said Grace warmly. "She stands high in every one of her classes, and she is so ridiculously funny that we would feel lost without her. She says things in the same droll way that a young man we know in Oakdale does. But I mustn't stay another minute. Good-bye, Mabel, I'll see you in a day or two." Grace darted across the campus and ran rapidly in the direction of Wayne Hall. She loved to run and her fleetness of foot had served her well on more than one occasion. Only that day she had complained to Miriam that it had been years since she had indulged in a good run. Miriam had laughingly accused her of still being a tomboy, and had proposed that they take a long tramp on Saturday. "You can run up and down the road to your heart's content when we get far enough away from Overton so that no one will see you and think you have suddenly gone crazy," Miriam had declared good-naturedly. Bounding up the steps two at a time, Grace reached the front door of Wayne Hall without drawing a laboring breath. "I'm certainly in good condition," she laughed to herself, inhaling deeply and inflating her chest. "I hope I'll be chosen to play on the team this year." She rang a third time before the door was opened by Emma Dean, who grumbled at her repeated ringing and then announced that she had rung six times that afternoon before any one had condescended to let her in. "Have you seen Elfreda?" flung back Grace on her way upstairs. "You'd better hurry," called Emma after her. "I heard her growling to herself as I passed her door." "I began to think you were never coming," greeted Elfreda, as Grace burst into the room, her eyes bright and her cheeks becomingly flushed from her recent run across the campus. "Why didn't you ask some one else to hook you up?" retorted Grace mischievously, throwing down her gloves and beginning on the top hook. "Because I wanted you to see how nice I looked in this new frock," replied the stout girl. "If I had not stipulated that you were to perform this extremely important service for me, you would have in all probability absented yourself from my immediate vicinity, unmindful of the rare exhibition of youth and beauty that was being prepared for you in my room." "If I had closed my eyes I could have sworn it was Miss Atkins," laughed Grace. "Even she herself couldn't fail to recognize that impersonation. It's ridiculously funny, Elfreda, but I wish you wouldn't do it." As Grace and Elfreda were standing with their backs directly away from the door neither girl saw the tense little figure that stood rigid, one hand on the door casing, listening with eyebrows drawn fiercely together. An instant later it had vanished. Grace, after triumphantly placing the last hook in its eye, began helping Elfreda find her handkerchief and gloves. "Now you have everything you need," she declared, holding up the stout girl's coat. "Do you wait here for your dinner partner or does she call for you?" "She is coming in here for me," answered Elfreda. "I wish she would hurry along. I haven't had even a cracker to eat since luncheon and I'm famished." "I think I'll go if you don't mind. I'm hungry, too. I must see if Anne has come in yet. Miss Atkins will be here in a moment. Good-bye. I hope you will have a nice time. I am so glad she invited you." Grace crossed the hall to her own room. Anne was rearranging her hair preparatory to going down to dinner. "I think I'll do my hair over again," decided Grace. "That run across the campus shook most of my hairpins loose. It will be at least ten minutes before the bell rings, so I shall have plenty of time." But her hair proved refractory and the clang of the dinner bell found her tucking in a last unruly lock. "I'm going on downstairs, Grace," called Anne from the doorway. "All right," answered Grace. As she passed Elfreda's room she heard her name uttered in a sibilant whisper. Wheeling at the sound, Grace stepped to the stout girl's door. Elfreda drew her in and, closing the door, said nervously: "What do you suppose has happened? I waited and waited for the An--Miss Atkins and she didn't appear, so I went down to her room and found the door closed. I knocked at least a dozen times, until my knuckles ached, but not a sound came from within. Then I came back to my room and waited. She hasn't materialized yet. I went down to her door just now and knocked again, but, nothing doing." In her agitation Elfreda dropped into slang. "That is strange," agreed Grace. "Do you suppose she has been taken suddenly ill?" "Search me," declared Elfreda wearily. "She ought to be called the Riddle. She is past solution, isn't she? I'm hungry, and if she doesn't appear within the next five minutes I'm going to put on my old brown serge dress and go down to dinner. I'm not used to being invited out to dine and then deserted before I've even had a chance to look at the bill of fare." "Never mind," comforted Grace. "I'll ask you to dinner at Martell's next week and won't desert you either. Wait a minute. I will go down to the dining room and see if by any chance she could be there. Then I'll come upstairs and let you know. If she isn't there you had better change your gown and go downstairs with me." "She isn't there," reported Grace, five minutes later. "Miss Taylor is, but her roommate is missing." "'Parted at the altar,'" quoted Elfreda dramatically. "Will you please unhook me?" For the second time that night Grace busied herself with the troublesome hooks and eyes. Elfreda jerked off the new gown. Her temper was rising. "This is what comes of cultivating freaks," she muttered, lapsing into her old rudeness. "I might have known she'd do something. Catch me on any more reform committees!" "The way of the reformer is hard," soothed Grace, as she picked up the gown Elfreda had thrown in a heap on the floor, and folding it, laid it across the foot of the stout girl's couch. Elfreda, who was reaching into the closet for her brown serge dress, wheeled about, regarding Grace solemnly. "Too hard for me," she declared. "Hereafter, the Anarchist can attend to her own reformation. The Briggs Helping Hand Society has disbanded." CHAPTER XVII MAKING OTHER GIRLS HAPPY The Thanksgiving holiday was welcomed with acclamation by the students of Overton College, who, with a few exceptions, ate their Thanksgiving dinners at their various campus houses and boarding places. During the four days tables at Martell's and Vinton's were in demand and a continuous succession of dinners and luncheons made serious inroads in the monthly allowances of the hospitable entertainers. The month of December dragged discouragingly, however, and when the time really did arrive to pack and be off for the Christmas holidays the latent energy that suddenly developed for packing trunks and making calls caused the faculty to sigh with regret that it had not been used in the pursuit of knowledge. Nothing of any event had happened at Wayne Hall. Since the evening when Elfreda had waited in vain for Laura Atkins, whose invitation to dinner she had accepted, this peculiar young woman had offered neither apology nor explanation for her inexplicable behavior. In fact, the next morning she had completely ignored Elfreda, who, feeling herself to be the aggrieved one, had made no attempt to discover what had prompted this glaring disregard of etiquette on the part of the eccentric freshman. For a week afterward Elfreda discussed and rediscussed the mystery with Grace, Anne and Miriam. Then she gave up in disgust and turned her attention to basketball. She had lost considerable weight and was now a member of the scrub team. Her greatest ambition was to make the real team in her junior year, and with that intent she sturdily refused to eat sweet things, took long walks and daily haunted the gymnasium, going through the various forms of exercises she had elected to take with commendable persistency. Grace had never sought to discover the identity of the freshman who had stolen her theme. She felt reasonably certain that the same roof covered them both, but she never allowed herself to reach the point of laying the finger of suspicion on any one in particular. That she had been vindicated of the charge was quite enough for her, but she could not resist wondering occasionally what had prompted the deed, and whether the other girl had turned over a new leaf. One other thing troubled Grace not a little. Mildred Taylor had become extremely intimate with Mary Hampton and Alberta Wicks. Both young women were frequent guests for dinner at Wayne Hall, and Mildred spent her spare time almost entirely in their society. As the two juniors were extremely unpopular with the Wayne Hall girls a peculiar constraint invariably fell upon the table when either young woman was Mildred's guest for the evening. "One has to weigh one's words before speaking when Alberta Wicks or Mary Hampton are here," Emma Dean had declared significantly to Irene Evans, and this seemed to be the prevalent opinion among the students who lived at Wayne Hall. Mildred's attitude toward Grace had not changed. In manner she was more distant than ever, and except for a slight bow when chance brought her face to face with Grace, she gave no other evidence of having been more than the merest acquaintance. Her dislike for her roommate had to all appearances disappeared, and Laura Atkins was now seen occasionally in company with Mildred and her two mischievous junior friends. Such was the situation when the longed-for Christmas vacation arrived. Grace Harlowe's thoughts were not on her own perplexities as she walked toward Wayne Hall after finishing her last round of calls. A new problem had arisen, and as she swung along through the crisp winter air she was deep in thought. It was peculiar Christmas weather. A light snow had fallen, but through the patches of white lying softly on the campus the grass still showed spots of green. It had been an unusually long, warm fall, and to Grace, whose winters had been spent much farther north, the mildness of December had seemed marvelous. "There!" she exclaimed, stopping in the middle of the walk to consult a small leather book, and drawing a pencil through the last item, "I can go home in peace. I have every single thing done, even to notifying the expressman to come for my trunk." A sudden trill sounded down the street behind her. Turning her head, Grace saw Arline Thayer bearing down upon her. "I thought I'd never make you hear me," panted the little girl. "Ruth is going home with me after all." "I thought she would," laughed Grace. "She assured me last night that she wouldn't think of imposing upon you, but I know your powers of persuasion. You have given Ruth a great deal of happiness, Arline, and I am sure she appreciates it, too." Arline shook her curly head. "I don't deserve any credit. I am nice with her because I like her. I am consulting my own selfish pleasure, you see, and that doesn't count. If I didn't care for Ruth I am afraid I wouldn't bother my head about helping her to have good times." "You are frank, at least," smiled Grace. "Seriously speaking, I am really very selfish," admitted Arline. "I never think of doing good for unselfish reasons. I don't find any particular interest in being nice with girls who do not appeal to me. That sounds terribly cold-blooded, doesn't it? They say an only child is always selfish, you know. Oh, forgive me, Grace; I forgot you were an 'only child.' Goodness knows you are not selfish." "Yes, I am," contradicted Grace. "This is my second year at Overton and in all the time I've been here I have thought about nothing but myself and my friends and my good times. This afternoon when I started out to make calls I met Miss Barlow, a little freshman who lives in a boarding house down on Beech Street. We were going in the same direction and I thoughtlessly asked if she were going home for Christmas. A second afterward I was sorry. Her face fell, then she brightened a little and said, 'No.' She and seven other girls who lived in the same house were going to have a Christmas tree. For three days they had been busy decorating it. They had just finished. She asked, almost timidly, if I would like to see it. Of course I said 'Yes,' and we started for her boarding house. It is away down at the other end of Overton, and the most cheerless looking old barn of a house. The inside of the house is almost as cheerless as the outside, too. They had set up their tree in the parlor, and it was the only bright spot in the room. "The tree was trimmed with popcorn and tinsel. There were funny little ornaments of colored paper, too, that they had made themselves. The presents were underneath the tree, a few forlorn looking little packages that made me feel like crying. I couldn't truthfully say that the tree was lovely, but I did tell Miss Barlow that I thought they had done splendidly and that I was sorry I hadn't known her better before, because I should have liked to help them with their tree. "Then she said she had always wanted to know me, but I had so many friends among the influential girls at Overton she had thought I wouldn't care to know her. You can imagine how conscience stricken I felt. At home I was the friend of every girl in high school, and to think that I have been developing snobbish traits without realizing it!" "Couldn't we do something nice for them before we go?" asked Arline generously. "It is only three o 'clock. Why not start a movement among the girls we know and send them a box? We can make the girls contribute, but we won't tell a soul who it's for. We will ask for money or presents--whatever they care to give," she went on eagerly. "What do you think of it? Do you suppose they would be offended?" "I think it is the greatest thing out!" exclaimed Grace enthusiastically. "How can they be offended if we send the things anonymously?" "They can't," chuckled Arline gleefully. "Now we had better separate. I'll do Morton House, Livingstone Hall and Wellington House. You can do Wayne Hall, Holland House and those two boarding houses on the corner below you. A lot of freshmen and sophomores live there. I'll come over to your house with my loot to-night, directly after dinner. Good-bye until then." At seven o'clock that night Arline set down a heavy suit case and rang the bell at Wayne Hall. Grace, who had been watching for her from one of the living-room windows, hastened to open the door. "Thank goodness," sighed the little fluffy-haired girl. "I thought I would never be able to drag this suit case across the campus. It is crammed with things. I've been busier than all the busy bees that ever buzzed," she continued happily, following Grace into the living room. "You can't begin to think how nice every one has been. About half of this stuff in the suit case is candy. One girl at Morton House had ten boxes given her. Of course, she couldn't eat it all, so she put in five." Arline did not volunteer the further information that she was the "girl" and that the candy was mostly from Willston men, with whom she was extremely popular. "Another girl gave me two pairs of gloves. She had half a dozen pairs sent from home. She's going to New York for Christmas, so her home presents were sent to her here. Ever so many girls who had bought presents to take home gave me something from their store. I caught them just as they were finishing their packing. But, best of all," added Arline triumphantly, sinking into a chair and opening her brown suede handbag, "I have money--fifty dollars! That will help some, won't it?" She gave a little, gleeful chuckle. "I should say so," gasped Grace. "I didn't do quite as well, although I have a whole table full of presents. Come on up and see them. None of us have put in our money contribution yet." "How much have you?" asked Arline curiously. "So far only twenty-five dollars," replied Grace. "The girls in the boarding houses are not overburdened with money. I collected half of it from the Holland House girls. Miriam has promised me five dollars and I will put in five. That makes thirty-five dollars. I haven't asked Elfreda yet. She went out on a last shopping tour early this afternoon and hasn't come home yet. I suppose she went to Vinton's for dinner. Anne hasn't given me her money yet." "Did you ask Miss Atkins?" was Arline's sudden inquiry. She was seized with a recollection of what transpired earlier in the fall. Grace shook her head. "I couldn't. She hasn't spoken to me since the beginning of the term." "Shall I run up and ask her?" proposed Arline. "She is quite cordial to me in that queer, stiff way of hers." "It is only fair to give her a chance to contribute if she wishes," said Grace slowly. "I should say you might better ask her than leave her out." "I'll go now, while I feel in the humor," declared Arline. "You might ask Miss Taylor, too. She is Miss Atkins's roommate. She has been rather distant with me, so I haven't approached her on the subject." Arline danced off on her errand with joyful little skips of anticipation. It was not long before she returned, a pleased smile on her baby face. "What do you think!" she whispered, gleefully. "She gave me ten dollars! She was lovely, too, and didn't scowl at all. I wished her a Merry Christmas, and she asked me to take luncheon or dinner with her some time after Christmas. Miss Taylor wasn't there." Grace was on the point of replying humorously that she hoped Arline would not share Elfreda's fate when the hour to dine came round. She checked herself in time, however. She had no right to betray Elfreda's confidence even to Arline. "That was generous in her," she said warmly. "Would you like to come upstairs with me now, Arline, while I collect my share of the contributions? Miriam and Elfreda will soon be here and I will ask Anne for her money." Arline obediently followed Grace upstairs to her room. Grace lighted the gas. As she did so she espied an envelope lying on the rug near the door. Crossing to where it lay, Grace picked it up. It bore no superscription. She turned it over, then finding it unsealed pulled back the flap and peered into it. With an exclamation of wonder she drew forth a crisp ten dollar bill. "Who do you suppose left it there?" she gasped in amazement. "I thought Anne was here. She must have gone out." "Look in the envelope. Perhaps there is a card, too," suggested Arline hopefully. Grace peered into it a second time. Close to the inner surface of the envelope lay a tiny strip of paper. She held it up triumphantly for Arline's inspection. "Is there any writing on it?" demanded Arline. Grace scanned the strip of paper earnestly, turned it over and found the faint lead-pencil inscription: "From a friend." "Who can it be?" pondered Arline. "Do you recognize the hand-writing?" "No." Grace looked puzzled. "It is a welcome gift. Just think, Arline, we have one hundred dollars. Your fifty, and Miss Atkins's ten makes sixty, and this makes seventy. The twenty-five dollars I have and twenty dollars more from the four of us makes one hundred and fifteen dollars. That will mean a great deal to those girls. I only wish it were more." "If I had known sooner I would not have been so extravagant in buying my Christmas presents," declared Arline regretfully. "There isn't time to write Father for money. I don't like to telegraph. I've been positively reckless with money this month. When I go home I'm going to have a talk with Father. Oh, Grace Harlowe, I've a perfectly lovely idea," she continued, joyfully clasping her two small hands about Grace's arm, "but I am not going to say a word until I come back to Overton." "Then I won't ask questions," smiled Grace. "Come, now, help me with these packages. It is eight o'clock and we haven't made a start yet. We had better wrap the presents in two large packages. I will ask Mrs. Elwood for some wrapping paper, and we'll bring the suit case up here." It was almost nine o'clock when Grace and Arline descended the steps of Wayne Hall with mystery written on their faces. Each girl carried an unwieldy bundle. In the center of Grace's bundle, securely wrapped in fold after fold of tissue paper, was a little box. It contained one hundred and fifteen dollars in bills. Wrapped about the bills was the following note addressed to Esther Barlow, the freshman Grace had encountered that afternoon: "Merry Christmas to yourself and your seven freshmen friends. Santa Claus." [Illustration: Each Girl Carried an Unwieldy Bundle.] "How can we manage to deliver this stuff without being seen?" demanded Arline. "My arms ache already, and we haven't walked a block." Grace set down her bundle on a convenient horse block and paused to consider. Arline dropped hers beside it with a sigh of relief. "I know what we can do," said Grace reflectively. "We can get Mr. Symes to go with us. He is that old man who does errands and takes messages for ever so many of the girls. We will go with him as far as the corner, then he can carry the things to the door and give them to the woman who owns the boarding house. He lives just around the corner from here. You stay here and watch the bundles and I will see if I can find him." Grace found Mr. Symes at home and quite willing to carry out the final detail of the Christmas plan. The old man was duly sworn to secrecy and entered into the spirit of his errand almost as heartily as did Arline and Grace. At the chosen corner the girls halted, repeated their final instructions, and drawing back into the shadow, left him to deliver the two bulky packages, his wrinkled face wreathed in smiles. He smiled even more broadly on his return to the watchers, as Grace slipped a crisp green note into his hand and wished him a Merry Christmas. "Now we ought to do a little celebrating on our own account," she proposed. "Suppose we pay a visit to Vinton's. It isn't too cold for ices." "That is just what I was thinking," agreed Arline. An hour later Arline and Grace said good-bye on the corner below Wayne Hall. "I won't see you in the morning at the station, Grace," said Arline regretfully. "My train leaves a whole hour later than yours. I hope you will have a perfectly lovely Christmas. I hope eight other girls will, too. Don't you?" "You're a dear little Daffydowndilly," smiled Grace as she kissed Arline's upturned face. "I am sure they will, and they have you to thank for their pleasure, though they will never know it." CHAPTER XVIII MRS. GRAY'S CHRISTMAS CHILDREN "If this isn't like old times, then nothing ever will be!" exclaimed David Nesbit, beaming on Anne Pierson, who was busy pouring tea for the "Eight Originals" in Mrs. Gray's comfortable library. "Old times!" exclaimed Hippy Wingate, accepting his teacup with a flourish that threatened to send its contents into the lap of Nora O'Malley, who sat beside him on the big leather davenport. "It takes me back to the days when I had only to lift my hand and say, 'Table, prepare thyself,' and some one of these fair damsels immediately invited me to a banquet. Gone are the days when I waxed fat and prosperous. Now I am thin and pale, a victim of adversity." "I think you look stouter than ever," declared Nora cruelly. "You say you have lost ten pounds, but--" she shrugged her shoulders significantly. "Cruel, cruel," moaned Hippy. "It is sad to see such calloused inhumanity in one so young. Pass me the cakes, Anne, the chocolate covered ones. They, at least, will afford me sweet consolation." "I object," interposed Reddy Brooks. "Don't give him that plate. Hand him one or two, Anne. I like the looks of those cakes, too." "Man, do you mean to insinuate that I am not what I seem?" demanded Hippy, glaring belligerently at Reddy. "No, I am stating plainly that you are exactly what you seem. That's why I am looking out for my share of the cakes." "Always prompted by selfish motives," deplored Hippy. "How thankful I am that the sweet blossom of unselfishness blooms freely in my heart. It is true that I would eat all the cakes on that plate, but from a purely unselfish motive." "Let's hear the motive," jeered Tom Gray. "I would eat them all," replied Hippy gently, favoring the company with one of his famously wide smiles, "to save you, my beloved friends, from indigestion. It is better that I should bear your suffering." "Thank you," retorted David Nesbit dryly, helping himself to the coveted cakes and passing the plate over Hippy's head to Mrs. Gray, "I prefer to do my own suffering." "Oh, as you like," returned Hippy airily. "I have always been fonder of Mrs. Gray than I can say." He sidled ingratiatingly toward where Mrs. Gray sat, her cheeks pink with the excitement of having her Christmas children with her. From the time Grace, Miriam and Anne stepped off the train into the waiting arms of their dear ones, their vacation had been a season of continued rejoicing. Mrs. Gray, who, Tom gravely declared, would celebrate her twenty-fifth birthday next April, was tireless in her efforts to make their brief stay in Oakdale a happy one. On Christmas night she had gathered them in and given them a dinner and a tree. She had also given a luncheon in honor of Anne and a large party on New Year's night. It was now the evening after New Year's and the morning train would take the boys back to college. Grace, Miriam and Anne would leave a day later for Overton. Nora and Jessica were to remain in Oakdale until the following week. It seemed only natural that they should spend their last evening together at the home of their old friend. Outside the "Eight Originals," Miriam had been the only one invited to this last intimate gathering. "Now, Hippy, stick to the truth," commanded Mrs. Gray, shaking her finger at him, but handing him the plate at the same time. Hippy swooped down upon it with a gurgle of delight. "It's the truth. I swear it," he declared, holding up one fat hand in which he clutched a cake. "What made you give him the plate, Aunt Rose?" asked Tom reproachfully. "Bless you, child, there are plenty of cakes. Let Hippy have as many as he can eat." "Vindicated," chuckled Hippy, between cakes, "and given full possession besides." "I wouldn't be so greedy," sniffed Nora O'Malley. "I'm so glad. I dislike greedy little girls," retorted Hippy patronizingly. "Stop squabbling," interposed Grace. "Here we are on the eve of separation and yet you two are bickering as energetically as when you first caught sight of each other two weeks ago. Did you ever agree on any subject?" "Let me see," said Hippy. "Did we, Nora?" "Never," replied Nora emphatically. "Then, let's begin now," suggested Hippy hopefully. "If you will agree always to agree with me I will agree--" "Thank you, but I can't imagine myself as ever being so foolish," interrupted Nora loftily. "She spoke the truth," said Hippy sadly. "We never can agree. It is better that we should part. Will you think of me, when I am gone? That is the burning question. Will you, won't you, can you, can't you remember me?" He beamed sentimentally on Nora, who beamed on him in return, at the same time making almost imperceptible signs to Grace to capture the plate of cakes, of which Hippy was still in possession. In his efforts to be impressive, Hippy had, for the moment, forgotten the cakes. But he was not to be caught napping. The instant Grace made a sly movement toward the plate it was whisked from under her fingers. "Naughty, naughty, mustn't touch!" he exclaimed, eyeing Grace reprovingly. "Let him alone, girls, and come over here," broke in David Nesbit. "He only does these things to make himself the center of attraction. He wants all the attention." "Ha," jeered Hippy exultantly. "David thinks that crushing remark will fill me with such overwhelming shame that I shall drop the cakes and retire to a distant corner. He little knows what manner of man I am. I will defend my rights until not a vestige of doubt remains as to who is who in Oakdale." "There is not a vestige of doubt in my mind as to what will happen in about ten seconds if certain people don't mend their ways," threatened Reddy, rising from his chair, determination in his eye. "Take the cakes, Grace," entreated Hippy, hastily shoving the plate into Grace's hand. "Nora, protect me. Don't let him get me. Please, mister, I haven't any cakes. I gave them all to a poor, miserable beggar who--" "Here, Reddy, you may have them," broke in Grace decisively. "It is bad enough to have an unpleasant duty thrust upon one, but to be called names!" "I never did, never," protested Hippy. "It was a mere figure of speech. Didn't you ever hear of one?" "Not that kind, and you can't have the cakes, again," said Jessica firmly. "Give them to me, Grace." "Jessica always helps Reddy," grumbled Hippy. "Now, if Nora would only stand up for me, we could manage this whole organization with one hand. She is such a splendid fighter--" "I'll never speak to you again, Hippy Wingate," declared Nora, turning her back on him with a final air of dismissal. "Gently, gently!" exclaimed Hippy, raising his hand in expostulation. "I was about to say that you, Nora, are a splendid fighter"--he paused significantly--"for the right. What can be more noble than to fight for the right? Now, aren't you sorry you repudiated me? If you will say so immediately I will overlook the other remark. But you must be quick. Time and I won't wait a minute. Remember, I'm going away to-morrow." "Good-bye," retorted Nora indifferently. "I'll see you again some day." "'Forsaken, forsaken, forsaken am I,'" wailed Hippy, hopelessly out of tune. "Now, see what you've done," commented David Nesbit disgustedly. "I'm truly sorry," apologized Nora. "Hippy, if you will stop singing, I'll forgive you and allow you to sit beside me." She patted the davenport invitingly. "I thought you would," grinned Hippy, seating himself triumphantly beside her. "I always gain my point by singing that song. It appeals to people. It is so pathetic. They would give worlds to--" "Have you stop it," supplemented Tom Gray. "Yes," declared Hippy. "No, I don't mean 'yes' at all. Tom Gray is an unfeeling monster. I refuse to say another word. I have subsided. Now, may I have some more tea?" Anne filled the stout young man's cup and handed it to him with a smile. "What are you going to be when you grow up, Hippy?" she asked mischievously. "A brakeman," replied Hippy promptly. "I always did like to ride on trains. That's why I am spending four years in college." "Don't waste your breath on him, Anne," advised Nora. "He won't tell any one what he intends to do. I've asked him a hundred times. He knows, too. He really isn't as foolish as he looks." "I'm going to try for a position in the Department of Forestry at Washington after I get through college," announced Tom Gray. "I'm going into business with my father," declared Reddy. "I don't know yet what my work will be," said David Nesbit reflectively. "All you children will be famous one of these days," predicted Mrs. Gray sagely. She had been listening delightedly to the merry voices of the young people. To her, as well as to his young friends, Hippy was a never-failing source of amusement. "To choose a profession is easier for boys than for girls," declared Grace. "I haven't the slightest idea what I shall do after my college days are over. Most boys enter college with their minds made up as to what their future work is going to be, but very few girls decide until the last minute." "Girls whose parents can afford to send them to college don't have to decide, as a rule," said Nora wisely, "but almost every young man thinks about it from the first, no matter how much money his father is worth." "That is true, my dear," nodded Mrs. Gray. "Yet I am sure my girls as well as my boys will astonish the world some day. In fact, Anne has already proved her mettle. Nora hopes to become a great singer, Jessica a pianiste and Grace and Miriam--" "Are still floundering helplessly, trying to discover their respective vocations," supplemented Grace. "Yes, Mrs. Gray," smiled Miriam, "our future careers are shrouded in mystery." "Time enough yet," said Mrs. Gray cheerily. "Going to college doesn't necessitate adopting a profession, you know. Perhaps when your college days are over you will find your vocation very near home." "Perhaps," assented Grace doubtfully, "only I'd like to 'do noble deeds, not dream them all day long,'" she quoted laughingly. "'And so make life, death and the vast forever One grand sweet song,'" finished Anne softly. "That is what I shall do when I am a brakeman," declared Hippy confidently. "You mean you will make life miserable for every one who comes within a mile of you," jeered Reddy Brooks. "Reddy, how can you thus ruthlessly belittle my tenderest hope, my fondest ambitions? What do you know about my future career as a brakeman? I intend to be touchingly faithful to my duty, kind and considerate to the public. In time the world will hear of me and I shall be honored and revered." "Which you never would be at home," put in David sarcastically. "What great man is ever appreciated in his own country?" questioned Hippy gently. Even Reddy was obliged to smile at this retort. "Let the future take care of itself," said Tom Gray lazily. "The night is yet young. Let us do stunts. Grace and Miriam must do their Spanish dance for us. Then it will be Nora's and Jessica's turn. Hippy can sing, nothing sentimental, though. David, Reddy, Hippy and I will then enact for you a stirring drama of metropolitan life entitled 'Oakdale's Great Mystery,' with the eminent actor, Theophilus Hippopotamus Wingate as the 'Mystery.' Let the show begin. We will have the Spanish dance first." "Come on, Miriam," laughed Grace. "We had better be obliging. Then we shall be admitted to the rest of the performance." The impromptu "show" that followed was a repetition of the "stunts" for which the various members of the little circle were famous and which were always performed for Mrs. Gray's pleasure. "Oakdale's Great Mystery," of which Hippy calmly admitted the authorship, proved to be a ridiculous travesty on a melodrama which the boys had seen the previous winter. Hippy as the much-vaunted Mystery, with a handkerchief mask, a sweeping red portiere cloak, and an ultra-mysterious shuffle was received with shrieks of laughter by the audience. The dramatic manner in which, after a series of humorous complications, the Mystery was run to earth and unmasked by "Deadlock Jones, the King of Detectives," was portrayed by David with "startling realism" and elicited loud applause. "That is the funniest farce you boys have ever given," laughed Mrs. Gray, as Hippy removed his mask with a loud sigh of relief and wiped his perspiring forehead with it. "You will be a playwright some day, Hippy." "I'd rather be a brakeman," persisted Hippy with his Cheshire cat grin. It was half-past ten o'clock when the last good night had been said and the young people were on their way home. As the Nesbit residence was so near Mrs. Gray's home, Miriam was escorted to her door by a merry body guard. At Putnam Square the little company halted for a moment before separating, Nora, Jessica, Hippy and Reddy going in one direction, Grace, Anne, Tom and David in the other. "Are you coming down to the train to-morrow morning to see us off?" asked David Nesbit, his question including the four girls. "Of course," replied Grace. "Don't we always see you off on the train whenever you go back to school before we do?" "Then we'll reserve our sad farewells until the morn," beamed Hippy. "Sad farewells!" exclaimed Nora scornfully. "I never yet saw you look sad over saying good-bye to us. You always smile at the last minute as though you were going to a picnic." "'Tis only to hide my sorrow, my child," returned Hippy lugubriously. "Would'st have the whole town look upon my tears and jeer, 'cry baby'?" "That's a very good excuse," sniffed Nora. "Not an excuse," corrected Hippy, "but a cloak to hide my real feelings." "That will do, Hippopotamus," cut in David decisively. "We don't wish to hear the whys and wherefores of your feelings. If we stayed to listen to them we would be here on this very spot when our train leaves to-morrow morning." "Wait until we come back for Easter, Hippy, then if you begin the first day you're home you'll finish before we go back to college," suggested Grace. "That's a good idea," declared Hippy joyfully. "I shall remember it, and look forward to the Easter vacation." "I shan't come home for Easter, then," decided Nora mercilessly. "Then I shan't look forward to anything," replied Hippy with such earnestness that even scornful Nora forgot to retort sharply. "We all hope to be together again at Easter," said Grace, looking affectionately from one to the other of the little group. "Remember, every one, your good resolution about letters." "We'll talk about that in the morning," laughed Reddy, who abhorred letter writing. "You mean you'll forget about it," said Jessica significantly. "We all have our faults," mourned Hippy. "Now, as for myself--" "Take him away, Nora," begged David. "I will," agreed Nora. "Come on, Hippy. Reddy, you and Jessica help me tear him away from this corner." "How can you tear me away now? At the precise moment when I had begun to enjoy myself, too?" reproached Hippy. "This is only the beginning," was Reddy's threatening answer. "We are going to leave you stranded on the next corner. Then you can go on enjoying yourself alone." "Try it," dared Hippy. "If you do I shall lift up my voice and tell everyone in this block how unfeeling and hard-hearted some persons are. I shall mention names in my most stentorian tones and the public will rush forth from their houses to hear the truth about you. Ah, here is the corner! Now, leave me at your peril." "His mind is wandering," said Reddy sadly. "He imagines he is still 'Oakdale's Great Mystery.' We had better lead him home. I'll take his left arm, and Nora----" "Will take my right," interrupted Hippy. "Reddy, you may attend to your own affairs, and keep your distance from my left arm. Jessica, please look after Reddy. His mind is wandering. In fact, it always has wandered. Crazy is as crazy does, you know." "Yes, we know," flung back David significantly. "Do you?" asked Hippy in apparent innocence. "I was so afraid you didn't. To lose one's mind is a dreadful affliction, but not to know that one is crazy is even worse. I am so relieved, David, Grace, Tom, and all of you, that at last you know the truth concerning yourselves. It is indeed a sad----" A moment later the loquacious Hippy was hustled down the street by three determined young people, while the other four turned their steps in the opposite direction. CHAPTER XIX ARLINE'S PLAN "It was beautiful to be at home, but it is nice to be here, too. If it wasn't for mid year exams, I could be happy," sighed Grace Harlowe, as she rearranged three new sofa pillows she had brought from home, the gifts of Oakdale friends. Grace and Anne had invited Arline Thayer and Ruth Denton to dinner, and Miriam and Elfreda had dropped in for a brief chat before the dinner bell rang. "We'll all survive even mid year," predicted Miriam confidently. "We had a perfectly lovely time in New York, didn't we, Arline?" asked Ruth Denton, looking at the little curly-haired girl with fond eyes. Arline nodded. "I wish our vacation had been two weeks longer," she remarked wistfully. "I just begin to get acquainted with Father, when it is time to go back to college again. Have you seen many of the girls?" "Only the Morton House girls and you," answered Arline. "This is the first call I've made outside the house. Are all the Wayne Hall girls here?" "Miss Taylor hasn't come back yet," said Elfreda. "Do you girls happen to know where she spent her vacation?" "No," said Grace. "I didn't see her before I left. When first she came to Wayne Hall she seemed to like me. At the sophomore reception I hurt her feelings, unintentionally you may be sure. I am afraid she has never forgiven me, for since then she has avoided me." "She must have very sensitive feelings," remarked Elfreda bluntly. "What did you do to hurt them?" "I missed asking her to dance," explained Grace. "I didn't see her until late that evening, and when I apologized and asked to see her card she refused, saying coldly that my forgetting to ask her to dance was of no consequence. Since then she has hardly spoken to me." "Why didn't you tell me that before?" asked Elfreda quickly. "That accounts for certain things." "Don't be mysterious, Elfreda," put in Miriam. "Tell us what you mean by 'certain things'?" "You girls know that on several occasions before Christmas Alberta Wicks and Mary Hampton were invited here to dinner. Who invited them? Miss Taylor. So Alberta Wicks retaliated by taking Miss Taylor home with her for the holidays." "Really?" asked Miriam, in surprise. "Who told you?" "They went home on the same train with Emma Dean," returned Elfreda. "She sat two seats behind them. Has any one seen the Anarchist?" No one answered. "Why don't we change the subject and talk about something pleasant," complained Arline Thayer. "Do you remember saying to me the night before we went home that you had thought of a lovely plan?" reminded Grace. "Yes," returned Arline. "I am glad you reminded me of it while we are all here. Just before I went home for my vacation the idea popped into my head that we ought to organize some kind of society for helping these girls who come to Overton with little or no money and who depend on the work they find to do here to help them through college." "Like me," put in Ruth slyly. "Don't interrupt me," retorted Arline, smiling at Ruth. "When I went home I had a talk with Father, and he has promised to give me five hundred dollars with which to start a fund. Now, what I propose to do is to organize a little society of our own with this same object in view. There is one society of that kind here at Overton, but it is always so besieged with requests for help that I don't imagine it more than keeps its head above water. There is room for another, at any rate. I don't see why we can't be the girls to organize it." Arline looked questioningly about the circle of interested faces. "I think it would be splendid," said Miriam emphatically. "I know my mother would contribute toward it." "So would Pa and Ma," declared Elfreda. "Suppose we all write home to-night." "What do you think of it, Grace and Anne?" asked Arline. "So far neither of you has said a word." "Neither has Ruth made any remarks," replied Anne. "Why don't you ask her? I think she has something to say on the subject." All eyes were immediately turned on Ruth, who flushed, looked almost distressed, then said slowly, "Could the girls who asked for help borrow the money and return it as soon as they were able?" "Of course," responded Arline. "Don't be afraid that you are going to have charity thrust upon you, Ruth." "That would be the only basis on which we could establish a society of that kind," commented Miriam. "An Overton girl would hesitate to make use of the money except as a loan." "What would we call ourselves?" asked Elfreda abruptly. "We can decide on a name later," said Arline. "The thing to decide now is, shall we or shall we not form this society? Answer yes or no?" "Yes," was the chorus. "Don't you think," said Grace after a slight deliberation, "that it would be nicer if we could finance this society ourselves, instead of asking our fathers and mothers for money? It isn't any particular effort for most of us to write home for money. How much better it would be if we could say that we had earned the money ourselves, or saved it from our allowances." "But what about my five hundred dollars?" questioned Arline plaintively. "As the originator of this scheme I claim the privilege of putting in as much capital as I please. I am going to be the exception that proves the rule. Besides, Father has already promised me the money. Take the five hundred dollars for the basis of our fund, then we will pledge ourselves hereafter to earn or contribute whatever money we put into it." "What do you say to that, girls?" asked Grace. "I think Arline ought to be allowed to give the five hundred dollars if she wishes," said Miriam. "It is her money and her plan. Besides, we need the money!" "I think so, too," echoed Elfreda. "We might call the society the 'Arline Thayer Club.'" "If you dare--" began Arline. "Save your breath, my child, I didn't mean that seriously," drawled Elfreda. "However, we had better begin our society here, to-night. There are six of us. Shall we add to our number or let well enough alone?" "I'd like to have Gertrude Wells in it," said Arline. "Shall we make it strictly a sophomore affair?" "I think it would be better," replied Grace. "Then let us ask Emma Dean, Elizabeth Wade, Marian Cummings and Elsie Wilton," pursued Arline. "Seven, eight, nine, ten," counted Anne. "Let us make it a dozen," suggested Miriam. "Then who shall the other two members be?" "Why not ask the Emerson Twins?" suggested Arline. "They would be good material, and they are both splendid on committees. Julia Emerson nearly worked her head off for the sophomore reception last fall." "Very well, we will ask them," agreed Grace. "In case any one of the girls we have named but haven't yet interviewed should not wish to belong to our society we can propose some one else to take her place. In the meantime you must each be thinking of a name for our little club. We can meet in the library after the last class to-morrow afternoon, and go from there to Vinton's to talk it over. Arline, you must tell Gertrude Wells, Elizabeth Wade and Marian Cummings. We can easily see the others." "The dinner bell! Thank goodness!" exclaimed Elfreda fervently. "I am almost starved. I hope dinner will be better than last night's offering. Everything we had to eat was warranted to fatten one." "Never mind, Elfreda," consoled Arline. "Think how nice it will be when you make the team. That will be a reward worth having." "Yes, if I make it," grumbled the stout girl. "We will go on with our new plan after dinner," said Grace. Then as an afterthought she added: "Don't say anything about it at the table. Suppose we keep it a secret until our society is in running order?" "Hello, children," greeted Emma Dean, as they entered the dining room that night. "Has the board of directors been holding a meeting? I see you are all here." Several girls already seated at the table looked up smilingly as the six girls slipped into their places. Laura Atkins returned Arline's friendly nod with a cold bow. She did not appear to see the others. During the progress of the meal she said little, keeping up a pretense of indifference as to what went on around her. Nevertheless her eyes strayed more than once toward the end of the table where Elfreda was entertaining the girls sitting nearest to her with a ludicrous account of what had happened to her on her way back to Overton. Miriam accidentally intercepted one of these straying glances. In it she fancied she read reproach. A quick flush rose to Laura Atkins's cheeks. Drawing down her eyebrows she scowled defiantly at Miriam, then turned her head away, and went on with her dinner. After dinner the discussion of the proposed club was renewed with energy. Emma Dean's innocent allusion at dinner to the meeting of the board of directors had brought smiles to the faces of the six girls. After they had again gathered in Grace's room, Elfreda was despatched to Emma's room with orders to bring her to the council, no matter what her engagements or obligations might be. "I knew something was going to happen," was Emma's calm announcement as she followed Elfreda into the room. "To quote my esteemed friend, Miss Briggs, 'I could see' it in your eyes at dinner. I have a theme to write, a dressmaker to see, and four letters to answer, but, still, I am here." "We can readily understand how deeply it must have grieved you to shun the dressmaker, put off writing your theme, and tear yourself away from your correspondence," sympathized Miriam Nesbit, her eyes twinkling. "Then, as long as you understand it, we won't say anything more about it," was Emma's hasty reply. "I move that we avoid personalities and proceed to business." CHAPTER XX A WELCOME GUEST The meeting in the library the next day, followed by a social session at Vinton's, resulted in the enthusiastic organization of the society proposed by Grace. As had been suggested, every girl had brought with her a slip of paper on which was written the name she had selected for the society. Arline collected the names and read each one in turn to the assembled girls. "Which one do you like best?" she asked, looking from one to another of her friends. "The first one," said Miriam Nesbit. "So do I," echoed half a dozen voices. "'Semper Fidelis,'" repeated Grace musingly. "I like the sound of that, too. Who proposed that name?" "I did," admitted Emma Dean. "I thought it might stand for our motto as well. It means 'always faithful,' you know. That applies to us, doesn't it?" "Of course we shall be always faithful to our cause," declared Grace. "All those in favor of the name Semper Fidelis, please manifest it by holding up their right hands." Twelve right hands were raised simultaneously. "That settles it," stated Grace. "From now on we are the Semper Fidelis girls. Let us lose no time in leaving the sacred precincts of the library for Vinton's. We can make more noise there." After the second sundae all around had been disposed of the society settled down to business. It was decided that the club should be a purely social affair. Arline was chosen for president, Grace for vice-president and Gertrude Wells as secretary and treasurer. There was to be no special day set aside for meetings. A meeting might be called at any time at the united request of three members. The sole object of the club was to extend a helping hand to the young women who were making praiseworthy efforts to put themselves through college. The foremost duty of the society would be to ascertain the names of these girls and offer them pecuniary assistance. Arline had written her father for the promised check for five hundred dollars, which would be deposited in the bank in Gertrude Wells's name as soon as it arrived. "I might as well tell you now that I wrote and asked Pa for a check in spite of what Grace said," confessed Elfreda rather sheepishly. "I might as well confess that I mentioned the club idea to Mother," said Miriam. "I didn't ask her for a check, but I wouldn't be astonished if she sent one in her next letter." "You two girls are traitors to the cause," laughed Grace. "Perhaps you will be disappointed." "I won't," asserted Elfreda boldly. "Pa might as well help us as any one else. I told him so, too." "The important question is what can we do to earn money for our cause?" asked Grace. "We might give a play," said Miriam Nesbit. "Anne can star in it. I should like to have the Overton girls see her at her best." "I don't wish to be seen 'at my best,'" protested Anne. "I want the other girls to have a chance, too. Why not give a vaudeville show? Grace and Miriam can dance. Elfreda can give imitations. There are plenty of things we can do. We will advertise the show in all the campus houses, and each one of us must pledge ourselves to sell a certain number of tickets. I think we would be allowed to use Music Hall for the show, and if we could sell tickets enough to fill it, even comfortably, it would mean quite a sum of money for our treasury. We might charge fifty cents for admittance, or, if you think that is too much, we might put the price down to twenty-five cents." "I think we had better charge fifty cents," said Elfreda shrewdly. "It will be as easy for those who come to pay fifty cents as to pay twenty-five. We might as well have the other quarter as Vinton's or Martell's." "Elfreda, you are a brilliant and valuable addition to this society," commended Arline. "I agree with you. We are likely to reap almost as many half dollars as quarters." "We might give an act from one of Shakespeare's plays," remarked Gertrude Wells doubtfully. "Still, I think it would be more fun to have just stunts. Those of us who know any ought to be willing to come forward and do them. We can ask some of the upper class girls to help. Beatrice Alden sings; so does Frances Marlton. Mabel Ashe can do almost any kind of fancy dancing. There is plenty of talent in college. The junior glee club will sing for us, I am sure. "We can make it a regular vaudeville entertainment, and have posters announcing each number. We can have two girls, costumed as pages, to bring out and remove the posters announcing the numbers." "That's a good idea," approved Arline. "I can sing baby and little-girl songs and dance a little. I might sing one to fill in." "You are engaged to sing one the first time you come to see me," laughed Grace. "Here is talent of which we never dreamed. I knew you could sing, but you never before confessed to being a real song and dance artist." "We shall have all 'headliners in our show,' as the billboard advertisements beautifully put it," commented Miriam. "I wish Eleanor were here, don't you, Grace? Then Anne could recite 'Enoch Arden.'" "Who is Eleanor, and why can't Anne recite 'Enoch Arden' without her?" were Elsie Wilton's curious inquiries. "The 'Eleanor' we speak of is in Italy, studying music, or was the last time we heard from her. She used to live in Oakdale and is one of our dearest friends. She arranged music to be played during Anne's recital of 'Enoch Arden.' They gave it at a concert at home and it was a tremendous success." "I wish she were to be here to our show, then," said Arline plaintively. "We would feature her. What's her other name?" "Savelli," replied Grace quickly. "Eleanor Savelli, the famous Italian pianiste," announced Arline, bowing to an imaginary audience. "Her name is the same as that of Savelli, the great virtuoso, isn't it?" "He is her father," said Grace simply. A little murmur of astonishment went up. "Oh, if she had only come to Overton instead of going to Italy!" sighed Elizabeth Wade. "I heard Savelli play at a concert three years ago. I shall never forget him." "We were awfully disappointed," interposed Miriam. "Eleanor's father was to tour America this winter, but changed his mind. There was talk of a spring tour, but we haven't heard from Eleanor for over a month, so we don't know whether there is any possibility of his sailing for America. If he did come to this country, Eleanor would be sure to accompany him. She has promised us that." "There is no use in wishing for the impossible, children," said Emma Dean briskly, rising from the table and beginning to put on her coat. "There is also no use in being late for dinner. In spite of this bounteous repast," she indicated the empty sundae glasses, "I yearn for Mrs. Elwood's simple but infinitely more satisfying fare. It's almost six o'clock. Those that are going with me, hurry up." "We must have another meeting within the next two or three days," declared Grace. "Can all of you girls come to our room next Friday evening? In the meantime we will arrange a programme which will be brought before the club for approval at our next meeting. Don't any of you fail to be there." As the Wayne Hall girls flocked in the front door that night, Mrs. Elwood met them with: "Miss Harlowe, there is a young lady in the living room, waiting for you. She's been there almost an hour." "For me?" inquired Grace in surprise. "I'll go in at once." An instant later the girls heard a delighted little cry of "Eleanor, you dear thing!" Then Grace sprang to the door, exclaiming: "Girls, girls! come in here at once. You can never guess who is here!" At the cry of "Eleanor," Miriam and Anne, who were half way upstairs, ran down again and into the living room. They were followed by Elfreda, who paused on the stairs, then turned and went slowly up to her room. "Last year I wouldn't have known enough to go on about my business," she muttered as she walked stolidly into her room and sat down on the end of the couch. Ten minutes later Miriam burst into the room with: "Come downstairs, Elfreda. Don't you want to meet Eleanor? You know you have said so ever so many times. She's very anxious to meet you." "Of course I want to meet her," returned Elfreda with a short, embarrassed laugh. "This room is the place for me, though, until you are ready to introduce me. Are you sure you want me to go downstairs?" "You funny girl," laughed Miriam. "Of course we want you. We have just been telling Eleanor about you. She hasn't time to come upstairs now, for her father is waiting for her at the 'Tourraine.' He is going back to New York City to-night. He has a concert to-morrow. Grace, Anne and I are going to dine with them. I'm sorry I can't take you along, but perhaps he will come again to Overton. Eleanor is going to stay a week longer if we can coax her to remain. She is traveling with her father. We must hurry downstairs, for Eleanor is to meet her father at half-past six o'clock, and it is a quarter-past now." Elfreda shook hands with Eleanor almost timidly. She was deeply impressed with the latter's exquisite beauty. "So this is Elfreda," smiled Eleanor, patting the stout girl's hand. "I have learned to know you through the letters my friends have written me. I feel as though you were an old friend." "It's awfully nice in you to say so," murmured Elfreda, her eyes shining with pleasure. "Won't you go with us to the 'Tourraine'?" asked Eleanor sweetly. "I would like to have you meet my father." "Thank you," almost gasped Elfreda. "I'd love to meet him, but I think--" "Never mind thinking," interrupted Eleanor, gayly. "Just hurry into your wraps and come along. We'll wait for you." "That's sweet in you, Eleanor," said Grace in a low tone as Elfreda ran upstairs. "She was wild to go with us. She has worshipped you ever since we showed her your picture. She has heard your father play, too, and considers him the greatest violinist living." "I suspected she wished to be included in the invitation," smiled Eleanor. "I imagine I am going to like her very much." Guido Savelli had engaged a private dining room at the "Tourraine" for his young guests. He welcomed them with true Latin enthusiasm, and to see him seated at the head of the table one would never have suspected him to be the moody, temperamental genius whose playing had made him famous in two continents. When the time came to leave the hotel for the train he was escorted to the station by an admiring bodyguard of five young women. "Remember, you have promised to visit Overton again before you leave New York," reminded Grace as he walked down the station platform between Grace and Eleanor. "He will," declared Eleanor. "I shall make him come back to Overton for me. Good-bye, Father. Take care of yourself. Remember to go for your walk every day, won't you? He's the nicest father," she said softly as the little group turned to leave the station after the train had gone. "Now take me to your house and let us have an old-fashioned gossip. I have so much to tell you, and I want to hear about Overton." A happy party gathered in Grace's room that night for an old-time talk about Oakdale. Elfreda was the only outsider present. For her benefit the story of the stolen class money and its timely recovery by Grace and Eleanor, as related in "Grace Harlowe's Senior Year at High School," was retold, as well as many other eventful happenings of their high school life. At a quarter to ten o'clock the four girls escorted Eleanor to the "Tourraine," returning just inside the half-past ten o'clock limit. "Well, what do you think of Eleanor, Elfreda?" asked Grace, stopping for a moment outside the room shared by Miriam and Elfreda before going to her own. "Don't ask me," rejoined Elfreda fervently. "I can't thank you girls enough for the good time I've had to-night. But I want to say that if there is anything I can do for any of you, just count on J. Elfreda Briggs to do it." "It isn't necessary for you to tell us that, Elfreda," said Anne. "We know that you are true blue, and so does Eleanor." "Does she really like me?" asked Elfreda eagerly. "She likes you very much," interposed Grace. "She said so." "Then I'm going to give a luncheon for her to-morrow afternoon at Vinton's," declared Elfreda with shining eyes. "I wanted to suggest it, to-night, but I was afraid she might not care to come." "Couldn't you 'see' that she liked you?" teased Miriam. "No, I couldn't. There are lots of things I can't 'see.' One of them is why you girls ever went to so much trouble to make me 'see.' Good night." Casting one glance of love and loyalty toward her friends, Elfreda vanished into her room, and wise Miriam took care not to enter the room until the stout girl's moment of self-communion had passed. CHAPTER XXI A GIFT TO SEMPER FIDELIS When the news was whispered about through Overton College that the attractive young woman who was frequently seen in company with Grace Harlowe and her friends was the daughter of Guido Savelli, the renowned virtuoso, it created a wide ripple of excitement among the four classes. Curious juniors and dignified seniors grew interested, and Mabel Ashe and Frances Marlton, who were Eleanor's sworn cavaliers, were besieged with requests for introductions. Far from being spoiled by so much adulation, Eleanor laughingly attributed it to her father's genius, and flouted the idea that her own delightful personality had made her a reigning favorite during her stay in Overton. It took Grace some time to recover from the surprise occasioned by Eleanor's unexpected arrival. During the month in which she had received no letter from Eleanor, Guido Savelli had reconsidered his decision not to appear in America and instead of canceling his contract had sailed at the eleventh hour to fulfill it, taking Eleanor with him. "You arrived just in time for our show!" exclaimed Grace gleefully to Eleanor. The two girls sat opposite each other at the library table in the living room at Wayne Hall, making up the programme for the vaudeville performance which was to be held in Music Hall, on the following Friday evening. "Oh, Eleanor, don't you think you can go home with me for Easter? Never mind if 'Heartsease' is closed. You can have just as much fun at our house. We have only one more week here, you know, and your father's concert tour doesn't end for another month," pleaded Grace. "I think I can arrange it," reflected Eleanor. "It is only that Father misses me so. In some ways he is like an overgrown child. All great musicians are like that, I believe." "It is a pity to take you away from him," admitted Grace, "but we would like to have you with us. Besides, Tom Gray is going to bring Donald Earle to Oakdale with him for the Easter. Donald will be so disappointed if he doesn't see you, Eleanor." "I'd like to see him, too," returned Eleanor frankly. "He is one of the nicest young men I know. Father is coming down here for our show, unless something unforeseen happens. I shall coax him to play. I imagine he will be willing. He will play if you ask him, Grace." "I wish we might feature him on the bulletin board," reflected Grace, with a managerial eye to business, "but he wouldn't like that. We could have him for a surprise, though." "I'll tell you what I will do," volunteered Eleanor. "I will telephone to his hotel in New York and ask him. If he says yes, we can go ahead and count on him to furnish Overton with a surprise." "Oh, Eleanor, could you, would you do it?" asked Grace, a note of excitement in her voice. "I'll telephone at once," nodded Eleanor, rising. "Suppose we go over to the 'Tourraine' to do it." Within the next hour Eleanor and Grace had talked with Guido Savelli. It had taken very little coaxing to secure his promise to play at Overton on Friday night, as he gave his last performance in New York on Thursday evening, and was free until the following Monday, when he would appear in Boston. "It seems almost providential, doesn't it?" asked Eleanor, as she hung up the receiver. "He could not have come here at any other time." "I'm so happy over it I could hurrah," declared Grace jubilantly. "I knew Father would not refuse us," smiled Eleanor. "Now hadn't we better hurry home and make up the rest of the programme?" By eight o'clock Friday evening every available foot of space in Music Hall was crowded with Overton students. The front rows of the hall had been reserved for the faculty, who were quite in sympathy with the idea of the new club. In order to obtain permission to use this hall, Grace had gone to the dean with the story of the organization of Semper Fidelis and its purpose. The dean had sympathized heartily with the movement, and had at once laid the matter before the president of the college, who willingly gave the desired permission. As the Semper Fidelis Club was composed entirely of sophomores, twelve young women of the sophomore class had been detailed as ushers and ticket takers. The majority of the club members were down on the programme, therefore these duties had been turned over to their classmates. Grace, besides appearing in the Spanish dance with Miriam, had taken upon herself the duties of stage manager. The two smallest sophomores in the class, dressed as pages, had been chosen to place the posters announcing the various numbers on the standards at each side of the stage. These posters had been designed and painted by Beatrice Alden and Frances Marlton, who, with Mabel Ashe, Constance Fuller and several other public-spirited seniors, had generously offered their services. As both Beatrice and Frances possessed considerable skill with the brush they turned out extremely decorative posters, which were afterward sold to various admiring students for souvenirs of the club's first entertainment. "I am so tired," declared Grace to Eleanor as they stood at one side of the stage while the Glee Club, composed of juniors and seniors, arranged themselves preparatory to filing on to the stage. "Everything seems to be going beautifully though. Not a single performer has disappointed us. How pretty the Glee Club girls look to-night." "Lovely," agreed Eleanor. "The audience is out in its best bib and tucker, too. Nearly every girl in the house is in evening dress." "Consider the occasion," laughed Grace. "Our show would not have amounted to much if it had not been for you and your distinguished father. Anne could not have recited 'Enoch Arden,' without your accompaniment, and the crowning glory of having the great Savelli play would have been missing. It reminds me of our concert, Eleanor," she added softly. Eleanor's blue eyes met Grace's gray ones with ineffable tenderness. "The concert that brought me my father," she murmured. "It seems ages since that night, Grace. I can't realize that I have ever been away from Father." "It does seem a long time since our senior year in high school," agreed Grace musingly. "Good gracious, Eleanor, the Glee Club are waiting for the signal to go on while we stand here reminiscing!" Grace hurried to the wing where one of the pages stood patiently holding the Glee Club poster, and signaled to the page on the opposite side. An instant later the singers had filed on the stage for their opening song. As the show progressed the audience became more enthusiastic and clamored loudly for encores. Elfreda's imitations provoked continuous laughter, and dainty Arline Thayer, looking not more than seven years old, was a delightful success from her first babyish lisp. Her song of the goblin man who stole little children to work for him in his underground cellar, with its catchy chorus of "Run away, you little children," was immediately adopted by Overton, and when later it was noised about that Ruth had written the words while Arline had composed the music, both girls were later rushed by the Dramatic Club and made members, an honor to which unassuming Ruth had some difficulty in becoming accustomed. Anne's "Enoch Arden," to Eleanor's piano accompaniment, met with an ovation. Guido Savelli had been purposely placed last on the programme. "No one will care for anything else after he plays. The audience will have the memory of his music to take away with them," Grace had said wisely. Knowing the musician's horror of being lionized, Grace had confided the secret to no one except Miriam, Anne, Mabel Ashe and Elfreda, who, in company with her and Eleanor, had met him at the train and dined with him at the "Tourraine." It had been arranged that at half-past nine o'clock Anne and Elfreda should go for him and escort him to Music Hall. At precisely ten minutes past ten o'clock he was escorted through the side entrance to the hall by his two smiling guides, and into the little room just off the stage that did duty for a green room. Eleanor's quick exclamation of, "You have plenty of time, Father, there are two more numbers before yours," caused the various performers to open their eyes, and when Eleanor turned to those in the room, saying sweetly, "Girls, this is my father. He is going to play for us," astonishment looked out from every face. In order that the surprise might be complete, Grace had purposely withheld until the last moment the posters bearing Guido Savelli's name. When the two pages placed them up on their respective standards, a positive sigh of astonishment went up from the audience that changed to vociferous applause as Eleanor appeared and took her place at the piano. A second later the great Savelli walked on the stage, violin in hand. Eleanor, having frequently accompanied him on the piano in private, had begged to be allowed for once to accompany him in public. As the delighted audience listened to the music of the man whose playing had won for him the homage of two continents, they realized that they had been granted an unusual privilege. "How did he happen to stray into Overton?" "I supposed great artists like him never condescended to play outside of the large cities," were the whispered comments. One stately old gentleman in particular, who had been the guest of the president at dinner, and who sat beside him during the performance, grew enthusiastically curious, asking all sorts of questions. Who had planned and managed the entertainment? What was the object of the "Semper Fidelis Club"? How long had it been in existence? Who had been on familiar enough terms with Savelli to induce him to play at the "show"? The president answered his questions with becoming patience, promising to introduce him to Grace Harlowe and Arline Thayer, who, he stated, had been responsible for the organization of the club. Later, the curious old gentleman was presented to Grace and Arline, who answered his flow of inquiries so courteously and with such apparent good will that he left the hall, smiling to himself as though he had gained possession of some wonderful bit of information. The vaudeville show netted the Semper Fidelis Club two hundred dollars, which Arline deposited in the bank the following morning. "'Every little bit helps'" chuckled Arline as she opened the bank book and pointed to the new entry. She and Grace were on their way from the bank. "I should say it did," returned Grace warmly. "I only wish we could always make money as easily and pleasantly as we made that two hundred dollars." "It was lots of fun, wasn't it?" declared Arline happily. "When we come back next fall as juniors we can give another show and add to our fund. We won't have time this year. We are all going home next week and after Easter it will be too late in the year to bother with entertainments." "We might give a carnival in the gymnasium next fall," suggested Grace. "We had a bazaar at home and made over five hundred dollars. If we gave it early in the fall we would have as much as a thousand dollars on hand to lend where it was needed. I imagine we can find plenty of places for it." "We can be thinking about it through the summer," planned Arline. That night when Grace reached Wayne Hall she found a letter bearing her address in the bulletin board at the foot of the stairs. After glancing curiously at the superscription, Grace tore it open and read: "To MISS GRACE HARLOWE, "Wayne Hall, "Overton. "MY DEAR MISS HARLOWE: "I am enclosing a check made payable to you, which I should like you to accept in behalf of the Semper Fidelis Club. I am greatly interested in your association and wish to say that at this time each year as long as the club exists I pledge myself to contribute the same amount of money. Trusting that the club will continue to thrive and prosper, "Yours very truly, "THOMAS REDFIELD." Grace lay down the letter and stared at the check with incredulous eyes. It was for one thousand dollars. It took but an instant to dart down the hall to Miriam's room, where Anne had just gone to borrow Miriam's Thesaurus. "Look, look!" cried Grace, holding the check before Anne's astonished eyes. Miriam rose from her chair and peered over Anne's shoulder. "Three cheers for Mr. Redfield!" she exclaimed. Three cheers for the fairy godfather of Semper Fidelis! CHAPTER XXII CAMPUS CONFIDENCES After the Easter vacation there seemed very little left of the college year. Spring overtook the Overton girls unawares, and golf, tennis, Saturday afternoon picnics and walking tours crowded even basketball off their schedule. It was delightful just to stroll about the fast-greening campus arm in arm with one's best friend under the smiling blue of an April sky. It was ideal weather for planning for the future, but it was anything but conducive to study. "It's a good thing we work like mad in the winter," grumbled Elfreda Briggs, giving her Horace a vindictive little shove that sent it sliding to the floor. "I can't remember anything now, except that the grass is green, the sky is blue--" "Sugar is sweet, and so are you," supplemented Miriam Nesbit slyly. "That wasn't what I was going to say at all," retorted Elfreda reprovingly. "Then I beg your pardon," returned Miriam, with mock contrition. "What were you going to say?" "Nothing much," grinned Elfreda, "except that I was weighed to-day and I've lost five pounds. I am down to one hundred and forty-five pounds now. If I can lose five pounds more this summer I shall be in fine condition for basketball next fall." "You did splendid work on the sub team this year," replied Miriam warmly. "I am sure that you will make the regular team next fall." "The upper class girls say they have very little time for basketball," mused Elfreda. "All kinds of other stunts crowd it out. I'm not going to be like that, though. I love to play and I shall manage to find time for it." "Where is Grace to-night?" asked Elfreda. "I didn't see her at dinner." "She had a dinner engagement with Mabel Ashe." "Vinton's?" asked Elfreda. Miriam nodded. "Grace is lucky," sighed Elfreda. "She is always being invited to something or other. Her dinner partners always materialize, too," she added ruefully. "Which is more than can be said of some of yours," laughed Miriam. "Strange you never found out about that, isn't it?" It was Elfreda's turn to nod. "I have often thought I would go to Miss Atkins and ask her why she left me to languish dinnerless in my room after inviting me to eat, drink and be merry," mused Elfreda. "I hate to go home with the mystery unsolved. I believe I will go ask her now," she declared, with sudden energy. "I know she's alone, for the Enigma isn't there to-night." Elfreda had recently bestowed this title upon Mildred Taylor on account of her inexplicable attitude toward Grace. "I have been disappointed in little Miss Taylor," remarked Miriam slowly. "I was so sure that she would prove another Arline Thayer. She had the same fascinating little ways and at first she seemed so genuinely frank and straightforward." "I wonder what made her change so suddenly," said Elfreda, walking to the door, "and toward Grace, especially. She doesn't speak to Grace when she meets her. She is an Enigma and no mistake. Now for our friend the Anarchist. If I don't come back within a reasonable length of time you will know that I have been annihilated." Ten minutes went by, then ten more. At the end of half an hour Miriam wondered slightly at her roommate's continued absence. Just before time for the dinner bell to ring, Elfreda burst into the room with: "Miriam, will you help me to dress? I am invited to dinner and this time I am going. The An--Miss Atkins has forgiven me, peace has been restored and we are going out to dine, arm in arm." Elfreda pranced jubilantly about the room, then flinging open the door of the wardrobe brought forth two large boxes that had come by express the day before, one of them containing her new spring hat, the other a smart suit of natural pongee. [Illustration: The Two Boxes Contained Elfreda's New Suit and Hat.] "Stop hurrying for a minute and give me a true and faithful account of this miracle," demanded Miriam. "I had begun to think the worst had happened. What did you say first, and what did she say?" "The door of her room stood partly open and I knocked on it, then marched in without an invitation," replied Elfreda. "She was so surprised she forgot to be angry, and before she had time to remember that she didn't like me I surprised her still further by asking her to tell me why she had refused to speak to me for so long. Before she knew it she had stammered something about Grace and I calling her names and making fun of her behind her back when she had asked me in all good faith to have dinner with her at Vinton's. She declared she had heard us. "The instant she said that I remembered that I had mimicked her that night while dressing and that Grace had laughed, but had said in the same breath, that it wasn't fair. So I asked her point blank if that was what she meant, and she said 'yes,' only she hadn't waited long enough to hear what Grace had said about unfairness. She had come to the door just in time to hear me mimic her, and had rushed back to her room angry and hurt. Then I explained to her that I had a bad trick of imitating even my friends, and that I had offended more than one person by my thoughtlessness. I was really dreadfully sorry and asked her to forgive me. She had half a mind not to do it, then she relented, smiled a little and actually offered me her hand. Of course, after that I stayed a few minutes to talk things over with her and she proposed going to dinner. She is changed. In just what way I can't explain, except that she is more gentle and not quite so prim. Will you look in the top drawer of the chiffonier and see if I put my gold beads in that green box? You know the one I mean." Miriam obediently opened the drawer and taking the beads from the box deftly fastened them about Elfreda's neck. "Grace will be glad to hear of this," she remarked. "May I tell her and Anne?" "Yes," returned Elfreda, "but please don't tell any one else." Pinning on her new hat she hurried off to keep her long-delayed engagement with the now thoroughly pacified Anarchist. When the dinner bell rang, Miriam suddenly remembered that of the four friends she was the only stay-at-home that night. Anne had gone to take supper and spend the evening with Ruth Denton. As she took her seat at the table she noted that Emma Dean's and Mildred Taylor's places were also vacant. "Where is everyone to-night?" asked Irene Evans, who sat opposite Miriam. "Grace, Anne and Elfreda were all invited out this evening," answered Miriam. "I don't know anything about Miss Dean and Miss Taylor." "Emma is spending the evening with her cousin, that other Miss Dean of Ralston House," replied Irene. "Miss Taylor," she shrugged her shoulders slightly, "is with Miss Wicks and Miss Hampton, I suppose." "I don't think I shall overstudy to-night," announced Miriam, a little later, as she rose from the table. "I'm going for a walk. Want to go with me?" "I'm sorry," replied Irene regretfully, "but I've a frightfully hard chemistry lesson ahead of me to-night." It had been an unusually balmy April and now that the moon was at the full, the Overton girls took advantage of the fine nights to walk up and down College Street or the campus. Sure of finding some one she knew, Miriam slipped on her sweater, and, disdaining a hat, strolled down the street toward the campus. Exchanging numerous greetings with students, she wandered aimlessly across the campus toward a seat built against a tree where she and Grace had had more than one quiet session. As she neared the seat, which was somewhat in the shadow, she gave a little startled exclamation. A girl was crouching at the darkest end of the seat, her face hidden in her hands. Turning away, Miriam was about to recross the campus when the utter despondency of the girl's attitude caused her to go back. Stopping directly in front of the bowed figure, she said gently, "Can I help you?" The girl rose, and without answering was about to hurry away, when Miriam, after one swift glance at her face, ran after her, exclaiming, "Wait a moment, Miss Taylor!" Mildred Taylor stopped and eyed Miriam defiantly. Despite her expression of bravado, she looked as though she had been crying. "What do you want?" she asked in a low voice. "To talk with you," said Miriam boldly, stepping forward and slipping her arm through Mildred's. "Shall we sit down here and begin? All my friends have deserted me to-night. There were ever so many vacant places at the dinner table. I noticed you were away, too." "I--I--have--haven't had any dinner," faltered Mildred. Then, staring disconsolately at her companion for an instant, she dropped her head on her arm and gave way to violent sobbing. "I am so miserable," she wailed. Miriam sat silent, touched by Mildred's distress, yet undecided what to do. Things were evidently going badly with the "cute" little girl. "She has done something she is sorry for," was Miriam's reflection. After a slight deliberation she said gently, "Is there anything you wish to tell me, Miss Taylor?" Mildred raised her head, regarding Miriam with troubled, hopeless eyes. Miriam took one of the little girl's hands in hers. "Do not be afraid to tell me," she said earnestly. "I am your friend." "You wouldn't be if you knew what a miserable, contemptible coward I am," muttered Mildred. "I can't tell you anything. Please go away." Her head dropped to her arm again. Miriam, still holding her other hand, patted it comfortingly. "No one is infallible, Miss Taylor. I once felt just as you do to-night. Only I am quite sure that my fault was much graver than yours can possibly be." Mildred raised her head with a jerk. She looked at Miriam incredulously. "I don't think _you_ ever did anything very contemptible," she said sceptically. "Let me tell you about it," replied Miriam soberly. "Then you can judge for yourself. The person whom I wronged has long since forgiven me, but I can never quite forgive myself or forget. It was during my first year in high school that I began behaving very badly toward a new girl in the freshman class, of whom I was jealous. I was the star pupil of the class until she came, then she proved herself my equal if not my superior in class standing, and I tried in every way to discredit her in the eyes of her teachers and her friends. At the end of the freshman year, a sum of money was offered as a prize to the freshman who averaged highest in her final examinations. Feeling sure that this other girl would win it, I managed, with the help of some one as dishonest as myself, to gain possession of the examination questions, but before I had finished with them, I was obliged to drop them in a hurry, to escape discovery by the principal. By the merest chance the girl I disliked happened along just in time to be suspected of tampering with the papers. But she had friends who fought loyally for her and cleared her of the suspicion. "She won the prize. Nothing was ever said to me about it, but I knew that the principal and at least four girls in school knew what I had done. When I entered the sophomore class in the fall I felt a positive hatred for this girl and for her friends. I did all sorts of cruel, despicable things that year, and succeeded in dividing my class into two factions who opposed each other at every point. "Toward the last of the year I grew tired of being so disagreeable. My conscience began to trouble me seriously. Then, one day, the two girls I despised did me a great service, and my enmity toward them died out forever. "I can't begin to tell you how differently I felt after I had acknowledged my fault and been forgiven. Those girls are my dearest friends now. You know them, too." "You--you don't mean Miss Harlowe and Miss Pierson?" asked Mildred in a low tone, her eyes fixed upon Miriam. Miriam nodded. "Grace and Anne are the most charitable girls I ever knew," she said softly, "If they were not they would never have forgiven me. Anne was the girl who won the prize. Grace was one of the friends who stood by her. If you feel that you have done some one an injustice, you will not be happy until you have righted matters. If the person refuses to forgive you, you at least will have done your part." "I can't go to the--the--person and tell her," faltered Mildred. "I should die of humiliation." "But you don't wish to go away from Overton carrying this burden with you," persisted Miriam. "It will weigh heavily upon you when you come back next fall--" "I'm not coming back next fall," mumbled Mildred. "I shall never again be happy at Overton." "Brace up, and square things with the other girl, and you'll feel differently," retorted Miriam. "If it were any one else besides Miss Harlowe," began Mildred. "Oh, I am so sorry you told me her name!" exclaimed Miriam regretfully. "Now that I know it is Grace, however, I shall redouble my advice about going to her. You need have no fear that she will not forgive you. Grace never holds grudges." "I can't do it," declared Mildred tremulously, "I am afraid." Miriam looked at her companion rather doubtfully. "I think Grace is the person with whom to talk this matter over," she declared. "Suppose we go over to Wayne Hall now? She went to dinner at Vinton's with Mabel Ashe, but she must be at the hall by this time." "Oh, I can't," gasped Mildred nervously, "Yes, yes, I will if you will come with me while I tell her." "I think it would be better for you to go to her by yourself," said Miriam dubiously. "I can't do it," protested Mildred miserably. "Please, please come with me." "Then, let us go now," returned Miriam decisively. "We may catch Grace at home and alone." During the walk across the campus the two girls exchanged no words. Mildred was trying to summon all her courage in order to make the dreaded confession. Miriam was thinking of the day that belonged to the long ago when she had confessed her fault, and, joining hands with Anne Pierson and Grace Harlowe, had sworn eternal friendship. She felt only the deepest sympathy for the unhappy little girl at her side, for having been through a similar experience she understood clearly the struggle that was going on in Mildred's mind. Twice the little freshman stopped short, declaring she could not and would not go on, and each time, with infinite patience, Miriam buoyed and restored to firmness her shaking resolution. "You do not know Grace Harlowe," Miriam said as they neared Wayne Hall, "or you would not be afraid to go to her and tell her what you have just told me. She is neither revengeful nor unforgiving, and I am sure that she will be only too glad to help you begin all over again." "But not here at Overton," quavered Mildred. "You can decide that later," Miriam said kindly, as they entered the house. But she smiled to herself, for she felt reasonably sure that Mildred would come back to Overton for her sophomore year. CHAPTER XXIII A FAULT CONFESSED Grace came home from Vinton's with the firm intention of putting in a full evening of study. "It is only half-past eight," she exulted. "I'll have plenty of time for everything. I suppose Anne won't be home until the last minute's grace." As she passed through the hall to the stairs she poked her head inquisitively into the living room. Three or four girls sat at the library table industriously engaged in writing. Grace turned away without disturbing them, and went quietly up the stairs. As she walked down the hall to her own room she noticed that Miriam's room was dark. "I wonder where the girls are!" Grace exclaimed. "I didn't know they were to be away to-night, too. Perhaps they have gone for a walk." Grace lighted the gas in her own room and, hanging up her hat, sat down in the Morris chair, beside the table on which lay her books piled ready for work. "If no one bothers me for the next hour and the girls obligingly stay away, the rest will be easy," she smiled to herself as she worked at her French. At five minutes of ten she closed her text book on chemistry with a triumphant bang. "Nothing left to do now but my theme and that can wait until to-morrow night. I think I'll read until the girls come in." Grace reached for her book, which lay on the table conveniently near her, opened it at the place she had marked and began to read. She had not read more than two or three pages when, through the half opened door, came the sound of voices. Grace's gray eyes opened in surprise as Miriam Nesbit walked into the room followed by Mildred Taylor. "I thought you would be here," greeted Miriam. Grace rose and walked toward Mildred. Without the slightest show of hesitation she held out her hand. "I am glad to see you, Mildred. Why haven't you come in before?" she asked frankly. Mildred looked from Miriam to Grace. "I can't tell you why!" she exclaimed in a choked, frightened voice. "I thought I could, but I can't." She began to cry softly. Grace sprang to her side, and, placing her arm about the little girl's waist, said soothingly, "Don't cry, and don't tell us anything you don't wish to tell. I am so glad you came at all. The early part of the year I thought we were going to be friends. I am sorry I hurt your feelings on the night of the sophomore reception. I told you so then, but I am afraid you thought I didn't mean what I said." "It wasn't that," quavered Mildred, wiping her eyes. "It was--it was--I had no business to take it. It was stealing!" Miriam looked sharply at Mildred's distressed face, as though trying to gain some inkling of what was to come. Grace's expression was one of anxious concern. Neither girl spoke. "I might as well tell you, Grace," went on Mildred in a low, shamed voice. "I am the person who stole your theme. I found it at the foot of the stairs. I did not look at the name written on it until I was in my own room. I ought to have given it to you at once, but I stopped to read it. It was so clever I wished I had written it. Themes are my weak point, and Miss Duncan had criticised my work so severely that I was feeling blue and discouraged. Then came the temptation to take your theme, copy it, and hand it in as my own. You had lost it, so you would never know what became of it. You could write another theme as easily as you had written that. It did occur to me that you might be able to rewrite that particular theme from memory. So I changed the title of your theme, copied it that night and changed the ending a little and took particular pains to hand it in early the next morning, so that if any suspicion were aroused it would not fall on me, but on you. It was thoroughly contemptible in me, and after I handed in the theme I felt like a criminal. When Miss Duncan sent for me, I grew frightened and instead of owning to what I had done I told more lies and tried to make it appear that you were the real offender. At first she believed me, but afterward she didn't, and made me admit that I had lied. When she told me about promising you that she would give me another chance and that you neither knew nor cared to know my name, I could hardly believe it. Since that time I've never dared to speak to you. I have been so dreadfully ashamed." Her voice broke. "Don't think about it ever again," comforted Grace. "Everyone is likely to make mistakes. I think you have suffered enough for yours. I am sure you would never do any such thing again." Mildred shook her head vigorously. "Never," she declared sadly. Miriam, who had listened to the little girl's confession, an inscrutable expression on her dark face, said practically, "Was there anything besides what you have told us that made you unhappy to-night?" "Why--why," stammered Mildred. "Yes, there was. How did you know?" "I didn't know," declared Miriam dryly. "I just wondered." "It was something that made me unhappy, yet glad, too," said Mildred, her face flushing. "I thought I hated Grace and said horrid things about her to two other girls I know, who are not her friends. To-night I was with them at Martell's, and I quarreled with them about you girls. Ever since I heard Savelli play at your entertainment I have felt differently about everything. His music brought me to my real self and made me realize how small and mean and contemptible I was. I discovered that it was not you but myself I hated, and when these girls began to say things about you, all of a sudden I found myself standing up for you as staunchly as ever I could. Then we quarreled and I got up from the table and almost ran out of Martell's. "I walked and walked until I was all tired out. Then I sat down on that seat by the tree where Miriam found me. In defending you, Grace, I found myself. I saw clearly that my college life was all wrong. The mean things I had done stared me in the face. The theme was the worst of all. No wonder I cried. Now that I've told you everything I am happier than I have been since last fall. Next year I am going to start all over again in some other college where no one knows me." "Besides yourself, there are only three who know, Miriam, Miss Duncan and I," said Grace slowly. "When Miss Duncan sent for me about the theme I told myself then that, although I had no desire to know the name of the other girl, if ever I should learn her identity I would try to be the best friend she ever had. I am ready to keep my word, Mildred, if you are ready to come back to Overton next year and help me keep it." Mildred glanced timidly from Grace to Miriam. "I'd love to come back," she faltered, "only I'm afraid you girls would never believe in me again." "My friends did," reminded Miriam softly, extending her hand to Mildred. "I believe in you now." "Of course we will believe in you," declared Grace cheerfully. "Come back next fall and give us a chance to show you that we trust you." "I will," answered Mildred with solemn resolution, "but you shall give me the chance to show you that your trust is not misplaced. Good night," she put out her hand again rather uncertainly. Grace's hand went quickly out to meet it, holding it in a warm, friendly clasp, and Mildred went to her room a changed girl. "How did you happen to be her confessor, Miriam?" asked Grace wonderingly, after the freshman had gone. Miriam related the evening's happenings. "I never even suspected her," said Grace. "I believed her to be angry with me for overlooking her at the reception. I always tried not to think of any particular girl as being guilty of taking my theme. It has turned out beautifully, hasn't it?" "Yes," nodded Miriam. "As a matter of fact everything generally does turn out well in the end if one has the patience to wait." CHAPTER XXIV CONCLUSION "Two more days, then good-bye to Overton," mourned Elfreda Briggs sadly. The stout girl was seated on the floor, the contents of her trunk spread broadcast about her. "Elfreda would like to stay here and study all summer," remarked Miriam slyly to Anne, who was watching Elfreda's movements with amused eyes. "Oh, no, I wouldn't," retorted Elfreda good-naturedly. "I am as anxious to go home as the rest of you, but I'm sorry to leave here, too. What's the use in explaining?" she grumbled, catching sight of her friends' laughing faces. "You girls know what I mean, only you will tease me." "Never mind, we won't tease It any more," said Miriam soothingly. "There is only one thing you can do to convince me that you are in earnest," stipulated Elfreda. "Name it," laughed Anne. "Invite me to a banquet, and have cakes and lemonade," was the calm request. "I thought you were strongly opposed to sweet things," commented Anne. "Not at the sad, sorrowful end of the sophomore year," returned Elfreda, impressively. "Besides, lemonade isn't fattening." "And it will be such splendid exercise for you to make it," added Miriam mischievously. Elfreda looked disapprovingly at Miriam, then a broad smile illuminated her round face. "So nice of you to think about the exercise," she beamed affectedly. "Lead me to the lemons." Miriam rose, took Elfreda by the arm, and leading her to the closet, pointed upward to the shelf. Elfreda grasped the paper bag with a giggle. Then Miriam led her calmly out again, just in time to encounter Grace, Mabel Ashe and Frances Marlton, who, in passing down the hall, had heard voices, and could not resist stopping for a moment. "What is going on here?" asked Mabel curiously. "Why is J. Elfreda in leading strings?" "She is taking exercise," replied Miriam gravely. "J. Elfreda, explain to the lady." "This exercise is compulsory," grinned Elfreda. "No exercise, no lemonade. Of course, you will stay and have some." "Of course," agreed Mabel. "I may not have a chance for a very long time to drink lemonade again with the Wayne Hallites." "You mustn't say that," remonstrated Grace. "Remember, you are going to visit me at Oakdale. Elfreda is going to visit Miriam. Can't you can arrange to come, too, Frances?" "I'm sorry," declared Frances, shaking her head, "but we are going to sail for Europe within a week after I reach home. I shall have to say good-bye in earnest on Thursday. But I'll write you, and make you a visit some time." "How comfortingly definite. I'll see you again during the next hundred years," jeered Mabel. "You know I don't mean that," reproached Frances. "I do intend before the end, This happy couple shall meet again," chanted Elfreda as she peered into the lemonade pitcher. "Precisely," laughed Frances. "Did you play 'Needle's eye' when you were a little girl, Elfreda?" "Yes, and 'London Bridge' and 'King William was King James's son,' too. I always loved to play, but was hardly ever chosen because I was so fat and ungainly. I remember once, though, when I went to a children's party in a pale blue silk dress that made me look like a young mountain. I thought myself superlatively beautiful, however, and the rest of the little girls were so impressed that I was a great social triumph, and made up for the times when I had been passed by," concluded Elfreda humorously. "Your adventures are worthy of recording and publishing," said Anne lightly. "Write a book and call it 'The Astonishing Adventures of Elfreda'." The stout girl eyed Anne reflectively, the lemon squeezer poised in one hand. "That's a good idea," she said coolly. "I'll do it when I come back next fall. Now I'm not going to say another word until I finish this lemonade, so don't speak to me." When she left the room for ice water, Mabel Ashe observed warmly, "She is a credit to 19--, isn't she?" "Yes," returned Grace. "They are beginning to find it out, too." "Your sophomore days have been peaceful, compared with last year," remarked Frances Marlton. "Certain girls have kept strictly in the background." "We have not been obliged to resort to ghost parties this year," reminded Mabel Ashe. "It requires ghosts to lay ghosts, you know." Grace could have remarked with truth that certain ghosts had not been laid as effectually as she desired, but wisely keeping her own counsel she was about to essay a change of subject when the return of Elfreda with the lemonade served her purpose. "'How can I bear to leave thee?'" quoted Mabel sentimentally, as she and Frances reluctantly rose to go half an hour later. "I hope you feel properly flattered. Graduates' attentions are at a premium this week. They ought to be, too, when one stops to think that it takes four years to reach that dizzy height of popularity. Four long years of slavish toil, my children. Observe my careworn air, my rapidly graying locks, my deeply-lined countenance." "Yes, observe them," grinned Elfreda. "You look younger than Anne, and she looks like a mere chee--ild. Don't forget that you are going to send us pictures of you in your cap and gown, will you?" she added, looking affectionately at the two pretty seniors, whose help and kindly interest had meant much to her individually. "We will see you to the door," laughed Grace, slipping her arm through Mabel's. "Did you ever find the girl?" asked Mabel in a low tone. "You know the one I mean. I have often wondered about her." "Yes," replied Grace in the same guarded tones. "I can't tell even you her name, but everything has been explained." Mabel pressed Grace's arm in silent understanding. "Good-bye," she said, "we shall see you again before we leave Overton." "You had better come into our room and finish the lemonade," declared Miriam, as they watched their guests go down the walk. "But I haven't begun my packing yet, and I have so many things to do and so many girls to see that I ought not waste a minute." "Time spent with us is never wasted," reminded Elfreda significantly. "Quite true," responded Grace gaily. "I am sorry I had to be reminded. To prove my sorrow I will help you with your packing, when I ought to be doing my own." "Come on, then," challenged Elfreda. She ran lightly up the stairs, her three friends at her heels. "I'll pour the lemonade while you and Grace pack," volunteered Miriam. "I choose to do nothing," said Anne lazily. "I am going to work all summer. I need a little rest now." "You won't know where you are to be for the summer until Mr. Forest writes, will you?" asked Miriam. "The Originals will be lonesome without you, Anne," mourned Grace. "You must be sure to visit me. That is, unless you are too far west." "I am going to have a visitor of my own," announced Elfreda proudly. "You can never guess who it is." "I know," laughed Anne, after a moment's reflection. "It is the Anar--Miss Atkins, I mean." "Who told you?" demanded Elfreda. "It is true, though. She is coming to Fairview the last two weeks in July, and I am going to give her the time of her life. Just think, girls, she has never had any girl friends until she came here. Her mother died when she was a baby, and a prim old aunt kept house for them. Her father is Professor Archibald Atkins, that Natural Scientist who went to Africa and was held captive by a tribe of savages for two years. "Living with the heathen didn't improve him, for when he came home he behaved so queerly that people thought him crazy. Then the aunt, who was the professor's sister, died, and poor Laura had to live alone with her father in a great big country house. Finally, she grew so tired of it she asked him to send her to college. She had always had a tutor, so she was ready for the entrance examinations, but she had never associated with other girls and didn't know much about them. I can't feel sorry enough for calling her names and imitating her. We had a long talk at Martell's the other night and I am going to be her knight errant from now on." "You found the rainbow side of your sophomore year in helping some one else, didn't you, Elfreda?" "I don't know what you are talking about," rejoined Elfreda bluntly. "I know you don't," laughed Grace. "It was nothing much. Last year at this time Anne and I were lamenting because we couldn't be freshmen all over again, and Anne said that being a sophomore was sure to have its rainbow side." "It has been the nicest year of my life," said Elfreda earnestly. "If being a junior is any nicer than being a sophomore--well--you will have to show me. There, I've ended by using slang. But I've found my rainbow side in another way, too." "Name it," challenged Miriam mischievously. "By losing twenty pounds," announced Elfreda, with proud triumph. "I weigh one hundred and forty pounds now, and next fall you will see me on the team, or it won't be my fault." "I hope I shall have time for basketball," said Grace. "There will be so many other things. Remember, girls, if during vacation you think of any good plan for the Semper Fidelis Club to make money, make a note of it. Just because we have money in our treasury, we mustn't become lazy. We will find plenty of uses for every cent we can earn. There are dozens of girls struggling through Overton who need help." "You never told us to what girls you and Arline played Santa Claus last winter, Grace," said Elfreda reproachfully. "And I never will," laughed Grace, "and Arline won't tell, either." "I know something, too," declared Elfreda, "but I'm not as stingy as Grace. I know who poked that envelope with the ten dollars in it under Grace's door." "Who?" came simultaneously from the three girls. "Mildred Taylor," replied Elfreda. "I saw her do it. I was just coming down the hall that night as she slipped it under the door and ran away. I never told any one, because I could see she didn't want any one to know she did it." "Elfreda always sees more than appears on the surface," commented Miriam mischievously. "Elfreda's energy has inspired me to go to my room and begin my own packing," declared Anne, rising. "I'll go with you," volunteered Grace. "I think Elfreda can be trusted to finish her packing by herself." "I think I'll accomplish more, at any rate," declared Elfreda pointedly. "It is half over, Anne, dear," said Grace, almost wistfully, as they strolled down the hall, school girl fashion, their arms about each other's waists. "Our life at Overton, you mean?" asked Anne. Grace nodded. "I was sure I should never like college as well as high school, but I've found it even nicer." "And we are going to like being juniors best of all," predicted Anne. How completely the truth of Anne's prediction was proven will be found in "Grace Harlowe's Third Year at Overton College." THE END. 
41858	----	Transcriber's Note: Inconsistent hyphenation and spelling in the original document have been preserved. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. Italic text is denoted by _underscores_ and un-italicized text by =equal signs=. SMITH COLLEGE STORIES SMITH COLLEGE STORIES TEN STORIES BY JOSEPHINE DODGE DASKAM NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS MCM _Copyright, 1900, by Charles Scribner's Sons_ _D. B. Updike, The Merrymount Press, Boston_ _To my Mother, who sent me to college, I offer these impressions of it._ _J. D. D._ PREFACE If these simple tales serve to deepen in the slightest degree the rapidly growing conviction that the college girl is very much like any other girl--that this likeness is, indeed, one of her most striking characteristics--the author will consider their existence abundantly justified. J. D. D. CONTENTS I _The Emotions of a Sub-guard_ 1 II _A Case of Interference_ 37 III _Miss Biddle of Bryn Mawr_ 67 IV _Biscuits ex Machina_ 85 V _The Education of Elizabeth_ 123 VI _A Family Affair_ 151 VII _A Few Diversions_ 205 VIII _The Evolution of Evangeline_ 247 IX _At Commencement_ 279 X _The End of It_ 321 THE FIRST STORY _THE EMOTIONS OF A SUB-GUARD_ I THE EMOTIONS OF A SUB-GUARD Theodora pushed through the yellow and purple crowd, a sea of flags and ribbons and great paper flowers, caught a glimpse of the red and green river that flowed steadily in at the other door, and felt her heart contract. What a lot of girls! And the freshmen were always beaten-- "Excuse me, but I _can't_ move! You'll have to wait," said some one. Theodora realized that she was crowding, and apologized. A tall girl with a purple stick moved by the great line that stretched from the gymnasium to the middle of the campus, and looked keenly at Theodora. "How did you get here?" she asked. "You must go to the end--we're not letting any one slip in at the front. The jam is bad enough as it is." Theodora blushed. "I'm--I'm on the Sub-team," she murmured, "and I'm late. I--" "Oh!" said the junior. "Why did you come in here? You go in the other door. Just pass right in here, though," and Theodora, quite crimson with the consciousness of a hundred eyes, pulled her mackintosh about her and slipped in ahead of them all. Oh, _here's_ to Ninety-_yellow_, And her _praise_ we'll ever _tell_--_oh_, Drink her _down_, drink her _down_, drink her _down_, _down_, _down_! the line called after her, and her mouth trembled with excitement. She could just hear the other line: Oh, _here's_ to Ninety-_green_, She's the _finest_ ever _seen_! and then the door slammed and she was upstairs on the big empty floor. A member of the decorating committee nodded at her from the gallery. "Pretty, isn't it?" she called down. "Beautiful!" said Theodora, earnestly. One half of the gallery--her half--was all trimmed with yellow and purple. Great yellow chrysanthemums flowered on every pillar, and enormous purple shields with yellow numerals lined the wall. Crossed banners and flags filled in the intervals, and from the middle beam depended a great purple butterfly with yellow wings, flapping defiance at a red and green insect of indistinguishable species that decorated the other side. A bevy of ushers in white duck, with _boutonnières_ of English violets or single American beauties, took their places and began to pin on crêpe paper sunbonnets of yellow or green, chattering and watching the clock. A tall senior, with a red silk waist and a green scarf across her breast, was arranging a box near the centre of the sophomore side and practising maintaining her balance on it while she waved a red baton. She was the leader of the Glee Club, and she would lead the sophomore songs. Theodora heard a confused scuffle on the stairs, and in a few seconds the galleries were crowded with the rivers of color that poured from the entrance doors. It seemed that they were full now, but she knew that twice as many more would crowd in. She walked quickly to the room at the end of the hall and opened the door. Beneath and all around her was the hum and rumble of countless feet and voices, but in the room all was still. The Subs lounged in the window-seats and tried to act as if it wasn't likely to be any affair of theirs: one little yellow-haired girl confided flippantly to her neighbor that she'd "only accepted the position so as to be able to sit on the platform and be sure of a good place." The Team were sitting on the floor staring at their captain, who was talking earnestly in a low voice--giving directions apparently. The juniors who coached them opened the door and grinned cheerfully. They attached great purple streamers to their shirt-waists, and addressed themselves to the freshmen generally. "Your songs are great! That 'Alabama Coon' one was awfully good! You make twice the noise that they do!" The Team brightened up. "I think they're pretty good," the captain said, with an attempt at a conversational tone. "Er--when do we begin?" "The Subs can go out now," said one of the coaches, opening the door importantly. "Now, girls, remember not to wear yourselves out with kicking and screaming. You're right under the President, and he'll have a fit if you kick against the platform. Miss Kassan says that this _must_ be a quiet game! She _will not_ have that howling! It's her particular request, she says. Now, go on. And if anything happens to Grace, Julia Wilson takes her place, _and look out for Alison Greer_--she pounds awfully. Keep as still as you can!" They trotted out and ranged themselves on the platform, and when Theodora got to the point of lifting her eyes from the floor to gaze down at the sophomore Subs across the hall in front of another audience, the freshmen were off in another song. To her excited eyes there were thousands of them, brilliant in purple and yellow, and shouting to be heard of her parents in Pennsylvania. A junior in yellow led them with a great purple stick, and they chanted, to a splendid march tune that made even the members of the Faculty keep time on the platform, their hymn to victory. _Hurrah!_ _hurrah!_ the _yellow_ is on _top_! _Hurrah!_ _hurrah!_ the _purple_ cannot _drop_! _We_ are Ninety-_yellow_ and our _fame_ shall never _stop_, _'Rah_, _'rah_, _'rah_, for the _freshmen_! They sang so well and so loud and strong, shouting out the words so plainly and keeping such splendid time, that as the verse and chorus died away audience and sophomores alike clapped them vigorously, much to their delight and pride. Theodora looked up for the first time and saw as in a dream individual faces and clothes. They were packed in the running-gallery till the smallest of babies would have been sorely tried to find a crevice to rest in. A fringe of skirts and boots hung from the edge, where the wearers sat pressed against the bars with their feet hanging over. They blotted out the windows and sat out on the great beams, dangling their banners into space. She could not see the Faculty behind her, but she knew they were adorned with rosettes, and that the favored ones carried flowers--the air where she sat was sweet with violets. A group of ushers escorted a small and nervous lady to the platform: on the way she threw back her cape and the sophomores caught sight of the green bow at her throat. Oh, _here's_ to Susan _Beane_, She is _wearing_ of the _green_, Drink her _down_, drink her _down_, drink her _down_, _down_, _down_! they sang cheerfully. Just behind her a tall, commanding woman stalked somewhat consciously, decked with yellow streamers and daffodils. The junior leader consulted a list in her hand, frantically whispered some words to the allies around her box, and the freshmen started up their tribute. Oh, _here's_ to Kath'rine _Storrs_, Aught but _yellow_ she _abhors_, Drink her _down_, drink her _down_, drink her _down_, _down_, _down_! Miss Storrs endeavored to convey with her glance, dignity, amusement, toleration of harmless sport, and a repudiation of the personality involved in the song; but it is to be doubted if even she was satisfied with the result. Theodora wished she had seen the President come in. She had been told how he walked solemnly across the hall, mounted the platform, unbuttoned his overcoat, and displayed two gorgeous rosettes of the conflicting colors--his official and exclusive privilege. And she had heard from the Team's retreat the thunder of applause that greeted this traditional rite. She wondered whether he cared who won: whether he realized what it was to play against a team that had beaten in its freshman year. A burst of applause and laughter interrupted her meditations. She felt herself blushing--was it the Team? No: the sophomore Subs were escorting to the middle of the floor a child of five or six dressed in brightest emerald green: a child with a mane of the most remarkable brick-red hair in the world. She wore it in the fashion of Alice in Wonderland, and it grew redder and redder the longer one looked at it. She held a red ribbon of precisely the same shade in her hand, and at the middle of the floor the sophomores suddenly burst away from her and ran quickly to their seats, revealing at the end of the ribbon an enormous and lifelike green frog. The child stood for a moment twisting her little green legs undecidedly, and then, overcome with embarrassment at the appreciation she had evoked, shook her flaming locks over her face, and dragging the frog with her, sometimes on its side, sometimes on its head, fled to the sophomores, who bore her off in triumph. "They got her in Williamsburgh," said somebody; "they've been hunting for weeks for a red-haired child, and that frog was from the drug store--oh, my dear, how _perfectly_ darling!" Alone and unabashed the freshman mascot took the floor. He was perhaps four years old and the color of a cake of chocolate. His costume was canary yellow--a perfect little jockey suit, with a purple band on his arm adorned with Ninety-yellow's class numerals. He dragged by a twisted cord of purple and yellow a most startling plum-colored terrier, of a shade that never was on land or sea, with a tendency to trip his master up at every step. In the exact middle of the floor the mascot paused, rolled his eyes till they seemed in danger of leaving their sockets, and then at a shrill whistle from the balcony pulled his yellow cap from his woolly head and made a deep and courtly bow to his patrons. But the storm of applause was more than he had been prepared for, and with a wild look about the hall and a frantic tug at the cord he dragged the purple and protesting animal to a corner of the room, where a grinning elder sister was stationed for his comfort. Theodora's heart beat high: theirs was the best! Everybody was laughing and exclaiming and questioning; the very sophomores were shrieking at the efforts of the terrier to drag the little darkey out again; one member of the Faculty had laughed himself into something very like hysteria and giggled weakly at every twitch of the idiotic purple legs. "It was Diamond Dyes," Theodora heard a freshman just above call out excitedly, "and Esther Armstrong thought of it. They dyed him every day for a week--" The mascot and the dog had trotted up again, and as they ran back and the animal gave a more than ordinarily vicious dart, the poor little boy, yielding suddenly, sat down with exquisite precision on his companion, and with distended eyes wailed aloud for his relative, who disentangled him with difficulty and bore him away, his cap over his ear and his little chocolate hands clutching her neck. In the comparative silence that followed the gale of laughter some bustle and conference was noticed on the sophomore side, and suddenly the leader rose, lifting her green and red stick, and the front line of sophomores and seniors intoned with great distinctness this thrilling doggerel: I never saw a purple pup: I never hoped to see one: But now my mind is quite made up-- I'd rather see than be one! This was received favorably, and the gallery congratulated the _improvisatrice_, while Theodora wondered if that detracted at all from the glory of the freshmen! The chattering began again, and she drummed nervously with her heels against the platform, while the Centre, sitting next her, prophesied gloomily that Grace Farwell felt awfully blue, and that Miss Kassan had said they were really almost too slight as a team--the sophomores were so tall and big. Harriet Foster had said that she was perfectly certain she 'd sprain her ankle--then who would guard Martha Sutton? It was all very well for Caroline Wilde to say not to worry about that--_she_ hadn't been able to guard her last year! She was just like a machine. Her arm went up and the ball went in; that was all there was to it. And Kate was as bad. They might just as well make up their minds-- "Oh, hush!" cried Theodora, her eyes full of nervous tears; "if you can't talk any other way, just keep still!" "Very well," said the Centre, huffily, and then the chattering died away as Miss Kassan made mysterious marks on the floor, and the coaches took their places with halves of lemon and glasses of water in their hands. A door opened, and in a dead hush the sophomore team trotted in, two and two, the Suttons leading, bouncing the big ball before them. There was such a silence that the thudding feet seemed to echo and ring through the hall, and only when Martha suddenly tossed it behind her at nothing and Kate from some corner walked over and caught it did the red and green burst forth in a long-drawn single shout: "Ninety-gre-e-e-e-e-n!" Miss Kassan looked apprehensive, but no _'Rah, 'rah, 'rah!_ followed; only,-- Here's to _Sutton M._ and _K._ And they'll _surely_ win the _day_, Drink 'em _down_, drink 'em _down_, drink 'em _down_, _down_, _down_! Theodora set her teeth. "Humph! Will they?" she muttered savagely. "Here they come!" cried the Centre, and they ran in, the big yellow numerals gleaming effectively against their dark suits, their braids bobbing behind them. Grace Farwell was quite pale, with one little spot of red in each cheek, but Harriet Foster was crimson with excitement, and the thick braids of auburn hair that fell over her breast bumped up and down as she breathed. The thunder of recognition died away, and they tossed the ball about nervously, with an eye on Miss Kassan, who handed a ball to her assistant and took her place on the line to watch fouls. "All ready!" said the assistant. There was a shuffling about, a confusion in the centre, a concentration of eyes. Harriet Foster took her place by Martha Sutton and sucked in her under lip; Grace lined up with Kate in the centre, clasping and unclasping her hands. Near her stood a tall slim girl with green numerals on her sleeve. Her soft dark hair was coiled lightly into a Greek knot--it seemed that the slightest hasty movement must shake it over her sloping shoulders. It grew into a clean-cut widow's peak low on her smooth white forehead; below straight, fine brows two great, sad, gray eyes, wide apart, wondered at life; her oval face was absolutely colorless and threw out the little scarlet mouth that drooped softly at the corners. Her hands lightly folded before her, she swayed a little and looked dreamily over the heads of the others; she seemed as incongruous as a Madonna at a bull-fight. "Who is that lovely girl in the middle?" said some one behind Theodora. "That is a Miss Greer," was the reply. "She is one of the best--" "Play!" called the assistant, and the big ball flew out of her hands into Kate Sutton's. Kate gave an indescribable twist of her shoulder, the ball rose in the air, passed over an utterly irrelevant scuffle in the centre, and landed in Martha's hands. Martha balanced it a moment and threw it into the exact middle of the basket, while the sophomores howled and pounded and the freshmen looked blankly at one another. They had not been accustomed to such simple and efficacious methods. "One to nothing!" said the assistant, quietly. "Play!" Theodora caught her breath. She dared not look at Grace, but she stared hard at Harriet. What was Harriet thinking? Not that she could have done anything--Martha was two inches taller and had the ball tight in her hands two seconds after the assistant had tossed it--Ah, what was that? The ball had reached the floor and Grace had somehow gotten it. She threw it to Virginia Wheeler, whose hands were just grazing it when something shot like a flash of lightning upon her. She fell back and some one slapped the ball from between her very finger-nails up, up into the air, where Kate caught it, and a few short, sharp, instantaneous passes got it into Martha's relentless hands. When it dropped into the basket Alison Greer was looking beyond the tumult, across the gallery, into the sky--white and unruffled. Theodora winked and tried to think that some one else had swooped down from her place six seconds before. The sophomores were shouting yet. Some one said: "That's as pretty a piece of team work as you'll often see, isn't it? Those twins have eyes in the backs of their heads." "Two to nothing--play!" said the assistant. Theodora did not see the next goal won. Through a mist she stared into the gallery. Her eye caught a face she knew, and she wondered angrily how Miss Carew could smile so nonchalantly--it was her own class! From the plume in her exquisite toque to the tip of her patent leather toe she looked the visiting lady of leisure. The little lace handkerchief dangling from her hand had a green silk monogram in the corner--how dared she wear green? She nodded at a senior, across the game, and fanned herself. The freshmen broke into a roar of delight that ended in a long-drawn _A-a-a-a-h!_ There was a scuffle, a little cry, a flash from Alison Greer's corner, and the assistant's "Three to nothing--play!" was drowned in the sophomore shouts. "You see the freshmen have no chance, really," said some one behind, calmly, and as if it made little matter at best. "They are terribly scared, of course, and they've never had the training of a big game. The sophomores have been all through this before--they don't mind the crowd. And then, they beat last year, and that gives them a tremendous confidence. They're so much bigger, too--" Theodora turned and stared at her. She was very pretty; she had a bunch of violets as big as her head pinned to her dress, and her hands were full of daffodils. That was like the Faculty! To take their flowers and talk that way! "Horrid thing! _Horrid_ thing!" she muttered, and the Centre, looking angrily at Miss Greer, assented. "She's a perfect tiger! Look at her eyes! She knocked Virginia right over--you couldn't stop her with a steam-engine--Oh! Oh! _Oh!_ _Ninety-yellow!_ _Rah, rah-a-a-a-ah!_" Right out of their hands it had slipped, and the two girls slid across the floor, fell, reached out, missed it, and gritted their teeth as the Centres, with a long-practised manoeuvre, passed it rapidly from hand to hand to Martha, whose long arm slid it imperturbably into the basket. "That Guard doesn't accomplish much," said somebody. "Good heavens, how can she? Look at the girl! She lays it in like--like that," was the answer, as the assistant called, "Five to nothing--play!" Theodora looked up at the purple and yellow gallery. The freshmen stared as if hypnotized at their steady misfortune, their faces flushed, their mouths tremulous: when the players ran to suck the half-lemon or kneeled to tighten their shoes, their class-mates held breath till they returned; when Grace got the ball or Virginia pushed it aside, they started a cheer that faded into a sigh as Alison Greer drove everything before her or Kate sent that terrible Sutton throw to her sister. Theodora suddenly started. Just before the ball left Kate, she threw up her left hand with the palm slightly spread, and some instinct moved Theodora to glance at Martha. Her left hand went up instantly as if to throw back a braid, but it waved toward the right, and while Harriet braced herself for a jump the ball flew into the air far off to the right and the instinctive motion toward Martha left the way clear for one of Alison Greer's rushes and sudden, birdlike throws. In a moment Martha had it, and as Harriet bent forward to guard, and the ball toppled unsteadily on the edge of the basket and fell off, in the midst of the hubbub and scuffle some one pushed heavily on Harriet, four hands grasped the ball firmly, somebody called, "Foul, foul!" and as five panting girls hurled themselves against the wall and the assistant tossed up where it fell, to make sure of fair play, Harriet dropped with her foot beneath her and did not get up. Martha put the ball in from an amazing distance, and in the storm of applause no one noticed the freshman Guard, till the cry of, "Six to nothing--play!" found her still sitting there. The ball was dropped, and they ran up to her. Two doctors hurried out; she half rose, fell back and bit her lip. The freshmen craned out over the gallery, the sophomores shook their heads; "Too bad, too bad!" they murmured. Two freshmen made a chair, lifted Harriet quickly and ran out with her, the doctors followed, and in the dead hush they heard her voice as the door closed. "I'm so sorry, girls--go right on--don't wait--" "Plucky girl," said a man's voice. "It's a shame!" The freshmen looked very blue; the team stood about in groups; the sophomores waited politely at one side. Martha went over to Grace and held her hand out: "I'm terribly sorry," she said earnestly, "it's too bad. They say your Subs are very good, though." Grace nodded, and ran over to the coaches, who walked aside with her for a moment, talking earnestly. Presently they came over to the platform and the Centre nudged Theodora enviously. "Go on!" she whispered. "Grace wants you!" Theodora gasped. "Not me--not me!" she objected feebly. "Me--guard--Martha Sutton!" "Go on!" said somebody, and they pushed her out. "Come on, Theodora--hurry up, now!" The people seemed to swim before her; for one dreadful moment she longed for her home as she had never longed before. Her knees shook and the clapping of the class sounded faraway. With her eyes on the floor she moved out; halfway to the centre Virginia Wheeler stepped to meet her and put her arm over Theodora's shoulder. "Don't be scared, Theo," she said, "don't be scared, but help us out--heaven knows we need it!" "Watch Martha--don't take your eyes off her!" whispered the coach as she handed the lemon to the new Guard. As in a dream Theodora passed to the lower basket. Martha patted her on the shoulder. "Hello!" she said in a bluff, friendly way, and then the assistant called, "Six to nothing, play!" and threw the ball. It dropped in the middle, and there was a terrible scrimmage for at least four minutes, while the people swayed and sighed and clapped and screamed, for the freshmen were getting terribly excited and rapidly losing their self-control, as it became evident that their team was struggling desperately and making one of the longest fights on record for the ball they were determined to have. It was almost in the basket, it tottered on the edge, it fell, and Kate Sutton caught it--how, no one knew, for it was nowhere near her. The freshmen were shrieking with rage, the sophomores clapping with triumph. Every eye in the hall was fixed on Kate Sutton--every eye but Theodora's. She watched Martha, and saw above her head that long brown hand wave ever so slightly to the left as she tossed her hair back. She braced herself, and just as Martha made a dash to the right, Theodora let her go and flew to the left. She went too far, but even as Martha dashed up behind her and put up her hands, Theodora jumped, caught the ball with her left hand and with her right hit it a ringing blow that sent it straight over to the other basket. It hit Alison Greer's head as she rushed toward it, and while she was raising her hand Grace Farwell snatched it from her shoulder, glanced desperately at the Home, who had lost them two balls, and bounded across, throwing the ball before her. The roar of delight from the freshmen was literally deafening, and as Grace put it into the basket it seemed to Theodora that the roof would surely drop. "Six to one and the first half's up," said somebody, and Theodora was pushed along with the Team--_her_ team--into the sanctum of their rest. But as they neared the door, the applause became a song, and before she quite understood what the verse was, it rang out above her head: Here's to _Theo_dora _Root_, She's our _dandy_ substi_toot_, Drink her _down_, drink her _down_, drink her _down_, _down_, _down_! Any one who has never been a subject of song to some hundreds of young women cannot perhaps understand why the mention of one's name in flattering doggerel should be so distinctly and immediately affecting. But any one who has had that experience knows the little contraction of the heart, the sudden hot tightening of the eyelids, the confused, excited desire to be worthy of all that trust and admiration. It is to be doubted if Theodora ever again felt so ideally, impersonally devoted to any cause, so pathetically eager to "make them proud of her." In the little room the Team dropped on the floor and panted. The coaches bustled in with water, shook the hand of the new Guard and told her to lie flat and not talk. A strong odor of spirits filled the room, and Theodora, turning her head languidly--for she felt very tired all at once--saw that one of the juniors was rubbing somebody with whiskey. Grace was nursing an elbow and excitedly asking everybody to sit on Alison Greer: "She works her elbow right _into_ you! She runs you right down--" "There, there!" said one of the juniors, "never mind, never mind, Gracie! She's a slugger, if you like, but you've got to beat her! Don't be afraid of her." "It's no good," said the Home that had missed two balls, "we're too--" "That's enough of that," interrupted the coach who was fanning Virginia Wheeler. "You're playing finely, girls. Now all you've got to do is to make up your five goals. Don't you see how low you've kept it down? You did some fine centre work. Last year it was eight to something the first half. You tried to put it in standing right under the basket, Mary--stand off and take your time." They trotted out to the music of the sophomore prize song. It was a legacy from the seniors, who had themselves inherited it. It leaped out at them--a mocking, dancing, derisive little tune to which everybody kept time. It was repeated indefinitely, and at every repetition it went faster and more furious, and strangers who had not heard it laughed louder and louder. Grace smiled grimly. The Team remembered her words just before the door opened. "Girls, it isn't likely that we'll win, _but we can give 'em something to beat_!" And as the ball went back and forth and could not get free of the centre, the sophomores realized that they had "something to beat." The freshmen had somehow lost their fear; they smiled up at their friends and grinned cheerfully at their losses, which is far better than to try to look unconscious. A little bow-legged girl with a large nose and red knuckles accomplished wonders in the centre, and won them their second basket by stooping abruptly and rolling the ball straight between Kate Sutton's feet to Grace, who sat upon it and threw it so hard at Alison Greer that it bounded out of her hands and was promptly caught by Virginia Wheeler and put into the basket. This feat of Grace's was due entirely to her having quite lost her head, but it passed as the most daring of manoeuvres, and received such wild applause that Miss Kassan very nearly stopped the game. "What _shall_ I do? This is terrible. I never _heard_ such noise as the freshmen are making!" she mourned, with an apprehensive glance at the platform. At that moment the ball soared high, fell, was sent up again, and caught by a phenomenal leap on the part of the little bow-legged girl, who got it into the basket before the Home knew what was happening. The war broke out again, and Miss Kassan beheld two members of the Faculty pounding with their canes on the platform. "Did you see her jump? George! That was a good one! Did you see that, Robbins?" But Robbins was standing up in his interest and cheering under his breath as Martha Sutton snatched a ball clearly intended for some one else, quietly put it in the basket, and smiled politely at her enthusiastic friends. "Lord! What a Fullback she'd make!" he muttered, as Alison charged down into the centre. The lavender shadows under her eyes were deep violet now; her mouth was pressed to a scarlet line; her eyes were fixed on the ball like gray stars. People seemed to melt away before her: she never turned to right or left. Theodora saw nothing, heard nothing but the slap of hands on the ball, the quick breaths that slipped past her cheek. She knew that the score was nine to five now; a little later it was nine to six. She caught the eye of the girl in the toque: she was standing now, her cheeks very red, and the little lace handkerchief was torn to shreds in her hands. "Does she really care?" thought Theodora, as she jumped and twisted and doubled. Back on the senior side sat Susan Jackson, her eyes wide, her lips parted; Cornelia Burt was breathing on her hands and chafing them softly. "Nine to seven--play!" called the assistant. Harriet sat near the fireplace, her bandaged foot on a bench before her, her hands twisting and untwisting in her lap. _Here's_ to Harriet _Foster_, And we're _sorry_ that we _lost_ her, Drink her _down_, drink her _down_, drink her _down_, _down_, _down_! sang the freshmen. Would Harriet have done better? Would she have--Ah! "Ten to seven--play!" And they were so near, too! They _were_ playing well--Grace and Virginia were great--they could have done something if that stupid Home--Oh! Theodora leaped, missed the ball, but danced up in front of Martha and warded off the girl who slipped in to help her. Martha uttered an impatient exclamation and scowled. The freshmen howled and kicked against the gallery, and as the freshman Home woke out of an apparent lethargy and put the ball in neatly Theodora clapped and cheered with the rest. "Ten to eight--play!" There was a scuffle, a fall, and a hot discussion. Two girls grasped the ball, and the captains hesitated. Miss Kassan ran up, and in the little lull Theodora heard from the platform: "Oh, give it to the freshmen! They deserve it!" "No, Miss Greer had it!" "She knocked the girl off it, if that's what--" A rebellious howl from the yellow gallery as Miss Greer bore off the ball, and a man's voice: "Oh, nonsense! If you don't want 'em to howl, don't let 'em play! The idea--to get 'em all worked up and then say: 'No, young ladies, control yourselves!' How idiotic! I don't blame 'em--I'd howl myself--Jiminy crickets! _Look_ at that girl! Good work! _Good work!_" "Eleven to eight--play!" "Good old Suttie! Good girl! Ninety-gre-e-e-en!" Theodora's mouth was dry, and she ran to the coach for a lemon. The junior's hand shook, and her voice was husky from shouting. "It's grand--it's grand!" she said quickly. "Martha's mad as a hatter! See her braid!" Martha had twisted her pale brown pigtail tightly round her neck, and was calling with little indistinct noises to her sister. Adah Levy was talking to herself steadily and whispering, "_Hurry now, hurry now, hurry now!_" as she doubled and bent and worried the freshman Home out of her senses. Grace Farwell was everywhere at once, and was still only when she fell backwards with a bang that sickened the visiting mothers, and brought the freshmen's hearts into their mouths. A great gasp travelled up the gallery, and the doctor left her seat, but before she reached the players Grace was up, tossed her head, blinked rapidly, and with an unsteady little smile took her place by Alison Greer. And then the applause that had gone before was mild in comparison with the thunder from both galleries, and Miss Kassan looked at her watch uneasily and moved forward. Now everybody was standing up, and the men were pushing forward, and only the gasps and bursts of applause and little cries of disappointment disturbed the stillness--the steady roar had stopped. Theodora knew nothing, saw nothing: she only played. Her back ached, and her throat was dry; Martha's elbow moved like the piston of a steam-engine; her arm, when Theodora pressed against it, was like a stiff bar; she towered above her Guard. It was only a question of a few, few minutes--_could_ they make it "eleven to nine"? She must have asked the question, for Martha gasped, "No, you won't!" at her, and her heart sank as Miss Kassan moved closer. The ball neared their basket; the little bow-legged girl ducked under Alison's nose and emerged with it from a chaos of swaying Centres, tossed it to Grace, who dashed to the basket-- "_Time's up!_" The freshmen shrieked, the Team yelled to its captain: "Put it in! put it in!" The sophomore Guards had not heard Miss Kassan, and Grace poised the ball. A yell from the freshmen--and she deliberately dropped it. "Time's up," she said, with a little break in her voice, and as Miss Kassan hurried forward to stop the play she gave her the ball. Through the tumult a bass voice was heard: "I say, you know, that was pretty decent! I'm not sure I'd have done that myself!" And as the assistant and Miss Kassan retired to compare fouls, and the noise grew louder and louder, the freshman team, withdrawn near the platform, heard a young professor, not so many years distant from his own alma mater, enthusiastically assuring any one who cared to hear, that "That girl was a dead game sport, now!" For a moment the feeling against Grace had been bitter--the basket was so near! But as the sophomores were openly commending her, and as Miss Kassan was heard to say that the Team had played in splendid form and had given a fine example of "the self-control that the game was supposed to teach," they thought better of their captain with every minute. "Eleven to eight, in favor of Ninety-green--fouls even!" said Miss Kassan, and the storm broke from the gallery. But before it reached the floor, almost, Martha was energetically beating time, and above the miscellaneous babble rose the strong, steady cheer of the sophomores: 'Rah, 'rah, 'rah! 'Rah, 'rah, 'rah! 'Rah, 'rah, 'rah!--Ninety-ye-e-e-e-llow! "Quick, girls! quick!" cried Grace, for Miss Kassan was running toward them with determination in her eye. 'Rah, 'rah, 'rah! 'Rah, 'rah, 'rah! 'Rah, 'rah, 'rah!--Ninety-gre-e-e-e-n! Then it was all a wild, confused tumult. Theodora had no distinct impressions; people kissed her and shook her hand, and Kathie Sewall carried Grace off to a swarm of girls who devoured her, but not before Martha, breathless from a rapid ride around the floor on the unsteady shoulders of her loyal team, had solemnly extended her hot brown hand to the freshman captain and said, with sincere respect, "That was as good a freshman game as ever was played, Miss Farwell--we're mighty proud of ourselves! Your centre work was simply great! And--and of course we know that that last goal was--was practically yours!" Theodora had expected to feel so ashamed and sad--and somehow she was so proud and happy! The sophomores last year had locked themselves in for one hour and--expressed their feelings; but the freshmen could only realize that theirs was the closest score known for years, and that they had made it against the best team the college had ever seen; that Martha had said that in fifteen minutes more, at the rate they were playing, nobody knew what might have happened; that Miss Kassan had said that except in the matter of noise she had been very proud of them; and that Professor Robbins had called their captain a Dead Game Sport! It would not have been etiquette to carry Grace about the hall, but they managed to convey to her their feelings, which were far from perfunctory, and in their enthusiasm they went so far as to obey the Council's earnest request that the decorations should remain untouched. They cheered Theodora and Virginia and Harriet and the bow-legged girl till you would have supposed them victorious; and when Harriet told Grace, with a little gulp, that it was all up with her, for her mother had said that a second sprained ankle meant no more basket-ball, the little sympathetic crowd brightened, and all eyes turned to Theodora, who breathed hard and tried to seem not to notice. Could it be? Would she ever run out bouncing the ball in that waiting hush?... They were out of the Gym now, and only the ushers' bonnets, the green and yellow flowers that the Council had _not_ controlled, the crumpled, printed sheets of basket-ball songs, and the little mascots posing for their pictures on the campus made the day different from any other. "Come and lie down," said somebody, regarding Theodora with a marked respect. "You'll want to get rested before the dinner, you know." And as Theodora stared at her and half turned to run after Grace, whom Kathie Sewall was quietly leading off, the girl--she was in the house with her--held her back. "I'd let Grace alone, if I were you," she said. "She's pretty well used up; she hurt her elbow quite badly, but she wouldn't say anything, and Dr. Leach says she'll have to keep perfectly quiet if she wants to be at the dinner--wants to! the idea! But she said _of course_ you were to come. They say they're going to take some of the Gym decorations down.--What! Why, the idea! _Of course_ you'll go! You're sure to make the Team, anyhow, for that matter! I tell you, Theodora, we're proud of you! It wasn't any joke to step in there and guard Martha Sutton with a score of six to nothing!" Theodora paused at the steps, her mackintosh half off, her hair tangled about her crimson cheeks, her sleeve dusty from that last mad slide. "No," she said, with a wave of reminiscence of that sick shaking of her knees, that shrinking from a million critical eyes. "No, it wasn't any joke--not in the least!" And she climbed up the stairs to a burst of applause from the freshmen in the house and the shrill cry of her room-mate: "Come on, Theo! I've got a bath-tub for you!" THE SECOND STORY _A CASE OF INTERFERENCE_ II A CASE OF INTERFERENCE "What I want to know," said the chairman of the committee, wearily, "is just this. Are we going to give the _Lady of Lyons_, or are we not? I have a music lesson at four and a tea at five, and while your sprightly and interesting conversation is ever pleasing to me--" "Oh, Neal, don't! Think of something for us! Don't you want us to give it?" "I think it's too love-making. And no one up here makes love. The girls will howl at that garden scene. You must get something where they can be funny." "But, Neal, dear, _you_ can make beautiful love!" "Certainly I can, but I can't make it alone, can I? And Margaret Ellis is a stick--a perfect stick. But then, have it! I see you're bent on it. Only I tell you one thing--it will take more rehearsing than the girls will want to give. And I shan't do one word of it publicly till I think that we have rehearsed enough together. So that's all I've got to say till Wednesday, and I _must_ go!" The door opened--shut; and before the committee had time for comment or criticism, their chairman had departed. "Neal's a trifle cross," suggested Patsy, mildly. "Something's the matter with her," said Julia Leslie. "She got a note from Miss Henderson this afternoon, and I think she's going to see her now. Oh, I haven't the vaguest idea--What? No, I know it's not about her work. Neal's all straight with that department. Well, I think I'll go over to the Gym and hunt out a suit. Who has the key to the property box now?" The little group dissolved rapidly and No. 18 resumed its wonted quiet. "There's nothing like having a society girl for a room-mate, is there, Patsy?" said the resident Sutton twin, opening the door. She and her sister were distinguishable by their room-mates alone, and they had been separated with a view to preventing embarrassing confusion, as they were incredibly alike. "Couldn't I make the Alpha on the strength of having vacated this hearth and home eighteen times by actual count for its old committees?" "I've put you up five times, Kate, love, but they think your hair's too straight. Couldn't you curl it?" Kate sniffed scornfully. "I've always known that the literary societies had some such system of selection," she said to the bureau. "Now, in an idle moment of relaxation, the secret is out! Patsy, I _scorn_ the Alpha, and the Phi Kappa likewise." "I scorn the Phi Kappa myself, theoretically," said Patsy. "Do you think they'll take in that queer junior, you know, that looks so tall till you get close to her, and then it's the way she walks?" "Dear child, your vivid description somehow fails to bring her to my mind." "Why don't you want her in Alpha? But be careful you don't wait too long! You're both leaving me till late in the year, you know, and then, ten to one, the other one gets me!" "A little violet beside a mossy stone is a poor comparison, Katharine, but at the moment I think of no other. I am glad you grasp the situation so clearly, though." "But, truly, I wonder why they don't take that girl--isn't her name Hastings?--into Phi Kappa? She writes awfully well, they say, and I guess she recites well enough." The other Sutton twin sauntered in, and appearing as usual to grasp the entire conversation from the beginning, rolled her sister off the couch, filled her vacant place, and entered the discussion. "But, my dear child, you know she won't make either society! She's too indifferent--she doesn't care enough. And she's off the campus, and she doesn't go out anywhere, and she is always alone, and that speaks for itself--" "Oh, I'm tired of talking about her! Stop it, Kate, and get some crackers, that's a dear! Or I'll get them myself," and Patsy was in the hall. Kate shook her head wisely at the bureau. "Something's in the air," she said softly. "Patsy is bothered. So is Neal. And there are plenty of crackers on the window-seat!" Miss Margaret Sewall Pattison sauntered slowly down the stairs. For one whose heart was set on crackers she seemed strangely indifferent to the hungry girls standing about the pantry with fountain pens and lecture books and racquets and hammocks under their arms. She walked by them and out of the door, stood a moment irresolutely on the porch, and then, as she caught sight of Cornelia Burt coming out of the dormitory just beyond, she hurried out to meet her. "Busy this hour, Neal?" she said. "No," said Cornelia, briefly. "Where shall we go?" "We can go to the property box and get some clothes," said Patsy, "and talk it over there." In the cellar of the gymnasium it was cool and dim. The beams rose high above their heads, and a musty smell of tarlatan and muslin and cheese-cloth filled the air. Patsy sat on an old flower-stand, and pushed Cornelia down on a Greek altar that lay on its side with a faded smilax wreath still clinging to it. "What did she say to you, Neal?" she asked. Neal looked at the floor. "She was lovely, but I didn't half appreciate it. I was so bothered and--vexed. Pat, I didn't know the Faculty ever did this sort of thing, did you?" "I don't believe they often do," said Patsy. "Did she read that thing to you, too?" "Yes. Patsy, that's a remarkable thing. Do you know, when I went there I thought she was going to call me down for taking off the Faculty in that last Open Alpha. The girls say she hates that sort of thing. You know she always says just what she thinks. And she said, 'I want to read you a little story, Miss Burt, that happened to come into my hands, and that has haunted me since.'" "How do you suppose _she_ got hold of it?" queried Patsy. "I don't know, I'm sure. I certainly shouldn't pick her out to exhibit _my_ themes to!--I never saw them together." "I think I saw them walking once--well, go on!" "'For the _Monthly_?' said I. "'No,' said she. 'I think the author would not consent to its publication.' And then she read it to me. Pat, if that girl has suffered as much as that, I don't see how she stays here." "She's too proud to do anything else," said Patsy. "Go on." "Then Miss Henderson said: 'I needn't tell you the value of this thing from a literary point of view, Miss Burt.' "'No,' said I, 'you needn't.' "'Very well,' said she; 'then I'll tell you something else. Every word of it is true.' "'I'm sorry,' said I." "Oh, Neal! I cried when she read it to me! I blubbered like a baby. And she was so nice about it. But I hated her, almost, for disturbing me so." "Precisely. So I said: 'And what have you read this to me for, Miss Henderson?' And then she told me that the girl in the story was Winifred Hastings. She has always lived with older people and been a great pet and sort of prodigy, you know, and was expected to do great things here, and found herself lonely, and was proud and didn't make friends, and got farther away from the college instead of nearer to it, and all that. And I said, 'I suppose she's not the only one, Miss Henderson.' And she looked at me so queerly. 'Mephistopheles said that,' said she." "Oh! Neal! How could you? I--why are you so cold and--" "Unsympathetic? I don't know. We all have the defects of our qualities, I suppose. Miss Henderson was quite still for a moment, looking at me. I felt like a fly on a pin. 'Why do you try so hard to be cruel, Miss Burt?' said she, finally. 'I think you have an immense capacity for suffering and for sympathy. Is it because you are afraid to give way to it?' And I said, 'Exactly so, Miss Henderson. I never go to the door when the tramps come.' "'Neither did I, once,' said she, 'but I found it was a singularly useless plan. You've got to, some time, Miss Burt.' "'That's what I've always been afraid of, but I'm putting it off as long as I can,' said I. "And then she told me that this was the first time that she had done anything of this kind for a long while. 'I don't believe in helping people to their places, as a rule,' she said. 'They usually get what they deserve, I fancy. But this is a peculiar case. You suppose she is not the only one, Miss Burt? I hope there are very few like her. I have never known of a girl of her ability to lose everything that she has lost. There are girls who are queer and erratic and somewhat solitary and perhaps discontented, but they get into a prominence of their own and you call it a "divine discontent," and make them geniuses, and they get a good deal out of it, after all. There are girls who are queer and quick-tempered, but good students, and devoted to a few warm friends, and their general unpopularity doesn't trouble them particularly. There are the social leaders, who don't particularly suffer if they don't get into a society, who are popular everywhere, and get the good time they came for. But Winifred Hastings has somehow missed all these. She got started wrong, and she's gone from bad to worse. She is not solitary by nature, and yet she is more alone than the girls who like solitude, even. She is not naturally reserved, and yet she is considered more so than almost any girl in college. I believe her to have great executive ability. I consider her one of the distinctly literary girls in her class,--and if there is anything in essentially "bad luck," I do honestly believe that she is the victim of it. Her characteristics are so balanced and opposed to each other that she can't help herself, and she does things that make her seem what she is not. Her real self is in this story. You can see the pathos of that!'" Neal drew a long breath. "Did she say that to you?" she concluded. "No, not exactly. She told me that she was speaking to me as one of the social influences of the college. I felt like a cross between Madame de Staël and Ward McAllister, you know. And then she spoke of the power we have, the girls like me, and how a little help--oh, Neal! it _does_ mean a good deal, though! I can't make people take this girl up, all alone! The girls aren't--" "They are! They're the merest sheep! If you do it, they'll all follow you. That is, if she's really worth anything. Of course, they aren't fools." "She sat on me awfully, though, Neal! I said, 'I suppose you think we ought to have her in Alpha, Miss Henderson.' She gave me a look that simply withered me. 'My dear Miss Pattison,' said she, in that twenty-mile-away tone, 'I am not in the habit of suggesting candidates for either of the societies: I must have made myself far from clear to you.' And I apologized. But it's what she meant, all the same!" "Of course it is. Well, I suppose she's right. It isn't everybody would have dared to do that much. I respect her for it myself. You are to launch her socially, I am to--" "Neal Burt, I think you ought to be ashamed! Didn't Miss Henderson tell you how Winifred Hastings admired you?" "Yes. She said that I was the only girl in the college whose friendship--Oh, dear! I wish she had gone to Vassar, that girl! Heavens! It's half-past three! I must go this minute. Well, Patsy, we're honored, in a way. I don't think Miss Henderson would talk to every one as she has to us, do you?" "No," said Patsy, gravely, "I don't. You know, Neal, just as I was going, she said, 'Of course you realize, Miss Pattison, that only you and I and Miss Burt have seen this story?' 'I understand,' said I. 'Perhaps I have done this because I understand Miss Hastings better than she thinks,' she said. 'I--I was a little like her, myself, once, Miss Pattison!'" "Yes," said Neal, "she told me that." "I don't see why Miss Henderson doesn't take her up herself, if she understands her so terribly well," scowled Patsy. "She looks just like the kind of girl to be devoted to one person and all that, you know. Miss Henderson could go for walks with her and--" "Too much sense!" said Neal, briefly. "She wants to get her in with the girls. That sort of thing would kill her with the girls, and she knows it." "Oh, bother! Look at B. Kitts--she's a great friend of Miss Henderson's, and look at yourself!" "Not at all," Neal returned decidedly. "Biscuits was in with your set long before she got to know Miss Henderson, and I knew Marion Hunter at home before she came up here. It's all very well to chum with the Faculty if you're in with the girls, too, but otherwise--as my friend Claude says, Nay, nay, Pauline! Besides, Miss Henderson doesn't go in for that sort of thing anyhow--she's too clever." "Oh, well, I suppose it _is_ best for us to do it. I guess she's right enough," said Patsy, rising as she spoke, "and I suppose we can do it as well as anybody, for that matter." They mounted the stone steps and came out into a light that dazzled them. "There she is!" said Patsy softly, as a tall girl, plainly dressed, walked quickly by them. Her face was strangely set, her mouth almost hard, her eyes looked at them with an expression that would have been defiant but for something that softened them as they met Neal's. She bowed to her, hardly noticing Patsy's "Good afternoon, Miss Hastings!" and hurried off to the back campus. Behind were two freshmen loaded with pillows. "Isn't that Miss Hastings?" said one. "Yes. She's going to leave college." "Oh! Well, we can lose her better than some others I could mention," said the prettier and better dressed of the two. Then, catching sight of Patsy and Neal, she stopped and blushed a little. "Did--did you get my note, Miss Burt? Will you come?" she asked prettily. Neal smiled. "Why, yes, I shall be pleased--at four on Saturday, I think you said?" And then as the two moved on she added, "I heard you say something about Miss Hastings: is it true she's going to leave?" "Yes," said the other freshman, importantly. "Immediately, she told Mrs. White. I'm in the house with her. I think she said next week. She's disappointed in college, I guess. Well, I should think she would be. She--" "I trust the college has given her no reason to be," said Neal, gravely. "I sometimes think her attitude--if that should happen to be her attitude--somewhat justifiable." And before the freshman could recover, Miss Burt and her friend were halfway across the campus. Patsy sighed with admiration. "Oh, Cornelia, how I reverence you!" she said. "I couldn't do that to save my soul. No. Once I tried it, and the freshman laughed at me. I slunk away--positively slunk." But Neal did not laugh. "I can't see what to do," she half whispered, as if to herself. "Next week--next week! Why then, why then, it's all over with her. She's thrown up the sponge!" Patsy peered into Cornelia's face and caught her breath. "Why, Neal, do you care? Do you really care?" she said. Neal looked at her defiantly through wet lashes. "Yes, I do care. I think it's horrible. To have her beaten like this!--I have to go now. Be sure to come to Alpha to-night!" "When Cornelia leaves, she leaves sudden," said Kate Sutton, from the window. "Coming up?" Patsy stamped slowly up the two flights, and rummaged in a very mussy window-box for a silk waist. Her room-mate listened for some expression of grief or joy to give the tone to conversation, but none came; so she began on her own account. "Martha says," indicating her twin, who was polishing the silver things with alcohol and a preparation fondly believed by her to be whiting, but which incessant use had reduced to a dirty gritty gum, "Martha says she knows who's going in to-night." "Oh, indeed?" "Yes. She says it's Eleanor Huntington and Leila Droch. She knows for certain." "Great penetration she has--they've never been mentioned," returned the senior, absent-mindedly, grabbing under the chiffonier for missing hair-pins. A shriek of triumph from the twins brought her to her knees. "Aha! I told you they weren't in it! Perhaps you'll believe me again! Perhaps I can't find out a thing or two!" The twins shook hands delightedly, and Patsy, irritated at her slip, grabbed again for the hair-pins, incidentally discovering a silver shoe-horn and a fountain pen. "Very clever you are--very," she remarked coldly. "Quite unusual, and so young, too. No wonder your parents are worried!" This was a bitter cut, for the twins were industriously engaged in living down the report that the Registrar had in their freshman year received a note from Mrs. Sutton imploring her to curb if necessary their passion for study, which invariably brought on nervous headaches. This was peculiarly interesting to their friends, who had never remarked any undue application on their part and were, of course, proportionately eager to caution them against it. They squirmed visibly now and changed their tone abruptly. "They say that Frances Wilde was terribly disappointed about making Alpha--she'd much rather have got Phi Kappa," said Kate, with a mixture of malice and humility. Patsy was silent. Martha grinned and took up the conversation. "But her heart would have been broken if she hadn't gotten in this year," she returned amiably. Patsy turned and glared at them, one arm in the silk waist. "What utter nonsense!" she broke out. "As if it made any matter, one way or the other! As if it made two cents' worth of difference! You know perfectly well that it's no test at all--making a society. Look at the girls who are in! It's a farce, as Neal says--" She stopped and scowled at them defiantly. The twins gasped. This from a society girl to them, as yet unelect! Even for a conversation with the Sutton twins, with whom, owing to their own contagious example, truth was bound to fly out sooner or later, this was unusual. It was odd enough to discuss the societies at all with perfectly eligible sophomores who might reasonably expect to enter one or another sometime and who were nevertheless yet uncalled; but the twins discussed everything with everybody, utterly regardless of etiquette, tradition, or propriety, and their upper-classroom-mates had long ago given up any ideas of reserve and discipline they might have held. Martha gasped but promptly replied. "That's all very well for Cornelia Burt," she said, with the famous Sutton grin. "Anybody who made the Alpha in the first five and was known well enough to have been especially wanted in Phi Kappa and even begged to refuse--" "How did you know that, Martha Sutton?" "Oh! how did I? The President confided it to me one day when he was calling. As I say, Neal Burt and you can afford to talk; you can say it's a bore and all that and make fun of the meetings--" "I don't!" "You do! I heard you growling about it to Neal. And Bertha Kitts said she'd about as soon conduct a class prayer-meeting as Phi--Oh, not to me, naturally, but I know the girl who heard the girl she said it to! Heard her tell about it, I mean. "It's all very well for you, but you'd feel differently if you were out! It's just like being a junior usher. There are plenty of spooks in, but there aren't many bright girls out. Everybody knows that lots of the society girls are pushed in by their friends and pulled in for heaven knows what--certainly not brains! But, just the same, you know well enough that you can count on one hand all the girls in the college that you'd think ought to be in and aren't. You don't know anything about it, for you were sure of it and everybody knew it, but the ones that aren't, they're the ones that worry! Why, I know sophomores to-day that will cry all night if they don't get their notes and their flowers and their front seat in chapel Monday!" "Oh, nonsense!" "Oh, nonsense, indeed! Won't they, Katie?" "Sure!" returned her sister, placidly. "I guess Alison Greer will cry all right, if she's not in!" Patsy bit her lip and tapped her foot nervously. Then she shrugged her shoulders and opened the door, turning to remark, "You don't seem to be wasted away, either of you!" "Oh, we! We're all right!" replied Martha, comfortably. "We never expected it sophomore year, anyhow. Nothing proddy about us, you know. Too many clever girls in the sophomore class, you see. But we expect to amble in next year, we do. And violets from you. And supper at Boyden's. Oh, yes! Don't you worry about us, Miss Pattison, we're all right!" Miss Pattison sighed: sighs usually ended one's conversations with the twins, for nothing else so well expressed one's attitude. "It's a pity you're so shrinking," she contented herself with observing. "I'm afraid you'll never come forward sufficiently to be known well by either society!" And she went down to get her mail. II There was a full meeting of the Alpha that Saturday night. The vice-president was lobbying energetically in behalf of a sophomore friend who would prove the crown and glory of the society, if all her upper-class patroness said of her could possibly be true. There was but one place open for the rest of the term, for the society had grown unusually that year, and some conservative seniors had pressed hard on the old tradition that sixty was a suitable and necessary limit, and put a motion through to that effect, and every possible junior had been elected long ago. So the vice-president was distinctly hopeful. Amid the buzz and clamor of fifty-odd voices, the president slapped the table sharply. "_Will_ the meeting please come to order!" she cried. A little rustle, and the handsome secretary arose. "The regular meeting of the Alpha Society was held--" and the report went on. "Are there any objections to this report?" asked the president, briskly. "Yes. It's far too long," muttered Suzanne Endicott, flippantly. The president looked at her reproachfully, and added, "If not, we will proceed to the election of new members--I mean the new member. As you probably know, there is but one place left, according to the recent amendment, and I think that we will vote as usual on the three that are before us, and elect the one having the most affirmative ballots. Are there any objections to this method?" There were none. The vice-president glanced appealingly at the girl she was not quite sure of and smiled encouragingly at the sophomore she had successfully intimidated. The secretary rose again. "The names to be voted on this evening are Alison Greer, '9-, Katharine Sutton, '9-, Marion Dustin, '9-," she announced. "I may add that Miss Sutton has the highest marks from the society, and that if we don't take her this time there is very little doubt that Phi Kappa Psi will. They'll be afraid to risk another meeting." "That's true," said somebody, as the buzzing began again. "We're carrying this point a little too far. I declare, it's harder to decide on the people that aren't prods than anybody would imagine. We know we want 'em sometime, but we put it off so long--" "Kate Sutton's awfully bright! I think she should have been here before. I've been trembling for fear we'd lose her by waiting so long--" "Still, Marion is _such_ a dear, and it's pretty late for a girl that's been known so well for so long, without getting in, it seems to me," said the vice-president, skilfully. "Why didn't she get in before if she was so bright?" "And there's Martha, too. They're just alike. I think Martha's a little brighter, if anything. Shall we have to take 'em both?" "No. The girls all say to give her to Phi Kappa, and tell 'em apart by the pins!" "Like babies!" "How silly!" "To be perfectly frank, Miss Leslie, I must say I don't think so. Alison is an awfully dear girl, and all that, but I hardly think she represents the element we hope to get into Alpha. I'm sorry to say so, but--" "The voting has begun," said the president. "Will you hurry, please?" "Miss President," said Cornelia Burt, rising abruptly, "may I speak to the society before the voting?" "Certainly, Miss Burt," said the president. There was an instant hush, and the girls stood clustered about the ballot-table in their pretty, light dresses--a charming sight, Neal thought vaguely, as she hunted for the words to say. "I know perfectly well that what I am about to propose is quite unconstitutional," she began, and to her own ears her voice seemed far off. How many there were, and how surprised and attentive they looked! They were no fools, as she had said. They represented the cleverest element in the college, on the whole, and they had, naturally enough, their own designs and inclinations--why should they be turned from them in a moment? "I know that no girl is eligible for voting upon until she has been read two meetings before, and been properly put up for membership, and all that," said Neal, quietly, with her eyes fixed on Patsy's, who tried to evade them. Poor Patsy. She wanted Kate to get the society in her sophomore year! "But I am in possession of certain facts that seem to me to warrant the breaking through the constitution, if such a thing can ever be done." The silence had become intense. An ominous look of surprise deepened on the girls' faces, and the president looked doubtfully at the secretary. "I think I am quite justified in believing that I have not the reputation of a sentimental person," said Cornelia. She had herself well in hand, now. The opposition that she felt nerved her to her customary self-possession. A little grin swept around the room. She was, apparently, quite justified. "I have been in the Alpha as long as any one here," said Neal, quietly still, "and in all this time I have never proposed any one for membership in it. I have voted whenever I knew anything about the person in question, and I have never blackballed but once. I think I may say I have done my share of work for the society--" There was a unanimous murmur of deep and unqualified assent. "You have done more than your share," said the president, promptly. "I mention these things," said Neal, "in order that you may see that I recognize the need of some apology for what I am about to propose. I want to propose the name of Winifred Hastings to-night, and have her voted on with the rest. If it is a possible thing, I want her elected. That she would be elected without any doubt, I am certain, if only I could put the facts of the case properly before you. That she must be elected, now, to-night, is absolutely necessary, for by another meeting she will have left the college--left it for the lack of just such recognition as membership in the society will give her." Cornelia Burt was a born orator. Never was she so happy as when she felt an audience, however small, given over to her, eyes and ears, for the moment. She stood straight as a reed, and looked easily over their faces, holding by very force of personality their attention. She spoke without the slightest hesitation, yet perfectly simply and after no set form. Insensibly the girls around her felt conviction in her very presence: they agreed with her against their will, while she was speaking. "Before I go any farther, I want to tell you that Miss Hastings is no friend of mine," said Neal. "I hardly know her. Only lately I have learned the circumstances that led me to take this step. I feel that I must do this thing. I feel that we are letting go from the college a girl whose failure in life, if she fails, will be in our hands. We can elect these others later: Winifred Hastings leaves the college next week. And, speaking as editor of the college paper, I must say that she carries with her some of the best literary material in the college. You ask me why we have never seen it--I tell you, because she is a girl who needs encouragement, and she has never had it. She can do her best only when it is called for. Some of you may think you know her--may think that she is proud and solitary and disagreeable: she is not. _This_ is the real girl!" And, stepping farther into the circle, Cornelia, by an effort of memory she has never equalled since, told them, with the simplest eloquence, the pathetic story of Winifred Hastings' life, as she had written it. She did not comment--she only related. Her keen literary appreciation had caught the most effective parts, and she had the dramatic sense to which every successful speaker owes so much. Under her touch the haughty, solitary figure of a scarcely known girl melted away before them, and they saw a baffled, eager, hungry soul that had fought desperately, and was going silently away--beaten. Cornelia Burt had made speeches before, and she made them afterward, to larger and more excited college audiences, but she never held so many hearts in her hand as she did that night. She was not a particularly unselfish girl, but no one who heard her then ever called her egotistic afterward. Her whole nature was thrown with all its force into this fight--for it was a fight. Perhaps there is nowhere an audience less sentimental and more critical than a group of clever college girls. They see clearly for the most part, and, like all clever youth, somewhat cruelly. They object to being ruled by any but their chosen, and however they admired her, Cornelia was not their chosen leader. It was not because her speech was able, but because it was so evident that she believed herself only the means of preventing a calamity that she was striving with all her soul to avert, that she impressed them so deeply. For she did impress them. When she ended, it was very quiet in the room. "I have broken a confidence in telling this," she said. "The girl herself would rather die than have you know it, I'm sure, and now--I feel afraid. It has been a bold stroke; if I have lost, I shall never forgive myself. But oh! I _cannot_ have her go!" She sat down quickly and stared into her lap. The spell of her voice was gone, the girls looked at each other, and a tall, keen-eyed girl with glasses got up. "I wish to say," she said, "that while Miss Burt's story is terribly convincing, still this may be a little exaggerated, and, at any rate, think of the precedent! If this should be done very often--" "But it won't be!" cried some one with a somewhat husky voice, and Patsy rudely interrupted the speaker. Dear Patsy! She crushed her handkerchief in her hand and said good-by to Kate: she would have liked to put her pin in Kate's shirt-waist, and now--now Phi Kappa would get her! When Patsy spoke, it was with the voice of eleven, for she carried at least ten of the leading set in the Alpha with her. "I think we are all very glad to realize that there won't be many such cases--most people have compensations--we ought to be willing to break the constitution again for such a thing, anyhow--and, Miss President, I move that Miss Hastings be voted upon by acclamation!" "I second the motion," said the vice-president, quickly. "It is moved and seconded that Miss Hastings be voted upon by acclamation," said the president. "All in favor--" "Miss Hastings has yet to be proposed," said some one, after the vote. The president looked at Cornelia. "I propose Winifred Hastings, '9-, as a member of the Alpha Society," said Cornelia, with flaming cheeks and downcast eyes. She dared not look at them. Were they going to punish her? She heard the motion announced, she heard the name put up. "All in favor please signify by rising," said the president, and only when the Alpha rose in a body did Cornelia lift her eyes. They were all looking at her, and she stepped a little back. "I cannot thank you," she said, so low that they leaned forward to hear. "It was no affair of mine, as I said. But--I think you--we--shall never regret this election." And then they applauded so loudly that the freshmen on the campus could not forbear peeping under the blinds to see what they were doing. They saw only the president, however, as she stepped back to the table and said with an air of relief--for, after all, emotion is very wearing--"We will now proceed to the literary programme of the evening!" "But Neal, dear," said Patsy, as they settled themselves to listen, "do you think she'll stay? (Oh, Neal! I'm so proud of you!)" "Shut up, Patsy!" said Neal, rudely. Then, as she thought of what Miss Henderson had told her of Winifred Hastings: "You are the only girl whose friendship"--she blushed. Then, assuming a bored expression, she looked at the girl who was reading. "I fear there's no doubt she will!" said Cornelia Burt. THE THIRD STORY _MISS BIDDLE OF BRYN MAWR_ III MISS BIDDLE OF BRYN MAWR "I wouldn't have minded so much," explained Katherine, dolefully, and not without the suspicion of a sob, "if it wasn't that I'd asked Miss Hartwell and Miss Ackley! I shall die of embarrassment--I shall! Oh! why couldn't Henrietta Biddle have waited a week before she went to Europe?" Her room-mate, Miss Grace Farwell, sank despairingly on the pile of red floor-cushions under the window. "Oh, Kitten! you didn't ask them? Not really?" she gasped, staring incredulously at the tangled head that peered over the screen behind which Katherine was splashily conducting her toilet operations. "But I did! I think they're simply grand, especially Miss Hartwell, and I'll never have any chance of meeting her, I suppose, and I thought this was a beautiful one. So I met her yesterday on the campus and I walked up to her--I was horribly scared, but I don't think I showed it--and, said I, 'Oh, Miss Hartwell, you don't know me, of course, but I'm Miss Sewall, '9-, and I know Henrietta Biddle of Bryn Mawr, and she's coming to see me for two or three days, and I'm going to make a little tea for her--very informal--and I've heard her speak of you and Miss Ackley as about the only girls she knew here, and I'd love to have you meet her again!'" Miss Farwell laughed hysterically. "And did she accept?" she inquired. Katherine wiped her face for the third time excitedly. "Oh, yes! She was as sweet as peaches and cream! 'I shall be charmed to meet Miss Biddle again, and in your room, Miss Sewall,' she said, 'and shall I bring Miss Ackley?' Oh, Grace, she's lovely! She is the most--" "Yes, I've no doubt," interrupted Miss Farwell, cynically; "all the handsome seniors are. But what are you going to say to her to-day?" Katherine buried her yellow head in the towel. "I don't know! Oh, Grace! I don't know," she mourned. "And they say the freshmen are getting so uppish, anyway, and if we carry it off well, and just make a joke of it, they'll think we're awfully f-f-fresh!" Here words failed her, and she leaned heavily on the screen, which, as it was old and probably resented having been sold third-hand at a second-hand price, collapsed weakly, dragging with it the Bodenhausen Madonna, a silver rack of photographs, and a Gibson Girl drawn in very black ink on a very white ground. "And if we are apologetic and meek," continued Miss Farwell, easily, apparently undisturbed by the confusion consequent to the downfall of a piece of furniture known to be somewhat erratic, "they'll laugh at us or be bored. We shall be known as the freshmen who invited seniors and Faculty and town-people to meet--nobody at all! A pretty reputation!" "But, Grace, we couldn't help it! Such things will happen!" Katherine was pinning the Gibson Girl to the wall, in bold defiance of the matron's known views on that subject. "Yes, of course. But they mustn't happen to freshmen!" her room-mate returned sententiously. "How many Faculty did you ask?" "I asked Miss Parker, because she fitted Henrietta for college, at Archer Hall, and I asked Miss Williams, because she knows Henrietta's mother--Oh! Miss Williams will freeze me to death when she comes here and sees just us!--and I asked Miss Dodge, because she knows a lot of Bryn Mawr people. Then Mrs. Patton on Elm Street was a school friend of Mrs. Biddle's, and--oh! Grace, I _can't_ manage them alone! Let's tell them not to come!" "And what shall we do with the sandwiches? And the little cakes? And the lemons that I sliced? And the tea-cups and spoons I borrowed? And that pint of extra thick cream?" Miss Farwell checked off these interesting items on her fingers, and kicked the floor-cushions to point the question. "Oh! I don't know! Isn't there any chance--" "No, goosey, there isn't. See here!" Grace pulled down a letter with a special delivery stamp from the desk above her head, and read with emphasis: Dear Kitten,--Just a line to say that Aunt Mary has sent for me at three days' notice to go to Paris with her for a year. It's now or never, you know, and I've left the college, and will come back to graduate with '9-. So sorry I can't see you before I go. Had looked forward to a very interesting time, renewing my own freshman days, and all that. Please send my blue cloth suit right on to Philadelphia C. O. D. when it comes to you. I hope you hadn't gotten anything up for me. With much love, HENRIETTA BIDDLE. Bryn Mawr, March 5. "I don't think there's much chance, my dear." "No," said Katherine, sadly, and with a final pat administered to the screen, which still wobbled unsteadily. "No, I suppose there isn't. And it's eleven o'clock. They'll be here at four! Oh! and I asked that pretty junior, Miss Pratt, you know. Henrietta knew her sister. She was in '8-." "Ah," returned Miss Farwell, with a suspicious sweetness, "why didn't you ask a few more, Katherine, dear? What with the list we made out together and these last extra ones--" "But I thought there wasn't any use having the largest double room in the house, if we couldn't have a decent-sized party in it! And think of all those darling, thin little sandwiches!--Oh well, we might just as well be sensible and carry the thing through, Gracie! But I am just as afraid as I can be: I tell you that. And Miss Williams will freeze me stiff." The yellow hair was snugly braided and wound around by now, and a neat though worried maiden sat on the couch and punched the Harvard pillow reflectively. "Never mind her, Kitten, but just go ahead. You know Caroline Wilde said it was all right to ask her if she was Miss Biddle's mother's friend, and there wasn't time to take her all around, and you know how nice Miss Parker was about it. We can't help it, as you say, and we'll go and get the flowers as we meant to. Have you anything this hour?" With her room-mate to back her, to quote the young lady herself, Miss Sewall felt equal to almost any social function. Terrifying as her position appeared--and strangely enough, the seniors appalled her far more than the Faculty--there was yet a certain excitement in the situation. What should she say to them? Would they be kind about it, or would they all turn around and go home? Would they think-- "Oh, nonsense!" interrupted Grace the practical, as these doubts were thrust upon her. "If they're ladies, as I suppose they are, of course they'll stay and make it just as pleasant for us as they can. They'll see how it is. Think what we'd do, ourselves, you know!" They went down the single long street, with the shops on either side, a red-capped, golf-caped pair of friends, like nine hundred other girls, yet different from them all. And they chattered of Livy and little cakes and Trigonometry and pleated shirt-waists and basket-ball and Fortnightly Themes like all the others, but in their little way they were very social heroines, setting their teeth to carry by storm a position that many an older woman would have found doubtful. They stopped at a little bakery, well down the street, to order some rolls for the girl across the hall from them, who had planned to breakfast in luxury and alone on chocolate and grape-fruit the next morning. "Miss Carter, 24 Washburn," said Grace, carelessly, when Katherine whispered, "Look at her! Isn't that funny? Why, Grace, just see her!" "See who--whom, I mean? (only I hate to say 'whom.') Who is it, Kitten?" Katherine was staring at the clerk, a tall, handsome girl, with masses of heavy black hair and an erect figure. As she went down to the back of the shop again, Katherine's eyes followed her closely. "It's that girl that used to be in the Candy Kitchen--don't you remember? I told you then that she looked so much like my friend Miss Biddle. And then the Candy Kitchen failed and I suppose she came here. And she's just Henrietta's height, too. You know Henrietta stands very straight and frowns a little, and so did this girl when you gave Alice's number and she said, 'Thirty-four or twenty-four?' Isn't it funny that we should see her now?--Oh, dear! If only she _were_ Henrietta!" Grace stared at the case of domestic bread and breathed quickly. "Does she really look like her, Kitten?" she said. "Oh yes, indeed. It's quite striking. Henrietta's quite a type, you know--nothing unusual, only very dark and tall and all that. Of course there are differences, though." "What differences?" said Grace, still looking intently at the domestic bread. "Oh, Henrietta's eyes are brown, and this girl's are black. And Henrietta hasn't any dimple, and her hands are prettier. And Henrietta's waist isn't so small, and she hasn't nearly so much hair, I should say. But then, I haven't seen her for a year, and probably there's a greater difference than I think." "How long is it since those seniors and the Faculty saw Henrietta?" said Grace, staring now at a row of layer chocolate-cakes. Her room-mate started. "Why--why, Grace, what do you mean? It's two years, Henrietta wrote, I think. And Miss Parker and Miss Williams haven't seen her for much longer than that. But--but--you don't mean anything, Grace?" Grace faced her suddenly. "Yes," she said, "I do. You may think that because I just go right along with this thing, I don't care at all. But I do. I'm awfully scared. I hate to think of that Miss Ackley lifting her eyebrows--the way she will! And Miss Hartwell said once when somebody asked if she knew Judge Farwell's daughter, 'Oh, dear me--I suppose so! And everybody else in her class--theoretically! But practically I rarely observe them!' Ugh! She'll observe me to-day, I hope!" "Yes, dear, I suppose she will. And me too. But--" "Oh, yes! But if nobody knows how Miss Biddle looks, and she was going to stay at the hotel, anyway, and it would only be for two hours, and everything would be so simple--" Katherine's cheeks grew very red and her breath came fast. "But would we dare? Would she be willing? Would it be--" "Oh, my dear, it's only a courtesy! And everybody will think it's all right, and the thing will go beautifully, and Miss Biddle, if she has any sense of humor--" "Yes, indeed! Henrietta would only be amused--oh, so amused! And it would be such a heavenly relief after all the worry. We could send her off on the next train--Henrietta, you know--and dress makes such a difference in a girl!" "And I think she would if we asked her just as a favor--it wouldn't be a question of money! Oh, Katherine! I could cry for joy if she would!" "She'd like to, if she has any fun in her--it would be a game with some point to it! And will you ask her, or shall I?" They were half in joke and half in earnest: it was a real crisis to them. They were only freshmen, and they had invited the seniors and the Faculty. And two of the most prominent seniors! Whom they hadn't known at all! They had a sense of humor, but they were proud, too, and they had a woman's horror of an unsuccessful social function. They felt that they were doomed to endless joking at the hands of the whole college, and this apprehension, though probably exaggerated, nerved them to their _coup d'état_. Grace walked down the shop. "I will ask her," she said. Katherine stood with her back turned and tried not to hear. Suppose the girl should be insulted? Suppose she should be afraid? Now that there was a faint hope of success, she realized how frightened and discouraged she had been. For it would be a success, she saw that. Nobody would have had Miss Biddle to talk with for more than a few minutes anyhow, they had asked such a crowd. And yet she would have been the centre of the whole affair. "Katherine," said a voice behind her, "let me introduce Miss Brooks, who has consented to help us!" Katherine held out her hands to the girl. "Oh, thank you! _thank_ you!" she said. The girl laughed. "I think it's queer," she said, "but if you are in such a fix, I'd just as lief help you as not. Only I shall give you away--I shan't know what to say." Grace glanced at Katherine. Then she proved her right to all the praise she afterward accepted from her grateful room-mate. "That will be very easy," she said sweetly. "Miss Biddle, whom you will--will represent, speaks very rarely: she's not at all talkative!" Katherine gasped. "Oh, no!" she said eagerly, "she's very statuesque, you know, and keeps very still and straight, and just looks in your eyes and makes you think she's talking. She says 'Really?' and 'Fancy, now!' and 'I expect you're very jolly here,' and then she smiles. You could do that." "Yes, I could do that," said the girl. "Can you come to the hotel right after dinner?" said Grace, competently, "and we'll cram you for an hour or so on Miss Biddle's affairs." The girl laughed. "Why, yes," she said, "I guess I can get off." So they left her smiling at them from the domestic bread, and at two o'clock they carried Miss Henrietta Biddle's dress-suit case to the hotel and took Miss Brooks to her room. And they sat her on a sofa and told her what they knew of her alma mater and her relatives and her character generally. And she amazed them by a very comprehensive grasp of the whole affair and an aptitude for mimicry that would have gotten her a star part in the senior dramatics. With a few corrections she spoke very good English, and "as she'd only have to answer questions, anyhow, she needn't talk long at a time," they told each other. She put up her heavy hair in a twisted crown on her head, and they put the blue cloth gown on her, and covered the place in the front, where it didn't fit, with a beautiful fichu that Henrietta had apparently been led of Providence to tuck in the dress-suit case. And she rode up in a carriage with them, very much excited, but with a beautiful color and glowing eyes, and a smile that brought out the dimple that Henrietta never had. They showed her the room and the sandwiches and the tea, and they got into their clothes, not speaking, except when a great box with three bunches of English violets was left at their door with Grace's card. Then Katherine said, "You dear thing!" And Miss Brooks smiled as they pinned hers on and said softly, "Fancy, now!" And then they weren't afraid for her any more. When the pretty Miss Pratt came, a little after four, with Miss Williams, she smiled with pleasure at the room, all flowers and tea and well-dressed girls, with a tall, handsome brunette in a blue gown with a beautiful lace bib smiling gently on a crowd of worshippers, and saying little soft sentences that meant anything that was polite and self-possessed. Close by her was her friend Miss Sewall, of the freshman class, who sweetly answered half the questions about Bryn Mawr that Miss Biddle couldn't find time to answer, and steered people away who insisted on talking with her too long. Miss Farwell, also of the freshman class, assisted her room-mate in receiving, and passed many kinds of pleasant food, laughing a great deal at what everybody said and chatting amicably and unabashed with the two seniors of honor, who openly raved over Miss Biddle of Bryn Mawr. As soon as Katherine had said, "May I present Miss Hartwell--Miss Ackley?" they took their stand by the stately stranger and talked to her as much as was consistent with propriety. "Isn't she perfectly charming!" they said to Miss Parker, and "Yes, indeed," replied that lady, "I should have known Netta anywhere. She is just what I had thought she would be!" And Miss Williams, far from freezing the pretty hostess, patted her shoulder kindly. "Henrietta is quite worth coming to see," she said with her best and most exquisite manner. "I have heard of the Bryn Mawr style, and now I am convinced. I wish all our girls had such dignity--such a feeling for the right word!" And they had the grace to blush. They knew who had taught Henrietta Biddle Brooks that right word! At six o'clock Miss Biddle had to take the Philadelphia express. She had only stopped over for the tea. And so the girls of the house could not admire her over the supper-table. But they probably appreciated her more. For after all, as they decided in talking her over later, it wasn't so much what she said, as the way she looked when she said it! But only a dress-suit case marked H. L. B. took the Philadelphia express that night, and a tall, red-cheeked girl in a mussy checked suit left the hotel with a bunch of violets in her hand and a reminiscent smile on her lips. "We simply can't thank you; we haven't any words. You've helped us give the nicest party two freshmen ever gave, if it is any pleasure to you to know that," said Katherine. "And now you're only not to speak of it." "Oh, no! I shan't speak of it," said the girl. "You needn't be afraid. Nobody that I'd tell would believe me, very much, anyhow. I'm glad I could help you, and I had a lovely time--lovely!" She smiled at them: the slow, sweet smile of Henrietta Biddle, late of Bryn Mawr. "You College ladies are certainly queer--but you're smart!" said Miss Brooks of the bakery. THE FOURTH STORY _BISCUITS EX MACHINA_ IV BISCUITS EX MACHINA B. S. Kitts--this was the signature she had affixed in a neat clerical backhand to all her written papers since the beginning of freshman year; and she had of course been called Biscuits as soon as she had found her own particular little set of girls and settled down to that peculiar form of intimacy which living in barracks, however advantageously organized, necessitates. She had a sallow irregular face, fine brown eyes surrounded with tiny wrinkles, a taste for Thackeray, and a keen sense of humor. It was the last which was subsequently responsible for this story about her. She was quite unnoticed for two or three years, which is a very good thing for a girl. During that time she quietly took soundings and laid in material, presumably, for those satiric characterizations which were the terror of her undergraduate enemies and the concealed discomfort of those in high places. During her junior year she began to be considered terribly clever, and though she was never what is known as a Prominent Senior, she had her little triumphs here and there, and in the matter of written papers she was a source of great comfort to those whom custom compels to demand such tributes. She was the kind of girl who, though well known in her own class, is quite unobserved of the lower classes, and this, if it deprived her of the admirations and attentions bestowed on the prominent, saved her the many worries and wearinesses incident to trying to please everybody at once--the business of the over-popular. She had a great deal of time, which may seem absurd, but which is really quite possible if one keeps positively off committees, is neither musical nor athletic, and shuns courses involving laboratory work. It is of great assistance also in this connection to elect English Literature copiously, when one has read most of the works in question and can send home for the reference books, thus saving an immense amount of fruitless loitering about crowded libraries. Biscuits employed the time thus gained in a fashion apparently purposeless. She loafed about and observed, with _Vanity Fair_ under one arm and an apple in the other hand. She was never the subject or the object of a violent friendship; she was one of five or six clever girls who hung together consistently after sophomore year, bickering amicably and indulging in mutual contumely when together, defending one another promptly when apart. The house president spoke of them bitterly as blasé and critical; the lady-in-charge remarked suspiciously the unusual chance which invariably seated them together at the end of the table at the regular drawing for seats; the collector for missions found them sceptical and inclined to ribaldry if pushed too far; but the Phi Kappa banked heavily on their united efforts, and more than usually idiotic class meetings meekly bowed to what they themselves scornfully referred to afterward as "their ordinary horse-sense." One of the members of this little group was Martha Augusta Williams. Sometimes she retired from it and devoted herself to solitude, barely replying to questions and obscurely intimating that to _ennui_ such as hers the prattle of the immature and inexperienced could hardly be supposed even by themselves to be endurable; sometimes she returned to it with the air of one willing to impart to such a body the mellow cynicism of a tolerant if fatigued _femme du monde_. In the intervals of her retirement she wrote furiously at long-due themes, which took the form of Richard Harding Davis stories--she did them very well--or modern and morbid verses of a nature to disturb the more conservative of those who heard them. At any expression of disturbance Martha would elaborately suppress a three-volume smile and murmur something about "meat for babes;" a performance which delighted her friends--especially Biscuits--beyond measure. Her shelves bristled with yellow French novels, and on her bureau a great ivory skull with a Japanese paper snake carelessly twined through it impressed stray freshmen tremendously. She cut classes elaborately and let her work drop ostentatiously in the middle of the term, appearing at mid-years with ringed eyes and an air of toleration strained to the breaking point. She slept till nine and wandered lazily to coffee and toast at Boyden's an hour later, at least three times a week, with an air that would have done credit to one of Ouida's noblemen. And yet, in spite of all this, Martha was not happy. The disapproval of the lady-in-charge, the suspicions of the freshmen, the periodical discussions with members of the Faculty, who "regretted to be obliged to mark," etc., "when they realized perfectly that she was capable," etc.,--all these alleviated her trouble a little, but the facts remained that her own particular set would never treat her seriously, and that her name was Martha Augusta Williams. Fancy feeling such feelings, and thinking such thoughts, and bearing the name of Martha Augusta Williams! It is, to say the least, dispiriting. And nobody had ever called her anything else. Harriet Williams was called, indifferently, Billie and Willie and Sillie. Martha Underhill took her choice of Mattie, Nancy, and Sister. A girl whose name was Anna Augusta. Something had been hailed as Gustavus Adolphus from her freshman year on; but below _her_ most daring flights of fiction must ever appear those three ordinary, not to say stodgy, names. That alone would have soured a temper not too inclined to regard life with favor. Martha might have lived down the name, but she was assured that never while Bertha Kitts remained alive would she be able to appear really wickedly interesting. For Biscuits would tell the Story. Tell it with variations and lights and shades and explanations adapted to the audience. And it never seemed to pall. Yet it was simple--horribly simple. Martha had invited a select body of sophomores to go with her to the palm-reader's. There were two clever ones, who vastly admired her Richard Harding Davis tales, two curious ones, who openly begged for her opinions and thrilled at her epigrams on Love and Life and Experience, and, in an evil hour, the Sutton twins, whom she admitted into the occasion partly to impress them, and partly so that if anything really fascinating should come to light, Kate Sutton could impart it to her room-mate, Patsy Pattison. When they were assembled in the palm-reader's parlor, Martha gravely motioned the others to go before her, and they took their innocent turns before the little velvet cushion. The Twins were admirably struck off in a few phrases, to the delight of their friends, and the palm-reader's reputation firmly established. In the case of one of the curious girls, peculiar and private events were hinted at that greatly impressed her, for "how _could_ she have known _that_, girls?" The clever girls were comforted with fame and large "scribbler's crosses," also wealthy marriages and social careers, but they looked enviously at Martha, nevertheless, and she smiled maternally on them, as was right. There remained only the other quiet little girl, and she modestly suggested waiting till another day, "so there'll be lots of time for yours, Miss Williams;" but Martha smiled kindly and waved her to the seat, suggesting that hers might not be a long session, with an amused glance at the empty, little pink palm. The palm-reader turned and twisted and patted and asked her age, and finally announced that it was a remarkable hand. The dying interest revived, and even Martha's eyebrows went up with amazement as the seer spoke darkly of immense influence; tact to the _n_th degree; unusual amount of experience, or at the least, "intuitional discoveries;" two great artistic means of expression; previous affairs of the heart, and an inborn capacity for ruling the destinies of others--marked resemblance to the hands of Cleopatra and Sara Bernhardt. It was hands like that that moved the world, she said. The sophomores regarded their friend with interest and awe, noted that she blushed deeply at portions of the revelation, recollected her Sunday afternoon improvisations at the piano and her request for a more advanced course in harmony, and attached a hitherto unfelt importance to her heavy mails. Martha may have regretted her politeness, but she smothered her surprise, sank, with an abstracted air, upon the chair before the cushion, and with a face from which all emotion had been withdrawn and eyes which defied any wildest revelation to disturb their settled _ennui_, awaited the event. The palm-reader glanced at the back of the slim hand, noted the face, touched the finger tips. "How old are you, please?" she asked. Martha wearily announced that she was twenty-one. She was conscious of its being a terribly ordinary age. The palm-reader nodded. "Ah!" she said easily. "Well, come to me again in a year or two. I can't really tell much now." Martha gasped at her. "You can't _tell_ much!" The palm-reader took her hand again. "There's nothing much to tell!" she explained. "The hand isn't really developed yet--it's the opposite from the last young lady's, you might say." She became conscious of a cold silence through the room, and added a few details. "There's a good general ability; no particular line of talent, I should say; orderly, regular habits; a very kind heart; I can't see any events in particular; you've led a very quiet life, I should say; fond of reading; I shouldn't say you'd met many people or travelled much"--she scrutinized the hand more closely--"you'll probably develop a strong religious feeling--" She stopped and smiled deprecatingly. "It is really impossible to say very much," she said, "just now. It's what we call an immature hand!" For months after that Martha woke in the night and tried to forget the nightmare of a terrible figure that led her to an amphitheatre of grinning enemies, and leered at her: _It's what we call an Immature Hand!_ She could have suppressed the others, but the Sutton twins were beyond earthly and human suppression. It seemed to her that she never met them or passed them in a corridor without hearing their jovial assurance: "Oh, Martha Williams is all right! Why, the idea! She's as kind a girl as ever lived--she's nothing like that story. Gracious, no! She's never been to Paris--she lives in Portland. Why, her father's a Sunday School Superintendent! Oh, bother! She's as good as Alberta May, every bit! She has a strong religious--" and somebody passed on, assured--heavens, perhaps admiring her character! At such times Martha would read furiously in her French novels or regard the skull pensively or sit up all night, which annoyed her room-mate and the lady-in-charge. Her room-mate was an absolutely unimportant person, and does not come into the story at all. It is now time to revert to the Twins. When they appeared in the house, two solemn-eyed, pigtailed imps from Buffalo, they were packed away together in a double room on the third floor, and except for their amazing resemblance, were absolutely unnoted. The matron uneasily fancied a certain undue disturbance on the third floor, the evening of their arrival, but on going to that level she found all as still as the grave, and immediately went back downstairs. It is only due to her, however, to say that she never again made such an error. From that time on any abnormal quiet in the house was to her as the trumpet to the war-horse; and she mounted unerringly to the all-too-certain scene of action. Their plans for the first year were rather crude, though astonishingly effective at the time. It was they who invented the paper bag of water dropped from the fourth floor to burst far below, and waken the house with the most ghastly hollow explosion; it was they who let a pair of scissors down two flights to tap against the pane of an unfortunate enemy in the senior class, and send her into convulsions of nervous and, as they said, guilty fear. It was they who stuck new caramels to their door-knob, and oblivious to the matron's admonitions of the hour, waited till in exasperation she seized the knob, when they met her disgust with soap and apologies; it was they who left the gas brightly burning and the door temptingly ajar at 10.15, so that the long-suffering woman pounced upon them with just recrimination, only to find her stored-up wrath directed against two night-gowned figures bowed over their little white beds, as it were two Infant Samuels. It is doubtful if a devotional exercise ever before or since has roused such mingled feelings in the bosom of the chance spectator. It was they who beyond a shadow of doubt won the basket-ball game for the freshmen--an unprecedented victory--by their marvellous intuition of each other's intentions and their manner of being everywhere at once and playing into each other's hands with an uncanny certainty. This gave them position and weight among their mates, which they duly appreciated. They were the recognized jesters of the class, and their merry, homely faces were sure of answering grins wherever they appeared. When they returned sophomore year more alike than ever, with happy plans for the best double room on the second floor, they were met by quite another kind of grin: its owner, Mrs. Harrow, would have perhaps described it as firm and pleasant--the Twins referred to it bitterly as hypocritical and disgusting. "No, Martha, no. It's no use to coax me--I can't have it. I cannot go through another such year. If you wish to remain in the house, you must separate. You can have No. 10 with Alberta Bunting, and Kate can go in with Margaret--she says she is perfectly willing, rather than give up the room, and Helen is not coming back till next year. Now, I don't want to have to argue about it; I think you are better apart." No one ever accused Mrs. Harrow of tact. Her placid firmness was almost the most exasperating thing about her. Her decisions, if apparently somewhat feather-beddish, ranked, nevertheless, with those of the Medes and Persians, and the Twins walked haughtily away--beaten but defiant. Of course it never occurred to them to leave the house, and Kate, after a time, grew quite contented, for Miss Pattison was eminently pleasant and tactful, kept the room in beautiful order, and spent a great deal of time in the Dewey with her sister, an instructor in the college, and her great friend Cornelia Burt, who was off the campus. This left the room to the Twins, who were almost as much together as of yore. But Martha was in quite another case. In her the insult of a dictated separation rankled continually, and her hitherto mild contempt for Mrs. Harrow deepened into a positively appalling enmity. Circumstances unfortunately assisted her feeling, for beyond a doubt Alberta May Bunting was not adapted to her new room-mate. She was a wholesome, kindly creature, with high principles and no particular waist-line. She drank a great deal of milk, and was a source of great relief to her teachers, her recitations being practically perfect. From her sophomore year she had been wildly, if solidly, addicted to zoölogy, and to her, after hours spent in the successful chase of the doomed insect, the grasshopper was literally a burden, for she slew him by the basketful. She rendered the surrounding territory frogless in her zeal for laboratory practice, and in her senior year it was rumored that stray cats fled at her approach: "She'll cut me up in my sleep," said Martha, gloomily, "and soak me in formaline in the bath-tub--the idiot!" For, although the "h'Arrow-that-flyeth-by-day-and-the-terror-that- walketh-by-night," as Martha Williams, in a burst of inspiration, had named her, could not, of course, have known it, Sutton M., as she was most commonly called, loathed and despised bugs, reptiles, and crawling and dismembered things generally, more than aught else beside. She regarded an interest in such things as an indication of mild insanity, and as a characteristic of Alberta May's such a predilection assumed the proportions of a malignant insult. "It's bad enough to have her drink milk like a cow, and eat graham crackers like a--like a _steam-engine_," she confided to her sympathetic sister, "and smell like a whole biological laboratory, and glower at me, and bobble her head like a China image whenever I open my mouth, and call me Mottha, which I despise, and say, 'Why, the _idea_! Why, Mottha, the _idea_! What _do_ you _mean_, Mottha?' without putting little bottles of Things all around, and my having to upset them. My gym suit made me sick to put on for a week because I upset some nasty little claws all pickled in something per cent. alcohol on the sleeve, and I kept thinking the legs were walking on me--ugh! they were leggy claws!" The h'Arrow-that-flyeth-by-day had fondly hoped that Alberta would "do Martha Sutton a world of good," because of her exemplary, regular habits and her calm, sensible nature, but this consummation, though devoutly to be wished, was fated never to be witnessed. Everyone heard the wails and gibes of Sutton M., but to few or none were the woes of Alberta May made known. But that she must have had them, her attitude at the time of the crisis conclusively proved. The Twins, in the course of their mysterious loitering, overheard a somewhat sentimental discussion between Evelyn Lyon and an extremely stiff and correct young man from Amherst, as to whether chivalry and openly expressed devotion to the fair were not disappearing from the earth. "Men like shirt-waists and golf-shoes," Evelyn had been heard to murmur, with a glance at her fluffy chiffon and bronze slippers, and the senior had protested that they did not, and that emotion, if controlled, was as deep as in the balcony-serenade days. "In fact," said he, finally, "Estabrook and I will serenade you Wednesday night." "You would never dare," said Evelyn, with a glance at his eye-glasses and collar, which for height and circumference might have been a cuff. "You'd be afraid the girls would laugh." The senior looked nettled. "Expect us at ten on Wednesday next," said he. "It won't necessarily be the Glee and Banjo Club, you understand, but it will be a real, old-fashioned serenade." Then, as Evelyn smiled maliciously, he added, "Only you must appear at the casement, and throw flowers, you know--that's what they did." Evelyn frowned, but agreed. "At the end of the song, I will," she said, with visions of the night-watchman hasting to the scene. The Twins were unaccountably strolling about as the senior left the house, and wondered with great distinctness and repetition why on earth Evelyn should say she'd be in 14 at the front when of course she'd be in the East corner on the first floor. "She has some game up," shrieked Martha, and Kate called back, "Of course she has--some one will be awfully left, that's all!" The senior listened, grinned, muttered that women told everything they knew, and went his way. On next Wednesday night, the entire house being congregated in the hall near No. 14, where Evelyn, not to be found wanting in case they _should_ get through a verse, was sorting carnations, a husky burst of song enlivened the East corner, a mandolin and a guitar having raced through a confused prelude under the spur of a youth hopping with nervousness and sputtering as he punched the mandolin-player: "Hang it all, Pete, get along, get along! He'll be here in a minute--whoop it up, can't you?" A muffled baritone began, standing so close to the window with a light in it that its owner could have touched the sill with his shoulder: Last night the nightingale waked me, Last night when all was-- The shade went up, the window followed, and the eyes of the musicians beheld, below an audience of house-maids, the only people at present on that side of the house, an enormous woman, with gray hair in curling-kids, and a blanket-wrapper which added to her size, grasping a lamp in her hand and regarding them with a mingling of amazement, irritation, and authority that caused their blood to curdle and their voices to cease. Pattering feet, a lantern turned on them, and a voice: "'Ere, 'ere, what you doing? H'all h'off the campus after ten--get along, now!" completed their confusion, and they left, with an attempt at dignity and a slowness which they had occasion to curse; for as they passed the front of the house, from out of the air above their heads, apparently, two sweet and boyish voices, a first and second soprano, lifted up to the fresh October sky an ancient and beautiful hymn: Some_times_ a _light_ sur_pri_ses The _Chris_tian _while_ he _sings_, It _is_-- A window banged forcibly, and the minstrels stood upon no order but fled to their carriage and rattled out of town. Evelyn Lyon, with set teeth and artistically loosened hair, rushed down the hall behind Martha Sutton, who made the room she was aiming for, slammed the door, realized that the key was lost, and dragged the first piece of furniture that came to hand against it. This was Alberta May's desk, and upon it were the collected results of her vacation work at Wood's Holl. Six jars upset under the impact of Evelyn's weight, a dozen mounted cross-sections jingled in the dark, a pint bottle of ink soaked a thick and beautifully illustrated note-book; and as the Terror-that-walketh-by-night headed Evelyn to her door and mounted a flight to quell the rising tumult, Sutton M., with a hysterical sob, for she was tingling with a delicious excitement, huddled the desk back into the corner, hoped none of the bugs were around the floor, and dropped into bed, wondering how ever Alberta May could sleep through such a night. And now--though perhaps you may have imagined that there was never going to be any story--now we are coming to it, and though it is short, all the characters appear. Alberta May, with an ugly brick-red flush, told Sutton M. that she need never speak to her again, for no answer would be forthcoming, and that she must have her things out of the room before night. Martha was really horribly frightened, and begged to be allowed to copy the note-book and hire some one to make the slides and re-pickle the scattered Things; but Alberta May merely shook her head, replied that she accepted apologies but could not speak again, and kept her word, for she never noticed Martha from then till the 22d of June. The h'Arrow-that-flyeth-by-day gave Martha an address that reduced her to a pulp, and having sent the Twins off to cry in each other's arms till dinner-time and got the doctor for Evelyn, who had sprained her ankle in the rush, she sat down to a cup of tea and council. To her entered Biscuits, and they talked of odds and ends till Mrs. Harrow had grown a little calm. The girls in the house accused Biscuits of a hypocritical and unnatural interest in the h'Arrow: Biscuits denied this, alleging that she was merely ordinarily courteous and saw no occasion for treating her like a dog, which somewhat strong language was addressed with intention to a few of her friends who certainly did not display any undue consideration in their manner to the lady in question. She was wont to add calmly that she saw no sense in having those in authority hate you when a little politeness would so easily prevent it. And many times had she successfully interceded for the offender and gained seats for guests and obtained the parlor for dancing purposes on nights not mentioned in the bond. On these accounts she made an unusually fine house president in her senior year, and though as a sophomore she had been but suspiciously regarded by that officer, she made as firm a bond as is perhaps possible between powers so hostile as those with which she struggled. To-day she listened sympathetically as Mrs. Harrow held forth, concluding with,-- "Now, Bertha, something _must_ be done. I hate dreadfully to make a change, so early in the year, too, but Alberta is decided, and says that she will leave the house to-morrow unless Martha leaves to-night. And Alberta is perfectly justified: nobody could be expected to put up with it. I don't know whom to put her with: she certainly can't be trusted with her friends, and I can't feel that I have any right to put her anywhere else. I hate to have to admit that I can't manage them--Miss Roberts insists that they're fine girls and will outgrow it all, and I have great respect for her opinion, and yet--think of that disgraceful performance last night! It would have done credit to a boarding-school! I was so disgusted--" "Yes, indeed, and I've talked to them, Mrs. Harrow, and told them just how the house feels about it, but don't you think that it was rather boarding-schoolish in Evelyn? She started it all, you know." "Oh, well, of course. Evelyn shouldn't have--but then she is a good, quiet girl, and--Oh, not that I would excuse her!" "Certainly not," said Biscuits, briskly. This was good management on her part, for Evelyn had one friend in the house to the Twins' ten, though a favorite with Mrs. Harrow. "Now, Mrs. Harrow, I've got an idea, and truly, I think it would work," she added persuasively. When she had unfolded the idea, the lady-in-charge could hardly believe her ears. "Why, Bertha Kitts, you must be crazy! Nothing could induce me to think of it for a moment--nothing! It would be the worst possible influence!" Biscuits argued gently. Her three years of consistent good sense and politeness stood in her favor, and though Mrs. Harrow had no sense of humor whatever, she was enabled to perceive a certain poetic justice in the plan set before her. "You know, Mrs. Harrow," she concluded, "that at bottom they're both nice girls! They're awfully irritating at times, and of course you feel that they've both occasioned a great deal of trouble; but they're both honorable, and I'm sure it will be all right: truly, I'd be willing to take the responsibility--if I can get them to consent to it!" "Very well," said Mrs. Harrow, unwillingly, "you know them both better than I do, Bertha, of course, and it certainly couldn't be any worse than it is! But at the first outbreak I shall take the matter into my own hands, and act very severely, if necessary!" Biscuits went directly upstairs and sought out Martha Williams, who lounged on the couch with Loti in her hand and a bag of chocolate peppermints in her lap. Her room-mate, observing that Biscuits glanced at the clock as she entered, murmured something about getting a History note-book and obligingly disappeared. "That's a good harmless creature," observed Biscuits, approvingly. "Yes, she's in very good training," the creature's room-mate returned. "Have a peppermint?" "Pity _she_ can't room with Alberta May," said Biscuits, lightly; "_she'd_ give her no trouble!" "Lord, no!" Martha agreed; "she wouldn't trouble a fly!" Biscuits wandered about the room and absent-mindedly picked up a sheaf of papers. "Themes back?" she inquired. Martha nodded. "'Me see 'em?" Martha shrugged her shoulders in a manner to be envied of the Continent. Biscuits opened at a poem that caught her eye, and read it. Martha's eyes were apparently fixed on _Madame Chrysanthème_, but they wandered occasionally to Biscuits' face as she read. The poem was called,-- THE LIFTING VEIL Do you love me now? Ah, your mouth is cold! Yet you taught me how-- Are we growing old? Did you love me then? Ah, your eyes are wet! If the memory's sweet, Why will you forget? Could you love me still? Hush! you shall not say! Love is not of will-- Shall I go away? Dare you love me now? Let me burn my ships! I, myself, am not so sure-- Am I worth your lips? "Um--ah--yes," said Biscuits, "sounds something like Browning, doesn't it?" Martha looked only politely interested. "Do you think so?" she said impersonally. "Yes. I like that line about the ships," added Biscuits, tentatively; "it--er--seems to--er--_imply_ so much!" Martha looked enigmatically at the skull. "Does it?" she asked. Biscuits caught a glimpse of a long, hastily written story, and gasped. "Why, Martha, did you really hand _that_ in?" she demanded. "Certainly I did," said Martha; "why not?" "Because it's really shocking, you know," Biscuits replied. "What _did_ she say?" Martha hesitated, but a twinkle slipped into her eye and she smiled as she replied. "Look and see," she said. Biscuits turned to the last page, passing many an underlined word or phrase by the way, and read in crimson ink at the bottom: _Mallock has done this better: you are getting very careless in your use of relatives._ At which Biscuits smiled wisely and reassured herself of an announcement she had made in the middle of her junior year to the effect that even among the Faculty one ran across occasional evidences of real intelligence. "Martha," she said abruptly, "I meant what I said about Mary and Alberta--they'd make a very good pair." "And Miss Sutton and I--" returned Martha, sardonically. "Precisely," said Biscuits, "Miss Sutton and you. Oh, I know nobody has the slightest right to ask it of you and we all supposed you wouldn't, but at the same time I thought I'd just lay it before you. I firmly believe, Martha, that you are the only person in this house capable of managing Martha Sutton!" "I?" And _Madame Chrysanthème_ dropped to the floor. "Yes, you. Now, Martha, just look at it: you know that the girl is a perfect child--you know that she means well enough, and in her way she has a keen sense of humor. Now you are much more mature than the average girl up here and you take--er--broader views of things than most of them. You wouldn't be so shocked at the things Suttie does; you could, very gradually, you know, convey to her that her ideas of humor were just a little crude, you know, and that would strike her far more than the lectures that Alberta used to read her by the hour." "Oh! Alberta!" Martha gasped. "Alberta was enough to drive _anybody_ to drink!" "Just so. Well, as I told Mrs. Harrow, you were the one, but of course no one had the least right to press it. And of course, in your last year, and all that, and naturally you haven't any special interest in her, and it's all right if you won't." Martha scowled for a moment and appeared to be reviewing her own past life, rapidly and impartially. "It would be a good thing to have her kept out of the halls, at least," she announced, at last, irrelevantly. "That's what I told Mrs. Harrow," said Biscuits, eagerly. "You see, Alberta _bored_ her so, Martha. She's a clever child and she likes clever people. She needs tact, and Alberta hasn't the tact of a hen. Only, you see, Mrs. Harrow felt that in a great many ways the example--" Martha rose and confronted her guest. "I hope you understand, Biscuits, that if I ever _did_ go into the kindergarten business I should know how to conduct myself properly. I have never for one moment tried to fit everybody to my own standards: I appreciate perfectly that things are--er--relative, and that what may be perfectly safe for me is not necessarily so for others." Biscuits coughed and said that she had always known that, and it was for just that reason that she had hesitated to ask Martha to give up her ways and habits: habits which if harmless to the unprejudiced observer were a trifle irregular, viewed from the strictest standpoint of a college house. "There's no particular reason why you should," she concluded, "and perhaps, anyhow, as Mrs. Harrow says--" "Perhaps what?" snapped Martha. "Oh, nothing! Only she doesn't believe you could do it, and of course she perfectly loathes having to make a change this way--she says it's a terrible precedent--and--" "See here, Biscuits," said Martha, solemnly, "never mind about my habits. I suppose," magnificently, "it won't hurt me to get to bed at ten, once in a way, and it's only till June, anyhow. She _is_ a bright enough child, and as you say, she needs tact. If it keeps the house quiet and saves you dinging at 'em all the time, I can do it, I suppose. I might try studying for a change before mid-years, too." Biscuits got up to go. "I appreciate this very much, Martha," she said gravely. "I know what it means to you, but I really think you'll do her a lot of good--I mean," at a sudden pucker of Martha's brows, "I mean, of course, that a person to whom her badness doesn't seem so very terrible will be a revelation to her." "Oh, yes!" said Martha. Biscuits waylaid Sutton M. on the stairs after dinner and suggested a conversation in her own cosey little single room. Sutton M. accompanied her, suspiciously. "Now, what do you think you're going to do?" she inquired bitterly, as Biscuits offered a shiny apple and tipped _Henry Esmond_ off the Morris chair. "Going to put me with some spook or other, I suppose--I'll leave the house first. I've had enough of that!" "No, you won't, either," Biscuits replied. "You'll be as good as Kate is, and not make me curse the day I was elected house president. Now, Suttie, I'm going to tell you something that must not go beyond this room--beyond this room," she repeated impressively. "Not Kate? I have to tell Kate," said Sutton M., but with an air of deepest interest. Outsiders rarely confided in the Twins. "Well, Kate then, but nobody else. Promise?" Sutton M. nodded. "I'm going to do what might be greatly criticised, Suttie, I'm going to tell you that I think it would be a very good thing for Martha Williams if you would quietly go in and room with her and let Mary come in with Alberta. Now, I've done no beating about the bush--I've told you out straight and plain. What do you say?" "I say it's a fool arrangement, and that I won't have a thing to do with it," said Sutton M., promptly. "All right," returned Biscuits, calmly, "that's all. Is that apple green? I don't mind it, but it makes some people sick." "You know perfectly well Martha's the last girl in the world--we'd fight night and day." "I know she's one of the brightest girls in the college, and that she's getting low in her work, and it's a shame, too," said Biscuits. "Would I make her higher?" Sutton M. tried to be sarcastic, but she showed in her manner the effect of the confidence. "Yes, you would," said Biscuits. "Mary Winter's just spoiling her. She's a perfect nonentity, and she studies like a grammar-school girl--it just disgusts Martha. And Mary admires her so that Martha just rides over her and gets to despise good regular studying because Mary does it so childishly. If some one could be with her who was bright and jolly and liked fun and had a sense of humor and did good work, too, for you two do study well--I'll give you that credit--it would be the making of her. And Mary's such an idiot. She shows that Martha shocks her so much that Martha just keeps it up to horrify her--" "I know," said Sutton M., wisely, "like those cigarettes--Martha never really liked them." "Exactly," Biscuits agreed, though with an effort, for the Twins certainly knew far too much. "The moment I told Martha that it wasn't in the least a question of morals with us but entirely a matter of good taste--that we didn't think she was wicked at all but that it was very bad for the house, and that when we were all represented in the _Police Gazette_ as trotting over the campus with cigarettes in our mouths, the college would get all the credit and she wouldn't get any--why, she stopped right away. And considering how it irritated her I think she was very nice and sensible about it." "But just because Kate and I studied, Martha wouldn't, would she?" "Yes, I think she would. She'd feel that it was an example to you if she didn't. And she's so bright. It's a shame she should flunk as she does. She knows we all know she could get any marks she chose, so she doesn't care." Sutton M. looked thoughtful. "I think her stories are fine," she remarked. "And I suppose I'd have to go with some spook, if I don't," she added gloomily. "Mrs. Harrow feels bad enough about the change," Biscuits interposed, "and she said she'd act very severely next time. I persuaded her that you'd--that is, I didn't persuade her, I'm afraid. Of course, she feels that if you _should_ by any chance drag Martha into your kiddish nonsense, why--she doesn't like Martha any too well, you know, and--" "Biscuits," interrupted Sutton M., hastily, "if I _should_ go in with Martha, and I must say I should think _anybody'd_ be welcome to her after that stick of a Mary Winter, I wouldn't drag her into a thing--truly, I wouldn't. I'd be careful! Kate says that Patsy says she's lots of fun and awfully jolly and nice when you know her," she added. Biscuits assented warmly. "And you understand, Suttie," she continued, "that it's not everybody I'd speak to in this way or that Martha would have. Martha's rather particular: she understands that Alberta May is a little trying, good and kind as she is. But I realize what a good thing it would be for Martha to be with somebody who wouldn't be so shocked whenever she said anything to that skull." "Oh, that skull!" said Sutton M., with a wave of her brown hand. She looked up and caught Biscuits' eye with the sharp, uncompromisingly literal Sutton twinkle. "Biscuits," she demanded, "did anybody ever know of anything really _bad_ that Martha ever did--ever?" "Never," said Biscuits, promptly. Sutton M. chuckled: "That's what we always thought," she said, and added: "Well, I'll try it, and," very solemnly, "you can trust me, Biscuits--I promise you." When Biscuits went back to Martha's room she missed the skull, and beheld on the newly dusted bookshelves a decorous row of historical works and an assortment of German classics. This gratified her, for it was with the German department that Martha's erratic methods of study most obviously clashed. Martha was detaching from the wall a pleasing engraving representing a long white lady with her head hanging off from a couch, on which she somewhat obtrusively reclined, an unwholesome demon perching upon her chest and a ghastly white horse peeping at her between gloomy curtains. This cheerful effect was entitled "The Nightmare," and as it left the wall, Martha fell upon an enlargement in colored chalk of one of Mr. Beardsley's most vivid conceptions, and laid them away together. "Why, Martha!" she exclaimed, "this is really too much--there's no reason why you should take your things down!" Martha smiled tolerantly. "Oh, it makes no matter to me," she said indifferently. "I know the Loti by heart, anyhow, and though none of these things affect me in the slightest way--I really can't see anything in them one way or the other--still I frankly refuse to take any responsibility. If the child should happen to feel that the skull, for instance--" Biscuits grinned. "It's one less thing to dust, anyway," she remarked, and left Martha to her work of reconstruction. She wandered in, one evening, two or three weeks later, to get a German dictionary, and beheld with a pardonable pride the Twins gabbling their irregular verbs in whispers by the lamp, while Martha, stretched on the couch beneath the gas, communed with Schiller and the dictionary. The Twins gave her one swift ineffable glance, kicked each other under the table, and bent their eyes upon their grammars: Martha nodded to her, indicated the Twins with one of her three-volume smiles, and drawled as she handed her the dictionary, "In the words of Mr. Dooley and the Cubans, 'Pa-pa has lost his job, and all is now happiness and a cottage-organ'!" THE FIFTH STORY _THE EDUCATION OF ELIZABETH_ V THE EDUCATION OF ELIZABETH I FROM MISS ELIZABETH STOCKTON TO MISS CAROLYN SAWYER _Lowell, Mass., Sept. 10, 189-._ MY DEAREST CAROL: The thing we have both wished so much has happened! Papa has finally consented to let me go to college! It has taken a long time and a _great deal_ of persuasion, and Mamma never cared _anything_ about it, you know, herself. But I laid it before her in a way that I really am ashamed of! I never thought I'd do anything like it! But I _had_ to, it seemed to me. I told her that she had often spoken of what a mistake Mrs. Hall made in letting Marjory come out so soon, and that I should _certainly_ be unwilling to stay at Mrs. Meade's another year. I'm doing advanced work now, and I'm _terribly_ bored. The girls all seem so very young, somehow! And I said that I couldn't come out till I was twenty-two, if I went to college. I teased so that she gave way, but we had a _terrible_ siege with Papa. He is the _dearest_ man in the world, but just a little _tiny_ bit prejudiced, you know. He wants me to finish at Mrs. Meade's and then go abroad for a year or two. He wants me to do something with my music. But I told him of the _fine_ Music School there was at Smith, and how much _harder_ I should work there, _naturally_. He talked a good deal about the art advantages and travel and French--you know what I think about the _terrible narrowness_ of a boarding-school education! It is _shameful_, that an intellectual girl of this century should be tied down to _French_ and _Music_! And how can the scrappy little bit of gallery sight-seeing that I should do _possibly_ equal four years of earnest, intelligent, _regular_ college work? He said something about marriage--oh, dear! It is _horrible_ that one should have to think of that! I told him, with a great deal of dignity and rather coldly, I'm afraid, that _my_ life would be, I hoped, _something more_ than the mere _evanescent glitter_ of a _social butterfly_! I think it really impressed him. He said, "Oh, very well--very well!" So I'm coming, dearest, and you must write me all about what books I'd better get and just what I'd better know of the college customs. I'm _so_ glad you're on the campus. You know Uncle Wendell knows the President very well indeed--he was in college with him--and, somehow or other, I've got a room in the Lawrence, though we didn't expect it so soon! I feel inspired already when I think of the chapel and the big Science Building and that _beautiful_ library! I've laid out a course of work that Miss Beverly--that's the literature teacher--thinks very ambitious, but I am afraid she doesn't realize the intention of a _college_, which is a little different, I suppose, from a _boarding-school_(!) I have planned to take sixteen hours for the four years. I must say I think it's rather absurd to limit a girl to that who _really_ is _perfectly_ able to do more. Perhaps you could see the Register--if that's what it is--and tell him I could just as well take eighteen, and then I could do that other Literature. I must go to try on something--really, it's very hard to convince Mamma that Smith isn't a _summer resort_! Good-by, dearest, we shall have such _beautiful_ times together--I'm sure you'll be as excited as I am. We shall _for once_ see as much of each other as we want to--I wish I could study with you! I'm coming up on the 8.20 Wednesday morning. Devotedly yours, ELIZABETH. II FROM MISS CAROLYN SAWYER TO MISS ELIZABETH STOCKTON _Lake Forest, Ill., Sept. 17, 189-._ DEAR BESS: I'm very glad you're coming up--it's the only place in the world. I'm not going to be able to meet you--I'm coming back late this year--Mrs. Harte is going to give our crowd a house-party at Lakemere. Isn't that gay? I met Arnold Ritch this summer. He knows you, he said. I never heard you speak of him. He's perfectly _smooth_--his tennis is all right, too. For heaven's sake, don't try to take sixteen hours--on the campus, too! It will break you all up. You'll get on the Glee Club, probably--bring up your songs, by the way--and you'll want to be on the Team. Have you got that blue organdie? You'll want something about like that, pretty soon. If you can help it, don't get one of those Bagdad things for your couch. I'm deadly sick of mine. Get that portière thing you used to have on the big chair at home. It's more individual. We're getting up a little dance for the 26th. If you know any man you could have up, you can come--it will be a good chance to meet some of the upper-class girls. We may not be able to have it, though. Don't tell Kate Saunders about this, please. She'd ask Lockwood over from Amherst, and I've promised Jessie Holden to ask him for her. We shall probably have Sue for class president this year--I'm glad of it, too. There will be a decent set of ushers. I suppose you'll want me for your senior for the sophomore-senior thing. I'll keep that if you wish. I shall get up by the 24th. I'm in the Morris. Don't forget your songs. Yours in haste, C. P. S. III FROM MRS. HENRY STOCKTON TO MRS. JOHN SAWYER _Lowell, Mass., Sept. 23, 189-._ DEAR ELLA: In spite of great uncertainty on my part and actual unwillingness on her father's, Lizzie has started for Smith. It seems a large undertaking, for four years, and I must say I would rather have left her at Mrs. Meade's. But her heart is set on it, and it is very hard to deny her. She argues so, too; really, the child has great ability, I think. She fairly convinced me. It has always seemed to me that a girl with good social surroundings, a good home library, and an intellectual home atmosphere does very well with four years at so good a school as Mrs. Meade's, and a little travel afterwards. Lizzie has quite a little musical talent, too, and I should have liked her to devote more attention to that. Very frankly, I cannot say that I have been able to see any improvement in Carrie since she went away. I suppose it will wear off, but when I saw her this summer she had a manner that I did not like so well as her very pleasant air three--no, two--years ago. It seemed a curious mixture of youth and decision, that had, however, no maturity in it. Katharine Saunders, too, seems to me so utterly irresponsible for a young woman of twenty-one, and yet so almost arrogant. I expected she would know a great deal, as she studied Greek before she went, but she told me that she always skipped the Latin and Greek quotations in books! She seems to be studying nothing but French and Literature and History; her father could perfectly well have taught her all that, and was anxious to, but she would hear nothing of it. She wanted the college life, she said. Ah, well, I suppose the world has moved on since we read Livy at Miss Hopkins'! I picked up a Virgil of Lizzie's yesterday and was astonished to find how it all came back. We felt very learned, then, but now it is nothing. I hope Carrie will be good to my little girl and help her perhaps with her lessons--not that I fear Lizzie will need very much help! Miss Beverly assures me that she has never trained a finer mind. Her essay on Jane Austen was highly praised by Dr. Strong, the rector of St. Mary's. Of course, dear Ella, you won't resent my criticism of Carrie--I should never dream of it with any one but an old and valued friend, and I shall gladly receive the same from you. But Lizzie has always been all that I could wish her. Yours with love, SARAH B. STOCKTON. IV FROM MR. WILLIAM B. STOCKTON TO MISS ELIZABETH STOCKTON _Boston, Mass., Oct. 16, 189-._ MY DEAR NIECE: Your mother advises me of your having just entered Smith Academy. I had imagined that your previous schooling would have been sufficient, but doubtless your parents know best. Your mother seems a little alarmed as to your success, but I have reassured her. I trust the Stockton blood. Whatever your surroundings may be, you can never, I am sure, set yourself a higher model than your mother. I have never known her to lack the right word or action under any circumstances, and if you can learn that in your schooling, your friends and relatives will be more than satisfied. I enclose my cheque for fifty dollars ($50), in case you should have any special demand on your purse not met by your regular allowance. I remember many such in my own schooldays. Wishing you success in your new life, I remain, Your affectionate uncle, WILLIAM B. STOCKTON. V FROM MISS ELIZABETH CRAIGIE TO MISS ELIZABETH STOCKTON _New Haven, Conn., Oct. 21, 189-._ MY DEAR ELIZABETH: Sarah tells me that you are going to college. I am sure I don't see why, but if you do, I suppose that is enough. Children are not what they used to be. It seems to me that four years at Mrs. Meade's should have been enough; neither your Aunt Hannah nor I ever went to college, though to be sure Hannah wanted to go to Mt. Holyoke Seminary once. I have never heard any one intimate that either of us was not sufficiently educated: I wonder that you could for one instant imagine such a thing! Not that I have any reason to suppose you ever did. However, that is neither here nor there. Your Aunt Hannah and I were intending to give you Mother's high shell-comb and her garnet set for Christmas. If you would prefer them now for any reason, you may have them. The comb is being polished and looks magnificent. An absurd thing to give a girl of your age, from my point of view. However, your Aunt Hannah thinks it best. I trust you will be very careful of your diet. It seemed to me that your complexion was not what it should have been when you came on this summer. I am convinced that it is nothing but the miscellaneous eating of cake and other sweets and over-education. There has been a young girl here from some college--I think it is Wellesley--and her complexion is disgraceful. Your Aunt Hannah and I never set up for beauties, but we had complexions of milk and roses, if I do say it. Hannah thinks that the garnets are unsuitable for you, but that is absurd. Mother was no older than you when she wore them, and looked very well, too, I have no doubt. I send you by express a box of Katy's doughnuts, the kind you like, very rich, and a chocolate cake. Also some salad and a loaf cake, Mrs. Harding's rule. I trust you will take sufficient exercise, and don't let your hands grow rough this winter. Nothing shows a lady so much as her hands. Would you like the garnets reset, or as Mother wore them? They are quite the style now, I understand. Hoping you will do well in your studies and keep well, I am, Yours lovingly, AUNT LIZZIE. VI FROM MISS ELIZABETH STOCKTON TO MR. ARNOLD RITCH, JR. _Lawrence House, Northampton, Mass., Nov. 1, 189-._ MY DEAR ARNOLD: It is only fair to you to tell you that it can never be. No, never! When I--if I did (which I can hardly believe)--allowed you to think anything else, I was a mere child. Life looks very different to me, now. It is quite useless to ask me--I must say that I am surprised that you have spoken to Papa. Nor do I feel called upon to give my reasons. I shall always be a very, very good friend to you, however, and very, very much interested in you. In the first place, I am, or at least you are, far too young. The American woman of to-day is younger than her grandmother. I mean, of course, younger than her grandmother is now. That is, than she was then. Also I doubt if I could ever love you as you think you do. Love me, I mean. I am not a man's woman. I much prefer women. Really, Arnold, it is very strange how men bore me now that I have known certain women. Women are so much more interesting, so much more fascinating, so much more exciting! This will probably seem strange to you, but the modern woman I am sure is rapidly getting not to need men at all! I have never seen so many beautiful red-haired girls before. One sits in front of me in chapel, and the light makes an aureole of glory about her head. I wrote a theme about it that is going to be in the _Monthly_ for November. I hope that you won't feel that our dear old friendship of so many years is in any way changed. I shall never forget certain things-- I am enjoying my work very much, though it is easier than I had thought it would be, and the life is different in many ways. If I did not think that Miss Sawyer had probably invited you, I should be very glad to have you come up for the Christmas concert, but I suppose it is useless to ask you. I had no idea you were so fond of tennis! Your friend always, ELIZABETH WOLFE STOCKTON. VII FROM MR. HENRY STOCKTON TO MISS ELIZABETH STOCKTON _Lowell, Mass., Nov. 1, 189-._ MY DEAR ELIZABETH: Yours received and read with my usual attention and interest. I am glad that your college life continues to be pleasant, and that you have found so many friends. I was much interested, too, in the photograph of Miss Hunter. I find the blue prints are more common than I had supposed, for I had imagined that they were something quite new. It is certainly very accommodating in your teachers to allow themselves to be so generally photographed. Your mother seemed much pleased with Miss Hunter, and glad that you were in the house with her and liked her so much. I was surprised to see her so young in appearance. I had very foolishly imagined the typical old style "school-marm," I suppose. But it seems that she was graduated only a few years ago, herself. Now, my dear Elizabeth, I am going to speak to you very seriously. I trust that you will take it in good part and remember that nothing can be more to my interest than the real happiness and well-being of my daughter. The tone of your letters to both your mother and me has seemed for some weeks unsatisfactory. I mean that we have found in them a nervous, strained tone that troubles me exceedingly. I cannot see why you should close with such expressions as this (I copy verbatim): "Too tired to write more;" "All used up--lots of Latin to do--can only find time for a note;" "Tired to death because I'm not sleeping quite as well as usual, just now;" et cetera, et cetera. I have been to see Mrs. Meade, and she assures me that your preparation was more than adequate: that your first year should prove very easy for you, _in Latin especially_. Now what does this mean? You left us well and strong, considering that you have always been a delicate girl. It was for that reason, as you know, that I particularly opposed your going to college. But there is more. Mrs. Allen's daughter, Harriet, has been at home for some days to attend her sister's wedding. Your mother and I naturally seized the opportunity of inquiring after you, and after some questioning from us she admitted that you were not looking very well. She said that you seemed tired and were "going it a little too hard, perhaps." That seemed to me a remarkable expression to apply to a young girl! My endeavors to find out exactly what it meant resulted in nothing more explicit than that "Bess was trying to do too much." Now, my dear girl, while we are naturally only too pleased that you should be striving to stand well in your classes, do not, I beg of you, imagine for one moment that any intellectual advancement you may win can compensate us or you for the loss of your health. You remember Cousin Will, who carried off six honors at Harvard and came home a nervous invalid. I fear that the Stockton temperament cannot stand the strain of too continued mental application. I must stop now, to attend to some business matters, and I will add only this. Do not fail to remember my definite conditions, which have not altered since September. If you are not perfectly well at the Christmas holidays, you must remain with us. This may seem severe, but I am convinced, your mother also, that we shall be acting entirely for your good. Yours aff., FATHER. VIII FROM MR. ARNOLD RITCH, SR., TO MISS MARION HUNTER _New York, N. Y., Nov. 4, 189-._ MY DEAR MISS HUNTER: You may remember meeting, five years ago, in Paris, in the Louvre, an old American, who had the great pleasure of rendering you a trifling assistance in a somewhat embarrassing situation, and who had the further pleasure of crossing on the _Etruria_ with you a month later. I was that man, and I remember that you said that if ever there should happen to be an occasion for it, you would be only too happy to return your imaginary debt. If you really meant it, the occasion, strangely enough, has come. I know well enough from my lifelong friend, Richard Benton, whose family you have so often visited, that you are an extremely busy young woman, and I will state my case briefly. I never make half-confidences, and I rely implicitly on your discretion in the following clear statement. My only nephew and namesake, incidentally heir, has been for some time practically engaged to Miss Elizabeth Stockton, the daughter of an old friend. The engagement has been entirely satisfactory to all parties concerned, and was actually on the eve of announcement, when the young lady abruptly departed for Smith College. My nephew is, though only twenty-four, unusually mature and thoroughly settled: he was deeply in love with the young lady and assures me that his sentiments were returned. She now quietly refuses him, and greatly to her parents' dissatisfaction announces that she intends remaining the four years and "graduating with her class," which seems a strong point with her. Her father and I would gladly leave the affair to work itself out quietly, were it not for an unfortunate occurrence. Ritch, Jr. has been offered an extremely good opening in a Paris banking-house, which he must accept, if at all, immediately, and for six years. He is extremely broken up over the whole affair, and says that unless Elizabeth returns to her old relations with him, he will go. This will be in three weeks. I am not so young as I was, and I cannot leave America again. I can only say that if the boy goes, my interest in life goes, to a great extent, with him. He does not mean to be selfish, but young people, you know, are harder than they think, and feel deeply and, for the moment, irrevocably. He says that he is certain that this is merely a fad on Miss Stockton's part, and that if he could see her for two weeks he would prove it. I should like to have him try. This is my favor, Miss Hunter. Elizabeth respects and admires you more than any of her teachers. She quotes you frequently and seems influenced by you. Arnold has made me promise that I will not ask her parents to bring her home and that I will not write her. I will not. But can you do anything? It is rather absurd to ask you to conspire against your college, to give up one of your pupils: but you have a great many, and remember that I have but one nephew! It is all rather a comedy, but a sad one for me, if there is no change within three weeks, I assure you. They are only two headstrong children, but they can cause more than one heartache if they keep up their obstinacy. Elizabeth has forbidden Arnold to come to Northampton on the score of her work, and wild horses could not drag him there. I offer no suggestion, I ask nothing definitely, I merely wonder if you meant what you said on the _Etruria_, and if your woman's wit, that must have managed so many young idiots, can manage these? Yours faithfully, ARNOLD M. RITCH. IX FROM MISS MARION HUNTER TO MRS. HENRY STOCKTON _Northampton, Mass., Nov. 7, 189-._ MY DEAR MRS. STOCKTON: As you have certainly not forgotten that I assured you in the early fall of my interest, professionally and personally, in your daughter, you will need no further explanation, nor be at all alarmed, when I tell you that Elizabeth is a little over-worked of late. In the house with her as I am, I see that she is trying to carry a little too much of our unfortunately famous "social life" in connection with her studies, where she is unwilling to lose a high grade. She entered so well prepared that she has nothing to fear from a short absence, and as she tells me that she does not sleep well at all of late, she will have no difficulty in getting an honorable furlough. Two weeks or so of rest and freedom from strain will set her up perfectly, I have no doubt, and she can return with perfect safety to her work, which is, I repeat, quite satisfactory. Yours very cordially, MARION HUNTER. X FROM MRS. HENRY STOCKTON TO MISS ELIZABETH STOCKTON (_Telegram_) _Lowell, Mass., Nov. 8._ Come home immediately will arrange with college and explain myself. MOTHER. XI FROM MISS MARION HUNTER TO MISS CONSTANCE JACKSON _Northampton, Mass., Nov. 10, 189-._ DEAR CON: I'm afraid it will be impossible for me to accept your seductive invitation for Thanksgiving. We're pulling the girls up a little sharply this year, and it would hardly do for me to come back late. But it _would_ be good to hear a little music once more! It was rather odd that you should have mentioned that idiotic affair of mine in Paris--the hero of it has just written me a long letter _apropos_ of his nephew, who wants to marry that little Miss Stockton, whose Harvard cousin you knew so well. That portly squire of dames is actually simple and straightforward enough to suggest that I precipitate the damsel into the expectant arms of his nephew and heir-apparent--he is used to getting his own way, certainly, and he writes a rather attractive letter. I owe him much (as you know) and if Elizabeth, who is a dear little thing and far too nice for the crowd she's getting in with--you knew Carol Sawyer, didn't you?--has such a weak-kneed interest in college as to be turned out of the way by a sight of the destined young gentleman, I fancy she would not have remained long with us in any case. She's a pretty creature and had cunning ways--I shall miss her in the house. For I don't believe she'll come back; she's not at all strong, and her parents are much worried about her health. It is more than probable that the Home will prove her sphere. Personally, I don't mind stating that I would it were mine. When I consider how my days are spent---- You might not believe it, but they grow stupider and stupider. Perhaps I've been at it a bit too long, but I never saw such papers as these freshmen give one. And they have begun singing four hymns in succession on Sunday morning! It's very hard--why they should select _Abide with Me_ and _Lead, Kindly Light_ for morning exercises and wail them both through to the bitter end every Sunday in the year is one of the local mysteries. I must get at my papers, they cover everything. Remember me to Mr. Jackson; it was very kind of him to suggest it, but I must wait till Christmas for the Opera, I'm afraid. If I should not come back next year--and it is more than possible that I shan't--I may be in Boston. I hope in that case you won't have gone away. Yours always, M. I. HUNTER. XII FROM MISS ELIZABETH STOCKTON TO MISS CAROLYN SAWYER _Lowell, Nov. 20._ CAROL DEAR: I am writing in a great hurry, as I have an engagement at four, to tell you that I have decided not to return to-day, as I intended. Will you get the key of 32 from Mrs. Driscoll, as Kitty goes home over Sunday, so it will be locked, and get out my mink collarette and my silver toilet things and my blanket wrapper, and I think there is twenty dollars in my handkerchief case. I am extremely disturbed and confused--when one is really responsible for anything one feels very much disturbed. Of course, I don't believe a word of it--it's all folly and nonsense--but still, six years is a long time. Of course, you don't know at all what I mean, dear, and I'm not sure I do either. I forgot to say that I'm probably not coming back to college this year. Mamma feels very worried about my health--you know I didn't sleep very well nights, and I used to dream about Livy. Anyway, she and Papa are going abroad early in the spring, and really, Carol, a college education isn't everything. If I were going to teach, you know, it would be different, but you see I was almost finished at Mrs. Meade's--I was taking advanced work--and it isn't as if I had had only the college preparation. Then, if we go abroad, I must do something with my French. You know there was simply _no_ chance to practise conversation in such a large class, and I was forgetting it, which Arnold thinks would be a pity. He speaks very fine French himself. Then, you see, there'll be all the galleries and everything and the Sistine Madonna and the cathedrals--they're so educative--everybody admits that. It's hardly to be supposed that Geometry and Livy are really going to be as broadening to me as a year of travel with Papa and Mamma, is it? And though I never said anything to you about it, I really have felt for some time that there was something a little narrow about the college. They seem to think it is about all there is of life, you know, with the funny little dances and the teas and all that. Even that dear Miss Hunter is really _un peu gâtée_ with it all--she thinks, I believe, that a college education is all there is for anybody. She told Mamma that I wasn't well--she wanted me to keep my high grade. Oh! Carol! there are better things than grades! Life is a very much bigger thing than the campus even! I think, dear, that one really ought to consider very frankly just what we intend to do with our lives--if we are going to marry, we ought to try to make ourselves cultivated and broad-minded, and in every way worthy to be--Oh, Carol, dearest, I'm terribly happy! It isn't settled, of course: I am utterly amazed that they all seem to think it is, but it isn't. Only probably if I still feel as I do now, when we get back, I shall ask you, dear, what we promised each other--to be my bridesmaid--the first one! I'm thinking of asking Sally and Grace and Eleanor--all our old set at Mrs. Meade's, you know. I think that pink, with a deep rose for hats and sashes, would look awfully well on all of you, don't you! It seems a long time since I was in Northampton: the girls seem very young and terribly serious over queer little lessons--or else trying to play they're interested in each other. Arnold says he thinks the attitude of so many women is bound to be unhealthy, and even in some cases a little morbid. I think he is quite right, don't you? After all, girls need some one besides themselves. I always thought that Mabel Towne was very bad for Katharine. Will you send, too, my Shelley and my selections from Keats? The way I neglected my reading--real reading, you know--oh! _c'était affreux!_ I'm learning the loveliest song--Arnold is very fond of it: _Ninon, Ninon, que fais-tu de la vie? L'heure s'enfuit, le jour succède au jour. Rose ce soir, demain flètrie-- Comment vis-tu, toi qui n'as pas d'amour?_ I'm going out now for a walk. I'm sure you'll like Arnold--I think you said you met him. He doesn't remember you. Remember me to all the juniors I met, and if you see Ethel Henderson, tell her I'll write to her when I get time. Excuse this pointed pen--I'm learning to use it. Arnold hates a stub. Yours always, BETTY. THE SIXTH STORY _A FAMILY AFFAIR_ VI A FAMILY AFFAIR There are Jacksons and Jacksons. As everybody knows, many, possibly most, of those who bear that title might as well have been called Jones or Robinson; on the other hand, I am told that certain Massachusetts families of that name will, on solicitation, admit it to be their belief that Eve was a Cabot and Adam a Jackson. Without asserting that she was personally convinced of this great fact, it is necessary to state that Susan was of the last-named variety of Jackson. She was distinctly democratic, however, and rather strong-willed, and for both of these reasons she came to college. It did not entirely please the family: neither of her sisters had gone, and her brothers in particular were against it. It is probable that she would have been decoyed from her plan had it not been that her cousin, Constance Quincy Jackson, had been for a year one of the young assistants who dash like meteors through the catalogue and disappear mysteriously, just as astronomers have begun to place them, into the obscurity whence they came. Constance, like Susan, had been persistent, and was studying at Oxford before the family had quite made up its mind how to regard her; later, she frequented other and American institutions of learning and bore off formidable degrees therefrom, and at about that time it was decided that she was remarkably brilliant, and that her much commended thesis on the Essential Somethingness of Something or Other was quite properly to be ranked with her great-grandfather's dissertation on the Immortality of the Soul. She would do very well; she could be relied on; and entrusted to her and further armed with letters of introduction to the social magnates of the vicinity--which, I regret to say, she neglected to present till her sophomore year--Susan began her career. Of the eminent success of this career, it is not the purpose of this story to treat. Beginning as freshman vice-president, she immediately identified herself with the leading set of her class, and in her sophomore year was already one of the prominent students in the college. She was one of Phi Kappa's earliest acquisitions, and belonged to three or four lesser societies, social and semi-educational; she had been on the freshman Team; she was twice a member of the Council; in her senior year she was literary editor of the _Monthly_ and class president, besides taking a prominent part in Dramatics. She fulfilled all these duties most acceptably, taking at the same time a very high rank in her classes: in one department, indeed, her work was pronounced practically perfect by a somewhat exigent professor. And in addition, she was well born, well bred, and well dressed, and considered by her most enthusiastic admirers the handsomest girl in the college, though this was by no means the universal opinion. You might imagine that Miss Jackson was therefore intolerably conceited, but in this you would err. She took no particular credit to herself for her standard of work; she had a keen mind, and had been taught to concentrate it, and her grandfather, her father, and two uncles had successively led their classes at Harvard. It seemed perfectly natural to her to be told that she was the one young woman on whose shoulders a golf cape looked really dignified and graceful--had not her grandmother and her great-aunt been famed for their "camel's-hair-shawl shoulders"? A somewhat commanding manner and a very keen-sighted social policy had given her a prominence that she was conscious of having done nothing to discredit; and as she had been quite accustomed to see those about her in positions of authority, and had learned to lay just the proper amount of emphasis on adverse criticism, she steered her way with a signal success on the perilous sea of popularity. Her idea of the four years had been to do everything there was to be done as well as any one could do it, and she was not a person accustomed to consider failure. I mentioned at the beginning of this story the two classes of Jacksons. Emphatically of the former and unimportant variety was Elaine Susan Jackson of Troy, New York. Mr. Jackson kept a confectionery shop and ice cream parlor, going to his business early in the morning and returning late in the evening. This he did because he was a quiet-loving man, and his home was a noisy one. Mrs. Jackson was a managing, dictatorial woman, with an unexpected sentimental vein which she nourished on love-stories and exhausted there. From these books she had culled the names of her daughters--Elaine, Veronica, and Doris; but prudence impelled her to add to these the names of her husband's three sisters--a triumph of maternal foresight over æsthetic taste--and they stood in the family Bible, Elaine Susan, Veronica Sarah, and Doris Hannah. Mr. Jackson was not a sentimentalist himself, and read nothing but the paper, sitting placidly behind the peanut-brittle and chocolate mice, and relapsing sometimes into absolute idleness for hours together, deep in contemplation, perhaps, possibly dozing--nobody ever knew. At such times he regarded the entrance of customers as an unwelcome intrusion and was accustomed to hurry them, if juvenile, into undue precipitance of choice. From this even quiet he emerged seldom but effectively: when Veronica entertained the unattractive young men she called "the boys," later than eleven o'clock, when Doris went to the theatre more than twice a week, or when they had purchased garments of a nature more than usually unsuitable and pronounced. Then Mr. Jackson spoke, and after domestic whirlwinds and fires the still voice of an otherwise doubtful head of the family became the voice of authority. Elaine gave him no trouble of this sort. She did not care for young men, and she never went to the theatre. Her clothes, when she had any choice in the matter, were of the plainest, and she had never teased her father for candy since she began to read, which was at a very early age. _I Say No, or the Love-letter Answered_, was her first consciously studied book, and between ten and fifteen she devoured more novels than most people get into a lifetime. Incidentally she read poetry--she got books of it for prizes at school--and one afternoon she sandwiched the _Golden Treasury_ between two detective stories. She did not care for her mother's friends, gossiping, vulgar women, and she loathed her sisters'. She had a sharp tongue, and as parental discipline was of the slightest, she criticised them all impartially with the result that she was cordially disliked by everybody she knew--a feeling she returned with interest. She found two or three ardent friends at school and was very happy with them for a time, but she was terribly exacting, and demanded an allegiance so intense and unquestioning that one by one they drifted away into other groups and left her. In her second year at the high school they read the _Idylls of the King_, and she discovered her name and saw in one shame-filled second the idiotic bad taste of it--Elaine Susan! She imagined the lily maid of Astolat behind her father's counter and became so abased in her own mind that the school found her more haughty and disagreeable than ever. From that moment she signed her name E. Susan Jackson and requested to be called Susan. This met the approval of the teachers, and as the schoolgirls did not hold much conversation with her, the change was not a difficult one. By the time she had been three years in the high school she was considered by every one the most brilliant student there, and the principal suggested college to her. This had never occurred to her. Though they had never lacked for necessities, Mr. Jackson's business was not conducted in a manner to lead to marked financial success, and though he said little about his affairs, it was evident to them all that matters were slowly but surely running down hill. Doris and Veronica were eager to leave school and spend a term at the Business College, some friends of theirs having done this with great success and found positions as typewriters, but their father insisted on their staying at school for two years at least. It would be time enough to leave, he said, when they had to. It was significant of the unconscious attitude of the family that there had never been any question of the oldest daughter's leaving school: Elaine had always been real bright, her mother said, and as long as books was all she took any interest in, she might as well get what she could--she presumed she'd teach. But this acquiescent spirit changed immediately when she learned that her husband had told Elaine he would send her to college for two years anyway, and as much longer as he could afford. It seemed to Mrs. Jackson a ridiculous and unwarranted expense, particularly as he had refused to allow the term at the Business College partly on the financial score. She lectured, argued, scolded; but he was firm. "I told her she should, and she shall," he repeated quietly. "She says she thinks she can help along after a while, and you needn't worry about her paying it back--she will, all right, if she can. I guess she's the best of the lot of us; she's worth the other two put together. You let Lainey alone, Hattie, she's all right!" This was during her last year at school, and as she had on her own responsibility taken the classical course there, finding a fascination in the idea of Greek, she accomplished the preparation very easily. Her mother, bowing to the inevitable, began to plume herself on her daughter "who was fitting herself to go to Smith's College," and rose many degrees in the social scale because of her. But their ideas of the necessary preparations differed so materially, that after prolonged and jarring hostilities marked by much temper on both sides, the final crash came, and after a battle royal Elaine took what money was forthcoming and conducted her affairs unchallenged from that moment. It was a relief to be freed from the wearisome squabbles, but she cried herself to sleep the night before she left--she did not perfectly know why. Later she told herself that it was because she had so little reason to cry when she left home for the first time. She went to the train alone, because the girls were at school and her father at his business. She said good-by to her mother on the porch, with the constraint that had grown to characterize her attitude towards them all, but her mother was suddenly seized with a spasm of sentiment, and kissing her wildly, bewailed the necessity that drove her firstborn from her to strangers. Later the girl found it sadly characteristic of her life, that absurd scene on the porch; with her heart hungry and miserable for the love and confidence she had never known, she endured agonies of shame and irritation at the demonstration that came too late. She went away, outwardly cold, with tight-pressed lips; her mother read _Cometh up as a Flower_, and wept hysterically that Fate should have cursed her with such an unfeeling, moody child. It is hard to determine just what incident convinced Susan--for she dropped the initial on her registration--that life had not changed for her because she was to live it in Northampton, and that she must be alone there, as she had been in Troy. Just before she left college she decided that she had known it immediately: that from the moment when she plunged into the chattering, bustling crowd in the Main Hall, where everybody knew somebody and most people knew all the others, a vague prevision of her four years' loneliness came to her: a pathetic certainty that she could not, even with the effort she was too proud to make, become in any reality a part of that sparkling, absorbed, unconscious current of life that rushed by her. Sometimes she dated her disillusionment--for she had had her dreams: she knew them only by the pathetic disappointment of the obstinate awakening--from the day that she saw her namesake laughing in the midst of a jolly group of girls to whom she was presenting her father and her aunt. They were handsome, well-dressed people with a distinct air, and they were tolerantly amused at Sue in her new environment and showed it in a kindly, courteous way that was much appreciated. As Susan passed the group there was a great laugh, and she heard Sue's voice above the rest. "Truly, Papa, I thought you'd finished! You know, whenever I interrupted, Papa used to make me sit absolutely still for a quarter of an hour afterward--it's not so long ago he stopped, either!" Her father laughed, and patted her shoulder, and Susan went on out of hearing. It was only a flash; but she saw the gracious, well-ordered household, the handsome, dignified people, the atmosphere of generations of good breeding and scholarship, as clearly as if she had visited them, and her heart swelled with angry regret and a sickening certainty that all the cleverness in the world could not make up for the youth she had been cheated out of. She thought of the bickering, squabbling family table in Troy and tried to imagine her father teaching Doris and Veronica not to interrupt: her cheeks burned. In class Sue was often near her; she knew that she was recognized chiefly by the fact that _she_ was Susan Jackson, too. On the first day, when the instructor had called "Miss Jackson" and they had both answered, "Miss Susan Jackson," when they still replied together, and finally "Miss Susan Revere Jackson," when the matter was cleared up, Sue had looked at her with interest, and after the class made some little joking remark. If the other had answered in the same spirit, nobody knows whether this story need have been written. But Susan had heard Cornelia Burt ask: "Is she related at all, Sue?" and heard Sue's answer, "Oh, dear, no! From Troy, I believe." Now Sue meant absolutely nothing but what she said, but her namesake read into the words a scorn that was not there--either in intention or fact. Her heart was sore with a hot, vague jealousy: this girl, no longer there than she, had stepped so easily into a place prepared, apparently, for her; she knew everybody, went everywhere; admired by her own class and made much of by the upper-class girls, she was already well known in the college. She was a part of it all--Susan only watched it. And because of this and because she admired her tremendously and envied her with all the force of a passionate, repressed nature, the poor child answered her little remark with a curtness that was almost insolent, and the manner of an offended duchess. Sue flushed a little, lifted her brows, threw a swift glance at Cornelia, and walked away with her. Susan heard them laughing in the hall, and bit her lip. She could not know that Sue had described her in a letter to her father as "a queer, haughty thing, but terribly clever. Nobody seems to know her--I imagine she's terribly bored up here. I said some footless thing or other to her the other day, and she turned me down, as Betty says. Did you meet Dr. Twitchell? He was stopping with the Winthrops...." Susan used to wonder afterwards if it would all have been different had she been on the campus. I know that most college people will say that it would, and it is certain that campus life was the best thing in the world for Martha Williams: nobody knows with what self-conscious egotism she might have been spoiled if her friends and foes had not conspired to laugh it out of her. But, on the other hand, those who have watched the victims of that reasonless, pitiless boycotting that only women can accomplish so lightly--so unconsciously, do you think?--know the ghastly loneliness of the one who, in the very centre of the most crowded campus house, is more solitary than the veriest island castaway. There is no doubt that Susan needed a great deal of discipline. She had been for so many years superior to her surroundings, so long not only the cleverest but the finest-grained, most aristocratic of all those she saw about her, that although she had perfectly appreciated the fact that she would probably no longer be in that relative position, she had not estimated the difficulty of the necessary adjustment, and it is only fair to those who gave her her hardest lessons of calm neglect to state at once that her manner was a trifle irritating. To begin with, she had made herself unpleasantly conspicuous at the time of their first freshman class-meeting by rising after half an hour of unventilated and tumultuous altercation, and leaving the room. Now it is not the custom of popular freshmen to leave their first class-meeting in this manner--not as if one were faint or demanded at recitation, but as merely intolerably bored and not a little contemptuous; and the scrambling, squabbling class regarded her accordingly. Susan Revere Jackson was bored, too--unspeakably bored; but she sat indefatigably in her chair in the front row, applauded nominations, discussed the presumably parliamentary features of the occasion, smiled and agreed, differed at proper intervals, and left the room vice-president. It is hard to know just how much enthusiasm Sue really felt: Susan, to whom she soon became the visible expression of all the triumph and ease and distilled essence of the successful college girl, used to wonder, later, as older than Susan have wondered, how much of her college life was ingenuous and how much a perfectly conscious attitude. For long before she left, Susan realized that she had greatly misjudged a large proportion of the girls, whom the event proved more practically wise than she, and that they who fill the rôle of "fine, all 'round girl" with the greatest success are often perfectly competent to fill others, widely different. This she did not understand at first, and as a result of her ignorance she included them all in her general condemnation: she found them immature, boisterous, inclined to be silly; or narrow-minded and dogmatic when they were less flippant. She was somewhat exacting, as has been said before, and the solemn, ponderous attitude of the occasional girl who wallows before the abstract Higher Education, and lectures the Faculty gravely on their failure to conduct her to its most eminent peaks during the freshman year, appealed as strongly to her sense of humor as if she had not herself been sadly disappointed in the somewhat restricted curriculum offered her at that period. This was through no fault whatever of the college, but because the girl had absolutely no practical basis of expectation and knew no more of the thousand implications of college life than she did of normal girlhood with its loves and disciplines and confidences, its tremendous little social experiences, its quaint emotions, and indispensable hypocrisies. Her vague conception of college life was modelled on _The Princess_: she imagined graceful, gracious women, enamoured of a musical, poetic, higher knowledge, deliciously rapt at the wonderful oratory of some priestess of a cult yet unknown to her: a woman beautiful and passionate, who should understand her vaguest dreams and sympathize with her strangest sorrows as no one she had yet known or seen could do. She found a crowd of jostling, chattering schoolgirls, unformed, unpoised; many of them vulgar, many stupid, many ill-bred; overflowing a damp, cold hall that smelled of wet, washed floors; reciting, in a very average fashion, perfectly concrete and ordinary lessons from text-books only too familiar, to businesslike, middle-aged women, rather plain than otherwise, with a practical grasp of the matter in hand and a marked preference for regular attendance on the part of freshmen. It was characteristic of her that what cut deepest in all the disillusionment was not the loss of the hope, but the shamed perception of the folly of it, the realization of the depth of practical ignorance it implied, the perfectly conscious pathos of a life so empty of real experience of the world as to make such naïve visions possible. She did the required work and kept her thoughts about it to herself, but the effect of what she secretly felt to have been a provincial and ridiculous mistake showed itself in her manner; and the occasional hauteur of her namesake, who had inherited a very effective stare of her own, was diffidence itself compared with the reserved disdain that covered her own smarting sensitiveness. Girls who had tumbled about with their kind from babyhood, who had found at home, at church, at school a varied if simple social training, resented her formality and could not see that pure shyness of them, pure wonder at their rough-and-ready ease of manner, their amazing power of adjustment, their quick grasp of the situation and each other, lay at the root of her jealous dignity. So she called them "Miss," and they thought her affected; she waited for invitations that she should have taken for granted, and they thought her haughty; she made no advance in a place where only the very favored are sought out and most must earn even the humblest recognition with honest toil and assiduous advertisement, and they quietly let her alone. She was not on the campus, and as the girls in the small boarding-house with her were industrious and ordinary to the last degree and became very early impressed with her realization of this fact, she saw little of them, and her one opportunity of getting the campus gossip, which is the college gossip, grew smaller and smaller. She took solitary walks, thereby confirming the impression that she preferred to be alone--for who need be alone among a thousand girls unless she wishes it? On such a walk, late in the fall, she stood for some time on one of the hills that rise above the town proper, looking for the hundredth time at the mountains, outlined that afternoon against the dying light of a brassy, green sky. The trees were bare and black about her; the lights in the comfortable houses were flushing up the windows with a happy evening red; belated children were hurrying home; and now and then groups of girls, fresh-cheeked from their quick walk, swung by, in haste for supper and their evening engagements. Over her heart, hungry and misunderstood, there poured a sudden flood of passionate longing for one hour of unconscious happy comradeship with homes and girls like these; one hour of some one else's--anybody else's--life; one taste of dependence on another than herself. It fell into rhythm and fascinating phrases while she gave herself up to the mood, and she made a poem of it that night. In two days she was famous, for High Authority publicly placed the poem above anything yet done in the college; it was seized by the _Monthly_, and copied widely in the various college publications; to the editorial board and the Faculty who did not have other reason for knowing her, she became "the girl who wrote _At Autumn Dusk_." It was long before she equalled it, though almost everything she did was far above a college standard; and one or two people will always think it her best poem, I have no doubt, in spite of more recent and perhaps more striking work. For this poem was only the beginning, it may as well be admitted now, of Susan's career as a genius. This degree is frequently conferred, no doubt, when unmerited; but the article is so susceptible of imitation, the recipe for producing the traditional effect so comparatively simple, that it is to be wondered at, on the whole, that the aspirants for the title should be, among so many clever young women, so relatively few. To a frank and recently awakened interest in Shelley, Keats, Rossetti, and Co., it is only necessary to add a vacant abstraction, a forgetfulness of conventional meal hours--supper, for choice--a somewhat occult system of reply to ordinary remarks, and the courage of one's convictions in the matter of bursting out with the irrelevant results of previous and prolonged meditation irrespective of the conversation of the moment. Any one who will combine with these infallible signs of the fire from heaven as much carelessness in the matter of dress as her previous bringing up will allow--though this is naturally a variable quantity--and a certain unmistakable looseness of _coiffure_--was there ever a genius with taut hair? heaven avert it!--may be reasonably certain of recognition. It is understood, of course, that with the qualifications above mentioned a taste for verse and an ear for rhythm, in conjunction with the frank appreciation of the poetical firm also above mentioned, have produced their inevitable result. The character of the output naturally has something to do with the extent of the reputation, and although Susan, the most promising candidate for the degree then in the field, had alarmingly few of the most obvious signs of her rank, this was indulgently passed over, and she was allowed her laurels. But it was Sue Jackson on whom all the first congratulations were heaped: roses and violets, that blossom at the slightest excuse in Northampton, covered the hall table in the Hubbard House, where she spent her first two years; affectionate and mock-reverential notes crowded the bulletin board for her; a spread was actually got up and the guests invited before the mistake was known. To do her justice she would have promptly despatched the notes and flowers to her defrauded namesake, but the donors, whom she consulted, would have none of it. "Why, Sue! Why, the idea! _Didn't_ you write it? Oh, girls, what a joke! How perfectly funny!--Send 'em to her? Not at all. Why on earth should Neal and I send that girl flowers? For that matter, she cut us dead day before yesterday, on Round Hill, didn't she, Pat? And she's in our Greek, too. We'll have the stuff to eat, anyhow. You're a nice old thing, Sue, if you can't write 'this extraordinary poem'!" Susan, who heard next to nothing of college news, heard about this. She heard how Sue had gayly responded to toasts: "The Poem I did not write," "My Feelings on failing to compose my Masterpiece"--this was Neal Burt's, and she was very clever over it--and others. The only thing she did not hear about was Sue's half-serious response to "My gifted God-child," suggested by an upper-class friend. She made a little graceful fun and then added quite earnestly, "And really, girls, I _do_ think she ought to be here! After all, the Class, you know--Let's take down the flowers and all the fudge--come on! She can't do more than squelch us!" The very girls who had scoffed at the idea before were naturally the ones to take it up immediately, and they were hastily gathering the things together, when the bell rang. They could not hope to get there and back before ten, and most of them were already deep in the matron's black list for reported lights; so they gave it up, and put the flowers in the tub, where a sudden frost over night struck them and they perished miserably. To Susan it was the bitterest thing of all; it took the sweetness from her success; it dulled the piquancy of her sudden position. She could not possibly know how little it meant to Sue; that it was only one of many spreads, and by no means the triumphal feast she imagined; that after the first they forgot why they had planned it, almost. To her it was her chance at life, her long-delayed birthright, and Sue had taken it, too, along with everything else. "She might have left me that!"--it was her thought for more than one unhappy night. Before she went home in June she had written a Chaucer paper that became vaguely confounded in the matter of literary rank with the works of its famous subject, in her class-mates' simple minds, so great was the commendation of Another High Authority in regard to its matter and style. It came out in the May _Monthly_, in which were some pretty little verses of Sue's. They were paraphrased from the French--Sue had taken any amount of French before she came up--and Susan spent her time at chapel in looking harder than ever at her namesake as she laughed and chattered and took her part in the somewhat crudely conceived jokes that seem to amuse girls so perennially. Less flexible, as she afterwards considered, less hypocritical, as she irritably felt then, she marvelled at the mental make-up of a girl capable of appreciating the force and pathos of De Musset's best work and expressing it so accurately, and able at the same time to find content in such tiresome, half-grown nonsense. When the _Monthly_ came out, she was amazed to receive a dozen copies with a hasty note: Dear Miss Jackson: Here are the copies you wanted--never mind the money. There are always a lot left over since we enlarged the edition. If you want more, after we've sent out the Alumnæ list, we'll give them to you. H. STUART. It was only one of the many notes intended for Sue that had been coming to her since the beginning. But none of the invitations to dinner, to Alpha and Phi Kappa, to walk, to ride, to wheel, to eat a box from home, had the effect of this one. For Sue came after her _Monthlies_ and in a ten minutes' conversation wrought more ruin than she would have believed possible. "Did you get all mine and your own, too?" she asked laughingly. "I should send away a hundred, more or less, if _I_ did 'absolutely satisfactory' Chaucer papers! I should be that proud.... "You see, Papa has to have the _Monthly_, if there's anything of mine in it, _tout de suite_--directly--now. He was wild with rage at me because he learned about that little fool story I had in, once before, from Cousin Con, 'long afterwards,' he said--it was only a week! And then, other people, you know.... "Did you get any of these off, before I came? Because it's all right if you did--I don't need a dozen. Isn't it funny I don't get any of your things? You must be somewhat cloyed with my notes and stuff--I should think you'd be bored to death. It's very wearing on me, Miss Jackson, explaining all the time, 'No, I'm not the one! I assure you I didn't write it.' You've no idea.... "My cousin is on the _Harvard Monthly_ board, you know--he telegraphed congratulations to me. He was that set up over it! It was really very funny.... "I'm afraid I'm keeping you--were you going out? Shall I tell Helen Stuart to send yours down? She may think we've both got all we want. Do you know what Alpha's going to be to-night? Somebody said it was going to be Dr. Winthrop--he's my uncle, you know, and I thought if it was I'd go down to the station...." She had not the slightest idea that her thoughtless and, to tell the truth, somewhat embarrassed chatter was one succession of little galling pinpricks to the other. Her father, who expected his daughter's little triumphs to be his own, as a matter of course; her cousin at Harvard; her uncle who lectured to the Alpha; her notes and flowers--she must know that there was the best of reasons for her not getting her namesake's!--her light implication that everybody went to Alpha; her very expression: "No, I'm not the one!" seemed to the girl's angry sensitiveness a studied insult. Not the one! As if there were any one else! She did not know how unbearably formal and curt she seemed to the other, nor how strongly she gave the impression of wanting to be let alone. Sue went away to mail her _Monthlies_, and Susan locked her door and considered at length and in detail the humor of her visitor's light remarks as applied to herself. She fancied _At Autumn Dusk_ and _A Study of Chaucer_ demanded by an enraged father, and smiled--a very unpleasant and ungirlish smile. Moreover, it is possible that she did her father an injustice here. While it is improbable that he would have persisted in lending them about among his friends, to his wife's open amusement, as did Mr. Jackson of Boston, and notwithstanding the fact that he would doubtless have failed to appreciate them fully, he might have liked to see them. Later, much later, Susan was to find a number of her poems and stories clipped with care from the magazines and pasted into an old scrapbook, with the glowing notices of her first really well-known work; the book hidden under a pile of old newspapers in her father's closet. She cried over them for days--he was dead then--and published _Blind Hearts_ shortly afterward. None of her class-mates, most of whom gave or received that exquisite sonnet-cycle for Christmas that year, could have known that the roots of it struck back to her freshman year at college. After a stupid, hot vacation, in which she lost touch more than ever with her people, from whom she was to draw slowly apart, it seemed, forever, she came back with a little, unowned hope for other things: a vague idea that she could start fresh. She told somebody, afterwards, that just as she got to understand girls a little she lost all connection with them; she did not lose connection with them just then, so it must be that she did not then understand them. Indeed, what was, perhaps, her greatest mistake was made at this time, and colored the year for her. It happened in this way. The Alpha had the first chance at the sophomores that year, and for a wonder, the sophomores were not only clever but possessed that intangible quality, "the Alpha spirit," in a gratifying degree. The ticket for the first drawing included the two Jacksons, Cornelia Burt, Elizabeth Twitchell, and to fulfil that tradition that inevitably elects one perfectly unexplainable girl, Kate Ackley, a young person of many and judiciously selected friends. At the very night of the election it was suddenly rumored that Sue Jackson had openly declared her intention of refusing Alpha in favor of the rival society, on the ground that she liked Phi Kappa better and had more friends there. Now aside from the fact that this report was utterly baseless, for Sue would have preferred the Alpha, if only to go in among the first five of all, it was aside from the point. As some irritated seniors afterwards explained with much temper and reiteration to the chidden society, Alpha was sufficiently honorable in the sight of the college to endure very calmly rejection at the hands of any freshman whatsoever, whether or not they had any certainty of the truth of the rumor. But the girls were struck with the solemn necessity of immediate and drastic action, and with a gratifying thrill of excitement they struck off Sue's name and put in Margaret Pattison's, the sixth in order, whereat Phi Kappa greatly rejoiced and promptly elected Sue the next week. Now it is very sad that the only person who seriously misunderstood this whole affair was Susan Jackson of Troy. Sue very quickly learned the whole matter; what her feelings may have been is not certain. Phi Kappa made a jubilee over her, and she became, as is well known, a great light in that society. Miss Pattison, by some mysterious free masonry--the girls who are "in everything" seem to absorb all such matters through their pores--soon found out her luck, and was frankly grateful for it. Alpha retained the courage of her convictions and assumed a distinctly here-I-stand-I-can-no-otherwise attitude. Phi Kappa chuckled privately and looked puzzled in public. But Susan had made a great mistake, and what is worse, never knew it. A little gossiping freshman in the boarding-house she had moved into, who had been injudiciously petted by the seniors and imagined herself in everybody's confidence, told Miss Jackson, with many vows of secrecy, that there had never been such a time in Alpha in the history of the college: they had meant to have Sue--oh, of course!--but there had been a terrible mistake at the balloting and names had been confused, and though etiquette forbade any expression of their real feeling, they were nearly wild at their clumsiness. It is hardly to be wondered at that Susan jumped to her conclusion. She had got so many things intended for Sue--why not this? She knew that cleverness and even college fame are not the only calls to a society, and she had no real friends in either of the two organizations. She could not believe that the Alpha would purposely omit Sue: if they had chosen both, it would have been different, but as it was.... So she received their very earnest congratulations with a constraint that chilled them. They reasoned that she was perfectly certain of the election and took no pains to hide it, and though they could not blame her for this, they thought her more conceited than ever, and regarded her accordingly. The poor child was suffering from actual humility, however, not conceit. She could not know that her mark on both society lists was the highest ever given; that Alpha would cheerfully have sacrificed any two, or even three, of the others for her; that much as they regretted Sue, they wasted less sorrow over her now that they were sure of the leading girl in Ninety-red. For that was what they called her--the girls that she thought patronized her. They took her after-successes almost as a matter of course. "Oh, yes! she was far and away the most brilliant girl in the college!" they said. But she never heard them. The house she had moved into with an unacknowledged hope of getting more in touch with them was the last house she should have chosen. It was filled from cellar to roof with freshmen, and not only are they notoriously clannish under such conditions, but there were at least eight or ten of them from the same prominent preparatory school, and among them was their class president. It was not possible for Susan to join herself to this little circle of satellites, and they controlled the entire house in a very short time. So she took to visiting the head of the house, a faded, placid soul with a nominal authority and a gentleness that moved even her worst freshmen--and a bad freshman combines the brutality of a boy with the finesse of a woman of the world--to a little shamed consideration during their periodic fits of social reform. Sitting by her fire in the dusk, with the smell of hot cooked chocolate drifting in from the hall, and the din of the assembled tribes in the president's room overhead, Susan passed long, bored, miserable hours. Half listening to the older woman's talk, half sunk in her thoughts, she alternately chafed with rage at the idea of her college life drifting out in solitary walks and tired women's confidences, or took a sad kind of comfort in one fire where she was always welcome, one friend that loved to talk to her. For Mrs. Hudson grew very fond of her, and something in the girl's own baffled, unsatisfied soul must have helped her to understand the stress and pathos of the tired little woman's life. Few of the girls who afterwards read _Barbara: A Study in Discipline_, would have believed that the high-hearted, wonderful heroine was based on Miss Jackson's study of their freshman landlady. But most of Susan's knowledge was gained from such unscheduled courses. In her junior year she let her work go, to a great extent, and spent much time in the town libraries, reading omnivorously. As a matter of fact, her class work deteriorated not a little, as much by reason of dangerously extended cuts as anything else. But it all failed to interest her, somehow: the detailed campaigns, the actual value of money, the soulless translations, the necessarily primary character of the beginnings of any study of modern language. She felt with growing irritation that she should have learned genders and verbs earlier in life, and she surprised her expectant teachers with poorer and poorer recitations. Mademoiselle had no means of knowing that though Miss Jackson stammered through the subjunctive she was reading dozens of novels and plays with a very fair ease; Fräulein could not tell from her imperfect handling of the modal auxiliaries that she had written a better paper on _Faust_ than many a six years' student of German, and already knew most of Heine by heart. This year she made a few friends, chiefly in Phi Kappa, for some reason or other, which irritated the Alpha girls a little. To do her justice, she was utterly ignorant of this result of her connection with Bertha Kitts and Alida Fosdick, nor would it have resulted in the case of an ordinary girl. But Susan was more prominent than she ever realized, and her whole connection with the others being official and logical rather than social and actual, her conduct and opinions were very sharply criticised from a rather exacting standpoint. Nor was this wholly unfair, for she was herself an unsparing critic. More than one of the Faculty smarted under her too successful epigrams; various aspirants for popularity and power in the Alpha or the class learned to dread her comments; her few friends themselves were never quite sure of her attitude toward them. But she was not, for her part, sure of them: it is hard to make friends in one's junior year. And though she saw quite a little of Biscuits and Dick and Neal Burt--always her constant admirer--she never for a moment lost the consciousness that she was no friend of their friends, that she had no place in those groups long since formed and shaken into place. They were a little jealous of her, too, and resented her selection of this girl and that from among them, though they could not but admit that her judgment was good. Her sources of irritation were the same always. Their very flexibility, the ease with which those she had chosen out slipped from her to their other friends (they laughed with her at them, even, after the manner of girls--did they laugh with them at her?), filled her with a hopeless jealousy. It was not their nice clothes and their good times she grudged them, though she wanted both: it was their connections, their environments, their very disciplines. When Biscuits with loud lamentations elected Philosophy at the decree of her father; when Neal took up two courses of Economics in order to help her mother with "some footless syllabi in mother's literary club;" when Betty Twitchell endured the gibes of her friends every rainy day because "Papa won't let me wear a short skirt; he hates a woman in one--I think it's perfectly horrid of him, too! Wait till I get pneumonia! As if I'd 'get a carriage' to take me from the Hatfield to College Hall!" Susan would have given every rhyme in her head for one year of their conventional, irresponsible lives. It was not money she longed for: Neal Burt was poor enough, and made no secret of "my cousin's boots, my dear, and my aunt's silk waist, and Patsy's gloves that don't fit her, that I have on this minute!" But Neal gave her one of her worst quarter-hours, at the time her mother came up. She was a pretty little woman with Neal's eyes; her simple clothes had, like Neal's, a distinct air of taste and selection about them; her interest in everything was so pleasant, her manner so cordial and charming, that she made an easy conquest of the girls and Neal's friends in the Faculty that came to meet her and drink tea in the quiet house where Neal lived almost alone, much petted by her landlady, an old family friend. Mrs. Burt was interested in Economics that year--"the dear thing has a new fad every time I go home!"--and a prominent professor of Economics from one of the universities happening to be in town just then, one of Neal's friends among the Powers invited mother and daughter to meet him. Mrs. Burt was equally charmed and charming; the distinguished professor begged to be allowed to send her a copy of his book, in which she had been much interested, "and she went home proud as Punch!" in the words of her daughter. Every word the kindly little woman had with Susan--and she had a great many, for Neal had interested her mother in her friend--brought closer home to her what had steadily grown to be the consuming trouble of her life. She tried to imagine _her_ mother drinking tea with a roomful of strangers; finding the right word for every one, talking with this girl about her friends, with that about the last book, with the other about college life in general. She fancied her meeting the distinguished professor and discussing his book so brightly--and saw the closet-shelves where Marie Corelli and the Duchess jostled Edna Lyall: Mrs. Jackson said she liked some real heavy reading now and then, and Edna Lyall had a good many problems in her books. She had a sickening consciousness that her mother would inevitably defer to the girls, particularly to the confident, well-dressed ones; and every time that Neal patted Mrs. Burt's shoulder or kissed the tip of her ear, she felt her heart contract with a spasm of that terrible gnawing envy that is surely reserved, with their equally terrible capacity for loving, for a certain small proportion of women, and women only. It is a very sad thing for a girl to be ashamed of her mother. In her junior year occurred one of her greatest triumphs. The senior class had petitioned vainly for the privilege of giving _Twelfth Night_ as their Commencement play: the refusal, based on the obstacle presented by the part of Sir Toby, and couched in the undying phrases of the Greatest Authority--"he should be neither drunk, nor half drunk, nor bibulous, nor rioting"--impressed very deeply those more susceptible to the humorous. With a commendable intelligence the dramatics committee decided that under the limitations above quoted the play would lack in verisimilitude, and cast about for another, but that was not the end of it; for Susan, in whose hands the Alpha farewell-meeting had been unreservedly placed, wrote, staged, and directed the performance of an elaborate parody entitled _First Night_, from which "the objectionable element in the unfortunate William's comedy," to quote the preface, was successfully and unsparingly expurgated. Not only were the most obvious situations cleverly treated; not only did Sir Toby, spare and ascetic, in a neat flannel wrapper, call decorously for "a stoup of thin gruel, Maria!" not only did he and his self-contained friends walk through a kind of posture dance with killing solemnity, chanting the while a staid canon in which the possibilities of "Why, should I drink on _one_ day?" were interpreted with a novel and gratifying morality; not only did Malvolio utterly eschew an article of apparel too likely to bring the blush of shame to the cheek of the Young Person, but painstakingly assume, in the eyes of the delighted audience, heavy woollen stockings, a constant and effectual reminder of his hidden traditional garb: but a parody within a parody ran cunningly through the piece. The trials of the committee, the squabbles of the principal actors, open hits at the Faculty, sly comments on the senior class, which had been active in reforms and not wholly popular innovations--all these were interwoven with the farce; and this not in the clumsy harmless fashion of most college grinds, but pointed by a keen wit, a merciless satire, an easy, brilliant style already well on to its now recognized maturity. Most of the principal actors in the play finally selected by the seniors, with more than half of the committee, were that year, as it happened, from Alpha, and their delight knew no bounds. Susan did not act herself, but she was a born manager; and the actors that cursed her unsparing drill and absolute authority during the long rehearsal season that made it the most finished affair of its kind, blessed her vociferously on the great night of its production. It was the most perfect success of her life--though the girls who thought she scorned her college triumphs would have laughed had she told them so, later. Every point was eagerly caught and wildly applauded; the stage setting, the funny, clever costumes, the irresistible caricatures, the wit and humor of the thing, all acted with a _verve_ and precision unusual in college dramatics, where criticism is too often forced to take the will for the deed, all called for a tremendous and well-earned appreciation. The author was frantically summoned again and again; the seniors exhausted a congratulatory vocabulary on her. Her classmates shook her hand many times apiece. Nor did the triumph end with the night, for the juniors, unable to contain their pride, gave surreptitious bits of the play to chosen seniors in Phi Kappa, and it was even rumored that the other society was going to request a revival of the combination entertainment, now out of vogue, with a view to having it repeated. This was suppressed by the Powers, but it got about that one of the few type-written copies of the piece had fallen into the hands of an Influential Person--probably through Neal Burt, who admired it in proportion to her own far from ordinary ability--and that the Person had assembled a select gathering of her Peers for the sole purpose of reading it, with unmistakably appreciative comments, to them. Some members of the Faculty, old Alpha girls themselves, and present on the occasion of its production, expressed their admiration in unstinted terms, and altogether the Alpha gained a tremendous prestige. This and her appointment as editor-in-chief of the _Monthly_ for her senior year marked the height of Susan's prosperity. She used to think, afterwards, that the play was the only pure pleasure she had ever had: it was certainly the only one that her namesake had left to her unspoiled. Fate ordered it that she should take off the bulletin-board with her notice of editorial appointment a note hastily addressed to S. Jackson, '9-. She opened it mechanically. Dear Old Sue: It's a miserable shame! You ought to have had it! But it seems that it makes no difference what we want, nor who would work in best with the girls. _Genius_ isn't everything, always--but you know what I wanted! Your disappointed H. S. K. The note was not sealed, and she folded it and put it back quietly. A moment later she received her congratulations, but to every one's "Of course you're not surprised, Miss Jackson!" she smiled strangely. Sue used the phrase, fresh from her own congratulations as literary editor, and the concentrated bitterness of three years flashed out in the other's curt answer. "Of course you're not surprised--" "_Are you?_" Sue's startled flush was all the proof she needed, and crushing in her hand the note that had meant the highest college honor to more than one of the girls who had got its like, she went home to bear alone the sharpest disappointment she had yet known. There was no one to tell her that the senior editor whose initials signed the note for Sue had been one of only two in Sue's favor; that the board, so far from acting unwillingly under the direction of the Rhetoric department, as she inferred from the note, had been practically unanimous for her, particularly as the two opposed held relatively unimportant positions and were far from popular. She did not know that the note itself was a gross breach of etiquette, anyway, and that both officially and socially its writer had risked the gravest censure; so much so that Sue, far from being pleased, was heartily ashamed of it and never told a soul about it till long afterwards. The person who could have explained most effectively to her how perfectly her election met the favor of everybody, herself included--for Sue would have been as surprised to find herself placed above her gifted namesake as to have found herself omitted entirely from the board--was too chagrined at the abrupt answer to her congratulations to dream of mentioning the matter further. So Susan got out her first two numbers of the _Monthly_ with none of the delighted importance of most editors. It was all spoiled for her. She knew that she deserved it: it was impossible for her not to realize that, so far as originality and power went, nobody in the class, or the college, for that matter, could touch her work. It was not the position that meant so much to her: she was perfectly competent to fill it easily and acceptably, and she knew it. But she wanted them to think so, too, and be glad to give it to her--and she did not believe they were. Shortly after her success of _First Night_, she got one of her rare letters from home. She had little correspondence with them, and had grown to regard their letters with dread, since each one had brought unpleasant news, from Doris', to announce her engagement to one of "the boys," a flashy, half-disreputable fellow, to her mother's, enclosing a cheque, with gloomy forebodings that it might be the last, and a disheartening chronicle of family affairs growing daily more sordid. The sight of her characterless, uncultivated handwriting always threw the girl into a gloomy, irritable mood, and as she opened this one the remorse that had begun to prick her more sharply of late at her inability to help them, if not in the way she would like, at least in the most obviously necessary manner, crept over her and saddened her even before she reached the crisis of the letter. It was very simple: she must come home. There was no more money; there had been none for some time, but her father was bent on her staying, and had put it off longer than he should have done. It had been a foolish expense, and she might have had a position long ago. There was car fare and a very little over, and it was hoped that she had no bills. They were going to move into an apartment over the store, and Veronica was going to keep her father's books. And that was all. Perhaps her mother felt sorrier than she knew how to say; perhaps it was only the constraint of years and lack of _savoir faire_ that made the letter so cold and curt; but there it was, with nothing to break the shock: no regret for her, to lighten her sense of selfishness; no appeal to her, even, to help them. They could get along very well; to give up the house would be a great financial relief, and she would be more a hindrance than otherwise. She knew that: she knew that her presence would be a constant irritation, her criticism, impossible to conceal, a constant source of strife and estrangement. It was only that they had no more money for her--that was all. She walked out to the long bridge, and sat down on a stone near the end of it. For perhaps the first time a complete consciousness of how bitterly she loved the place came to her. She, of whom many of the Faculty afterwards wondered that she stayed as long as she did, credited by all her acquaintances with infinite boredom at its restrictions and wearisome routine, dreaded to leave it as she herself could hardly endure to think. For three years she had taken a place, unchallenged, among people of a class she had never known before. Unknown, unhelped, she had by sheer personality and natural power made herself not only respected but respected to an unusual degree. She had patronized girls who would not have acknowledged her existence three years before; whether they loved her or not, her class was proud of her. Her going would be noticed--oh, yes indeed! She rose to go home, and a little beyond the bridge turned to look back: something told her that she should not know that view soon again. Meadow and river and softly circling hills with the beautiful afternoon haze thick on them, she stamped it on her heart--and with it a sudden nearing figure. Down the long arch, slim and shapely against the blue background of the tunnel, Sue flew toward her on her wheel. Her hands swung by her sides--she had ridden from childhood--her feet were off the pedals, her perfectly fitting heavy skirt hung out in graceful fluted folds. Beneath her soft, trim hat her cheeks glowed rose-color, her eyes shone like stars. The sun caught her smooth, thick hair and framed her face in a glittering halo. She sat straight as a dart, her lips parted with the sheer physical delight of the swooping, effortless sensation--she was tremendously handsome. To the other girl she was victory incarnate; the essence of ease and triumph and perfect _bien-être_; her hopeless envy and despair. As she flew by she spread out her hands in a quick, significant gesture, half graceful and high-bred--half pert and of the music-hall: it typified her and her friends perfectly to Susan, who never forgot her as she saw her then, and whose _Mademoiselle Diana_, much admired by Sue and her family, is nobody more nor less than Sue herself. She found a letter waiting for her at home, a letter that the maid explained had just been brought from the house where the other Miss Jackson lived--it had been kept there by mistake and neglected for two or three days. It was hoped it was not important. She opened it in the hall, read it hastily through, read it again, looked at the date, and asked for a time-table. The maid, suspecting bad news, was officious in assistance and eagerly agreed to pack her things and get a man to box the books when she had gone, which would be in the morning, she said, with a strange, absent-minded air. She gave the girl her last fifty cents, and while Maggie folded and packed, she wrote a letter home. "It seems foolish for me to come to Troy; I should only have to go right back to Boston again," _she said in it_. "They want me to begin to collect the stories right away and do some reading for them besides--so I must be there. There is a new magazine they have just bought, too, and I am to do some work on that. It is a very good position and will lead to a better, they say, and I am very fortunate to get it. They say very nice things about my work in the "Monthly"--the college paper that I was elected editor of--they seem to have read them all. I must go on immediately. Their letter was delayed, and I shall try to get there to-morrow. I will let you know when I find a place to stay. I hope to be able to help you soon. "Hastily, "SUSAN." She wrote a note to the Registrar and one to Neal Burt, whom, in her letter of resignation, she recommended strongly to the board as her successor, overlooking the constitution, which provides for the literary editor's filling the first place when it falls vacant, and refusing supper, she walked out over the campus. The dining-rooms were opened to the soft air; the cheerful clatter of plates came out from every window; she could see the maids hurrying about. She sat for an hour in one of the hammocks, and then walked about the larger buildings. The last dance of the season was on in the Gym; the violins rose above the tramping and the confused uproar inside. White-armed girls passed the windows and leaned out into the cool. "How is it?" one called up from below. "Mortal slow, dearie, but don't say I told you!" the other answered in a stage whisper from above, and the music dashed into a two-step. "Be_hold_ El _Cap_-i-_tan_!" It haunted Susan's dreams for nights, that tune--it seemed impossible that the dancers' hearts should not ache as hers did. She lingered, fascinated, while the violins sang it over and over, and over again at the storm of clapping that followed it. "Be_hold_ El _Cap_-i-_tan_!" It was a hideous, cruel tune, light and utterly careless, and yet with that little sadness in it that some sensitive ears find always in good dance music--is it because dancing must so obviously end so soon?--and Susan has loathed it all her life. Indeed, at a recent luncheon given in her honor by the alumnæ of New York, she requested that the orchestra stop playing it after the first few bars--these people of genius are so delightfully eccentric! She left college as quietly as she had entered it; there is no doubt that they would have made her Ivy Orator, had she stayed. The mail that took the notice of her lodging-house to her family crossed one of Sue's to her Uncle Bradford, of the well-known Boston publishing firm. Among other things she said: I'm glad you like her so well--I knew you would. She's really much better for the place than Con. And I'm sure it was better to write to her directly--she doesn't like any of us very well, except Neal and Biscuits, and I have an idea she really almost dislikes me. I knew that when you saw that essay on the French and English as short-story writers, you'd want to give her the chance. And she was the very girl to leave college, too--it isn't everybody would be so glad to go just before senior year. Not but what I would, fast enough, if I had her future before me--Mon dieu! she's the only girl I ever thought I'd rather be--you should see the poem she left with Neal for the "Monthly"! She turns them off over night, apparently. It's a loss to the class, of course, but everybody is very glad for her--she always seemed so out of place up here, somehow. If one doesn't care for the little footless stunts, it must be a terrible bore, I should think. And when she's famous we can pat each other on the back and say we done it--partly. With a great deal of love for you and Aunt Julia, SUE. THE SEVENTH STORY _A FEW DIVERSIONS_ VII A FEW DIVERSIONS "I wish you _would_ ask her up, Nan," said Mrs. Harte, confidentially. "I want her to see the place. So far as I can judge, it's the best thing for her. There isn't any doubt that she's a very bright girl, but she's getting thoroughly spoiled here. You see, she does just as she pleases--she's the only young person in the family--and I know we spoil her terribly. Her mind is made up to come out in the winter, here in Chicago, and they'll refuse her nothing--her father and mother." "They _don't_ seem what you'd call oppressively strict with her," remarked Anne, twirling her racquet. "Now what I want is for her to get somewhere where she isn't the only clever girl; to see that other girls can read and talk and play the guitar and wear nice clothes and order silly young men about. And judging from those of you that I've seen, you can!" "We do our little best," said Anne, modestly. "And I wanted her to see you all: that's one reason why I planned the house-party. I was so disappointed when she came so late. You see, her cousin Georgiana was--was unfortunate. She went to Yale and Columbia and goodness knows where, and she had short hair and was such a frump and she wore such hideous spectacles and talked about Socialism--or was it Sociology?--all the time. I remember she was always trying to persuade us to join clubs and protest against something or other--it was very wearisome. So Madge got to despise the whole thing: she has always thrown Georgiana at me when I mentioned college. It was perfectly useless to try to make her understand that every girl needn't be like Georgiana. She's very obstinate. But she's a nice girl, too, and if she can only get out of her present atmosphere for four years--" "Pity she couldn't have seen Ursula, if she's afraid we're all frumps," Anne suggested. "Yes, isn't it? But I think she stayed purposely. Now, you--she says you're an exception; that there can't be many like you. You see, Madge has a standard of her own; she says she'd be ashamed to go through college the way some of the boys do, with just a good time and as low marks as they can safely get. She says she'd want to be a student if she pretended to, and yet she must have a good time, and--" "And she thinks it can't be done? Dear me, what an error! Well, if she'll come up I'll be very glad to have her, I'm sure. I can trot out our little pastimes and er--omit the more _sociological_ side," said Anne, with a grin. Mrs. Harte leaned forward eagerly. "Yes, that's just what I mean! She got enough of that from Georgiana. I want her to watch you--" "Sport about on the lawn? Gambol through the village? 'Make the picturesque little lake echo with sweet girlish gayety,' as the newspaper gentlemen say?" "Yes, that's it," and Mrs. Harte patted Anne's broad shoulder. "That's what I mean, you silly child. Just let her see that there are a few diversions!" Miss Marjory Cunningham, who was just then coming up from the lake, was a tall, well-grown young woman of seventeen, with a handsome, assured face and unexceptionable garments. She looked fully twenty, and was young enough to find satisfaction in this circumstance. She had been brought up, in the orthodox American fashion, to take a prominent part in the household, particularly in the entertainment of her mother's many guests; and this, added to the fact that she happened to be much cleverer than the young women with whom her social lot had hitherto been cast, inclined her to regard any one under thirty with a patronage somewhat offensive, if mild. She dropped down beside Anne as her aunt left the broad piazza, and smiled politely. "Aunt Frank says you're going to-morrow," she remarked, adding a little curiously, "Shall you be glad to get back?" "East, you mean? Why, yes. You see I'm a week late. They've started up the show without me, so to speak, and naturally it's rather hard for them to worry along. They may have given me up and laid my new little single room at Lucilla Bradford's feet, which would more than trouble me." "Do they allow you to come back whenever you want to?" Miss Cunningham's tone was that of an indulgent aunt toward a pet nephew on his Christmas holidays, and Anne's reply was framed accordingly. "Oh, easily! They only insist on our being back for the Glee Club concert. They're just bound up in that, you know. So we usually make a point of it. I must say," she changed her tone, "I'd like to hear Carol Sawyer's explanations to Miss Roberts! Carol has a fine imagination, but she's used it so much of late that she'll have to surpass herself this time to make much impression on Robbie. You see I have the great good fortune to possess an accommodating relative: the Amiable Parent is far from well, and asked me if I'd wait a week till he could go on, and cheer his last moments--smooth his pillow, as it were. So, since I've never gone away early once and only come back late twice before, and once with an excuse, I thought I was safe to stay. And I told him that, notwithstanding the fact that I was languishing among dirt courts and single-piece drivers and Saturday hops and--_and_ your noble family, I'd stick it out a week longer. Said I to the Amiable Parent: "_My own convenience count as nil; It is my duty, and I will!_" Next morning, when Nan came down to breakfast, pink under her tan and with that air that she always carried of having just come out of the tub, Marjory really regretted her going. She mentioned to her aunt that she would have liked to see more of her, and that if she _did_ go to New York in the spring she should surely go up to Northampton. It was not only because Miss Gillatt danced and golfed and drove and played tennis so well that Marjory's interest was for the first time roused in a girl of her own age, nor because her clothes were nice and her ways amusing; what struck Miss Cunningham was her guest's entire absence of surprise at what she utterly failed to recognize as an unusual amount of interest on Marjory's part. "This is Marjory--how do you do, Marjory?" she had said easily on their first meeting, and she had never cared to learn that Marjory intended her own "Miss Gillatt" for a lesson to forward schoolgirls. And she had taken Marjory's growing attentions quite as if she were accustomed to have handsome young women talk to her and row her about and give her their photographs. When she had herself mentioned looking Nan up in Northampton, her proposition had not evoked the grateful surprise that might have been expected. "Glad to see you any time," the future hostess had returned. "Better come up in the spring; it's a lot prettier." And Madge had decided then and there to go, though her suggestion had been more or less perfunctory. She would never have considered it for a moment had it not been perfectly obvious that the college girl did not regard herself at all in the light of a possible example. Georgiana's lectures on the Higher Education of Women and its Ultimate Effect on the Sex were not to be thought of in connection with this athletic damsel, whose quotations, though frequent, indicated a closer study of Lewis Carroll and W. S. Gilbert than her alma mater's official catalogue would suggest. She referred very little to the college and then only as the scene of incidents in which she and her "young friends," as she invariably called them, had taken amusing or amazing parts. Marjory's chief impression had been that of the jolliest possible crowd of girls, who seemed to derive great comfort and entertainment from one another's company, and it was a half-envious desire to see if they really did this to the extent that Anne implied, that drew her to Northampton one fine day in the late spring. As she stood on the station platform looking in vain for a tall girl with broad shoulders and a persuasive grin, she heard her name called, and turned to meet the outstretched hand of a very different person. This person was small and slender, with a plain, distinguished little face, intelligent eyes, and a low and charming voice. From the very Parisian arrangement that topped her shining coils of hair to the tips of her tiny shoes, she was one of the most thoroughly well-dressed young women Marjory had ever seen. She reminded one vaguely, though not disagreeably, of Mr. Wenzell's pictures, and Marjory failed utterly in a dazed attempt to correlate her and Georgiana. "You are Miss Cunningham, are you not? I am Ursula Wyckoff. Nan is so sorry, but Hodgkinson Davids or Davidson Hodgkins--I can't remember the way--has come up from New York to play over the course to-day, and of course all the golf people have to be out there. She and Caroline have been there all the afternoon, and I'm to bring you out a little later, when they serve the tea. Isn't it dreadfully warm? Nan's next to Caroline and Caroline holds the championship, so they're naturally interested. I don't play at all. I was so sorry to miss you at the house-party: we all fell in love with your aunt. Oh, no, New York, but I've lots of Western friends: you know I've met your aunt before, in London. We bought some Liberty things, and we were staying at the same hotel, and they sent us each other's parcels, so we got acquainted picking them out. There was a lovely fan; she said it was for her niece. Was it you? I dream of that fan yet." They walked slowly up the long street, Ursula chatting easily, and Marjory wondering how many of the girls they passed belonged to the college. They paused before a druggist's window, all Huyler's and violet soap, and Ursula walked by a long, shining soda fountain to a room in green and white, with little tables and a great palm in the centre. The tables were very nearly filled, and there was a cheerful clatter of tall spoons and a businesslike bustle of clerks with trays. "This is Kingsley's," said Ursula, with a comprehensive gesture. "Will you have a chocolate ice?" While absorbing the inviting and pernicious mixture, Miss Cunningham looked about her with interest. In one corner four girls with rumpled shirt-waists and dusty golf stockings squabbled over scores, and illustrated with spoons preferred methods of driving and putting. Their voices rose above the level prescribed for drawing-room conversation, and they called each other strange names. In another corner a tall, dark girl with a grave expression talked steadily in a low voice to her companion, a clever-looking creature, whose bursts of laughter grew hysterical as the dignified one continued, with a perfectly impersonal manner, to reduce her to positive tears of mirth. To them Ursula bowed, and the narrator, politely recognizing her, went on with her remarks, to an accompaniment of gurgling protest from her friend. Near them a porcelain blonde, gowned in a wonderful pale blue stuff with a great hat covered with curly plumes, ate strawberry ices with a tailor-made person clothed in white piqué, mystic, wonderful. She was all stiffness and specklessness, and she looked with undisguised scorn at the clamoring athletes, a white leather card-case in her hand. Near one window a gypsy-faced child in a big pink sunbonnet imparted mighty confidences to her friend, who shook two magnificent auburn braids over her shoulders with every chuckle. "And I heard a knock at the door and of course I thought it was Helen or some of the girls, and I called to come in and, my dear, _who_ do you think it was? It was the _expressman_! 'Will you sign this book?' said he, and he brought the book right up to the bed and I leaned on my elbow and signed it! My dear, wasn't that perfectly--" "Oh, well, it's awfully funny here, anyway. That beastly old laundry tore my lovely lace nightgown to shreds and it was new, and I put in an old dressing-sacque that was all in rags and I was going to throw it away, and they mended it carefully before they sent it back!" As they left the room and Ursula waited while the clerk looked up her soda ticket, the door flew open and an impish little creature, with a large, deprecating, motherly girl in her wake, slipped into the shop. "Now don't make for the back room, Bertie dear, for there isn't time. We've got lots of places to do yet!" she called, and catching sight of Ursula she dashed up to her. "What do you think Alberta and I are doing? We're _so_ bored, and we're going to stop at every drug store on this side and have an ice-cream soda, and the same going back on the other side. Isn't that interesting? I tell Alberta it's bound to be--sooner or later!" "Is that a freshman?" Marjory inquired competently, and Ursula's eyes twinkled as she replied gravely: "No, that's a senior. She has fits of idiocy, but in her better moments she's quite a person to know. She's in the Lawrence with me. Why on earth she should go and get Alberta May and drag her into degradation and dyspepsia, nobody knows, but she always does." They rested for a while in Ursula's room, which was "more than enormous," as Anne said--it was intended for a double room--and furnished very delightfully. There were some beautiful Copley prints and a cast or two and a long low shelf of books and fascinating wicker chairs with puffy cushions. There was the inevitable tea-table and chafing-dish paraphernalia and the inevitable couch with a great many Yale pillows; but there were not more than a dozen photographs of girls in any one place and only one Gibson girl, and she was very small. There was a beautiful desk all littered with papers and little photographs of Ursula's family and her horse at home, and a lot of the pretty little cluttering things one picks up abroad. Marjory saw no girl with such consistently fascinating clothes as Ursula's during her visit, nor did she sit in any room so charming as hers, the college girl being a generation behind her brother in this regard; but first impressions are strong, and Ursula's silver brushes, her beautiful etching, and the two wonderful rugs that nearly covered her shining floor formed the stage setting for all Marjory's subsequent imaginary dramas. They went out to the links by trolley, through the long quiet street, past pretty lawns and pleasant houses, into the real country of fields and scattered cottages. Marjory learned how "the crowd" had vacationed together more than once; how they were going up to Carol Sawyer's place in Maine next summer for "the time of their lives"; how, after their Commencement obsequies, they were going for two weeks to Nan at Sconset and live in a house all by themselves, and then four of them were going abroad together with Nan's father--"the dearest thing in the world"; how Caroline was going to study medicine in Germany and Lucilla Bradford was going to be married and continue to illumine Boston, and Ursula and her sister were going to stay indefinitely in France or Italy with various relatives. They seemed to have a very intimate knowledge of one another's affairs, Marjory decided, as they got out at the links and strolled up to the tiny club-house. A straggling crowd was gradually melting away there: hot, dishevelled girls with heavy bags, cool and fluffy girls with tea-cups, men arguing in white flannels and men conversing in frock coats. Important small boys--professors' sons and their friends from the town--caddied for the great man and his followers, patronizing the urchins who ordinarily amassed wealth from this employment, and a crowd of interested golfers from the town trailed about the holes, admiring, criticising, and chattering. Here and there a crimson coat shone out, some of the ladies tilted gay parasols, white duck dotted the grass everywhere. It was all very jolly and interesting, and when Nan came up with a white-flannelled youth and a cheerful if exhausted friend whom she introduced as "one of my little mates--Caroline Wilde," Marjory could have thought, as she sipped her tea and learned the score, that she was back on the links at home. Caroline had learned much and Nan had held a reverent conversation with the champion and was basking in the recollection of it. Marjory met an ardent golfer in marvellous stockings, who was with difficulty restrained from illustrating, by means of his empty cup and the parasol his fellow-professor was guarding, the very latest method of effecting a tremendous drive from a bad spot in the course, and his friend turned out to be a classmate of her brother's; and so they started from Yale, which is a very good conversational starting-point, and their reminiscences attracted Ursula, who, with an adoring little freshman--Ursula was never without a freshman--and the Church and the Law wrangling pleasantly over a lost ball, was holding her court in a near corner. They drifted up, and the Church and the Law were so amusing and well set up that Marjory quite lost her heart to them and wished they would come "West," as they persisted in calling Chicago, remarking confidentially that nothing seemed to upset a person from Chicago so much as that! They rode home with the Church and the Law, while the assistant in that great undertaking, the higher education of women, raced the trolley on a Columbia Chainless, to the wild delight of the passengers, who cheered his futile efforts and bribed the motorman to an exciting rate of speed. "Do you have lessons with him, really?" Marjory demanded, as they left the rapidly churning golf stockings behind for the moment. Nan grinned. "Do you, Ursula?" she repeated. Ursula sighed but said nothing, and Nan explained that in the midst of his artless prattle last week he had mentioned a written lesson in the near future, based upon certain reference reading. "It comes off to-morrow," she added cheerfully, "and the young Lucilla is hastily sprinting through the volumes and gathering information. She sought the seclusion that a cabin grants last night, and when I howled at her through the keyhole that we were going to Boyden's for the evening meal, she said that if she got through two hundred pages and her notes by then she'd be along. Ursula does it bit by bit, and then tells us to go to the ant, thou sluggard, but little Lucy thinks she knows him better than we do, and she said he wouldn't do it. I told her, go to, he would; I saw it in his eye. So Caroline started to fill her fountain pen--she calls it that from force of habit--but what she really does is to fill the room, and what drips over--" "There's Lucilla!" said somebody, and they got off the car and teased Lucilla--a small, tired person with a prim little face and beautiful manners--all the way down to Boyden's. A striking, sulky-looking girl with a stylish golf suit that made her look like the costumers' plates of tailor-made athletic maidens, was holding a table for them, and she turned out to be Carol Sawyer. She was the first girl of "the crowd" Marjory did not like. Her voice was loud and her manner a little overbearing; she wore too many rings and her attitude toward the college was very different from the harmless nonsense that in the case of the other girls covered plenty of good work and a real interest in it. She was evidently very wealthy, and Marjory caught herself wondering if that was why the others put up with her. When they had half finished their supper--and a very good little supper it was--a large girl, almost too tall for a girl, in a mussy short skirt and badly fitting shirt-waist sauntered into the room. From their own table and most of the others a chorus of welcome went up. "Hello, Teddy!" "Don't hurry, Dody!" "Come over here, Dodo!" "Theodora, dear child, your side-comb is nearly out!" "Have some berries, Ted?" She included them all in a cheerful "Hello!" and strolled up to Nan's table. "This is little Theodora Bent," said Nan, kindly. "She is very shy and unused to company, but her heart--" "Her heart," little Theodora interrupted, dragging a chair from somewhere and quietly appropriating Ursula's creamed chicken, "is not here. It is with our friend, Mrs. Austin, who sits at a lonely table wondering where her loved ones are to-night. I met her at the door. 'Dorothea,' said she--and why she persists in calling me Dorothea we shall know, perhaps, when the mists have cleared away--'Dorothea, there is hardly a Friday night that you girls are in to supper. I'm sure I can't see why!' I said that it _was_ strange, but it just happened so. Then she insisted on knowing why; so I suggested that perhaps you found the noise in the dining-room trying--" "Dodo! you didn't!" "Certainly I did. I should suppose you might. Anybody who sits near _you_ certainly does! And she said that some freshman or other had been decorating the piazza all the afternoon, lying in wait for me to tutor her, and suggested that I ought to manage better. And I told her I'd tutored three hours and a half to-day and I had a written lesson and Phi Kappa Farewell to-morrow night, and I thought that if she didn't object to the freshman I'd leave her there till next week. So I left her standing in the door--" "_A thing she has never done before!_" sang Nan, softly, and they laughed long and merrily, as people laugh who are not very ancient, and who have just had a good supper and are the best of friends. It was a little after that that the Glee Club sang on the steps of Music Hall, while crowds of girls streamed out and sat on the grass and wandered up and down or listened on dormitory steps. They sang sweet songs and funny songs, and the audience sitting on the campus clapped and clapped again. Their repertoire amazed Miss Cunningham, who had been firmly impressed with the idea that _A Spanish Cavalier_ and _Aunt Dinah's Quilting Party_ were necessarily sung by the college girl to the exclusion of all other melodies. She was used to them now, used to pigtails and puffs, shirt-waists and evening dresses, Western rolled r's and Eastern broad a's, handsome matronly young women, and slim, saucy little chits, solitary walkers, devoted pairs, and rollicking bands. The light faded imperceptibly, turning the ugly brick to a soft pink, bringing out the pale mingling of colors that spread over the smooth, green campus, with here and there a girl vivid in crimson or violet. The leader raised her hand and they started a medley, with queer changes and funny little turns. Three blind mice! See how they run! They all ran after the farmer's wife-- For she was the jewel of Asia, Of Asia, Of Asia-- How happy they seemed, how well able to amuse each other! Then, as the faces on the steps grew indistinct and the little night noises grew plainer, just as the Club turned to go in somebody called, "_Mandalay!_" The crowd took it up and "_Mandalay!_" sounded from all the groups. Three or four girls with guitars turned up from somewhere, and a mandolin was produced from the Hubbard; a tall, slender girl stepped out a little from the rest and turned upon the waiting audience the kind of soft, rich voice that sounds rough and strained indoors, but only a little thrilled and anxious in the open air. By the old Moulmein Pagoda, lookin' eastward to the sea, There's a Burma girl a-settin' an' I know she thinks o' me! Some of the girls perched on balcony railings; some leaned on each other's shoulders; the strolling pairs and groups stopped, interlocked, and listened as attentively as if they did not already know it by heart; their white dresses glimmered among the shrubbery. Ursula and Theodora Bent, a strange pair, Marjory thought, had dropped down on a bench, the little graceful figure balanced on the back of the seat with one arm over the broad shoulders of her big, careless friend. Nan's merry face took on the almost wistful look that music always brought there, and Marjory wondered if the silent, waiting group knew how soft their eyes grew and how much alike they all looked suddenly. An' the dawn comes up like thunder out er China 'crost the Bay! A moment of silence, a burst of applause, and the crowd was scurrying away as if a bell had struck. The chatter rose again, the faces changed, and to crown the transformation a tall, dark girl with a handsome face--the girl they had seen at Kingsley's--rose languidly from the top step of the Washburn and sang with a startling imitation of the first singer, to a group of girls about her: Oh, that Road to Mandalay! Must we hear it night and day? For the author'd swear like thunder if he heard it sung that way! Wild applause and a cry of, "Second verse, Neal! second verse!" followed, and as they walked past the Hatfield by a group of girls audibly disapproving of the parody and its singer, they caught the second verse: For they sing it ev'ry evening, and they sing it ev'ry morn; They will sing it at my fun'ral--was it sung when I was born? Just as soon as I reach heaven, and they teach me how to play, Oh, I know the tune I learn on will be Road to Mandalay! The juniors chuckled, and as Nan commended the abilities of the cynical senior, Marjory remembered her face as it had been a few minutes before, and wondered. They took her to her boarding-house and left her to get to bed, for she was tired. And in the morning she went, by previous arrangement, to the Lawrence, whence Dody Bent took her down to Boyden's to eggs and toast, and coffee in a shining silvery pot, and said that in consequence of the apparently unchanged intentions of Dr. Robbins she should necessarily be much engaged from ten until eleven and the few scant minutes preceding those hours, and that Misses Gillatt, Bradford, and Wyckoff expected to be similarly occupied. Caroline Wilde, however, who apparently did little but work in the laboratory and keep out-of-doors, would be charmed to row her about Paradise. Accordingly, at a few minutes after nine, Marjory stood at the foot of the main staircase, swaying backward and forward in the chapel rush, and picked out Caroline, sauntering down with a cheerful "Hello!" for everybody on the stairs and that air of leisure that was the despair and admiration of the perpetually rushed; for she was one of the notoriously busy people in the college--always "at everything," distressingly competent in several of the stiffest courses offered, the first aid to the injured in any capacity, and the prop of more committees than she had fingers. She was always perfectly well and always wore a shirt-waist, and she was one of the exceedingly few people who are equally popular with students, Faculty, and ladies-in-charge. She pulled Marjory about in the most scientific manner over a somewhat restricted body of water boasting a great deal of scenery for its size, conversing at length on basket-ball, in which she had been twice defeated, and not at all on golf and tennis, in which she held the college championship. In the course of her remarks it became apparent that Ursula and Dodo formed one third of "their crowd," she and Nan another third, and Lucilla and Carol Sawyer one sixth each. Of Lucilla there seemed to be little to say: she was of extensive ancestry and made the best fudge in the place. She was also a good person to tell things to and was always quiet and polite. Dodo spoke--very literally--for herself. She was one of the best actresses in the college; she had some very bad quarter-hours back of her continual nonsense; she was poor, and there was something the matter all the time at home. Ursula was one of the all 'round girls of the college; she did beautiful work, and wrote very well and knew a lot--and her clothes! She dressed for the crowd. Nan was, of course, the best girl in the world, as might be seen by anybody with an eye in its head. And Carol? Oh, Carol was all right. You had to come to know her, that was all. People didn't understand Carol. Her mother died when she was a baby, and she didn't like her Eastern aunt, who took care of her part of the time. They were really ridiculously wealthy, and her father was--well, her father wasn't very attractive. She had lived a great deal in San Francisco, and in the West girls do very much more as they please, you know. There wasn't a more generous girl on the face of the earth. She was a mighty good friend to her friends. People said she was being tutored through college. It wasn't so. And what if she was? Look at the men! Her bark was worse than her bite: she said more than she did. If all the things she had done for people up here were known--but she would be horribly angry if they were. It occurred to Marjory during that morning and afterwards, as she was handed impartially from one to the other of the six juniors who constituted her entertainment committee, that it was well to have five friends to take care of your character with the world. In the evening she went, by favor of Ursula and Dodo, in the character of a distant relative, to the entertainment proper of the Phi Kappa Farewell, a play given to the seniors of that honorable body by the juniors. Nothing but a detailed account of the drama could worthily treat of it, and that cannot be given. It was a melodrama based on the Spanish War, adapted from a blood-and-thunder novel into a play of five acts with three and four scenes to the act. A large cast presented it, comprising revolutionists, Cubans, spies, U. S. Army and Navy, native population, planters, New York belles, and English nobility, and there were slow deaths, ghastly conspiracies, horribly pathetic separations, magnificent patriotic tableaux, and a final and startling adjustment that exceeded in scenic display the wildest expectation of the enraptured audience. From the first act, in a Fifth Avenue parlor, furnished with a toy piano perched on a card-table and a Vision of Elegance accompanying, with much execution and one finger, a rival Vision who rendered _My bonnie lies over the ocean_ with dramatic fervor and a sob that recalled Bernhardt, while Dodo, in irreproachable evening dress and a curly mustache, devotedly turned the half-inch sheet music, one elbow ostentatiously leaned on the twelve-inch piano; to the ecstatic _finale_ in the Havana Cathedral, where two marvellous brides in window-curtain-trained wedding dresses, orange blossoms, and indefinite yards of white mosquito netting were led to the altar by a noble naval officer and a haughty peer of the realm, the entire cast in the character of bridal party performing an elaborate ballet to the Lohengrin March, the procession preceded by a priest two-stepping solemnly at the head, it was the most astonishingly, cleverly, unspeakably idiotic performance Marjory had ever seen. Revolvers went off, victims shrieked, dons and doñas sneered, terrible shell-trimmed, tawny-skinned natives leaped and brandished and gabbled, virtue pleaded, and villainy cried "Ha, ha!" and everybody called upon Heaven except the peer of the realm, who very properly called upon England. They rolled their r's and smote their chests and spoke in a vibrating contralto, while at the proper places the audience groaned and clapped and hissed and at the end fairly thundered its applause. Nobody who had seen the two heroines under a trusty Spanish escort travelling through a mountain gorge, half of the escort placidly dragging a ramping, double-breasted rocking-horse cart, and the other half cavorting gracefully about with a small mounted horse under his arm, could ever forget the sight; nor the languishing ladies in glorious Spanish costumes tossing their trains behind and coquetting with enormous fans as they conspired in dramatic and deep-chested asides to the audience. Ursula, Dodo, and another genius had adapted this never-sufficiently-to-be-praised work, and they appeared flushed and panting from the wedding scene, to receive the ovation prepared for them. Ursula said that to have seen Martha Williams in undisguised hysteria and B. S. Kitts and Susan Jackson collapsed in their chairs was honor enough for her, and that she would willingly have worked twice as hard as she did for it. Then they went over, costumes and all, to the Dewey, to eat ices and go home, for the play had occupied two hours or more and such a strain was naturally somewhat enervating, as Biscuits said. They took breakfast next morning in Ursula's room: strawberries and rich chocolate and rolls and scrambled eggs. Lucilla cooked it in two chafing-dishes, and Carol and Caroline came over from the Morris to share it, Carol in a magnificent fluffy party-cloak with a gorgeous crêpe kimono under it, Dodo in a hideous house-jacket, and Caroline in the inevitable shirt-waist. Then Ursula went to church in a heavenly lavender bâtiste and white-rabbit gloves, as Nan called them; Lucilla accompanied her in a demure little checked silk, and Carol sulked in her room, wrapped in the kimono. Dodo wrote some difficult letters home, and took a walk to get over them; Caroline tramped out to Florence, where she conducted a funny little Sunday-school--in a shirt-waist; Marjory and Nan strolled out to Paradise and talked. They dined in state with the house and its guests on the traditional Sunday turkey, Nan speculating solemnly on the exhaustless energy of Providence, except for whose ceaseless intervention the race of turkeys must long since have become extinct. Later they retired to the parlor and sat on sofas while the after-dinner Sunday music was performed--an apparently mechanical process where the same girls offered the same things to the same audience with the same expression that they had presented the Sunday before. The _Marche Funèbre_ received the usual sighs of pleasure, an optimistic young lady rendered the love song from _Samson et Dalila_, and at unmistakable evidences of approaching _Mandalay_ the occupants of the sofa nearest the door murmured something about letters and melted away. To vespers, referred to by the devout as "the sweetest of the college services," entitled by the profane "the Sunday strut," owing to the toilets of the carefully selected ushers and the general prevalence of millinery, Marjory did not go, for returning from a walk with Lucilla, they found Miss Gillatt pinching the ears of a gentleman upon whose lap she sat, whose not too abundant hair she had arranged in peculiarly foolish spirals that bobbed over his ears as he responded to the introduction, "_Voilà le père aimable Il est arrivé avec un =box= énorme--c'est un enfant bien gentil, n'est-ce pas? Nous en mangerons =to-morrow night=, mon Dieu, =and for once= nous aurons quelqu' chose =fit to eat=--hein? A moi, Lucille--il y aura une chaleur excessive dans la ville ancienne ce soir!_" _Le père aimable_ greeted Marjory with an unfeigned interest, and when to his inquiring "Cunningham? Cunningham? I don't remember Cunningham, do I, Nannie?" Nan replied easily, "Oh, no, she's not a regular inmate!" Marjory felt suddenly left out and undeserving, somehow, of all the joy in store. It was worth being away from home to be one of the four girls who hung upon the Amiable Parent the next day as he wandered happily through the campus, distributing Allegretti and admiration as he went. He beamed upon them all, annexing the pretty ones regardless of expense, as his irreverent daughter put it. He chartered a tally-ho, and they tooted off to Chesterfield and broke the horn beyond repair, convulsing him with laughter all the way. Caroline cut her laboratory for it and enjoyed it "with a serene and sickly suavity known only to the truly virtuous," to use her friends' quotation; Dodo was a continuous performance all the way; and at Chesterfield they ate till there was little left in the village, as it had not been sufficiently forewarned of their invasion. They got back in time to dress, and here Marjory's ideas sustained a distinct shock. She had always perfectly understood from the fiction devoted to such descriptions that it was the custom of young ladies at boarding-schools and colleges, when they wished to be peculiarly uproarious and sinful, to gather in carefully darkened apartments, robed in blanket-wrappers and nightgowns, with braided or dishevelled hair, in order to eat olives and pickles with hat-pins from the bottles, toasting marshmallows at intervals, and discussing the suitability of cribs and the essential qualities of really earnest friendships. But the consumption of the "box _énorme_" was differently organized. If she hadn't brought any evening dress it didn't matter, Nan assured her, but they considered the event more than worthy of it, though it wasn't an occasion for a Prom costume by any means. All the way down the corridor she smelled it, that night at seven. It was necessarily far from private--envious upper-class girls not invited sniffed it from afar, and the three little freshmen who waited on them glowed with pride and anticipation. It was in Ursula's room, for Nan's was too small and the guests used it for a cloak-room. Mrs. Austin greeted her cordially at the door, and Marjory, who had always supposed that those in authority were constitutionally opposed to spreads, could not realize that her wreathèd smiles were genuine. She did not know that the Amiable Parent had dutifully called upon Mrs. Austin in all good form, openly discussed the spread, and cannily presented the lady with a fascinating box of Canton ginger-buds--ginger being the Amiable Parent's professional interest. When they were assembled, a baker's dozen of them, the Amiable Parent grinning, as his dutiful daughter expressed it, like a Cheshire cat over his capacious shirt-front, Marjory made their acquaintance over again from the evening-dress standpoint. Against the dark furniture and bookbindings their shoulders shone soft and white; their hair was piled high; they looked two or three years older. Ursula in pink taffeta, with coral in her glossy dark coils, was a veritable _marquise_; Nan in white with lavender ribbons, and a pale amethyst against her throat, was transformed from a jolly, active girl to a handsome young woman with charmingly correct shoulders; Caroline was almost pretty; Lucilla's small prim head was set on the most beautiful tapering little neck in the world. Only Dodo in an organdie many times laundered was the same as ever, bony, awkward, and the greatest fun possible; while Carol's strange half-sullen face looked more impassive than ever under her heavy turquoise fillet. The freshmen, shy but delighted, passed them "food after food," as Dodo called it: cold roast chicken, lobster salad on crisp, curly lettuce, delicious thin, little bread-and-butter sandwiches with the crusts off, devilled eggs, stuffed olives, almonds and ginger. There was a great sheet of fudge-cake, which is a two-storied arrangement of solid chocolate cake with a thick fudge filling and a half-inch icing, a compound possible of safe consumption to girls and ostriches only. There were dozens and dozens of a fascinating kind of thin wafer filled with nuts, and there were plates of chocolate peppermints. Also there were many bottles of imported ginger ale, which the freshmen presented in graceful, curved glasses after the Amiable Parent had with much chuckling pulled the corks, the freshmen pitching these last cheerfully down the corridor at their friends who came to scoff but went away to pray. That immediate amalgamation with the class of her hostesses which always occurs to guests made Marjory regard the pretty waitresses with upper-class patronage, till it occurred to her that they might be older than she, and that after all.... One in especial, whom the Amiable Parent insisted on feeding from his own plate, was very pretty and apparently very popular. But why the brown-eyed, red-cheeked adorer of Ursula should be _Theo_ Root, while Miss Bent was always _Dodo_; why Alida Fosdick was _Dick_, but Serena Burdick was Serena; why Elizabeth Twitchell was _Twitchie_, but Elizabeth Mitchell was _Betty_; why Ursula was always Ursula, and Nan was often _Jack_ and sometimes _Pip_ (it was because _Captain Gadsby_ was one of her famous parts) Marjory could not tell. When they were through and not another of all those two pounds of almonds could be eaten, and the freshmen had carried off the remains to dispose of them in the most obvious and economical manner, they proceeded to "do stunts," to the boundless joy of the Amiable Parent. Dick Fosdick, a plain, heavy-eyed senior, arose, draped in a black cashmere shawl, and delivered a lecture on the suffrage in a manner to cause one to pinch oneself to make sure it was not a dream and she was not forty-five and horrible. The Amiable Parent choked to suffocation, vowed she was the cleverest actress this side the water, and called for the next. Dodo, with lifted skirts and utterly unmoved features, jumping up heavily and landing on both feet with turned-in toes--she followed the good old custom of tan walking-boots with evening dress--droned in a monotonous nasal chant, to which her thudding feet kept time, an unholy song of no tune whatever: Oh, it's _dance_ like a _fairy_ and _sing_ like a _bird_, And _sing_ like a _bird_, And _sing_ like a _bird_, It's _dance_ like a _fairy_ and _sing_ like a _bird_, _Sing_ like a _bird_ in _June_! Anybody who has not seen this done by a solemn-looking girl of five feet seven or so, who divests a naturally humorous mouth of any expression whatever, and lands on the floor like an inspired steam-roller, is not in a position to judge of the comic quality of the performance. Nan, with much coy reluctance and very Gallic gestures, rendered what was pessimistically called her "naughty little French song." Its burden was not discoverably pernicious, however, consisting of the question, "_O Jean Baptiste, pourquoi?_" occasionally varied by the rapturous answer, "_O Jean Baptiste, voilà!_" But there was accent enough to make anything naughty, and she looked so pretty they made her do it again. Lucilla resisted many appeals, but succumbed finally to the Amiable Parent, who could wheedle the gate off its hinges, according to his daughter, and delivered her "one and only stunt." She had performed it steadily since freshman year, always with the same wild success, never with a hint of its palling. Marjory wondered why they laughed so--they all knew it by heart--and asked if anybody else never did it; their amazed negative impressed her greatly. She stood before them slim and straight, this daughter of a hundred Bostonians, a little cold, a little bored, a little displeased, apparently, and with an utterly emotionless voice and a quite impersonal manner delivered the most senseless doggerel in the most delicately precise enunciation: Baby sat on the window ledge, Mary pushed her over the edge. Baby broke into bits so airy-- Mother shook her finger at Mary. Sarah poisoned mother's tea, Mother died in agonee. Father looked quite sad and vexed-- "_Sarah, my child,_" he said, "_what next?_" Any one to whom this seems a futile and non-humorous piece of verse needs only to hear Lucilla's delivery of it, and catch the almost imperceptible shade of displeasure and surprise that touched her slender eyebrows at the last line, to realize that all similar exhibitions must seem forever crude beside it. They begged Marjory to sing and got her a guitar. As it had slowly dawned on her that most of the girls in the room played something, and that at least one third of them belonged to one or another of the musical clubs besides the many other organizations they carried, and thought nothing whatever of it--or concealed it if they did--her estimate of a hitherto much prized accomplishment had steadily decreased. She sang a little serenade for them, however, more tremulously than she had been wont to sing for a crowd of young people, and took an unreasoning and disproportionate amount of pleasure in their hearty applause. She sang again, and when Miss Cornelia Burt, who turned out to be the dark girl she had watched at Kingsley's and recognized, thanked her particularly and told her with a smile that she should "come up" and sing that with the Glee Club, Marjory remembered that she was a prominent senior, and found her heart beating a little faster when her friend Miss Twitchell, also prominent, repeated the suggestion. It could not be, she asked herself a moment afterwards, that _she_ was proud to have them notice her? There were more stunts, for the Amiable Parent could not have enough of what Nan called Dodo's Anglo-Saxon attitudes. Only the bell brought a stop to the proceedings, which had grown more and more hilarious, ending with a toast in ginger ale, to the delighted hero of the feast: Oh, _here's_ to Nannie's _Dad_, drink him _down_! Oh, _here's_ to Nannie's _Dad_, drink him _down_! Oh, _here's_ to Nannie's _Dad_, He's the _best_ she could have _had_, Drink him _down_, drink him _down_, drink him _down_, down, _down_! Nan and he and Marjory went out into the cool, dark campus, and they marched to "Balm of Gilead" all the way to Marjory's boarding-house. She watched them from her window, tramping arm-in-arm down to the hotel, where Nan was to stay the night with him. Nan had explained that while of course it would be a trial to her to be obliged to select her own breakfast, still her relative had desired it, and she had as usual bidden him "her own convenience count as nil." Marjory undressed slowly, humming the tune they had marched to and surveying the plain boarding-house bed-room. It seemed lonely after the Lawrence, and there was no dashing about in the halls, nor glimpses of fudge-parties and rarebits and laughing, busy people through half-shut doors. "Still, that Miss Burt was off the campus," she murmured as she braided her hair; and as she set the alarm-clock somebody had loaned her--for she took an early train--and climbed into bed, she explained to an imaginary aunt that people on the temporary list with no campus application whatever often "got on" miraculously--Lucilla had done that, and Caroline! THE EIGHTH STORY _THE EVOLUTION of EVANGELINE_ VIII THE EVOLUTION OF EVANGELINE To those who knew her afterward it may seem an impossible condition of affairs, but it is nevertheless quite true that until the night of the sophomore reception she was utterly unheard of. Indeed, when her name was read to the chairman of the committee that looks up stray freshmen, yet uninvited, and compels them to come in, the chairman refused to believe that she existed. "I don't believe there's any such person," she growled, "and if there is, there's nobody to take her. I can't _make_ sophomores! Evangeline Potts, forsooth! What a perfectly idiotic name! Who's to take her? Where does she live? Where's the catalogue?" "She lives on West Street," somebody volunteered, "and Bertha Kitts' freshman is sick, or her uncle is sick, or something, and Bertha says that lets _her_ out--she never wanted to go, anyhow--and now she's not going. Couldn't she take her?" "Not going!" the chairman complained bitterly. "If that's not like B. Kitts! Go get her, somebody, and send her after Evangeline, and tell her to hurry, too! Don't stop to argue with her, there isn't time. She'll prove that there isn't any reception, if you let her. Just get her started and then come right back. I promised to send three Bagdads over, and I can't get but two." The messenger paused at Miss Kitts' door, sniffed scornfully at the sign which read: "Asleep! Please do not disturb under any circumstances whatever!" and entered the room abruptly. Miss Kitts was curled comfortably on the window-seat, with _Plain Tales from the Hills_ in one hand, and _The Works of Christopher Marlowe_ in the other. From these volumes she read alternately, and the pile of cores and seeds on the sill indicated a due regard for other than mental nutriment. At intervals she lifted her eyes from her book to watch the file of girls loaded down with the pillows, screens, and palms whose transportation forms so considerable a portion of the higher education of women. Just as the door opened Biscuits was chuckling gently at the collision of a rubber-plant with a Japanese screen and the consequent collapse of their respective bearers, who, even in their downfall, poured forth the apologies and regrets that take the place of their brothers' less considerate remarks upon similar occasions. But her mirth was rudely checked by the messenger, who closed the Marlowe and put the Kipling under a pillow. "Hurry up," she remarked briefly, "and find Evangeline Potts and tell her that you can't sleep at night till you take her to the sophomore reception. Nobody urged her to attend and yours is sick." "She's not, either," returned B. Kitts, calmly. "She's quite well, and--" "Oh, don't possum, Biscuits, but get along. Sue's nearly wild. It's her uncle, then; we know you weren't going, so we know you can take her. Can I take this couch cover along? She's on West Street, and I can't stop to discuss it, but we depend on you. Now _do_ hurry up; it's three already." Biscuits freed her mind to the heap of pillows in the middle of the floor, for there was no one else to hear her. Then, still grumbling, she put on her golf cape and walked over to West Street. In a pessimistic frame of mind she selected the most unattractive house, and on inquiring if Miss Evangeline Potts lived there and ascertaining that she did, she astonished the slatternly maid by a heartfelt ejaculation of "Sherlock Holmes!"--adding, with resignation, "Is she in?" She was in, and her guest climbed two flights of stairs and knocked at her door. Although Evangeline Potts was not fully dressed and her room in consequent disorder, she did not appear at all embarrassed, but finished buttoning her shirt-waist and attached her collar with calm deliberation. She was a large, tall girl, with masses of auburn hair strained back unbecomingly from a very freckled face and heaped in tight coils on the top of her head. Her eyes were a rich red-brown; they struck you as lovely at first, till after a while you discovered that they were like glass or running water, always the same and absolutely expressionless. She had large hands and feet and a wide, slow smile, and she was dressed in unmitigatedly bad taste, with sleeves two years behind the style and a skirt that could have had nothing to do with it at any date. "I came to--to see if you had been--if you were going to the sophomore reception," said Biscuits. "I'm Miss Kitts, Ninety-red, and--and I've nobody to go with me and--and I shall be glad--" Biscuits was frankly embarrassed. She was a clever girl, and clever girls of her age are invariably conscious and more or less sensitive. She knew how she would have felt if she had been a freshman and a "left over": she would have resented such an eleventh-hour invitation and shown it, possibly. But if Evangeline Potts bore any resentment it was not apparent. "No," she said quietly, "I haven't been asked and I'd just as lieve go with you." "Oh, that's very nice!" returned Biscuits, cheerfully, "then that's settled. And what color is your gown? I should like to send you some flowers." "I'm not sure what I _will_ wear," said Evangeline; "what will you?" "My dress is pink," and Biscuits carefully kept her surprise out of the answer. Miss Potts did not look like the kind of girl to possess more than one evening gown. "How is it made?" Evangeline pursued. She was not curious, and yet she was not talking vaguely to cover any embarrassment: she merely desired information. "Oh, it's quite plain," and Biscuits rose to go; she was a little bored and there was nothing in Miss Potts' room to give any clew to her apparently pointless character. Biscuits prided herself on her ability to get at people through their belongings, and graded her friends as possessors of Baby Stuart, the Barye Lion, a Botticelli Madonna, or the imp of Lincoln Cathedral. But Evangeline did not rise. "I mean, is it low neck and short sleeves?" she insisted; and as Biscuits nodded, she added, "Does everybody wear them?" "Why, yes," said Biscuits, hastily; and then, "That is, a great many do. It's not at all necessary, though: you'll see plenty of girls without. Any light organdie will do perfectly." "I don't think I'll go, then," remarked Evangeline, calmly; "my dress wouldn't do." She was not in the least apologetic or pathetic or vexed: she merely stated a fact, and it occurred to Biscuits, who was somewhat susceptible to personality, that she meant precisely what she said. Although absence from the reception was just what Biscuits had previously planned, she did not care to please herself at this price, and though Evangeline Potts was the last person she would have selected for her companion, and visions of the pretty little freshman she had had in mind on filling out her programme flashed before her with irritating clearness, she smiled encouragement and remonstrated cheerfully. "Oh, nonsense! Why, anything will do, I tell you! You don't need evening dress! One of my friends last year had all her clothes ruined by a pipe or something that burst in the closet and she went in white duck. And she was one of the best-dressed girls in the class, really--" "Yes, but I'm not," interrupted Evangeline, "and that's different. I'm just as much obliged to you for asking me, Miss Kitts, but I haven't any evening dress and I shouldn't go without one." It was characteristic of Biscuits that she attempted no further argument. She knew that Evangeline Potts would not go unless she had an evening dress, and it seemed, somehow, imperative that she should go. She realized, too, that borrowing was out of the question. "Why don't you cut one of your dresses out?" she suggested after a moment. "Suzanne Endicott did that once when she was unexpectedly asked to a dance and hadn't any low waist with her." "I can't sew," Evangeline replied, "and I shouldn't know how to cut it." In proportion as she seemed convinced of the impossibility of going, Biscuits waxed more eager to change her determination. "See here," she said suddenly, "if I get Suzanne over here, will you let _her_ cut one of your dresses out? I think she would; she's awfully clever about that sort of thing and she's very obliging, sometimes." She was prepared for any answer but the one forthcoming. "Why, I don't care," said Evangeline, indifferently, "only she'd better hurry, hadn't she?" Biscuits was by now so impressed with the vital necessity of getting Suzanne that she had hardly time to wonder at her haste or her nervous fear that the young lady might not be at home. She trudged up the two flights and sighed with relief at the sound of Suzanne's mandolin. Miss Endicott was not fond of the mandolin and played it solely for the purpose of annoying the senior next door, who had a nasty habit of rising early to study, and making her bed violently, driving it into the wall just opposite Suzanne's pillow. When remonstrated with she returned with calmness that she had not been accustomed, when herself a sophomore, to object to the habits of seniors, and that excitable young people who came to college for heaven knew what, had better acquaint themselves with habits of study in others, since that was their only probable source of knowledge of such habits. Henceforth it became at once Suzanne's duty and pleasure to give what she modestly called "little recitals from time to time," accompanied by her mandolin, which instrument maddened her neighbor beyond endurance. As Biscuits entered she was giving a very dramatic rendering of the Jewel Song from Faust, and to her guest's opening remarks she replied only by a melodious burst of laughter and the arch assurance: "_Non, non! Ce n'est plus toi! Ce n'est plus ton visage!_" Biscuits obeyed an imperative gesture and held her peace till the song was over, when the performer, with an inimitable grin at the wall, laid down her mandolin and pointed to a chair. "_Que voulez-vous, ma plus chère? Vous avez l'air--_" "Oh, for heaven's sake talk English, Suzanne! I want you to come over and cut out Evangeline Potts' evening dress. Will you? She's freckled and big, and she won't go unless you do. She's got to go, too. We can't leave anybody out. Will you come?" "_Mais qu'avez-vous donc, ma chère Berthe? Est-ce que j'suis couturière, moi?_" "Yes," said Biscuits, obstinately, "you are, and you know it. You might be able to make her look like something. She's a perfect stick now." Suzanne shot one of her elfish glances at her visitor. It was impossible to know what she would do. "_Mais certainement vous avez assez de joue, vous!_" she suggested. Biscuits did not reply, but watched the clock on the desk. Suzanne shrugged her shoulders. "_Eh bien!_" she said cheerfully, "_me voilà sage, Petits-pains, sage et bien aimable! Où demeure-t-elle donc, votre amie?_" "Bless you, Suzanne, her name's Evangeline Potts! and she--" "_Mon Dieu!_ Evangeline Potts! _Mais quelle horreur! Est-ce que je saurais prononcer ce nom affreux?_" babbled Suzanne, while Biscuits found her golf cape and hustled her out of the door. Those who relied too long or too securely on Miss Endicott's moods were frequently disappointed in the end. She had been born in San Francisco and brought up, alternately, in Paris and New York, by her brother, a rising young artist, whose views were as broad as his handling, and whose regret at parting with her was equalled only by his firm determination to fulfil the promise he had made their mother, long dead, to educate her properly. Only his solemn assurance that she should come back every summer if she would behave, and finally conduct their joint establishment in Paris with the Angora for chaperon and the silky Skye for butler, kept her from taking the first steamer back from the seaport nearest the town she had hated consistently since she left that scene of delicious little suppers and jolly painter-people and nights at the play and ecstatic exhibitions when Brother was "on the line." Now a wealthy young woman from San Francisco who chooses to spend from two to four years at an Eastern college is a sufficiently complicated type in herself; when she has grown up in studios and done very much as she pleases all her life, she affords even more food for thought to the student of character. People who disliked Suzanne called her unprincipled and shallow and lazy; people who admired her called her brilliant and irresponsible and lazy; people who loved her called her fascinating and spoiled and lazy. She could dance like a leaf in the wind; she could make herself the most bewitching garments out of nothing to speak of; she could create a Japanese tea-room with one parasol and two fans, and make a Persian interior from a rug, an inlaid table, and a jewelled lantern; she could learn anything perfectly in half the time it would take anybody else to get a fair idea of it, and she could, if so minded, carry insolence to the point of a fine art. She was far from pretty, but her clever little brown face, with its strange gray eyes, compelled attention, and her hair had that rare silvery tinge that is an individuality in itself. She was never without two or three devoted admirers, but her class disliked her, and it took all their self-control to bear with her to the extent that was necessary in order to profit by her special abilities. She was no more to be depended upon than a kitten, and her periodical bursts of rage rendered her unendurable to that large majority which objects to flaming eyes and torrents of assorted abuse, to say nothing of the occasional destruction of bric-a-brac. And yet, to the wonder of these righteous critics, Suzanne kept her warm friends. There was always some amiable Philistine to watch her erratic movements with delighted awe, to run on her errands, to listen to her amazing confidences, and to stand up for her through thick and thin. Though Biscuits and her little circle were, even in their sophomore year, beginning to draw away from her, vaguely conscious of a necessary parting of the ways, frankly puzzled at the vagaries of this girl who was half a spoiled baby, half a woman of the world, at intervals the fascination of her personality drew them back for a while, and they wondered that they could have thought her irresponsible and selfish at heart. To-day, as Biscuits walked beside her, convulsed by her narration of a recent tussle with the lady-in-charge--"I was only putting an accordion-pleated crêpe-paper frieze above the moulding, with thumb tacks, and if she had kept out of the way--pig! 'What do you think you came to college for, Suzanne? Certainly not work of this sort!' 'Oh, no, Mrs. Wylie, of course not. I have long realized that our real object in coming here was to save the maids trouble!'"--she almost forgave her that curt refusal to have anything to do with the reception decorations: "You'd far better save me for the Prom--I'll manage that, but I won't do both, _vous savez, c'est un peu trop fort_!" she had remarked royally, and the committee had smothered their wrath and agreed, and cursed her afterwards in detail, after the manner of practical young women who are far from the short-sightedness of allowing their emotions to interfere with their intentions. Also, they do not enjoy giving needless pain--on the spot. This is one of the sweetest attributes of woman. They knocked at Evangeline's door, and omitting preliminary ceremonies, demanded the dress. Evangeline produced a dark red cashmere: Suzanne shook her head. A much washed white lawn with what appeared to be blue palm-leaf fans scattered over it was next offered for consideration: Suzanne gasped, "_Mon Dieu!_" A gray gingham decorated with yellow spirals met her demand for "a summer thing," and caused the artist to sink upon the floor with a tragic groan. "_Mais, Evangéline, vous me serrez le coeur! C'est horrible! C'est effrayant!_" Evangeline smiled politely but offered no further suggestion. Suzanne looked at her searchingly through half-closed eyes. "Have you anything black?" she demanded. "I have a black silk," said Evangeline, and she brought out a heavy, corded, ribbon-trimmed affair with a pointed vest that would have been highly suitable for a maiden aunt who had, as Suzanne remarked, seen misfortune. Biscuits sighed, but Suzanne rose rapidly to her feet and clutched the scissors she had brought with her. "_Enfin! Ça y est!_" she cried. "Put it on her, Biscuits!" She persisted in utterly ignoring Evangeline, or, more exactly, in treating her as if she had been a doll, talking to her in a pitying tone that required no answer and commenting upon her deficiencies in a manner that made Biscuits squirm visibly and glance apologetically at the object of such impersonal criticism. "Perhaps Miss Potts doesn't care to have such a--such a nice dress cut," she suggested, as Suzanne, with what seemed a perfectly careless gesture, slashed at the sleeves. "_Quel malheur!_" replied the artist, indifferently, and Evangeline added, "I'd just as lieve." With pursed lips Suzanne snipped and pinched, while Biscuits followed her every motion and Evangeline silently adjusted herself to each new position as Suzanne pulled and pushed her arms and neck about. At length with a sudden motion Suzanne stripped off the detached sleeves as if they had been gloves, and snatched away the top of the scant middle-aged waist with a quick movement. "_Voilà!_" she said, and Biscuits gasped: for Evangeline Potts was a transformed creature. Her arms and neck were ivory white and as soft and smooth as satin; the lovely curves of her throat and shoulders could never have been guessed at under the stiff black seams of the waist. Suzanne patted her arms appreciatively. "I might have known it, with that hair and those freckles!" she murmured. Then, calmly, to Evangeline: "The trouble with your kind is, you never have any eyebrows and your eyelids get red, _n'est-ce pas?_" She went a few steps back from the motionless figure and stood silent. "You could twist a black scarf," suggested Biscuits, hastily. Suzanne waved her hand. "_Tu me dégoûtes, à la fin!_" she said coldly; "Get your cape on!" Then, to Evangeline: "Undo your hair!" As the thick coil tumbled over her shoulders, the directress of ceremonies deliberately selected a light inner tress and snipped it off. "Take it down town and match it--in velvet if you can, in silk if you can't," she commanded. "And get enough, get two, three yards!" "But will Miss Potts want to spend--" Biscuits looked doubtfully at the white-armed goddess who contemplated herself quietly in the glass. It was impossible to know what she was thinking; she was apparently quite accustomed to strangers who dressed her in low-cut evening dresses and snipped her hair and spent her money. Suzanne stamped her foot. "_Va-t-en!_" she cried, and then, with an irresistible mimicry of Evangeline, "_She'd_ just as lieve!" When Biscuits returned with a great strip of tawny velvet, it was taken from her at the door, and she was instructed to get from Suzanne's room her make-up box and the gold powder that had so unaccountably disappeared after the play last week. "They borrowed the eyebrow pencil and that, the night of the dress rehearsal, and they _swore_ to bring them back--beasts! What have I to call my own? _Rien!_ Never, never, never will I lend anything again! _Il faut faire un fin, vraiment!_" It was a long hunt for Biscuits, and more than once it occurred to her that she had refused to go on the decorating committee with a view to escaping just such wearisome trotting about. When she handed the box to Suzanne and suggested that the result should be extremely pleasing to justify such toil, the red spot in the artist's either cheek and her wide-opened eyes indicated the happy absorption to which no effort seems worthy of mention. Biscuits, not allowed to enter the room, sat wearily on the stairs, longing to go home but unwilling to abandon Suzanne. It was very nearly six, and she was not dressed; she had left the necessary perusal of _The Works of Christopher Marlowe_ till late in the day, thinking to devote the evening to it; she took little interest in Evangeline Potts, and she did not care much for dancing. But for the moment her resentment vanished when Suzanne called her in and she beheld the object of her labors under the gaslight in a carefully darkened room. Her milk-white shoulders rose magnificently from folds of auburn velvet that her wonderful hair repeated in loose waves about her face and a great mass low on her neck. Her long, round arms gleamed against the black of her skirt and melted into the glow of her velvet girdle. In the white light her freckles paled and her eyes turned wholly brown, and said mysterious things that could never by any possibility have occurred to her. "_Tiens! J'ai eu la main heureuse, n'est-ce pas? Vous la trouvez charmante?_" said Suzanne, turning her about as if she had been a dummy and indicating her opinion that the back view was, if anything, more satisfying than the front. "You're a genius, Suzanne! She's simply stunning! How did you do it?" Suzanne smiled. "_C'est pas grand' chose_," she said modestly. But she looked contentedly at Evangeline and loosened her hair a little. "Now remember, don't put on those hideous rings," she commanded, "and don't wear anything on your head. Do you dance well?" she added. Evangeline hesitated. "I dance a little," she replied, "pretty well, I guess." Suzanne promptly encircled her waist and whistled a waltz. After a few turns she stopped. "You dance very badly," she said encouragingly. "If I were you, I'd sit out most of them. You can say it bores you--they'll be glad enough. Besides, you might get red and then you'd not be pretty. Now don't move about much, and when Miss Kitts brings you the white roses put them just where I told you. "Very well," said Evangeline, and as the other two prepared to go she gave them one of her long, slow smiles. "I'm much obliged to you both, I'm sure," she said; "you've been very kind." "_Adieu, mon enfant--à plus tard!_" and Suzanne seized the door knob. She turned in the door and threw a quick, piercing look at her handiwork. "If you take my advice, you'll never put on that dreadful shirt-waist again, _très chère_," she said lightly. "You'll spoil all this splendor, if you do. Give it away--or, no, don't! you'd corrupt the taste of the poor--burn it up, and the others with it, and get a black suit and a black silk waist and wear a big white tie, if you like. And a white tam--one of those pussy ones. Wear one color--_c'est plus distingué_--and if you want a big black hat with plumes, I'll make it for you. _Et maintenant, regarde-toi dans la glace!_" With this invocation they left her, and Biscuits, learning that Suzanne had exhausted her energy and proposed to inform her freshman that she was ill and unable to attend the reception, became possessed by the idea that she was responsible for this particular illustration of the artistic temperament, and went without her dinner to hunt up a substitute. She wasted no time in argument with Suzanne, who lay luxuriously on her couch pillows with her hands under her head, and planned costumes for Evangeline Potts all the evening, but tramped angrily over the campus till quarter of seven to find an unattached sophomore, forgetting that Evangeline's flowers were yet to be purchased. Coming up with them in her hand, a little later, she was forced to stop and explain to the substitute the intricacies of Suzanne's programme, breaking off abruptly to beat her breast like the wedding guest, for she heard the loud bassoon and fled to her room, tearing her evening dress hopelessly and completing her toilette on the stairs. The substitute suffered from a violent headache as the result of her unexpected exertions, and the little freshman cried herself to sleep, for she had dreamed for nights of going with Suzanne, whom she admired to stupefaction. But of all this Evangeline Potts knew little, and, it may be, cared less. She was one of the successes of the evening, and her few remarks were quoted diligently. She could have danced dozens of extras, had so many been possible, and Biscuits was considered to have displayed more than her ordinary cleverness in procuring a creature so picturesque and distinguished. This did not surprise her, nor did she particularly resent being pointed out by more than one freshman as "the sophomore that took that stunning Miss Potts"; but her amazement was undisguised, the next morning but one, at the sight of Evangeline walking out from chapel with a prominent junior, the glamor of the evening gone, it is true, her face somewhat heavy and undeniably freckled, but nevertheless an Evangeline transformed. From her fluffy white cap to the hem of her dignified black skirt she was the realization of Suzanne's parting suggestions, and the distinct intention of her costume had its full effect. She was far more impressive than the jolly little short-skirted junior, whose curly yellow hair paled beside the dark richness of Evangeline's massive coils, and Biscuits, remembering that she had called her "a perfect stick," marvelled inwardly. She went to call on her a little later, but Evangeline was not in; and feeling that her duty was done, Miss Kitts gave no further thought to what she considered an essentially uninteresting person, but devoted herself to a study of the campus house into which she had moved only that year. She saw Evangeline very rarely after that, except at the dances and plays, where her white shoulders framed in auburn velvet appeared very regularly. Once, happening to sit beside her, she began a conversation, but she could not remember afterward that Miss Potts said anything but, "Yes, indeed," or, "Yes, I think so, too." Her surprise was therefore great when, on hearing the result of the sophomore elections the next fall, and audibly commenting on the oddity of Miss Evangeline Potts in the position of sophomore president, she was indignantly assured by a loyal member of that class that the vote was almost unanimous and that she was one of the ablest girls in the class. Even this she did not consider long, for the sophomore presidency is the least important of the four; but when among the first five sophomores to be triumphantly ushered into Phi Kappa Psi she was asked to consider the name of Evangeline Potts, she remonstrated. "But she's not clever! She's not half so bright as lots we haven't got!" she objected. "Why do we want her?" "She's no prod, of course, but she's a prominent girl and class president," was the answer, "and she's really very strong, I think--they say she does fair work, and everybody but you wants her. Do you really disapprove of her?" "Oh, no!" said Biscuits, and watched Miss Potts with interest. She received her congratulations quietly, with a manner that made one wonder if they had been quite in good taste, and acted altogether as if she had fully expected to enter the society with Ursula Wyckoff and Dodo Bent. The senior class president took her out of chapel at the head of the file, with a bunch of violets as big as her two fists pinned to her belt, and Biscuits was asked to a supper in her honor in the campus house she had recently entered. One of the other guests was the little freshman Biscuits had first asked to the sophomore reception, herself a sophomore now, and one of Phi Kappa's first five. "Was your class surprised at the elections?" asked Biscuits, glancing half unconsciously at Evangeline. The sophomore smiled gently, with a hardly perceptible recognition of Biscuits' look. "Oh, no," she replied; "we expected them--except, perhaps, one or two." Her polite little blush showed her traditional surprise at her own success, and the junior gave the equally traditional deprecating smile. "Who's the other?" she inquired bluntly. The sophomore was taken off her guard and glanced again at Evangeline. "Why, some of us didn't exactly see--we think Alison Greer's terribly bright--we didn't expect--and yet, I don't know! After all, I think perhaps we weren't so awfully surprised!" "Now, I wonder if you really weren't, or if you're lying?" thought Biscuits, and then, remembering suddenly, "but that's just the way _we_ all talked last year about Evelyn Lyon!" That summer Evangeline spent in France with Suzanne, who informed Biscuits before they sailed that though she couldn't find out anything about Miss Potts' parents, she had learned of the existence of a well-to-do uncle in New Hampshire who intended leaving quite a little money to his uncommunicative niece--he had given her the money to go abroad. "She planned it all out, and asked to go with me, and I couldn't well refuse," said Suzanne, "though Brother will be wild with rage--he hates women who are not clever: _il est un peu exigéant, mon frère_." By senior year Biscuits had very nearly lost track of Suzanne, who left the campus and spent most of her time sketching. Brother had shown some pen-and-ink portraits of hers to a great critic, who had declared that Brother had by no means exhausted the family genius, and Suzanne, heavily bribed, had returned to her last year of durance. The day of the Junior Prom Biscuits received a very French little note inviting her to "_une première vue_," and with the full expectation of a pen-and-ink collection, she confronted Evangeline, glorious in white satin and gold passementerie, with an amber chain and a great amber comb in her hair. "_Vous rappelez-vous cette première fois, hein?_" Suzanne asked, with a grin. "_Ça date de loin, n'est-ce pas?_" Adding cheerfully, "_L'oncle est mort et nous avons une jolie dot!_" Biscuits was not surprised to learn that Ursula Wyckoff had moved heaven and earth to get her cousin from Columbia for Evangeline's escort; she had heard how Nan Gillatt actually took her own brother to the Glee Club concert because Evangeline preferred the youth selected by Nan for herself, and she remembered how _she_ had hunted from shop to shop for the velvet that matched that auburn hair. It was not that Evangeline insisted: she did not beg favors. But her habit of receiving a proposition in silence filled one with an irresistible desire to better one's offer, and even the improvement seemed poor in the calm scrutiny of those red-brown eyes. "What I can't see is, who pushes her!" mused Biscuits. "Who? who?" repeated Suzanne. "_Par exemple!_ Why, she herself, of course! Who else?" "But how?" Biscuits persisted. "Now Evelyn made up to everybody so--she earned her way, heaven knows! And Kate Ackley was a sort of legacy--her sister's reputation started her and she was rushed so freshman year that you couldn't blame her for failing to realize what a fool she really is. And the Underhills' coming in with the crowd they did, explains them. But nobody rushes Evangeline particularly--" "_C'est bien dommage!_" Suzanne interrupted with mock sympathy. "_Seule au monde!_ Don't be an idiot, Biscuits, we _all_ rush her, and we shall--till she begins to see what a bluff she's making! The beauty of Evangeline is, that she fools herself--_mais parfaitement_! She really thinks she's somebody--_voilà tout!_" "I suppose that's it," assented Biscuits, thoughtfully. "Ursula," Suzanne remarked oracularly, "is so anxious to please that sometimes she doesn't, and even Susan the Great has her little plans--_mais oui!_ But Mlle. Potts doesn't care a _sou_. It's all one to her, _vous savez_, she agrees with all; and what's the result? _Tout le monde l'admire! C'est toujours comme ça!_" For some reason or other her large and shapely figure was the most prominent feature of Biscuits' Commencement. She was a junior usher, of course, and in aisles or under lanterns, at Phi Kappa Farewell or Glee Club promenade, her calm, heavy face and deliberate movements attracted Biscuits' eye. The mob had not appealed to Miss Kitts as a desirable method of dramatic début, and she was, consequently, one of the few seniors in the audience on the night of her class dramatics. Between the acts she wandered down to the door, and caught a bit of conversation among a group of ushers. "And all Ursula's friends were in the middle aisle, and she begged Evangeline to change, but she wouldn't. Ursula could have had a seat then, with Dick Fosdick's people, and she was frightfully tired, but Evangeline wouldn't." "Pooh! did you expect she would?" "Oh, no! She's terribly selfish, of course, but you'd think, considering how nice Ursula's been to her--" "Oh, my dear! As if _that_ made any difference to Evange--sh, here she is!--What stunning violets, Evangeline! That's your Prom dress, isn't it? It's terribly sweet!" Evangeline smiled and sank into the seat a little freshman promptly and adoringly vacated for her, and Biscuits went back to her place. Suzanne stopped in America that summer, and with the promise of five subsequent years in Paris, prolonged her stay till the following June. She went so far as to come up to Northampton to her class reunion, assuring her friends that she had forgotten a few opprobrious epithets in her final anathema and had returned to deliver them in person. As they stood in the crowd on Ivy Day, watching the snowy procession, the cameras suddenly snapped rapidly all about them and an excited voice murmured: "There she is! Isn't she grand? My dear, she had eleven invitations for the junior entertainment! Martha Sutton took her--" Evangeline Potts walked slowly by. "And you ought to have seen her Commencement flowers! She had a bathtub full--literally! She wouldn't take 'em out and the tub couldn't be used--" "She's president of Phi Kapp, I hear," said Biscuits. "Oh, yes," replied Suzanne, "and on the dramatics committee, you know. She has lots of friends." "I wonder why," said Biscuits, absently. "_'Sais pas!_ They're clever girls, too. She knows the pick of the class--but then, she always did, you know." "I suppose she'll marry money," mused Biscuits, the student of human nature. "_Du tout!_" Suzanne returned, "she won't care about that. It's clever people she wants--she always went with the clever ones: _elle aime les gens d'esprit_. She's got money enough; she'll marry some clever man who knows the best people and will make her one of them--_vous l'verrez!_" And the prophecy was fulfilled, for Evangeline very shortly married Walter Endicott, the well-known artist, whose portrait of her in white and gold attracted so much attention at a very recent _Salon_. THE NINTH STORY _AT COMMENCEMENT_ IX AT COMMENCEMENT I DRAMATICS _It is the Saturday night performance of the senior play. The curtain is about to rise. The aisles and back of the house are packed with people struggling for seats; alumnæ and under-class girls who have admission tickets only, are preparing to sit on all the steps; the junior ushers are hopelessly trying to keep back the press. It is to be supposed that the orchestra is playing, judging from the motion of arms and instruments. The lights are suddenly lowered and the curtain rises. The struggle for seats at the back, the expostulations of the ushers, and the comments of the alumnæ and students, who have seen the play twice before and consequently do not feel the need of close attention, completely drown the first words of the scene._ _Back of house. Large and fussy mother, looking daggers at the sophomores squatting beside her, giggling at the useless efforts of a small worried usher to prevent a determined woman, escorted by her apologetic husband, from prancing down into the orchestra circle; and unimportant senior._ _Mother._ What? What? Who is this, Emma? Where are we? _Emma._ That's Viola, Mother. She's just been shipwrecked, you know. _Mother._ Oh, she's the heroine. She's the best actor, then? _Emma._ Dear me, no. Malvolio's 'way by the best. And then Sir Toby and Maria--they're awfully good--you'll see them pretty soon now. I don't care for Viola much. She tries to imitate Ada Rehan-- _Curtain drops on First Scene._ ¶ _Orchestra Circle. Handsome, portly father, exceptionally well set up, his wife, and head of department._ _Father, with enthusiasm._ By Jove! Is that a girl, really? You don't say so! Well, well! Sir Toby, eh? Well, well! And who's the little girl? Maria? Did you ever see anything much prettier than she is, Alice? _His Wife._ She's very charming, certainly. _Head of Department._ She's about the best of them. A very clever girl. But you ought to see Malvolio! I don't care for Sir Andrew-- _Father._ Alice, look at him! Did you ever see anything so odd? Now I call that clever--I must say I call that clever! To think that's a girl--well, well! See him shiver, Alice! Capital, capital! Do they do this themselves--costumes and acting and ideas and all? _Head of Department._ They make the costumes, I believe, most of them. Then they have a trainer at the last. It's amazing to me, but as a matter of fact their men's parts are as a rule, considering the proportionate difficulty, you know, much better than their women's. Comedy parts, at that. I've never seen but one woman's part really well done. _Father._ Really? Now why do you suppose, sir, that is so? _Head of Department._ I can't say. But they're very artificial women, as a rule. Overtrained, perhaps. ¶ _A group of last year's graduates and two ushers on the platform of the fire-escape upstairs._ _First Graduate._ I suppose you're nearly dead, poor child? _First Usher._ Heavens! I never slaved so in my life! Did you see Ethel Williams' mother _insist_ on going down into her seat? I don't see how people can be so rude. _First Graduate._ Going better, to-night, isn't it? _First Usher._ Goodness, yes! I think it's fine. Don't you? Isn't Dick _simply fine_! There she is! (_A burst of applause as Malvolio and Olivia enter._) _Second Usher._ Do you know, they say that Kate Ackley thinks it's half for her! _Second Graduate._ Not really? _Second Usher._ Yes, really. She is stunning, there's no doubt. _Second Graduate._ Oh, yes, she's stunning. Is that her own dress? _Second Usher._ Yes. Her aunt gave it to her. It's liberty satin. But she's a stick, just the same. Do you like Viola? _Second Graduate, parrying._ She looks very well. I was rather surprised she got it, though. _Second Usher._ You know Mr. Clark wanted her for Sir Andrew, and she wouldn't. He was very angry, and so was the class. They don't care for Ethel at all. But it was Viola or nothing. She's seen it four times and she thinks she knows it all, they say. I _do_ think she does some parts very well indeed. _First Usher._ Oh, Miss Underhill, isn't Viola grand? Don't you think she's fine? _Second Graduate, sweetly._ Yes, indeed. She looks so cunning in that short skirt! _Curtain falls on First Act._ ¶ _Two fathers standing at back._ _First Father, smiling affably._ A great sight, I assure you, sir! All these young girls, and parents, and friends--a proud moment for them! And how well they do! That one that takes the part of Malvolio, now, that Miss Fosdick--pretty smart girl, now, isn't she? _Second Father._ That's my daughter, sir. _First Father._ Well, well! I expect you're pretty pleased. You ought to be. _Second Father, confidentially._ I tell you, sir, I never believed she had it in her, never! Her mother and I were perfectly dumfounded--perfectly. I don't know where she got it from; certainly not from me. And her mother couldn't take part in tableaux, even, she got so nervous. _First Father._ Just so, just so! Now, I want to tell you something, Mr.--Mr. Fosdick. These colleges for women are a great thing, sir, a great thing! You take my daughter. When she came up here, she was as shy and bashful and helpless as a girl that's an only child could possibly be. Couldn't trust herself an inch alone. Never went away from home alone in her life. Look at her now! She's head of this whole committee: you may have noticed their names on the back of the programme. Costumes, scenery, music, lights, stage properties, scene shifting--all in her hands, as you might say! I slipped up to the stage door, and I begged the young woman there to let me step in and see her a moment. Girls do it all, you know! She was on policeman duty there. But she let me in and I just peeked at Mary, bossing the whole job, as you might say! It was "put this here" and "put that there" and taking hold of the end and dragging it herself, and answering this one's questions and giving that one orders--I tell you, I couldn't believe it! Short skirt and shirt-waist, note-book in her hand--Lord! I wished I had her up at the office with me! _Second Father._ Then you're Miss Mollie Vanderveer's father? _First Father._ Yes, sir, James L. Vanderveer. _Second Father._ Pleased to meet you. 'Lida often speaks of her. She said to her mother and me to-night just as she went down to "be made up," as they call it, that Mollie was a brick and no mistake. It seems she's doing two girls' work to-night. _First Father._ Yes, one of the committee is sick. After all, it's a pretty hard strain, it seems to me. Mary's pretty strong, but she said to me yesterday that if there had been another performance-- _Curtain rises on Second Act._ ¶ _Lobby. College physician and junior usher._ _Physician._ Will you just step over to the drug store across the street and get me some brandy--quickly, please? _Usher._ Oh, certainly, Dr. Leach! _Physician._ Here, child, stop! Put on a cloak--are you crazy? _Usher._ But I'm quite warm, Dr. Leach! _Physician._ Put on a cloak! With your neck and arms bare! It's damp as a well outside. (_Usher runs out._) _A ubiquitous member of the faculty suddenly appears._ What's the matter? Anybody sick? _Physician._ Oh, no! Not much. Miss Jackson was resting in her dressing-room and somebody leaned over the sill and spoke to her--you know she's on the ground floor. She's quite nervous, and she got a little hysterical--slight chill. My brandy was all out, so I--Oh, thank you! (_Usher disappears breathless._) _Ubiquitous Member of Faculty, gloomily._ I've always said there should be understudies--always. What will they do without their Viola? It's a ridiculous risk-- _Physician, hastily._ But Miss Jackson is all right, or will be as soon as I get--yes, I'm coming! Oh, nonsense!--She's all right: there's no need for an understudy, I assure you!--No, keep them all out! No, she has enough flowers in there now! Yes, keep people away from the window! ¶ _Curtain rises on Third Scene._ _Group of ushers collapsed on stairs leading to gallery._ _Nan._ (_White organdie over rose pink silk; rose ribbons._) Oh, girls, I'm nearly dead! _Ursula._ (_Black net over electric blue satin; silver belt and high silver comb; black gloves._) There's one good thing, we're downstairs to-night. Last night I got so dizzy hopping up and down those steps-- _Leonora._ (_Yellow liberty silk cut very low; gold fillet; somewhat striking Greek effect._) Oh, what do you think I just did? I was so tired I stumbled just behind the orchestra circle (after I'd shooed that funny woman out of three seats) and I fell almost flat! And the nicest man helped me up and made me take his seat, and who do you think it was? It was Mr. Fosdick. He went and stood back, and I sat a long time then. Wasn't he ducky? _Sally._ (_White dimity with green ribbons; a yard or more of red-gold hair; babyish face._) Where's your own seat, dear? _Esther._ (_Pale blue silk with long rope of mock pearls._) Oh, Piggy's given it to her little friend, as usual! It's a great thing to have--(_The door swings open, and the actors' voices are heard_: "There dwelt a man in Babylon, lady, lady!" _Another usher comes out._) _Nan._ How'd the song go? Better? _Usher._ Oh, grand! They made her do the second verse again. Miss Selbourne says that she's the best all 'round clown they've ever had. _Sally._ Oh, does she? I heard her tell Dr. Lyman that the plays deteriorated every year--(_Enter another usher._) _Second Usher._ Girls, you _must_ be quiet! That woman at the back says she can't hear a word-- ¶ _Curtain rises on Fourth Scene; applause, as audience takes in stage setting. Row of enthusiastic alumnæ in upper box._ _First Alumna._ (_Happy mother of three; head of sewing circle; leader of the most advanced set in her college days; president of the Anti-Engagement League, junior year._) Oh, girls, did you ever see anything so lovely? How _do_ they manage it? We never imagined anything like it, I'm perfectly willing to admit. Aren't those lords and ladies fine? Why, look at them--there must be forty or fifty! And aren't the costumes beautiful? How handsome Orsino is! _Second Alumna._ (_Rising journalist; very well dressed; knows all the people of note in the audience; affects a society manner; was known as the Gloomy Genius in her college days, and never talked with any one who didn't read Browning._) Quite professional, really! How that Miss Jackson reminds one of Rehan! I wonder if Daly sends the trainer? That little Maria, now--she's quite unusual. Lovely figure, hasn't she? Elizabeth Quentin Twitchell. Dr. Twitchell of Cambridge, I wonder? Do they set that stage alone? _Third Alumna._ (_Blonde and gushing; sister in the cast._) You know, that Miss Twitchell was the best Viola, too, they say. Peggy tells me Mr. Clark says he wished she could play them both. She's very popular with the class. But Miss Jackson does everything. Writes, acts, plays basket-ball, beautiful class work--Oh, isn't that sweet! (_Clown and chorus of ladies with mandolins and guitars sing to wild applause._) _Fourth Alumna._ (_Tall, thin, dark, and dowdy; very humble in manner; high-principled; worth two millions in her own right; slaved throughout her entire college course._) I don't see how anybody can say that girls can't do anything in the world they set out to. Isn't it wonderful? You can say what you please, but it's just as Ella says--they do ten times what we did and do it better too. I think they're prettier than they used to be, don't you? And they're just like real actors--I'm sure it's prettier than any play I ever saw! They make such wonderful men! Would you ever know that Sir Toby was a girl? And Malvolio--he's just too good for anything! _Curtain falls on Fourth Scene._ ¶ _There is a long wait in total darkness. The audience smiles, then settles down to be amused. Somebody faints and is restored with shuffling, apologies, and salts._ _Slender, dark-eyed, gray-haired man, with non-committal expression, uncle of one of the Mob; with his wife, who grows more frankly puzzled as the play advances._ _Uncle._ I suppose they've outdone themselves in this garden scene. _Aunt._ Yes, Bertha says they've worked tremendously over it. Henry, what _do_ you think of it? _Uncle._ Very ingenious, my dear. _Aunt._ But Henry, their voices-- _Uncle._ They _are_ a little destructive to the illusion, but you hear the gentleman behind me. He assures us that he thinks they are men! _Aunt._ Oh, _Henry_! _Uncle._ It's a pity they haven't more like Maria. Viola could take a few points from her. _Aunt._ But Bertha says that they adore Viola. She writes, and plays basket-ball, and stands high in her classes, and-- _Uncle._ But she isn't an actress, that's all. She shouldn't grasp all the arts! She's too melodramatic--she rants. _Aunt._ Bertha says the trainer admires her very much--he wants her to go on the stage. _Uncle._ Oh! does he? _Aunt._ Did you know that even the mobs are trained very carefully? Bertha says she goes to rehearsals all the time. And the principal parts--Malvolio worked six hours with Mr. Clark one day and eight the next. And Viola had to do more. And the stage committee _slave_, Henry, they simply slave. Little Esther Brookes is worn to a shadow--not but what they love to do it. _Uncle._ And when did Malvolio and Viola and the stage committee do their studying? _Aunt._ Oh, they keep up with their work. It's a point of honor with them, Bertha says. Of course they can't do _quite_ so much, I suppose-- _Uncle._ I suppose not. _Aunt._ But Bertha says that they would give up anything in college sooner than that. Viola and Malvolio, both of them, say that they regard it as the most valuable training they've gotten up here. They say it's quite the equal of any of their courses. _Uncle._ Ah! do they? ¶ _Curtain rises on a very elaborate garden scene of arbors and flowers; frantic applause, doubled at the entrance of Sir Toby and Sir Andrew._ _Group of cynical alumnæ on fire-escape._ _First Alumna._ As for that Sir Toby-- _Second Alumna._ Hush, my dear, that may be the bosom of her family forninst us! _First Alumna, lowering her voice._ I think he's indecent and ridiculous. _Second Alumna._ He'll be the pride of the class, my little cousin says. They're raving over him. _First Alumna._ Then they're idiots. My dear, we may have had our faults, but we were seldom vulgar, if we weren't remarkable! _Third Alumna._ What I mind so much is that all the papers are filled with that trash about gracefulness and womanliness and girlish delicacy and the great gulf between us and the coarse professionals, and as far as I can see, we are filling in that gulf as fast as possible. We seem to be striving after the very thing-- _First Alumna._ Precisely. In a word, it's Daly, not Shakespeare. And they don't see that Dalyism takes money--we haven't the scenery and costumes for it. _Second Alumna._ That horrible Sir Andrew! _Fourth Alumna._ But Malvolio-- _First Alumna._ Oh, Malvolio's all right. As far as a girl can do it. The question is, _can_ a girl do it? I think she can't. _Third Alumna._ And as for allowing that Miss Jackson to imitate all Ada Rehan's bad points, when she naturally fails of her good ones-- _Fourth Alumna._ But, my dear, the men like it. They're all pleased to death. They think it's the cleverest thing they ever saw. They say Viola's magnetic-- _Third Alumna._ Hgh! She's coarse, if that's what you mean! The whole tone of the thing is lowered. I think that way she acted the duel scene last night was simply vulgar. But the girls all howled with laughter. _Fourth Alumna._ Well, if they're pleased-- _First Alumna._ They shouldn't be pleased! _Fourth Alumna._ Surely, Annie, you think this garden scene is funny! _First Alumna._ Why, I laughed. It's a good acting play. But I wish the Literature department had more to do with it and the trainer confined himself to-- _Usher interrupts._ If you please, I must ask you to make less noise. You are disturbing the people near the door! ¶ _The curtain has fallen on the Fourth Act. A group of last year's graduates standing at the back in party-cloaks, with a few of the Mob in shirt-waists and make-up._ _Recent Court Lady, tentatively._ Did you like the dance? _First Graduate._ Oh, it was fine! It was terribly pretty, Ellen, the whole thing! _Recent Court Lady, relieved._ I'm so glad you liked it. Wasn't Sue grand! _First Graduate._ Yes, indeed, but I liked Malvolio so much! _Court Gentleman._ Good old Dick! My, don't we love her! Orsino's going to do him at class supper, you know. And Olivia's going to be Sir Toby. _Second Graduate._ How noble! Sir Toby is about the best I ever saw, May. _Court Gentleman._ Isn't she that? She's going to be Viola. She squirms and twists just like her-- _Court Lady._ Oh, come on, May Lucy, and get to bed! (_They go out whistling airs from the play and are violently suppressed by a group of ushers, whose excited remonstrances are loudly criticised by a large and nervous lady in the rear, greatly delighting the contingent from the Mob._) _First Graduate._ Now, Katharine, just tell me, perfectly impartially of course, how you think it compares with ours. _Second Graduate._ Well, girls, frankly I must say I'm a little disappointed. (_Nods from the others._) _Third Graduate._ It's not that it's not well done, for it is, but it's such a fine play it ought to have been well done by anybody. And for all that Sue Jackson's such a wonder, I must say-- _Fourth Graduate._ Yes, exactly. She's too heavy for the part, I think. _Second Graduate._ Of course Toby was fine and Malvolio and Maria-- _Fifth Graduate._ Well, then, with three fine ones I should think-- _Second Graduate._ But Olivia and Sebastian and Orsino were such sticks-- _Fourth Graduate._ Still, those third and fourth and fifth scenes in the second act were beautiful. _Second Graduate._ But the others were so plain. They just stacked on the good ones. Still, I suppose they did the best they could. Mary Vanderveer has just _slaved_ over it. _Fifth Graduate._ We know what _that_ is! _Second Graduate._ Well, honestly, I think this is a _prettier_ play than ours, but I do feel that ours was a little _better done_! Here, let's see Sue in this. I think she's pretty good. ¶ _The curtain has fallen on the Fifth Act. Malvolio and Viola come out of their dressing-room to the street, and slip out of a crowd of ushers and under-class girls. A general flutter of congratulation and sympathy follows them._ Oh, Miss Jackson, it was great! Simply fine! Susy, my child, say what you'd like and it's yours!--Where's Lida Fosdick?--Lida! Dick! She's gone long ago. Where's Toby? Gone, too. Somebody has some flowers for her. Oh, take 'em up to the Wallace!--Well, good-night! Wasn't it grand!--Grand! There's Betty! Hi, Betty! Oh, Miss Twitchell, it was so-- _Miss Twitchell, mechanically._ So glad, so glad you liked it--we loved to do it! Oh, yes! Oh, dear, no! Just a little, yes. The making-up was so long. Mother--thank you, _thank_ you--Mother, where _is_ the carriage? Oh, thank you _so_ much! _Mrs. Twitchell, nervously._ Yes, indeed, she's tired to death. I'm very glad, I'm sure, if you liked it. Oh, how do you do, Mrs. Waite? Yes, here she is. Bessie, here is Mrs. Waite. You see she sat in the Opera House since five o'clock to be made up, and only sandwiches and all the strain--yes, indeed. Fanny looked very pretty, I thought. In the dance, wasn't she? Yes, so pretty. I'm sure I wish Bessie had only been in the dance--Oh, here's the carriage, dear! ¶ _Malvolio and Viola, slipping quietly past the crowd; make-up not off; arms on each other's shoulders._ _Malvolio._ I suppose Dad's holding that carriage somewhere. _Viola._ Well, I can't help it. I simply can't talk to everybody. _Malvolio._ Do you know your speech? _Viola._ I think so. It's so short, you know. I hate to have the president's speech long. (_A pause._) _Malvolio._ Well, it's over, Susy Revere! No more glory for little Lide and Sue! _Viola._ All over! Well, we've had the time of our lives, Dick! I'd--I'd give anything to do it over again, three nights! _Malvolio._ Me too. It's a pleasant little spot up here. (_They walk to the campus in silence._) ¶ _Recent court lady and two young gentlemen, brothers of her friend, the stage manager. Her eyes are underlined heavily, and she has not gotten the rouge quite off her cheeks._ _Recent Court Lady._ Oh, _thank_ you, it would be _such_ a help! Mollie is nearly wild, and these things must be got out to-night. If you would take this and this and this, and oh, Father, would you please carry this tankard and the cups? And could you take those two swords? I'll take the distaff and the mandolin. Jack, have you room for the moon? Will, here are more poppies, and I promised Ada that I'd put that rubber-plant in her room to-night. You're so good! You're sure you don't mind carrying them? Now don't get laughing, Father, and drop the cups. _A Recent Court Gentleman._ Good-night, dear! I knew you'd like it. Oh, I think everybody seems to feel it's the best yet. Of course, last year they had so much better opportunity, so much easier scenery. But with four such stars--yes, indeed. It was so much harder to find people to take--oh, she _did_! She thinks that just because it doesn't all depend on one or two people, it's easier? Well, just find your extra people, that's all!--Did you like it? Most people seemed to think it _was_ a pretty dance. Well, we rehearsed enough, heaven knows. Did you know Orsino's fiancé was there? She said she felt like such an idiot. Too bad Sue got scared, wasn't it? Well, good-night. ¶ _Steps of the Dewey House. Three ushers propped against the pillars. The night watchman approaches with lantern._ _Watchman._ Well, well, well! Want to get in? _Hi'll_ bet yer do! (_First usher nods her head._) Are yer h'ushers? Fine play, wa'n't it? (_Second usher nods her head._) Well, you do look tired! You pretty tired, Miss Slater? (_Third usher murmurs something about sleeping till noon, and second usher chuckles feebly and mentions Baccalaureate. They stumble into the Dewey, and the watchman shuts the door._) II IVY DAY _The sun is glaring down on the campus. A crowd of parents and other relatives is surging toward an awning near the steps of College Hall; a stream of white-dressed seniors continually flows toward the Hatfield House, where a procession is forming. Forty junior ushers struggle with a rope wound with laurel, which is to encompass the column of seniors. A few scattered members of the Faculty and a crowd of alumnæ wander aimlessly about, obstructing traffic generally._ _Small imperious mother, dragging large good-humored father toward the awning._ Hurry up, Father, hurry up! _Father._ But Mother, I want to see 'em! _Mother._ Well, you've got to take your choice of seeing 'em and not hearing a word of the speech or-- _Father._ You go right along, Mother, and I'll get there on time. I want to see Hattie marching. ¶ _A crowd of girls with cameras rushes up and lines both sides of the walk. Two ushers sail up the path, clearing a way with white-ribboned sticks. The crowd becomes unmanageable, torn by the desire to watch the progress of the march and at the same time to secure a good place at the exercises. People summon each other wildly from various points of the campus._ _A group of strolling sophomores, dodging some ushers and wheedling programmes from others, screws its way in a body to the best possible position in the front, smiling at the efforts of the displaced to reinstate themselves._ _First Sophomore._ There they come! There's Sue and Betty Twitchell! My, what roses! _Second Sophomore._ Roses? Did the ushers-- _Third Sophomore._ Oh, goodness, Win, haven't you heard that yet? _Second Sophomore._ No--tell me! _Third Sophomore._ Why, Miss Tomlinson's fiancé sent her fifteen dozen American Beauties, and there wasn't any room for them in the house, and she asked if the class would like to carry them, and first they voted no and then they voted yes, and some of the girls don't like it, but they are doing it just the same--Oh, isn't Helen Estabrook's gown stunning! There's Wilhelmina--Hello, Will! Sue looks well, don't you think? _Second Sophomore._ Fifteen dozen American Beauties! Great heavens! _First Sophomore._ I think it's perfectly absurd and bad taste, too. The idea! _Third Sophomore._ Well, she's not to blame, is she? They're certainly lots prettier than laurel or daisies or odd flowers--Oh, girls, _I_ think Louise Hunter is too silly for anything! She feels too big to live, leading the way! I'd try to look a little less like a poker if I _was_ an usher! ¶ _The Ivy Procession marches to the steps two and two, each girl with an enormous American Beauty in her hand. At every step the girls with cameras snap and turn, so that the sound resembles a miniature volley of cannon. There is a comparative silence during their progress._ _Mother and daughter standing on their seats under awning, clutching at the heads of those near them for support._ _Mother._ Who is that with Susy, dear? _Daughter._ That's the vice-president--I don't know her name. Sue looks pale, doesn't she? _Mother._ And that's Bess Twitchell next--with the tucks. She's Ivy Orator, you know. I think Sue's dress drops too much in the back--Ah, Miss Fosdick has stepped on it! Good heavens--right on that Valenciennes! (_She sits down abruptly._) ¶ _The procession winds slowly up and groups itself on the steps. The last third stands a long while before the awning and exchanges somewhat conscious remarks with its friends outside the rope, which the ushers endeavor to carry without straining or dropping: this attempt puckers their foreheads and tilts their hats._ _A group of last year's graduates standing close to the enclosure._ _First Graduate._ Stunning gowns, aren't they? _Second Graduate._ Awfully. Prettiest I ever saw. And so different, too! And yet they're all alike--organdie over silk or satin, mostly. Isn't Sue Jackson's lovely? _Third Graduate._ I like Esther Brookes'; it's so plain, but there's not a more artistic-- _Fourth Graduate._ How do you like Lena Bergstein's? _Fifth Graduate._ What's that? _Fourth Graduate._ My dear, haven't you seen that? It's solid Valenciennes as far as I can see. I think it's altogether too elaborate. But I tell you, it's stunning, all the same! _Fifth Graduate._ Ah, I see it! Poor taste, I think. _Fourth Graduate._ I know it. Betty Twitchell's is so simple-- _First Graduate._ Simple, yes! It's imported, I happen to know! _Fourth Graduate._ Really! It _does_ hang beautifully! Oh, they're moving: there's Sir Toby. You know nobody ever heard of her before, girls. Isn't that funny? Wasn't she great, though? _Second Graduate._ Well, they won't forget her in a hurry. I think it's a mighty good thing that Dramatics brings out that kind of girl and gives her a place in the class. It keeps two or three girls like Sue Jackson and Twitchie and Mollie Van from running everything. Well, going to stay here? ¶ _A Ubiquitous member of the Faculty suddenly dashes from her seat and pushes through the crowd, which lets her out, under the impression that she is faint._ _Ubiquitous Member of Faculty, to a scared usher._ Where is Dr. Twitchell? Is he back there? _Usher._ I--I don't know! Is he big? _Ubiquitous Member of Faculty._ Big? Big? What do you mean? A pretty thing--to have the father of the Ivy Orator have no seat! He must be found! _Usher._ I--I'll go see-- _Ubiquitous Member of Faculty._ Do you know him? _Usher, helpless but optimistic._ No, but I'll-- _Ubiquitous Member of Faculty, suddenly dashing through the crowd into a lilac clump and producing, to every one's amazement, a large and amiable gentleman from its centre._ Well, well! Are you going to remain here long, Dr. Twitchell? Why aren't you in your seat? _Dr. Twitchell, somewhat embarrassed at his prominent position, but beaming on every one._ Why, no--that is, yes, indeed! Certainly. I only wanted to see Bessie march along with the rest. A very pretty sight--remarkably so! All in white--I counted ninety couples, I think. Has--has she begun? Is her mother-- _Ubiquitous Member of Faculty._ We're all in the front row, and they've not begun. The class president will be making her speech in a moment--there is plenty of time, but we were a little anxious--(_They enter the enclosure._) ¶ _The class is crowded upon the steps and overflows before and behind them. The sun is in their eyes, and they look strained and pale. Under the awning a few hundred relatives fan themselves, and smile expectantly._ _The class president makes an indistinguishable address, in which the phrases "more glad than I can say," "unusual opportunity," "women's education," "extends a hearty welcome," rise above the rest, and sinks back into the crowd._ _The leader of the Glee Club frowns at her mates and leans forward: the class sings "Fair Smith," with a great deal of contralto. The Ivy Orator steps back and upward instinctively, with an idea of escaping from the heads and shoulders that are packed like herring about her, realizes that the audience is entirely out of her reach, steps down to meet them, becomes lost to view, and with a despairing consciousness that nothing can better the most futile position she has ever occupied, steps back to her first place and shrieks out her opening phrases._ _Two mothers sitting on a bench just behind the enclosure, looking over the campus._ _First Mother._ So you didn't get a seat? _Second Mother._ Well, I didn't try, to tell the truth. I'm interested in the speech, but my daughter tells me that I can see it in the _Monthly_ next fall, and as I got here so late, I couldn't possibly hear it from the back. _First Mother._ I was sorry to leave, for Kate wanted me to hear Bessie so much; but after Miss Jackson's speech I had to go--the heat made me rather faint. And as you say, one can read it. _Second Mother._ That's what every one seems to think--see them all walking up and down here. One of the old graduates--a friend of my daughter's--told me that this was the chance for them to talk with the professors! _First Mother._ Well, I suppose if they _will_ have it outdoors, very many people can't expect to hear. It's very hard to speak in the open air. _Second Mother._ Yes, indeed. What a fine-looking girl that Miss Ackley is--the dark one--did you notice her? _First Mother._ That is my daughter, so I've noticed her quite a little! _Second Mother._ Oh, indeed! I'm sure I didn't know-- _First Mother._ It isn't necessary to be told that _you_ have a daughter here, Mrs. Fosdick! _Second Mother._ No, everybody seems to think that the resemblance is very strong indeed. Isn't it pleasant to meet people so strangely, and without any ceremony, like this? It's a very pleasant place, anyway, isn't it? _First Mother._ Yes, indeed. It's beautiful all the spring, but particularly beautiful now, I think, with all the girls in their pretty dresses and the general holiday effect. _Second Mother._ What I like so much is the spirit of the place. When we found out from things in my daughter's letters and stories she would tell us in the vacations that all her little set of friends were very much richer than she and could afford luxuries and enjoyments that she couldn't, Mr. Fosdick and I were quite worried for fear that she would feel hurt, you know, or want to get into a style of living that she could not possibly keep up. But, dear me, we needn't have worried! It never made the least difference, just as she assured us. We were very glad to find that she was the friend of some of the leading girls in the class, when we saw that she went right along as she had to, tutoring and selling blue prints and going about just as contentedly as if her shirt-waists had been their organdies. Not that that sort of thing _ought_ to make any difference, but sometimes it _does_, you know. She was telling me about Bess Twitchell's Commencement dress, and Sue Jackson's, and I grew quite alarmed, for I thought that perhaps that was expected, and we couldn't possibly afford anything like it. But, dear me, it was all the same to her! She was perfectly satisfied with muslin, and when I asked her if she was sure she'd prefer to walk with Bess, she actually made me feel ashamed! Bess herself said that it wasn't every one who could have the honor of walking with Malvolio, and she'd like to see herself lose it! _First Mother._ Oh, of course! Why, I have always understood, both from Kate and her cousin who graduated three years ago, that some of the leading girls in every class were poor. The girls seemed prouder of them, if anything. As you say, it's the spirit of the place. Now Kate herself--well, it's a little thing, I suppose, but her father and I--well, I suppose any one would think us silly, but we actually cried, we were so touched. Her father gave her her dress--it was really lovely. Not elaborate, but it was made over beautiful silk, and he gave her a handsome string of those mock pearls they wear so much now, you know. It was very becoming to her indeed, and she was delighted with it. Well, just three weeks ago I got a long letter from her saying that Eleanor Hunt's father had lost every cent he had in the world and that they were in a dreadful condition. Eleanor's mother had sold her Commencement gown and Eleanor was going to wear an old white organdie that she'd worn all the year to dances and plays. She said that Eleanor was feeling very bad indeed about it and especially about Commencement time. They had planned to walk together in all the processions--they are great friends. So she asked me if I thought Papa would mind if she wore her old organdie, too, to all the things, because Eleanor seemed to feel it so. Her father offered to give Eleanor one for a Commencement present from her, but she wouldn't have that--she said Eleanor wouldn't like it--she was feeling very proud about gifts, just now. Well, her father was more pleased than I've seen him for years. You see, Kate has always thought a great deal of her clothes, and she's always had a good allowance, besides lots of presents from us and her aunts. And being an only child, you know--well, I wouldn't say she was _spoiled_ at all, but she certainly was a little thoughtless, perhaps selfish, when she came up here. Her father and I feel that it has done a great deal for her. He says that he'd call it a good investment if she'd never learned anything in all the four years but just how to do that one thing! _Second Mother._ Yes, indeed! We feel, Mr. Fosdick and I, that my daughter's friends have been almost as good for her as what she learned, though that comes first, as she must teach, now. She was always so solitary and reserved and never cared for the girls at home, but here she has such good friends and loves them all so--she's grown more natural, more like other girls; and we lay it all to her having been thrown in from the beginning with such pleasant, nice girls as these. You know them, I suppose--Bessie and Sue and Bertha Kitts-- ¶ _Two alumnæ strolling between the houses and the enclosure, chatting with friends and spying out acquaintances._ _First Alumna._ Good gracious, isn't she through yet? I pity the poor girls, standing all this while! _Second Alumna._ Yes, that's just it! Arrange the oration to suit the girls, do!--If they're tired, let them sit down! It's absurd to criticise the one really academic exercise of the whole affair entirely on the basis of the girls' comfort, I say! _First Alumna._ But, my dear, the poor things have done so much and stood so much anyhow--and I should think Miss Maria would be tired herself. _Second Alumna._ Then it's her own lookout. She should have dropped one or the other. They try to do too much. I can tell you that we were proud enough to stand twenty minutes when Ethel Richardson talked, and she didn't feel that it was beneath her notice to devote all her time and attention to that one thing, either. We didn't make so much of these universal geniuses then, but I doubt if we had poorer results from the less widely gifted. It's too much strain; one simply can't do everything. _First Alumna._ No. They're 'way ahead of us in lots of things, but I'm glad I came when I did. Don't you remember what a good time we used to have spring term? Dear old last spring term! Do you know there isn't any, now? Don't you remember how we dropped ev--well, a good deal, and lay in the hammocks in the orchard and mooned about and took a long, comprehensive farewell to all our greatness? We'd made or lost our reputations by then, and we just took it all in and--oh, I suppose we did sentimentalize a little, but it all meant more to us apparently.... Well, it's all gone now. They begin on the play so early, and it's all rehearsing, and then they can't let their work drop, so they keep everything right up to the pitch--according to their story. And there are six societies to our one, you know. And all the houses give receptions to them right in a bunch, and every one is so bored at them--at least Kitty says they are. But you can't always tell by that, I suppose. ¶ _Applause from the enclosure and a general scurry as the ushers crowd up to surround the class, who begin their Ivy Song--a piece of musical composition something between a Gregorian chant and a Strauss waltz, with a great deal of modulation, in which the words "hopes and fears," "coming years," "plant our vine," and "still entwine" occur at suitable intervals. They wander away in a bunch, frantically surrounded by the ushers and the chain, to another side of College Hall, where the Ivy is interred. A general break-up then begins, the orator and the president join their admiring families, and people begin to stroll home, the prominent members of the class pausing at every sentence to have their pictures taken._ _Two members of the class and one of the Faculty._ _First Member of Class._ It was the funniest thing I've heard this year, really! You know the girls simply _slave_ for her--they _slave_. They can't help it, you know, for she thinks that's all there is in the world and if you don't have your note-book made out she looks at you in such a way--oh, well, it makes Mollie's spine cold, she says. Mollie's done splendid work for her--not that she doesn't do it for everybody--but she was determined to make her see that she could be at all the rehearsals and take the observations, too. The only thing she didn't do was to go the last two or three nights, but gracious, she'd more than made that up! I thought I did pretty well when I put in five hours of Lab., but those girls have done eight and ten hours a week some weeks, note-books and observations and all. Just to satisfy her, you know--they love to work for her. And what do you think she said the last time they met? Do you know about Astronomy, Mr. Brooke? If you do, I shall spoil the story for you, for I don't know the first thing. But I think it was the parallax of the sun. "Now, I should think you could just step out between the acts," said she, calmly, "if you couldn't get out for all the evening, and take your note-book with you, Miss Vanderveer, and just take it--it's a beautiful observation! And you've taken one, and it will be a great thing to tell your children that you've gotten the parallaxes of the sun yourself!" _Second Member of Class._ And when we thought of Mollie dancing about there with her collar undone, trying to make those idiotic men understand something and being everywhere at once--between the acts, you know, being a fairly occupied time for her--when we imagined her walking out of the garden scene or Orsino's house to take the what-do-you-call-it of the sun (though I don't see how she could take it of the sun at night--it must have been the moon, Ethel). _Member of Faculty._ And what did Miss Vanderveer say? _First Member of Class._ I'm sure it was the sun, Teddie, Mollie said sun--why, she coughed and said, "I certainly will, if I get time, Miss Drake!" _Member of Faculty._ Great presence of mind, I'm sure. ¶ _Group of relatives and three members of the class._ _First Member._ Mamma, this is Miss Twitchell and Miss Fosdick--Maria and Malvolio, you know. _Mother._ I am pleased to meet you both. I want to tell you how much I enjoyed, _etc._ _Misses Twitchell and Fosdick._ We're so glad if you did, _etc._ _Mother._ I was not able to catch much of your speech, but Ellen tells me we can have the pleasure of reading it later. _Miss Twitchell, moving away._ I'm afraid you will have the opportunity--but I tried to make it as short as I could! _Mother._ And now I suppose you're going home to sleep all day? I should think you'd need it. _Miss Twitchell._ Oh, dear, no! I'm going to the Alpha on the back campus this afternoon, and I want to look in at Colloquium, and then there's the Glee Club to-night, you know. I've no more worry now, nothing to do but enjoy myself. _Aunt._ What is this, Ellen? The Glee Club-- _Ellen._ Why, Aunt Grace, the Glee Club promenade, don't you know? That's when the lanterns are all over, and they give a concert, and we all walk about, and it's so pretty--don't you remember I told you? _Aunt._ Well, then, I'll go right home and take my nap, if I'm to go out to-night. Are you going to all these things, too, Ellen? _Ellen._ Well, practically. Only I'm going to Phi Kapp and Biological instead. But I _am_ going to lie down--I'm so tired, I can't think straight, and you know I'm on the Banjo Club, and we have to have a short rehearsal-- ¶ _The crowd gradually disperses, and the campus is practically deserted; men begin to put up poles and wires for lanterns; others gather and arrange scattered chairs. Stray relatives hunt for each other and their boarding-places or inquire with interest which is the Science Building and the Dewey House. Belated members of the class wander homewards or patiently seek out their families, whose temporary guardians are thus relieved._ _Abstracted member of the class and large, domineering woman in black satin, before the Morris House gate._ _Large Woman._ This is the Hatfield, is it not? _Member of Class._ Oh! I beg your pardon? No, it's the Morris. _Large Woman._ Ah! I was told it was the Hatfield. _Member of Class, simply._ Well, it's not. _Large Woman._ And that over there (_pointing to the Observatory_), that is the Lilly House? _Member of Class._ No, that's the Observatory. Lilly Hall is up farther. It's just beyond the Dickinson--no, the Lawrence--I mean the _Hubbard House_! _Large Woman._ And where is the Hubbard House? _Member of Class._ Oh, dear! (_pulls herself together with an effort_) it's up in a line, the one, two, three, third from here. _Large Woman._ Thank you. And I wish to see the Botanical Gardens, too. Where are they? (_Member of Class points out their position._) _Large Woman._ And where is the Landscape Garden? _Member of Class, vaguely._ Why, I suppose it's over there, too. I don't exactly--it's all landscape garden, I suppose--it's not big-- _Large Woman, severely._ I was told there was a fine landscape and botanical garden--are you a member of the college? _Member of Class, leaning against the post._ Why, yes, but it's all botanical garden, for that matter. (_Catches sight of a tree with a tin label tied to it and points luminously at it._) _That's_ botanical, you know--all the trees and shrubs! _Large Woman, with irritation._ I am quite aware that it is--I-- _Member of Class, despairingly._ Oh, excuse me, I mean it's--it's--_I mean they all have labels!_ (_Large Woman stalks majestically away; Member of Class makes a few incoherent gestures in the air, murmurs_, "I am _such_ a fool, but I'm _so_ tired!" _Throws out her hands wearily and trails into the Morris House._) THE TENTH STORY _THE END OF IT_ X THE END OF IT There are two methods of conducting a class supper. The first is something like this: you pick out three utterly unrelated girls who never had anything to do with one another in their lives, and call them the supper committee; you pick out two clever, uninterested girls and call them the toast committee; you pick out an extremely busy girl who lives half a mile off the campus and call her the seating committee; you pick out a popular girl who is supposed to be humorous because she laughs at everybody's jokes and knows one comic song, and call her the toast-mistress. And this is the result of it: The supper committee meets, wonders what under heaven induced the president to appoint the other two, finds out what caterer they had last year, and after a little perfunctory argument employs him again without further action, with the result that one end of the table has five kinds of ice cream and the other a horrifying recurrence of lukewarm croquettes; the toast committee spends a great deal of time in hunting out extremely subtle quotations from Shakespeare and Omar Khayyam, with the result that no one of the toasters gets the least idea of how she is expected to elaborate her theme; the seating committee is so harassed by everybody that she gives up her diagram in despair, and successive girls erase and sign and re-erase till nobody but the three or four leading sets in the class are satisfied, and they are displeased because the toasters are either put in a line at the head or scattered about the tables, and that separates them from their immediate cliques; the toast-mistress turns out to be more appreciative than constructive, and worries her friends and bores her enemies beyond previous conception. The main body of unimportant necessary people are crowded off by themselves and feel somewhat flat and heavy and irritated at the noisy groups beyond them; the toasts are apt to be a little sad and vague because the girls don't fit them and talk too much about enduring friendships, the larger life, four years of stimulating rivalry, and alma mater. Why they do all this at this season and this alone, only the Lord who made them knows. But Ninety-yellow did not employ this method. It occurred to Theodora somewhat originally, perhaps, as she looked around her that last Tuesday evening, that a better class supper was never arranged. It can hardly be asserted that it was a really good supper, for it is to be doubted if a hundred and seventy-five women ever sat down to a really good supper; but there was almost enough of it, and it was very nearly hot. Kathie Sewall had picked the supper committee well, and they knew one another thoroughly enough to give it all to the chairman to do and to make fun of her till she was spurred on to a really noble effort. She knew that it is always damp and cold class supper night, and planned accordingly. Kitty Louisa Hofstetter managed the toasts, and though Kitty Louisa was uneven and a little vulgar at times, she was clever in her unexpected hail-fellow-well-met way and popular with the class for the most part. She had a genius for puns of the kind that grow better as they grow worse, and they were shamelessly italicized in the toast-cards, which caused great merriment before the toasts had begun. And the seating was very well done, for the class was nicely broken up and mixed about among the tables till everybody was within four or five of a reasonably important person. As for the toast-mistress--well, you see, Theodora's opinion of her might have been a trifle exaggerated, for she was Theodora's best friend. How little she had changed, Theo thought, as she watched her rumple her hair in the same funny, boyish way that she had freshman year. Theo had seen her first in the main hall, floating with the current of freshmen that pushed its way almost four hundred strong to meet its class officer and find out that O. G. meant Old Gymnasium. That far-off freshman year! Theo smelt again the clean, washed floor; saw again the worried shepherds herding their flocks into the scheduled stalls and praying that the parents might go soon and leave their darlings, if misunderstood, at least unencumbered; heard again the buzz and hum of a thousand chattering, scuffling girls, bubbling over with a hundred greetings for each other. "Hello, Peggy! Peggy! I say, _hello Peggy_!" "Oh, hello! Have a good time?" "Grand! Did you?" "Perfectly fine--I saw Ursula and Dodo and--Oh, Ursula! hello! Here I am!" "Why, Peggy Putney, you dear old thing! When did you come? They say you're in the Hatfield--how did you get there?" "Two ahead of me and they dropped out. Miss Roberts only just told me--" Theodora had felt very lonesome and homesick just then--everybody but herself knew so many people! And then Virginia had happened along and jostled her and begged pardon, and they had fallen into a conversation on the relative merits of the Dewey and the Hatfield. Later they had studied Livy together and confided their difficulties to each other. Virginia's mother was a Unitarian and her father was an Ethical Culturist, and her room-mate was a High Church Episcopalian and never ate meat in Lent! She thought Virginia would very probably be damned, if not in the next life, certainly in this, and she intimated as much. Virginia thought it was very hard to live with somebody who disapproved of you so much. Theodora had been brought up to be a neat, self-helpful little person, and her room-mate, Edith Bliss, had never even seen her bed made up and left her clothes in piles on the floor just as she stepped out of them. She was horribly homesick and wept quarts every Sunday afternoon, and confided to Theodora in moments of hysterical relaxation that she thought every girl owed it to herself to have soup and black coffee for dinner and that she was going to wire Papa to take her home immediately. Theo looked at her now, eagerly devouring a doubtful lobster concoction and openly congratulating herself on the olives at her left. She was fond of Frankfurters now, was Edith, and had recently alarmed the authorities by her ingenuous scheme for annexing a night-lunch cart and keeping it on the campus: it would have been so nice, she said regretfully, to slip out and get a Frankfurter between hours! How pretty the Gym looked! The juniors had decorated it as well as they could at odd minutes, and they had lingered in a bunch as the class came in to lean over the balcony and sing to them. Theodora remembered how the Gym had looked the night of the sophomore reception: all light and music and girls and a wonder of excitement. She had never had an evening dress before, and her little square-necked organdie had been dearer to her than any other gown before or since. They played _Rastus on Parade_, and she had such nice partners and some of the girls were so lovely and had such white, beautiful shoulders--they seemed to count evening dress but a slight and ordinary thing. By junior year house-dances are wont to pall, and seniors have been known to make rabbits and read Kipling in preference; even among the freshmen Theodora had found some disillusioned souls who lamented the absence of men and found the sophomore reception slow! Across the table an odd, distinguished-looking girl, with a clever face and dark, short-sighted eyes, smiled at her, and Theo's thoughts flashed back to that great day when she first really loved the class--the day of the Big Game. What a funny, snub-nosed little nobody Marietta Hinks had been then! But how she played! How she dodged and doubled and bounced the ball, and how they cheered her! Oh, _here's_ to Mari_etta_, For we _shall_ not soon _forget_ her-- Well, well, how they had grown up! Now she was "Miss Root" to the little, dark-eyed girl in the back seat in chapel, who smiled so shyly at her when the seniors led out down the middle aisle. Theo was wearing her roses to-night, and as she scratched off a little note to thank her she had seemed to see herself, another little dark-eyed girl, sending anonymous roses to Ursula Wyckoff. Dear me! would anybody ever again combine such graces of mind and body as that ornament of Ninety-purple? She had gone on wheel-rides with Theo, and once she had asked her over to wait on the juniors at a spread--Theo had sat up and got her light reported in order to write home about it. There are those, I understand, who disapprove strongly of this attitude of Theodora's happy year: dogmatic young women who have not learned much about life and soured, middle-aged women who have forgotten. I am told that they would consider Theodora's adoration morbid and use long words about her--long words about a freshman! I have always been sorry for these unfortunate people: their chances for reconstructing Human Nature seem to me so relatively slight. When Theo had gone home that summer with hands almost as well cared for as Ursula's, sleek, gathered-in locks, and a gratifying hold on the irregular verbs (Ursula spoke beautiful French), her mother had whimsically inquired if Miss Wyckoff could not be induced to remain in Northampton indefinitely and continue her unscheduled courses! But perhaps she was a morbid mother. Her mother! The plates and flowers swam before Theodora's misted eyes, and the sight of Virginia--so kind that year--brought back somehow those waves of desolation that would come over her again and again, in lecture rooms, in her own dear room, at meals--all that clouded sophomore year. It was just as her good fortune came through the mail to her--a room in the Nicest House--that her mother died, and rooms mattered little to Theo, then. There were kindly aunts and other children, and she was not needed at home; so it seemed best to go on, and she had come up the steps of the Nicest House, a little black-dressed figure, and into the arms of the Nicest Woman. It seemed to her that there was never a room so cheerful, nor pictures so lovely, nor a fire so red, nor tea and bread and butter so good, nor a smile so comfortable as the Nicest Woman's. Mademoiselle and Fräulein and Miss Roberts were sweet and kind, and the girls did all they could, but it was to the Nicest Woman that one came when conditions and warnings were in the air or one's head ached or one had eaten too much fudge or been annoyed by somebody's banjo practice. When the seniors of the Nicest House were eating and laughing there at night, it was a gay room--the Nicest Woman's; but it was very dim and quiet in the dusk, when Theodora slipped in by herself with reddened lids, and sat on the couch, and they talked of things that started to be sad but somehow always turned out cheerful; for when it was about the children and Will at Yale little jokes were sure to come up, and when Theo wondered if perhaps she hadn't been careless about writing home, and if Mother had gotten more letters in the spring, maybe--the conversation always changed, and she found herself feeling so glad and thankful that she'd gone right home in June and not visited at Virginia's. Virginia had gone into Phi Kappa that winter, and Theo had been so proud of her. She was in the first five, and as she really hadn't expected it at all it was quite exciting. Adelaide Carew went in too, and though she went about with the seniors a great deal and called most of her class "Miss," she was much more generally liked than in her freshman year, and Virginia had got to know her better and better. Through her Theo had seen more of Adelaide, and she had been amazed to find out how really kind-hearted and human she was beneath her unapproachable ways. But then, you never could tell--girls were so queer! Only last night, when they were walking about under the lanterns after the concert, she and Virginia and Adelaide, with two of the junior ushers, and the juniors, sophisticated young people, had cynically suggested that perhaps they'd better take themselves away in order that the three might seek out their Ivy and bedew it with their final tears, Adelaide had coughed a little huskily and suggested that perhaps when they'd planted their own Ivy they wouldn't be feeling so gay! They had stared at her blankly, hesitated, decided that coming from such a source it must have been an extraordinarily acute sarcasm, and gone away giggling, leaving Theo to wonder and Adelaide to flush and talk very hard about Bar Harbor and the comfort of a big room all to yourself once more. Such a strange room-mate as Theo had had that year--she seemed fated to room with girls who had never made up their beds. This one had lived freshman year with friends in the town, and had had everything done for her, and when Theo asked her one day if campus life was wearing on her, she had turned two stormy gray eyes on her and burst out, "Oh, no, Theodora, but I am so _deadly_ tired of picking up my night-gown every _single_ morning, I think I shall _die_!" On one historic occasion, early in the year, Theo had happened to make up her bed for her, and upon her pleased recognition of the fresh linen it had come out that she had been for some weeks accustomed to change her upper sheet and leave the under one undisturbed on the bed--it had seemed more logical, she said, and how was she to know? They had teased her about it till the Nicest Woman interfered and fined every girl who mentioned it, and they bought _Sentimental Tommy_ with the money, and read it evenings in the Nicest Woman's room after supper. Well, well, they'd sit about her fire no more, as the poem said that somebody wrote to go with the silver tea-ball the seniors gave her when she served them their last tea. They'd come in no more after Alpha and Phi Kapp to tell her all about it--how nice she had been when Theo got into Alpha! That was junior year and they took her to Boyden's for supper, and her bowl and pitcher were full of violets for days. Everybody seemed so glad, and Martha Sutton had pinned her own pin on Theo's red blouse. Kathie Sewall had taken her over--nobody dreamed that Kathie would be senior president then--and what a hand-shaking there had been! And such a funny, clever play, with butlers and burglars and lady's-maids--it was illustrative of American literature, she learned later, but it was not a pedantic illustration. Theodora loved plays, and she had delighted in her very humble part in the House play. She was a little house-maid, and said only, "Yes, madam," and "No, madam," and, "Oh, sir, how can you--a poor girl like me!" but she had a great American Beauty and two bunches of violets, and she sent the programme home. Next to its basket-ball decorations she remembered the Gym arranged for a play, with the running-track turned into boxes and the girls prettier than ever against the screens and pillows. She had been chairman of the stage-setting committee, and the _Monthly_ had especially commended the boudoir scene. Were they ready for the toasts so soon? Where had the time gone? she thought, as Virginia, with solemn pomp, called upon Miss Farwell to respond to "Our Team." Dear old Grace--she stammered a little when she was excited, and she was not the most fluent of speakers, but they cheered her to the echo. "Team! Team! Team!" they called, and the teams, freshman and sophomore, Regulars and Subs, had to stand on their chairs and be sung to. As Theo balanced on a tottering seat, she caught sight of a crowd of girls moving toward the Gym, and as they sat down a shout from below greeted them: Oh, _here's_ to Ninety-_yellow_, And her _praise_ we'll ever _tell_--_oh_, Drink her _down_, drink her _down_, drink her _down_, down, _down_! A cheerful, aimless creature at the bottom of one of the great tables, whose one faculty was for improvised doggerel, instructed her neighbors rapidly, and they sent back a tuneful courtesy: Oh, _here's_ the Junior _Ushers_, And I _tell_ you they are _rushers_! Theodora had "ushed," in classical phrase, in her day, and the bustle of last year, so much more exciting somehow than this one, came back to her. Her little, white-ribboned stick was packed now--in fact, everything was packed: she was going away for good! Some one else would lounge on the window-seat in her room in the Nicest House, and light the cunning fire.... Who was this? Oh, this was Sallie Wilkes Emory, responding to "The Faculty." Kitty Louisa, whose soul knew not reverence, had attached to this toast the pregnant motto, _That we may go forward with Faculties unimpaired_, an excerpt from one of the President's best-known chapel prayers, and Sallie was developing the theme in what she assured them was a very connotative manner. Theo saw them pass in review before her, those devoted educators, from her dazed freshman Livy to her despairing senior Philosophy--_that_ was over, at least! Theodora was not of a technically philosophical temperament. Sallie was quoting liberally from a recent famous essay of her own: _The Moral Law, or the End-Aim of Human Action According to Kant_, apropos of which she had remarked to the commendatory professor that she was glad if _somebody_ understood it! Sallie was a great girl--how grand she had been in the play! Theo had been in the mob herself, having first tried for every part, and had enjoyed every minute of it, from the first rehearsal to the last dab of make-up. She had been an attendant and hadn't an idea how pretty she looked, nor how many people spoke of her and called her graceful. It may have been because Theo had so few ideas about herself that she had so many friends. And how many she had! She took great pride in them, those fine, strong, good-looking girls that hailed her from all directions, and always wanted a dance or a row or a skating afternoon with her. She wondered if anybody so ordinary--for Theo knew she wasn't clever--ever had so many jolly good friends. There was the Mandolin Club, now--all friends of hers. She got on late in junior year and played in the spring concert. Her father came up and said he'd never seen such a pretty house in his life--packed from orchestra circle to balcony with fluffy girls alternated with dapper, black-coated youths. He gave Theo such a darling white gown for it, all ruffled with white ribbon, and she had her picture taken in it, holding the mandolin, and sent it to him in a big white vellum frame covered with yellow chrysanthemums, with "Smith" scrawled in yellow across one corner. He kept it on his desk and was tremendously proud when his friends asked about it. Here were the class histories. Theodora thought she listened, but though she laughed with the rest and applauded the grinds, it was her own history that she was reading as face after face recalled to her some joke or mistake or good luck. Not that it was sad--oh, dear, no! If any member of the class of Ninety-yellow dared to be sad that night there was a fine, and more than that, the studied coldness of the class directed toward her: it was an orgy, not an obsequy, as Virginia elegantly put it. Just as the junior history, which is always the best for some unexplained reason--perhaps because of the Prom--was finished, there was a loud knock, and a big bunch of yellow roses from the class that was having a decennial supper somewhere was brought in by a useful sophomore. They clapped it and sent some one back to thank them--a point of etiquette that some self-centred classes have been known to omit--and then they remembered that Ninety-green was supping at its first reunion in the Old Gym, and sent over some of the table flowers to them. Virginia motioned to Theo, and proud of the mission and blushing a little at the eyes that turned to her as she went, she took them over. They clapped and sang to her: Oh, _here's_ to _Theodora_, And we're _very_ glad we _sor_ her! Martha Sutton waved to her and the toast-mistress thanked her for the class, and she went back--alone, because, being an older class, Ninety-green didn't need a delegate. On the way, two juniors met her, and they condoled with her cheerfully: "How do you feel, Theo dear? Isn't it kind of dreadful? Do you keep thinking it's the last time? Goodness--I should!" One of them threw a sympathetic arm over her shoulder and looked at the moon, but Theo grinned a little and said that she was tired as a dog and that if there was one place in the world she wanted it was her room At Home. And as the juniors gaped at this matter-of-fact attitude, Theodora added, pausing at the Gym door, "Of course I've had a perfectly grand time here, and all that, but I've been here four years and that's about long enough, you know. And they want me, of course, and--I want to come! I think it gets a little--well, toward the end, you know--" But Theo was tired, and so are seniors all, and until three or four generations of them have learned how to do it easily, so will they be. They were doing stunts upstairs: Clara Sheldon had seen Cissie Loftus who had seen Maggie Cline who sang _Just tell them that you saw me_, and Clara, who was the most tailor-made and conventional creature imaginable to the outward eye, was forced by those from whose farther-reaching scrutiny she was never free, to imitate the imitator at all social functions that admitted song. She used stiff, absurd gestures and a breathy contralto that never palled upon her friends. Cynthia Lovering danced her graceful little Spanish dance for them, and Leslie Guerineau told them her best darkey story in her own delicious Southern drawl. And then there was a murmur that grew to a voice that swelled into a shout as they drummed on the table and called, "_We_ want _Dutton_! _We_ want _Dutton_! _We_ want _Dutton_, _Dutton_, _Dutton_!" She said no; that she'd had a toast; that they knew all her stunts by heart--but they hammered on her name with the regularity of a machine till she got up at last with a sigh and, "Well, what do you want?" They wanted a temperance lecture, and she drooped her head to one side, and with an ineffably sickly smile and a flat nasal drawl she told them "haow she'd been a-driving 'raound your _graounds_, and they're _reel_ pleasantly situated, _too_, dears, and your _President_, such a nice, _gentlemanly_ man, accompanied me, and pointed aout to me your _beeyutiful_ homes and I said to him, 'Oh, what a _beeyutiful_ thought it is that all these _hundreds_ of young souls are a-drinking _water_, nothing but _water_, all the time and every day!'" She was going to teach in a stuffy little school in the wilds of Maine, and Ethel Eaton, who had been taught in that school, was going to travel abroad for a year--it was a strange shuffle. What, was it half-past eleven? Impossible! But somebody had started up their great song that had been their pet one since freshman year, and they were shouting it till the Gym rang: _Hurrah!_ _hurrah!_ the _yellow_ is on _top_, _Hurrah!_ _hurrah!_ the _purple_ cannot _drop_; _We_ are Ninety-_yellow_ and our _fame_ shall never _stop_, _'Rah_, 'rah, _'rah_, for the _seniors!_ They sang all the verses, and then the watchman and the superintendent of buildings, waiting like sleuth-hounds to prevent any demonstration from without, gritted their teeth and dashed furiously down the wrong stairs as Ninety-green, who had softly assembled at the back of the Gym, having come from different directions, burst into the traditional tribute: Oh, _here's_ to Ninety-_yellow_, And her _fame_ we'll ever _tell_--_oh_! "'Ere, 'ere! stop that now! Miss Sutton, it ain't allowed--will you please to go 'ome quietly! No, they ain't a-comin' h'out till you go--'e says they ain't!" "Oh, come now! We aren't students any more! We can do what we like--" "Oh, come on, girls! Don't make a fuss; we don't want to stay, anyhow!" They sang themselves away, and the class upstairs looked around the tables and thought things, for it was time to go. And here I am afraid I shall lose whatever friends I may have gained for Theodora, for it is necessary to state that none of those comprehensive, solemn moments of farewell, known to us all to be the property of departing seniors, came to her. She was conscious of a little vague excitement, but all the last days had been more or less exciting--generally less--and her mind was occupied with irrelevant details. Had Uncle Ed remembered to change at Hartford? Had Aunt Kate packed her black evening dress? Would the post-office forward that note to the little freshman? Could she get Virginia up in time for the 9.15? Had she lost the slip with the Nicest Woman's address on it? And had she given Marietta that senior picture yet? There had been one moment when her throat had contracted and her eyelids had crinkled: it was that very evening, when Annie, the cook, had beckoned to her in the hall of the Nicest House, and said: "There's three o' them little cakes on a plate on your table, Miss The'dora. I shan't be bakin' 'em agin, an' I know you do be terrible fond of 'em!" "Thank you, Annie," she had said, and shaken her hand warmly. Annie had cooked fifteen years in the Nicest House, and what she and her mistress didn't know about girls you could put in a salt-spoon. It wasn't every girl that Annie liked, either. Grace was getting up, and they stood a moment irresolutely by the chairs. "Let's make a ring, girls, and sing once 'round, and say good-by till next year," she said; and then there was a little quick shuffling, and the carefully divided sets got together and stood as they had stood for the last two or three years. Theo took tight hold of Virginia and Adelaide, and they moved slowly around the tables, a great circle of girls, so quiet for a moment that Ninety-green, singing one another home around the campus, sounded as loud and clear as their own voices a moment ago. They listened with a common impulse as the rollicking _Tommy Atkins_ song paused awhile under the Washburn windows; they had been very fond of Ninety-green. Ninety-_green_ she is a _winner_, Ninety-_green_ she is a _star_, Is there _any_thing _agin_ her? No, we _do_ not think there _are_! There have _been_ some other _classes_, Other _seniors_ have been _seen_, But they _cannot_ match the _lasses_ That are _wearing_ of the _green_! They smiled a little and remembered the great mass of green flags and ribbons that had waved to that song in last year's Rally. But they did not answer with one of their own; a little of the first faint conviction that the college owns all her classes, the feeling that grows with the years, came to them, and as the circle pressed closer and closer and their steps fell into an even tramp, Grace called out, "Now, girls, here's to old Smith College!" and they sent it out over the campus, so strong and loud that the decennial people and the groups of Ninety-green and the juniors and the belated sophomores lurking about heard them and joined in: Oh, _here's_ to old Smith _College_, drink her _down_! Oh, _here's_ to old Smith _College_, drink her _down_! Oh, _here's_ to old Smith _College_, For it's _where_ we get our _knowledge_, Drink her _down_, drink her _down_, drink her _down_, down, _down_! COLLEGE STORIES PUBLISHED BY MESSRS. CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS NEW YORK _Smith_ SMITH COLLEGE STORIES BY JOSEPHINE DODGE DASKAM 12_mo_, $1.50 An animated picture of a particularly active-minded and picturesque community is contained in Miss Daskam's volume. "Smith" may be taken as an epitome of the woman's college world; and these ten stories have a real value accordingly in showing what the undergraduate life of many thousands of American young women really is in its varied phases, illustrating their ambitions, manners, occupations, and traits. The stories, however, show that a good deal of human nature exists within college walls, and they will certainly appeal as strongly to the fiction-lover as to the sociologist, being written with great cleverness and sparkle, and clearly the work of a born writer of stories. TITLES OF THE STORIES _The Emotions of a Sub-Guard_ _A Case of Interference_ _Miss Biddle of Bryn Mawr_ _Biscuits ex Machina_ _The Education of Elizabeth_ _A Family Affair_ _A Few Diversions_ _The Evolution of Evangeline_ _At Commencement_ _The End of It_ _Princeton_ PRINCETON STORIES BY JESSE LYNCH WILLIAMS _9th Thousand_ 12_mo_, $1.00 Here is the evanescent charm, the touch of poetry and sentiment, that pervades a thousand unpoetic and rather reserved young men. You will find here the good fellowship depicted without any rant about it. There isn't a prig in these stories, ... that are well written and well constructed, judged from the standard of good American short-story writers.--_Droch in Life_. They breathe a spirit of commendable vigor and manliness. Princeton men are fortunate in having the life of their college so favorably presented to the outside world.--_Atlantic Monthly_. THE ADVENTURES OF A FRESHMAN BY JESSE LYNCH WILLIAMS _Illustrated_, 12_mo_, $1.25 The new story of college life by the author of "Princeton Stories" is a stirring tale of experiences at college, and has already been pronounced (by the New York _Evening Sun_) "a better picture of college life than the same author's 'Princeton Stories'" (which is now in its ninth thousand). The _Independent_ says: "Hazing, the ups and downs of athletics, manliness and boyishness happily blended, escapades and adventures--all tending to the building up of a typical American character, brim the book with genuine life." CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, PUBLISHERS 153-157 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK 
6432	----	[Illustration: THE "SHOW" WAS A TREMENDOUS SUCCESS] BETTY WALES, SOPHOMORE A STORY FOR GIRLS BY MARGARET WARDE Author of "Betty Wales, Freshman" "Betty Wales, Junior" "Betty Wales, Senior" "Betty Wales, B.A." Illustrated by EVA M. NAGEL 1905 CONTENTS CHAP INTRODUCTION I MOVING IN II ELEANOR'S FRESHMAN III PARADES AND PARTIES IV ELEANOR WATSON, AUTHORESS V POINTS OF VIEW VI ON AMBITION VII ON TO MIDYEARS VIII THE "FIRST FOUR" IX THE COMPLICATIONS OF LIFE X IN THE "ARGUS" SANCTUM XI A PROBLEM IN ETHICS XII A BRIEF FOR THE DEFENSE XIII VICTORY OR DEFEAT XIV A DISTINGUISHED GUEST XV DISAPPOINTMENTS XVI DORA CARLSON'S "SUGARING-OFF" XVII A MAY-DAY RESOLUTION XVIII TRIUMPHS AND TROUBLES XIX GOOD-BYES ILLUSTRATIONS THE "SHOW" WAS A TREMENDOUS SUCCESS "DON'T PUT THAT GREEN VASE THERE" "WELL," SAID MISS FERRIS, "THAT WON'T BE NEW WORK" "LET US MAKE A FAIR START," HE SAID THE GREEN LINE WAS SHOUTING ITSELF HOARSE ELEANOR DID NOT ANSWER "NEVER MIND THAT NOW," SAID BETTY INTRODUCTION Readers who did not make the acquaintance of Betty Wales and her friends while they were freshmen may like to know that there were nine girls in all who spent their first year together at Mrs. Chapin's. Two of them, however, took very little part in the life of the house and left college at the end of the year. Katherine Kittredge, "of Kankakee," was the fly- away of the group, Rachel Morrison its steadiest, strongest member. Shy, sensitive Roberta Lewis found her complement in a volatile little sophomore, the only one in the house, named Mary Brooks. Mary had a talent for practical jokes and original methods of entertainment, and supplied much of the fun and frolic at the Chapin house. It was she who put Betty's picture into the sophomore "grind book," who let out the secret of the Mountain Day mishap, and who frightened not only the Chapin house freshmen but the whole class with an absurd "rumor" of her own invention. Helen Adams, Betty's roommate, was a forlorn, awkward little body, who came to college expecting to study all the time, and was amazed and disappointed at what she considered the frivolity of her companions. Betty Wales, in particular, with her fascinating, merry ways, her love of fun, and her easygoing fashion of getting through her work, was a revelation to Helen. She began by placing her roommate rather scornfully in the category of pretty girls, who, being pretty, can afford to be stupid, and ended by loving her dearly, and fully appreciating what Betty had done to make her more like other girls and so happier in her environment. In spite of her beauty and cleverness, Eleanor Watson was not a favorite with the Chapin house girls. She was snobbish and overbearing, intent upon making herself prominent in class and college affairs, and utterly regardless of the happiness of other people, as well as of the rules and moral standards of Harding. Betty, who was unreasonably fond of Eleanor, though she recognized her faults, unconsciously exerted a great deal of influence over her. How she finally managed at the instigation of her upper-class friend, Dorothy King, and with the help of Miss Ferris, a very lovable member of the faculty, to extricate Eleanor Watson from an extremely unpleasant position, and finally to make her willing and even eager to finish her course at Harding, is told at length in "Betty Wales, Freshman." There are also recorded many of the good times that she and her house-mates and a few other friends had during the first of their four happy years at Harding College. The story of what Betty did at Harding and elsewhere will be found continued in "Betty Wales, Junior," "Betty Wales, Senior," and "Betty Wales, B.A." Margaret Warde. CHAPTER I MOVING IN Betty Wales sat down on the one small bare spot on the floor of her new room at the Belden House, and looked about her with a sigh of mingled relief and weariness. "Well," she remarked to the little green lizard, who was perched jauntily on a pile of pillows, "anyhow the things are all out of the trunks and boxes, and I suppose after a while they'll get into their right places." She looked at her watch. Quarter to eight,--that left just about two hours before ten o'clock. Somebody rapped on the door. "Come in," sang Betty. It was Eleanor Watson. Betty leaped over a motley collection of cups and saucers, knocked down a Japanese screen--which fortunately landed against a bed, instead of on the cups and saucers--and caught Eleanor in her arms. "Isn't it great to be back?" she said when she could speak, meanwhile setting up the screen again, and moving trunk-trays so they might sit down on the bed. "Are you settled, Eleanor?" "A little," said Eleanor, surveying Betty's quarters with amusement. "Quite settled compared to this, I should say. Why do you take everything out at once, Betty?" "Oh, then they're all right where I can get at them," returned Betty easily. "I hate to keep stopping to fish something out of the bottom of a box that I haven't unpacked." "I see," laughed Eleanor. "Did you have a lovely summer?" "Perfectly lovely. I can swim like a fish, Eleanor, and so can Emily Davis. You don't know her much, do you? But you must. She's lots of fun. Did you have a good time too?" "Beautiful," said Eleanor, eagerly. "Father is coming east before long to see Jim and me, and he and Jim are coming on together from Cornell. You'll help me entertain them, won't you, Betty?" "I should think I would," Betty was saying heartily, when there was another bang on the door and Rachel and Katherine appeared. Then there was more leaping over teacups, more ecstatic greetings, and more readjustment of Betty's belongings to make room for the newcomers. "Where's Helen?" demanded Rachel, when everybody was seated. "Coming the first thing to-morrow morning," explained Betty. "You see she lives so near that she can come down at the last minute." "It's lucky she's not here now," laughed Katherine. "There's no room for her, to say nothing of her things." "I should think not," agreed Betty, tragically. "Girls, these campus rooms are certainly the smallest places! This isn't half as big as ours at Mrs. Chapin's. And see the closet!" She picked her way across the room, and threw open a door, disclosing a five-by-three cupboard. "I ask you how we're going to get all our clothes into that." "Helen hasn't many clothes," suggested Katherine, cheerfully. "She has plenty to put on half those hooks," answered Betty, with finality, closing the door on the subject, and coming back to sit between Eleanor and Rachel. "Isn't the Chapin house crowd scattered this year?" said Katherine. "Let me see. You and Helen and Mary Brooks are here. Has Mary come yet?" Betty shook her head. "Her steamer isn't due till to-morrow morning. Didn't you know she'd been in Ireland all summer?" "Won't it be fun to hear her tell about it?" put in Rachel. "You three here," went on Katherine, intent on her census, "and you're at the Hilton, aren't you, Eleanor?" "Yes," answered Eleanor with a grimace. "I wanted to be here, of course, but Miss Stuart wouldn't manage it. Which house are you in, Rachel?" "I'm off the campus," answered Rachel, quietly, "at the little white house just outside the gate. It's a dear, quaint place, and delightfully quiet. Of course, I'd rather have been on the campus, but father couldn't afford it this year." "Make way, make way for us!" sang a noisy chorus out in the hall. There were shouts and shrieks and bangs and more shrieks, and then the din died away suddenly into an ominous stillness that evidently heralded the approach of some dreaded power. "It's lucky one of us lives in a quiet place, where the rest of us can take refuge occasionally," said Eleanor. "Isn't it?" chimed in Katherine. "I'm at the Westcott myself, and I never heard anything like the racket there was, when the girls began to come in from the eight o'clock train." "Our crowd seems to have been on hand early," said Rachel. "You know Betty's father doesn't like her to travel alone," jeered Katherine, "especially after dark. Did he telegraph the registrar again this year, Betty?" "Please don't," begged Betty, blushing prettily. "Weren't we green little freshmen though, at this time last fall?" "And isn't it fun to be coming back as sophomores?" asked Rachel. "We haven't quite finished with the residences of the Chapin house girls," said Eleanor. "How about Roberta?" "She's going to stay on at Mrs. Chapin's, I think," answered Katherine. "She couldn't get in here at the Belden, and she and Mary want to be together." "And the Riches aren't coming back, I believe," added Rachel. "And now I, for one, must go back and finish unpacking." Katherine and Eleanor rose too, astonished to find how fast the evening had slipped away, and how little time there was left in which to get ready for the busy "first day" ahead of them. When they had all three gone, Betty lay back on the bed, her head pillowed on her arms, to rest for a moment longer. She was tired. The journey from Rockport had been hot and disagreeable, and some of her box covers had been nailed on with disheartening thoroughness. But besides being tired, she was also very happy--too happy to turn her attention again at once to the trying business of getting settled. In spite of the "perfectly lovely" summer at the seashore, she was glad to be back at Harding. She was passionately fond of the life there. There had been only one little blot to mar her perfect enjoyment of freshman year, and that was Eleanor's unexplainable defection. And now Eleanor had come back, fascinating as ever, but wonderfully softened and sweetened. The old hauteur had not left her face, but it was in the background, veiled, as it were, by a determination to be different,--to meet life in a more friendly spirit, and to make the most of it and of herself. Betty could have hugged her for her cordial greetings to Katherine and Rachel, and for the kindly little speech about Rachel's boarding-place. The other girls had been tactful too, ready to meet Eleanor half-way and to let bygones be bygones. It was all "just lovely." Betty was picking herself up, intent upon clearing Helen's half of the room at least, before she went to bed, when another tap sounded on the door. "Come in," she called eagerly, expecting to see Roberta, or perhaps Alice Waite, or even Dorothy King. Instead, a tall, stately stranger opened the door, and entering, closed it again after her. "May I come in and talk to you?" she asked. "I live next door--that is, my trunks aren't here, so I haven't begun living there to any great extent as yet. Don't stop working. I'll sit and watch; or I'll help, if I can. There seems to be plenty doing." And she sat down calmly in the place that Betty had just vacated. Betty was not easily embarrassed, but the strange girl's perfect composure and ease of manner disconcerted her. She did not know many upper classmen in the Belden House, and she could not remember ever having seen this one before. And yet she surely was not a freshman. "Yes, I--I am busy," she stammered. "I mean, I ought to be. But I've had callers all the evening long. Oh, dear! I didn't mean that. I'm truly glad to have you come, and I will keep on working, if you don't mind." The stranger's eyes twinkled. "Which class are you?" she asked. "Sophomore," answered Betty promptly. "And you're an upper-class girl, aren't you?" The stranger shook her head. "No?" questioned Betty in bewilderment. "Why, I'm sure you're not a sophomore--I know all the girls in my class at least by sight,--and of course you're not a freshman." "Why not?" demanded the new girl gaily. Betty laughed. "I know," she said, "but I don't believe I can explain. You seem too much at home, and too sure of yourself somehow. Now, are you a freshman?" The stranger laughed in her turn. "Technically, yes," she said, "really, no. This is my first year here, but I've passed up all the French and Spanish and Italian that the institution offers, and some of the German. I think myself that I ought to rank as a graduate student, but it seems there are some little preliminaries in the way of Math, and Latin and Logic that I have to take before I can have my sheepskin, and there's also some history and some English literature which the family demand that I take. So I don't know just how long I may hang on here." "How--how funny!" gasped Betty. "Where do you live?" "Bohemia, New York," answered the new girl promptly. Betty looked puzzled. "Why, you see," explained her mysterious friend, "it's no use saying one lives in New York. Everybody--all sorts and conditions of people--live in New York. So I always add Bohemia." "Bohemia?" repeated Betty helplessly. "Yes, Bohemia--the artistic New York. We have a studio and some other rooms up at the top of one of those queer old houses on Washington Square--you know it,--funny, ramshackle old place. Father has afternoons, and mother and I feed the lions and the lesser animals with tea and strawberry jam. It's very good fun, living in Bohemia." "And how did you learn so many languages?" "Oh, a little from tutors, but mostly from living abroad. We're not in Bohemia, New York, very much. We have a villa near Sorrento--awfully out- at-elbows, but still a villa; and we've been in Spain a good deal, and once father illustrated a book on Vienna--that was where I learned my German. Let me see--oh, it's French that I haven't accounted for. Well, we have some French relatives. They love to have us visit them at their funny old chateau, because mother mends their moth-eaten tapestries beautifully, and father paints the family portraits." "And what do you do?" inquired Betty, much impressed. "I? Oh, I teach the girls American slang. It doesn't amount to much, teaching French girls slang, because they never have any chance to get it off on the men. But they always like it." "Don't you know any other languages?" "No--why, yes I do, too. I know Bengali. When Mademoiselle asked me that very question this noon I forgot Bengali. I learned one winter in India. I guess I'll telephone her--or no--I'd rather see her august face when I remind her of my humble linguistic existence. My name is Madeline Ayres. Now it's your turn," ended the new girl suddenly. "But I haven't anything to tell," objected Betty, "except that I'm Betty Wales, in the sophomore class, and live in Cleveland. Please go on. It sounds exactly like a fairy tale." Madeline Ayres shook her head. "It may now," she said, "but when you come to think it over, you'll decide that I talk too much. Don't put that green vase there. It belongs on the bookcase. It just litters your desk and spoils the effect of that lovely water-color. Do you mind my telling you?" It was ten o'clock when Miss Ayres took her departure. Between them, she and Betty had made astonishing progress toward bringing order out of the chaos that had reigned supreme an hour earlier. "It's so pretty, too," declared Betty, alone once more with the little green lizard. "Whatever she touches goes right into place. I suppose that's because she's always lived with artists. Oh, dear, I wish I could do something interesting!" There was a tap on the door, and Betty sprang for her light, for she had the new girl's terror of breaking the ten-o'clock rule, which is supposed by outsiders to be kept to the letter on the campus. However, it wasn't the matron, but only Nita Reese, who had a single room on the fourth floor and had come to say that the three B's were spending the night with her, and that they wished Betty to hurry right along and help eat up the food. [Illustration: "Don't put that green vase there."] "Lights don't count on the first night, they say," explained Nita, who, like Betty, had spent her freshman year off the campus. "So we've got to make the most of it." "But what are the B's doing over here?" demanded Betty in perplexity. "Have they moved away from the Westcott?" Nita laughed. "No indeed, but the rest of their floor hadn't come, and they felt lonely and came over to see me. They say their matron won't miss them the first night, and I'm sure I hope ours won't find them here. They seem to think it's all right." Betty pulled on her gray kimono, brushed the hair out of her eyes, and followed Nita through the hall and up-stairs to the fourth floor. There was a wilderness of trunks in the narrow passages. Every girl must have three at least, Betty thought. And their owners appeared to be in no haste about unpacking; the serious business of the hour was conversation. They stopped to talk with their neighbors to greet newcomers, to help or hinder other workers with questions and suggestions. Betty and Nita felt lost and rather friendless in the big house, and were strangely glad to see one familiar face down the corridor and to get a brisk little nod from a senior hurrying past them on the stairs. But on the fourth floor the B's pranced gaily out to meet them. "Poor little lambs, just come on the campus," sang Babe. "'Fraid to death of the matron," jeered Bob. "We've come to cheer you up," ended Babbie. "Girls," said Betty, when the five-pound box of chocolates that Bob's father had thoughtfully provided was nearly empty, "wouldn't it be dreadful if we didn't know each other or anybody? How did we ever manage last fall?" "Oh, you can always do what you have to," returned Bob practically. "One mattress is too narrow for four, though," announced Babbie, somewhat irrelevantly. "I'm going down to sleep with you, Betty. Come along." Thus ended Betty's first evening on the campus. CHAPTER II ELEANOR'S FRESHMAN It was early in the afternoon of the great day of the sophomore reception that Betty Wales ran up two flights of stairs at the Hilton House, and bursting into Eleanor's "extra-priced" corner single, flung herself, hot and breathless, into Eleanor's Morris chair. "Oh, but I'm tired," she said, as soon as she could speak. "And dirty," she added, looking ruefully at the green stains on the front of her pink linen suit. "You also seem to be in a hurry," observed Eleanor, who was always vastly entertained by Betty's impetuous, haphazard methods. "I am," said Betty. "We're awfully behind with the decorating, and I ought to rush back to the gym. this very minute, but I--" she paused, then finished quickly. "I wanted to see you." "That was nice of you," said Eleanor absently, sorting over the pages of a theme she had just finished copying. "I helped wind the balcony railings with yellow cheese-cloth all the morning, and I thought I'd better finish this before I went back. I'm bound not to get behind with my work this year." "Good for you," returned Betty, cheerfully. "But I'm glad you're through now. I was hoping you would be." "Did the chairman send you after me?" asked Eleanor, fastening her sheets together, and writing her name on the first one. "Oh, no," said Betty, quickly. "She didn't at all. I wanted to see you myself." Eleanor was too preoccupied to notice Betty's embarrassment. "Who is it that you're going to take to-night?" she asked. "You told me, but I've forgotten, and I want to put her name on my card." "I asked Madeline Ayres--" began Betty. "You lucky thing!" broke in Eleanor. "She's the most interesting girl in her class, I think, and she's going to be terribly popular. She's a class officer already, isn't she?" "Yes, secretary. I'm glad you like her, because I came over to see if you wouldn't take her, in my place." "I?" said Eleanor, in perplexity. "Why, I'm going to take Polly Eastman, --Jean's freshman cousin, you know. Do you mean you want me to take Miss Ayres too? Are you sick, Betty?" "No," said Betty, hastily, "but Polly Eastman is. She's got the mumps or the measles or something. Jean told me about it, and an A.D.T. boy was just leaving a note for you--from Polly, I suppose--when I came up. She's gone to the infirmary." "Poor child," said Eleanor. "She missed the freshman frolic, and she's been counting on to-night. I had such a lovely card for her, too. Pity it's got to go to waste. Well, she can have her violets all the same. I'll go down and telephone Clarke's to send them to the infirmary. But I don't see yet why you want me to take Miss Ayres, Betty." "Because," said Betty, "we've just discovered a left-over freshman. She lives way down at the end of Market Street, and she entered late, and somehow her name wasn't put on the official list. But this morning she was talking to a girl in her Math. division, and when the other girl spoke about the reception this one--her name is Dora Carlson--hadn't heard of it. So the other freshmen very sensibly went in and told the registrar about it, and the registrar sent word to the gym. And then Jean said that her cousin was ill, so I came over to see if you'd take Madeline, and let me take Miss Carlson. Now please say 'yes' right off, so that I can go and change my dress and hurry down and ask the poor little thing." Eleanor got up and came over to sit on the arm of the Morris chair. "Betty Wales," she said, with mock severity, but with an undertone of very real compunction in her voice, "do you think I'd do that? Have I ever been quite so mean as you make me out? Did you really think I'd take Miss Ayres and let you take Miss Carlson? You're absurd, Betty,--you are absurd sometimes, you know." "Yes, I suppose I am," began Betty, "but--" "It's perfectly simple," broke in Eleanor. "You go straight back to the gym. and work for the two of us, while I go and invite Miss Carlson to go with me to the reception. Where did you say she lives?" "Number 50 Market Street. Oh, Eleanor, will you really take her? She's probably--oh, not a bit your kind, you know," ended Betty, doubtfully. "Trust me to give her the time of her life all the same," said Eleanor, decidedly, putting on her hat. "Oh, Eleanor, you are a gem," declared Betty, excitedly. "I'll go and get Helen to take your place at the gym. Good-bye." And she was off. As Eleanor went down the steps of the Hilton House, she looked regretfully over at the gymnasium. They were dumping another load of evergreen boughs at the door. The horse was restless. It took three girls to hold him, and three more, with much shouting and laughter, to unload the boughs. Through one window she could see Rachel and Alice Waite stringing incandescent lights into Japanese lanterns. Katherine Kittredge was standing behind them in her gym suit. She had evidently been hanging lanterns along the rafters. It had been bad enough to stay at home and copy her theme. Now the decorating would be finished and the fun almost over, before she could get back. Eleanor shrugged her shoulders and turned resolutely away, trying to remember whether Market Street was just above or just below the station. Before she had reached the campus gate, she heard some one calling her name. It was Jean Eastman. "What's your hurry?" panted Jean. "Did you get Polly's note? And why aren't you at the gym.?" "Yes, I got the note," answered Eleanor. "I'm more than sorry for Polly, and for myself, too. I shall get back to the gym. as soon as I can, but I have to ask another freshman to the reception first." "Who?" demanded Jean. "Miss Carlson," answered Eleanor simply. "Oh, that! Don't you think, Eleanor, that you're getting a little quixotic in your old age?" Her scornful tone was very exasperating, and Eleanor straightened haughtily. "I don't think either of us need worry about being too charitable just yet awhile," she began. Then she caught herself up sharply. "Don't let's get to bickering, Jean. You know I ought to ask her, and you know how much I want to. But I'm going to do it, and I expect every girl on my program to help make her have just as good a time as if she were one of us." And Eleanor was off down the hill, leaving Jean gazing amazedly after her. Jean had no clue to the new Eleanor, whose strange toleration of the world in general annoyed the "Hill girls" (as those who had come from the Hill School were called) more than her high-handed attempts to run her own set, and her eventual wrecking of its influence, had done the year before. But the Hill girls appreciated Eleanor's ability, and they had resolved among themselves to wait a little and see what happened, before declaring open war. Somebody came to call just before dinner, and Betty was consequently late in dressing for the reception. But in the midst of her frantic efforts to make her own toilette and help Helen with hers, she had time to wonder what Dora Carlson was like and how she and Eleanor would get on together. She knew that Eleanor was equal to any emergency, if she cared to exert herself, but the question was: would Dora Carlson in the concrete arouse the best--or the worst--of her nature? Betty loved Eleanor in spite of everything, but she had to admit to herself that a timid little freshman might infinitely prefer staying at home from the sophomore reception to going in Eleanor's company, if she happened to be in a bad mood. And furthermore, as Betty lost her temper over Helen's girdle, which would go up in front and down behind, completely spoiling the effect of an otherwise pretty evening dress, she was in a position to realize that trying to help is by no means the soul-inspiring thing that it sometimes seems in contemplation. But she need not have worried about Dora Carlson, who, having lived alone with her father on a farm in the environs of a little village in Ohio, and kept house for him ever since she was twelve years old, was abundantly able to take care of herself. She was not at all timid, though she was not aggressive either, and she had a quaint way of expressing herself that would have interested almost any one. But it was the frank good-nature with which she accepted her eleventh hour invitation that appealed most to Eleanor, newly alive to the charm that lies in courageously making the best of a bad matter. For half an hour Eleanor devoted herself to finding out something about Miss Carlson and to making her feel at ease and happy in her company. Then she went off to order a carriage and twice as many violets as she had sent to Polly Eastman, and to find a maid who would press out her white mull dress,--this in spite of her decision, an hour earlier, that the white mull was much too pretty to waste on a promiscuous crush like the sophomore reception. As a result of all these preparations, Dora Carlson arrived at the gymnasium in a state of mind that she herself aptly compared to Cinderella's on the night of her first ball. She had a keen appreciation of the beautiful, and she had never seen any one so absolutely lovely as Eleanor in evening dress. It was pleasure enough just to watch her, to hear her talk to other people, and to feel that she--Dora Carlson--had some part and lot in this fascinating being, who had suddenly appeared to her as from another world. But Eleanor had no intention of keeping her freshman in the background. All through the reception that preceded the dancing she took her from group to group, introducing her to sophomores whom she would dance with later and to prominent members of her own class. Eleanor Watson might be considered odd and freakish by the Hill girls, and very snobbish by the rest of the college; but nobody of either persuasion cared to ignore her, when she chose to make advances. And there was, besides, a good deal of curiosity about the short, dark little freshman, with the merry brown eyes, the big, humorous mouth, and the enormous bunch of Parma violets pinned to the front of her much-washed, tight-sleeved muslin. Why in the world had the "snob of snobs" chosen to bring her to the reception? Eleanor knew how to utilize this curiosity for Miss Carlson's advantage. She took pains, too, to turn the conversation to topics in which the child could join. She was determined that, as far as this one evening went, the plucky little freshman from Ohio should have her chance. Afterward her place in the college world would of course depend largely on herself. "Do you dance?" asked Eleanor, when the music for the first waltz began. And when Miss Carlson answered with a delighted "yes," Eleanor, who always refused to lead, and detested both crowds and "girl dances," resolutely picked up her train and started off. Betty Wales and Jean Eastman, who had taken their freshmen up into the gallery, where they could look down at the dancers, saw her and exchanged glances. "More than she's ever done for me," said Jean, resignedly. "Isn't it nice of her?" returned Betty, with enthusiasm. And Jean, meditating on the matter later, decided shrewdly that Betty Wales was somehow at the bottom of Eleanor's unexplainable change of heart, and advised the Hill girls to make a determined effort to monopolize Eleanor's time and interest, before she had become hopelessly estranged from their counsels. But to all their attentions Eleanor paid as little heed as she did to the persistent appeals of Paul West, a friend at Winsted College, a few miles away, that she should give up "slaving over something you don't care about and come over to our next dance." To the Hill girls Eleanor gave courteous but firm denials, and she wrote Paul West that once in three weeks was as often as she had time for callers. "And you really had a good time?" said Eleanor, riding down to Market Street to see Miss Carlson home. "Splendid!" said Miss Carlson, heartily. "I'm sorry your first partner was sick, but I guess I enjoyed it fully as much as she would. Your friends were all so nice to me." "I'm glad of that," said Eleanor, relieved to find that Dora had not apparently noticed Jean Eastman's insolent manner, nor the careless self- absorption of one or two of her other partners. "And now that you've met the girls," she added practically, "you mustn't let them forget you. Making friends is one of the nicest things about college." "Yes, isn't it?" responded the little freshman, quickly. "I quite agree with you, but I don't expect to make any. I guess it's like other gifts. It doesn't come natural to some people. But," she added, brightening, "I came here to learn Greek and Latin, so that I can teach and support my father in his old age. And the good time I've had to-night is enough to last me for one while, I guess." Eleanor put out a slim, white hand and caught Miss Carlson's hard, brown one impetuously in hers, "Don't," she said. "That isn't the way things are here. Good times don't have to last, because one always leads to another. Why, I know another that's coming to you very soon. I've had a good deal of company for dinner lately and I can't ask for a place again right away, but the first Sunday that I can arrange it, you're coming up to have dinner with me at the Hilton House. Will you?" Jean Eastman had a great deal to say about Eleanor's freshman crush, as she called Dora Carlson. It was foolish, she said, and not in good taste, to send a bunch of violets as big as your head to a perfect stranger, whom you never expected to see again. Later, after Dora's appearance at the Hilton for Sunday dinner, Jean declared that it was a shame for Eleanor to invite her up there and make her think she really liked her, when it was only done for effect, and she would drop the poor child like a hot coal the minute she felt inclined to. Even Betty Wales failed to understand Eleanor's interest in the quaint little freshman, and she and the other Chapin house girls rallied her heartily about Miss Carlson's open and unbounded adoration. "Please don't encourage the poor thing so," laughed Katherine, one day not long after the reception. "Why, yesterday morning at chapel I looked up in the gallery and there she was in the front row, hanging over the railing as far as she dared, with her eyes glued to you. Some day she'll fall off, and then think how you'll feel, when the president talks about the terrible evils of the crush system, and stares straight at you." Eleanor took their banter with perfect good-nature, and seemed rather pleased than otherwise at Miss Carlson's devotion. "I like her," she said stoutly. "That's why I encourage her, as you call it. Now, Helen Adams doesn't interest me at all. She keeps herself to herself too much. But Dora Carlson is so absolutely frank and straightforward, and so competent and quick to see through things. She ought to have been a man. Then she could go west and make her fortune. As it is--" Eleanor shrugged her shoulders, in token that she had no feasible suggestion ready in regard to Dora Carlson's future. To Betty, in private, she went much further. "You don't know what you did for me, Betty, when you made me ask that child to the reception. Nobody ever cared for me, or trusted me, as she does--or for the reasons that she does. I hope I can show her that I'm worth it, but it's going to be hard work. And it will be a bad thing for her, and a worse thing for me, if I fail." CHAPTER III PARADES AND PARTIES It was surprising how well the girl from Bohemia fitted into the life at Harding. She had never experienced an examination or even a formal recitation until the beginning of her freshman term. She had seldom lived three months in any one place, and she had grown up absolutely without reference to the rules and regulations and conventions that meant so much to the majority of her fellow-students. But she did not find the recitations frightful, nor the simple routine of life irksome. She was willing to tell everybody who cared to listen what she had seen of French pensions, Italian beggars, or Spanish bullfights. It astonished her to find that her experiences were unique, because she had always accepted them as comparatively commonplace; but her pity for the girls who had never been east of Cape Cod nor west of Harding,--there were two of them at the Belden,--was quite untinged with self-congratulation. She was very much amused and not a little pleased, by her election to the post of class secretary. "They did it because I passed up four languages," she explained to Betty. "Somehow it got around--I'm sure I never meant to boast of it--and they seemed to think they ought to show their appreciation. Nice of them, wasn't it? But I fancy I shan't have a large international correspondence. It would have been more to the point if they'd found out whether I can write plainly." And the girl from Bohemia chuckled softly. "What's the joke?" inquired Betty. "Nothing," answered Madeline, "only I can't. Miss Felton made me spell off every word of my Spanish examination paper, because she couldn't read it, and I can't read my last theme myself," and she laughed again merrily. "Let's see it," demanded Betty, reaching for the paper at the top of the pile on Madeline's desk. "That's next week's," said Madeline. "I thought I'd do them both while I was at it. But this week's is funnier." "This week's" proved to be an absurd incident founded upon the illegibility of Henry Ward Beecher's handwriting. It was cleverly told, but the cream of its humor lay in the fact that Madeline's writing, if not so bad as Mr. Beecher's, was certainly bad enough. "Maybe Miss Raymond can make out what he really wrote, but I've forgotten now, and I can't," said Madeline, tossing the theme back on the pile. "And I didn't try to write badly either. It just happened." Everything "just happened" with Madeline Ayres. Betty had said that things fell into place for her, and people seemed to have a good deal the same pleasant tendency. But if they did not, Madeline seldom exerted herself to make them do her bidding. She admired hard work, and did a good deal of it by fits and starts. But she detested wire-pulling, and took an instant dislike to Eleanor Watson because some injudicious person told her that Eleanor had said she was sure to be popular and prominent at Harding. "What nonsense!" she said, with a flash of scorn in her slumberous hazel eyes. "How it spoils life to count up the chances like that! How it takes the fun out of everything! The right way is to go ahead and enjoy yourself, and work your prettiest, and take things when they come. They always come--if you give them a little time," she added with a return of her usual serenity. So it was wholly a matter of chance that Madeline Ayres should have succeeded in turning Helen Chase Adams into an athlete. Helen had come to college with several very definite theories about life, most of which had been shattered at the start. She had promptly revised her idea of a college in conformity with what she found--and loved--at Harding. She had decided, with some reluctance, that she had been mistaken in supposing that all pretty girls were stupid. But she still believed that genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains--laying no very stringent emphasis on the "infinite"; and she was determined to prove the truth of that bold, if somewhat elusive, assertion, at least to the extent of showing that she, Helen Chase Adams, could make a thoroughgoing success of her college course. Success may mean anything. To Helen Adams it had meant, ever since the day of the sophomore-freshman basket-ball game, the ability to write something that would interest her classmates. It might be a song that they would care to sing, or a little verse or a story that Miss Raymond would read in her theme class, as she had Mary Brooks's version of the Chapin house freshmen's letters home, and that the girls would listen to and laugh over, and later discuss and compliment her upon. It was not that she wanted the compliments, but they would measure her success. Helen admired the girl from Bohemia because she could write--Betty had told her about the Henry Ward Beecher theme,--also because she was quick and keen, seldom hurried or worried out of her habitual serenity, and finally because Betty admired her. Madeline Ayres, for her part, thought of Helen chiefly as Betty's roommate, noticed the awkward little forward tilt of her head just as she had noticed the inharmonious arrangement of Betty's green vase, and commented upon the one in exactly the same spirit that she had called attention to the other. "You ought to go in for gym," she said one afternoon when she had strolled into Betty's room and found only Helen. "It would straighten you up, and make you look like a different person. I'm going in for it myself, hard. I'm hoping that it will cure my slouchy walk, and turn me out 'a marvel of grace and beauty,' as the physical culture advertisements always say. Let's be in the same class, so that we can practice things together at home." "But I should take sophomore gym and you'd be with the freshmen," objected Helen. "Why don't you take freshman gym too? You can't do the exercises any too well, can you?" "No," admitted Helen, frankly. "I cut a lot last year, and I couldn't do them anyway." "Don't you hate to struggle along when you're not ready to go?" asked the girl from Bohemia. Helen agreed that she did, and a moment later they were comparing schedules and deciding upon a class which they could both join. It came directly in the middle of the afternoon, and Helen Adams had always considered gym at any hour a flagrant waste of time; but she did not say so. There had been something in Madeline's outspoken reference to her awkward carriage that, without hurting her, had struck home. Helen Chase Adams aspired to literary honors at Harding; to this desire was suddenly added a violent ambition to be what Madeline had termed "a marvel of grace." Betty was amazed, when she came in a little later, to find Helen trying on her gym suit. "What in the world are you doing?" she demanded. "Gym doesn't begin for two weeks yet." "I know it," said Helen, "but the neck of my suit never was right. It's awfully unbecoming. How would you fix it?" "You frivolous thing!" laughed Betty, squinting at the unbecoming neck for a moment. "It's too high behind, that's all. Rip off the collar and I'll cut it down. And I have an extra blue tie that you can have--it needs a tie. But I thought you'd manage to get an excuse from gym, when you hate it so." "Perhaps I shan't hate it this year," ventured Helen, and neither then nor later did Betty exactly understand her roommate's sudden devotion to parallel bars, ropes, the running track, and breathing exercises. But in time she did thoroughly appreciate the results of this physical training. Helen Chase Adams was never exactly "a marvel of grace"; but she was erect and supple, with considerable poise and dignity of bearing, when she left Harding. Another thing that Madeline Ayres "happened upon" was the Republican parade. Presidential elections had been celebrated in various ways at Harding. There had been banners spread to the breeze, songs and bells in the night-watches, mock caucuses and conventions, campaign speeches, and Australian balloting, before election time. But the parade was of Madeline's invention. It was about eight o'clock on the evening after election day that she appeared in Mary Brooks's door--she had made friends with Mary almost as easily as Betty had. "I say," she said, dropping off her rain-coat and displaying a suit of manly black beneath, to match the short brown wig above. "Let's have a Republican parade. Who'll be the defeated candidate, in chains?" Then she smiled broadly, displaying rows of even white teeth, and Mary grasped the situation in a moment. "I'm with you, Roosevelt," she said. "Nita Reese can be the defeated one. I'll go and get her." "And you be leader of the band," said Madeline. "You get combs and I'll get tin pans." "Let's take up a collection and have ice-cream later," proposed Mary. "All right. I'll tell Betty to see to that. I've got to lead a strenuous life finding clothes for Fairbanks," and "President Roosevelt" disappeared down the hall. Promptly at nine the parade assembled on the third floor corridor. The president elect was drawn in an express wagon, except down the stairs between floors. Out of consideration for the weight of his chains the defeated candidate was allowed to ride in a barouche, alias a rocking- chair. But he objected to riding backward, and the barouche would not move the other way round, so he accepted the arm of the leader of the band and walked, chains and all. The vice-president walked from the start. At intervals of five minutes one or both of the successful candidates made speeches. The defeated candidate wished to do likewise, but the other two drowned him out. Between times the band, composed of all the Belden House who could play on combs or who could find tin pans, discoursed sweet music. Those who could not do either formed what Mary Brooks called "a female delegation of the G.O.P. from Colorado," and closed in the rear of the procession in a most imposing manner. The vice-president elect wanted to make a tour of the campus houses, but the twenty minutes to ten bell rang, and there was only time to eat the ice cream. The fact that Roberta Lewis, who happened to be in Mary's room when the president made his first call, laughed herself into hysterics over the parade, proves that it was funny. The further fact that she had firmly decided to leave college at Christmas time, but changed her mind after she had seen the parade, shows that even "impromptu stunts" are not always as silly and futile as they seem. But before the Republican parade came Hallowe'en, and Hallowe'en on the campus is not a thing to pass over lightly. Each house has some sort of party, generally in costume. There is a good deal of rivalry, and as every house wishes to see and judge of the achievements of its neighbors, the most interesting encounters are likely to take place midway between houses, on the journeys from one party to another. In Betty's sophomore year the Belden had a masquerade ball, under the direction of Mary Brooks and the girl from Bohemia. The Hilton House indulged in an old-fashioned country Hallowe'en, with a spelling match, dancing to "Roger de Coverley" and "Money Musk," apple-bobbing and all the other traditional methods of finding out about your lover on All Saints' Eve. The Westcott gave a "spook" party, one of the other houses a play, still another a goblin dance, to which everybody carried jack-o'- lanterns, and the rest celebrated the holiday in other characteristic and amusing ways. The campus resembled a cross between the midway at a World's Fair and the grand finale of a comic opera; for ghosts consorted there with ballet dancers and Egyptian princesses, spooks and goblins linked arms with pirates in top-boots and rosy farmers' daughters in calico, and nuns and Puritan maidens chatted familiarly with villainous and fascinating gentlemen, who twirled black mustaches and threatened to kiss them. By nine o'clock everybody had seen everybody else, and congratulations for successful costumes, clever acting, and thrilling ghost stories were nearly all distributed. Toward the end of the evening there were a good many small gatherings, met to talk over the fun in detail and enjoy the numerous "spreads" that had been sent on from home,--for the college girl's family becomes almost as expert in detecting a festival afar off as is the girl herself. Nan never let the Wales household forget its duty in such matters, and a merry party was assembled in Betty's room to eat the salad, sandwiches, jelly, olives, cake, candy, nuts, and fruit that her mother had provided. "How time flies," observed Mary Brooks sagely, helping herself to another sandwich. "I suppose you gay young sophomores don't realize it, but it's almost Christmas time." "And after Christmas, midyears," wailed a freshman from her corner. "And after midyears what? "'To be or not to be, that is the question,'" quoted Katherine Kittredge loudly. "But for sophomores who survive the midyears," went on Mary, "the next thing of importance is the society elections." "That's so," said Betty eagerly. "We can get into your wonderful societies after midyears, if we're brainy enough. I'd forgotten all about them." "Then I'll wager you're about the only sophomore who hasn't thought of them occasionally this fall," announced Mary. "And now I'm ready for some candy." "Tell us how to go to work to get into those societies, can't you?" asked Bob from her place beside the salad bowl. "Work hard and write themes," said Mary briefly, and the subject was dropped. Betty thought no more about Mary's remark then, but when she and Helen were alone it came back to her. "I suppose some girls do think about the societies a lot, and plan and hope to get in," she said. "I suppose so," returned Helen. "I shan't have to. I am perfectly safe to stay out." "Oh, so am I, as far as that goes," said Betty carelessly. Helen, watching her closely, wondered how any popular girl could be as unconscious as Betty seemed. She had overheard a Belden House senior telling Mary Brooks that Betty Wales was sure to go into a society the minute she became eligible. Helen opened her mouth to convey this information to Betty, but stopped just in time. "For she's not unhappy about it," thought Helen, "and it would be dreadful if they should be mistaken. But they can't be," concluded Helen loyally, watching Betty's face as she read a note that her mother had tucked in among the nuts. Most pretty girls might be stupid, but the best of everything was none too good for Betty Wales, so thought her roommate. CHAPTER IV ELEANOR WATSON, AUTHORESS Eleanor Watson leaned back in her Morris chair, her eyes fixed absently on the opposite wall, her forehead knit in deep thought. "Somehow there isn't enough of me to go round," she reflected. "I don't see why,--the other girls, no quicker or brighter than I, seem to get on all right. I wonder why I can't. I can't give up everything in the way of recreation." It was easy enough for an outsider to analyze her difficulty. Never before had Eleanor tried to "go round," as she put it. She had always done what she pleased, and let alone the things that did not appeal to her. Now she had suddenly assumed responsibilities. She really wanted to do her college work, all of it, as it deserved to be done, and to do it honestly, without resort to any of the various methods of deception that she had employed almost unconsciously hitherto. She wanted to make life pleasanter for Dora Carlson. She wanted to write the long, newsy letters to Jim and to Judge Watson; letters that brought characteristic replies, confidential from Jim, genially humorous from her father, but both equally appreciative and as different as possible from their cold, formal notes of the year before. On the other hand, she wanted, both for selfish and unselfish reasons, to enter into the social life of the college. She had not lost her worldly ambitions in one summer; and she had not gained, at a bound, the concentration of mind that enabled other girls to get through an amazing amount of work and fun with perfect ease. She knew infinitely less of the value of time than Betty Wales; she had less sense of proportion than Helen Adams; and she was intensely eager to win all sorts of honors. So it was natural that she should stare at the wall opposite for some little time before she came to the conclusion that sitting empty-handed, thinking about her troubles, while the morning took to itself wings, was not the best way to mend matters. And when she did finally come back to earth, it was only to give an angry little exclamation, pick up a magazine from the table at her elbow, and go to reading it. At the end of half an hour, however, she tossed it aside, and sitting resolutely down at her desk, wrote diligently until lunch time. "Have you done your theme, Eleanor?" asked Alice Waite, overtaking her on the way down to the dining-room. Eleanor nodded curtly. "Did it between twelve and one." "Really?" Alice's brown eyes grew big with admiration. "Oh, dear, it takes me days to do mine, and when they're done they're nothing, and yours are just fine. I do think it's queer--" "Nonsense," interrupted Eleanor crossly. "You don't know anything about my themes. You never saw one." "Oh, but Betty Wales says--" began Alice eagerly. "Now what does Betty Wales really know about it either?" inquired Eleanor a trifle more amiably. "Why, I don't know," returned Alice helplessly, "but I'm sure she's right. Is your theme a story?" "Yes." "Oh, and is it about a man and a girl? Betty says your man-and-girl stories are great, specially the love parts. Now I could no more write love-making--" "Well, there's no love-making in this one," interrupted Eleanor crossly, "and it's not great at all. It's so poor that I'm not even sure I shall hand it in. So please don't say any more about it." All through luncheon Eleanor sat silent, wearing the absent, harassed expression which meant that she was deciding something--something about which her better and her worse selves disagreed. Just as she was leaving the lunch-table, Christy Mason rushed up to her in great excitement. "Now, Eleanor," she began, "don't say you can't come, for we simply won't let you off. It's a construction car ride. Meet at the Main Street corner at four--right after Lab., if you have it. It's positively the last ride of the season and an awfully jolly crowd's going,--Betty and Jean and Kate Denise and the three B's, and Katherine Kittredge and Nita Reese,-- oh, the whole sophomore push, you know. Now, say you'll come, and give me twenty cents for the supper." "Give me time to breathe," laughed Eleanor. "Now seriously, Christy, why should I go off on one of those dirty, hard, bumping flat-cars, on a freezing night in November--" "It's moonlight," interrupted Christy, "and we must have your guitar to help with the singing." "We shall nickname you dig, if you don't come," declared Bob, who had danced up in the midst of the colloquy. "Now, how will you like that--Dig Watson?" Eleanor laughed good-naturedly. "Don't be ironical," she said. "I'll come. I hadn't any intention of not coming. I only wanted to know why you will persist in lugging those horrid flat-cars into all your fun." "Stunty," explained Christy. "Different," added Bob. "But since you're coming, we can argue about it to-night," concluded Christy, decidedly. "What I want now is your twenty cents." It was half past three when Eleanor started over to the main building to deposit her theme in one of the tin boxes which Miss Raymond and her assistants opened at specified hours on specified days,--not, as Mary Brooks explained, because they wanted what was in the boxes, but because they wished to discover what was not in them, in order that they might make life a burden for those whose themes were late. Just ahead of Eleanor a little freshman walked up to the box and slipped in a stamped envelope. "Pardon me, but this isn't a mail-box," explained Eleanor. "Why, it says 'Collections made at 6 P.M. Tuesdays and Thursdays,'" gasped the little freshman. Then she glanced at the heading, "'Themes of Second Class, L to Z.' Oh, I thought of course that said United States Mail." "Evidently you're fortunate enough not to have elected themes. When you do, remember that the collections are as prompt as the postman's," said Eleanor. "Come back at six, and you can get out your letter." But the freshman, blushing as red as her scarlet cap, had vanished down the hall. Then, instead of dropping in her theme and hurrying home, as she had intended, to get into an old skirt and a heavy shirt-waist before four o'clock, Eleanor sat down on the lowest step of the broad stairway, as if she had decided to wait there until six o'clock and rescue the freshman's letter herself. Five--ten--fifteen minutes, she sat there. Girl after girl came through the hall to deposit themes, or consult the bulletin boards. Among them were one or two of the "sophomore push," as Christy had called them. "Aren't you a lady of leisure, though," called Christy, dashing through the hall at quarter to four. "I have to go ahead and see about the ice cream. Don't you be late, Eleanor." Eleanor looked after her wistfully; Christy was one of the girls who always "went round." Then she shrugged her shoulders, got up, and dropped her theme into the box. "What's the odds, anyhow?" she muttered, as it fell with a soft little swish on the top of the pile inside. "It's too late to write another now." And she hurried after Christy down the hill. The construction car ride was a great success. The night was decidedly balmy for November, and the moon rode, full and glorious, in a cloudless sky. If the car bottom made a hard seat, the passengers' spirits were elastic enough to endure all the bumps and jolts with equanimity. Hatless, though bundled in ulsters and sweaters, they laughed and sang and shouted in the indefatigably light-hearted fashion that is characteristic only of babies and collegians off on a frolic. Eleanor's story of the absent-minded freshman was the hit of the evening, and the tinkle of her guitar added the crowning touch to the festivity of the occasion. As they rounded the last corner on the homeward stretch, she turned to Betty Wales, her eyes shining softly and her hair blown into distracting waves under her fluffy white tam. "It is fun, Betty," she said. "Flat-car and all,--though why it should be, I'm sure I don't see, and last year it wasn't--for me." Then her face grew suddenly sombre, and she settled back in her corner, dropping into a moody silence that lasted until the car had dumped its merry load, and the "sophomore push" was making its way in noisy twos and threes up the hill to the campus. "Come over for a minute, can't you, Eleanor?" asked Betty, when they reached the Belden House gate. "Why, yes--no, I can't, either. I'm sorry," said Eleanor, and was starting across the grass toward home, when Jean Eastman overtook her. "Come over to the Westcott and warm up with coffee," said Jean. Eleanor repeated her refusal. "Why not?" demanded Jean with her usual directness. "Because I want to see Miss Raymond a minute," returned Eleanor, coolly. "Well, you can't do that to-night," said Jean. "She's entertaining Professor Morris of New York. I don't suppose you care to break into that, do you? She's probably having a select party of faculty stars in for a chafing-dish supper." "Oh, dear!" There was genuine distress in Eleanor's voice. "Then I'm going home, Jean. You're perfectly certain that she'll be engaged? You're sure this is the night he was coming?" Having duly assured Eleanor that Professor Morris and Miss Raymond had taken lunch at the Westcott House and that Miss Mills had been invited out to dinner with them, Jean went home to inform her roommate that Eleanor Watson was in more trouble over her English work--that she was rushing around the campus at nine in the evening, trying to find Miss Raymond. Eleanor, left to herself at last, turned and went slowly back to the Belden House. Betty looked up in astonishment when she appeared in the door. "How'd you happen to change your mind?" she asked. "Fate was against me," said Eleanor shortly. "I wanted to see Miss Raymond about a theme, but she's busy." "Won't morning do?" asked Betty, sympathetically. "Yes, I suppose so, only I wanted to have it off my hands." "I don't wonder," agreed Betty. "She's none too agreeable about late themes." "It's not a late theme. I want to get back the one I handed in to-day. It ought never to have gone in." Betty stared at Eleanor for a moment in speechless amazement, then she danced across the room and pulling Eleanor after her, tumbled back among the couch cushions. "Oh, Eleanor, you are the funniest thing," she said. "Last year you didn't care about anything, and now I believe you're a worse fusser than Helen Chase Adams. The idea of worrying over a theme that is done and copied and in on time! Come and tell Madeline Ayres. She'll appreciate the joke, and she'll give us some of her lovely sweet chocolate that her cousins sent her from Paris." But Eleanor hung back. "Please don't say anything about it to Miss Ayres. I'd really rather you didn't. It may be a joke to you, but it's a serious matter to me, Betty." So more people than Eleanor were surprised the next afternoon to find that the clever story which Miss Raymond read with great gusto to her prize theme class, and commented upon as "extraordinary work for an undergraduate," should prove to be Eleanor Watson's. As early in the morning as she dared Eleanor had gone over to get back her theme "that should never have gone in," and to ask permission to try again. But Miss Raymond had been up betimes, working over her new batch of papers, and she met Eleanor's apologies with amused approval of sophomores, who, contrary to the popular tradition about their cock- sureness, were inclined to underestimate their abilities, and imagine, like freshmen before midyears, that their work was below grade. So there was nothing for Eleanor to do but submit gracefully and leave the theme. It did not occur to her to caution Miss Raymond against reading it to her class. In spite of hard struggles and little disappointments like Helen Adams's, it really takes very little to make a college reputation. One brilliant recitation may turn an unassuming student into a "prod."; and on the strength of one clever bit of writing another is given the title of "genius." This last distinction was at once bestowed on Eleanor. She was showered with congratulations and compliments. Her old school friends like Lilian Day and Jean Eastman hastened to declare that they had always known Eleanor Watson could write. Solid, dependable students like Dorothy King and Marion Lawrence regarded her with new respect; awed little freshmen pointed her out to one another as "that awfully pretty Miss Watson, who is a perfect star in themes, you know"; and her own class, who had cordially disliked her the year before, and not known what to think of her recent friendliness, immediately prepared to make a class heroine of her and lauded her performance to the skies. But Eleanor would have none of all this "pleasant fuss," as Mary Brooks called it. Suddenly and most inexplicably she reverted to her sarcastic, ungracious manner of the year before. She either ignored the pretty speeches that people made to her, or received them with a stare and a haughty "I really don't know what you mean," which fairly frightened her admirers into silence. "I hope," said Mary Brooks to Betty, after having received a particularly scathing retort, "that hereafter Miss Raymond can be induced not to approve of the lady Eleanor's themes. I've heard that prosperity turns people's heads, but I never knew it made them into bears. She's actually more unpleasant than she was before she reformed. And the moral of that is, don't reform," added Mary sententiously. Betty Wales was completely mystified and bitterly disappointed by Eleanor's strange behavior. "Eleanor dear," she ventured timidly, "don't be so queer and--and disagreeable about your theme. Why, you even hurt my feelings when I spoke to you about it, and the other girls think it's awfully funny that you shouldn't be pleased, and like to have them congratulate you. The theme must have been good, you see. Miss Raymond knows, and she liked it ever so much. She told the class about your rushing over to get it that morning, and she thought it was such a good joke. Do cheer up, Eleanor. Why, I should be so proud if I were you!" Eleanor was silent for a moment, then she smiled suddenly, her flashing, radiant smile. "Well, I'll try to be pleasant, Betty, if you want me to," she said. "There's no use crying over spilt milk. I am queer--you know that--but I hadn't meant to hurt people's feelings. You're going to the library, aren't you? Well, Dora Carlson's up there. Tell her, please, that I was tired when she came in just now--that I didn't intend to be disagreeable, and that I love her just the same. Will you?" So when, just after Betty had left, Dorothy King came in and plunged at once into the familiar "I want to congratulate you on that story, Miss Watson," Eleanor smiled pleasantly and murmured, "It's nothing,--just a stupid little tale," in conventional college fashion. "And of course," went on Dorothy briskly, "we want it for the 'Argus.' I'm not a literary editor myself,--just business manager,--but Frances West is so busy that she asked me to stop in and see you on my way to a meeting of the Editorial board. Frances is the editor-in-chief, you know." A dull red flush spread itself over Eleanor's pale face. "I'm sorry, Miss King, very sorry, but--but--I can't let the 'Argus' use my story." Dorothy stared. "We can't have it? Why--well, of course it's very good. Were you going to try to sell it to a regular magazine?" Eleanor shook her head. "No," she said with an odd little laugh. "No, I'm not going to try to sell it." Dorothy looked puzzled. "Most people are very glad to get into the 'Argus.' We don't often have to ask twice for contributions. And we want this very, very much. Miss Raymond likes it so well and all. Can't I persuade you to change your mind?" "No," said Eleanor curtly. In spite of her poise and her apparently even temper, Dorothy King was a rather spoiled young person, used to having her own way and irritable when other people insisted, without reason, upon having theirs. She disliked Eleanor Watson, and now Eleanor's manner nettled her beyond endurance. She rose suddenly. "Oh, very well, Miss Watson," she said. "But I really don't understand why you should raise such a tempest in a teapot over a theme. You make me quite curious to see it, I assure you. It must be a very strange piece of work." Eleanor's face went white instantly. "I beg your pardon, Miss King. I didn't mean to be either rude or disobliging or even--queer. Here is the story, and if the 'Argus' can really use it, I shall be delighted, of course." On the campus Dorothy met Betty Wales. "I've got it," she cried, waving the theme aloft in triumph. "She didn't want to give it to me at first, and I lost my temper--she is so trying--but later she was lovely, and I apologized, and now we're fast friends." Betty was on her way to gym, but she stole five minutes in which to run up and see Eleanor. "Hurrah for you!" she cried. "I saw Dorothy and she told me the great news. Eleanor, you'll be on the Argus board yourself, if you're not careful." "Would you mind not staying now, Betty?" asked Eleanor, who was lying buried among her pillows. "I have a dreadful headache, and talking makes it worse." CHAPTER V POINTS OF VIEW During the first part of their year at the Chapin house Betty and her friends had taken very little interest in the Harding Aid Society. It had been to them only a name, about which Mary Brooks, who was a member of the aid committee of her class, talked glibly, and in behalf of which she exacted onerous contributions, whenever the spirit moved her. But at the time of the valentine episode, when Emily Davis and her two friends suddenly appeared upon Betty's horizon, Betty and Katherine realized all at once what the Aid Society must mean to some of their classmates. During the rest of the year they seconded Mary's efforts warmly, and the whole house got interested and plied Mary with questions about the work of the society, until, in sheer desperation, she admitted that she knew very little about it, and set herself to get some definite information. The head of the committee, pleased with Mary's sudden enthusiasm, sent her to one of the faculty trustees, and for a few days Mary, who was entirely a creature of impulse, could talk of nothing but the splendid work of the Harding Aid Society in helping the poorer members of the college to meet their expenses. It was perfectly marvelous how little some girls got along on. To many of them a loan of twenty-five dollars actually meant the difference between going home and staying in college a year longer. "Now fancy that!" interpolated Mary. "It would mean just about the price of a new hat to me." And each dollar helped an endless chain of girls; for the society made loans, not gifts; and the girls always paid up the moment they could get the money together. "One girl paid back two hundred dollars out of a five hundred dollar salary that she got for teaching, the year after she graduated. Imagine that if you can!" said Mary. The Aid Society managed the bulletin boards in the gymnasium basement. It ran an employment agency, a blue-print shop, and a second-hand book- store. It was astonishing, said Mary, with a mysterious shake of her head, how many splendid girls--the very finest at Harding--the society was helping. Confidentially, she whispered to the valentine coterie that Emily Davis and her two friends had just been placed on the list of beneficiaries. Her eloquence extorted a ten dollar contribution from Roberta, and smaller amounts from the rest of the girls. But then came spring term, and the Harding Aid Society was forgotten for golf, bicycling, the bird club, and the other absorbing joys of the season. But it was only natural that Mary, casting about for a "Cause," in behalf of which to exercise her dramatic talent, should remember the Aid Society, and the effort it was making to complete its ten-thousand-dollar loan fund before Christmas. Mary was no longer on the aid committee, but that was no reason why she should not help complete the fund, for which everybody,--alumnae, friends of the college, and undergraduates,--were expected to work. Mary was a born entertainer, never so happy as when she was getting up what in college-girl parlance is called a "show." She had discovered how to utilize her talent at Harding, at the time of the Sherlock Holmes dramatization. It had lain dormant again until the Hallowe'en party brought it once more to light, and the election parade kindled it into fresh vigor. In all her enterprises Mary found a kindred spirit in Madeline Ayres. Madeline had taken part in amateur theatricals ever since she could talk. "And I've always been wild to do men's parts," she said. "I hope I can up here." "Of course you can," returned Mary, promptly. "Do you know any actors or actresses?" "Oh, two or three," answered Madeline, carelessly. "Or at least father does--he knows everybody that's interesting--and I've talked to them. And once I 'suped.' It was a week when I'd been to the theatre three times, and I didn't want to ask father for any more money. So I went to the manager and got a chance to be in the mob--that's the crowd that don't have speaking parts, you know. And the people who'd promised to take me home forgot and went off to supper without me, and the leading lady heard about it and took me home in her carriage. So mother asked her to tea, and she came, and was a dear, though she couldn't act at all. I forget her name. But the family wouldn't let me go on again. They said it wouldn't do, even in Bohemia." "Goodness!" exclaimed Mary, excitedly. "Wasn't that a lark! Madeline, do let's get up a play." "But how can we?" objected Madeline, lazily. "Hallowe'en is over, there aren't any more elections or holidays coming, and we're not either of us on the committee for house plays. We can't just walk in and offer our services, can we?" Mary stared at her absently. "That's so," she said. "That's the bother of being on the campus, where they have committees for everything. Oh, dear! Isn't there something we can have a play for?" Then her face lighted suddenly. "The Harding Aid! The very thing!" she shrieked, and seizing the stately Madeline around the waist, she twirled her violently across the room. "I haven't the ghost of an idea what you are talking about," said Madeline, gravely, when she had at last succeeded in disentangling herself from Mary's bearish embraces. "But I'm with you, anyway. What shall it be?" "Why, a--a play." "Don't you like vaudeville shows better?" inquired Madeline, "and circuses, and nice little stunts? Girls can do that sort of thing a lot better than they can act regular plays. And besides it brings in a bigger cast and takes fewer bothering old rehearsals." This time Mary danced a jig all by herself. "Come over to Marion Lawrence's," she commanded, breathlessly. "She's chairman of the big Loan Fund Committee. She'll make us two a special entertainment committee, and tell the rest to let us go ahead and do what we please." But Madeline shook her head. "I loathe committees," she explained. "You go along and see Miss Lawrence and be on your committee, if you like. And when you want some help with the stunts or the costumes--I have a lot of drapery and jewelry and such stuff--why, come and tell me, and I'll do what I can." And no amount of persuasion on the part of Mary, Marion Lawrence, or the Loan Fund Committee _en masse_, could induce Madeline to change her mind. "Why, I can't be on a committee," she said. "I get around to recitations and meals and class meetings, and that's all I can possibly manage. You don't realize that I'd never had to be on time for anything in all my life till I came here, except for trains sometimes,--and you can generally count on their being a little late. No, I can't and won't come to committee meetings and be bored. But all that I have is yours," and Madeline tossed a long and beautifully curled mustache at Mary, and a roll of Persian silk at Marion. "For the circus barker," she explained, "and the Indian juggler's turban. I'll make the turban, if the juggler doesn't know how. They're apt to come apart, if you don't get the right twist. And I'll see about that little show of my own, if you really think it's worth having." So, though her name did not appear on the list of the committee or on the posters, it was largely due to Madeline Ayres that the Harding Aid "Show" was such a tremendous success. "The way to get up a good thing," she declared, "is to let each person see to her own stunt. Then it's no trouble to any one else. And you'd better have the show next week, before we all get bored to death with the idea." These theories were exactly in accordance with Harding sentiment, so next week the "Show" was,--in the gymnasium, for it rapidly outgrew the Belden House parlors, where Mary and Madeline had at first thought of holding it. It was amazing how much talent Madeline and the committee, between them, managed to unearth. The little dressing-rooms at the ends of the big hall had to be called into requisition, and the college doctor's office, and Miss Andrews' room, and even the swimming tank in the basement (it leaked and so the water had all been drained off), with an improvised roof made by pinning Bagdad couch-covers together. All along the sides of the gymnasium hall there were little curtained booths, while the four corners of the gallery were turned respectively into a gypsy tent, a witch's den, the grotesque abode of an Egyptian sorceress, and the businesslike offices of a dapper little French medium, just over from Paris. You could have your fortune told in whichever corner you preferred,--or in all four if your money lasted. Then you could descend to the floor below, and eat and drink as many concoctions as your digestion could stand, sandwiching between your "rabbits," Japanese or Russian tea, fudges, chocolate, and creamed oysters, visits to the circus, the menagerie, the vaudeville, and the multitude of side-shows. "Side-show," so the posters announced, was the designation of "a bewildering variety of elegant one-act specialties." Mary Brooks was very proud of that phrasing. Mary herself was in charge of the menagerie. "Not to be compared for a single instant with the animals of the biggest show on earth," she shouted through her megaphone, accompanying her remarks with impressive waves of her riding-whip. Then the white baby elephant walked forth from its lair. It was composed of one piece of white cheese-cloth and two of Mary's most ardent freshman admirers. There was a certain wobbly buoyancy in its gait and a jauntiness about its waving white trunk,--which was locked at the end, as Mary explained, to guard against the ferocious assaults of this terrible man-eater,--which never failed to convulse the audience and put them in the proper humor for the rest of the performance. The snake-charmer exhibited her paper pets. The lion, made up on the principle of the one in "Midsummer Night's Dream" pawed and roared and assured timid ladies that she was not a lion at all, but only that far more awful creature, a Harding senior. And finally Mary opened the cage containing the Happy Family, and there filed out a quartette of strange beasts which no Harding girl in the audience failed to recognize as the four "class animals,"--the seniors' red lion, the juniors' purple cow, the green dragon beloved by the sophomores, and the freshmen's yellow chicken. "They dance" announced Mary in beatific tones, and the three four-legged creatures stood on their hind legs and, joining paws and wings with the chicken, went through a solemn Alice-in-Wonderland-like dance. This was always terminated abruptly by some animal or another's being overcome by mirth or suffocation, and rushing unceremoniously back into the cage to recuperate. When the Happy Family was again reunited, Mary announced that they could also sing, and, each in a different key, the creatures burst forth with the "Animal Song," dear to the hearts of all Harding girls: "I went to the Animal Fair; the great Red Lion was there. The Purple Cow was telling how She'd come to take the air. The Dragon he looked sick, and the little Yellow Chick, Looked awfully blue, and I think, don't you, He'd better clear out quick--quick!" At the end of this ditty, the chick hopped solemnly forward, gave vent to a most realistic cluck, scratched vigorously for worms, and the Happy Family vanished amid an uproar of applause, while Mary piloted her audience into the circus proper, managed by Emily Davis. Here Mlle. Zita, beautiful in pink tarleton,--only her skirt had been mislaid at the last moment and she had been compelled to substitute the Westcott House lamp shade,--Mlle. Zita balanced herself on a chair, and gave so vivid an imitation of wire-walking, on solid ground all the time, that the audience was actually fooled into holding its breath. Then Bob's pet collie did an act, and the juggler juggled, in his turban, and some gym "stars" did turns on bars and swings. And there was an abundance of peanuts and pink lemonade, and a clown and a band; and Emily's introductions were alone well worth the price of admission. At the end of her performance Emily stated that this circus, being modern and up-to-date in all respects, had substituted for the conventional after-concert, "a side-splitting farce which would appeal to all intelligent and literary persons and make them laugh and cry with mirth." So everybody, wishing to appear intelligent and literary, went in to see the little play which Madeline Ayres had written. It was called "The Animal Fair," and three of the class animals appeared in it. But the mis- en-scene was an artist's studio, the great red lion was a red-faced English dramatist, the chick a modest young lady novelist attired in yellow chiffon, and the dragon a Scotch dialect writer. The repartee was clever, the action absurd, and there were local hits in plenty for those unliterary persons who did not catch the essential parody. Everybody was enthusiastic over it, and there were frequent calls for "Author!" But nobody responded. "Who wrote it? Oh, some of the committee, I suppose," said the doorkeeper, carelessly. "Perhaps Marion Lustig helped--they didn't tell me. No, the actors don't know either. Did you give me fifty cents or a quarter? Please don't crowd so. You'll all get in in a minute." Meanwhile Madeline, having seen through the first performance of her farce, in her capacity of stage manager, had left the actors to their own devices, and wandered off to explore the other attractions. Betty met her at the vaudeville. "Come and get some fudge and see the sleight-of-hand stunts in the swimming tank," whispered Madeline. "These songs are all too much alike." It was half-past nine. The sleight-of-hand performance was being given for the tenth and last time to an audience that packed the house. When it was over Betty, who had been a ticket-taker at the circus all the afternoon and evening, hurried Madeline back to see how much money Emily had made. "Fifty dollars," said Emily, with shining eyes. "Think of it! I've helped to make fifty dollars for the Aid Society that's helping me through college." "Splendid!" said Betty, too tired to be very enthusiastic over anything that night. Madeline led her to a deserted corner of the gallery, and they sank down on a heap of pillows that had composed the gypsy queen's throne. "I suppose I ought to care about the money," said Madeline, when they were seated, "but I don't much. I care because it's all been so funny and jolly and so little trouble. We can help to make money for good causes all our lives, but most of us will forget how to make such good times out of so little fuss and feathers when we leave here." Betty looked at her wonderingly. Madeline's philosophy was a constant source of interest and amazement to all her friends. She had a way of saying the things that they had always thought, but never put into words. "That's so," she agreed at last, "but I don't see how you knew it. You haven't been here a term yet. How do you find out so much about college?" Madeline laughed merrily. "Oh, I came from Bohemia," she said, "and the reason I like it up here is because this place isn't so very different from Bohemia. Money doesn't matter here, and talent does, and brains; and fun is easy to come by, and trouble easy to get away from. But not for everybody," she ended quickly. Eleanor Watson, still in her gypsy fortune-teller's costume, was hurrying up to the big pile of pillows, six devoted freshmen following close at her heels. "Hop up, girls," she called gaily to Betty and Madeline. "My faithful slaves have come to empty the throne room." "Aren't you tired, Eleanor?" asked Betty. "You've been at it since three o'clock, haven't you? I should think you'd be dead." Eleanor shrugged her shoulders. "Oh, I'm a bit tired," she answered, indifferently, "But I couldn't stop. The girls simply wouldn't let me, though Blanche Norton was willing to take my place. I was a goose to tell them that I could read palms. Look out for that white satin pillow, Maudie. Yes, the yellow one is mine, but I can't carry it. I'm too done up to carry anything but myself." "Now that," said Madeline, decidedly, as soon as Eleanor was out of hearing, "that is all wrong,--every bit of it. It's not the fun she wants. She doesn't even care about the money for the good cause. It's the honor and the chance to show off her own cleverness that she's after." Madeline waited a moment. "Is she so clever, Betty?" "Oh, yes," cried Betty eagerly. "Don't you remember her theme?" "To be sure." Madeline's eyes twinkled. "I'd forgotten her wonderful theme. Oh, well, then I suppose she is clever--but I'm sorry for her." "Why?" asked Betty quickly. Surely Madeline could not know anything about Eleanor's stepmother, and nowadays her career at Harding was a series of delightful triumphs. More reason why Madeline should envy, than pity her, Betty thought. "Oh, for lots of reasons," answered Madeline easily, "but chiefly because she's so anxious about getting things for herself that she can't enjoy them when she's got them; and secondly because something worries her. Watch her face when she isn't smiling, and when she thinks nobody is noticing her. It's so wonderfully sad and so perfectly beautiful that it makes me pity her in spite of myself," ended Madeline with a sudden rush of feeling. "But I can't love her, even for you, you funny child," she added playfully, pulling one of Betty's curls. "I'm not a child," retorted Betty, with great dignity. "I'm a sophomore and you're only a little freshman, please remember, and you have no business pulling my hair." "Lights out in two minutes, young ladies," called the night-watchman from below, and freshman and sophomore raced for the stairs. CHAPTER VI ON AMBITION "It was awfully good of you to come and take me out for a walk, little sister. My head ached and I knew I ought to get some fresh air, but I hadn't the resolution to start off alone." Betty and Miss Hale, the "faculty" who was an intimate friend of Betty's older sister, had been for a long, brisk tramp through the woods. Now they were swinging home in the frosty December dusk, tired and wind blown, and yet refreshed by the keen air and the vigorous exercise. Betty turned off the path to scuffle through a tempting bed of dry leaves. "I think it's you who are awfully good to let me come for you," she said, stopping to wait for Miss Hale at the end of her run. "I do get so tired sometimes of seeing nobody but girls, and such crowds of them. It's a great relief to have a walk and a talk with you. It seems almost like going home." "But you still like college, don't you, Betty?" "Oh, yes!" assented Betty eagerly. "I just love it." Then she laughed merrily. "You and Nan told me the summer before I came here that all nice girls liked college, so it's hardly polite of you to ask me now if I like it, Ethel." Then Miss Hale laughed in her turn. "And who are your friends this year?" she pursued. "Has your last year's crowd broken up?" "Oh, no! We're all too fond of one another for that. Of course we're in different houses now, some of us, and we've all made lots of new friends down on the campus. Do you know Madeline Ayres?" Miss Hale nodded. "I'm glad you know her, Betty; she's a splendid girl. And how is your protege, Miss Watson, getting on nowadays?" "Beautifully." Betty launched into an enthusiastic account of Eleanor's literary triumph, her softened manner, her sudden popularity, and her improved scholarship. Miss Hale listened attentively. "That's very interesting," she said. "I had no idea that Miss Watson would ever make anything out of her college course. And do you see as much of her as ever, or has she dropped her old friends now that she has so many new ones?" "Oh, dear!" said Betty sadly. "You don't like her one bit, do you, Ethel? I'm so sorry. Nan didn't like her either. Of course I know she has her faults, but I do love her so--" "I'm glad of that," broke in Miss Hale heartily. "She would have left Harding in disgrace last June, if she hadn't had such a loyal friend in you. We can't help people unless we care for them, Betty,--and sometimes not then," added Ethel soberly. "The only way is to take all your opportunities, and then if you fail with one, as I did with Miss Watson, you may succeed with some one else. And it's the finest thing in college, Betty, or in life,--the feeling that you really mean something to somebody. I wish I'd learned to appreciate it sooner." They walked on for a while in silence, Betty wondering if she did "really mean something" to Eleanor or to Helen Adams, Miss Hale harking back to her own college days and questioning whether she and her set had ever spared a thought for anything beyond their own fun and ambitions and successes. She blushed guiltily in the dark, as she remembered how they had snubbed Nan Wales, until Nan actually forced them to recognize her ability, and later to discover that they all wanted her for a friend. "I wonder if Nan's forgotten," she thought. "I wonder if she's told Betty anything about it, and if that's why Betty is so different." Thinking of Nan finally brought Miss Hale out of her reverie. "Little sister," she said, "I mustn't forget to ask you about Nan. Isn't that European trip of hers almost over? She wrote me that she should surely be back in time for Christmas." "Yes," assented Betty, "she will. Her steamer is due on the eighth." "The eighth--why that's to-day," said Miss Hale. "Isn't she going to stop here on her way west?" "I'm afraid not," answered Betty, sadly. "Will is going to meet her in New York, and when I wrote home and wanted them to stop, he wrote back that he didn't propose to come up here to be the only man among a thousand girls. And I suppose Nan will be so tired of traveling around sight-seeing that she won't care about stopping, either." They had reached Miss Hale's boarding-place by this time, and Betty said good-night and hurried back to the campus, full of excitement over Nan's return. "Just think," she told Helen, as she dressed for the Hilton House dance to which Alice Waite had invited her that evening, "Nan's ship came in to-day, and I pretty nearly forgot all about it. Oh, dear! it seems as if I must see her right off, and it's two whole weeks to vacation." Just as she spoke, there was a knock at the door, and a maid held out a telegram. "For Miss Wales," she said. "Oh, it's from Nan," cried Betty, snatching at the bit of yellow paper. "And she's coming to-night," she shrieked so loudly that the whole third floor heard her and flocked out into the corridor to see what in the world was the matter. The message was provokingly short:-- "Meet the 7:10 to-night. "WILL." "Oh, I wonder if he's going to stop too," said Betty, dropping the telegram into the wash-bowl and diving under the bed for her gold chain, which she had tossed there in her excitement. "How long do you suppose they'll stay?" "I don't see that you can tell about that till they come," said Helen, practically. "Are you going to wear that dress to the station to meet them?" Betty stopped short in her frantic efforts to fasten her belt, and stared blankly at her filmy white gown and high-heeled satin slippers. Then she dropped down on the bed and gave a long despairing sigh. "I haven't a bit of sense left," she said. "Tell me what else I've forgotten." "Well, where are they going to sleep?" "Goodness!" ejaculated Betty. "I ought to go out this minute and hunt for rooms." "And what about the Hilton House dance? Oughtn't you to send word if you're not going?" "Gracious!" exclaimed Betty. "Of course I ought. Alice has a card all made out for me." Just then Mary Brooks and Madeline Ayres sauntered in. "Don't worry, child. You've got oceans of time," said Mary, when she had heard the great news. "We'll get you some rooms. I know a place just around the corner. And Helen can go and tell the gentle Alice Waite that you'll be along later in the evening with your family. If you want your brother to fall in love with Harding, you must be sure to have him see that dance. Men always go crazy over girl dances. And if I was offered sufficient inducement," added Mary, demurely, "I might possibly go over to the gallery myself, and help you amuse him--since none of my Hilton House friends have invited me to adorn the floor with my presence." So Mary and Madeline departed in one direction and Helen in another, while an obliging senior who roomed across the hall put Betty's half of the room to rights--Helen's was always in order,--a freshman next door helped Betty into a white linen suit, which is the Harding girl's regular compromise between street and evening dress, and somebody else telephoned to Miss Hale that Nan was coming. And the pleasant thing about it was that everybody took exactly the same interest in the situation as if the guests and the hurry and excitement had belonged to her instead of to Betty Wales. It is thus that things are done at Harding. As a matter of fact, Will did not wait until he had seen the Hilton House dance to become enamored of Harding College. When he and Nan arrived they announced that they had only stopped over for the evening, and should go west on the sleeper that same night. But as they were sitting in the Belden House parlor, while Nan and Betty discussed plans for showing Will as much as possible of the college in one evening, Mary Brooks sauntered through the hall, ostensibly on her way to do an errand at the Westcott House. Of course Betty called her in, and five minutes later Will announced that he couldn't think of not occupying the room which Miss Brooks had been good enough to engage for him; and he and Mary went off to the gymnasium gallery, which is as near as man may come to the joys of a "girl dance" at Harding. There Betty promised to join them as soon as Miss Hale arrived to spend the evening with Nan. And Miss Hale had no sooner appeared than Nan telephoned for her trunks and made a dinner engagement that would keep her until the next night at least. In the morning Will remembered that John Parsons was still at Winsted, and announced that he should spend the following day on an exploring tour over there. And Mr. Parsons insisted that you could not see Winsted properly unless you had some Harding girls along, and as the first snow of the season had just fallen, he organized a sleighing party, with Nan and Miss Hale as chaperons. Then Will gave a return dinner at Cuyler's, which took another day, so that a week sped by before Betty's guests could possibly get away from Harding. "And now," said Betty to Will on the afternoon before the one set for their departure, "I think you'd better stay another week and see me." "Wish we could," said Will absently. "I haven't had time to call on Miss Waite. I've only been snow-shoeing once with Miss Ayres, and I've got to have another skate with Miss Kittredge. She's a stunner on the ice. I say, Betty, you don't suppose she'd get up and go before breakfast, do you? I'd ask her to cut chapel, only I promised to take Miss Brooks." "Indeed!" said Betty, with feigned indignation. "I guess that on the whole it's a good thing you're going to-morrow." "Now why do you say that? Haven't I behaved like a scholar and a gentleman?" demanded Will gaily. "It's your conduct as a brother that I object to," returned Betty severely. "Nobody pays any attention to me. Nan's gone off sleighing with Roberta, and you're only enduring my society until Dorothy King finishes her Lab, and you can go off walking with her. Then I shall be left to my own devices." "To your studies you mean, my child," corrected Will. "Do you think that Nan and I would be so inconsiderate as to come down here and break up the regular routine of your college work?" "How about the regular routine of Dorothy King's work?" inquired Betty saucily. "And Mary Brooks's?" Will took out a card from his pocket and consulted its entries industriously. "I have only one date with Miss Brooks to-morrow, and none at all with Miss King, more's the pity." "It's queer," said Betty reflectively. "You never can prophesy what girls men will take to. Now I should have supposed that you'd like Nita Reese and Eleanor Watson best of all the ones you've met. They're both so pretty." "That's all right," said Will severely. "We men don't go so much by looks as some of you think we do. And anyhow Miss Brooks and Miss King are good-lookers too. Miss Reese is a nice girl, but she's a little too quiet for me, and Miss Watson--let's see, she was at that dance the first night, wasn't she? I didn't see much of her, but I remember she's a stunner." "She's one of my best friends," said Betty, proudly. "Oh, here comes Dorothy," she added, glancing out the window. "I hope you'll have a nice walk." "See here, little sister," began Will, blocking Betty's progress to the door. "You weren't in earnest about my having run off and left you so much?" Betty laughed merrily. "I should think not," she said. "If you must know it, I'm awfully proud of my popular family. I hope you understand that Mary Brooks and Dorothy King don't take the trouble to entertain everybody's brother. Now hurry up, or she'll get way into the house before you can catch her." "Wait a minute," commanded Will. "Have we anything on for to-night?" "Nan has, but you and I haven't." "Then let's eat a nice little dinner at Cuyler's," suggested Will. "Just you and I and one more for variety. You ask any one you like, and I'll call for you at six." "Lovely! Don't you really care whom I ask?" "Pick out a good-looker," called Will, striding off to meet Dorothy. Betty had no trouble in choosing the third person to make up the dinner party. It should be Eleanor Watson, of course. Will would like her--men always did. She had been tired and not in a mood to exert herself the night of the Hilton House dance; and one thing or another had interfered with her joining in any of the festivities since. "But she'll be all ready for a celebration to-day, with her story just out in the 'Argus,'" reflected Betty, and started at once for the Hilton House. Eleanor was curled up in her easy chair by the window, poring over a mass of type-written sheets. "Studying my part for a little play we're giving next Saturday night," she announced gaily, as Betty came in. "So remember, you're not to stay long." "I don't believe there's anything you can't do, Eleanor," declared Betty, admiringly. "I'm awfully proud of knowing such a star. I read your story in the 'Argus' the first thing after lunch, and I thought it was perfectly splendid." "Did you?" said Eleanor, carelessly. "Well, I suppose it must be good for something, to have so much said about it; but I for one am thoroughly tired of it. I'm going to try to act so well on Saturday that people will have something else to talk to me about." "You will," said Betty, with decision. "You made a splendid leading lady last year in Sherlock Holmes, and you didn't try at all then. Well," she added quickly, "you said I mustn't stay long, so I must hurry and tell you what I came for. I want you to have dinner with Will and me to-night at Cuyler's." "That's very good of you," said Eleanor formally, "and I'm sorry that I can't come. But it's quite impossible." "Oh dear!" There was nothing perfunctory about Betty's regret. "Couldn't you learn your part this evening? It won't take you any longer to eat at Cuyler's than it would here, and you can come right back." "Oh, it's not the play," said Eleanor. "I could manage that; but Beatrice Egerton is going to be here for dinner." "Oh, of course if you've asked any one to dinner--" began Betty. "No," broke in Eleanor, impatiently, "I haven't asked her, but Lil Day has. She's invited me to sit with them, and she'd be awfully vexed if I ran off. You know," went on Eleanor, impressively, "Beatrice Egerton is the most prominent girl in the senior class." "Oh!" said Betty, blankly. "And I barely know her," continued Eleanor, "so this is my opportunity, you see. Lil thinks she'll like me. She's very influential, and she doesn't seem to have any particular friends in our class. Do you know her at all?" Betty shook her head. "But you're so solid with Dorothy King," said Eleanor. "She's just about as prominent as Bess Egerton. We have to look out for those things, don't we, Betty?" "If you mean," began Betty, slowly, "that I like Dorothy King because she's an influential senior, why, please never think so again, Eleanor. I like her just as I like any one else, because she's so dear and sweet and such a fine, all-around girl." Eleanor laughed scornfully. "Oh, of course," she said, "but you have your little plans, I suppose, like all the rest of the world. Anyhow, if you haven't, I have; and I put future honors ahead of present bliss, so I can't go with you to Cuyler's. Please tell your brother that I'm very sorry." "Yes," said Betty. "He will be sorry, too. Good-bye, Eleanor." It seemed a long walk back to the Belden House. The snow had turned to slush, and Betty sank into it at every step. The raw wind blew her hair into her eyes. The world looked dull and uninteresting all of a sudden. When she reached home, Helen was getting ready for gym. "Helen Chase Adams," began Betty, savagely. "Do you see any use in ambition?" "Why, yes," gasped Helen. "What?" demanded Betty. "Why--it helps you to get things," ventured Helen. "May be they're not worth getting," snapped Betty. "Well, isn't it better to try to get foolish things than just to sit around and do nothing?" "No," answered Betty with emphasis. "People who just sit around and do nothing, as you call it, have friends and like them, and aren't all the time thinking what they can get out of them." "I'm sorry, but I have to go to gym," said Helen. "I don't think ambitious people always depend on their friends." Left to herself, Betty came to a more judicial state of mind. "I suppose," she said to the green lizard, "I suppose I'm the kind that just sits around and does nothing. I suppose we're irritating too. It makes Helen mad when I write my papers any old way, while she's toiling along, trying to do her best. And she makes me cross by fussing so. She has one kind of ambition and Eleanor has another. I haven't any, and I suppose they both wish I'd have some kind. Oh, dear! I don't believe Madeline Ayres is ambitious either, and Ethel Hale called her a splendid girl. I'll go and ask her to come to dinner with us." CHAPTER VII ON TO MIDYEARS Exactly a week after Nan and Will left Harding, Betty herself was speeding west, with Roberta Lewis as traveling companion. Nan had discovered that Roberta's father was in California, and that she was planning to spend her Christmas vacation in solitary state at Mrs. Chapin's, without letting even her adored Mary Brooks know how matters stood. But Nan's arguments, backed by Betty's powers of persuasion, were irresistible; and Roberta finally consented to come to Cleveland instead. It was amusing, and a little pathetic too, to watch the shy Roberta expand in the genial, happy-go-lucky atmosphere of the Wales household. A lonely, motherless child brought up by a father who loved her dearly, treated her as an equal, and was too absorbed in his own affairs to realize that she needed any companionship but his own, she had been absolutely swept off her feet by the rush of young life at Harding. The only close friend she had made there was Mary Brooks; and, though Mary fully reciprocated Roberta's fondness for her, she was a person of so many ideas and interests that Roberta was necessarily left a good deal to herself. During her first year, the sociable atmosphere of the Chapin house had helped to break down her reserve and bring her, in spite of herself, into touch with the college world. But now, in a house full of noisy, rollicking freshmen, who thought her queer and "stuck-up," she was bitterly unhappy. So she shut herself in with her books and her thoughts, wondered whether being on the campus would really make any difference in her feelings about college, and stayed on only because of her devotion to Mary and her unwillingness to disappoint her father, who was very proud of "my daughter at Harding." Roberta loved children, and she and the smallest sister instantly became fast friends. Will frightened her dreadfully at first, but before the week was out she found herself chatting with him just as familiarly as she did with her Boston cousin, who was the only young man she knew well. And after she had helped Mrs. Wales to trim the smallest sister's Christmas tree, and been down town with Mr. Wales to pick out some books for him to give Nan,--"Because you and Nan seem to be cut out of the same piece of cloth, you see," explained Mr. Wales genially,--Roberta felt exactly like one of the family, and hoarded the days, and then the hours, that remained of this blissful vacation. "It seems as if I couldn't go back," she told Betty, when the good-byes had all been said, and the long train was rumbling through the darkness toward Harding. "I'm sorry to leave too," said Betty dreamily. "It's been a jolly old vacation. But think how we should feel if we couldn't go back at all--if the family fortune was swept away all of a sudden, or if we were sick or anything, and had to drop out of dear old 19--." "Yes," said Roberta briefly. Betty looked at her curiously. "Don't you like college, Roberta?" she asked. "Betty, I can't bear it," declared Roberta in an unwonted burst of confidence. "I stay on because I hate people who give things up just because they don't like doing them. But it seems sometimes as if I couldn't stand it much longer." "Too bad you didn't get on the campus. Perhaps you will this term." suggested Betty hopefully, "and then I know you'll fall absolutely in love with college." "I don't believe that will make a bit of difference, and anyway Miss Stuart said I hadn't the least chance of getting on this year." "Then," returned Betty cheerfully, "you'll just have to make the best of it where you are. Some of the Chapin house freshmen are dear. I love that cunning little Sara Westervelt." "Isn't she pretty?" Roberta's drawl was almost enthusiastic. "But she never speaks to me," she added sadly. "Speak to her," said Betty promptly. "You probably frighten her to death, and freeze her all up. Treat her as you did the smallest sister." Roberta laughed merrily. "It's funny, isn't it, that I can get on with children and most older people, but not at all with those of my own age." "Oh, you only need practice," said Betty easily. "Go at it just as you go at your chemistry problems. Figure out what those freshmen like and give it to them. Have a party and do the Jabberwock for them. They'd be your slaves for life." "Oh, I couldn't," protested Roberta. "It would seem so like showing off." "Don't think about yourself; think about them. And now," added Betty yawning, "as we were up till two last night, I think we'd better go to bed, don't you?" "Yes," said Roberta, "and--and thank you for telling me that I'm offish, Betty. Could you come to the Jabberwock party Monday night, if I should decide to have it?" Though Rachel was off the campus, her room was far and away the most popular meeting place for the Chapin house crowd. Perhaps it was because the quiet of the little white house round the corner was a relief after the noisy bustle of the big campus dormitories. But besides, there was something about Rachel that made her quite indispensable to all gatherings of the clan. Katherine was fun when you were in the mood for her; Roberta, if she was in the mood for you. Betty was always fascinating, always responsive, but in many ways she was only a pretty child. Helen and Eleanor, unlike in almost everything else, were at one in being self-centred. Rachel was as jolly as Katherine, as sympathetic as Betty, and far more mature than either of her friends. As Katherine put it, "you could always bank on Rachel to know what was what." So it was no unusual thing to find two or three of the "old guard" as Rachel dubbed them, and perhaps two or three outsiders as well, gathered in her tiny room, in the dark of the afternoon, talking over the happenings of the day and drinking tea out of the cups which were the pride of Rachel's heart, because they were all pretty and none of them had cost more than ten cents. One snowy afternoon in January Betty walked home with Rachel from their four o'clock class in history. "Come in, children" called a merry voice, as they opened Rachel's door. "Take off your things and make yourselves at home. The tea will be ready in about five minutes." "Hello, Katherine," said Betty, cheerfully, tossing her note-book on the bed and shaking the snow off her fuzzy gray tam. "Isn't it nice to come in and find the duties of hostess taken off your shoulders in this pleasant fashion!" laughed Rachel. "I hope you've washed the cups," she added, settling herself cozily on the window seat. "They haven't been dusted for three weeks." "Indeed I haven't washed them," answered Katherine loftily. "I'm the hostess. You can be guest, and Betty can be dish-washer." "Not unless I can wiggle the tea-ball afterward," announced Betty firmly. Katherine examined a blue and white cup critically. "I think you must be mistaken, Rachel," she said. "These cups don't need washing. They're perfectly clean, but I'll dust them off if you insist." Then there was a grand scramble, in the course of which Betty captured the tea-ball and the lemons, and Katherine the teakettle, while Rachel secured two cups and retired from the scene of action to wash them for Betty and herself. Finally Katherine agreed that Betty might "wiggle the tea-ball" provided that she--Katherine--should be allowed two pieces of lemon in every cup; and the three lively damsels settled down into a sedate group of tea-drinkers. "Do you know, girls," said Katherine, after they had compared programs for midyears, and each decided sadly that her particular arrangement of examinations was a great deal more onerous than the schedules of her friends,--"Do you know, I was just beginning to like Eleanor Watson, but I wash my hands of her now." "Why? What's she done lately?" inquired Rachel. "Oh, she hasn't done anything in particular," said Katherine. "It's her manner that I object to. It was bad enough last year, but now--" Katherine's gesture suggested indescribable insolence. Betty said nothing. She was thinking of her last interview with Eleanor, whom she had not seen for more than a casual moment since the day of Will's dinner, and wondering whether after all Ethel Hale was right about her, and she was wrong. It did seem amazingly as if Eleanor was giving up her old friends for the new ones. "But Katherine," began Rachel soothingly, "you must remember that her rather dropping us now doesn't really mean much. We should never have known her at all if we hadn't happened to be in the house with her last year. It was only chance that threw us together, so there really isn't any reason why she should keep up the acquaintance unless she wants to." "Oh, no, not the slightest reason," agreed Katherine, wrathfully. "And on the same principle let us all proceed to cut Helen Chase Adams. She isn't exactly our kind. We should never have known her if we hadn't happened to be in the house with her last year. So let's drop her." "Oh, you silly child," laughed Rachel. "Of course I don't approve of Eleanor Watson's way of doing things. I only wanted to explain what is probably her point of view. I can understand it, but it doesn't follow that I'm going to adopt it." "I should hope not," snorted Katherine. "I met my lady this afternoon at Cuyler's. I was buying molasses candy for this function--by the way, I forgot to pass it around. Do have some. And she was in there with that high and mighty senior, Beatrice Egerton, ordering a dinner for to-morrow night. I had on my green sweater and an old skirt, and I don't suppose I looked exactly like a Fifth Avenue swell. But that didn't matter; the lady Eleanor didn't see me." Rachel laughed merrily. "So that was it," she said. "I knew there was something personal behind your wrath, and I was waiting for it to come out. Never mind, K.; Betty and I won't cut you, even in your green sweater." "That's good of you," said Katherine, spearing a thick slice of lemon for her third cup. "Seriously though, my green sweater aside, I do hate such snobbishness." "But Eleanor Watson isn't exactly a snob," objected Rachel. "There's Dora Carlson." "Dora Carlson!" repeated Katherine, scornfully. "You don't mean that she's taken you in with that, Rachel? Why, it's nothing but the most transparent sort of grand-stand play. I suppose the lady Eleanor had more sense than to think that the Dora Carlson episode would take in any one." Betty had been sitting quietly in her corner of the window seat, not taking any part in the discussion, because there was nothing that she cared to say on either side of it. Now she leaned forward suddenly. "Oh, Katherine, please don't say that," she begged. "Indeed it isn't so! I know--Eleanor told me herself that she is awfully fond of Dora Carlson,-- that she appreciates the way Dora feels toward her, and means to be worthy of it if she possibly can." "Then I'm sure I beg her pardon," said Katherine heartily. "Only--when did she tell you that, Betty?" "Oh, back in the fall, just a little while after the sophomore reception." "I thought so, and I don't doubt that she meant it when she said it. But she's completely changed since then. Don't you remember how we used to count on her for all our little reunions? Why, she was quite one of the old guard for a month or two. But ever since that wonderful story of hers came out in the 'Argus,' she's gone in for the prominent sophomore act with such a vengeance--" Katherine stopped suddenly, noticing Betty's distressed expression. "Oh, well," she said, "there's no use going over it again. I suppose you and Rachel are right, and I'm wrong." "Only you do resent the injustice done your green sweater," said Rachel, hoping to close the discussion with a laugh. But Katherine was in deadly earnest. "I don't care how the lady Eleanor treats me and my green sweater," she said, "but there are some people who've done too much for her--Well, what I mean is, I hope she'll never go back on her real friends," she finished lamely. "Well, if one prominent sophomore snubs us, we can always comfort ourselves with the thought that another is going to love us to the end," said Rachel, reaching over a mound of pillows to squeeze Betty's hand. "Did you know you're a prominent sophomore, Betty?" "I'm not," said Betty, indignantly. "I wouldn't be such a thing for the world. I hate the word prominent, the way we use it here." Katherine exchanged rapid glances with Rachel. "Something personal behind that, too," she reflected. "If the lady Eleanor dares to go back on Betty, I shall start out after her scalp." So it was fortunate that Betty and Eleanor did not meet on their respective homeward ways until Katherine was well inside the Westcott House, out of hearing of their colloquy. Between the darkness and the flying snow the two girls were close together before they recognized each other. Then Eleanor was hurrying on with some commonplace about "the beastly weather," when Betty stopped her. "We were just talking about you," she said, "Rachel and Katherine and I, over in Rachel's room, wondering why you never meet with the old guard any more." "Why, I'm busy," said Eleanor, shortly. "Didn't you know that it's less than a week to midyears?" "But all this term--" protested Betty, wishing she had said nothing, yet reluctant now to let the opportunity slip through her hands. "Well, to tell the truth," broke in Eleanor, impatiently, "our interests are different, Betty,--they have been from the first. You like to be friends with everybody. I like to pick and choose. I don't really care anything about the rest of the Chapin house girls, and I can't see you without seeing them too." "But this fall," began Betty. "Well--the truth is this fall--" said Eleanor, fiercely, "this fall I forgot who I was and what I was. Now I've come to my senses again." And without giving Betty time to reply she swept off into the darkness. Betty wasn't very hungry for dinner. As soon as possible she slipped out of the noisy dining-room, up to the silence of the deserted third floor. "What I can't understand," she told the green lizard, "is the way her voice sounded. It certainly broke just as if she was trying not to cry. Now, why should that be? Is she sorry to have come to her senses, I wonder?" The green lizard had no suggestions to offer, so Betty put on her new kimono with butterflies in the border and a bewitching pink sash--it was real Japanese and the envy of all her friends--and prepared to spend the evening cramming for her history exam, with Nita Reese. CHAPTER VIII THE "FIRST FOUR" Midyears were safely over, and schedules for the new term more or less satisfactorily arranged. It was Saturday night--the gayest in all the week--and up on the fourth floor of the Belden House Nita Reese was giving a birthday spread. Until she came to Harding, Nita's birthday had always been in August. At the beginning of her sophomore year she announced that she had changed it to February ninth. "I told the family," explained Nita, "that just because I happened to be born in August they needn't think they could get out of sending me a birthday box. Father wanted to know if that let him off from giving me a sailing party next August, and I said that I'd leave it to him. I knew he wouldn't miss that sailing party for anything." Nita disappeared behind a screen, where, on the wash-stand, in lieu of a buffet, the good things from the birthday box were arranged on tin-box covers and wooden plates. There were nine china plates for the twelve guests, and a cup and a sherbet glass apiece, which is an abundance for any three-course supper, however elaborate. "Girls, do you realize what's happening to-night?" said Nita, emerging from behind the screen with a plate of sandwiches in one hand and a tray of cake in the other. "Here, Betty Wales, have some cake. Or are you still on salad and sandwiches?" "I'm still on salad and sandwiches, but I do want that big piece of chocolate cake before Madeline Ay--Oh, Madeline, aren't you ashamed? You've made me spill coffee on Nita's Bagdad." "I can't help that," said Madeline Ayres, composedly. "You were implying that I'm a pig. I'm not; I'm only devoted to chocolate." "What's happening to-night, Nita?" demanded Bob, popping up like a Jack- in-the-box from behind Madeline's back. "There!" exclaimed Betty, resignedly. "I've spilled it again! Where have you been, Bob?" "Oh, I've just been resting back there between the courses," said Bob, edging herself to the front of the couch and beginning on the nearest dish of strawberry ice. (The strawberry ice was not, strictly speaking, a part of the birthday box.) "I feel quite hungry again now. What's to- night, Nita?" "Why, society elections, of course, goosie," answered Christy Mason from the window where she was cooling a pan of fudge. "Girls, this fudge is going to be elegant and creamy. Reach me the marsh-mallows, Babe, that's a dear. Shall I make it all over marsh-mallows, Nita?" "Yes!" chorused the occupants of the couch, vociferously. "To hear the animals roar, you wouldn't think they'd been eating steadily for an hour, would you, Nita?" laughed Christy, sticking in the marsh- mallows in neat, even rows, like white tents pitched across the creamy brown field of chocolate. "It's not that we're hungry, Nita, dear, but we all like it better that way, because it's newer," explained Alice Waite, who never took a joke and couldn't bear to have Nita's feelings hurt. "Hungry!" groaned Rachel, from her corner. "I don't believe I shall ever be hungry again. Who do you suppose will go in tonight?" "Go in where, Rachel?" asked Bob, dropping back again on the pillows behind Madeline and Betty. "Aren't you a sweet little innocent, Bob Parker?" mocked Babe, derisively. "As if you hadn't betted me six strawberry ices and three dinners at Cuyler's that you go into the Dramatic Club to-night, your ownself." "When I get you alone," began Bob, wrathfully. Then her tone changed instantly to one of honeyed sweetness. "No," she said, "you're such an artistic prevaricator that I'll give you one dinner at Cuyler's as your well-earned reward." Christy Mason dropped her pan of fudge, seized a candle from the chiffonier and held it close to Bob's prostrate form. "Girls," she shrieked, "it's true. Bob's blushing. She hasn't blushed since the president spoke to her about spilling salad all over the night watchman." Then there was a scene of wild commotion. Shouts and laughter drowned out Bob's angry protests, until in despair she turned her attention to Babe, who took refuge on the fire-escape and refused to come further in than the window-seat even when order was partially restored. "Girls," shouted Katherine Kittredge, as soon as she could make herself heard, "let's drink to the success of Bob's bet!" There were clamorous demands for hot coffee, and then the toast was drunk standing, amid riotous enthusiasm. "Speech!" called somebody. "Speech! Speech!" chorused everybody. "I never bet any such thing," responded Bob, sulkily. "You all know I didn't--and if I did, it was in fun." "Never mind, Bob," said Nita, consolingly. "We won't tell any of the Dramatic Club girls about it. We're all sophomores here, but Madeline Ayres, and she's as good as a sophomore; so don't worry. You can trust us." "What I object to," put in Katherine Kittredge, solemnly, "is the principle of the thing. It's not true sport to bet on a certainty, Bob. You know that you're sure to go in to-night, and it's a mean trick to deprive Babe of her hard-won earnings." This sally was greeted with shrieks of laughter, for it was a standing joke with 19-- that Babe was supposed by her adoring mother to be keeping a French maid at Harding. In October of her freshman year she had packed the maid off to New York and engaged Emily Davis to do her mending. But the maid's board and wages were paid unquestioningly by her mother, who lamented every vacation that she could get no such excellent seamstresses as her daughter was always able to find at Harding. Meanwhile Babe rented a riding horse by the term, reveled in dinners at Cuyler's, and stilled her conscience with the thought that Emily Davis needed the money more than any maid. "I wish," said Madeline Ayres, when the tumult had subsided again, "that you'd explain something to a poor, benighted little freshman. There's just one thing about Harding that I don't understand. Why should Bob mind having you know that she hopes she's going into the Dramatic Club?" "Suppose she doesn't go?" suggested Christy. "Of course there's always a chance that she won't." "Seems so nervy, anyhow," muttered Bob, who was still in the sulks. "I don't see why," persisted Madeline. "When you all say that she's perfectly certain to go in. But in general, I mean, why will you never admit that you want a certain thing, or hope to get a certain thing?" "It is funny, isn't it?" said Rachel. "Wild horses couldn't drag it out of any junior that she hopes for a place on the 'Argus' board, or the Senior Play committee." "Nor out of any sophomore that she hopes to make a society," added Christy Mason. "I suppose," said Babbie, "that it's because nothing is competitive here. You just take what people think you ought to have. You stand or fall by public opinion, and of course you are never sure how it will gauge you." "College men aren't that way," said Katherine. "They talk about such things, and discuss their chances and agree to help one another along where they can. And if they lose they never seem to care; they joke about it." "But we never admit we've lost, because we never admit we were trying for anything," put in Nita. "I like the men's way best then," said Madeline decidedly. "Let's try it," suggested Christy. "Girls, who of us here do you think will make Dramatic Club in the first two elections?" There was an awkward silence, then a general laugh. "It won't work, you see," said Christy. "Well, of those who aren't here, Marion Lustig will go in to-night of course,--she's our bright particular literary star. And what do you think about Eleanor Watson?" "Wouldn't she be more likely to go into the Clio Club next week?" asked Nita Reese. "Oh, no," objected Christy. "Didn't you know that Beatrice Egerton is rushing her? And she's the president of the Dramatic Club." "I don't care," insisted Nita. "I think Eleanor Watson is more the Clio Club kind." "That's another thing I want to know about," broke in Madeline Ayres. "What is the Clio Club kind? You say the Dramatic Club isn't particularly dramatic nowadays, but just amusing and literary, and the Clio Club is the same. Why aren't the members the same sort too?" "They're not, exactly," answered Christy. "I can't describe the difference, but you'll notice it by the time you're a sophomore. The Clio girls--oh, they have more executive ability. They're the kind that know how to run things--all-around, capable, splendid girls. The Dramatic Club is more for the stunty, talented, artistic sort." "But Dorothy King is vice-president of the Dramatic Club," objected Betty. "She's the exception." "Well, I still think," insisted Christy, "that which society a girl goes into simply depends on where her friends are. Both societies want executive ability, and they both want people who can write and act and sing and do parlor stunts. I don't know Eleanor Watson very well, but I have an idea that after her story in the 'Argus' the Dramatic Club will be afraid of losing her to Clio, and so they'll take her to-night." "Oh, I hope so," said Betty Wales under her breath to Madeline. Later in the evening she told Helen all about the spread. "It was so exciting," she began. "How can a spread be exciting?" demanded Helen, sceptically. "Oh, in lots of ways," responded Betty. "There's excitement about whether the fudge will be done in time, and whether it will be good, and who's going to be there, and how much of a box it is. But the most excitement to-night was about society elections." "Were they to-night?" "Dramatic Club's was. It has first choice of the sophomores this year, you know, and Clio Club has second; and we were guessing who would go in to-night among the first four." "Well, you know now, don't you?" "Know? I should think not," said Betty impressively. "Helen Chase Adams, haven't you noticed that society elections aren't announced till the next Monday morning? Don't you remember last year how all that crowd of girls came up to Mrs. Chapin's after Mary Brooks, and she'd gone down-town to breakfast with Roberta, and was going to cut chapel; and how we all rushed down after her, and how I stayed at the Main Street corner, in case she'd left Cuyler's before the girls got there and come up the back way? And she did just that, and what a time I had keeping her till the girls got back!" Betty laughed heartily at the recollection. "I didn't go down, but I do remember about it," admitted Helen. "Do they always do it that way?" "Always, only the four girls who go into each society first--they elect only four at a time, you know--have about sixty times as much fuss made over them as the ones who go in later." "Then you'd better put your part of the room in order to-morrow," said Helen significantly, glancing at the disorderly pile of books and papers on Betty's desk, and at the pictures which she had brought back at Christmas time and which still lay on the floor beside her couch, waiting for her to find time to hang them. Betty's glance followed Helen's to the desk and down to the floor. "I'll hang those pictures this minute," she said, jumping up and rummaging energetically through her desk drawer. "That is, if I can borrow some picture wire" she added. "I remember now that mine is all gone. That's why I've left them on the floor so long. But somebody must have some." At the door she turned back suddenly. "But, Helen," she said, "I'm not fixing up for society elections. I shan't go in this time--not for a long while, if I ever do. And Helen--you know the girls never talk about going in themselves." "All right," said Helen submissively. "Who do you think was taken in to-night?" "Oh, the girls with one big talent. Didn't I tell you last year that every Harding girl has to find out her one talent before she can amount to anything? We think Bob will go in; she can do such beautiful pantomimes, and she's such a prod. and such jolly fun too. Then Marion Lustig because of her writing. Writing counts more than anything else, and so I'm hoping for Eleanor Watson. I can't even guess who the fourth one will be." All day Sunday Mary Brooks and the other Dramatic Club juniors and seniors in the Belden House went about wearing a tantalizing, don't-you- wish-you-knew air, and after dinner when the whole house assembled in the parlors as usual for coffee and music, they gathered in mysterious little groups, which instantly dissolved at the approach of curious sophomores. It seemed to Betty and Nita, interested on account of Eleanor and Bob, that Monday morning would never come. But it did dawn at last, and after an unconscionable delay--for the announcement committee went up to Marion Lustig's first, and she boarded away off on the edge of the meadows, and then to Emily Davis's, which was half a mile from the college in quite another direction--the committee and its escort finally reached the campus, and, gaining recruits at every step, made its picturesque and musical way to the Westcott House after Bob. At this point Betty and Nita joined it, and they had the exquisite pleasure of seeing Bob blush so red that there was no need for a candle this time, then turn very white, and clinging to the chairman's arm insist that there must be some blunder--it couldn't be she that they wanted. Finally, assured that the honor had indeed fallen to her, she broke into a war- whoop which shook the house to its foundation and brought the matron on the run to her door. "Now Mrs. Alison, aren't you proud of your holy terror?" cried Bob in tremulous, happy tones, holding out her tie with the Dramatic Club pin on it. And in spite of the lateness of the hour and the wild desire of the procession to know where it was going next, Mrs. Alison's delight over the honor done her "holy terror" was well worth waiting to see. And then--Betty squeezed Nita's hand till it ached. No--yes--they were going to the Hilton! They weren't stopping on the second floor. Then it must--oh, it must be Eleanor! And it was. Margaret Payson was chairman of the announcement committee, but almost before she could give Eleanor her note of invitation to the society Beatrice Egerton had pressed forward and fastened her pin on Eleanor's shirtwaist. After seeing Bob's frenzied excitement it was amusing to watch Eleanor Watson. She was perfectly composed. "Just as if she'd been expecting it," said little Alice Waite, who had joined the procession as it passed through her corridor. "But she was pleased--I never saw her so pleased before--and didn't it make her look lovely!" As soon as the pin was safely fastened and the note read, there was another tumult of congratulations. Then Beatrice Egerton took off the great bunch of violets she was wearing,--"just till I could bring them to you," she explained,--and carried Eleanor off to sit among the seniors at chapel. Just opposite them was Emily Davis, with Dorothy King. Emily was also wearing violets, and her plain face was almost pretty, it was so full of happiness. "Just to think," she whispered to Dorothy, "that you picked out me, when you could have any one in 19--. I can't realize it!" She glanced at her shabby coat, made over from Babe's discarded golf cape, and then at Eleanor Watson's irreproachable blue walking suit and braided toque to match. "Here all girls are really created free and equal, aren't they, Miss King?" "Of course. Don't be silly," said Dorothy, with a queer little catch in her voice. Dorothy King was not at all sentimental, but the splendidly democratic spirit of her college sometimes brought a lump into her throat. Only once that morning did the radiant smiles leave Eleanor Watson's lovely face. That was when Katherine Kittredge, on the way out of chapel, rallied her about her famous theme. "Now aren't you glad Miss Raymond got up early that morning?" she said. It was the first time that any one had referred to the story in connection with her election to the Dramatic Club. Eleanor frowned and turned to Beatrice Egerton, who was standing close beside her. "Bess," she said, pouting, "did you run me in because of that footless little story? Wasn't it for myself that you wanted me? Do say that it was." Miss Egerton smiled her lazy, enigmatical smile, which her admirers considered the secret of her tremendous popularity. "Of course we wanted you for yourself," she said, "but that footless little story, as you call it, is a rather important asset. We expect you to keep on writing footless little stories, remember." "How tiresome!" said Eleanor, with a shrug of her shoulders. "That's the bother of doing anything up here. What you do once, you are expected to repeat indefinitely. Now my method is to do one thing as well as I can, and then go on to something else." "Just do them all as well as you did the story, and we shan't complain," said Miss Egerton. "And now, Eleanor, I must be off to Psychology One. Do you suppose anybody will give a dinner for you to-night?" "Yes, Miss Egerton," called Jean Eastman, appearing around the corner. "Kate and I are giving one, and we want you to come, of course. And Eleanor," she went on, after Miss Egerton had left them, "we want you to answer to a toast--'My Story and How I Wrote It.' Now be just as clever and amusing as you can. I thought I wouldn't spring it on you--" "Jean," Eleanor broke in suddenly, "I won't answer to anything of the sort. And if you have that story mentioned--even mentioned, remember--to- night, I shall get up and leave. Give me your word that I shan't hear of it in any way,--or give up the dinner." Jean stared in astonishment. "Why certainly, Eleanor," she said, "but I thought you had given up being so absurd. Is there any one in particular that you want asked tonight?" "Dora Carlson," flashed Eleanor, and hurried off, murmuring something about a nine o'clock recitation at the other end of the main building. Jean looked after her for a moment, her mouth twisted into a funny grimace, and then pursued her way to the college library. At the door she met Betty Wales. "Your face is one big smile," she said. "Of course," laughed Betty. "Isn't it perfectly splendid about Eleanor and Emily?" Jean grinned cheerfully. "Considering last year I thought it was more or less amusing to see the two of them sitting up there together on the front row at chapel. I wonder if Eleanor remembers any of the remarks she used to let drop about the genius of 19--. See here, Betty," she added quickly, "have you any idea why Eleanor is so touchy about that story? She won't even have it toasted tonight at the supper." "No," said Betty. "I asked her, but she didn't tell me anything except that she didn't care for it." "Well, most people would begin to care for it a little, after it had pulled them into the Dramatic Club among the first four," said Jean, opening the library door and tiptoeing over to the anthropological alcove. There she spent the hour, busily engaged in making out a new list of toasts, that should avoid all mention of the objectionable story. "But they must have some point," reflected Jean, sadly, as she ran her pen through "My Story and How I Wrote It," and "The Rewards of Literature" and "Our Rising Young Novelist," which she had intended for herself and Kate Denise. "Bother Eleanor's tantrums!" muttered Jean, as the ten o'clock gong rang, and she picked up her books and hurried off to recite a French lesson that, because of Eleanor's "tantrums," she had not learned. And for Betty Wales Eleanor's election to the Dramatic Club also brought disappointment. She had hoped that once Eleanor's ambition was gratified and all her hard work and careful planning rewarded, the anxious lines would leave her face and the sweeter, softer expression that she had worn in September would come back. But though Eleanor professed the greatest pleasure in the election, it did not seem to make her any less haughty or capricious, or any better content with life. She still snubbed or patronized her train of adoring freshmen by turns, according to her mood. She was still a devoted admirer of Beatrice Egerton, and a member of her very exclusive set. She received Betty's congratulations just as cordially as she had every one's else,--it was one of Beatrice's principles to treat everybody well "up to a certain point,"--but she did not come to the third floor of the Belden House except on errands. CHAPTER IX THE COMPLICATIONS OF LIFE By the middle of February basket-ball practice was in full swing again. The class teams had not yet been chosen, but every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon l9--'s last year's "regulars" and "subs" met in the gymnasium to play exciting matches. Of course there were some changes in the make- up of the teams. Two of the "sub" centres and a "regular" home had left college; the guard who sprained her ankle in the great game of the year before and whose place Katherine Kittredge had taken in the second half, was not allowed to risk another such injury; and one or two other players had lost interest in basket-ball and were devoting their energies to something else. So there was a chance for outsiders, and Betty Wales, who had almost "made" the freshman sub-team, was one of the new girls invited to play in the practice matches. Helen Adams had cut basket-ball all her freshman year, because Miss Andrews never called the roll on basket-ball days. Now she could not get enough of it, nor of regular gym. On Wednesday and Saturday afternoons there were no classes, so she used to put on her gym. suit and go over to watch the teams. And if some player failed to appear or was late in arriving, T. Reed or Betty would suggest calling Helen down to take the absentee's place. Helen was painfully awkward and not very strong, but she had acquired T. Reed's habit of slipping under the outstretched arms of the enemy and T. Reed's fashion of setting her teeth and getting the ball in spite of opposition; and some of her plays were remarkably effective. "I believe," Betty said to her one day, as they lay side by side in a sunny spot on the gym. floor, resting between the halves, "I believe, if you'd begun last year when the rest of us did, you might have been on one of the teams yourself." Helen laughed a pleased little laugh. "Oh, no!" she said. "But I love to play with you sometimes, and I love to watch Theresa." "Isn't she a wonder?" said Betty dreamily. "Do you remember that game, Helen? Wasn't it the most exciting thing? And this year it will be our turn to win. Bob Parker has seen the picked freshman teams play, and she thinks they haven't a chance against us." "I hope you can be on the sub-team, Betty," said Helen. "And I hope you can write your song for 19-- to sing to its team," returned Betty gaily. "You haven't forgotten about our talk the day of the game, have you, Helen?" "Oh, no!" said Helen, quickly. Not for worlds would she have let Betty know how much she counted on that song. She had written another little verse for her theme class, and that very morning it had come back with "Good work--charming lilt," scrawled across the margin. So Helen had high hopes for the song. Just then the door of the gym. opened, and Lucy Merrifield, the president of 19--, came in. "Hello, Lucy," chorused the group of sprawling figures nearest the door. "You're just in time to see us do up the regular team," called Elizabeth West, who captained the "subs." "Thank you," returned Lucy, "but I can't stay to see you do any such unbecoming thing. I came on an errand to Betty Wales. Isn't she here?" "Here I am," called Betty, scrambling upright and brushing the hair out of her eyes. "I came to tell you that you've been appointed to the Students' Commission, to serve until Christy Mason gets back," explained Lucy. "Till Christy gets back?" repeated Betty in bewilderment. "Yes, she's been called home very suddenly. Her mother is ill, and Christy is going to keep house and see to the children. She'll be away a month anyhow and perhaps all this term. And as there are a lot of important matters coming up just now, we decided that we would better appoint a substitute on the commission." "I'm afraid I can't be much help," began Betty, doubtfully. "Oh, yes, you can," declared Lucy. "Come to the meeting to-morrow at two, and we'll give you plenty to help about." "Time's up," called the captain of the regulars, and Lucy ran for the door, leaving Betty in a state of pleased excitement. Dorothy King was president of her class this year, and therefore also president of the Students' Commission. Marion Lawrence was a representative from the junior class. To be even a temporary member of so august an assembly seemed to Betty a very great privilege. She was so busy wondering who had chosen her,--whether Lucy or the whole commission,--and what to-morrow's meeting would be like, that she deliberately threw the ball twice toward the wrong basket and never discovered her mistake until Elizabeth West begged her please to "come to" and help her own side a little just for variety. On the way home Betty met Miss Ferris. "Come and have tea with me, little girl," she said. "Could I, like this?" asked Betty wistfully, pulling back her rain-coat to show her gym. suit and the tightly braided pig-tails tucked inside. Miss Ferris laughed. "I shouldn't mind, but some one else might drop in. It takes me ten minutes to make tea. Now run!" Exactly nine minutes and a half later. Betty, looking very slender and stately in a clinging blue gown and a big plumed hat, her cheeks pink with excitement and her hair blown into fascinating ringlets from her brisk run across the campus, knocked timidly on Miss Ferris's door. "Come in," called Miss Ferris. "You're early. The water hasn't boiled." "It used to take me half an hour to dress, at the very fastest," said Betty, slipping into a low chair by the fire, where she could watch Miss Ferris making tea in a fat little silver pot, and pouring it into cups so thin and beautiful that Betty hardly dared touch hers, and breathed a deep sigh of relief when it was safely emptied and out of her hands. Just as she was leaving, she told Miss Ferris about her appointment to the Students' Commission. "Well," said Miss Ferris, "that won't be new work for you. You were an ex-officio member last year." Betty looked puzzled. "What you did for Miss Watson was Students' Commission work," explained Miss Ferris. "And judging by the position Miss Watson seems to be taking this year, I should call it very good work indeed." [Illustration: "WELL," SAID MISS FERRIS, "THAT WON'T BE NEW WORK"] "But you did it, not I," protested Betty. "I did my part, you did yours," corrected Miss Ferris. "To be successful nowadays, you know, you must not only work yourself, but you must get other people to work for you." "Yes," said Betty, vaguely. Then she laughed. "I'm afraid that I do the second more than the first, Miss Ferris. My roommate thinks that I get a great deal too much out of other people. And when I was at home Nan used to tell me to be more independent and see how I could get along if I were left on a desert island." Miss Ferris smiled across the fire at her dainty little guest. "The best things in the world,--which fortunately isn't a desert island,--come about by cooperation," she said. "Be independent; think for yourself, of course, but get all the help you can from other people in carrying out your thoughts." The dinner-bell began to jangle noisily in the hall and Betty rose hastily. "I've stayed too long," she said, "but I always do that when I come to see you. I shall tell my roommate what you said. Do you suppose I shall ever learn to think up arguments for myself?" "Of course," said Miss Ferris, encouragingly. "That's one thing you're here for--to learn to argue and to dress in a hurry and to work on Students' Commissions. You'll master them all in time. Good-bye." When Betty got back to the Belden House the bell had rung there too, and as the girls stood about in the halls and parlors waiting for Mrs. Cass, the matron, to lead them in to dinner, they were all discussing what Mary Brooks could mean by a "hair-raising." "It sounds like a house-raising," said a girl from Nebraska. "I mean the sort of thing they have away out west, where laborers are scarce and the whole town turns out to help a man get up the timbers of his house." "But there's no sense to that kind of a hair-raising," objected the Nebraskan's roommate, who was from Boston. "I think that Mary has invented a hair tonic and is going to try it on us before she has it patented." "I'm sure I hope so," said Madeline Ayres, patting her diminutive twist of hair tenderly. "Why, it's some kind of party she's giving for her mother," announced a stately senior, authoritatively. "I don't see how that tells what it is, though," said Betty. "Am I invited?" "Yes," explained Helen Adams. "Mary came in while you were out and asked us." "But she hasn't said anything about expecting her mother." At this everybody laughed and Marion Lawrence explained that Mary, being a very busy person, had a habit of putting away her letters unopened, until she found time to read them. "And somehow she thought this was a book-bill from Longstreet's--you know how near-sighted she is--so she stuck it into her desk until she got her next month's allowance. But to-day she found some money that she'd put in her collar-case for safe-keeping and forgotten about; so she got out the bill to pay it, and it turned out to be a letter from her mother, saying she was coming up tonight. Mary wouldn't have her know for anything, so she decided to give a hair-raising to-night, as if she'd planned for it days ahead." "But what is it?" demanded Betty. If Miss Lawrence was in Mary's confidence she had no intention of betraying it; and there was nothing to do but wait for eight o'clock, the hour which Mary had mentioned in her invitations. Promptly on the moment all those bidden to the hair-raising made a rush for Mary's room. "She hasn't come back from taking dinner with her mother," said Helen. "Her transom is dark." But "come in, children," called Mary, sociably, and opening the door just wide enough to admit one girl at a time she disclosed a room absolutely dark save for a gleam of light from a Turkish lantern in one corner. "Goodness!" cried Betty, who went in first. "What am I running into? Oh, it's a skeleton." "I'm all mixed up with a snake," added Katherine. "I feel my hair rising already." "Girls, I want you to meet my mother," said Mary, briskly. "Here I am," called a sweet voice from the shadows. "Wouldn't you better turn on the lights for a moment, daughter?" "No, indeed," retorted Mary, firmly. "They're nothing to see, dear, I assure you, but if you insist on seeing them you can all go across to Laurie's room and come back after you've had a general inspection." So everybody filed over to Marion Lawrence's room, where it was discovered that Mary's mother was, as Betty Wales put it, "a perfect little darling." She was small, like Mary, and she looked so young that Katherine gravely asked Mary if she was quite sure she wasn't palming off a sister on them instead of a mother. She entered into all the absurdities of the hair-raising, which proved to be only a particularly diverting sort of ghost party, with as much zest as any of the girls, and her ghost stories were the feature of the evening. "You see, dear," explained Mary, when the lights were finally turned on and the hair-raising had resolved itself into a spread, "you see I had a hair-raising because you tell ghost stories so well. Why, ever since I read your letter I've been planning how I should show you off--Oh, mother, it's too good to keep." And Mary regaled her mother with the story of the neglected book-bill. "Speaking of lost letters," said Marion Lawrence, "there's a letter for Frances West over on the zoology bulletin board in Science Hall. It's been there for two weeks." "What a funny place for it!" said Mary. "Frances never as much as sticks her head inside Science Hall. She thinks it's wrong to cut up frogs and angle-worms. How did it get there, Laurie?" "Postman dropped it, probably, and somebody who didn't know any better stuck it up there--the janitor, maybe." "Perhaps Frances dropped it herself," suggested Madeline Ayres. Marion shook her head. "Anyhow if she did, she hasn't read it. I noticed that it hadn't been opened." "Perhaps it's a letter like Mary's, saying that her mother is coming," suggested Helen Adams. "Guess again. It can't be that, because her mother wouldn't direct a letter to the editor-in-chief of the 'Argus.'" "Hear that, Dottie," called Mary Brooks to Dorothy King, who was sitting on the divan below the Turkish lantern, talking busily with Mrs. Brooks. "There's a letter for your chief over on the zoology bulletin board. You'd better stop in and get it for her." "Isn't it funny," said Rachel Morrison, "that, as well as Frances West is known in college and as many juniors and seniors as look at that bulletin board, nobody has thought to take her the letter." "Why didn't you take it to her, Laurie?" asked Mary severely. "Oh, because I wanted to see how long it would stop there if I didn't take it," returned Marion easily. "I'm writing a theme on 'What's everybody's business is nobody's business,' and I want to get the psychology right. Oh, Mrs. Brooks," she called, getting up and going over to the divan, "did you know that Mary had set a fashion up here? Ever since her 'Rumor' story, we're all racking our brains to see if we can't get up some psychological experiments that will make Professor Hinsdale think we're clever too." "And most of you," said Mary loftily, "just succeed in making your friends uncomfortable. I hope Frances' letter won't upset her the way mine did." "Oh, I guess it isn't a hair-raiser," said Marion easily. "It's probably a bill for printer's ink or paper, or whatever they buy for the 'Argus.' You get it to-morrow, Dottie, and then you can tell us what is in it." "I will," said Dorothy. Just as she spoke the twenty-minute-to-ten bell clanged suggestively in the corridors, and the hair-raising came to an abrupt end. "I don't think I care much for hair-raisings," said Betty, as she and Helen made hasty preparations for bed. "I think you have enough to worry about and be frightened over, without getting up a lot of extra things on purpose. I can hear that blood-hound panting under the window this very minute. Isn't Mrs. Brooks a wonderful story-teller?" "Yes. I didn't suppose you were ever worried or frightened over things," said Helen. "Well, I am," returned Betty. "I'm worrying this very minute about my to- morrow's recitations. I'd planned to study tonight but how could I hurt Mary's feelings by not going to the hair-raising? I suppose," went on Betty, when Helen did not answer, "I suppose you want to ask why I don't sit up to study? But if I did I should be breaking a rule, and besides," concluded Betty, yawning prodigiously, "I am altogether too sleepy to sit up, so I am just going to sleep and forget all my troubles." And Betty suited the action to the word. A few moments later she roused herself. "Life is just full of things to decide, isn't it, Helen? And so often you can't tell which one is best-- like me going to the hair-raising to-night, or Marion Lawrence and that letter." "I think she ought to have delivered the letter," said Helen. "But it was such fun not to," objected Betty. "And probably it was only an advertisement. Now I'm really going to sleep." CHAPTER X IN THE "ARGUS" SANCTUM Dorothy King hurried down the steps of Science Hall and across the campus to the main building, carrying Frances West's belated letter in her hand. She stopped for a moment in Miss Stuart's office to tell her that the Students' Commission wanted to hold a mass-meeting of the whole college at the end of the month, and waited while Miss Stuart, who was an enthusiastic supporter of the commission, obligingly hunted up an available date for the meeting, and promised to hold it open until the final arrangements could be perfected. Outside the office door Dorothy hesitated and looked at her watch. Quarter past four; laboratory work was over for the afternoon, and there would be ten girls to one copy of Ward's "Poets" in the library. "I'll go up there this evening," she decided swiftly, "and now for a skate before dinner," and she swung off toward the Hilton House to get her skates and her sweater. As she put out her hand to open the door, she suddenly noticed that she was still carrying Frances' letter, and gave an impatient little exclamation. "All out of my way," she thought, "so I might as well take it back now and get rid of it." The editorial office of the "Argus" was in the Students' Building, over behind the gym. As she went, Dorothy congratulated herself that it was this errand, and not the one to Miss Stuart, which she had forgotten; for the main building was twice as far away. She wondered idly whether Frances would be in the "sanctum"; she often spent her free afternoons there, for the big building, which was used chiefly in the evening for club meetings, plays, and other social and semi-social functions, was generally silent and deserted earlier in the day; and the quiet and the view over Paradise river from the west windows of the sanctum appealed to the poetic soul of the chief editor. Dorothy, who was a very practical person herself, had a vast admiration for Frances' dreamy, imaginative temperament, and enjoyed her work as business manager of the "Argus" chiefly because it brought her into close contact with Frances; while Frances in her turn admired Dorothy's executive ability, and depended on her to soften the hearts of obdurate printers, stir the consciences of careless assistant editors, and in short to stand as a sort of buffer between her beloved "Argus" and a careless world. Dorothy hoped that Frances would be in the sanctum; it would be fun to tell her about the letter. But if not, all responsibility could be fulfilled by dropping it and a note of explanation into the editorial mail-box. But Frances was there, and also Beatrice Egerton, who, as exchange editor of the "Argus," Dorothy had come to know well and to like for her quick wit and her daring, piquant ways, while she thoroughly disapproved of her worldly, self-seeking attitude toward college life. "Hello, Dottie," called Beatrice, when Dorothy opened the door. "We thought you weren't coming, Frances and I." "Why should I be coming?" inquired Dorothy curiously, tossing the letter into Frances' lap. "Proof!" exclaimed Beatrice, with a funny little grimace. Dorothy sank down on the long window seat, which ran across two sides of the sanctum, with a groan and a gesture of despair. "I entirely forgot," she said. "I was going skating. Could it possibly wait till to-morrow?" Frances West looked helplessly at Beatrice. "I'm sure I don't know," she said. "You told me that to-day was the time. I always depend on you to keep track." Beatrice laughed gaily. "I'm so glad I happened in," she said. "It's such a lovely spectacle to see the methodical Dottie King trying to persuade the poetical and always-behind-time Frances to put off till to-morrow what she ought to have done day before yesterday. Come, Dottie, take off your coat and go to work." "I'm sorry I'm always late," said Frances, sweetly. "I've decided to try to be on time now that we've got our new rugs and these lovely green curtains. So I bought a calendar pad and put down my date for reading proof with you last week, when you first reminded me of it." Dorothy had followed Beatrice's instruction to take off her coat. Now she sat down resignedly before the writing-table, pulled a long strip of printer's proof off the spindle, and dipped her pen in the ink, ready for work. "How do you happen to be here, Bess?" she asked. "Came to read my mail," said Beatrice. "Some of the best exchanges are out about this time in the month. When you didn't come, I tried to correct proof with Frances, but we couldn't either of us remember the printers' marks; and our Webster's dictionary, that has them in the back, got lost in the shuffle of house-cleaning last vacation." "Then if the dictionary is lost, you must stay," said Dorothy, "because I can correct proof, but I can't spell, and neither can Frances. Come, Frances, here's the copy for you to read." Frances West's voice had a peculiarly charming quality, and her manner of reading was so absorbed and sympathetic that she never failed to interest her auditors; so that even the mechanical drudgery of correcting proof was endurable with her help. The work went on rapidly, Dorothy bending over the long printers' galleys, adding mysterious little marks here and there in the wide margins, Frances reading as expressively as though she were doing her best to entertain Beatrice Egerton, who curled herself up on the window-seat, listened, made flippant comments, perused her exchanges when the "Argus" articles did not interest her, and when appealed to by Dorothy, acted as substitute for the missing Webster's dictionary. "Well, that's over," said Dorothy, at last, straightening in her chair and stretching out her cramped arms over her head. "Next month will be Laura Dale's turn again. I wonder if she'll do it." "Poor Dottie!" mimicked Beatrice. "'Could you do it just once more? I can't seem to learn the marks.' That's what she'll say. You shouldn't be so capable, Dottie, and then you could go skating afternoons instead of doing your own work and the assistant business manager's too." "Oh, I don't mind," said Dorothy, who was really very tired indeed, and so preferred not to talk about it. "Laura is a great deal of help with some parts of the work, and I don't blame any one for not wanting to correct proof--though I don't mind doing it so long as Frances will read for me. Aren't our new curtains lovely?" "Such a cool, woodsy green," said Frances. "Just right for poets to write behind," supplemented Beatrice, who loved to tease Frances, though in her heart she admired her as much as Dorothy did. "Girls, it's long after six," said Dorothy, rising abruptly, "and I must go. I have an evening's work still before me." As she picked up her gloves, she noticed Frances' letter still lying neglected on the window-seat. "Here, Frances," she said, "do just open this letter, and tell me that it's dreadfully important. I want to bother Laurie about it. She saw it on the zoology bulletin board last week and didn't trouble herself to bring it to you." "Oh, I presume it's nothing," said Frances, dreamily. She was watching the sunset glowing gold and scarlet between the green draperies. "Here, Frances," laughed Beatrice, thrusting the letter into her hands. "Read it by the light of the dying sun, if you prefer that to good green- shaded electricity. You owe it to Dorothy to take an interest when she bothered herself to bring it to you, and so got caught and deprived of her afternoon's fun. Poor Dottie! can't you go skating tomorrow?" They were animatedly discussing the possibility of Miss Mills's neglecting to call for a recitation on Ward's "Poets" the next day, when Frances gave a little exclamation. "Why, girls," she began, excitedly. "I don't understand. Isn't to-day the twentieth of February?" "Yes, dear," said Beatrice. "You knew from that wonderful calendar pad, didn't you?" Frances disregarded the question. "Then--Why, this letter is dated February second. Where has it been all the time?" "I just told you," repeated Dorothy, "that Laurie saw it on the zoology bulletin board last week. Perhaps it was there a week or two before she saw it. Is it really important, Frances? Laurie supposed from the direction that it was just a bill or an advertisement. She'll be very sorry." "Oh, I don't know what it is," declared Frances, in bewilderment. "Read it," and she held out the letter to Dorothy. "Read it aloud," suggested Beatrice. "Yes, do," added Frances. "I haven't any idea what it means." "'The Quiver' Offices, "--Fulton St., New York, "Feb. 2, 19--. "MISS FRANCES WEST, "Editor-in-Chief of Harding "College 'Argus': "DEAR MADAME:--It always gives me great pleasure to see the merits of 'The Quiver' recognized, particularly in haunts of high culture, like your alma mater. Nevertheless, you will readily understand that the little tribute to the genius of one of our contributors, contained in your December number, which, owing to my prolonged absence from the city, has just now come under my observation, is, to speak bluntly, deserving of some return from me. I have no doubt that you will be glad to offer the proper explanation. If, however, you insist upon leaving the matter in my hands, I assure you that I shall not mince matters. College honor is a point about which I am very sensitive. We go to press on the twentieth inst. Until that time I am "Yours confidentially, "RICHARD BLAKE." "Well," said Dorothy, folding the letter carefully and putting it back in its envelope, "what do you make of that, Bess?" "Nothing," said Beatrice, "nothing at all. Who in the world is Richard Blake?" "I don't know. Don't you, Frances?" Frances shook her head. "But 'The Quiver' is a magazine. I've seen a copy once or twice." "Then," said Dorothy, promptly, "Richard Blake must be the editor, or one of them." "Well, did we say anything about him in the December number?" pursued Beatrice. "Or anything about his magazine?" "No," declared Dorothy, "of course not. 'The Quiver' isn't a college magazine, is it, Frances? It couldn't be on the list of exchanges?" "Oh, no," said Frances, wearily. "'The Quiver' is a real magazine, Dorothy. It's new, I think, but I know Miss Raymond considers it very clever. I saw a copy once in her room." "Clever or not clever," said Beatrice, calmly, "I'm sure this editor must be insane. There is absolutely no sense to his letter." Dorothy unfolded Mr. Richard Blake's missive, read it through once more, and passed it without comment to Beatrice. Meanwhile Frances was rummaging through the files of the "Argus." "Here it is," she said at last. "Didn't he say the January number?" "No, December," corrected Beatrice, joining-Frances in her search for the missing magazine. "There," said Frances, at last, reading down the table of contents. "'The Self-government System at Harding'--he wouldn't be mentioned in that. My poem is next--he certainly isn't in that. Then that story of Eleanor Watson's, and an essay on 'Sweetness and Light.'" "Perhaps he's in that," suggested Dorothy, hopefully. "It sounds as if it might mean almost anything." Beatrice Egerton giggled. "You didn't take the course in nineteenth century essayists, I guess, Dottie. He's not in 'Sweetness and Light,' unless Richard Blake is an alibi of Matthew Arnold's." "And he couldn't possibly be in any of these sketches," went on Frances, anxiously, "nor in the editorials, nor in the alumnae notes." "Of course not," agreed Beatrice, scornfully. "See here, girls," she added, referring again to the note, "he doesn't tell us the name of his contributor--the simpleton! That's what we ought to look for. He says we printed a tribute to the genius of one of his contributors." "I have it!" declared Dorothy, pulling the December "Argus" out of Frances' hands. "The contributor is a member of the faculty, and the article is spoken of in the faculty notes. That's it, of course." But diligent search of the faculty notes failed to unearth any item about an article in "The Quiver." "Besides," added Beatrice, who had returned to the note once more, "that wouldn't explain what he says about college honor. And what is this about 'offering the proper explanation'? Are people supposed to explain compliments?" "I don't know," said Frances. "I suppose I've made some dreadful blunder, and he noticed it. And to-day is the twentieth; he evidently wanted an answer by that time. Do you think I ought to telegraph?" "No," said Dorothy, after a moment's thought "It wouldn't be any use. If he went to press--or 'The Quiver' went to press--to-day, it's gone hours ago. You'd better write him to-night. He'll get your letter in the morning, and then he'll understand." "But what am I to write?" asked Frances, helplessly. "Tell him to study Genung on clearness," suggested Beatrice, flippantly. "Don't, Beatrice," broke in Dorothy. "This is evidently a serious matter. I should tell him that you didn't know what he meant by his letter, Frances, and of course explain why you haven't written before." "Will you two stay while I write it?" asked Frances. "I should never dare to take the responsibility alone." Dorothy sat down on the window-seat in silence, and Beatrice followed her example. There was no sound in the sanctum but the scratching of Frances' pen, moving swiftly over the paper. When the brief note was finished, the editor-in-chief handed it to her colleagues. "That's all right," said Dorothy, reading it through. "Infinitely better than his," added Beatrice. "His reminds me of that verse of Marion Lustig's that was more obscure than Browning--the one we persuaded you not to print." "Don't you think," began Dorothy hesitatingly, "that, until we know exactly what Mr. Richard Blake means, it would be better not to mention his letter?" "Not even to the rest of the 'Argus' board?" asked Beatrice, who had been anticipating the sensation that the story of the mysterious letter would create. "Dottie," she went on, looking keenly at Dorothy, "I believe you have another idea about what that note means." "I know just as little about it as you do," said Dorothy quietly, "but I think eight girls are too many to keep a secret and--it's Frances' letter. She must decide." "I think Dorothy is right," agreed Frances. "I believe that we would better wait before telling the others. If it's some dreadful blunder that I have made, perhaps I could correct it if only we three knew of it. Though I don't know whether that would be quite honest," she added sadly. Beatrice put her arm around Frances' waist and led her to the door. "You old dear," she said, "you're so proud of your beloved 'Argus.' I believe you worry over every word that goes into it." "And over every s that is upside-down and isn't detected by my eagle eye," laughed Dorothy, locking the door and carefully hiding the key in the place where half the college knew it was kept. It was seven o'clock--no use going home to dinner. Dorothy decided to get an early start with Ward's "Poets," and to dine later in the evening on ship's biscuit and a glass of milk. The library was very quiet. She read busily, concentrating her attention upon the pages before her, oblivious of her surroundings, forgetful even of the mysterious letter and the theory, which, despite her declaration to Beatrice Egerton, she had formed concerning it. Presently some one tiptoed up behind her and clasped two hands tightly across her eyes. "Who is it?" whispered a laughing voice. "I don't know," answered Dorothy a trifle irritably. "Did you give it to her?" demanded the voice imperturbably. "Give what to whom?" "The letter to Frances West." "It's Mary Brooks," said Dorothy, pulling away the hands and turning to find Mary and Marion Lawrence standing behind her chair. "Aren't you nearly through with that book?" asked Marion. Dorothy nodded. "Leave me in peace for ten minutes and you may have it." "Well, tell us first about the letter," demanded Mary. "Was it a hair- raiser?" "Oh, no," answered Dorothy calmly. "It was--oh, a note of thanks, or something of the sort from some magazine that the 'Argus' had spoken of." "Bother!" said Marion. "That's no good for an ending to my theme." "No good at all," agreed Dorothy. "I shouldn't use it if I were you." "I certainly shan't," said Marion. "I can invent a nicer ending than that. Come, Mary, leave her alone, so that I can have Ward. Oh, dear! I'm dreadfully disappointed about my theme." The reply to Mr. Richard Blake, presumably editor of "The Quiver," had been dispatched on the evening of the twentieth. Two days later Frances, looking as if she had seen a ghost, stopped Dorothy on her way from morning chapel to her first recitation. "Can you come to the sanctum right after lunch?" she asked. "Beatrice can come then." "Yes," returned Dorothy. "You've got his answer?" Frances nodded. "And oh, Dorothy, it's just dreadful!" When Dorothy reached the sanctum that afternoon she found Beatrice and Frances there before her. Without a word Frances handed her the letter. "MY DEAR MISS WEST--" it ran: "Your note is received and the delay in sending it fully explained. I am sorry you could make nothing of my first letter. I intended to be vague, for I wanted to test your knowledge of the episode in question; but it seems I overshot the mark. So let me say, please, since you and your colleagues evidently do not read 'The Quiver' that a story in your December number by a Miss Eleanor Watson is practically a copy of one that appeared in our November issue, which I am sending you under separate cover. All I ask is that some public acknowledgment of the fact shall be made, either by you or by me. I have delayed the notice I intended to insert in our next number, until I hear from you. "Let me say that I blame neither you nor your associates in the matter. 'The Quiver' is young, and plagiarists will happen. "Yours very truly, "RICHARD BLAKE." "Has the magazine come?" asked Dorothy, without exhibiting the least surprise at Mr. Blake's startling announcement. "Yes," said Frances. "There must be some dreadful mistake." "Can't you find the story he means?" "Yes, but of course Eleanor Watson didn't copy it. No Harding girl would do such a thing." "Eleanor Watson is different," said Dorothy. "You mean you think she did it?" asked Beatrice Egerton. "You don't think it was a coincidence? Frances knew of something like it happening once, entirely by chance." "This wasn't chance," said Dorothy slowly. "Oh, Beatrice--you know Eleanor Watson better than I--I don't want to be uncharitable. That was why I didn't tell you girls the other day, when it occurred to me that this was what Mr. Blake meant. Can't you see that it explains everything? Don't you remember I told you how queer she was about giving me the story; and before that, just after she handed it in, she went over to get it back." "Yes," said Frances eagerly. "I remember. We thought it such a good joke. Oh, let us go and ask her how it was. She will surely be able to explain." "But Frances," began Dorothy and stopped, glancing uncertainly at Beatrice. "Oh, you needn't mind me," said Beatrice calmly. "If this is true, I wash my hands of Eleanor Watson." She turned to Frances, and her face softened. "You dear old idealist," she said, pulling Frances down on the seat beside her. "Can't you see that appealing to Eleanor Watson wouldn't do at all? Can't you see that if she is mean enough to plagiarize 'The Quiver's' story, she is probably capable of lying out of it? And how should we know whether or not she told the truth?" "Or suppose that she did convince us," said Dorothy gently, "you see there is still Mr. Blake. I don't believe Eleanor's denial would satisfy him." "Well," said Beatrice resignedly, "next to Eleanor Watson herself, I suppose I am the person who would profit most by having this whole affair hushed up. It's going to be mighty unpleasant for me, what with my having put her up for Dramatic Club and all that. But frankly, I don't see what there is to do but let Mr. Richard Blake go ahead and say what he pleases. Eleanor Watson will probably leave college. Some people will believe the story and some won't. Some won't even hear it--'The Quiver' seems to be a very obscure magazine. And in nine days every one will forget all about it." "But Eleanor Watson will never forget," added Frances softly. To her art was sacred and the idea of stealing it horrible. There was a silence broken at last by Dorothy. "Frances," she said, "you're right, you always are. You divine things that the rest of us have to reason out. This affair is unpleasant for everybody concerned, but it isn't a vital matter to us or to Mr. Blake. The only person to be considered is Eleanor Watson. If the matter is made public--" "It would serve her right, and it might be the best thing in the world for her," broke in Beatrice, who was growing more angry with Eleanor the longer she thought of the intimacy between them. "That," said Dorothy, "is the question we have to decide. I for one am not at all sure what to think. Being publicly humiliated might be a good thing for her, or it might ruin her whole life." "Oh, I can't bear to have people know about it," said Frances, her face white with horror. "Let us go home now and think it over, and let us be oh! so careful not even to hint at what has happened. We may have to confide in some others, but let us not give up the chance of keeping our secret by telling the wrong people now. And let us meet again tomorrow afternoon." "In your room," suggested Beatrice. "This place is too conspicuous." The three editors crept down the stairs like so many conspirators, separated with soft good-byes in the lower hall, and went their several ways, each feeling that the weight of the world rested on her shoulders. To Beatrice the affair was a personal one, involving her judgment and her status in the college world; Frances mingled pity for Eleanor with jealousy for the fair name of the "Argus"; Dorothy was going over the career of Eleanor Watson since she entered Harding, wondering whether it would be possible, by any method of treatment, to make her over into a trustworthy member of the student body, and whether she would ever be worth to the world what her evil influence had cost her college. All at once a bitter thought flashed upon Dorothy. She herself was partly responsible for Eleanor's downfall; for had she not persuaded her, against her will, to give the story to the "Argus"? CHAPTER XI A PROBLEM IN ETHICS Betty Wales sat in Dorothy King's big wicker easy chair, an expression of mingled distress and perplexity on her usually merry face. Dorothy had sent word that she was ill and wanted to see her little friend, and Betty had hurried over in her first free period, never guessing at the strange story that Dorothy had summoned her to hear. The story was told now. It remained only for Betty to decide what she should do about it. "It's the most annoying thing," Dorothy was saying from the bed where she lay, pale and listless, among the pillows. "I've heard of girls being ill from overwork, and I always thought they were good-for-nothings, glad of an excuse to stay in bed for awhile. But I can't get up, Betty. I tried hard this morning before the doctor came, and it made me so sick and faint--you can't imagine. So there was nothing to do but submit when she insisted upon my going to the infirmary for two weeks." "I'm so sorry," murmured Betty sympathetically. "She tried to make me promise not to see any one except the matron before I was moved," went on Dorothy, "but I told her I must talk to you for half an hour. I promised on my honor not to keep you longer than that, and we haven't but ten minutes left. Now won't you decide to go and see Mr. Blake?" "Oh, I don't know what to decide!" cried Betty in despairing tones. "It's so dreadful that Eleanor should have done it. That's all I can think of." "But listen to me, Betty," began Dorothy patiently. "Let me show you just how matters stand. Frances can't go down to New York alone--you can see that. She doesn't know the city, and she'd get lost or run over, and ten to one come home without even remembering to see Mr. Blake. You can't believe how absent-minded she is, till you've worked with her as I have. Besides, she is too dreamy and imaginative to convince a man of Mr. Blake's type. "And Bess Egerton mustn't go; Frances and I are agreed about that. She's too flighty. She'd be angry if Mr. Blake didn't yield his point immediately, and say something outrageous to him. Then she'd go off shopping and come back here in the best of spirits, declaring that there was nothing to be done because Mr. Blake was 'such a silly.' And I can't go." "If you only could!" broke in Betty. "Then it would be all right. Isn't there any chance that you might be able to by the end of next week?" Dorothy shook her head. "I couldn't get leave, on top of this two weeks' illness, without telling Miss Stuart exactly why I needed to go, and I don't want to do that. Miss Raymond knows all about it and approves, and we don't want to confide in any one else. Besides, I doubt if Mr. Blake will wait so long." "Well then, Dorothy, why not write to him?" Dorothy shook her head again. "We tried that. We wrote one letter, and when his answer came we tried again, but eight pages was the least we could get our arguments into. No, it's a case where talking it out is the only thing to do. You could take him unawares and I'm sure you'd bring him round." "That's just it," broke in Betty eagerly. "I know you're mistaken, Dorothy. I couldn't think of a thing to say to him--I never can. It would be just a waste of time for me to try." Dorothy took a bulky envelope from under her pillows and held it out to Betty. "Here," she said. "These are the letters we wrote. We all three tried. Here are arguments in plenty." "But I should forget them all when I got there." "You mustn't." "Besides, it would look so queer for me to go, when I'm not on the 'Argus' board, and have nothing to do with the trouble." "Didn't I tell you why we chose you?" exclaimed Dorothy. "No? I am so stupid to-day; I put everything the wrong way around. Why, there were two reasons. One is because you are so fond of Eleanor and understand her so well. Nobody on the 'Argus' staff, except Beatrice and myself, has more than a bowing acquaintance with her, whereas you can tell Mr. Blake exactly what sort of girl she is, and why we want to save her from this disgrace. The other reason is that, while Christy is away, you are one of the two sophomores on the Students' Commission; Eleanor is a sophomore and either you or Lucy Merrifield is the proper person to act in her interests in a case of this kind. Because you know Eleanor best, we chose you--and for some other reasons," added Dorothy, truthfully, remembering the confidence they had all felt in Betty's peculiar combination of engaging manner and indomitable pluck and perseverance, where a promise or a friend was concerned. "Oh, Dorothy!" sighed Betty, feeling herself hopelessly entangled in the web of Dorothy's logic. "There is a third reason," went on Dorothy, inexorably, "just between you and me. Of course you understand that I feel personally to blame about this trouble. If I hadn't lost my horrid temper and said something disagreeable to force her hand, Eleanor Watson might never have allowed the story to be printed and the worst complications would have been avoided. Now I personally ask you, as the person I can best trust, to go to Mr. Blake for me. You know Eleanor. You agree with us that it is very likely to spoil her whole life if this is made public--" "But, Dorothy, I'm not sure it's right to keep it a secret," broke in Betty. "I believe you will feel sure when you have had a chance to think over all sides of the question," resumed Dorothy, "and to see how much to blame I am. Then you are a typical Harding girl, the right sort to represent the college to Mr. Blake, who seems to be very much interested in knowing what sort of girl Harding turns out." "Oh, no!" demurred Betty. "I'm not the right kind at all." "Besides, you have a way of getting around people and persuading them to do what you want," concluded Dorothy. "Never," declared Betty. Dorothy smiled faintly. "You have the reputation," she said. "Of course I don't know how you got it; but now that you have it you're bound to live up to it, you know. And if you don't go, we shall have to risk writing and I am perfectly certain that no letter will keep Mr. Blake from publishing his notice next month, whereas I think that if he were to talk over the matter with you, he might very easily be persuaded to give it up." Dorothy lay back on her pillows and closed her eyes. "It does certainly seem like shirking to be ill just now," she said. Betty rose hastily and came over to the bed. "Dorothy," she began, "I must go this minute. You are all tired out. I wish I could promise now, but I must think it over--whether I can do what you want of me and whether I ought. I'll tell you what," she went on eagerly, "I can't see you again, but I'll send you a bunch of violets the first thing in the morning, and I'll tuck in a note among the flowers, saying what I can do. And it will be the very best I can do, Dorothy." "I know it will," said Dorothy. "Don't think that I don't realize how much we're asking of you." "I like to be trusted," said Betty, ruefully, "but it seems to me there are hundreds of girls in college who could do this better than I. Good- bye--and look out for the violets, Dorothy." A moment later she opened the door again. "Of course Eleanor doesn't know that you've found out?" "No," said Dorothy. "We've told no one but you and Miss Raymond. We thought it would only complicate matters and hurt her needlessly to tell her now. I suppose she will have to know eventually, to guard against a repetition of the trouble, if for no other reason; but we haven't looked so far ahead as that yet." It was fortunate that Betty was not called upon to recite in her next class. Refusing the seat that Bob Parker had saved for her between herself and Alice Waite, she found a place in the back row where a pillar protected her from Bob's demonstrations, and leaning her head on her hand she set herself to work out the problem that Dorothy had given her. But the shame of Eleanor's act overcame her, as it had in Dorothy's room; she could not think of anything else. She woke with a start at the end of the hour to find the girls pushing back their chairs and making their noisy exit from the room, and to realize that she might as well have learned something about Napoleon's retreat from Moscow, since she had decided nothing about her trip to New York. "I say," said Bob, joining her outside the door, "why are you so unsociable?" "Headache," returned Betty, laconically, and with some truth. "Too bad." Owing to the fact that she had never had a headache in her life, Bob's sympathy was somewhat perfunctory. "When you have the written lesson to study for, too," mourned Alice. "Written lesson?" questioned Betty, in dismay. "Yes. Didn't you hear Professor White giving it out for to-morrow? All of Napoleon--that's five hundred pages." Betty gasped. "I suppose he made a lot of new points to-day. I didn't hear a word." "Next time," said Bob, severely, "perhaps you'll be willing to sit down among people who can see that you keep awake." "Don't tease her," begged Alice. "She must have an awful headache, not to have heard about the written lesson. What did you think we were all groaning so about, Betty?" "I didn't hear that, either," said Betty, meekly. "Will one of you lend me a notebook?" Betty could have hugged Helen Adams when immediately after luncheon she announced that she was going down to study history with T. Reed and should stay till dinner time. Betty hung a "Busy" sign on her door--the girls would think that she too was studying history madly--and set herself to read over the original of Eleanor's story in "The Quiver" that Dorothy had lent her. It was the same and yet not the same. Plot and characters had been taken directly from the original, but the phrasing-- Betty knew Eleanor's story almost by heart--was quite different, and a striking little episode at the end that Miss Raymond had particularly admired was Eleanor's own. "I like hers best," thought Betty, stoutly. "I wonder if the resemblance couldn't have happened by chance. Perhaps she read this story a long while before and forgot that she had not thought it up herself." Betty looked at the date of the magazine and then consulted her calendar. The November "Quiver" had come out just two days before the afternoon of the barge ride, which had also been "theme afternoon." Betty remembered because her monthly allowance always came on the third. She had borrowed her quarter for the ride of Helen and paid her out of the instalment that arrived the very next morning. That settled it,--and as Dorothy had pointed out, all Eleanor's seemingly inexplicable queerness about the story was now explained. Betty threw the magazine on the table and going to the window gazed drearily out at the snow-covered campus. The next thing to settle was whether it were right to help Eleanor to cover up her deceit? Dorothy felt, from the little she knew of Eleanor, that open disgrace would take away her last chance of being honest and upright. "She is terribly sensitive," Dorothy argued, "and if she feels that nice people don't trust her, she will go as far as she dares to show them that they are right. Perhaps she can be led, but she certainly can't be driven. She isn't strong enough to meet disgrace and down it." That might be true, but there was the mathematics examination of the year before. Miss Hale had argued as Dorothy did. In the hope of ultimately winning Eleanor by kindness, she had not let Miss Meredith know that Eleanor had told her an untruth. For a while afterward Eleanor had been scrupulously honorable, but now she had done something infinitely more dishonest than the deception of Miss Meredith. No doubt Dorothy regarded the affair of the story as a first offense, and Betty could not tell her that it wasn't. She had been glad enough to help save Eleanor from the consequences of her foolish bragging, the year before; but saving her from the consequences of deliberate dishonesty was a different matter. Betty had been taught to despise cheating in any form, and to avoid the least suspicion of it with scrupulous care. And now Dorothy wanted her to aid and abet a--a thief. Betty flushed hotly as she applied the hard name. All at once the memory of her last interview with Eleanor flashed upon her. "I was an idiot last fall. Now I have come to my senses--" that was what she had said. When her voice broke, it must have been because she was sorry for the change--sorry that the old, shifty, unreliable self had come back to take the place of the strange new one whose ideals had proved too hard and too high to live by. The sad, hunted look that Madeline had spoken of was explained too. Eleanor was sorry. But was she sorry, as she had been in the case of the mathematics examination, only because she was afraid of being found out, or did she honestly regret having taken what was not her own, and used it to gain honors that she had not earned? There was another point that Dorothy had not spoken of--perhaps had not thought of. What about the Dramatic Club election and the other college honors that had come or would come to Eleanor, one after another, all because, at the beginning of her sophomore year, she had made a reputation for brilliant literary work? Eleanor had been right, when she was a freshman, in insisting that it was the start which counted. Then, despite her first abject failure, she had compassed the difficult achievement of a second start. How proud Betty had been of her! And now all her fair hopes and high ambitions had crumbled to dust and ashes. Was it right to help her cover up the ruin? Was it fair to girls like Helen Adams, who worked hard and got no recognition, that Eleanor should get recognition for work which was not her own? Anyway, she was not going to New York. Those three editors could choose some one else. And yet if she refused--oh, it was all dreadful! Betty flung herself on the couch and buried her face in the pillows. A moment later the door opened stealthily, and Madeline Ayres stuck her head in. In spite of her caution, Betty heard her and sat up with a nervous start. "I hope you weren't asleep," said Madeline, settling herself comfortably at the other end of the couch. "I didn't mean to wake you; that was why I came in without knocking." "I wasn't asleep," returned Betty faintly. "I was just resting." "You look as if you needed to," said Madeline cheerfully. "Does your head ache now?" "Not--not very much," stammered Betty. "Have you read over all this?" Madeline reached out a long arm for the life of Napoleon that lay on the table. "No, hardly any of it," confessed Betty, reddening as she remembered the "Busy" sign. But Madeline remarked briskly, "That's good. Neither have I. I don't feel a bit like cramming, so I shall bluff. When father was studying art in Paris, he knew a man who had been one of Napoleon's guards at St. Helena. He was old and lame and half blind and stunningly homely then, and an artist's model. He used to tell merry tales about what a tiger of a man--" Madeline stopped short in the act of replacing the life of Napoleon on the table and stared at Betty in unfeigned admiration. "Betty Wales," she said at last, "you are certainly a splendid actress. I never dreamed that you knew." Betty's eyes followed Madeline's to the table, and then to "The Quiver," lying in full view where she had dropped it an hour before. There was one chance in a thousand that Madeline meant something besides Eleanor's story, and Betty resolved to make sure. "Knew what, Madeline?" she asked steadily, trying not to blush but feeling the tell-tale red spread over her cheeks in spite of all she could do. It was no use. Madeline picked up the magazine and flipped over the pages carelessly till she came to Eleanor's story. "That," she said, holding it out for Betty to see. Their eyes met, and at sight of Betty's frightened, pleading face, Madeline's hand dropped to her side. "I beg your pardon," she said quickly. "I didn't mean to hurt you, Betty. I see now how it is. You didn't know before; you've just found out, and when I came in you were mourning for your fallen idol. Shall I go?" Betty stretched out a detaining hand. "No," she said, "tell me,--quick before Helen comes,--how did you know?" "Read it in 'The Quiver,' away back last fall, before Miss Watson's story came out in the 'Argus.' It's been--oh, amusing, you know, to hear people rave over her wonderful theme." "Does any one else know?" "I doubt it. 'The Quiver' isn't on sale up here. Father thinks it's clever and he sends it to me. I suppose he knows the editor. He's always knowing the editors of little, no-account magazines and having to sit up nights to do them cover-designs or something; and then they send him their magazines." "But--I mean--you haven't told any one?" stammered Betty. Madeline shook her head. "It wouldn't make a pretty story, do you think?" "Madeline"--Betty's voice thrilled with earnestness--"did you ever think you ought to tell?" Madeline stared at Betty for a moment in silence. Then her gray eyes twinkled. "You absurd little Puritan," she said, "is that what you're bothering your head about? I know you don't want to tell. Why aren't you satisfied to let matters take their course?" "Because," Betty hesitated, "because if they take their course,--suppose, Madeline, that somebody else knows and wants to tell? Ought I to interfere with that?" Madeline spread out her hands with a gesture that suggested helpless resignation. "My dear, how should I know? You see in Bohemia we're all honest--poor, but honest. We never have anything like this to settle because we're all too busy enjoying life to have time to envy our neighbors. But I think"--Madeline paused a minute--"I think if a man stole a design and got, say a medal at the water-color exhibit, or a prize at the Salon, I'd let him have it and I'd try to see that he kept it in a conspicuous place, where he'd be sure to see it every day. I think the sight of his medal would be his best medicine. If he was anything of a man, he'd never want another of the same sort, and if he was all cheat, he'd be found out soon enough without my help. So I'd give him the benefit of the doubt." "And you think that would be fair to the one who ought to have had the medal?" "If he was much of a man he didn't paint just for the medal," returned Madeline quickly. "He painted because he couldn't help it,--because he meant to make the most of himself,--and a medal more or less--what's that to him?" She turned upon Betty suddenly. "Don't you see that the great fault with the life here is that we think too little about living and too much about getting? These societies and clubs and teams and committees-- they're not the best things in life; they're nothing, except what they stand for in character and industry and talent. No, I shouldn't worry because Eleanor Watson got into Dramatic Club, if that's what you mean, and may get into other things because she cribbed a story. That very fact will take all the fun out of it, unless she's beneath caring,--but she isn't beneath caring," Madeline corrected herself swiftly. "No one with a face like hers is beyond caring. It's the most beautiful face I ever saw--and one of the saddest." "Thank you very much, Madeline," said Betty, soberly. "I'm so glad I could talk it over with you." Madeline was never serious for long at a time. "I've been preaching regular sermons," she said with a laugh. "The thing I don't understand is why this editor of 'The Quiver' hasn't jumped on Miss Watson long ago. Editors are always reading college magazines--hoping to discover a genius, I suppose." "Are they?" said Betty. A tap sounded on the door. "Don't worry, whatever else you do,--and hide your magazine," said Madeline, and was off with a cheerful greeting for Helen Adams, who had come back from her afternoon at T. Reed's crammed full of Napoleonic lore and basket-ball news. "Theresa had made a table of dates and events," said Helen eagerly. "I copied it for you--it's lots of help. And Betty, she says the teams are going to be chosen soon, and she is almost sure you will be on." Madeline Ayres wondered idly, as she dressed for dinner, how Betty Wales had come into possession of a four months' old magazine which was not to be had at any library or book-store in Harding. Then, being a person born, so she herself asserted, entirely without curiosity, she ceased wondering. By the time dinner was over and she had related a budget of her Napoleonic stories to a delighted group of anxious students, she had actually forgotten all about Eleanor's affairs. CHAPTER XII A BRIEF FOR THE DEFENSE "DEAR DOROTHY-- "I have thought and thought all the afternoon and I can't do it. I should only--" "DEAR DOROTHY-- "If you are perfectly sure that there is nobody else to go--" "DEAR DOROTHY-- "Don't you think that Mary Brooks or Marion Lawrence would be a lot better? Mary can always talk--" "Oh, Dorothy, I don't know what to say--" Betty had slipped up-stairs to her room the minute dinner was over. The rest of the Belden House girls still lingered in the parlors, talking or dancing,--enjoying the brief after-dinner respite that is a welcome feature of each busy day at Harding. Ida Ludwig was playing for them. She had a way of dashing off waltzes and two-steps that gave them a perfectly irresistible swing. As Betty wrote, her foot beat time to the music that floated up, faint and sweet and alluring, through her half-open door. The floor around her was strewn with sheets of paper which she had torn, one after another, from her pad, and tossed impatiently out of her way. "Such a goose as I am, trying to write before I've made up my mind what to say!" she told the green lizard, as she sent the seventh attempt flying after the others. "And I can't make it up," she added despondently, and shut her fountain pen with a vicious little snap. She would go down and have a two-step with Roberta, who had been Mary's guest at dinner. Roberta could lead beautifully--as well as a man--and the music was too good to lose. Besides, Roberta might feel hurt at her having run off the minute dinner was over. A shadow suddenly darkened the door and Betty turned to find Eleanor Watson standing there, smiling radiantly down at her. "Eleanor!" she gasped helplessly. Somehow the sight of the real Eleanor, smiling and lovely, made the deceit she had practiced seem so much more concrete and palpable, the penalty she must pay at best so much more real and dreadful. Betty had puzzled over the rights and wrongs of the matter until it had come to be almost an abstraction--a subject for formal, impersonal debate, like those they used to discuss in the junior English classes, in high school days--"Resolved: that it is right to help plagiarists to try again." Now the reality of it all was forced upon her. In spite of her surprise at seeing Eleanor, who almost never came to her room now, and her dismay that she should have come on this evening in particular, she found time to be glad that she had not yet refused Dorothy's request--and time to be a little ashamed of herself for being so glad. Her perturbation showed so plainly in her face and manner that Eleanor could not fail to notice it. Her smile vanished and a troubled look stole into her gray eyes. "May I come in, Betty?" she asked. "Or are you too busy?" "No-o," stammered Betty. "Come in, Eleanor, of course. I--I was just writing a note." Eleanor glanced at the floor, littered with all Betty's futile beginnings, and her smile came flashing back again. "I should think," she said, "that you must be writing a love letter--if it isn't a sonnet-- judging by the trouble it's making you. They told me downstairs that you were cramming history, but I was sure it would take more than a mere history cram to keep you away from that music. Isn't it lovely?" "Yes," said Betty. "Would you like--shan't we go down and dance?" It would surely be easier to talk down there, with plenty of people about who did not know. Again her embarrassment and constraint were too evident to be ignored, and this time Eleanor went straight to the heart of the matter. "Betty," she said, "don't tell me that you're not glad to see me back again after all this time. I know I'm queer and horrid and not worth bothering about, but when you find it out,--when you give me up--you and Jim--I shall stop trying to be different." For an instant Betty hesitated. Then the full import of Eleanor's words flashed upon her. There was no mistaking their sincerity. She knew at last that she did "really mean something" to somebody. Ethel Hale had been wrong. Eleanor had not forgotten her old friends--and Betty would go to New York. With a happy little cry she stretched out her arms and caught Eleanor's hands in hers. "I'm so glad you feel that way," she said, "and I shall never stop caring what you do, Eleanor, and neither will Jim. I know he won't." "He gave me up once before, and if you knew something--" She broke off suddenly. "Betty, Jim is coming Friday night. That's one reason why I'm here. I didn't want him to miss seeing you just because I'd been disagreeable and was too proud to come and say I'm sorry. I am sorry, Betty,--I'm always sorry when it's just too late." "Oh, that's all right. I knew you didn't mean anything," said Betty, hastily. Apologies always made her nervous, and this particular one was fraught with unpleasant suggestions little guessed at by its maker. "You'll be awfully glad to see your brother, won't you?" Eleanor's assent was half-hearted. "To tell the truth, I'm too tired to care much what happens." "Oh, you won't feel tired when he gets here," suggested Betty, cheerfully. Eleanor shook her head. "I'm tired all through," she said. "I don't believe I shall ever be rested again." "What are you going to do to entertain him?" asked Betty, wishing to change the current of Eleanor's thoughts, since she did not dare to sympathize with them. Eleanor detailed her plans, explained that Judge Watson had suddenly been called home from Cornell and so was not coming with Jim, according to the summer plan that Betty remembered, and rose to go. "I know you'll like Jim, Betty," she said, "and he'll like you. He's your kind." The moment she was left alone, Betty sat down again at her desk and dashed off her note to Dorothy. "Dear Dorothy: "I have thought it over and seen Eleanor. I am the one to go, and I'll do my best. "Yours ever, "Betty. "P.S.--I can't start till Wednesday." She twisted the note into a neat little roll, and slipping out the back way went down to leave it at the florist's, to be sent to Dorothy-- securely hidden in a big bunch of English violets, lest any martinet of a nurse should see fit to suppress it--the very first thing in the morning. On the way back to her room she danced up the stairs in her most joyous fashion, and when Mary Brooks, coming up from escorting Roberta to the door, intercepted her and demanded where she had been all the evening, she chanted, "Curiosity killed a cat," and fled from Mary's wrath with a little shriek of delight, exactly as if there were no such things in the world as plagiarism and hard-hearted editors. For had not Eleanor come back to her, and was not the difficult decision made at last? And yet, when Betty was a senior and took the course in Elizabethan tragedies, she always thought of the visit of Jim Watson as a perfect example in real life of the comic interlude, by which the king of Elizabethan dramatists is wont to lighten, and at the same time to accentuate, his analyses of the bitter consequences of wrong-doing. For close upon her first great relief at finding her decision made, followed a sudden realization that the incident was not yet closed. Madeline had read the November "Quiver"; some less charitable person might have done likewise. If she had been careless in leaving her magazine in sight, so might one of the three editors have been careless, with disastrous results. Mr. Blake might write to the college authorities. Everything, in short, might come out before Jim Watson had finished his week-end visit to Harding. Helping to entertain him seemed therefore a good deal like amusing oneself on the verge of a crackling volcano. Jim's personality made it all the harder; he was so boyishly light- hearted, so tremendously proud of Eleanor, so splendid and downright himself, with a flash in his fine eyes--the only feature in which he resembled Eleanor--and a quiver about his sensitive mouth, that suggested how deep would be his grief and how unappeasable his anger, if he ever found out with what coin his sister had bought her college honors. He "blew in," to use his own phrase for it, on an earlier train than Eleanor had expected, and marched up to the Hilton House with a jaunty air of perfect ease and assurance. But really, he confided to Eleanor, he was in a "blooming blue funk" all the way. "And what do you think?" he added ruefully, "somehow I got mixed up with the matron or whatever you call her. I thought, you see, that this was like a boarding-school, and that I'd got to have some gorgon or other vouch for me before I could see you. So I asked for her first, and she's invited me to dinner. Did you say there were thirty girls in this house? Sixty! I see my finish!" concluded Jim, dolefully. Nevertheless he rose to the occasion and, ensconced between Eleanor and the matron he entertained the latter, and incidentally the whole table, with tales of mountain-climbing, broncho-busting and bear-hunting, that made him at once a hero in the eyes of the girls. But Jim disclaimed all intention of following up his conquest, just as he had, though ineffectually, disclaimed any part in the thrilling escapades of his stories. "I can talk to a bunch of girls if I have to, but if you leave me alone with one, I shall do the scared rabbit act straight back to Cornell," he warned Eleanor. "I came to see you. Dad and I compared notes and we decided that something was up." "Nonsense!" laughed Eleanor, but her eyes fell under Jim's steady gaze, and her cheeks flushed. "Well then, I'm tired," she admitted. "I suppose I've done too much." "I should think so," retorted Jim, savagely. "Quit it, Eleanor. If you break down, what good will it do you to have written a fine story? I say"--his tone was reproachful--"one of those girls at the dinner you gave last night said your story was printed somewhere, and you never sent it to dad and me. You never even told us about it." "It wasn't worth while." "You might let us decide about that. The girl at the dinner said it was a corker, and got you into some swell club or other. That's another thing you didn't write us about." "No," said Eleanor, wearily. "You can't expect me to write every little thing that happens, Jim." Jim, who remembered exactly what his fair informant had said regarding the importance of a Dramatic Club "first election," knit his brows and wondered which of them was right. Finally he gave up the perplexing question and went off to order a farewell box of roses for his sister. It was at about this time that Betty Wales, going sorrowfully to pay a book bill that was twice as large as she had anticipated, heard swift, determined steps behind her, and turned to find Jim Watson swinging after her down Main Street. "I say, Miss Wales," he began, blushing hotly at his own temerity, "Eleanor is off at a class this hour. I'm such a duffer with girls--is it all right for me to ask you to go for a walk?" "Of course," said Betty, laughing. "And if you ask me, I'll go." "Then," said Jim, "I do ask you. You'll have to pick out a trail, for I don't know the country." "Let's walk out to the river," suggested Betty. "It's not so very pretty at this season of the year, but it's our prize walk, so you ought to see it anyhow." Silently Jim fell into step beside her. "Have you had a good time?" inquired Betty, who had decided by this time that Jim really enjoyed talking, only he couldn't manage it without a good deal of help. She had seen more of him in the three days of his visit than any one else but Eleanor, but this was their first tete-a- tete. Hitherto, when Eleanor was busy Jim had gone on solitary tramps or sought the friendly shelter of his hotel. "Great," replied Jim, enthusiastically. "Harding College is all right. I'm mighty glad Eleanor wanted to stay on here." "You're very fond of Eleanor, aren't you?" asked Betty, sure that this topic would draw him out. "You bet." Jim's eyes shone with pleasure. "Eleanor's a trump when she gets started. She was splendid at home this summer. Of course you know"-- Jim flushed again under his tan--"my mother--I'm awfully fond of her too, but of course her being so young makes it queer for Eleanor. But Eleanor fixed everything all right. She made dad and me, and mother too, just fall dead in love with her. You know the way she can." Betty nodded. "I know." "And I guess she's made good here, too," said Jim, proudly, "though you'd never find it out from her. Do you know, Miss Wales, she never wrote us a word about her story that came out in the college magazine." "Didn't she?" said Betty, faintly. "Nor about getting into some club," continued Jim, earnestly. "I forget the name, but you'll know. Isn't it considered quite an honor?" "Why, yes," said Betty, in despair, "that is, some people consider it-- Oh, Mr. Watson, here's the bridge!" Poor Jim, unhesitatingly attributing Betty's embarrassment to some blunder on his part, was covered with mortification. "It's evidently a secret society," he decided, "and that other fool girl didn't know it, and got me into this mess." So he listened with deferential attention while Betty tried to tell him how lovely the snowy meadows and the bleak, ice-bound river looked on a bright June day, and carefully followed her lead as she turned the conversation from river scenery to skating and canoeing; so that they reached home without a second approach to the dangerous topics. Jim was going back to his work that evening. As he said good-bye, he crushed Betty's hand in a bear-like grip that fairly brought tears to her eyes. "I'm awfully glad to have met you," he said, "though I don't suppose you'd ever guess it--I'm such a duffer with girls. Eleanor told me how you stuck by her last year and helped her get her start. I tell you we appreciate anything that's done for Eleanor, dad and I do." As Betty watched him stride off to the Hilton House, she remembered Madeline's advice. "I guess she isn't enjoying her honors very much," she thought. "Imagine getting into Dramatic Club and not writing home about it! Why, I should telegraph! And if I had a thing in the 'Argus'"--Betty smiled at the absurdity of the idea--"half the fun would be to see Nan's face. And if I was ashamed to see her face!" Betty gave a sigh of relief that the comic interlude was over. Under ordinary circumstances the entertaining of Jim would have been the height of bliss. Just now all she wanted was to go to New York and get back again, with her errand done and one source of danger to Eleanor, if possible, eliminated. Jim left Harding on Tuesday evening. Wednesday morning bright and early, Betty started for New York. She went by the early train for two reasons. It was easier to slip away unquestioned during chapel-time, and furthermore she meant to reach New York in time to see Mr. Blake that same afternoon and take the sleeper back to Harding. She thought that spending the night with any of her New York cousins would involve too much explanation, and besides she could sleep beautifully on the train, and she wanted to be back in time for the Thursday basket-ball practice. The girls played every day now, and very often Miss Andrews dropped in to watch them and take the measure of the various aspirants for a place on the official teams, which it would soon be her duty to appoint. CHAPTER XIII VICTORY OR DEFEAT During the first part of her journey Betty busied herself with reading over Mr. Blake's two letters and the lengthy replies that the editors had composed. These last were as totally unlike as their writers, and Betty thought that none of them hit the point so well as Madeline's suggestions, and none was so cogent as the plea that Eleanor and Jim between them had unconsciously made; but they might all help. From Mr. Blake's two letters she decided that he must be a very queer sort of person, and she devoutly hoped that his conversational style would be less obscure than that of his first letter to Frances West; for it would be dreadful, she thought, if she had to keep asking him what he meant. "Well, I guess I shall just have to trust to luck and do the best I can when the time comes," she decided, putting the letters back into her suit-case with a little sigh. She admired Helen Adams's way of deliberately preparing for a crisis, but in her own case it somehow never seemed to work. For example, how could she plan what to say to Mr. Blake until she knew what Mr. Blake would say to her? It would be bad enough to try to answer him when the time came, without worrying about it now. After a brief survey of the flying landscape, which looked uniformly cold and uninviting under a leaden sky, and of her fellow-travelers, none of whom promised any possibilities of amusement, Betty remembered that she had intended to study all the way to New York, and accordingly extracted Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales" from her bag. For half an hour she read the Knight's tale busily. But the adventures of Palamon and Arcite, deciphered by means of assiduous reference to the glossary, were not exciting; at the end of the half hour Betty's head drooped back against the plush cushions, her eyes closed, and her book slid unheeded to the floor. Regardless of all the elegant leisure that she had meant to secure by a diligent five-hour attack upon "The Canterbury Tales," Betty had fallen fast asleep. Some time later the jolt of the halting train woke her. She glanced at her watch--it was twelve o'clock--and looked out for the station sign. But there was no station sign and no station; only snowy fields stretching off to meet wooded hills on one side and the gorge of a frozen river on the other. It had been a gray, sunless morning; now the air was thick with snow, falling in big, lazily-moving flakes which seemed undecided whether or not the journey they were making was worth their while. All this Betty saw through small bare spots on the heavily frosted car windows. She picked up "The Canterbury Tales" from the floor where they had fallen, found her place and sat with her finger in the book, anxiously waiting for the train to go on. But it did not start. The other passengers also grew restless, and asked one another what could be the trouble. There were plenty of guesses, but nobody knew until Betty managed to stop a passing brakeman and asked him if they were going to be late into New York. "Oh, my, yes, ma'am," he assured her affably. "We're about an hour late now, and there's no tellin' how long we'll stand here. There's been a big blizzard and an awful freeze-up in the west--" he waved his hand at the frosty window. "We do be gettin' a bit of it now ourselves, you see--and the connections is all out of whack." This was a cheerful prospect. The train was due in New York at half past one. Allow half an hour for the present delay and it would be fully half past three before Betty could reach Mr. Blake's office. Besides, she had brought nothing to eat except some sweet chocolate, for she had planned to get lunch in New York. It was most provoking. She settled herself once more, a cake of chocolate to nibble in one hand and her book in the other, resolved to endure the rest of the journey with what stoicism she might. Finally, after having exhausted the entire half hour that she had allowed it, the train started with a puff and a wheeze, and ambled on toward its destination, with frequent brief pauses to get its breath or to accommodate the connections that were "all out of whack," and a final long and agonizing wait in the yards. That was the last straw--to be so near the goal and yet helplessly stranded just out of reach. Wishing to verify her own calculations, Betty leaned forward and asked a friendly-looking, gray-haired woman in the seat ahead if she knew just how long it would take to go from the Forty-second Street station to Fulton Street. The woman considered. "Not less than three-quarters of an hour, I should say, unless you took a Subway express to the bridge, and changed there. Then perhaps you might do it in half an hour." Betty thanked her and sat back, watch in hand, counting the minutes and wondering what she would better do if she had to stay in New York all night. In spite of some disadvantages, it would be much the best plan, she decided, to go to her cousins. But never thinking of any such contingency as the one that had arisen, she had left her address book at Harding, and she had a very poor memory for numbers. She remembered vaguely one hundred twenty-one, and was sure that cousin Will Banning lived on East Seventy-second Street. But was his number one twenty-one, or was it three hundred forty-something, and Cousin Alice's one twenty- one on One Hundred and Second Street? Was that east or west, and was it Cousin Alice's address before or after she moved last? The more Betty thought, and the more certain it seemed that she could not reach Mr. Blake's office by any route before five o'clock, the more confused she became. She had never been about in New York alone, and she had a horror of going in the rapidly falling dusk from one number to another in a strange city, and then perhaps not finding her cousins in the end. Then there was nothing to do but stay at a hotel. Luckily Betty did remember very distinctly the name of the one that Nan often stopped at alone. She leaned forward again and asked the lady in front to direct her to it. "Yes, I can do that," said the lady brightly, "or if you like I can take you to it. I'm going there myself. Aren't you a Harding girl?" Betty assented. "And I'm the matron at the Davidson," said the gray-haired lady. "You are!" Betty's tone expressed infinite relief. "And I may really come with you? I'm so glad. I never went to a hotel alone." And she explained briefly why she was obliged to do so now. The snow was still falling softly when they finally reached New York and boarded a crowded car to ride the few blocks to their hotel. It seemed that Betty's new friend had come down to visit her son, who was ill at a hospital. She helped Betty through the trying ordeal of registering and getting a room, and they went to the cafe together for a little supper. Then she hurried off to her son, and Betty was left to her own devices. She despatched a special-delivery letter to Helen, explaining why she could not take the sleeper--Helen had the impression that Betty had gone to New York to have her hair waved and was ashamed to confess to such frivolity. Then she yawned for a while over "The Canterbury Tales," and went to bed early, so as to be in perfect trim for the next day's interview. She intended to see Mr. Blake as early as possible in the morning and take a noon train for Harding. "And I do hope there isn't going to be a blizzard here," she thought, as she fell asleep to the angry howling of the wind, which dashed the snow, now frozen, into tiny, icy globules, against her window panes. But her hope was not destined to be realized. When she woke later than usual the next morning, with a queer feeling of not knowing where she was nor what had happened, the storm was still raging furiously. The street beneath her windows was piled high with impassable drifts, which were getting higher every minute, while on the opposite side a narrow strip of roadway was as clean as if it had been swept with the proverbial new broom. It was snowing so hard that Betty could not see to the corner of the street, and the wind was blowing a gale. "I don't care," said Betty philosophically. "Here goes for seeing New York in a blizzard. I've always wanted to know what it was like." And she began making energetic preparations for breakfast. When she got down-stairs she found a hasty note from her friend of the day before, explaining that her son was worse and she had gone as early as possible to the hospital. So Betty breakfasted in solitary state on rolls and coffee,--for her exchequer was beginning to suffer from the unexpected demands that she had made upon it,--paid her bill, and bag in hand sallied forth to meet the storm. Before she had plowed her way to the nearest corner, she decided that a blizzard in New York was no joke. While she waited there in the teeth of the wind, bracing herself against it as it blew her hair in her eyes, whipped her skirt about her ankles, and swept the snow, sharp and cutting as needle-points, pitilessly against her cheeks, she was more than half minded to give up seeing Mr. Blake altogether and go straight to the station. But it was not Betty's way to give up. She brushed back her flying hair, held up her muff as protection against the wind, and when her car finally arrived, tumbled on with a sigh of relief and then a laugh all to herself at the absurdity of the whole situation. "Mr. Blake will want to laugh too when he sees me," she thought, "and perhaps that will be a good beginning." In this cheerful mood Betty presently arrived at the door of "The Quiver" office. She made a wry face as she shook the snow out of her furs, straightened her hat and smoothed her hair. It was too bad to have to go in looking like a fright, after all the pains she had taken to wear her most becoming clothes, so as to look, and to feel, as impressive as possible. As a matter of fact, she had never looked prettier than when, having done her best to repair the ravages of the wind, she stood waiting a moment longer to get her breath and decide how she should ask for Mr. Blake and what she should say when she was summoned into his awful presence. Her cheeks were glowing with the cold, her eyes bright with excitement, and her hair blown into damp little curls that were far more becoming than any more studied arrangement would have been. Mr. Richard Blake would indeed be difficult to please if he failed to find her charming. She gave a final pat to her hair, loosened her furs, and knocked boldly on the office door. There was no answer. Betty had reached out her hand to knock again when it occurred to her that people who came to her father's office walked right in. So she carefully opened the door and stepping just inside, closed it again after her. She found herself in a big, bare room, with three or four desks near the long windows and a table by the door. Only one desk was occupied--the one in the farthest corner of the room. The young man sitting behind it--he was very young indeed, smooth-shaven, with expressionless, heavy-lidded eyes, and a mouth that drooped cynically at the corners,--barely glanced at his visitor, and then dropped his eyes once more to the papers on his desk. Betty waited a moment, while he wrote rapidly on the margin of one sheet with a blue pencil, and then, seeing that he apparently intended to go on reading and writing indefinitely, she gave a deprecating little cough. "Is Mr. Richard Blake in?" she asked. "Yes," answered the young man behind the desk, without so much as glancing in her direction. "Can--may I see him, please?" "You can," returned the young man, emphasizing the word can in what Betty thought an extremely disagreeable way. He made no move to go and get Mr. Blake, and Betty, knowing nothing else to do, awaited his pleasure in silence. "Is it so very important as all this?" asked the young man at last, tossing aside his papers and coming toward Betty with disconcerting suddenness. "You know," he went on, "I can't possibly read it to-day. I'm desperately busy. I shall put it in a pigeon-hole and I shan't look at it for weeks perhaps. So I can't see that it was worth your while to come out in a storm like this to bring it to me." "Are you Mr. Richard Blake?" demanded Betty, wishing to get at least one thing definitely settled. The young man nodded. "I am," he said, "but pray how did you arrive at your conclusion--so late?" "Because," said Betty promptly, "you talk exactly as your letters sound." "That's interesting," said the young man. "How do they sound?" "I mean," said Betty, blushing at her own temerity, "that they are hard to understand." The young man appeared to be considering this remark with great seriousness. "That implies," he began at last very slowly, "that you must have had either a letter of acceptance or a personal note of refusal from 'The Quiver.' So perhaps your story is worth coming out in a blizzard to bring after all. Anyway, since you have brought it out in a blizzard, I'll just glance over it, if you care to wait." Betty stared at Mr. Richard Blake in growing bewilderment. "I think you must have mistaken me for some one else," she said at last. "You don't know me at all, Mr. Blake, and you never wrote to me. The letter that I saw was written to some one else." "Indeed! And am I also mistaken in supposing that you have brought me a story for 'The Quiver'?" "I brought you a story for 'The Quiver'!" gasped Betty. Then all at once she took in the situation and laughed so merrily that even the blase, young editor of "The Quiver" was forced to smile a little in sympathy. "I see now," she said, when she could speak. "You thought I was a writer--an authoress. I suppose that most of the people who come to see an editor are authors, aren't they?" "Yes," said the young man gravely. "The only possible reason that has ever brought a pretty young woman to 'The Quiver' office is the vain hope that because I have seen that she is pretty, I shall like her story better than I otherwise would." "Well," said Betty, too intent upon coming to the point to be either annoyed or amused by Mr. Blake's frank implication, "I haven't come about a story. Or--that is, I have too. I came to see you about Eleanor Watson's story--the one that is so like 'The Lost Hope' in the November 'Quiver.'" "Indeed!" The young man's face grew suddenly sombre again. "Won't you have a seat?" He led the way back to his desk, placing a chair for Betty beside his own. "Let us make a fair start," he said, as he took his seat. "You mean the story that was copied from 'The Quiver,' I suppose." "Yes." Betty hesitated, wondering if she was being led into some damaging confession. But she had not come to palter with the truth. "I'm afraid there is no doubt that it was copied from 'The Quiver,' Mr. Blake." "Did you know that it was a better story than the one in 'The Quiver'?" [Illustration: "LET US MAKE A FAIR START," HE SAID] Betty's eyes sparkled with pleasure. "Do you really think so?" she asked eagerly. "I'm so glad, because I did, too, only I was afraid I might be prejudiced. But you wouldn't be." Betty stopped in confusion, for Mr. Blake had abruptly turned his back upon her, and was staring out the nearest window at the mist of flying snow. There was a long pause, or at least it seemed oppressively long to Betty, who had no idea what it meant. Then "To whom have I the honor of speaking?" asked Mr. Blake in the queer, sarcastic tone that had annoyed Betty earlier in the interview. As briefly as possible Betty explained who she was, and why she had come as special envoy from the editors. She was relieved when Mr. Blake turned back from his survey of the landscape with another faint suggestion of a smile flickering about his grim mouth. "You relieve me immensely, Miss Wales," he said. "I was quite sure you were not an editor of the 'Argus,' because you seemed so totally unfamiliar with the machinery of literary ventures; and so I supposed, or at least I feared, that Miss Watson had come to speak for herself." Betty flushed angrily. "Why, Mr. Blake, do I look--" "No, you don't in the least," Mr. Blake interrupted her hastily. "But unfortunately, you must admit, appearances are sometimes deceitful. Now suppose that your friend Miss Watson had come herself. Does she look or act like the sort of person that she has shown herself to be?" Betty smiled brightly. "Of course not," she said. "She doesn't at all. But then she isn't that sort of person. I mean she never will be again. If she was, I can tell you that I shouldn't be here. It's just because she's so splendid when she thinks in time and tries to be nice, and because she hasn't any mother and never had half a chance that I'm sorry for her now. And besides, it's certainly punishment enough to see that story in the 'Argus,' and know she didn't write it, and to get into Dramatic Club partly because of it, and so have that spoiled for her too, and not to be able to let her family be one bit proud of her. Don't you see that an open disgrace wouldn't mean any more punishment? It would only make it harder for her to be fair and square again. It isn't as if she didn't care. She hates herself for it, Mr. Blake, I know she does." Betty paused for breath and Mr. Richard Blake took the opportunity to speak. "What, may I ask, is the Dramatic Club?" "Oh, a splendid literary club that some of the nicest girls in college belong to," explained Betty impatiently, feeling that the question was not much to the point. "Do you belong to it?" demanded Mr. Blake. "Oh, no," said Betty, with a laugh. "I'm not bright enough. I hate to stick to things long enough to learn them." "That's unfortunate, because I was hoping you were a member," said Mr. Blake, inconsequently. "But to return to the story, do you think that Miss Watson was so very much to blame for copying it?" "Of course I do," said Betty, indignantly, wondering what Mr. Richard Blake could possibly be driving at now. "But consider," he pursued. "Miss Watson is a very clever girl, isn't she?" "Yes, indeed," assented Betty, eagerly. "She finds this story--an unusual story, rather badly written, with a very weak ending. It strikes her as having possibilities. She puts on the needed touches,--the finish, the phrasing and an ending that is almost a stroke of genius. Isn't the story hers?" Betty waited a moment. "No, Mr. Blake," she said decidedly, "it isn't. Those little changes don't make any difference. She took it from 'The Quiver.'" "But how about Shakespeare's plays? Every one of them has a borrowed plot. Shakespeare improved it, added incidents and characters, fused the whole situation in the divine fire of his genius. But some characters and the general outline of the plot he borrowed. We don't say he stole them. We don't call him a plagiarist, Miss Wales." "I don't know about that," said Betty, doubtfully. "I never understood about Shakespeare's plots; but I suppose it was different in those days. Lots of things were. And besides he was a regular genius, and I know that what he did hasn't anything to do with Eleanor. She oughtn't to have copied a story. I don't see how she could do it; but I wish you could feel that it was right to overlook it." "Miss Wales," said Mr. Blake, abruptly, "I'm going to tell you something. I don't care a snap of my finger for Miss Watson. I don't really believe she's worth much consideration, though her having a friend who will go around New York for her on a day like this seems to indicate the contrary. But what I'm particularly interested in is the moral tone of Harding College. That's a big thing, a thing worth thought and effort and personal sacrifice to maintain. Now tell me frankly, Miss Wales, how would the Harding girls as a whole look at this matter?" "If you knew any," returned Betty, swiftly, "you wouldn't ask. Of course they'd feel just the way I do." "Perhaps even the way I do?" "Y-yes," admitted Betty, grudgingly. "But I believe I could bring them round," she added with a mischievous smile. "Then how did Miss Watson happen to do such a thing?" "Because," explained Betty, earnestly, "she doesn't feel the way the rest of the girls do about such things. I'm awfully fond of her, but I noticed the difference almost the first time I met her. Last year she--oh, there was nothing like this," added Betty, quickly, "and after she saw how the other girls felt, she changed. But I suppose she couldn't change all at once, and so she did this. But she isn't a typical Harding girl, indeed she isn't, Mr. Blake." "And yet she is a member of the Dramatic Club," said Mr. Blake, taking up a telegram from his desk. "Don't you suppose she wishes she wasn't?" inquired Betty. Mr. Blake made no answer. "Well, Miss Wales," he said, at last, "I fancy we've talked as much about this as is profitable. I'm very glad to have seen you, but I'm sorry that you found us in such disorder. The office boy is stuck in the drifts over in Brooklyn, and my assistant and the stenographer are snowed up in Harlem. I only hope you won't get snowed in anywhere between here and Harding. You're going back to-day, you said?" Betty nodded. "And I should like--" "To be sure," Mr. Blake took her up. "You would like to know my answer. Well, Miss Wales, I really think you deserve it, too; but as it happens, I find I'm going up to Harding next week, and I want to look over the ground for myself,--see what I think about the moral tone of things, you know." "You're coming up to Harding!" said Betty, ruefully. "Then I needn't have come down here at all." "Oh, but I didn't know it till to-day," explained Mr. Blake, soothingly. "I got the telegram while I was breakfasting this morning. I can't telegraph my answer, because the wires are all down, so you might tell them I've written, or you might post my answer for me in Harding. I have the greatest confidence in your ability to get through the drifts, Miss Wales." "Are you"--Betty hesitated--"are you coming up about this, Mr. Blake?" For answer he passed her the telegram. It was an invitation from the newly-elected president of the Dramatic Club--Beatrice Egerton had gone out of office at midyears--to lecture before an open meeting of the society a week from the following Saturday. "Goodness!" said Betty, returning the telegram. "I didn't know you were a lecturer too, Mr. Blake." "Oh, I'm not much of one," returned Mr. Blake, easily. "I suspect that the man they had engaged couldn't come, and Miss Stuart--you know her, I presume--who's an old friend of mine, suggested me as a forlorn hope. You see," he added, "'The Quiver' is a new thing and doesn't go everywhere yet, as your friend Miss Watson was clever enough to know; but before I began to edit it, I used to write dramatic criticisms for the newspapers. Some people didn't like my theories about the stage and the right kind of plays and the right way of acting them; so it amuses them now to hear me lecture and to think to themselves 'How foolish!' 'How absurd!' as I talk." "I see," laughed Betty. "I'm afraid I don't know much about dramatic criticism." "Well, it doesn't amount to very much," returned Mr. Blake, genially. "That's why I stopped doing it. Shall you come to hear me lecture, Miss Wales?" Betty laughed again. "I shall if I can get an invitation," she said. "I suppose it's an invitation affair." "And Miss Watson will be there?" Betty nodded. "Unless, of course, she knows that you are the editor of 'The Quiver.'" "She won't," said Mr. Blake, "unless you or the editors of the 'Argus' tell her. Miss Stuart doesn't know, and she is probably the only other person up there who's ever heard of me. Good-bye, Miss Wales, until next week, Saturday." Betty got her bag from the elevator boy, into whose keeping she had trustfully confided it, and went out into the snow. She was very much afraid that she had not done her full duty. Dorothy had told her to be sure to pin Mr. Blake down to something definite. Well, she had tried to, but she had not succeeded. As she thought over the interview, she could not remember that she had said anything very much to the point. It seemed, indeed, as if they had talked mostly about other things; and yet toward the last Mr. Blake's manner had been much more cordial, if that meant anything. Anyway it was all over and done with now, and quite useless. Dorothy and Beatrice and Frances could do their own talking next week. And--she had stood on the corner for ten minutes and still there was no car in sight. A few had crawled past on their way to the Battery, but none had come back. It was frightfully cold. Betty stamped her feet, slapped her arms, warmed first one aching ear and then the other. Still no car. A diminutive newsboy had stopped by her side, and in despair she appealed to him. "Isn't there some other way to get up town?" she asked. "These cars must have stopped running, and I've got to get to the Central station." "Take de L to de bridge and den de Subway. Dat ain't snowed in," suggested the little newsboy. "C'n I carry your bag, lady?" It was only a few blocks, but it seemed at least a mile to Betty, too cold and tired to enjoy the tussle with the wind any longer. When she had stumbled up the long flight of stairs and dropped herself and her bag in the nearest corner of the waiting train, she could scarcely have taken another step. The Central station, like the whole city, wore a dejected, deserted appearance. Yes, there would be a train for Harding some time, a guard assured Betty. He could not say when it would start. Oh, it had been due to start at ten-thirty, and it was now exactly twelve-five. There was nothing to do but wait. So Betty waited, dividing her time between "The Canterbury Tales"--she had not money enough to dare to waste any on a magazine--and a woman, who was also waiting for the belated ten-thirty. Her baby was ill, she told Betty; she feared it would die before she could get to it. Betty's own weariness and discouragement sank into insignificance beside her companion's trouble, and in trying to reassure her she became quite cheerful herself. At half past eleven that night Madeline Ayres heard something bang against her window and looked out to find Betty Wales standing in the drifts, snowballing the front windows of the Belden House with an impartiality born of despair. "I thought I should never wake any one up," she said, when Madeline had unlocked the door and let her into the grateful warmth of the hall. "The bell wouldn't ring and I was so afraid out there, and I've been ten hours coming from New York, and I'm starved, Madeline." When, after having enjoyed a delicious, if not particularly digestible supper of coffee and Welsh rarebit in Madeline's room, Betty crept softly to her own, and turned up the gas just far enough to undress by, Helen woke and sat straight up in bed. "Why, Betty!" she said, "I'm awfully glad you've come. We all worried so about you. But--why, Betty, your hair isn't waved a bit. Didn't you have it waved?" "Helen, were you ever in New York in a blizzard?" enquired Betty, busily unlacing her shoe-strings. "No," said Helen. "Did it take out the curl?" "Would it take out the curl!" repeated Betty scornfully. "It would take out the curliest curl that ever was in thirty seconds. It was perfectly awful. But, Helen, don't say anything about it, but I didn't go to New York for that." "Oh!" said Helen. The next day Betty woke up with a splitting headache and a sore throat. The day after the doctor came and called it a mild case of grippe. It was a week before she felt like playing basket-ball, and that very day the teams were chosen and Babbie had the position as sub-centre that Betty had coveted. One thing she gained by being ill. By the time she was able to be up and out even Mary Brooks, with her "satiable curiosity," had forgotten to ask why she went to New York. CHAPTER XIV A DISTINGUISHED GUEST "It's going to be lots of fun. They can't any of them act at all, of course, and their plays are the wildest things, Babe says. She and Bob went once last winter. This one is called 'The Hand of Fate'--doesn't that sound thrilling? I say, Betty, I think you might be a true sport and come along. You know you don't care a straw about 'The Tendencies of the Modern Drama.'" Katherine Kittredge sat cross-legged on Betty's couch, with Betty's entire collection of pillows piled comfortably behind her back, while she held forth with eloquent enthusiasm upon the charms of the "ten-twenty- thirty" cent show which was giving its final performance that evening at the Harding opera house. "I don't know anything about them, so how can I tell whether I care or not?" retorted Betty, who was sitting before her desk engaged in a desperate effort to bring some semblance of order out of the chaos that littered its shelf and pigeon-holes. "Well, even if you do care, you can probably read it all up in some book," continued Katherine. "And, besides," she added briskly. "you would get a lot of points to-night. Isn't 'The Hand of Fate' a modern drama, I should like to know?" Betty gave a sudden joyous exclamation. "Why, I'm finding all the things I've lost, Katherine. Here's my pearl pin that I thought the sneak thieves must have stolen. I remember now that I put it into an envelope to take down to be cleaned. And,"--joy changing abruptly to despair,-- "here's my last week's French exercise, that I hunted and hunted for, and finally thought I must have given to some one to hand in for me. Do you suppose mademoiselle will ever believe me?" Katherine chuckled. "She would if she knew your habits better. Now listen, Betty. Nita's coming to-night, and Babe and Babbie--Bob would, only she doesn't dare cut the lecture when she's just gone into Dramatic Club--and Rachel and Roberta, and I've about half persuaded Mary Brooks. We're going to sit in the bald-headed row and clap all the hero's tenor solos and sob when the heroine breaks his heart, and hiss the villain. How's that for a nice little stunt?" "I just love ten-cent plays," admitted Betty, obviously weakening. "Then come on," urged Katherine. Betty shook her head. "No, I don't believe I will this time. You see Emily asked me to the lecture, and I accepted." "Well, so did most of us accept," argued Katherine. "You needn't think we weren't asked. Emily won't care. Just give your ticket away, so there won't be too many vacant seats, and come along." "But you see," explained Betty, "I really do want to hear the lecture, and I can go off on a lark with you girls almost any time." "I never knew you to be so keen about a lecture before," said Katherine indignantly. "I believe Helen Adams is turning you into a regular dig." "Don't worry," laughed Betty. "You see one reason why I--" There was a tap on the door, and without waiting for an answer to her knock Eleanor Watson entered. She was apparently in the best of spirits; there was no hint in face or manner of the weariness and nervous depression that had been so evident at the time of Jim's visit. "Have you both tickets for Mr. Blake's lecture?" she asked with a careless little nod for Katherine. "I have one left and Beatrice has one, and she sent me out hunting for victims. I've asked you once already, haven't I, Betty?" "Yes, you did," said Betty, "but Emily asked me before that." "And I'm going to 'The Hand of Fate,'" said Katherine stiffly, picking up a book from the table and turning over its pages with an air of studied indifference. She had no intention of being patronized by Eleanor Watson. "But she's given away her ticket, Eleanor," said Betty pacifically, "so you needn't worry about empty seats." "Oh, we're not worrying," returned Eleanor loftily. "The subject is so attractive"--Katherine winked at Betty from behind the shelter of her book. "And then Miss Stuart knows Mr. Blake, and she says that he's a splendid speaker. Miss Stuart is ill to-day, so Miss Ferris is going to have Mr. Blake up to dinner. Of course we Hilton House girls are dreadfully excited about that." "Of course," said Betty, with a little gasp of dismay which neither of her friends seemed to notice. "Miss Ferris has asked the Dramatic Club girls to sit at her table," went on Eleanor impressively, "and she wants me to be on her other side, right opposite Mr. Blake. Just think of that!" "Splendid!" said Betty, feeling like a traitor. And yet what else could she say, and what difference would it make, since Eleanor did not know that Mr. Blake was the editor of "The Quiver," and Mr. Blake, in the general confusion of introductions, would probably not catch Eleanor's name. "I hope you know a good deal more about the tendencies of the modern drama than I do," said Katherine drily, "if you're in as deep as all that." She slid off the couch with a jerk. "Good-bye, Betty. Are you sure you won't change your mind?" "I guess not this time, Katherine," said Betty, following her guest to the door. Eleanor went off too, after a moment, and Betty was left free to bestow her undivided attention upon the rearrangement of her desk. But even several "finds" quite as important and surprising as the pearl pin and the French theme did not serve to concentrate her thoughts upon her own affairs. The absorbing question was, what did Mr. Blake mean to do, and how would a dinner with Eleanor in the seat opposite affect his intentions? He had said that he wasn't interested in Eleanor, but he couldn't help being influenced by what she said and did, if he knew who she was. For the hundredth time Betty questioned, did Eleanor deserve the consideration that was being asked for her? Was it fair to set aside the gay, self-absorbed Eleanor of to-day in favor of the clinging, repentant Eleanor of the week before? Why, yes, she thought, it must be fair to judge a person at her best, if you wanted her to be her best. She sighed over the perplexities of life, and then she sighed again, because of her tiresome desk and the Saturday afternoon that was slipping away so fast. It was half-past four already, and at five she had promised to meet Madeline Ayres in the college library for a walk before dinner. She put the papers that she had sorted into their proper pigeon-holes, swept the rest of the litter into a pile for future consideration, and made a hasty toilette, reflecting that she should have to dress again anyway for the lecture. As she put on her hat, she noticed the ruffled plume and smoothed it as best she could. "That blizzard!" she thought ruefully. Reminded again of Mr. Blake, she wondered if he had taken an early train from New York. If so he must have reached Harding long ago. Perhaps he was closeted with the editors--Frances hadn't heard from him about an interview when Betty saw her last. Or perhaps he was investigating the moral tone of the college. Betty wondered smilingly how he would go about it, and looked up to find Mr. Richard Blake himself strolling slowly toward her from the direction of the front gateway. At the same instant he saw her and came quickly forward, his hat in one hand, the other stretched out for Betty to take. "So you didn't get stuck in the snow," he said, gravely. "Not so deep that I had to stay stuck for a week," laughed Betty. "Haven't the office-boy and the stenographer got out yet?" "Yes, but they didn't have so far to go," returned Mr. Blake, calmly. "May I walk on with you?" "Of course," agreed Betty, "but you weren't going my way, were you?" Mr. Blake smiled his slight, cynical smile. "To tell the truth, Miss Wales, I haven't the least idea which way I am going--or which way I ought to be. I'm supposed to turn up for five o'clock tea with one Miss Raymond, who lives at a place called the Davidson House. My friend Miss Stuart is ill, and I escaped the escort of a committee by wickedly hinting that I knew my way about." "Well," said Betty, "you were going the right way when I met you. The Davidson is straight down at the other end of that row of brick houses." "Thank you," said Mr. Blake, making no move to follow Betty's directions. "I detest teas, and I'm going to be as late as I dare. But perhaps I shall be in your way." Betty explained that she was bound for the college library to meet a friend. "Ah," said Mr. Blake, "I think I should like to see that library. You know I have theories about libraries as well as about plays. Is this a nice one?" "Of course," said Betty. "Everything at Harding is nice. Don't you think so?" Mr. Blake shook his head uncertainly. "I hardly feel competent to speak of everything yet, Miss Wales." "Well, how about the moral tone?" inquired Betty demurely. She had a feeling that more direct questions would not help Eleanor's cause. Mr. Blake shook his head again. "I haven't gone very far with that yet, Miss Wales. I mean to make them talk about it at the tea." They had climbed the stairs to the library and Betty pushed back the swinging doors and stepped inside, wondering vaguely whether she should call the librarian or take Mr. Blake from alcove to alcove herself, when Madeline Ayres looked up from her book, and catching sight of them started forward with a haste and enthusiasm which the occasion, Betty thought, hardly warranted. "I'm afraid I don't know enough about the books to take you around," she was saying to Mr. Blake, when Madeline descended precipitately upon them and, paying not the slightest attention to Betty, said in a loud whisper to Mr. Blake, "Dick, come outside this minute, where we can shake hands." "Come on, Miss Wales," whispered Mr. Blake. "It will be worth seeing," and Betty, not knowing what else to do, followed him into the hall. "Why, Dick Blake," Madeline went on enthusiastically, "you don't know how good it seems to see one of the old Paris crowd again. Have you forgotten how we used to hunt chocolate shops together, and do the Latin Quarter at night, and teach my cousins American manners?" "Hardly," laughed Mr. Blake. "We were a pair of young wretches in those days, Madeline. But I thought you were all for art and Bohemia. What on earth are you doing up here?" "Completing my education," returned Madeline calmly. "The family suddenly discovered that I was dreadfully ignorant. What are you doing up here yourself, Dick?" "Helping to complete your education," returned Mr. Blake serenely. "Is it possible that the fame of my to-night's lecture hasn't reached you, Madeline?" Madeline laughed merrily. "To think that we've come to this, Dick. Why, I never dreamed that was you. I've been refusing tickets to that lecture all day--I abhor lectures--but of course I shall go now." She turned to Betty. "Why didn't you tell us that you knew Mr. Blake, Betty?" Betty blushed guiltily. "Why, I--because I don't know him much," she stammered. "To be exact, Madeline," interposed Mr. Blake, "this is only our second meeting, and of course Miss Wales didn't want to stand for me in the critical eyes of the Harding public." "Well, but--" Madeline looked from one to the other sharply. "Dick, whom are you writing for now?" she demanded. "For myself. I'm running a magazine." "'The Quiver'?" Mr. Blake nodded. "Yes, have you seen it? I've sent one or two numbers to your father on the chance of their finding him in some far corner of the earth." "So that's it," said Madeline enigmatically, ignoring the question. "Now I understand. I--well, the point is, Dick, do whatever Betty Wales wants you to. You may depend upon it that she knows what she's about. Everything she tells you will be on the straight." Mr. Richard Blake threw back his head and laughed a hearty, boyish laugh. "You haven't changed a bit, Madeline," he said. "You expect me to be your humble chessman and no questions asked, exactly as you did in the old days. I can't promise what you want now," he added soberly, "but I heartily subscribe to what you say about Miss Wales. See here"--he reached hastily for his watch--"I was going to a tea, wasn't I? Do I dare to cut it out?" Betty hesitated and looked at Madeline, who shook her head decidedly. "Never. This isn't Bohemia, you know. Run along, Dick. I'll see you to-night if I can get a chance, and if not you'll surely be round at Easter?" "Rather," said Mr. Richard Blake, striding hurriedly down the hall. Madeline watched him go with a smile. "Nice boy," she said laconically. "We used to have jolly times together, when he was Paris correspondent for the something or other in New York. Have we time to take our walk, Betty?" "Madeline," said Betty solemnly, "you are a jewel--a perfect jewel. Do you think he'll do it?" "Of course," said Madeline coolly. "He'll keep you on tenter-hooks as long as he can, but his bark is always worse than his bite, and he'll come round in the end." "Oh, I hope so," said Betty anxiously. Madeline smiled lazily down at her. "It's no good worrying, anyhow," she said, "You can't pursue him to his tea. Besides, ten minutes before you met him you'd almost decided that it would be better to let the whole thing out, and be done with it." "Madeline," demanded Betty in amazement, "how do you guess things?" "Never mind how," laughed Madeline. "Come and dress for the lecture." Betty answered Helen's eager questions about the discovery of the pearl pin in absent-minded monosyllables. After all, things were turning out better than she had hoped. Indirectly at least the trip to New York had counted in Eleanor's favor. She need not reproach herself any longer with carelessness in letting Madeline into the secret, and she could feel that it was not for nothing that she had lost her chances of being on the "sub" team. As she entered the lecture hall that evening with Helen and Alice Waite, Dorothy King, who was standing by the ticket taker, accosted her. "I wanted to tell you that Christy is coming back before long," she said. Having drawn her aside on that flimsy excuse, Dorothy grew suddenly earnest. "What's he going to do, Betty?" she demanded. "Why, I don't know," said Betty, blushing at thought of Madeline, "any more than you do. Haven't you seen him?" "No," explained Dorothy. "He wrote to say that it would be wasting time to argue any more--that he was sure he understood our point of view from you, and now he meant to see for himself and decide." "Then I suppose he'll tell Miss West tonight." "We hoped he'd told you this afternoon." "How did you know I'd seen him?" inquired Betty evasively. "Eleanor Watson told me that she saw you together in the library." Betty gave a little cry of dismay, then checked it. "But she doesn't know who he is," she said. "Yes, she does know now," said Dorothy quickly. "How?" "He told her himself. He was at dinner this evening with Miss Ferris, you know. Eleanor sat up at his end of the table looking like a perfect queen, and she talked awfully well too--she is certainly a very brilliant girl. He talked to her a good deal during dinner and as we were leaving the table he asked Miss Ferris again who she was." "What did he say when she told him?" "He just said 'Indeed!' in that queer, drawling voice of his. Afterward Miss Ferris made coffee for us, and what do you suppose he did? He began to ask everybody in the room about the code of honor at the college." "Well?" "After one or two of the girls had said what they thought, he turned straight to Eleanor Watson. 'And you, Miss Watson,' he said, 'what do you think? Is this fine moral feeling strong enough to stand a strain? Would you be willing to risk one thoroughly dishonest student not to overthrow it?' She got awfully white, and I could see her cup shake in her hand, but she said very quietly, 'I quite agree with what has already been said, Mr. Blake.'" "And then?" "Then he said 'Indeed!' again. But when the girls got up to go and he bid them each good-bye, he managed to keep Eleanor on some pretext about wanting to finish an argument that they'd begun at dinner. Miss Ferris kept me to know about a Hilton House girl who was down at the infirmary when I was and finally had to be sent home; and as we stood talking at the other side of the room, I distinctly heard Mr. Blake say, 'The editor of "The Quiver," Miss Watson.'" "Did Miss Ferris hear it too?" "Probably not. Anyway it wouldn't mean anything to her. The next minute Eleanor Watson was gone, and then I went too. Betty, we must run back this minute. He's going to begin." As far as her information about "The Tendencies of the Modern Drama" was concerned, Betty Wales might quite as well have been enjoying herself at "The Hand of Fate." She sat very still, between two girls she had never seen before, and apparently listened intently to the speaker. As a matter of fact, she heard scarcely a word that he said. Her thoughts and her eyes were fixed on Eleanor, who was sitting with Beatrice Egerton, well up on the middle aisle. Like Betty, she seemed to be absorbed in following the thread of Mr. Blake's argument. She laughed at his jokes, applauded his clever stories. But there was a hot flush on her cheeks and a queer light in her eyes that bore unmistakable evidence to the struggle going on beneath her forced attention. After the lecture Betty was waiting near the door for Helen and Alice, when Eleanor brushed past her. "Are you going home, Eleanor?" she asked timidly, merely for the sake of saying something friendly. Eleanor turned back impatiently. "You're the tenth person who's asked me that," she said. "Why shouldn't I be?" "Why, no reason at all--" began Betty. But Eleanor had vanished. Once in her own room she locked the door and gave free rein to the fury of passion and remorse that held her in its thrall. Jim's visit had brought out all her nobler impulses. She had caught a glimpse of herself as she would have looked in his eyes, and the scorn of her act that she had felt at intervals all through the fall and winter--that had prevented any real enjoyment of her stolen honors and kept her from writing home about them,--had deepened into bitter self-abnegation. But Jim had come and gone. He still believed in her, for he did not know what she had done. Nobody knew. Nobody would ever know now. It was absurd to fear discovery after all these months. So Eleanor had argued, throwing care and remorse to the winds, and resolving to forget the past and enjoy life to the full. Then, just at the moment of greatest triumph, had come Mr. Blake's startling announcement. He had not told her what he had done or meant to do, nor how he had found out about the story, nor who shared his secret; and Eleanor had been too amazed and frightened to ask. Now, in the solitude of her room, she drew her own swift conclusions. It was a plot against her peace of mind, his coming up to lecture. Who had arranged it? Who indeed but Betty Wales? She knew Mr. Blake intimately, it seemed, and she had such horribly strict ideas of honesty. She would never forgive her own sister for cheating. "She must have seen 'The Quiver' on my table," thought Eleanor, "and then to use it against me like this!" No doubt she or Mr. Blake had told that hateful Madeline Ayres, who knew him too. No doubt all the editors had been told. It was to be hoped that Dorothy King, with her superior airs, realized that it was mostly her fault. A dull flush spread over Eleanor's pale face, as it suddenly flashed upon her that Beatrice Egerton was an editor. Well, if Beatrice was in the secret, there was no telling how many she had confided in. Eleanor's devotion to Miss Egerton had been utterly without sentiment from the first. She realized perfectly that Beatrice was flippant and unprincipled, swayed only by selfish considerations and by a passion for making a sensation. If she did not mind being associated with the story, she would tell it; only regard for her own reputation as Eleanor's "backer" might deter her. Swiftly Eleanor laid her plan. After all, what did it matter who knew? Mr. Blake, Betty and Dorothy, Beatrice--the whole college--what could they prove? Nothing--absolutely nothing, unless she betrayed herself. No doubt they thought they had brought her to bay, and expected her to make some sort of confession. They would find there was no getting around her that way. There was no danger of discovery, so long as she kept her head, and she would never show the white feather. She would write another story--she could do it and she would, too, that very night. But first she would go back to the Students' Building. The Dramatic Club was giving a reception to Mr. Blake and the members of the faculty. She had been unpardonably stupid to think of missing it. As she crossed the shadowed space in front of the big building, she caught sight of three dimly outlined figures clustered about one of the pillars of the portico, and heard Frances West's voice, so sweet and penetrating as to be quite unmistakable. "Yes, he leaves it entirely to us," she was saying. "He said he thought we could be trusted to know what was best." "I wish he hadn't made the condition that no one should say anything to her," objected a second speaker. "It doesn't seem to me quite wise to let things just drift along the same as ever." "Nonsense," broke in a third voice, sharp with irritation. "You know perfectly well--" Eleanor had walked as slowly as she dared. Now there was nothing for it but to open the door without waiting to find out the identity of the last two speakers, or risk being caught eaves-dropping. She hurried on up the stairs to the society rooms on the second floor, and devoted herself for the rest of the evening to the dullest and most unpopular members of the faculty with an ardor that won her the heart- felt gratitude of the president of the club. "I can be agreeable," she thought, as she sat down at her desk an hour later. "I can do whatever I make up my mind to. I'll show them that I'm not going to 'drift along!'" It was six o'clock in the morning when, stiff and heavy-eyed, she turned off her light and crept into bed. "I've driven a coach and four through their precious ten o'clock rule," she thought, "but I don't care. I've finished the story." The story was a little sketch of western life, with characters and incidents drawn from an experience of Jim's. Eleanor was an excellent critic of her own work, and she knew that this was good; not so unusual, perhaps, as the other one had been, but vivid, swinging, full of life and color, far above the average of student work. It should go to Miss Raymond the first thing in the morning. She would like it, and the "Argus" perhaps would want it--Eleanor closed her tired eyes, and in a moment was fast asleep. CHAPTER XV DISAPPOINTMENTS It was the day of the great basket-ball game. In half an hour more the gymnasium would be opened to the crowd that waited in two long, sinuous lines, gay with scarfs, banners and class emblems, outside the doors. Now and then a pretty girl, dressed all in white, with a paper hat, green or yellow as the case might be, and an usher's wand to match, darted out of one of the campus houses and fluttered over to the back door of the gymnasium. The crowd watched these triumphal progresses languidly. Its interest was reserved for the other girls, pig tailed and in limp-hanging rain-coats, who also sought the back door, but with that absence of ostentation and self-consciousness which invariably marks the truly great. The crowd singled out its "heroes in homespun," and one line or the other applauded, according to the color that was known to be sewed on the blue sleeve beneath the rain-coat. The green line was just shouting itself hoarse over T. Reed, who had been observed slinking across the apple orchard, hoping to effect her entrance unnoticed, when Eleanor Watson hurried down the steps of the Hilton House, carrying a sheet of paper in one hand. Hearing the shouting, she shrugged her shoulders disdainfully and chose the route to the Westcott House that did not lead past the gymnasium doors. As she went up the steps of the Westcott, she met Jean Eastman coming down, her white skirts rustling in the wind. Jean looked at her in surprise. "Why, Eleanor, you're an usher too. Aren't you going to dress? It's half past two this minute." "Yes," said Eleanor curtly, "I know. I'm not going to usher. I have a headache. Jean, where is my basket-ball song?" "How should I know?" said Jean, smoothing the petals of the green chrysanthemums that were festooned about her wand. "On the paper with the rest, isn't it?" [Illustration: THE GREEN LINE WAS SHOUTING ITSELF HOARSE] "No," said Eleanor, "it's not. I didn't go to the class 'sing' last night, but this noon somebody left a song sheet in my room. You said they chose mine, Jean." "I said," corrected Jean, "that I thought they chose it. I was on the song committee, but I didn't go to the meeting. From your description I thought it must be one of those that Kate said was taken." Eleanor held out the paper to Jean. "Whose are these?" Jean glanced hastily down the page. "Why, I don't know," she said, "any more than you do--except that first one to the tune of 'St. Louis.'" She hummed a lilting measure or two. "That's our prize song all right, and who do you think wrote it?" "Who?" demanded Eleanor fiercely. "That little Adams girl--the one who rooms with Betty Wales. T. Reed told me she'd been working on it for weeks." Eleanor's eyes flashed scornfully. "I should think it ought to be fairly decent then," she said. "Well, it's considerably more than fairly decent," said Jean cheerfully. "I'm freezing here, Eleanor, and it's late too. Don't bother about your song. Come over to the gym. with me and you can go in the back way." "No, thank you," said Eleanor in frigid tones, and went back as she had come. To be beaten, and by Helen Chase Adams, of all people! It was too humiliating. Six basket-ball songs had been printed and hers rejected. No doubt the other five had been written by special friends of the committee. She had depended on Jean to look after hers--although she had not doubted for a moment that it would be among the very best submitted-- and Jean had failed her. Worse yet, the story on which she had staked her hopes had come back from Miss Raymond, with a few words of perfunctory, non-committal criticism. Miss Raymond had not read it to her class, much less sent the "Argus" editors after it. "Does she know, too?" questioned Eleanor. "Does she think that because I've cheated once I can't ever be trusted again, or is it just my luck to have them all notice the one thing I didn't write and let alone the things I do?" It was two weeks since Mr. Blake's lecture, and in that time she had accomplished nothing of all that she had intended. Her idea had been to begin over--to blot out the fact that once she had not played fair, and starting on a clean sheet, repeat her triumph and prove to herself and other people that her position in college affairs was no higher than she deserved. But so far she had proved nothing, and every day the difficulties of her position increased. It was almost more than she could manage, to treat the girls whom she suspected of knowing her secret with exactly her accustomed manner. She had not been able to verify her suspicions except in the case of Beatrice Egerton. There was no doubt about her. When the two were alone together she scarcely took pains to conceal her knowledge, and her covert hints had driven Eleanor into more than one outburst of resentment which she bitterly regretted when it was too late. It was absolutely impossible to tell about Betty. "She treats me exactly as she did when Jim was here," reflected Eleanor, "and just as she did last year, for that matter. If she doesn't know it's no particular credit to her, and if she does--" Eleanor could not bear the idea of receiving kindness from people who must despise her. Jean ran on to the gym., shivering in her thin dress, and muttering savagely over Eleanor's "beastly temper." As she passed the sophomore-senior line, one and another of her friends shouted out gay greetings. "Hurry up, Jean, or we shall get in before you do." "You sophomore ushers look like a St. Patrick's Day parade." "Tell the people in there that their clocks are slow." "All right," said Jean, hanging on to her unmanageable paper hat. As she passed the end of the line, Beatrice Egerton detached herself from it, and followed her around the corner of the gym. "Oh, Miss Eastman," she coaxed. "Won't you let me go in with you? I shall never get a place to see anything from way back there in the line." Jean eyed her doubtfully. She wanted to oblige the great Miss Egerton. "I'm afraid all the reserved seats are full by this time," she objected. "Oh, I don't want a seat," said Beatrice easily. "I'll stand on the steps of the faculty platform. There's no harm in that, is there?" "I guess not," said Jean. "Come on." The doorkeeper had gone up-stairs for a moment, and the meek little freshman who had her place only stared when Jean and Miss Egerton ran past her without exhibiting their credentials. "Thanks awfully," said Miss Egerton, sitting down on a pile of rugs and mattresses that had been stacked around the fireplace. Jean went off to get her orders from the head usher. There was really nothing to do but walk around and look pretty, the head usher told her. The rush to the gallery had begun, but the janitors and the night-watchman were managing that. Of course when the faculty began to come-- "Oh, yes," said Jean, and hurried back to Beatrice. "Good-looking lot of ushers," she said. Beatrice nodded. "You have a lot of pretty girls in 19--." "To say nothing of having the college beauty," added Jean. "Of course," said Beatrice. "Nobody in college can touch Eleanor Watson for looks. There she is now, talking to Betty Wales and Kate Denise." "No," chuckled Jean, "that's Laura Perkins. Their back views are amazingly alike, but wait till you see Laura's face. No, the lady Eleanor wouldn't come to the game. She's in the sulks." "Seems to be her chronic state nowadays," said Beatrice. "Talking to her is like walking on a hornet's nest. What's the particular cause of grievance to-day?" "Oh, the committee didn't accept her basket-ball song," said Jean, "and I was on the committee." Beatrice lifted her eyebrows. "She actually had the nerve to write--to hand one in?" "Oh, that wasn't nervy," said Jean. "The girls wanted her to--l9-- is awfully shy on poets. What I don't admire is her taste in fussing because it wasn't used." Beatrice smiled significantly. "Did she tell you about her story?" "What story?" "Oh, a new one that she handed in for a theme a week or so ago." "What about it?" "Why, Miss Raymond didn't notice it particularly, and Eleanor was fussed to death--positively furious, you know. I was with her when she got it back." "How funny!" said Jean. "But don't they say that Miss Raymond is pretty apt to like everything a girl does, after she's once become interested? I suppose Eleanor was taking it easy and depending on that." Beatrice's face wore its most inscrutable expression. "But, my dear," she said, "if you knew all about that other wonderful story--the famous one--" There was an unusual commotion at the door opposite them. By flower- bedecked ones and twos the faculty had been arriving, and had been received with shouts and songs from the galleries and escorted by excited ushers across the floor to their seats on the stage. Miss Egerton had stopped in the midst of her sentence to find out whose coming had turned the galleries into pandemonium and brought every usher but the phlegmatic Jean to the door. "Oh, it's Prexy and Miss Ferris and Dr. Hinsdale, all in a bunch," she said at last. "How inconsiderate of them not to scatter the fireworks!" She turned back to Jean. "As I was saying, if you knew all about that wonderful story--" Betty Wales, hurrying to help escort her dear Miss Ferris to the platform, caught sight of the two on the mattresses, noticed Jean's look of breathless interest and Beatrice's knowing air, and jumped to exactly the right conclusion. With a last despairing glance at Miss Ferris she turned aside from the group of crowding ushers, and dropped down beside Jean on the mattings. "Have you heard the latest news?" she asked, trying to make her tone perfectly easy and natural. "The freshman captain was so rattled that she forgot to wear her gym. suit. She came in her ordinary clothes. They've sent an usher back with her to see that she gets dressed right this time. Isn't that killing?" "Absurd," said Beatrice, rising. "Jean, you haven't done anything yet; you're too idle for words. I'm going up to jolly Dr. Hinsdale." In her heart she was glad of the interruption. She had said just enough to pique curiosity. To tell more would have been bad policy all around. Betty Wales had arrived just in the nick of time. But Jean was naturally disappointed. "Betty Wales," she said, "do you know what you interrupted just now? Beatrice Egerton was just going to tell me the inside facts about Eleanor's story in the 'Argus.'" "Was she?" said Betty steadily. "If there are any inside facts, as you call them, don't you think Eleanor is the one to tell you?" "Oh, I don't know," said Jean carelessly. "Eleanor's so tiresome. She wants to be the centre of the stage all the time. Shouldn't you think she'd be willing to give other people a little show now?" "Why, she is," returned Betty vaguely. "Not much," asserted Jean with great positiveness. "She's sulking in her tent this very minute because the girls aren't singing her basket-ball song. Anybody who wasn't downright selfish would be glad to have girls like Helen Adams get a little chance." "Eleanor's tired and doesn't think," suggested Betty. "You'd better go down to the door," said the head usher. "The 'green' faculty are coming in swarms." The game went on much as last year's had done. First one gallery shook with forbidden applause, then the other. Sophomores sang paeans to their victories, freshmen pluckily ignored their mistakes. T. Reed appeared as if by magic here, there, and everywhere. Rachel Morrison played her quiet, steady game at the sophomore basket. Katherine Kittredge, talking incessantly to the bewildered freshman "home" whom she guarded, batted balls with ferocious lunges of her big fist back to the centre field, where a dainty little freshman with soft, appealing brown eyes, half hidden under a mist of yellow hair, occasionally managed to foil T. Reed's pursuit and sent them pounding back into the outstretched arms of a tall, ungainly home who tossed or dropped them--it was hard to tell which--into the freshman basket. It was a shame to let her play, the sophomores grumbled. She was a giantess, not a girl. But as the score piled up in their favor, they grew more amiable and laughed good- humoredly at the ineffectual attempts of their guards to block the giantess's goals. Betty watched it all with keen interest and yet with a certain feeling of detachment. It was splendid fun, but what did it matter after all who won or lost? The freshman centres muffed another ball. Up in the "yellow" gallery she saw a tall girl standing behind a pillar unmistakably wink back the tears. How foolish, just for a game! It was over at last. Miss Andrews announced the score, congratulating victor and vanquished alike on clean, fair play. Betty joined in the mad rush around the gym., helped sing to the team and to the freshman team and finally retired to a quiet corner with Christy Mason, who had come back to see the game and get a start with her neglected work before vacation. Betty gave her the Students' Commission key with a little sigh of satisfaction. "It's a good deal of responsibility, isn't it?" she said. Christy nodded. "If you take it seriously. But then isn't life a responsibility?" Helen was sitting alone in their room when Betty got back, her eyes shining like stars, her plain, angular little face alight with happiness. "I say, Helen," began Betty, hunting for the hat-pins that still fastened a remnant of her once gorgeous paper hat to her hair, "your song was great. Did the girls tell you?" "Some of them," said Helen, shyly. "Some of them didn't know I wrote it. One asked me if I knew." Betty laughed. "Did you tell her?" "No, I didn't," said Helen, blushing. "I--I wanted to, awfully; but I thought it would seem queer." "Well, plenty of them knew," said Betty, mounting a chair to fasten her wand over a picture. "Of course,"--Helen's tone was apologetic,--"it's a very little thing to care so much about. I suppose you think I'm silly, but you see I worked over it pretty hard, and I don't have so very many things to care about. Now if I were like you--" "Nonsense!" said Betty, descending suddenly from her lofty perch. "I couldn't write a line of poetry if I tried from now till Commencement." "Oh, yes, you could," said Helen, eagerly. "Well, if I were like Eleanor Watson then--" "Helen," said Betty, quickly, "you're not one bit like her." Helen waited a minute. "Betty," she began again shyly. "Yes," said Betty, kindly. "I'm awfully sorry you couldn't have your wish, too." "My wish!" Betty repeated. "Oh, you mean about being on the team. I don't mind about that, Helen. I guess I was needed more just where I was." Helen puzzled over her answer until the supper-bell rang. Betty's problem stayed with her all through the bustle of last days and on into the Easter vacation. Even then she found only a doubtful solution. She had thought that Mr. Blake's decision, of which Dorothy had told her as soon as possible, would close the incident of the story. Now she saw that the affair was not so easily disposed of. Beatrice Egerton was an incalculable source of danger, but the chief trouble was Eleanor herself. Somehow her attitude was wrong, though Betty could not exactly tell how. She was in a false position, one that it would be difficult for any one to maintain; and it was making her say and do things that people like Jean, who did not understand, naturally misinterpreted. Why, even she herself hated to meet Eleanor now. There was so much to hide and to avoid talking about. And yet it would certainly be worse if everybody knew. Betty puckered her smooth forehead into rows and rows of wrinkles and still she saw no way out. She thought of consulting Nan, but she couldn't bear to, when Nan had always been so pessimistic about Eleanor. It was not until the vacation was over and Betty's train was pulling into Harding that she had an idea. She gave a little exclamation. "I've got it!" "Got what?" demanded her seat-mate, who was a mathematical prodigy and had been working out problems in calculus all the way from Buffalo. "Not one of those examples of yours," laughed Betty, "only an idea,--or at least about half an idea." "I don't find fractions of ideas very useful," said the seat-mate. "I never said they were," returned Betty irritably. It had occurred to her that if there was any way to get Eleanor to confide in Miss Ferris, perhaps matters might be straightened out. The missing half of the idea, to which Betty had not the faintest clew, was--how could it be done? CHAPTER XVI DORA CARLSON'S "SUGARING-OFF" Dora Carlson pulled back the heavy oak door of the Hilton House and stepped softly into the hall. With bright, darting glances, such as some frightened wild creature might bestow on an unfamiliar environment, she crept past the parlor doors and up the stairs. Dora was not naturally timid, and her life on a lonely farm had made her self-reliant to a degree; but there was something about these big campus houses that awed her--mysterious suggestions of a luxurious and alien existence, of delightful festivities and dainty belongings, that stimulated her imagination and made her feel like a lawless intruder if she met any one in the passages. Of course it was foolish. Nettie Dwight, who lived next door to her on Market Street, had not a single friend on the campus, and yet she had been into every one of the dwelling houses and explored them all from top to bottom. Where was the harm, she asked. All you had to do was to step up and open the door, and then walk along as if you knew where you were going. When you had seen as much as you wanted to, you could stop in front of some room of which the door stood open so that you could tell from the hall that it was empty, and turn around and go away again. Everybody would think that the person you had come to see was out. It sounded perfectly simple, but Dora had never been anywhere except to Eleanor's room at the Hilton House and once, at Betty Wales's invitation, to the Belden. She hated to hurry through the halls. She would have liked to turn aside and smell the hyacinths that stood in the sunny bay-window of the long parlor; she wanted desperately to read through all the notices on the house bulletin-board at the foot of the stairs; but instead she fled up the two flights and through the corridor, like a criminal seeking sanctuary, and arrived at Eleanor's room in a flurry of breathless eagerness. The door was open and Eleanor sat by the window, staring listlessly out at the quiet, greening lawns. The light was full on her face and Dora, who had had only a passing glimpse of her divinity since before the spring vacation, noticed sadly how pale and tired she looked. "May I come in, Miss Watson?" she asked. "Of course, but you mustn't call me that," said Eleanor, turning to her with a charming smile. Beatrice Egerton had said that she should be over in the course of the afternoon, and Eleanor had been dreading her coming. The necessity of keeping up appearances with Beatrice and the rest was wearing Eleanor out. It was a distinct relief to talk to Dora, with whom no artifices were necessary. Whoever else knew her secret, Dora certainly did not; she was as remote from the stream of college gossip as if she had lived in another world. "I am so glad to see that you're resting," said Dora brightly. "I take it as an omen that perhaps you'll be able to do what I want." "I hope I can," said Eleanor. "What is it?" "Why, I'm going to have a sugaring-off tonight," announced Dora impressively, "and I should be very pleased to have you come." For a moment Eleanor hesitated, then her better nature triumphed. This was the first thing the child had ever asked of her, and she should have it, even at the cost of some trifling annoyance. "How nice," she said cordially. "I shall be delighted to come. Just what is a sugaring-off, Dora?" Dora laughed gleefully. "It's amazing to me how few people know what it is. I'm not going to tell you the particulars, but I will excite your interest by saying that it has to do with maple sugar." "How did you happen to think of having one?" inquired Eleanor curiously. "Why, you see," explained Dora, "we have a sugar orchard on our farm. Ohio is a great maple-sugar state, you know." "Oh!" said Eleanor. "No, I didn't know." "Sugaring time used to be the delight of my childish heart," went on Dora quaintly. "So many people came out to our farm then. It was quite like living in the village and having neighbors. And then I do love maple sugar. My father makes an excellent quality." "And he's sent you some now?" "Yes," assented Dora eagerly, "a whole big pailful. I suppose my dear father thought it would console me for not having been home for my spring vacation. It came this morning, and yesterday Mrs. Bryant went to pass a week with her son in Jersey City, and she told me I could use the kitchen for a sugar-party if I wanted to while she was gone--I told her that I was expecting to have a party--and this is the only night for a week that Nettie Dwight can come, because she teaches in a night-school." Dora paused for breath. "Who is Nettie Dwight?" asked Eleanor idly. "Oh, she is a Market Street girl. There will be three Market Street girls and you and Miss Wales, if she can come. Miss Wales asked me to a play at her house last fall and I am so glad to have a chance to return it. I was afraid I never could." "Hello, Eleanor. Good-afternoon, Miss Carlson." Beatrice Egerton threw her books and then herself unceremoniously on to Eleanor's couch. Beatrice could hardly have told why she persisted in inflicting her society upon Eleanor Watson. In her shallow way she was fond of her, and she felt vaguely that considering her own careless code of morals it would be inconsistent to drop Eleanor now, just because she had followed similar standards. At the same time she was angry at what she looked upon as a betrayal of her friendship, and considered that any annoyance she might inflict on Eleanor was no more than she deserved. As for Dora Carlson, she amused Beatrice, who, being thoroughly self-seeking herself, could not imagine why the exclusive Eleanor should choose to exhibit a freakish tendency toward philanthropy in this one direction. Beatrice would have liked, for the satisfaction there is in solving a puzzle, to get at the root of the matter. Accordingly she always took pains to draw Dora out. "I've met you before this afternoon, Miss Carlson," she said, thumping a refractory pillow into place. "What are you doing up on the campus?" It was the most casual remark, but Dora answered it with the naive frankness that was her peculiar charm. "I am giving out my invitations for a sugaring-off," she said. "A sugaring-off!" repeated Miss Egerton gaily. "Now I haven't the faintest idea what that is but it sounds very festive." Dora looked at her questioningly and then at Eleanor. "Miss Egerton," she said at last, "I should be very pleased to have you come too, because you are Eleanor's dear friend." Beatrice gave a little shriek of amusement. "Are you really going, Eleanor?" Eleanor nodded. "Then I shall certainly come too," declared Beatrice, merrily, "to see that you don't eat too much sugar." As Dora danced down the Belden House steps a few moments later, her face was wreathed in smiles. Miss Wales was coming too. They were all coming. "I guess my father would be pleased if he could look in on us to-night," thought the little freshman happily. Then, as the college clock chimed out the hour, her brow wrinkled with anxiety. The kitchen must be swept, --Dora had decided views about Mrs. Bryant's housekeeping,--and the "surprise," which was to eke out the entertainment afforded by the sugaring-off proper, had yet to be prepared. The unaccustomed responsibilities of hostess weighed heavily upon Dora Carlson as she traversed the long mile that stretched between the campus and 50 Market Street. It was an odd little party which gathered that night in Mrs. Bryant's dingy kitchen. The aggressive Nettie Dwight, two hopelessly commonplace sophomores, cousins, from a little town down the river, and Dora composed the Market Street contingent. They were all very much in awe of Eleanor's beauty, and of Beatrice's elaborate gown and more elaborate manner. Betty Wales, enveloped in one of Mrs. Bryant's "all-over" kitchen aprons, vigorously stirring the big kettleful of bubbling, odorous syrup, tried her best to put the others at their ease and to make things go, as affairs at the college always did. But it was no use. Everything progressed too smoothly. Nothing burned or boiled over or refused to cook,--incidents which always add the spice of adventure to a chafing dish spread. Nobody had come in a kimono. There was no bed to loll back on, no sociable sparcity of plates, no embarrassing interruptions in the way of heads of uninvited guests poked in the door and apologetically withdrawn; and the anxious pucker of hospitality on the face of the little hostess imposed an added restraint and formality upon the oddly assorted company of guests. Beatrice Egerton played with her rings, yawned without dissimulation, and wished she had stayed at home; Eleanor bravely parried Nettie Dwight's incisive questions about "her set"; and Betty, stirring and talking to the cousins and Dora, had time to admire Eleanor's self-control and to wonder pityingly if there were many girls in Harding College so completely "out of it" as these four seemed to be. And yet they were not unhappy; they were enjoying Dora Carlson's sugaring-off as though it had been a delightful college spread instead of a dull and dreadful party. When the biscuits, that Dora had made herself, were done and the sugar boiled to the right consistency, everybody began to brighten up, and the refreshment feature bade fair to be a real success. It was too late in the spring for snow, so Dora had provided some little cakes of ice on which to wax the sugar. They were not quite so good a substitute as might have been desired, for they had a fashion of slipping dangerously over the plates, and then the hot sugar slipped and spread on the ice and had to be dexterously coaxed to settle down in one place and melt out a cool bed for itself, as it does easily enough in snow. But all this only added to the interest of the occasion. One sophomore cousin lost her cake of ice on the floor, and she showed more animation than she had in all the rest of the evening together, in spite of Betty's valiant efforts. Then Nettie Dwight suggested that they grain part of the sugar, so, when everybody had eaten as much as possible of the waxed variety, spread on as many crisp little biscuits as Dora could force upon them, Dora brought saucers full of the hot syrup and there was a stirring contest, with results in the shape of creamy maple candy, which Dora put out to cool, ready to be eaten later. "And now," she said, with a little quiver of eagerness in her voice, "there is one course more. Look under your plates." Search revealed a carefully folded square of white paper at each place. Beatrice got hers open first and muttered, "What perfect nonsense!" before Eleanor could stop her with an imploring glance. "Such a bright idea!" cried Betty Wales, hurrying to the rescue. "They're fortunes, aren't they? Oh, dear, I'm afraid mine doesn't fit. It's much too grand." Dora laughed gleefully. "That's the fun, you see,--to notice how they fit." "How'd you ever think of it?" giggled one of the cousins. "There's a man in mine all right." "Oh, I didn't think of it myself," explained Dora, modestly. "I found it in a magazine. I don't suppose any of you see the 'Farmer's Friendly Counsellor.'" "No," said Betty, quickly, "I don't believe we do." "It's a fine magazine," continued Dora, "with quantities of good reading matter of all kinds. There's always one page for farmers' wives, with recipes and hints for home dressmakers. Last winter I read about giving a luncheon, and it sounded so pretty that I cut it out, though I never expected to use it. Right in the middle of it was one course like these fortunes, only they were to be put into stuffed peppers, instead of stuffing, and when the guests took the covers off their peppers, there they would find their fortunes." "But Miss Carlson," began Beatrice, impatiently, "don't you see that the whole point--" "I like this way just as well," broke in Betty Wales. "What you really care about is the fortune, and it doesn't matter whether it's in a pepper or under your plate." "Not a bit," agreed Eleanor, crumpling up her fortune nervously. "And now," said Dora, "we'll all read them out loud and see how they fit. I put them around without looking at them, and I didn't know where any of you were going to sit." "I guess mine fits pretty well," said the giggling cousin, whose fortune had a man in it. "Then why don't you begin?" suggested Betty, and the cousin began with avidity. Dora had absolutely no literary ability; the spontaneous gaiety that bubbled up in all that she said and did was entirely lacking in the stiff, sentimental little character-sketch, but it pleased its reader, and Betty and Eleanor joined in declaring it very interesting. "Now, Eleanor," said Betty, "you come next." Eleanor shook her head. "I'm sorry, but I tore mine up before I knew we were to read them." She held up the crumpled ball of paper. "Oh, you can smooth that out," said Betty, noticing Dora's disappointment. "Here, give it to me." Eleanor surrendered the paper in silence, and without glancing at the contents Betty smoothed it out and passed it back. "Now, Eleanor." Eleanor looked around the table. Everybody was waiting. There was no escape. Resolutely she pulled herself together and plunged in. "You are the soul of truth and honor and generosity. You never think of yourself, but are always trying to make other people happy. Your noble nature is shown in your beautiful--" Eleanor's voice faltered and she flushed painfully. "I can't go on," she said. "It's so--so--" She stopped in utter confusion. Dora had been listening with shining eyes. "Oh, please go on," she begged. "That's the very one I wrote for you. I didn't plan it a bit, but I hoped you'd get that one." The matter might have been adjusted easily enough, if Beatrice, who was sitting between Betty and Dora, had not turned to Betty with her oracular smile, and murmured, "A keen sense of irony for one so young, isn't it?" behind her hand. Betty flushed in spite of herself and looked up to find Dora staring at them with wide, startled eyes. She had caught the word irony, and distinctly remembered the succinct definition that she had learned years before at school--"saying the opposite of what you mean." She looked at Eleanor who was struggling to regain her composure and attacked the situation with simple directness. "Miss Egerton," she said, "I couldn't avoid overhearing you just now. I don't see why any one should think I didn't mean what I wrote about Eleanor. Of course I meant it. You know I did, don't you, Eleanor?" "Of course you meant it," repeated Eleanor, with an unsteady little laugh. "If you hadn't, I shouldn't have minded reading it. Please forgive me." It was all over in a moment. Before the three strangers had had time to wonder what the trouble was, Betty had plunged gaily into her fortune. Nettie followed eagerly, and Beatrice had the grace to bring up the rear. There was the candy to eat after that and the party broke up with a fair semblance of mirth. But as she washed up the big pile of sticky dishes, Dora's face was troubled. What could Miss Egerton have meant? Why should Eleanor's dearest and most intimate friend have said such a thing? How could she have thought it? Eleanor walked home wrapped in a silence which Betty's most vigorous sallies could not penetrate. Long after Dora had finished her dishes and gone to bed, she sat in her Morris chair in the dark, wide-awake, every nerve throbbing painfully. She had failed Dora Carlson, spoiled the party that the poor child had so counted on, made her Beatrice Egerton's butt and laughing stock. Dora would never wholly trust her again. She would wonder what Beatrice had meant. By and by she would guess, and the friendship that Eleanor had meant should brighten her college course, would be turned to a bitter memory. Whether or not she ever knew the whole miserable story would make small difference. She, Eleanor Watson, had made Dora waste her love on a cheat--a thief; she had made Betty Wales and Miss Ferris help a cheat. Eleanor's face softened. Betty had been awfully good to Dora. Perhaps, after all, she had not been the one to tell Mr. Blake. But Betty's disappointment was not the worst thing. Betty would make other friends-- find other interests. Dora Carlson was different; she had not the talent for making many friends, and in losing Eleanor she would lose all she had. For the first time Eleanor realized how mean and contemptible her action had been, because it did not concern herself alone, but involved every one of the people who cared about her--Jim and her father, Dora, Betty, Miss Ferris. It was a short list; perhaps Jean and Kate Denise cared a little too. She felt no resentment against Beatrice. There was no room for it in the press of deeper emotions. Her one idea was that she must do something to save them all. But what? Creep away like a thief in the night--let them forget that she had ever been a disgrace to them and to 19--? Eleanor's pride revolted against such a course, and yet what else was there to do? She had not even arrived at Betty's half answer to the problem when she undressed in the silence of the great, sleeping house and, thoroughly tired with her long vigil, forgot the difficult tangle until morning. CHAPTER XVII A MAY-DAY RESOLUTION The spring had been a late one at Harding, but it had come at last with a sudden rush and a glare of breathless midsummer heat. The woods of Paradise were alive with fresh young green, gay with bird songs, sweet with the smell of growing things. The campus too was bright in its new livery. The tulips in front of the Hilton House flaunted their scarlet and gold cups in the sunshine. The great bed of narcissus around the side entrance of college hall sweetened the air with its delicate perfume, and out on the back campus the apple-trees, bare and brown only a day or so before, were wrapped in a soft pink mist that presaged the coming glory of bud and blossom. It was there, in the square of dappled sunshine and shadow under the apple-trees, at once the loveliest and most sequestered spot on the campus, that the Harding girls were holding a May-day fete. It was a strictly impromptu affair. Somebody had discovered at breakfast the day before that to-morrow would be May-day, and somebody else had suggested that as it was also Saturday, there ought to be some sort of celebration. A May queen was decreed "too old"; a May masque too much trouble. Then somebody said, "Let's all just dress up as little girls and roll hoops," and the idea met with instant favor. It was passed along at chapel and morning classes, and at three o'clock the next afternoon the whole college, its hair in waving curls or tightly braided pig-tails, its skirts shortened, its waists lengthened and encircled by sashes, had gathered in the space under the apple-trees, carrying hoops, dolls and skipping ropes, intent on getting all the fun possible out of being little once more. There were all sorts of children there; little country girls with checked gingham aprons and sunbonnets, demure little Puritan maids with cork- screw curls and pantalets, sturdy little girls in sailor suits, sweet little girls in ruffled muslins, tall little girls, all arms and ankles. There was even a Topsy, gay in yellow calico, and an almond-eyed Japanese whose long kimono and high-piled hair prevented her taking part in the active American games of her mates. The taller girls were necessarily absurd. Some of the smaller ones were surprisingly realistic. And all, big and little, danced and laughed and squabbled, tripped over their skipping ropes, pursued their hoops or played with their dolls under the apple-trees in true "little girl" fashion and with the utmost zest and abandon. Miss Ferris's room at the Hilton House overlooked the apple orchard, and presently she and Miss Raymond strolled out together to see the fun. They were greeted with a shout of joyous welcome from a noisy group in the farthest corner of the lawn, who immediately joined hands and came in a long, wavering line, "hippity-hopping" to meet them. "Oh, Miss Ferris," called Dorothy King from one end of the line, "we want you and Miss Raymond to be judge. Which of us looks the youngest?" "We've been disputing about it all the afternoon," added Mary Brooks breathlessly from the middle of the line. "You see we're all dressed alike in white muslin and blue sashes. Now Miss Raymond, don't I look lots younger than Dottie?" "Stand in a row," commanded Miss Ferris laughingly, and the chattering group straightened out demurely, with much nudging of elbows and planting of feet on an imaginary line. Miss Raymond and Miss Ferris considered a moment, and then held a brief consultation. "We both decide in favor of Betty Wales," announced Miss Ferris. "She looks about nine and none of the rest of you are under twelve." "There! What did I tell you!" shrieked Betty gaily, her curls bobbing, her sash ends flying. "I protest," called Katherine Kittredge. "Betty doesn't look over twelve any of the time, and the rest of us look twenty. We've taken off eight years and she's only dropped five. 'Tain't fair!" and Katherine burst into a beautiful "little girl" boohoo. "Don't you wanter hold my dollie?" said Mary Brooks, tendering a handkerchief puppet to Miss Raymond with a perfect imitation of childish innocence. "Oh, no, come an' tell us a story," begged Babbie, twisting her white apron into a roll. "You'd ruther roll hoops, hadn't you?" said Katherine to Miss Ferris. "Please tie on my hair-ribbon," demanded Bob, who in spite of a much beruffled dress and a resplendent array of doll and sash-ribbon, looked exactly as tomboyish as usual. Miss Ferris and Miss Raymond appeared to be properly amused by all this nonsense, and Miss Raymond, escorted by a little crowd of her special admirers, went on to the crest of the hill to see Alice Waiters doll party, which was being held on the grass at the top of the dust-pan slope. But Miss Ferris refused all the invitations. She had only come out for a moment, she said, and must go straight back to her work. Betty and Mary Brooks walked over to the Hilton House with her. When she had gone in Betty seized Mary's hand and pulled her around the corner of the house. "Let's trill up to Eleanor," she said. "I don't think she's been out at all." Mary looked longingly back at the May party. "I believe--yes, they've found a hurdy-gurdy, Betty. What's the use of bothering if she doesn't know enough to come down?" "Just a minute," pleaded Betty. "Here she is. Oh, Eleanor, come out and watch, even if you haven't dressed up. It's piles of fun." "Is it?" said Eleanor uncertainly, touched by Betty's constant thoughtfulness. "Well, perhaps I will come later. I must finish a letter first." "Finish a letter," echoed Mary, "with that hurdy-gurdy going! I admire your concentration. Betty, truly I can't stand it another minute. I'm going back." "All right. Good-bye, Eleanor. Hurry up and come," called Betty, flying after Mary down the path. Eleanor Watson looked after them for a moment and then with a little despairing sigh sat down again at her desk. She was writing to Jim. It was almost a month since she had sent off her last letter to him and yet there seemed to be nothing to say. She added a line or two, dropped her pen and went back to the window. The girls were dancing to the music of the hurdy-gurdy. Alice Waite was standing on the edge of the crowd, hugging a huge rag-doll in her arms as if it was her dearest treasure. Eleanor shrugged her shoulders impatiently. The whole affair was perfectly absurd. She had told Alice Waite so at luncheon, in her haughtiest manner. She picked up a book from the table and began to read, but in spite of her determination to ignore it, her thoughts would wander to the pretty picture outside her window. The shouts and laughter, the gay babel of talk with the undertone of droning music rang in her ears. She slammed down her window, but still she could hear them. What a good time they were having! Yes, they were absurd, with the absurdity that belongs to youth--happy, light-hearted, inconsequent youth. Eleanor Watson felt that she had left that sort of thing far behind her. Before the summer when Judge Watson had brought home a gay young wife to take his daughter's place at the head of his household, before the night on the river when she had seen herself as Harding college saw her, before the Indian summer afternoon when she had fought and lost her battle on the stairway of the main building,--before those crises she could have been a happy little girl with the rest of them, but not now. Her heart was full of bitter, passionate envy. How easy life was for them, while for her it seemed to grow harder and more impossible every day. In the week that had passed since the sugaring-off she had seen Dora once, and she had been more hurt by the restraint and embarrassment that the child could not hide than by all that had gone before. How was she to win back Dora's confidence and change Betty's pity to respect? She could not stand that music another minute. She would go for a long walk--far enough at least to escape from hurdy-gurdies and chattering girls. She got her hat, pulled on a light silk coat, for in spite of the unseasonable heat the late afternoon would be cool, and hurried down- stairs. Hastening through the lower hall she almost ran into Miss Ferris, the last person she wanted to meet. "My dear," Miss Ferris cut short her apology, "we evidently have too much to think about, both of us." She looked at Eleanor keenly. "Why aren't you out being a little girl with the rest of them?" she asked. "I didn't feel like it, Miss Ferris," said Eleanor, turning away from the searching gray eyes, "I was going for a walk instead." "Alone?" "Yes." "Then"--Miss Ferris hesitated--"may I come too, or don't you want me?" For an astute person Miss Ferris developed all at once an amazing density. She did not seem to notice the ungracious stiffness of Eleanor's assent. "Good!" she cried enthusiastically, running off like a girl to get ready. Eleanor waited, her face set in hard lines of resentful endurance. She could not openly insult Miss Ferris, who had been kindness itself to her all the year, but she would be as cold and offish as she pleased. "Now which way shall we go?" asked Miss Ferris eagerly as they started off. "It makes no difference to me, Miss Ferris." Eleanor's tone was frigidly courteous. "Then suppose we go to Paradise. It's always lovely there." Almost in silence they climbed down the steep slope that leads to the water path, crossed the sunny stretch of meadow land and came out into the dim, silent wood beyond. Here the path widened and Miss Ferris, who had led the way, waited for Eleanor to come up with her. "Isn't it beautiful?" she said with a little catch in her voice. "There's nothing quite like the woods in spring, is there? Oh, I'm so glad I ran away!" "Ran away?" questioned Eleanor. "Yes, from my work and my worries and myself out into this big, beautiful, new world. Doesn't it make you wish you could send out fresh shoots and blossoms yourself, and help make the world glad?" "I'm afraid not," said Eleanor coldly, and again she felt the gray eyes, keen and yet very kindly, fastened on her face. A turn in the path brought the end of the grove into view. "Oh, dear!" exclaimed Miss Ferris sadly. "I'd forgotten that Paradise was so very small. Let's go back to that big pine-tree with the great gnarled roots and sit down by the water and forget that we aren't lost in a lovely primeval wilderness." Eleanor followed her in silence and they found seats on the roots of the big tree, Eleanor choosing one as far as she dared from her companion. "And now," said Miss Ferris, as soon as they were settled, "tell me all about it." "About what?" inquired Eleanor steadily. "What you were running away from." Eleanor flushed angrily. "Miss Ferris, did any one ask you to--" "No," said Miss Ferris quickly. "No one told me that you were in trouble. I wish some one had. I'm afraid I've been very blind. I've let you worry yourself almost ill over something and never asked you if I could help. I've been so busy being proud of you this year that I've never even noticed how tired and worn out you were getting." "Proud!" repeated Eleanor, scornfully. "Yes," said Miss Ferris, firmly, "proud. You've made a splendid record, Miss Watson,--a remarkable record, considering last year." "Please don't. You wouldn't say that if you understood." Miss Ferris looked puzzled. "Don't tell me anything that you'd rather not," she said, "but there is one thing that a friend always wants to know. Do you see your way out, Miss Watson?" "There isn't any way out." "Oh, but I think there is always one somewhere," said Miss Ferris, brightly. "You're quite sure we couldn't find it between us?" "Quite sure." "If you ever change your mind--" "Thank you," said Eleanor, curtly. There was a little silence. "We runaways mustn't be gone too long. Have you any idea what time it is?" asked Miss Ferris. Eleanor did not answer, and Miss Ferris looked up to find her crying softly, her face hidden in one hand, her shoulders shaking with suppressed sobs. For a moment Miss Ferris watched her without speaking. Then she moved nearer and stretched out her hand to take Eleanor's free one. "I'm very, very sorry," she said kindly. "I wish I could have helped." [Illustration: ELEANOR DID NOT ANSWER] To her surprise Eleanor's sobs ceased suddenly. "I'd rather tell any one else," she said wearily. "I hate to have you despise me, Miss Ferris." For answer Miss Ferris only gave the hand she held a soft, friendly little squeeze. Then it came out--the sad, shameful story in a fierce, scornful torrent of words. When it was told, Eleanor lifted her head and faced Miss Ferris proudly. "Now you know." she said. "Now you can see that I was right-- that there isn't any way out." Miss Ferris waited a moment. "Miss Watson," she said at last, "I can't feel quite as you do about it. I think that if you honestly regret what you did, if you are bound to live it down, if you know that in all your life long you are never going to do anything of the sort again,--never going to want anything badly enough to play false for it,--why then the way out is perfectly plain. That is the way out--to let this time teach you never to do anything of the sort again." Eleanor shook her head hopelessly. "But don't you see that I can't put it behind me--that I can't live it down, as you say. The girls won't let me forget that I was taken into Dramatic Club the first time. They won't let me forget that I am the only sophomore who is practically sure of a place on the 'Argus' board. I tried--" Eleanor gave a pitiful little history of her efforts to establish her literary reputation on a fair basis with the song and the story. "I see," said Miss Ferris, thoughtfully. "Miss Watson, if I understand you correctly, you find yourself in the position of a man who, having stolen a precious stone, repents and strains every nerve to pay for his treasure. But as he is commonly supposed to be the lawful owner of the stone, his neighbors naturally resent his eagerness to gain more riches and consider him grasping. It's going to be very hard for you to earn that stone, isn't it?" "The thing to do," said Eleanor with quick decision, "is to give it back." Miss Ferris waited. "I don't know that you will believe me," Eleanor went on after a minute, "because it seems so unlikely; but this is the first time I ever thought of resigning from Dramatic Club." "You must remember," said Miss Ferris, quietly, "that if you should resign now, you would never be voted into the society again, no matter how much your work might deserve recognition." "Yes," said Eleanor. "And that so unusual a proceeding will create comment. People who don't understand will be likely to say unpleasant things." "I don't believe I should mind--much," said Eleanor, unsteadily. "It's the people who do understand that I care about--and myself. I want to feel that I've done a little something to repair damages. Of course this won't make things just right. Some other girl in 19-- ought to have been in the first four, but it will be something, won't it?" "Yes," said Miss Ferris, soberly. "I should say it would be a great deal." The walk back through the green aisle of wood and thicket was almost as silent as the walk out had been, but there was a new spring in Eleanor's step and an expression of resolute relief on her face that had not been there an hour before. As they turned into the campus Eleanor broke silence. "Miss Ferris, if the man should return the stone, do you think he ought to confess to having stolen it?" Miss Ferris looked up at the orchard on the hill where the girls were dispersing with much talk and laughter, with gay good-byes and careless snatches of song, and then back to the girl beside her. "No," she said at last. "If we were all old in the ways of this world and wise and kind enough, it might do, but not now, I think. I agree with the girls who have been keeping your secret. I believe you can accomplish more for others and for yourself, in the large sense, by stating no reason for your action. I know we can trust you." "Thank you," said Eleanor. Then all at once a strong revulsion of feeling overcame her. "But I haven't promised to resign. I don't believe I can do it. Think what it will mean to drop out of things--to be thought queerer than ever--to--" "Caught red-handed!" cried a mocking voice behind them, and three stealthy figures bounded out from a tangle of shrubbery. Betty, Madeline and Mary Brooks had come down the hill by the back path and, making a detour to leave Rachel at the gate nearest her "little white house round the corner," had discovered the truants and stolen upon them unaware. "We're sorry you both had so much to do," said Betty, demurely. "And that you don't appreciate May parties," added Mary. "And haven't a proper feeling for hurdy-gurdies," finished Madeline. "Ah, but you can't tell what deep philosophical problems we may have been working out answers for down in Paradise," said Miss Ferris, playfully. Betty slipped a soft arm around Eleanor's waist. "I'd rather go for a walk with her than to any May party that was ever invented," she whispered. "Isn't she just splendid?" "Yes," agreed Eleanor, solemnly, "so splendid that I guess I can't live up to her, Betty." "Nonsense! That's the very reason why she is splendid--that she makes people live up to her, whether they can or not." And then, feeling that she was treading on delicate ground, Betty hastily changed the subject. "I wonder," she asked the green lizard that night, "I wonder if she could have been telling Miss Ferris about it, and if they were talking it over when we three big blunderers rushed up to them. Oh, dear!" Then she added aloud to Helen, who was vigorously doing breathing exercises before her mirror, "I guess I'll go and see Mary Brooks. I feel like being amused." Helen let her breath out with a convulsive gasp. "I saw her go out," she said. "She went right after supper." "Then," said Betty, decidedly, "you've got to stop breathing and amuse me yourself." CHAPTER XVIII TRIUMPHS AND TROUBLES "Aren't you going to have any breakfast, Betty?" Helen Chase Adams coming up from her own hasty Monday morning repast, paused in the door to stare at her roommate, who stood in a cleared space in the middle of the floor with diaphanous clouds of beflowered dimity floating about her feet. "Breakfast!" repeated Betty, mournfully. "It just struck eight, didn't it? I don't know how I'm going to have any now unless I cut chapel and go down town for it. On Mondays I have classes all the morning long, and I haven't half studied anything either, because of that hateful May party." "Then why did you begin on your dress?" inquired Helen with annoying acuteness. "Helen," said Betty, tragically, "I haven't a single muslin to my name, since I tore my new one and the laundry tore my old one, and I thought if I could only get this hung then I could be putting in the tucks at odd minutes, when people come in, you know. I didn't think it would take a minute and I've been half an hour just looking at it." "Isn't it rather long?" asked Helen, with a critical glance at the filmy pile on the floor. "Why, that's the tucks," explained Betty, impatiently. "And the only reason I had tucks instead of ruffles was because I thought they'd be easier. Shouldn't you have thought tucks would be easier, Helen?" "I shouldn't have known." "Well, I guess they're both bad enough," agreed Betty, gloomily. "I was foolish to try to make a dress, but I thought if Nita and the B's could, I could. The waist wasn't any trouble, because Emily Davis helped me, but it isn't much use without a skirt." "Let me know if I can do anything," said Helen, politely, opening the volume of Elizabethan lyrics which had succeeded "The Canterbury Tales" as pabulum for the class in English Literature II. Betty kicked at the enveloping cloud savagely. "If only it would stay down somewhere, so I could tell where the bottom ought to be." She gave a little cry of triumph,--"I have it!" and reaching over to her bookshelves she began dropping books in an even circle around her feet. An instant later there was a crash and the thud of falling books. "There!" said Betty, resignedly. "That bookcase has come to pieces again. It's as toppley on its legs as a ten-cent doll. Never mind, Helen. I can reach them beautifully now and I will truly pick them all up afterward." She dropped a Solid Geometry beside a "Greene's History of the English People," and stooped gingerly down to move "Alice in Wonderland" a trifle to one side, so that it should close the circle. Then she looked doubtfully at Helen, who was again deep in her lyrics. "Helen," she said at last, "would you mind awfully if I asked you to put in some pins for me? If I stoop down to put them in myself, the books move and I can't tell where the pins ought to go." Helen had just put in the last pin with painful deliberation, and was crawling around her necessarily immovable model to see that she had made no mistakes, when the door opened with a flourish and Mary Brooks appeared. "What in the world!" she began, blinking near-sightedly at Betty in her circle of books, at the ruins of the "toppley" bookcase lying in a confused heap beside her, and at Helen, red and disheveled, readjusting pins. Then she gave a shriek of delight and rushing upon Betty fastened something to her shirt-waist. "Get up!" she commanded Helen. "Hurry now, or you'll certainly be killed." In a twinkling the room was full of girls, shrieking, laughing, dancing, tumbling over the books, sinking back on Betty's couch in convulsions of mirth at the absurd spectacle she presented and getting up to charge into the vortex of the mob and hug her frantically or shake her hand until it ached. It was fully five minutes before Betty could extricate herself from their midst, and with her trailing draperies limp and bedraggled over one arm, make her way to Helen, who was standing by herself in a corner, quietly enjoying the fun. "Helen," she cried, catching the demure little figure in her arms, "Helen, just think of it! I'm in Dramatic Club. Oh, Helen Chase Adams, how did it ever happen?" The room cleared out gradually after that, and the nicest part, Betty thought, was having the people you liked best tell you in intelligible English and comparative quiet how very glad they were. "I never in all my life saw anybody look so funny as you did when we came in," said Mary Brooks at last. "What were you doing, anyway?" "Hanging a skirt," explained Betty, with great dignity. "Was it going to have a court train all the way around?" inquired Mary. "Tell her, Helen," commanded Betty. "That was tucks, Mary," repeated Helen, obediently, and then everybody laughed. Under cover of the mirth Betty sought out Dorothy. "Where's Eleanor?" she whispered. "She went off for Sunday with Polly Eastman," Dorothy explained. "And Betty, she's a trump after all. She--but I think perhaps she'd rather tell you herself." "Betty," broke in Nita Reese, "you must hurry and get dressed. You'll have to appear at chapel, if you never get that skirt hung." "Yes," said Betty, meekly. "And I'll go and bribe the new maid, who hasn't learned the rules yet, to send you up some breakfast," put in Madeline, the watchful. Nita went off to make her bed and Dorothy to see Mary's prom. dress which had just been sent on from home. Presently the new maid appeared with toast and coffee and regrets that "the eggs was out, miss," and Betty sat down at her desk to eat, while Helen, the Elizabethan lyrics quite forgotten, rocked happily beside her. "Helen," said Betty, a spoonful of hot coffee held aloft in one hand, consternation hiding her dimples, "what in the world shall I do? I told you I hadn't studied anything, and I can't flunk now." "Oh, they won't call on you to-day," said Helen hopefully, counting the Dramatic Club pins that made Betty's shirt-waist look like a small section of a jeweler's window. "Aren't they pretty?" said Betty, touching them lovingly. "I hope the girls know which is which, because I don't. The one with the pearl gone is Bob's, of course, and Dorothy's is marked on the back, and that's Mary's, because she always pins it on wrong side up. One of the others is Christy's, and one is that sweet Miss West's--she writes poetry, you know, and is on the 'Argus.' Wasn't it lovely of her to pin it on me?" "I should think anybody would be glad to have you wear their pin," said Helen loyally, if ungrammatically. "But to think the society wanted me!" said Betty in awe-struck tones. "Helen, you know they never do take a person unless she amounts to something, now do they? But what in the world do I amount to?" "Does being an all-around girl count?" asked Helen. "Because the senior that is such a friend of Eleanor Watson's said you were that, and that's what you wanted to be, isn't it? But I think myself," she added shyly, "that your one talent, that we used to talk about last year, you know, is being nice to everybody." The journey to chapel was a triumphal procession. The girls said such pleasant things. Could they possibly be true, Betty wondered. Nan would be pleased to know that she was somebody at last, even if she had missed the team both years, and was always being mistaken for a freshman. Sitting beside Dorothy, with the eight pins on her shirtwaist, and a guilty consciousness that Miss Mills, who taught "Lit. II" was staring at them from the faculty row, Betty resolved that she was going to be different--to keep her room in order, not to do ridiculous things at ridiculous times, and always to study Monday's lessons. "I have tried harder lately," she thought, but it was reassuring outside chapel to have Miss Mills stop to shake hands and Miss Hale say something about being glad that Betty had turned out a thoroughly good student. Mary Brooks said the same thing. "It's funny, Betty, how your innocent, baby airs belie you. If we'd guessed what a splendid record you'd made this year, we'd have taken you in even sooner." Wherefore Betty was glad that she had looked up all the history references and stayed at home from the Westcott House dance to write a zoology report that Professor Lawrence himself had called excellent, and done her best with the "Canterbury Tales." "I have done better than I used to last year," she thought happily, "but it wasn't for this, not one bit. It was because a person is ashamed not to do her best up here." "Will you take a few notes, please?" said Miss Mills in crisp, businesslike tones, and Betty woke up to the fact that she had not answered to her name in the roll. "She saw you, though," whispered Christy, "and she was properly amused." Miss Mills had finished her lecture and the class in "Lit. II" was making its leisurely exit, when Jean Eastman caught up with Betty. "Glad you've gone into the great and only," she said with a hearty hand- shake. "And what do you think about the Lady Eleanor's latest escapade?" "I don't know what you mean, Jean," said Betty quickly, remembering Dorothy's hint, and wondering why Eleanor hadn't come to chapel, since Polly was there, and she and Eleanor would surely have come back together. "Why, resigning from Dramatic Club, of course. Didn't she consult you about it?" "Jean, do you mean that Eleanor--has resigned--from Dramatic Club?" Pleasure and bewilderment struggled for the mastery of Betty's face. "Yes," said Jean carelessly. "Funny you hadn't heard of it, because it's the talk of the whole college. She sent a note in Saturday night, it seems, but nobody outside heard of it till this morning, and now we're all speculating over the whys and wherefores. The Clio girls say that if she did it because she thought she'd rather go into that, she will be doomed to everlasting disappointment. For my part I don't think that was her reason." Jean's tone hinted of deep mysteries. "Of course not," said Betty indignantly. "Can't they see, Jean, that a girl has got to have a big, splendid reason for doing a thing like that?" "A big reason all right, but I don't know about the splendor," returned Jean cheerfully, shouldering her way across the stream of girls in the hall to join Beatrice Egerton. To Jean's disappointment Beatrice had nothing to say about the resignation, except that it was Eleanor's own affair and that all the talk about it was utter nonsense. Then Jean, warming to her work, ventured a direct attack. "But Miss Egerton, wasn't there something queer about that story of Eleanor's--the one that got her in? You were going to tell me once, but you never did." "I was going to tell you once, but I never did?" repeated Beatrice with an extreme affability which those who knew her better than Jean would have recognized as dangerous. "Go and ask Eleanor Watson that question if you care to, Miss Eastman. I admire her far too much to wish to discuss her private affairs with you. Thank you, I should like to go to your house-play, but I have another engagement. The night isn't set? But really, I'm so busy just now I can't promise, you know." Beatrice Egerton had not spent four years at Harding College for nothing. She was incapable of heroism herself, but she could appreciate certain types of it in others, and she was bitterly ashamed of the part she had played in Eleanor's affairs. "Miss Wales," she said an hour later, when her path from class to class crossed with Betty's, "where is Eleanor? I can't wait another minute to see her." Betty explained that Eleanor had not appeared at chapel or morning classes. "Then I suppose," said Beatrice impulsively, "that I am one of the people she's trying to avoid. Go and see her the first chance you have, Miss Wales, and tell her that I admire her grit--and that I'm too much ashamed of myself to come and say so. Now don't forget. Did you ever see such duds as the pickle heiress wears? Perfect rags!" The mocking, insolent Beatrice was back again, the more debonnaire for the effort that her confession had cost. Betty meditated cutting her eleven o'clock class, decided that with those eight pins on it would never do, and tried not to be glad that a severe headache prevented Mademoiselle from meeting her French division at twelve. She walked down to the Hilton House with a chattering little freshman, one of Polly Eastman's chums and a devoted admirer of Eleanor's. "It's too bad that Eleanor Watson felt she ought to give up Dramatic Club, isn't it?" said the girl. "Some of the girls think it was an awfully queer thing to do, but I think it's fine to put your work first when you don't feel strong enough to do everything." "Yes, indeed," agreed Betty cordially, glad to be able to meet her on her own ground. "Polly is afraid," volunteered the little freshman, "that Eleanor is going to break down. She's had to drop themes, too, you know. Polly said they almost missed their train Saturday night because Eleanor would wait to write to Miss Raymond about it, when anybody could see that Monday would have done just as well. And she was so tired that she cried while she was writing the note." Betty shook off her loquacious companion by stopping on the second floor to see a girl who was sure to be out, and went on up the back stairway to Eleanor's corner. There was no answer to her knock, and after a second trial she deliberately opened the door and went in. Eleanor lay in a forlorn disheveled little heap on her couch. Her cheeks were flushed with crying, her eyes rimmed with dark circles that made them look bigger and brighter than ever. "Oh, I thought the door was locked," she cried, when Betty appeared. "But luckily for me it wasn't." Betty took her up brightly, dropping sociably down to the couch beside her. "You dear old Eleanor," she went on quickly, "I've come to tell you that Dorothy thinks you're a trump and Beatrice Egerton thinks you're a brick and I'm so proud of you I don't know what to do. There now!" "Oh, Betty, you can't be, after everything." Eleanor shook off the clinging arms and sat up among the pillows. "Listen," she commanded. "It isn't fair for me to take anything from you after what I've thought. I had a letter from Mr. Blake this morning. He has been very nice to me about the story, Betty. And he said he felt that he ought to tell me what good friends I had here. So now I know all about it, but oh, Betty! I'd thought such horrid things--" "Never mind that now," said Betty. "Please don't tell me. It would only hurt both of us, and it wouldn't be any use that I can see." [Illustration: "NEVER MIND THAT NOW," SAID BETTY] "I'm a coward, too," Eleanor went on steadily. "I was afraid to see Beatrice, and now I'm afraid to see Jean and all the rest of them. Oh, Betty, I can't bear to have people think I'm a freak. If I could take those two notes back I would this minute. I hate giving things up. There, now you know just how mean I am." "No," said Betty, gently, "I only know how tired you are and how much you needed some one to come in and tell you that we are all ready to stand by you." Eleanor waited a minute before she answered. "Betty," she said at last, an uncertain little smile fluttering about her mouth, "shall you be glad when you've got me through college?" Then she straightened with sudden energy. "This is your day, Betty,"--she pointed to the pins,--"and I won't spoil another minute of it. Of course there isn't any use in hiding up here. I promise to go down to lunch and to take what's coming to me, and do the best I can. Now run and let the rest of the college congratulate you." "And if the Chapin house girls should have a spread to-night over at Rachel's--" began Betty, doubtfully. "I'll come. I'll even be the life of the party. Only you're not to worry about me one instant longer." Eleanor kept her word to the letter for the rest of the day, but the weeks that followed were necessarily full of ups and downs, of petty humiliations and bitter discouragements, and Betty uncomplainingly shared them all. The editors did what little they could, and Madeline and Miss Ferris and Katherine and Rachel helped without understanding anything except that Betty wanted them to; but the brunt of it all fell on her. "I can't bother Miss Ferris with my blues," said Eleanor one afternoon, "and I know I oughtn't to bother you with them." "Nonsense!" laughed Betty. "I like being bothered," and did not mention that she had given up the golf tournament because the practice would have interfered with her position as Eleanor's confidante. There were nice things to share too. Miss Raymond wrote a prompt and cordial answer to Eleanor's note about the theme course. "After your action of last week, I see no reason why you should not continue in my classes on the old, pleasant footing. Please don't deprive me of the privilege of seeing your work." There was a note from the Dramatic Club too. Dorothy had managed to get herself and Beatrice and Frances made a special committee to consider the resignation--the first in the annals of the society,--and they decided to accept it for one year from its date. After that, they said, they saw no reason "to deprive the society of a valued member." Betty was delighted, but Eleanor shook her head. "I may not have earned it even then," she said gloomily. "Leave it to Miss Ferris," suggested Betty. "She'll be a perfectly fair judge. If she says you can take it then, you will know it's all right." And to this arrangement, after some hesitation, Eleanor consented. A week or two later Bob came to Eleanor, in a sad state of embarrassment. "It's about the basket-ball song, Eleanor. The committee never saw it. Babe was chairman, you know, and she put her shoulder out of joint playing hockey the day the songs were called in, so I emptied the box for her. I remember I stopped in my room on the way back and I must have dropped yours there. Anyhow it turned up to-day in my top drawer. I'm awfully sorry." Eleanor took the song and read through a stanza or two, while Bob wriggled, blushed and waited for the storm to burst. She had heard a good deal about Eleanor Watson's uncertain temper. But at first Eleanor only laughed. "Goodness! What jiggly meter! It's lucky you lost it, Bob." "No," said Bob, sturdily. "It was a dandy song, one of the best that came in. Babe said so too. I am really awfully sorry. I'm too careless to live." "Well, you were lucky not to have found it a month ago," said Eleanor, with a sudden flash of anger, and Bob departed, wondering. "Little things do make a big difference," said Betty, when she heard the story. "If they'd chosen it and everybody had said how clever it was--" "I should have felt that I'd squared my account--proved that I could do what I hadn't done, and I should never have owned up to anybody." "Then you really ought to have been nicer to Bob," laughed Betty, "because she helped you to come to the point." "Yes, that helped," Eleanor admitted, soberly, "just as Dora helped and Beatrice in her way and Jim in his; but you were the one who meant to help, Betty. You got me the chance to begin over, and you made up my mind for me about taking it, and you've kept me to it ever since." "But El--" "Now let's not argue about it," laughed Eleanor. "I only wanted to say that I'm going to try to be nice to you to the extent of 'staying put' this time. I don't mean that you shall have to waste your junior year over me." CHAPTER XIX GOOD-BYES "Oh, Betty Wales, what's your hurry?" Betty, who had strolled up Main Street with Emily Davis and now was walking back alone, turned to see Eleanor and Dora Carlson coming down the steps of the house behind her. "We're hunting rooms," explained Eleanor, gaily, "the most systematic hunt you ever heard of. We went to every possible house on the other side on the way up, and then we came back on this side, doing the same thing. So if you want any pointers--" "But you're not going off the campus, Eleanor," asked Betty anxiously. "Oh, no, it's a room for me," interposed Dora, with an adoring glance at Eleanor. "I've always longed to live up among the elm-trees of Main Street, but I knew its glories were not for me until--" "Dora," warned Eleanor, laughingly, "I told you not to mention elm-trees again this afternoon." She turned to Betty. "They all come down to two possibilities. Which should you prefer, a big room with a microscopic closet or a microscopic room with an enormous closet?" "Oh, the one with the big closet," said Betty, decidedly. "I've tried the other, you know." "And unknown horrors are always preferable to familiar ones," laughed Eleanor. Dora left them at the next corner and as soon as she was out of hearing Betty turned upon Eleanor. "Well," she said, "I've caught you in the act, and I think it's perfectly lovely of you. College will be a different place to her if she can live up here somewhere near things." "It will be nicer for her, I think," said Eleanor, simply. "But Betty, I'm not doing much,--just making her a little present of the difference between Mrs. Bryant's prices and the very cheapest ones up here. I can do as much as that, I hope, after spoiling her sugaring-off party; and I really don't need that extra-priced room again." "You mean," said Betty, in amazement, "that you're going to give up your corner-room with the three windows and the lovely burlap hangings?" Eleanor nodded. "It wouldn't be much of a present from me if I just asked father for the money." "Eleanor," said Betty, solemnly, "I don't believe I could do it." "But it's really all your doing, Betty. If it hadn't been for you, I shouldn't have known Dora Carlson, and I shouldn't be here now. Besides, you set the example with Helen. So if you don't like it, there's only yourself to thank, you see," ended Eleanor, playfully. "No, I don't see,--not one bit," declared Betty. "You'll be telling me that I'm responsible for the way you recite next." "Well, you are, partly," laughed Eleanor, turning off to the Hilton. Betty went up-stairs behind two strange girls who were evidently expecting to be in the Belden House next year. "Of course the fourth floor is a long way up," one was saying, "and I suppose it's hot sometimes. But if I can get a single room there, I'd rather have it, wouldn't you?" "Well, perhaps," answered the other doubtfully. "No perhapses about it, my friend," thought Betty, turning off to her own quarters. Rooms and roommates--the air was full of them! And to-morrow was the day that the Belden House matron had appointed for settling all such matters. Betty could have a single room, if she wanted it, on the other side of Madeline Ayres, and she had almost made up her mind to take it. To be sure, it did seem a little hard on Helen. Nobody in the house had approached her on the subject of roommates, Betty felt sure of that; she would have to be "assigned" with some outsider. Well, why not? If she didn't take the trouble to make friends, of course she would have to suffer the consequences. And yet--if Eleanor had really been influenced by what she had tried to do for Helen, wouldn't it be mean to back out now? "But Eleanor has decided already," thought Betty, "and there's no reason why I should keep on bothering with Helen forever. I don't believe she's one bit happier for it." Helen looked up expectantly when Betty came in. After all she was a sweet little thing; her face lighted up wonderfully at times. "What's the news, Helen?" Betty asked. "You look as if something extra nice had happened." "Why no," answered Helen, "unless you count that I've learned my Latin for tomorrow." The answer was just like her, Betty reflected with a sigh. She might improve a great deal, but she would be a "dig" to the end of the chapter. As she dressed, Betty tried to lead up gradually to the subject of rooms by telling about the two strange girls she had met in the hall. But it was no use; Helen preserved the same gentle, obtuse silence that had kept Betty from opening the subject before. Little by little her courage oozed out, and with the ringing of the supper-bell she surrendered. "I can't do it," she told the green lizard savagely. "She thinks we're settled here forever and I can't bear to disappoint her. It's not generosity though; it's just hating to make a fuss." At supper all the girls were talking about rooms. "I'm first on the waiting list for singles," Nita Reese announced, "but I might as well be first on the waiting list for a trip to the moon, I suppose. Nobody ever gives up a chance at a single." Betty opened her mouth to tell Nita the sad truth, saw Helen looking at her queerly, and shut it again. It would be time enough for Nita to hear of her good fortune to-morrow. After supper Helen hurried back to her work and Betty joined a merry party on the piazza, went for a moonlight stroll on the campus, helped serenade Dorothy King, and finally, just as the ten o'clock bell was pealing warningly through the halls, rushed in upon Helen in a state of breathless excitement. "Helen," she cried, "T. Reed's coming into the Belden and you never told me." "I didn't know till this afternoon." "Then that was the piece of news I saw in your face. Why didn't you tell it?" "Why, I don't know--" "Helen," cried Betty, with a sudden inspiration, "you and T. Reed want to room together." "Oh, Betty, Theresa couldn't have gone and said so!" Helen looked the picture of distress. "Nobody went and said so till you did just now," laughed Betty. "Oh, Helen, why didn't you tell me?" "Why didn't you tell me that you'd rather room alone?" Then they both laughed and, sitting close together on Helen's bed in the dark, talked it all over. "You've been just lovely," Helen said. "You've given me all the good times I've had--except Theresa. But you couldn't make it any different from what it is. I never shall know how to get along the way other girls do, and Theresa is a good deal the same way, except that she can play basket-ball. So I guess we belong together." "You needn't think you'll be rid of me," said Betty. "I shall be just two doors away, and I shall come in and bother you when you want to work and take you walking and ask you to hook up my dresses, just as I do now. Helen, how fast things are getting settled." "They'd better be," said Helen. "There's only two weeks left of our sophomore year." For a long time Betty lay awake, staring at the patch of moonlight on the floor beside her bed. "How mean I should have felt, if I'd told her when she wouldn't tell me," she thought. "I wonder if it's all right now. I wonder if next year is going to be as perfect as it seems. I wonder--" Betty Wales was asleep. Five minutes later she woke from a cat-nap that had turned her last thoughts into a very realistic dreamland. "No," she decided, "it won't be quite perfect. Dorothy will be gone." Those are the good-byes that count--the ones you must say to the seniors. Dorothy would come back to visit the college, of course, and to attend class reunions, but that would not be the same thing as living next door to her all through the year. Betty was not going to stay to Commencement. Sophomores were only in everybody's way then, she thought, and she preferred to say good-bye to Dorothy before the onslaught of families, alumnae and friends should have upset the regular routine of life and made the seniors seem already lost to the college world. Packing was worse than ever this year, and examinations could not have been more inconveniently arranged, but in spite of everything Betty slipped off on her last evening for a few minutes with Dorothy. The Belden House was a pandemonium, the piazzas deserted, the hot rooms ablaze with lights, the halls noisy with the banging of trunk-lids and the cries of distracted damsels; but the Hilton, either because it had more upper-class girls who were staying to Commencement, or because its freshmen and sophomores were of a serener temperament, showed few signs of "last days." The piazza was full, as it always was on warm nights, and a soft little crooning song was wafted across the lawn to Betty's ears. Dorothy was singing. Her voice was not highly cultivated, but it was the kind of voice that has a soul in it--which is better than much training. As Betty stole softly up to the piazza, so as not to interrupt the song, and found a place on the railing, she remembered her first evening in Harding. How forlorn and frightened she had been, and how lovely Dorothy was to her. Well, she had been just as lovely ever since. Dorothy's song stopped suddenly. "Girls, I can't sing to-night," she said. "It's--so--warm. And besides, Betty Wales has come to see me on a very particular errand, haven't you, Betty, dear?" Up in Dorothy's room, in the dusk, nobody said much of anything. There is never much left to say at the last. But Dorothy had a way of putting things and of looking at things that was like nobody's else, Betty thought; and when she said, "I know I can trust you to work for the democratic, helpful spirit and to keep down cliques and snobbishness and see that everybody has a fair chance and a good time," Betty felt more pleased than she had about her election to Dramatic Club. She had been Dorothy's lieutenant. Now she must be Dorothy's successor, and it was a great honor and a greater responsibility--but first she must pack her trunks. On the way home she overtook Roberta. "I'm in the Belden, Betty," she announced, breathlessly, "and there are a lot of things I want to ask you and Mary about, but I can't stay long, because those dear little freshmen are going to give me a good-bye spread." "Those snippy freshmen?" laughed Betty. "Oh, but they came around after the Jabberwock party, just as you said they would. It was an impromptu party, Betty. I did it the night Sara Westervelt was there, and somebody stole the ice cream. That's why you weren't invited." Up-stairs the rest of the "old guard" were sitting on boxes, trunks and the floor, waiting to say good-bye to Betty and meanwhile being entertained by Madeline Ayres, who was giving a lively account of her experience with a washwoman. "She said, 'It's twinty white skirruts Oi have to do up now, me dear,' and I said, 'But I can't go without a skirt, Mrs. Mulvaney, and everybody who doesn't wear white to chapel will be expelled, and then where will your goose that lays the golden eggs be?' 'Shure, I kape no geese, me dear,' said she, and--oh, here's Betty." "Finish up," demanded Katherine. "Oh, there isn't any more," said Madeline, "except that she's just sent the skirt home, and it isn't mine, but it fits rather well, doesn't it, and I can't possibly return it before chapel, now can I?" "Is that the way they do in Bohemia?" said Mary, severely. "Betty, I've got to have half your bed to-night. An alum, who came on from San Francisco got mixed in her dates and appeared a day too early. And as she is a particular pal of the matron and I am notoriously good-natured, she's got my room." "To think of it," said Katherine, impressively, "and you a senior next week." "And we juniors next week!" said Rachel. "It doesn't seem possible, does it? Here's to hoping we shall all be back next year." "What a forlorn toast!" said Katherine, who knew better than the rest how hard it was for Rachel to make both ends meet. "Here's to hoping that we all go on as splendidly as we've begun!" "You have done tolerably well so far, children," said Mary, beaming around the group. "See the society pins bristle in our midst!" said Katherine, with melodramatic gestures in the direction of Mary, Betty, and of Rachel, who wore the Clio Club insignia proudly. "And we've got the college beauty," added Betty quickly. "And the Jabberwock," put in Eleanor. "Please don't forget the basket-ball stars," suggested Katherine, with becoming modesty. "Nor the basket-ball song," added Rachel, smiling at Helen. "So many honors," laughed Betty. "Do you suppose we've left anything for next year?" "The song of the classes talks about 'jolly juniors,'" said Rachel. "That sounds as if there would be plenty of fun in it." "There is; junior year is the nicest one in college," declared Mary. "It can't be," objected Katherine, "because each year has been as nice as it possibly could." "Unless you were foolish enough to spoil it," whispered Eleanor in Betty's ear. Roberta suddenly remembered her waiting freshmen, Mary offered to escort her to Mrs. Chapin's, and the other three declared they must go home to their packing. Betty and the girl from Bohemia went to the head of the stairs to see them off. It was not exactly good-bye, because there were chances of meeting at chapel and the station, but it was near enough to it to be a little sad. "Oh, dear, I hate endings," said Betty, waving her hand to Eleanor. "Do you?" said the girl from Bohemia. "You'd get used to them if you lived my scrappy, now-here-and-now-there kind of life. You'd find out that one thing has to end before another can begin, and that each new one is too good to miss." "Um--perhaps," said Betty, doubtfully. "Any how we've got to take the chance. So here's to junior year!" THE END 
53548	----	available by Internet Archive (https://archive.org) Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 53548-h.htm or 53548-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/53548/53548-h/53548-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/53548/53548-h.zip) Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/jeancabotatashto00scotiala Transcriber's note: Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). Text in small capitals has been replaced by regular uppercase text. [Illustration: "WELL, I NEVER, A FRESHMAN ASLEEP AT THE SWITCH!"--_Page 23_.] JEAN CABOT AT ASHTON by GERTRUDE FISHER SCOTT Illustrated by Arthur O. Scott [Illustration] Boston Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co. Published, August, 1912 Copyright, 1912, by Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co. All rights reserved JEAN CABOT AT ASHTON Norwood Press Berwick & Smith Co. Norwood Mass. U. S. A. Contents CHAPTER PAGE I. THE DAY BEFORE 1 II. HOW IT LOOKED ON WEDNESDAY 14 III. FIRST IMPRESSIONS 31 IV. THE FRESHMAN RECEPTION 49 V. INITIATION 78 VI. THE HARVARD-YALE GAME 102 VII. THE THANKSGIVING HOLIDAYS 126 VIII. THE CORAL BEADS 154 IX. THE CHAFING-DISH PARTY 167 X. THE COSTUME PARTY 189 XI. MIDYEAR'S 206 XII. BEFORE THE FRESHMAN-SOPHOMORE GAME 224 XIII. THE GAME 246 XIV. THE BANQUET 261 XV. MR. CABOT'S VISIT 280 XVI. PRIZE-SPEAKING 298 XVII. THE TENNIS TOURNAMENT 321 XVIII. CLASS DAY 339 Illustrations "Well, I never, a freshman, asleep at the switch!" (Page 23) _Frontispiece_ FACING PAGE "Why, what are you doing here? We've been looking for you all over college" 90 "I don't know yet, Jean, but a man can do anything if he's educated" 152 "Somebody open the south window, quick!" 178 With a quick movement she threw it over the shoulder of her antagonist 258 Natalie went after the last two games in whirlwind fashion 328 Jean Cabot at Ashton CHAPTER I THE DAY BEFORE "Now, Tom dear, don't you do another single thing for me; I'm sure I shall be all right, and Cousin Anna will meet me at the train in Boston and then everything will be smooth sailing. You'll miss your train if you wait another moment and blame me for it ever after, so good-by; I'll write you as soon as I'm comfortably settled with Elizabeth Frances Fairfax, in 45 Merton Hall." "Well, so long, little sister; let me know if there's anything I can do for you and we'll spend Thanksgiving together surely at Aunt Sarah's, and may be, if you're very good, I'll come up and take you to the Harvard-Yale the week before. You wouldn't mind going with that good-looking room-mate of mine if I could persuade Connie Huntington to accompany me, would you? It's only a few hours' run up to Boston, but here are some chocolates and magazines in case you tire of the scenery. Be game, little girl, and above every thing else, _make good_." With these words Thomas Cabot swung off the train just in time to catch a near-by accommodation train to convey him to Littleton Center, where he was to join a merry house-party of young people. Jean quietly arose from her seat and watched from the car window until her brother had entirely disappeared from view, and then somewhat reluctantly turned and resumed her former seat. Brother and sister had come from Los Angeles to New York together, he to enter upon his senior year at Yale and she to become a freshman at Ashton College. Jean was the only daughter and youngest child of a family of six. The four older brothers had been educated in the West and were determined that the two youngest children should see something of the life and culture of the East. Mrs. Cabot had died when Jean was six, and although she had had governesses and accommodating aunts and cousins galore to consider her welfare, still most of her life had been spent in the company of her father and brothers, and when they decided that she should go East to Ashton, a small college of about five hundred strong, within twenty-five miles of Boston, she had never for one moment doubted the wisdom of their choice, and acquiesced as willingly as though Brother Will had said, "Jean, go get your racket for a set of tennis." From Los Angeles to New York, Tom and she had kept up a continuous conversation on the "do's and don'ts" of college life, and at the end of the journey Jean felt that she had a great advantage over the other green freshmen, for she had been too carefully coached by her brother to make any serious errors. Then, too, Cousin Anna Maitlandt, a graduate of Ashton 1911, was to meet her at Boston and take her out to college to see that she made a good beginning amid the strange new surroundings. Now Tom was gone, and for the first time that she could remember, Jean was alone, face to face with the first big thing in her life. She tried to read, but thoughts of home would persist in rushing in upon her, and between the lines danced little pictures of life away out in California. She wondered why she had come to college. Was it simply to please her father and brothers or did she mean to make a success of it for her own sake? She was fond of books and of study, but fond of so many other things as well. What would there be in college to take the place of her horseback rides over the ranch with the boys, her evenings with her father in his den, her tennis, her weeks in camp in the mountains, her whole free outdoor life? She knew little of girls and cared less, for up to this time they had played a small part in her life. To be sure, she had known them at St. Margaret's, her fitting school, but she had spent as little time as possible there in order to be at the call of the boys when they needed her, and you may be sure some one of the five needed her most of the time. She was their true confidante and they told her their little business worries and successes, their love affairs, and their hopes and ambitions, for each felt that his secret was safe with her. In spite of her tender years and lack of real experience she seemed to be able to advise where many an older person would have failed. And now she was leaving them all behind and was wondering what they could do without her. The more she thought, the more the longing came over her to give it all up and go back to those she loved best. Before she realized it two great tears were rolling down her cheeks and as she was about to wipe them away a tall, handsome girl stood before her, smiling down at her. "Isn't this Jean Cabot?" she asked, giving her hand a cordial shake. "May I sit down here and talk a little? You're going to Ashton College, aren't you? So am I. My name is Allison, Marguerite Allison, 1914. Of course you're wondering how I knew it was you. Well, I was sitting in the last chair of this car and saw your brother as he bade you good-by. I met Tom last year at the Yale Prom and I am sure he is going now to a house-party at Littleton Center. I've just come from there and know all about it. I was terribly disappointed not to stay over the week-end, but I'm on the House Committee and just have to be back to-morrow. You know Student Government just makes you do things. Belle Thurston, an old Ashton girl, who is giving the house-party, told me she expected Tom this evening, but he was stopping off in New York long enough to get his sister Jean started for her year at Ashton. So that's how I knew it was you. But tell me, dear, where are you going to live?" By this time Jean's tears had dried and she had regained her usual composure and quite firmly replied, "Oh, Miss Allison, I'm so glad to know you; I was just beginning to get homesick, but you've saved my life. I'm to live in Merton, 45, with Elizabeth Frances Fairfax. I got my assignment just the day before we started." "Merton; why, that's my house. Isn't it grand? 'Forty-five' is fourth floor and mine is 27, second floor. As for Elizabeth Frances Fairfax, she's probably another freshman from Massachusetts; name sounds like one of those good old New England families. Massachusetts girls are all right in spite of their strict old Puritan ancestors. I'm from Cherokee, Iowa, but I haven't been home all summer. Really I haven't any home to go to, for my father is interested in mines and is down in Mexico most of the time. I stay with my aunt when I'm in Cherokee, but this summer I've been visiting some of the college girls in New York State and ended up at Littleton Center. And you've come all the way from Los Angeles? I thought I'd come some distance, but it's nothing in comparison with your trip. Most of the girls at college are Easterners, but I'm sure you'll like them after you get used to their ways. "What studies are you going to take? Can I help you with your program? Come right into 27 as soon as we land and I'll fix things up for you. Speaking of Massachusetts girls, you'll fall in love with my room-mate, Natalie Lawton, just the minute you see her. She's from Boston; lived there all her short life, not fifteen minutes' walk from the Boston Public Library and Copley Square. Excuse me, of course you don't know anything about Boston yet, but you will before you've been a month at Ashton. Miss Emerson, she's college president, you know, thinks there's no place on the whole earth quite like Boston, and it's her especial delight to impress upon freshmen the advantages of being so near to this wonderful city. The first time you hear her say, 'Now, girls, remember the great advantages offered to you by being in such close proximity to Boston,' you will think it rather significant, but by the time you've heard it 576 times it will begin to grow a little monotonous. "Why, Miss Cabot, we're actually passing through Hyde Park, and we'll be in the South Station in a few minutes. Hasn't the time gone quickly? How many trunks have you and where are your checks? Let's be getting our things together. I left my luggage up in the other end of the car, so I'll go up and collect it and be back in a minute." "Oh, thank you, Miss Allison, but my cousin, Miss Anna Maitlandt, has promised to meet me at the train and I am sure she will help me with my trunks." "What! Anna Maitlandt, 1911, your cousin! Why, she lived in East Hall her senior year when I was a freshman. I haven't seen her for perfect ages, but she was my crush freshman year. How good it will seem to see her again! And to think she's your cousin! How small the world is after all! Here we are--follow me and I'll keep my eye open for Anna." The long express train was crowded, but the two girls were quickly out upon the platform and well up the track before a word was said. Marguerite was well in the lead, when all at once Jean saw her drop her bags and vigorously seize a rather petite girl, trim in her immaculate white linen suit. By the time their greetings were over, Jean had arrived on the scene and found herself as effusively greeted. "So this is little Jean! Well, I never should have known you. Why, you're as big as Tom, and look more like a senior than a green freshie! No hazing you, my lady. Oh, what a prize for Ashton Athletic Association! What is your specialty, Jean, tennis, basket-ball or rowing? You'll make all three without half trying. "Now, where are your trunk checks? We'll send the trunks out to Ashton at once to have them waiting for us when we arrive. I'm going to take you girls up town with me for dinner and a good talk, and Jean must go out home with me for the night. To-morrow will be plenty early enough for her to arrive. What say'st thou, Peggy?" "Oh, Nan, you're a perfect dear to invite me, but really I can't accept. You see I'm due out at Merton for a meeting of the House Committee to-night. I stayed down at Littleton Center till the last minute and now I've got to hustle back, for we've loads of work to plan out. Drop into 27 to-morrow as soon as you arrive and make it your headquarters until Jean's room is settled. Come down to the Inn for lunch with me at noon. All of the old girls will be there and it will be a good opportunity to introduce Jean to them. You know there's nothing like knowing the right girls at the start. "By the way, did you know that Bess McNeil was married last week? Oh, I'm just brim-full of news to tell you, but it will have to wait till later, for I must leave you now or I'll never catch the 5:09. So glad to have met you, Nan; seems like old times, and I think your cousin is a perfect dear. So long till to-morrow," and with this she dashed across the station to a waiting taxicab which would convey her and her bags across the city to the North Station. Jean's trunks were soon re-checked and the two girls left the station and took an uptown electric. Before long they alighted and entered a quiet hotel where a good dinner was quickly served. Since Jean's arrival the two girls had talked a steady stream, but the conversation had centered almost entirely upon the families and home life of the two. Now, however, it changed to the more important subject of college. Anna did most of the talking, for it took a long time to answer Jean's many questions. How much there was to be said. In fact, Anna might have sat there all night discoursing on the joys and sorrows of a college girl's life if a sweet-sounding clock had not reminded her that in a very few moments the last suburban train departed for Framington. Quickly she paid her bill and they were on their way again. Although it was rather late when they arrived home, they found Mr. and Mrs. Maitlandt waiting for them. After a most cordial greeting, Mrs. Maitlandt suggested that they all retire, as it had been a hard day for Jean and she must be fresh and rested for her first day at college. After the good-nights had been said, Jean found herself alone in her room a little bewildered in her new surroundings. Her poor body and head ached as she had never known them to do before. To be sure, everybody had been so good to her, but now they had all left her and for the first time since she had left home she was alone. Quickly undressing she put out her electric light and went over to the window. It was a bright, starry night and as she gazed out upon its splendor a wave of homesickness swept over her and she sobbed, "Oh, father and the boys, why did I leave you? I wish I'd never promised to go to college." CHAPTER II HOW IT LOOKED ON WEDNESDAY Bright and early Wednesday morning, Jean was up and dressed, for the two girls had planned an early start in order to reach Ashton before noon. Mr. Maitlandt, whose business took him into Boston every day, accompanied them to the South Station and saw them safely on a North Bound elevated. They easily caught the 10:17 train for Ashton and in twelve minutes had arrived at the little station, where they found "confusion worse confounded." Girls and trunks everywhere, irate and tired expressmen trying to settle difficulties, small boys by the dozens begging to carry suit-cases, wagons piled high with trunks and packing-boxes. They waded through the crowd and, as Anna spied Mr. Chapin, the express agent, she hastened up to where he stood and said, "Good morning, Mr. Chapin. Of course you remember me, Anna Maitlandt. No, I'm not back for post graduate; I have only come out for a few days to see that my cousin gets started properly as a freshman. Here are her trunk checks and when you have time will you please see that they are taken up to Merton, 45. Any time to-day will do, but of course we should like them as soon as possible. Thank you." And he was off again before she could say more had she wished to do so. Just then they heard, "Why, Nan Maitlandt, what on earth are you doing out here to-day?" and a tall girl darted round a pile of trunks. "I've brought my young sister Bess to college and we're having a terrible time. Only one of her trunks has come, and not a thing in it that she really wants. We've been arguing with old Chapie for an hour, but it doesn't do one bit of good." "Nell, how like old times it seems. You always were in some kind of trouble all our four years and it wouldn't be you if something wasn't wrong. How many times do you suppose you lost one of your trunks, or books, or hats, or themes, or tennis rackets? But you always found them sooner or later and I'm confident your sister's trunk will turn up all right. I want you to know my cousin, Jean Cabot, from Los Angeles. She and your sister will be in the same class. Jean is to live in Merton. Where is Bess assigned?" "Poor child, she didn't make the campus this year and is to room first semester at Mrs. McAllister's, but I hope second half she will get in East or Wellington, for you know so many drop out at midyear's that there's always a chance. How long will you be here? Can't you come down to the Cottage with your cousin?" "Thanks, Nell, but I expect to be very busy and I'm only here for a few days. You know I begin hospital work at the Massachusetts General the first of October and I need every minute at home. But I'll try to see you somewhere if it's only for a few minutes. I want to hear all about yourself and the other girls." It took but a few moments to leave the little station and its confusion behind them and Jean said, "Why, Anna, are we the last ones to arrive? Everybody seems to be at the station." "No, child, they're mostly freshmen. The upper-class girls won't arrive until to-night or early in the morning. You know to-morrow is registration day and classes won't meet until Friday and Saturday. Now look straight ahead of you up the hill and you will get your first view of the campus. Let me tell you some of the buildings even if you don't remember them all. That tower is the chapel; the trees hide the building itself, but we shall see it better as we climb the hill. The white building is the new library, not quite finished as yet; to the right is East, next to that College Hall; opposite is Wellington; those dark-red buildings are the laboratories and away over beyond is Merton. We will walk slowly up Faculty Row and get a closer view. The rest of the dormitories are on the other side of the hill. Don't you love the hill already? Aren't the trees wonderful? The leaves are just beginning to turn and soon will be at their best. Wait till you see the ivy on the chapel in its brilliant autumn coloring. Before long you'll be racking your poor brain to sing its praises, for every one in Lit. I has to write a sonnet on the glory of the ivy on the chapel tower. Miss Whiting, 'prof' in Lit. I, is daffy on the subject and you'll find her any time in the fall lingering in the shadows of the tower and rhapsodizing on its beauty. "Here's 'Prexy's' house. Isn't it dear? It was finished only last year and modeled after a little English house in Stratford-on-Avon where Miss Emerson spent several summers. Miss Thurston, the dean, lives there with her. Be sure you get on the right side of Miss Thurston, freshman year, Jean, and then you'll be safe for the other three." "Other three! Why, Anna Maitlandt, I've only come to college for this one year. Nothing on earth could make me stay any longer. I've made up my mind on that subject, and when a Cabot once makes up his mind he never changes it. I'll do the best I can this year, but when June comes you can be sure I'll start for home on the very first train and stay there the rest of my life." "Oh, Jean, college hasn't begun yet. Wait till midyear's and I'll wager by that time you'll be the most enthusiastic freshman on the hill, with room-mate chosen and plans all made for sophomore year. College life grows on you, and once it has made a start you can't stop it. I'm not going to give you a bit of advice now, but just before I leave I've a word or two for you. "Here we are at old Merton. We have talked so much I forgot to point out the other buildings. How do you like the looks of your new home? I tried four of the dormitories and liked this the best of them all and Mrs. Thompson is a gem of a matron. Let's go right in and see her now." Mrs. Thompson's rooms were on the first floor opposite the parlors and reading-room. She was a large, cheery woman who welcomed the girls in a way that made them feel at home instantly. "We haven't begun our regular meals yet for so few of the girls are here, but I should be pleased to have you both lunch with me in my sitting-room." "Thank you, Mrs. Thompson, but we have promised to go down to the Inn. Has Miss Fairfax, who is to be Miss Cabot's room-mate, arrived yet?" "No; we received word this morning that owing to sickness in her family she may be delayed several days. So if you like, Miss Maitlandt, you may be Miss Cabot's room-mate until the real one arrives." "Thanks; it will be quite like old days to be rooming again in Merton. We'll go up directly, Jean," and they darted up the stairs. "Let's stop in Peggy's room on second for a minute." Stopping before 27, Anna gave a vigorous knock and receiving no response opened the door and entered the room, followed by Jean. Evidently both of the occupants had arrived, for the room was in perfect order and presented a most attractive appearance. Anna walked over to one of the desks and found a note addressed to herself. Opening it she read aloud: "DEAR NAN: Natalie and I couldn't resist the call of the game and we're up on the courts for a set of tennis. Meet us at the Inn at one o'clock sharp. Hastily, PEG." "Those two are fiends at tennis and Natalie won the college championship last year and she was only a sophomore. Generally it goes to a senior; in fact, Natalie is the first under-class girl to win the honor. Wait till she's up against you, Jean. Oh, I have it, there's something for you to work for. Why not be the first and only Ashton freshman to win the Tennis Championship? You can do it if you try. Why, Tom says you are the speediest girl player he ever saw, and for a fellow to admit that a girl can play tennis means more than anything else I know of. "Well, what do you think of their rooms? The bedroom is just off at this side. Evidently their enthusiasm waned when they finished the study, for clothes are piled mountain high on their beds. It isn't fair to criticize first day, though, so let's up to fourth." As they walked slowly up the stairs, Jean said a little hesitatingly, "Why, cousin, our rooms will never look like that unless my room-mate has all those pretty things. I haven't any pictures except father's and the boys' and they had pictures everywhere. And I haven't any flags or tea-table or chafing-dish or pillows or anything attractive." "Never mind that, Jean; it's easy enough to get such things. We'll put the necessary things in order and then make a list of the other things you want, and a trip in town to-morrow will purchase them all. Most girls are not as fortunate as you in the matter of money, for I know you can have anything money will buy. So don't worry about it at all. Take my word for it, don't have too much in your room. The simpler the arrangement, the better. First-year girls are apt to fill every inch of space with pictures and souvenirs that senior year they would be ashamed to own. You can always tell an upper-class girl's room at first glance. You notice for yourself and see what it is that makes a room attractive to you, and I think in the end you will agree with me. "Why, 45 is locked and we haven't the key. You wait a minute here and I'll run down and see Mrs. Thompson. Sit down on the suit-cases and I'll be back before you can count ten." But it was a good ten minutes before Anna returned, for she evidently had some difficulty in finding the matron. For about five minutes Jean sat alone and thought of everything but college, then she leaned back against the wall and closed her eyes, for excitement had tired her a bit. Suddenly a loud laugh aroused her and she heard, "Well, I never, a freshman asleep at the switch! What's the matter, stranger, can I help you?" "No, thank you; I'm waiting for some one to come and unlock my door. We couldn't find the key. My cousin has gone to find Mrs. Thompson." "Well, in the meantime, come right over into my room. I'm to live just opposite. My name's Remington, Midge, or, more properly speaking, Marjorie Remington, 1915. Of course I'm a sophomore and your hated enemy, but that needn't make any difference yet. Leave your bags right there. Now sit down wherever you can find room. Looks pretty bad round here, doesn't it, but you see I only arrived this morning. I've a single this year. Couldn't stand another room-mate. Nearly died last year with the three I had. First girl flunked out at Thanksgiving, second's mother died and she left at midyear's, and the rest of the time I had the greasiest grind in the class to live with. I never studied and she always wanted to, so there was trouble from the start. How are you on the study question?" Before Jean could answer she heard Anna hurrying up the hall and she excused herself quickly. The door of 45 was soon opened and the room indeed presented a desolate appearance. To be sure, it was clean and large and had plenty of windows, but the pieces of furniture were merely stacked up in the center in one huge pile. Jean simply gasped "Oh!" but before she could finish, Anna said, "Put everything down in the corner and come over here and see the view." Indeed, from the southeast corner window there was a wonderful view of the surrounding country, and as here and there Anna pointed out interesting places, Jean's attention was drawn from the bareness and unattractiveness of the room to the beauty of the landscape. "Now we'll not do a thing here until after lunch and then we'll work like Trojans and get the place livable. How's your appetite? I'm nearly starved. It's almost one o'clock, so we'll have to hustle to meet the girls on time." When they arrived at the Inn they found it thronged with girls, but Marguerite was waiting for them and said that she had reserved a table and that Natalie was waiting inside. They entered the dining-room and were immediately seated in an extreme corner near a large window. Introductions were soon over and Jean thought Natalie the most attractive girl she had yet seen. She was her exact opposite in every way, small, dark, with large dancing brown eyes and an abundance of wavy brown hair. Her face and arms were brown as berries and just now, when violent exercise had flushed her cheeks, the heightened color came and went as she talked. Immediately she and Jean found a common subject of conversation in tennis and Jean talked as she had not done before with any one. Girls came up to their table with pleasant words of greeting and passed on and before Jean was quite aware of it lunch was over and they were on their way back to Merton. Natalie and Jean walked together and soon Jean was telling her all about the ranch and her early life there. When they reached the dormitory the two juniors insisted upon going up to 45 to help put things in order. "You know we juniors are your staunchest friends, even-year classes against the odd years," said Natalie. So up the stairs went the four and took possession of 45. They first chose the bedroom furniture and placed it in the small adjoining room. There were two white beds, two chiffoniers and two small chairs. To tell the truth, the room could hardly have held any more, and it required some care to place this amount so that there was any walking space. "We can't make up the beds until your trunks are unpacked, so let's tackle the study," said Peggy. Out in the other room there was one large study-table, two small book-cases, two desks, a large couch, and two comfortable rockers. Just as they were moving some of these into place there was a knock at the door, and Joe, the colored janitor, announced the arrival of Jean's trunks. These he put in the middle of the room and unstrapped them. "What! Three trunks? Aren't you the lucky girl to have enough to put in them? It's all I can do to fill one," said Peggy Allison, whose love of clothes was her greatest failing. "Father insisted upon Aunt Molly's superintending my wardrobe, and all summer long I've done nothing but try on clothes until I don't care whether I ever see any more or not. That largest trunk has the few things I brought for my room." From the top of the trunk she lifted one box very carefully and showed the three girls the pictures of "her family" as she called the five. Surely they were splendid examples of American manhood, and one could not blame any girl for being loath to leave them. "Sometime soon I'm coming up to visit you, Miss Cabot, and I want you to tell me all about your family and especially this member of it," and Peggy held up the picture of the second son, Nelson Cabot, a somewhat serious-looking fellow. "Oh, Nels? Why, he's coming east on business in the winter and he has promised to spend a week in Boston and give me the time of my young life, as he says. Of course he'll come out here, and then you can see him and judge for yourself. We all call him our 'serious brother,' but he's got fun in him just the same when he gets started. "Now let's make out a list of the things you really think I need for my room. I'll do my share before my room-mate appears and she'll find such a comfortable room that she'll be glad I arrived first. Now I want a tea-table and 'fixings' like yours, Peggy, and a chafing-dish, some ferns, rugs, curtains, pictures, a couch-cover, chairs"--and the girls added one thing and another to the list until it was a very long one. Jean detested shopping, and Anna made a most welcome promise to help her out with the difficulties the following afternoon. The two juniors were to be busy in the evening, so, left to themselves, Jean and Anna enjoyed a long walk after supper. As they returned across the campus, lights twinkled in the windows of the dormitories, happy voices and the occasional burst of music floated out on the still evening air. Once Anna stood perfectly still for several moments and then exclaimed almost to herself, "Oh, how I love it all! How I wish I were just beginning college! Oh, Ashton, how much you have done for me!" Then with scarcely a word they approached old Merton and climbed slowly to 45. "I told you, Jean, that before I left I was going to give you a little advice. It's only this, Go slowly, choose the best of everything, make the best of everything and love old Ashton better than anything else in the world." CHAPTER III FIRST IMPRESSIONS Jean awoke with a start and sat straight up in bed. "Don't be alarmed, Jean," said Anna; "it isn't a fire; just the rising bell which rings every morning at ten minutes before seven. There's another one at seven and the breakfast bell at half-past. Of course no one needs forty minutes to dress for breakfast, and before long you will be able to do it in five, or ten at the most. Meals are served promptly here and Mrs. Thompson is very particular about having every one on time. So if you do oversleep I warn you that you'll get no breakfast unless you keep a good supply of food in your room. And there's danger in that, too, for mice fairly haunt these rooms, especially the closets and behind the radiators, for that's a favorite dumping place for crumbs. I remember the winter that our room seemed to be a regular gathering-place for them, and once when I had one of the girls from home out here over night we had a merry chase with five from under our beds before we could get any sleep. One morning not long after that my room-mate found one in her bed when she was making it up. She never knew whether it had been there all night or not, but she very carefully examined her bed ever after that before she got into it. "Well, suppose we arise and take plenty of time to dress this morning and make our best appearance at the breakfast table. You know first impressions are often lasting and as most of the girls here are upper-class girls I want them to see you at your best. Of course, dear, you always look well; you can't help it any more than you can help breathing, but this is a special occasion. Wear one of those good-looking white linens I saw you hang up in the closet last night. I must say I admire your Aunt Molly's choice of materials and dressmaker, judging from the clothes I've seen so far. You must open the other trunk and show me your best gowns before I depart. And by the way, Jean, that must be to-night. We'll start in town early and have a good afternoon of it and I'll leave you at the North Station on the right train for Ashton. You won't mind the short ride out here alone, will you? I'd love to stay the rest of the week, but you know how little time I have left to finish my preparations for the hospital, and I wouldn't be found deficient for anything. "Of course you take a cold bath every morning; any one could tell that just to look at you. Well, hustle into the bath-room now, for I just heard some one leave it. When you're finished, please draw the water for me." As the two girls entered the long dining-room they found most of the seats at table occupied, for they were a bit late in spite of their thirty minutes. However, Mrs. Thompson was always lenient first mornings and greeted them with a pleasant smile. "You will sit at the end of the second table, Miss Cabot, and your cousin may sit beside you this morning, as Miss White, who will have that seat permanently, has not yet arrived." "Oh, I had hoped that would be my room-mate's seat. Where will she sit?" "Why, of course you didn't know that Miss Fairfax is to wait on table here and so will not have a regular table seat." At these words Jean's expression changed and she looked so astonished that Anna said softly, "You know, dear, some of the girls who haven't much money pay their board by waiting on table. Lots of girls do it, and it's perfectly all right. Some of the best girls I ever knew worked their way through college." Jean said nothing, but she was bitterly disappointed. Why couldn't her room-mate have been Miss Remington or some one equally attractive? She was already beginning to wish that she'd been fortunate enough to draw a single room. If Nan Maitlandt had wished to have her cousin make a favorable impression on the other girls in Merton she certainly succeeded in doing so. Jean was tall and broad-shouldered, with a splendidly developed figure, a perfect picture of health and strength. She had masses of yellow hair which she wore this morning coiled in thick braids round her well-shaped head. Her eyes were dark and her skin, naturally fair, was now somewhat tanned from her out-of-door life. She wore a severe white linen dress with a turned down collar and a bow of black which set off her style of beauty to perfection. She carried herself well and with head held high in the air she had entered the room almost unconscious of its occupants. The girls stared for a moment and then whispered comments on her beauty and wondered who she could be. Mrs. Thompson soon went the rounds of the tables introducing the new girls until at length everybody knew everybody else. There were about a hundred girls seated at the three long tables and only here and there appeared a vacant seat. At Jean's table there were five freshmen besides herself, and much to her satisfaction she soon discovered her acquaintance of the day before, Miss Remington, half way down the other side of the table. Peggy Allison and her room-mate were at the first table at the opposite end from Jean, but they waved her a hearty welcome, even at that distance. She looked at the girls around her laughing and talking and seeming so perfectly at home and she had to admit to herself that they were a happy lot and if so many girls found college such good fun there ought to be something in it for her. Most of the conversation at her end of the table seemed to be on summer vacations and proposed studies for the coming year. Just beyond Nan sat a freshman named Miss Samson, who after some deliberation found the courage to lean forward a little and ask Jean if she had decided what studies to take. Jean answered cordially in the negative and added that her cousin was to help her choose them later on. She was conditioned in French, so she supposed she'd have to take that, although she hated it thoroughly. After breakfast the girls collected here and there about the reading-room and halls in little groups. Miss Remington came up at once to where Jean was standing and talked casually about her room and trunks and then asked her how long her cousin would remain with her. Upon hearing that she was to leave that evening she promised to spend the night with Jean, so she wouldn't get lonesome. Jean was delighted, for to herself she admitted that Marjorie appealed much more to her than any of the other girls she had met, excepting, perhaps, Natalie Lawton. She hoped they were going to be good friends even if they were not in the same class. Registration was to be at ten o'clock and Nan suggested that they go up to 45 and talk over studies before Jean made out her programme. She had arranged some tennis with Peggy and Natalie at ten-thirty and then after lunch they would take the first train for Boston. Nan had been a good, all-around girl in college, but had maintained a high standard in her studies and was anxious to have Jean do the same, but she was discovering that Jean cared very little for her books. Every freshman was required to take English and mathematics and had the choice of the other subjects. As Jean had been conditioned in French her cousin suggested that she begin at once to remove the condition. By satisfactorily completing a course in French at the end of the year this could be done. Jean agreed to this and then after much discussion she decided to add German, oratory and music to the list, with gymnasium work twice a week. Mathematics and German were to come Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings; French and English, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday mornings; oratory once a week on a day to be announced later; "gym" two hours each on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons and music two hours a week when she could arrange it with the instructor. "That looks like a pretty stiff programme to me, Nan," said Jean; "I don't see any time in the week for anything but studying. A girl can't study all the time, you know. I want to do other things, too." "You will find plenty of time for other things, dear, for this isn't a very hard programme. You will find any number of girls taking more than you have. You'll have every Saturday afternoon free, and generally the girls go in town to the theater that day. Boston always has all the best plays and music and there are Wednesday matinées, too. I don't advise cutting recitations, but once in a while when there's something worth while it won't do any harm. Then, Friday afternoon is Symphony rehearsal, which you must hear once in a while. The faculty very often advise the girls to attend certain performances and are very willing to chaperon them. Speaking of the faculty, I think you are going to enjoy all of yours, for I had them all with the exception of Miss Whittemore, the gym instructor, who is new this year, and I can vouch for them. My advice is to work hard at the beginning of the year, get the principles of the study and a good foundation and the second half-year will come easy. Don't let things slide, for it's awfully hard to make up a lot of work in a short time. If you must cut classes or chapel, cut consistently. To-morrow morning you will meet some of the instructors and have lessons assigned for next week. Things will hardly be in running order before a week, so you can take your own time for a few days. Now we'll start for the office and get registration off our hands. Is your programme written out carefully; ready to pass in to the clerk? Let's stop for the other freshmen on our way downstairs so we can all go together." Nan and her six charges hurried up the hill as the college clock rang out its ten strokes. The office was crowded and each girl had to pass in single file before the registrar. It took some time for Jean to reach the desk and when at length it was her turn to sign her name to the great book and pass her programme to the waiting clerk she gave a sigh of relief. Now she was a freshman and the year had actually begun, and there was no turning back. Hurriedly the six girls were shown over College Hall and Nan pointed out the mathematics room and then the French room and so on until they all knew where to go on the following days. In one of the rooms on the third floor they met Miss Whiting, and as Nan had always enjoyed her courses in spite of some rather marked peculiarities, she was glad to stop and talk with her and have her know her charges. They talked a few moments, long enough to have her ask the girls if they had yet seen the ivy on the chapel tower. Nan had to admit that as yet they had not, pleading as her excuse that she wished them to see the chapel for the first time the following day at chapel exercises. Remembering her tennis appointment, Nan invited the other freshmen to accompany Jean and herself to the courts, but as they had their rooms to settle and letters to write they returned to the hall. Soon the two reached the courts and found plenty of girls enjoying the game. They had time for two sets in which Jean showed her skill and she and Nan easily defeated their opponents, causing Peggy to exclaim, "You see, Nat, it's as I said, you'll have to work hard for championship next year." The afternoon passed all too quickly for Jean. Nan knew just what stores to shop in and just what to buy and before she realized it the long list had been bought and ordered to be sent out to Merton. They had time for tea in a quiet little English tea room which Nan often frequented, and here she told Jean some of her own plans for the future and how she had decided to take up hospital work. Her conversation revealed quite another girl from the light-hearted one of the last two days, and Jean found herself admiring her cousin more than ever. "You must come in to see me whenever I have time off and you can arrange it. I shall feel the greatest interest in your life at college, for in a way I feel responsible for it. There are many things I might have told you, but I am going to let you meet problems and solve them by yourself. Now we must start for the station or we'll miss the train." When they reached the station Nan said that she knew they would find friends on the train, but Jean pleaded to be left alone, for she wanted to think things over by herself. Nan stayed until the train pulled out of sight and then gayly started homeward, saying to herself, "I'll bet on Jean every time. She'll have no end of trouble, but she'll come out all right in the end." When the train drew into the Ashton Station Jean alighted with the others and as she stepped off the train she found Marjorie Remington waiting for her. "I thought you'd be out on this train, so I came down to meet you." So saying, she put her arm through Jean's in a friendly manner and they started up the hill. "Supper isn't for half an hour yet; let's take a walk and see the sunset from the hill. I never stay in the 'dorm' when there's any possible excuse for being out of doors. Thank goodness there's no lessons until next week. Have you promised to do anything Saturday afternoon?" "No," said Jean. "Well, I want you to spend it with me then in town. I'll get tickets for 'The Spring Maid'; everybody's wild about it. Are you fond of the theater?" "Yes, but I've never been very often except once in a while with father or one of my brothers. We live some distance out of the city and it's pretty hard getting home after the theater." "Oh, I'm just crazy over it, and never miss a Saturday afternoon if I can help it." "I'm going to ask Mrs. Thompson if I can change seats with Miss White and sit next to you at table. I've no use for the girls who sit on either side of me and I'd much rather sit beside you. Let's go to supper now, this walk has made me hungry as a bear. Wait a minute in the hall while I speak to Mrs. Thompson about changing." When Marjorie returned she looked anything but pleased and exclaimed, "Just like her, says she has assigned the seats and doesn't want to change them even for one meal. Well, I sha'n't tell her that we're going to room together to-night, for I suppose she'd put her foot down on that, too. She's certainly the crankiest individual I ever ran up against." As the two girls entered the dining-room, arm in arm, several of the older girls smiled and looked knowingly at each other. Peggy Allison seemed a bit worried, as she whispered to Natalie, "Midge Remington's up to her old game again, always appropriating the best-looking girl in the place. We'd better look out or we'll lose this Jean Cabot." After supper, one of the girls went over to the piano and began playing a dreamy waltz. The chairs were moved to one side and several of the girls began to dance. Natalie came up to Jean and asked her for the waltz. "You'll have to lead, Miss Cabot, you're so tall. Why, it will be almost as good as dancing with a man, you're so big and strong." "I don't know how to lead, Miss Lawton. I never have danced with girls before." "Well, I'll show you over here at one side. You'll have to content yourself here dancing with girls, for we only have men on state occasions, which are few and far between." And the two left the others for a little lesson in leading. It did not take Jean long to learn, and soon they were swinging over the floor with the others. "Why, Miss Lawton," exclaimed Jean as the music stopped, "I wouldn't have believed it could be such fun to dance with girls and lead. Won't she play some more music?" "Yes, we generally dance half an hour after supper every evening and the girls take turns playing. Will you play for us some times? Nan says you play beautifully. In Merton we believe in making every girl do all she can for the good of the rest. If I don't see you again while you're dancing I want to invite you down to 27 Saturday evening to meet some of my friends and a few of the freshmen. I hope your room-mate will have arrived by that time; if so, please invite her for me, although I shall try to see her myself. Thanks for this splendid dance." And she hastened on to another freshman. Jean had plenty of opportunities to dance and at the last dance Marjorie Remington came up to her and said, "Now for my turn. I've been waiting patiently all the evening. You seem to be in great demand." After the dance was finished the two girls went up to Marjorie's room; several of the other girls dropped in and made themselves comfortable in the rather close quarters. "Have some chocolates, girls," said Marjorie as she passed them a large five-pound Huyler's box. "Wasn't it good of Jack to leave this with me at the train?" Everybody but Jean seemed to know who Jack was, but she asked no questions and the conversation changed from one subject to another. Suddenly there came a knock at the door. As Marjorie opened it the girls saw Mrs. Thompson standing in the hall with a shy, timid girl behind her. "Is Miss Cabot in your room, Miss Remington? I saw you go up the stairs together. I should like her to meet her room-mate, Miss Fairfax, who has just arrived." Jean left the room and the merry group assembled there and went somewhat reluctantly into 45. Introductions were soon over and Mrs. Thompson left the two girls together. Jean soon learned that it was Elizabeth's brother who had been ill with typhoid fever, but his condition was so much improved that she was no longer needed at home. She was very tired, for it had been five long weeks that she had helped to care for him, but she felt she must leave for college as soon as possible in order not to miss any more than was absolutely necessary. Could she go to bed at once, she asked, and leave all her unpacking until the next day? Jean helped her as best she could and before long she was sound asleep in the little white bed and Jean stole softly back into Marjorie's room. The girls had left and she found Marjorie propped up on the couch writing a letter. "Come right in. I'm only writing to Jack to thank him for the chocolates. Well, isn't it a shame to have our plans for to-night spoiled? What do you think of your room-mate? Isn't she awful? Worse than any of mine. Did you notice her hat? Where do you suppose she hails from? Hard luck for you, that's all I've got to say. Well, make yourself at home in my room any time you want to, whether I'm here or not." "Yes, she is a disappointment, but perhaps things will look different in the morning. Good night, I guess I'm tired, too," and Jean left the room and was soon sleeping quietly in the other white bed in 45. CHAPTER IV THE FRESHMAN RECEPTION Although Elizabeth was as careful as possible, her moving to and fro between the two rooms awakened Jean, who, after wishing her good-morning, offered to arise and help unpack. "No, Miss Cabot," replied Elizabeth, "it's only five o'clock; please don't think of getting up yet. I am used to rising early, for I've been up every morning all summer at five. I'm sorry to have disturbed you. Can't you get to sleep again? You know I'm to wait on table this year and Mrs. Thompson wishes me to be in the dining-room at seven to help in setting the table. I thought I would unpack my trunk and suit-case before breakfast, for there will be so much for me to do to-day I probably won't have another opportunity. If you will tell me where to put things I can get right at work now. Would you mind if I called you by your first name, it seems so strange to say 'Miss' to the girl I'm to live with all the year? My name is Elizabeth." Instantly Jean arose and put on a white silk kimona, splashed with great pink roses, slipped her feet into some dainty pink silk quilted slippers and then led the way into the study, where she sat down in the only empty chair. "Why, of course I want you to call me by my first name, Elizabeth; it's Jean. How do you like the arrangement of the rooms so far? My cousin and two of the juniors helped me with it. It looks very bare, but we bought a lot of things in town yesterday and as soon as they are sent out we can finish settling. That is your desk and bookcase and here is your clothes closet. I borrowed one or two of your hooks, for I couldn't seem to find room enough in my own closet. I'll take the dresses down now and put them back in the trunk." "Oh, please don't, Jean; all my dresses together won't fill the hooks on one side of the closet. You're welcome to this whole side." "Thank you. Now you can put your pictures and banners anywhere you choose. We want to make our room as attractive as possible so our friends will be glad to come and see us." "I'm afraid I haven't many attractive things for the room. I didn't know much about college girls' rooms, and besides if I had known I couldn't have brought them. Father is only a country doctor and could hardly afford to send me to college at all. It will be a struggle to go through the four years, but I mean to do it if hard work counts. "I've never known a real mother, for two years after mother's death my father married again when I was six and Brother four. Since then we've had a home and that's about all as far as a mother's concerned. Father is away most of the time and doesn't know all that happens during his absence, but we know and never can forget. Fathers don't seem to understand children very well. Perhaps Brother and I have been more to each other than most brothers and sisters, for we had to make up for all that we missed in others. That's the hardest thing for me in coming to Ashton--to leave Brother at home sick with the fever. He means to go to college, too, sometime, and after two years here I hope to be able to teach at home and help him with his education. I don't know why I'm telling you all this, for I guess it doesn't interest you at all." "Yes, it does, Elizabeth, for my mother is dead, too, and I have five brothers and the best father in all the world, and I'm here to please them, but you can believe I'm going back to them after one year of it." "What! You could go four years and graduate if you wanted to, and instead you're only going freshman year? Why, I'd give everything in the world if I could go through the four years. I've thought of asking permission to take extra work this year and next, and then if anything should happen that I could come back a third year I could do the four years' work in three and graduate. I want a college diploma so much I'll do anything to get it. But if it's a question of Brother's giving up a year or of my doing so, it will not be he, for it seems as though he were always the one to make the sacrifice. "Have you decided what you are to take this year? There are so many things I want to take I hardly know what to choose. Tell me your programme. Wouldn't it be fine if we had the same courses, then we could study together?" "I'm going to take as little as I can, for I hate studying. I think my cousin Nan has made me out too stiff a programme and I'll have to drop something before I flunk out. I want to keep up my music, anyway, and practising does take a lot of time. Besides, I have English and mathematics and German and French and of course oratory and gym, because they're snap courses." "I shall take Latin instead of your French, but the other subjects are what I want, too. In place of your music I'd like some history, for that's my favorite study. I've read everything I could lay my hands on in the history line and never could get half enough. I've longed for the college library with its rows upon rows of books. If ever I'm missing, be sure to look for me in the library. Do you suppose my being a day late will make any difference with my work?" "No, child, for all we did yesterday was to register and pass in our programmes. You sent them word that you were delayed at home by sickness in the family and won't be fined, but ordinarily when we fail to register on time we are fined five dollars. To-day we are to go to the classes which usually meet on Friday. I have mathematics at nine and German at ten, and probably you will be in the same divisions. It's mighty hard to think of studying these glorious days. How I'd enjoy a twenty-mile horseback ride over the hills this morning! I wonder where I could hire a horse and if any of the other girls ride." "Why! you wouldn't cut your recitations the very first day, would you, Jean?" "No, I suppose not, but I'd like to mighty well. Don't be surprised at anything I ever do. Sometimes I fear I can't stand this living by rules and regulations. I've always done just what I wanted to and when I wanted to, and I shall probably forget to ask permission to do things, especially of other girls. I'm not so sure that I approve of student government." "Why, it seems to me the fairest way, and I'm sure you will like it after you become used to it. Now that I've finished unpacking I think I'll just write a few lines to Brother, for he'll be waiting very impatiently for my first letter. Can't you go to sleep again?" "No, I think I'll write letters, too. I haven't had a minute before, and I promised Tom and father faithfully that I'd write to them." And soon the two girls were writing as though their life depended upon it, and did not stop until the rising bell sounded. Elizabeth was as startled as Jean had been on the previous morning, but it did not take long to explain it to her. Soon she started downstairs for her duties in the dining-room, but hesitated a little and said, "Jean, may I go to chapel with you this morning?" "Yes, we freshmen in the house agreed last night to go together; our seats are to be in the right aisle directly back of the sophs. They say ours is the largest entering class on record, so some of us may have to sit in the annex. Let's go by a quarter-past eight, anyway, so as to be in the main chapel. After chapel exercises I'll take you to the office and help you with your registration." When the seven freshmen from Merton walked up to chapel, six of them felt very green indeed, but Jean held her head high and displayed her usual composure. But when they took their places with the other three classes and at a given signal rose while the hundred or so seniors in cap and gown marched slowly down the center aisle to their seats on the left, Jean felt for the first time the insignificance of a freshman and wondered just how it would seem to be a senior. Miss Emerson welcomed the incoming class in such a way that Jean felt drawn to her at once. She was not at all what she had pictured a college president to be, and there was something so sweet and lovable about her that Jean thought she came nearer to the mother she had always pictured to herself than anybody else she had ever seen. Most of the faculty seats were occupied, and Jean noticed that many of the professors were young and good-looking in spite of their degrees and reputed knowledge. After chapel Jean and Elizabeth hastened to the registrar's office and Elizabeth was enrolled as a freshman. Just as they were leaving the building two seniors in cap and gown stopped them and one of them said, "This is Miss Cabot and her room-mate, Miss Fairfax, is it not? I am Miss Wright and this is Miss Farnsworth. We would like to invite you to be our special guests at the senior reception to the freshmen and faculty on a week from Monday evening in the Gym. You live in Merton, I believe? We will call for you there at about half-past eight." The two freshmen were glad to accept the invitation, and after a few general remarks about recitations the seniors hurried away. "Jean, did you notice the little star-shaped pins both of those seniors wore on their shirtwaists? What are they for?" "I suppose they must be their society pins. Societies are like fraternities in the men's colleges. They are secret organizations, and about twenty-five girls belong to each one. I don't know much about them except what Tom told me." "Oh," said Elizabeth, "I should like to join one, wouldn't you?" "I guess it isn't for us to say, Elizabeth. You see, the girls are very particular whom they ask, and only a few are chosen from each class." "Oh, you'll be chosen, Jean; you needn't worry about that." "I'm not so sure about it. I suppose it will soon be time for mathematics. O dear, how I dread it! Your division doesn't meet to-day, does it? You ought to be thankful for that. I'm going upstairs now to see where Room 21 is. Good-by; see you later." At the top of the stairs she met Marjorie Remington, who stopped her. "Oh, Miss Cabot, have you received your invitation to the freshman reception yet?" "Yes, Miss Wright and Miss Farnsworth just stopped Elizabeth and me downstairs and invited us to go with them." "Oh, you should feel much honored, for they are two of the most popular girls in the senior class, and Miss Wright is class president. But I think the reception is an awful bore, just standing around and meeting a lot of girls and faculty you don't care anything about, and dancing in between times. Still a freshman makes a big mistake to cut it, and I advise you to go. "What's your first recitation--can I take you to the class room? There's the bell now. But wait a minute. Here comes a girl I want you to meet. It's Lill Spalding, sophomore basket-ball captain and one of the nicest girls in North Hall. I've invited her in town with us to-morrow." The three girls became so interested in their plans for the following day that Mathematics I. was almost forgotten, and when Marjorie remembered she was to show Jean the room it was fully five minutes after the hour. Stopping before a door marked "21" Marjorie said, "Here it is, and Miss Hooper is in charge. Oh, she's fierce; I pity you. I had Miss Baldwin, who's a regular cinch. I'll meet you here at the end of the hour if you like." As Jean entered the room Miss Hooper was just reading the class list and she heard "Miss Cabot" ring out distinctly in the stillness of the large room. "Here," said Jean, and she sank into the only vacant chair in the front row directly in front of the desk. Miss Hooper paused, looked up quickly from her class book and said sharply, "Five minutes late. A very bad beginning, Miss Cabot; remember hereafter, please, that this class meets promptly at nine o'clock." It was on Jean's tongue to say that she had lost her way, but something restrained her. Miss Hooper explained that the work of the year would be divided into three parts, algebra the first third of the year, geometry the second, and trigonometry the last. The class were to use Wells's College Algebra, which they could buy at the college book-store. The first lesson would be the problems on page 47. "And now, class, let us spend the rest of the hour reviewing a little. Miss Cabot, you may explain what is meant by the 'binomial theorem.'" Poor Jean tried to collect her scattered senses enough to answer the question. She remembered there was such a thing as this binomial theorem, but what it was she could not have told had her life depended upon it. After waiting as long as she dared she answered in a low voice, "I do not know." Miss Hooper looked annoyed and repeated the question to Miss Caldow, next on the list, who, to Jean's disgust, jumped on her feet and recited glibly and entirely to Miss Hooper's satisfaction. "Very well done, Miss Caldow. I see no reason why the entire class should not be perfectly familiar with the theorem. No one can expect to do any kind of work in advanced algebra unless she has a thorough foundation in the elementary work. Miss Cabot, you will please look up the binomial theorem and be prepared to recite it at the next meeting of the class." Jean thought the hour would never end, but when at last the class was excused she rushed from the room almost into the arms of Marjorie Remington who was waiting for her just outside the door. "Well, honey, how did Mathematics I. go?" "Terribly. I never want to see Miss Hooper again and I'll not take her old mathematics course another day. I don't know anything about algebra, and she pounced on me first one to explain the binomial theorem, and because I didn't know it she insulted me before the whole class." "Just like her. Isn't she the most sarcastic person you ever knew? She can say more hateful things in fifteen minutes than any one I know. Why don't you drop mathematics and take something else in its place? You can take it up again next year." "Next year, indeed; thank goodness I'll be far away from Ashton College by that time! One year's enough for me. But tell me, can I really drop mathematics?" "Sure you can. I dropped Latin the first day last year and I'm just beginning it again, but I doubt if I ever pass it. All you've got to do is to go down to the office and give some reasonable excuse for dropping mathematics and offer something else in its place. They don't care when you take the required subjects as long as you finish them before senior year." "But what can I take instead of mathematics?" "Miss Cushing has a fine course in philosophy first half-year, and psychology second half. It's a lecture course, only her exams are stiff, but if you read up in her book in the library you'll get by all right. If you're only going to be here one year you don't care much for making records, do you?" "No. Leave that to my room-mate, she's out for real study and nothing else. Aren't we the great combination? But still there's something about her I like; and I pity her, too, for she's had a hard time all her life. I nearly forgot, I have a German recitation now, so I'll have to leave the mathematics proposition until later." German was delightful, as Fräulein Weimer in her broken English explained the work of the year and then talked to the class in German, telling them stories and quoting poems. Jean felt a little calmer as she left the room, but with the memory of her first recitation still burning in her mind she hurried to the office. She explained to the secretary that she felt so poorly prepared in mathematics that she wished to leave that work until another year and take philosophy in its place. She understood that mathematics, although a required subject, could be taken any one of the first three years. She was given permission to do as she wished, and hastened to Miss Cushing's room to make further arrangements. In the hall she met Miss Hooper, who stopped her and said, "Am I right in understanding that Miss Anna Maitlandt is your cousin? Do tell me where she is and what she is going to do this year. I have wanted to know very much, but have not heard from her all summer." "Yes," replied Jean, "Miss Maitlandt is my cousin and she was out here on Wednesday and Thursday, but was obliged to return to Framington early because she is to enter the Massachusetts General Hospital the first of October to begin a three-years' training course. She was abroad all summer and only returned last week, so she has a great deal to do in a short time." "Oh, I am so sorry not to have seen her, for I always enjoyed her so much. What does she mean by burying herself in a hospital? She's altogether too brilliant for that." Just then some one came up to ask Miss Hooper a question and as she excused herself Jean passed on, muttering to herself, "Horrid old thing! I suppose she wants to impress upon me how brilliant my cousin was here. Wait till she misses me in mathematics on Monday and perhaps she'll realize she can't make her cutting, sarcastic remarks to every freshman in college." The days were full and happy ones, and Monday night arrived with the annual freshman reception. After supper Marjorie Remington went upstairs with Jean and offered to help her dress. "What shall I wear, Marjorie?" said Jean. "All your dresses are such perfect dreams I don't know which one I like the best. But let me have another look at them. Dangerous business, though, letting me see them, for I may be tempted to borrow some of them one of these days. Now, after all, I think this figured chiffon is the best for to-night, it's so different from anything I have ever seen. I'm crazy to see you in it." It did not take long for Jean to do her hair and get into the chiffon dress. It was a peculiar chiffon, a light pink background shot with black and pink roses made up over a soft pink silk lining. The dress was low and showed off to advantage Jean's firm white throat and neck, and the sleeves came just above her elbows. The skirt reached only to her ankles and her stockings and slippers were of a delicate pink. Around her neck on a narrow band of black velvet was a small diamond star which sparkled with wonderful brilliancy. "There, will I do?" and she danced over gayly to Marjorie, who lay on the couch as though exhausted after her labors. "Do? Why you are the most wonderful creature I've ever seen! You'll take everybody by storm. Wait till Jack sees you. I'm going to make him invite us out to his frat's first dance. You see, Jack's at Harvard and knows all the big men in his class. I have the best times in the world whenever I can get out there for anything. The only trouble is it's such awful hard work getting off the hill for the night. One of my aunts lives in Newton and she's perfectly willing to chaperon me or let me stay at her house all night, but she travels so much of the time that she's always away when I want her most. I hate taking one of the faculty with me, for they're such awful sticks. I don't see any need of chaperons anyway, but they'd make an awful fuss out here if a girl went anywhere without them." Just then the door opened and a cheery voice began, "Have you started dressing yet?" but when the eyes of the speaker fell on the vision of loveliness before her she stopped short and just gazed. Miss Remington arose, saying, "I guess it's time for me to go, I'm not needed any longer. Hope you'll have a good time, Miss Cabot," and she brushed by Elizabeth and banged the door after her. "Oh, Jean, have I interrupted you? I didn't mean to. Miss Remington seems to have taken a violent dislike to me. What have I done to her?" "Nothing, Elizabeth; she doesn't mean anything, but she's rather brusque at times, I guess." "How beautiful you look, Jean, but I can't go with you. I haven't anything except my graduation dress and you'll be ashamed of me in that." "Nonsense, child; let me help you dress. You'll be too sweet for words in that dainty white muslin I saw hanging in your closet. Let me do your hair low and tuck this rose at one side; it will bring out the color in your cheeks. And I've a coral pink sash I'm going to drape around your waist and with those coral pink beads father gave me just before I started you'll be a symphony in white and pink." Indeed she did look sweet in her simple white gown and excitement made her big eyes sparkle more than was their wont. "Do you know, Jean, I've never been to a real big reception like this before. I can't dance, but I shall enjoy just sitting and watching the others. Sometime I hope to learn if I ever have the time. It's only eight now, we have half an hour before the girls will come for us. Let's read over some German. I haven't quite finished the assignment." "Not to-night, Elizabeth. I'm not in the mood for studying. Perhaps I'll get up early in the morning and read over a little with you. I made a good recitation to-day and that ought to do for a while. I'm going over in Marjorie's room; you can call me when the girls arrive." Elizabeth sat down at her desk to study alone, a little disappointed in Jean, for she knew she had been playing tennis all the afternoon and had made no preparation for the next day. After she had read about three pages a maid announced the arrival of their escorts, so she called Jean and the two girls hastened down the stairs. It did not take long to reach the Gymnasium, which was ablaze with lights. As they entered the main hall they paused to survey the scene of beauty before them. The massive building was transformed into a vast autumn out-of-doors, for golden rod and purple asters and bright-colored leaves were everywhere. The orchestra was concealed at one end of the hall, and played softly as the seniors introduced their guests to each other and to the faculty. Jean and Elizabeth were given dance-orders, but Elizabeth timidly said, "I don't dance, Miss Farnsworth." "That doesn't make a particle of difference, dear; lots of the girls don't, and perhaps you'd like to keep the dance-order as a souvenir for your memorabilia, for of course you will have one; all freshmen do. You will have partners just the same for all the dances and get acquainted just as quickly as though you were on the floor dancing. You must learn to dance as soon as possible, though, for it means so many good times here. Now let us meet the faculty." Jean felt a little dismayed at the thought of meeting Miss Hooper, but she soon found herself shaking hands with her and heard her say, "Later in the evening, Miss Cabot, I hope I may have the pleasure of eating an ice with you in the faculty alcove. Can you spare me a few moments?" Jean answered that she would be very pleased to, although she felt she was in for an explanation of her non-appearance in the mathematics class, and dreaded it. Every member of the faculty seemed to be particularly interested in every freshman who was introduced to her and had something pleasant to say to them all. They seemed to have entirely forgotten their mannerisms and the severity of the class rooms. Jean looked long and earnestly at Miss Emerson and wished she might stand and talk to her indefinitely, but the long line of waiting freshmen pushed her quickly along, and she determined to find time later in the evening to ask her a few questions. Before long the dancing began and Jean found herself passed on from one girl to another; some who danced well and some who did not; some who did nothing but ask questions; some who persisted in telling their whole family history in five minutes; some tall, some short, some handsome, some homely, but all college girls filled with the spirit of good fellowship. Once or twice she rushed over to where Elizabeth was sitting with whom she had deposited her gloves, fan, handkerchief and dance-order, and usually found her silently listening to the pearls of wisdom which fell from the lips of the senior sitting beside her. About half-past ten Elizabeth said to her, "Jean, I have just been talking with Miss Hooper and she wishes to know if you will look for her in the faculty alcove after the next dance." Jean was tempted to ignore the invitation and all through the next two-step turned the matter over and over in her mind and was so absorbed that her partner wondered what the other girls had found so attractive in this good-looking freshman who apparently could not talk. However, when the music stopped Jean said very casually, "Will you please tell me where the faculty alcove is?" and on being shown she very slowly approached the corner. The dim lights revealed Miss Hooper among a pile of cushions. She wondered how she could ever talk to her and what she should say. When Miss Hooper perceived her she called out, "Oh, Miss Cabot, come right in. I have been waiting for you and hoping Miss Fairfax would not forget to deliver my message. Make yourself comfortable here while we enjoy these delicious ices. First, I want to talk to you about your charming cousin. We were interrupted the other day before you had told me half I wanted to know." Just then every light in the Gymnasium went out and left the place in total darkness and a strong chorus burst into song. "Oh, you green freshmen, green freshmen, green freshmen; Oh, you green freshmen, come list to our song. We're going to haze you, to haze you, to haze you; We're going to haze you before very long." Over and over again they sang the lines, louder and louder each time. Red-fire burned outside the building and groups of girls with their hands joined danced wildly around the red lights. "It's the sophomores," said Miss Hooper; "every year they try to break up the freshman reception. It has become a tradition, but one I believe should be abolished," and she slipped out into the main hall. The seniors found it was impossible to turn on the electricity, but hurried here and there and borrowed enough lanterns from obliging janitors to light the Gymnasium dimly. The music continued and the girls danced as though nothing had happened and thought it all the more fun to disappoint the sophs, who imagined the dance would be given up when the lights gave out. Partners had claimed Jean, and the dreaded interview with Miss Hooper ended almost where it had begun. At length the dancing stopped and after the good nights had been said Jean and Elizabeth and the two seniors wended their way homeward. "What a mean thing it was to break up your reception," said Elizabeth to Miss Farnsworth. "Oh, it wasn't wholly unexpected," she replied; "there is always great rivalry between the two lower classes and one never can tell when it will break out. You'll find this is only the beginning. Be on the watch, but take everything that's done in good spirit, for you must remember you'll be sophs next year and can pay it all back on the next entering class." Soon they reached Merton Hall and found other freshmen saying good night to their escorts. Soon the great outer door was closed and the weary freshmen started upstairs. When Elizabeth and Jean reached 45 they found the door locked and on it a piece of paper which they tore down and carried over to the hall light to read. These words met their astonished gaze: "Oh, you green freshmen, green freshmen, green freshmen, Oh, you green freshmen, pray don't try your door. We'll give you a mattress, a mattress, a mattress, We'll give you a mattress, to sleep on the floor." "Well, I must say I think this is carrying things altogether too far," said Jean indignantly. "Who ever heard of sleeping on the hall floor?" By this time the other freshmen had joined them, reporting similar experiences at their rooms. One girl came down from the fifth floor, whispering, "Isn't this the limit! In front of my door is a double mattress spread on the floor with a blanket or two over it. Come upstairs, all of you and let's make ourselves as comfortable as we can and to-morrow we'll begin to plan our revenge on the sophs." Jean was the most reluctant to go, and as she followed the others down the hall she cast one look over at 47 and said, "And to think she pretended to be my friend!" Then an idea seemed to come to her and she said, "Wait a minute girls; of course some of the seniors are up, so we can put our good clothes in their rooms and borrow some kimonas. But even if they want us to sleep in their rooms let's not accept their invitations. Let's drag that mattress down from fifth and put in front of some soph's room, say Marjorie Remington's, as close as possible to the door and give her a big surprise when she tries to walk out to-morrow morning." The girls laughed at the thought of the joke and hurried to the rooms of the seniors to tell them what the sophs had done and to ask them for help in carrying out Jean's bright suggestions. Before long they had carried down everything the sophs had left them on fifth floor to 47 and worked so carefully that no one heard them. Then the seven girls lay down on the mattress very near together to be sure, and were soon asleep forgetting the cares of their little world. CHAPTER V INITIATION It did not take very long for Jean and Elizabeth to find out a great deal about the secret societies at Ashton, much to the satisfaction of one and the keen disappointment of the other. There were five in all, the Beta Mu, the Kappa Alpha, the Sigma Delta, the Phi Beta, and the Gamma Chi. Each had from twenty to twenty-five members, chosen from the four classes; each had its club room and its society pin, which was always in evidence on the left side of the girls' waists. The first days of college the society was in the background as college came first and then class, but as matters became adjusted and the girls settled down to the routine of regular life, this factor came into evidence. It was pretty generally conceded that the two most desirable societies were the Gamma Chi and the Sigma Delta, and both were eager to obtain Jean Cabot as one of their members. However, the membership of the two was entirely different; to the former belonged Peggy Allison, Natalie Lawton, Dorothy Wright and Frances Farnsworth, girls with a serious purpose in college but still finding time for plenty of fun; to the latter belonged Midge Remington, Lill Spalding, Lena Jameson and Gerry Fairbanks, girls with plenty of money and clothes and a desire for athletic honors and good times foremost, with scholastic efforts in the background. Rushing had begun early, and although at first Jean had not realized why so many girls had been so kind to her, it flashed over her all of a sudden that it had all been with the purpose of finally winning her to their particular society. Nothing definite had been said, and she had not been invited to join one or the other but she felt that it was only a matter of time. She had been to walk, to drive, to the theater, to lunch, rowing on the lake; had played tennis with the best players college afforded, had been to "hoodangs," first in one girl's room and then in another's, to tea at the Inn, home for week-ends with the girls who lived near by--one pleasant thing after another until she began to tire of so much attention and decided to accept no more invitations until she had had a breathing spell. One thing had troubled her at first, but she soon became used to the fact that Elizabeth had not been invited to many of the good times and often watched her depart with a look upon her face which seemed to say, "Why does she have everything and I nothing?" One Saturday towards the end of October both girls had been invited down to Peggy Allison's room to a Gamma Chi "hoodang" or rushing-party. It was one of the few invitations in which Elizabeth was included and she had counted on it for many days. At noon she said to Jean, "What time shall we go to Miss Allison's room to-night?" "Oh, I'm sorry Elizabeth, but you'll have to go with one of the other girls for I've promised to walk with Marjorie and Lill Spalding to Tramp's Rock this afternoon and have tea at the Inn on our return. I'll be back about eight or thereabouts and go directly to Peggy's room so I'll see you there surely. What are you going to do this afternoon?" "I don't know now, I had hoped that you and I could do something; we haven't had a single Saturday afternoon together yet. Isn't the college library open Saturday afternoons and evenings? Perhaps I'll go over and read a little while the last part of the afternoon." Jean and her friends enjoyed every minute of the afternoon and just before they were ready to start back home Marjorie said to Lill, "I'm going to take Jean round the other side of the Rock for a few moments; you can sit and gaze at the clouds until we come back again if you want to." After they had walked a few moments Marjorie said, "Jean, I've been appointed a committee of one to invite you to become a member of Sigma Delta society. We have some of the best girls in college among our members as you have had an opportunity to see for yourself. You know what our girls have done in athletics and in social activities and we want you to be one of us. Here is a bow of blue ribbon and if you decide to become a member of Sigma Delt you will wear this ribbon Monday to chapel and to all your recitations during the day. Then all the other girls will see what you have chosen and from then on you will be ours and they will let you alone. I'm pretty sure you've made up your mind already, but I can't ask you to commit yourself until Monday. Now we'll go back for Lill and then start for the Inn." It was considerably after eight when Jean knocked upon Peggy Allison's door and at the pleasant "Come in" entered the room and found herself the last arrival, for some twenty upper-class girls with ten or twelve freshmen were packed closely in the room and the one adjoining which had been loaned by an accommodating sophomore. "Why, where's your room-mate, Miss Cabot?" sang out one of the girls. "Oh, isn't she here? She said she was coming, but I haven't seen her since dinner for I was away all the afternoon and had supper at the Inn. Didn't she wait on table? I'll run upstairs and see if she's forgotten to come. That hardly seems possible, though, for she has been counting on this so long." When Jean returned she reported that Elizabeth was nowhere to be seen, although her hat and coat were on the couch where they had evidently been thrown in haste and her white party dress still hung in the closet in its accustomed place. "I'm going downstairs to ask Mrs. Thompson if she knows whether Elizabeth was at supper, or excused for some reason." But Mrs. Thompson said that she had been at supper as usual and she knew nothing further of her whereabouts. Next, Jean hastened to the register in the reading-room and found no record of Elizabeth's leaving the dormitory. Perhaps Mary Boynton, the general proctor of Merton for student government, would have some explanation for her, so she hurried to 34, but Miss Boynton knew nothing about the girl and in despair she returned to 27. "Oh, hasn't she come yet? I've been everywhere I can think of and nobody knows anything about her. Where can she be?" "Now, Jean, calm yourself," said Natalie, "perhaps she's visiting some of the girls in another house and has forgotten all about us. We'll wait until nine o'clock and then if she hasn't put in an appearance we'll organize a searching-party. Come, girls, pass those candies to Jean before they're all eaten up. Can't you see she's waiting for them?" But Jean didn't seem to enjoy the candies or the other things which circulated round about her. She seemed, somehow, above the happiness of the occasion to see the disappointed look on Elizabeth's face when at noon she had told her she could not go to the party with her, and above the voices of the others she seemed to hear Elizabeth's trembling voice saying that she would spend the half-holiday in the library. It had seemed so ridiculous to Jean then to think of spending unnecessary time in the library among dry old books. But perhaps Elizabeth had gone to the library; they could ask the librarian. It seemed to Jean as though nine o'clock would never strike, every step in the hall must be Elizabeth's but still she did not come and at last Jean burst out, "Girls, I'm sorry to break up your little party but I can't stand it another minute. I've just got to do something. Will two or three of you come with me while I get Mary Boynton and Mrs. Thompson and with them we can go to all the dormitories and ask if she is in any of the girls' rooms? It doesn't seem probable, for she has hardly any friends outside of Merton, but I think it's the best thing to do. Each of us can take a dormitory and report at College Hall. I'll go to Wellington, Peggy can take East, Natalie, West, Miss Boynton, North, and Emily Sanderson, South. Mrs. Thompson can wait at College Hall so in case any of you girls here at Merton see Elizabeth or hear anything about her you can tell her. I'm going down now for Mrs. Thompson; and, Natalie, will you get Mary Boynton? Don't stop to change your gowns, for we mustn't lose a minute's time. Put on your sweaters and let's start at once." It was after ten o'clock when the little group finally met again at College Hall and the matter began to look so serious that the girls hardly knew what to do. Although they had searched the dormitories very carefully not a trace could they find of the missing girl. Finally Jean said, "Where does Miss Clarkson, the librarian, live?" "Somewhere off the hill, Jean," answered Peggy. "We could find out from some of the faculty." "No," said Jean, "if she isn't on the hill it won't do any good to try to find her. I wanted to ask her if she remembered seeing Elizabeth in the library to-day. I wonder how we could get into the library? What time does it close on Saturdays?" Mary Boynton replied that Saturday evening was the only one of the week when it was open. She thought this was until half-past eight, and suggested that probably if they could find the janitor he would let them into the building. "But why should you think Elizabeth is in the library? Wouldn't she go out with the others when it closed?" asked Mary. "Yes, I should think so," said Jean, "but there's nowhere else to look and if she isn't there I give up the search. I'm going to run over to Miss Emerson's a moment to ask her how we can get into the library. You people start in that direction and I'll be with you in a few moments." Jean fairly tore over the campus and gave Miss Emerson's bell a vigorous pressing. There were no lights at the front of the house but after a little while Miss Emerson herself appeared at the door. "Why! good evening, Miss Cabot, what can I do for you so late at night? Come right into my study for it's a little chilly here. My maid has retired but I was looking over an address I am to give next week in Chicago." "Oh, no, thank you, Miss Emerson, I can't sit down. My room-mate, Elizabeth Fairfax, is missing and we have looked everywhere for her but can't find her. I want to look in the library before we give up the search for the last time I saw her, this noon, she told me that she might go down to the library to read. How can I get into the library to-night?" "Now, my dear child, do calm yourself. It is rather late to disturb the janitor but I will take my keys and go with you and probably we can find the night-watchman and he will assist us. Just step into the hall while I get my coat and hat." It seemed an interminable time to Jean before Miss Emerson returned, but at last they started out. Miss Emerson talked constantly on subjects entirely foreign to the matter of the lost girl, and Jean wondered how she could possibly think of such trivial things, much less talk about them. When they reached the little group in front of the library Miss Emerson was the only calm one among them and she quietly wished each one a good-evening and then started up the library steps. With a small electric bulb which she held in her hand she easily fitted the key into the lock and opened the great outer doors. Then it was an easy matter to spring open the inner doors and press the electric button which flooded the foyer with brilliant light. Calling the girls to her she said, "We will take different sections of the building to explore, and if one of us discovers Miss Fairfax we will let the others know." Each girl then took an alcove and began the search. Jean went straight to the alcoves belonging to the history department. Here she called softly, "Oh, Elizabeth, are you there?" but no response came, and she went away down into the last alcove calling again and again softly, "Oh, Elizabeth, Elizabeth." At last she heard the sleepy reply, "What is it, Jean? Here I am." And Jean switched on another light and saw her room-mate lying on the floor with her head on a great book apparently as comfortable as she would have been in her own bed in Merton. Jean went out into the main corridor and shouted, "Oh, girls--Miss Emerson--come here! I've found her." And then returning to Elizabeth she said, "Why, what are you doing here? We've been looking for you all over college, and I've been nearly frightened to death about you." When Elizabeth saw Miss Emerson and Mrs. Thompson and all the girls, she looked anxiously from one to the other and said, "Oh, I am very sorry to have caused so much trouble, I didn't think I was of enough account ever to be missed by any one, least of all by you, Jean." "Oh, Elizabeth, how can you say that?" said Jean as she helped her to arise. "Now sit down here on this chair and tell us how you happened to be here. You didn't do it on purpose did you, Elizabeth, because I--" [Illustration: "WHY, WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE? WE'VE BEEN LOOKING FOR YOU ALL OVER COLLEGE."--_Page 90_.] But Elizabeth interrupted her with, "Oh, Jean, thank you so much for wanting to find me! It's worth all the rest. I don't see how it could have happened--unless when I get to reading history I forget everything else in the world. About four o'clock I went into the history alcove and took down a volume on Queen Elizabeth's reign and began to read. When I was about half way through the third chapter, Betty Winship, who went down with me, told me it was a quarter of six. I knew I was due at Merton at six but I had reached the most interesting account of Elizabeth's education. I slipped a corner of my handkerchief into the book and put it carefully back on the shelf, deciding to go back after supper and just finish the chapter before I got ready for Peggy's party. "I hurried back as soon as I had eaten my supper and began reading again about Elizabeth. I suppose I must have forgotten everything else in the world, for the first thing I knew every light in the building went out. I called as loud as I could but no one answered me, and for a moment I was frightened. It was so dark I could not find the electric light switches and the windows were too high even to hope to reach. I made up my mind there was nothing to do but stay here until morning when perhaps I could hail a passer-by." "But Elizabeth, didn't you know it was Saturday night and the library wouldn't be opened again till Monday morning?" said Jean. "Just think what might have happened if you couldn't have found some one to open the door. You'd have almost starved in there alone. I guess very few of the girls ever go by the library on Sundays. Isn't it lucky we came here to-night?" "I didn't think about that. I forgot it was Saturday and thought of course it would open early the next morning. I was tired and as I could find nothing else for a pillow I took the book in my lap and laid my head on that. Of course floors aren't the softest beds in the world, but I must have fallen asleep, for I don't remember anything else until I heard Jean calling to me. I'm so sorry to have caused so much worry and trouble. I didn't dream any one would ever miss me," and the tears began to trickle down her cheeks. Miss Emerson put her arm around Elizabeth and led her out into the foyer, followed by the rest of the little procession. "Miss Cabot," she said, "will you please put off the lights and after we are all out, close the door; it locks itself. Thank you very much." Soon Elizabeth had regained her usual good spirits and walked up the Row with Mary Boynton and Peggy Allison, followed by the others, with Jean and Miss Emerson in the rear. "Thank you so much, Miss Emerson, for coming with me and helping us to-night," said Jean, but Miss Emerson replied, "I think it is you who ought to be thanked. Without your good work Miss Fairfax would have remained all night in the library and doubtless would have caught a severe cold, to say nothing of a nervous shock. She does not look very strong, but what an interesting little room-mate she must be!" Jean was thankful that they reached Miss Emerson's house just then in time to save her the humiliation of having to reply that as yet she really hadn't had much time to find out anything interesting about her room-mate. It did not take long to reach Merton and disperse for the night. As they were going upstairs Peggy Allison said, "Oh, Jean, after you have taken Elizabeth upstairs would you mind coming down in my room for just a moment?" Jean replied that she would, although she was so tired that it seemed as though she could not wait another moment to get into bed. She threw her things on the couch, stumbled over her waste-basket, groped her way down the stairs and knocked timidly at Peggy's door. "Come in, Jean," said Peggy. "Sit down just for a moment. It's too bad our party wasn't the success we hoped it would be but I want to tell you that I think what you have done was splendid. We never would have found her if it hadn't been for you. But there's something else I want to tell you to-night. I had intended to earlier in the evening but really I couldn't find an opportunity until now. We, that is, the Gamma Chis, want you to become one of our members. Monday is pledging day and here is a bow of green ribbon; if you decide to join us you will wear this little bow pinned on the left side of your shirt-waist and that will show the other girls that you belong to us. Wear it to chapel in the morning and to recitations all day. You will not be the only girl with a bow of colored ribbon on, for every society will have invited girls to do the same as I have you. You know our girls; you've met them all, and by this time know whether you like us or not. I've wanted you for one of our members since the first day I saw you on the train at New York, but I realize others have desired you, too. We do have good times together, and you won't make a mistake if you join Gamma Chi. I'll be watching to see you enter chapel Monday morning and I hope we win. There, I won't keep you another minute to-night. Good night, dear. Remember, whichever way you choose, it can't make a particle of difference in our friendship. We can always be good friends even if we're not sisters. Can you see your way upstairs? The lights have been out for hours." When Jean reached her room she switched on the light and walked over to her somewhat disordered desk. She swept the books and papers off and placed the two bows of ribbon, the green and the blue, side by side on the cleared space and contemplated them for a moment. Her reverie was interrupted by a knock at the door and she found Marjorie Remington just outside. "Let me in for just a moment," whispered Marjorie; "put out your lights for it's late. Tell me what all this excitement's about. I didn't get back from Lill's room till almost ten and every one was talking about Elizabeth's being lost and all you people out hunting for her. Where did you find her?" Jean related the incident as briefly as possible, and when she had finished Marjorie said, "And you did all that for that insignificant little freshman? I thought you never bothered your head about her except for German translations? You're easy, that's all I've got to say. I'm dead for sleep, so good night," and she stole quietly back to her room. As Jean went over to her desk and put on the lights again she looked at the two bows on the desk and smiled down at them without saying a word. Monday morning Jean arose before Elizabeth and went out to the desk to do a little studying before breakfast. She had been translating her French for about a half-hour when two telegrams were brought to her room. Frightened, she tore open the envelopes and read first, "Is it to be cousin or sister? "ANNA MAITLANDT." And then, "I bet on the 'Wearing of the Green.' "THOMAS CABOT." She smiled as she read them a second time, and then wondered how Tom and Anna had ever guessed. Jean purposely avoided Elizabeth that morning and hurried to chapel alone. When she took her usual seat she felt as if every eye was upon her. She tried not to look conscious, but she felt that she failed in the attempt. It took only a moment to see that she wore the bow of green, and joy reigned among the Gamma Chis and sorrow among the Sigma Delts. It was about two weeks after Pledging Monday that Jean was told to be ready on Wednesday, November twelfth, for her initiation into Gamma Chi. At half-past eight she reported at Peggy Allison's room where she was blindfolded and wrapped in a long black cape. It seemed to her that she was led miles and miles by a guard on either side who spoke never a word. Finally they reached what appeared to be a subterranean passage which led into a cold, damp cave. Jean was commanded to fall upon her knees and raise her right hand and swear by all the sacred spirits of the past to be true forever to Gamma Chi. Then there arose a most dismal wail from the spirits of the past, and Jean in fear and trembling promised all that was asked of her. "Will you wear for evermore the insignia of Gamma Chi?" said a sepulchral voice. "I will," said poor Jean. "Then stretch forth thy good right arm that we may bare it to the elbow. Here let us imprint our emblem," and Jean shuddered as the red-hot brand traced out the figures on her arm. She wondered why she did not scream out, and although she had never fainted in her life she felt at this moment as though she were about to fall to the floor. Just then the handkerchief was torn from her eyes, a hearty laugh came from the girls and Jean found herself in the cellar of the dormitory which the girls had borrowed for the occasion. She looked down at her bared arm and then at Peggy, who stood before her with a pointed piece of ice still in her hands. "You're a brick, Jean. It's no fun trying to haze you; why didn't you scream or do something exciting? Well, you have been so good about this part that we'll take you up to society rooms without any more delay." When they reached the rooms which were on the upper floor of a private residence a little distance from the college buildings they found all the girls chatting merrily and laughing over the evening's adventures. Soon, however, they proceeded to serious matters, and the five freshmen and one sophomore were initiated into the noble society of Gamma Chi. As it was then, and still is, a secret society, it would not be fitting to divulge the mysteries which were revealed to the wondering six. Suffice it to say that in due time the serious business ended, the eating began, and such quantities of food as those thirty girls consumed! At length, however, they were satisfied and arose and forming a circle they joined hands and sang: "Oh, here's to Gamma Chi, Gamma Chi; Oh, here's to Gamma Chi, Gamma Chi; Oh, here's to Gamma Chi. We'll be loyal till we die; Drink it down, drink it down to Gamma Chi, Chi, Chi!" And then the president, Florence Farnsworth, took the bunch of American Beauty roses which stood in the center of the table and gave one rose to each of the new members and pinned a glittering gold star upon the left side of their waists, saying as she did so, "Just above your hearts, girls; always loyal to Gamma Chi. Now, three cheers for our six new members." After these were given, it was all over and the girls departed to their different dormitories. As Jean had expected, she found Elizabeth had gone to bed and to sleep, but not before first putting Jean's kimona and slippers on the couch so that she might make herself comfortable as soon as she arrived. Jean put her beautiful rose in a long, thin vase she had recently purchased in town and then placed it on Elizabeth's desk. She wished that there might have been one more freshman initiated that evening. She saw how impossible it was just then, but it was something to work for by herself. She was just beginning to see something of the real Elizabeth of whom the other girls had not the slightest suspicion. Just before she retired Jean went to her desk and filled out a telegram blank which she found there: "To MISS ANNA MAITLANDT, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts: "From now on it is to be sister and cousin. "JEAN." CHAPTER VI THE HARVARD-YALE GAME "Oh, Elizabeth, it's come, it's come!" and Jean danced into the room and frantically waved several sheets of paper in her hands. "What's come?" said Elizabeth, as she looked up from her history. "My letter from Tom, and the invitation to the Harvard-Yale game. You see, I've been wondering all the fall if I was to go, or whether Tom would find other fellows' sisters more attractive and forget all about me. Don't you know that little verse: "All good boys love their sisters; So good I have grown, That I love other boys' sisters 'Most as well as my own." As it is, though, I am going with Tom's room-mate and Tom is going to take Connie Huntington. You haven't met her, have you? She's a California girl, in at the Conservatory, and an awfully good friend of Tom's. "I mean to have her out here as soon as there's something worth while to take her to. The game comes the Saturday before Thanksgiving, November 23d, and it's only five days off. Tom says I'm to meet the other three in town Saturday morning and we'll have lunch early and then start for the game; afterwards we'll have dinner at the Touraine, and go to the theater. Won't that be glorious? Oh, I'm so anxious to see Tom! I wonder if he'll think I've changed any since September. Then he encloses a letter from Aunt Sarah, telling him her plans to give us a good time on our visit with her over the Thanksgiving holidays. You know, she lives in New York City winters and has more money than she knows what to do with." "But, Jean," said her room-mate, "you four aren't going to dinner and to the theater alone on Saturday, are you? And how are you going to get back to the hall after the theater?" "Oh, I shall have to get permission from Mary Boynton to be away for the day, and I shall come back after the theater in Mrs. Nutter's machine. Mrs. Nutter is an aunt of Constance Huntington's, who lives in Boston, and has promised to chaperon the party. I'm going in to see Midge Remington a few minutes, for she's been telling everybody for weeks that she was going to the game with Jack Goodrich, who's a senior at Harvard. She'll know all about everything and tell me just what to do." But Marjorie was not at home, or at least did not answer to the knock on her door. She had never forgiven Jean for joining Gamma Chi, and had been rather cool to her ever since although she did not openly show her hostility. Jean hurried on to Mary Boynton's room to gain the desired permission to attend the game at Cambridge. When she entered Miss Boynton's room, that young lady and her room-mate, Ethel Lillibridge, were having afternoon tea with Miss Hooper. Mary insisted upon Jean's joining them and drawing another chair up to the cozy tea-table poured out a cup of tea and passed her the heaped-up plate of sandwiches. "How pleasant," said Miss Hooper. "I was intending to call on you, Miss Cabot, after I left here. I seldom get over to Merton, and when I do I enjoy the girls here so much that I usually spend the afternoon in one room instead of making several calls so perhaps I shouldn't have seen you after all. How are you enjoying the year? I believe I haven't seen you except at a distance since the freshman reception when the sophomores left us in the dark so unceremoniously. Of course, like the rest of us, you are very busy all the time." "Oh, I hope I'm not intruding upon your tea-party," said Jean. "I came to see Miss Boynton on business, but I can postpone it until another day." "Now, Jean, wait until we have finished our tea and then if Miss Hooper will excuse us for a moment we can transact our little business in the other room and come back for some more tea." About five o'clock, after Jean and Mary had discussed the game and permission had been given her to attend, Jean arose to leave the room. Miss Hooper excused herself, and the two started down the corridor together. "I think this is a splendid afternoon to walk, Miss Cabot, I wonder if you would care to stroll down to the Willows with me before supper," said Miss Hooper. "I haven't been down there since college opened, and it has always been one of my favorite walks." Jean had planned to spend the hour before supper on her French, but she felt that she could not refuse Miss Hooper's invitation. The day had been clear and crisp and the setting sun dropped its mantle of brilliant color upon all the world. Twilight was creeping on apace as they entered the Willows, so called because of the great weeping willows which grew thickly on both sides of the road for a half mile or so below the post-office. "When the snow is on the ground and it's moonlight, I want you to come down here with me some evening," said Miss Hooper, "and see the beauty of the willows in winter. I haven't a particle of poetry in my soul, but if I did have I am sure I should find inspiration here. What a wonderful thing it is to have talent and give so much that is beautiful to the world! I cannot play or sing, but music has always been a passion with me. Mary Boynton told me how well you play and how much you enjoy music. I am glad that we have that taste in common. I have two tickets for the Symphony concerts in Boston this winter and I should like to take you with me the Saturday evening after our Thanksgiving holidays if you would like to go." "Indeed I should like to go, Miss Hooper, and I thank you very much for the invitation. Music is my favorite study and I intend to devote all my time to it next year." "What! do you mean that you are going to be a special?" "No, Miss Hooper, I do not intend to return to Ashton another year. I shall study music in Los Angeles, and in a year or two perhaps study in Germany." "Oh, you're not coming back to college? Are you serious about it? I hope you have not fully made up your mind to it, for we want you here." "Yes, Miss Hooper, from the very first I have only intended staying this one year." "Perhaps we can make you change your mind before June. I think we had better turn back now for it must be almost six o'clock. I could walk on for miles and miles here and forget time completely. Do you know where I live, Miss Cabot? It's Wellington, first floor. I have been matron there for ten years, and every year I am determined to give it up and live out of a dormitory, but still I stay on. There's something very fascinating to me in living with the girls and coming to know them so intimately. Do you spend the Thanksgiving recess away?" "Yes, my brother, who is in Yale, and I are going to an aunt's in New York. I'm to go over Wednesday noon and stay until Sunday night. It seems as though I couldn't wait for the time to come. Do you go away?" "No, I haven't many relatives in this part of the country, so I shall be here. Miss Emerson always invites the faculty and girls, who have no other place, to her house to eat turkey with her." The conversation changed from one subject to another and when they parted at Merton, Jean wondered why no reference had ever been made to her dropping mathematics without an explanation to Miss Hooper. She was beginning to think she had been a little hasty in her judgment of her and she almost wished she had not given up the subject so quickly. The days went by on leaden feet until Saturday the twenty-third. Jean awoke that morning early for excitement would not let her sleep. She looked over at Elizabeth's bed and found she was awake, too, so she quickly jumped from bed and ran to the window and raised the shade. "Oh, goody," she cried, "it's going to be a fine day! I was afraid last night it would rain, for the moon had a ring around it, and that's a sure sign of storm. I'm going to get ready for the game before breakfast so I can go to Chapel and first recitation. I don't need to start in until 10.23 for I'm not to meet the others until eleven at the Touraine. Wasn't it lucky I chose a blue hat and suit this fall? It isn't a real Yale blue, but it is near enough to show where my sympathies are. Do you think I'd better take my fur coat? I suppose one can't tell about the weather these days, and it's better to be on the safe side." Jean talked continually as she dressed and answered her own questions, for Elizabeth seemed unusually silent. When she finished dressing she looked to Elizabeth for approval. "What, aren't you up yet? What's the matter this morning?" "I don't know, Jean. When I went to bed last night I had a slight headache and this morning it's so bad I can't lift my head from the pillow. I don't understand it, for I never have headaches." "Too much studying, dear. You know you were reading very late last night. Well, you stay right in bed all the morning. I'll bring up your breakfast to you and sign off for you at the office. Where do you keep your apron? I'm going to do your work this morning in the dining-room." "Why, Jean Cabot, of course you're not! The idea of your thinking of such a thing. I'll be better if I get up, and I'm sure I shall be all right when I get at work." "No, you stay right where you are and let me do as I said. There, it's seven now; good-by for a little while; please go to sleep again," and Jean shut the door before Elizabeth could protest further. Every girl in the dining-room was so astonished that she could hardly eat when she saw Jean Cabot with a dainty white apron over her new blue suit, waiting on the middle table at breakfast. She hurried here and there and supplied their wants as though she had done it every morning of the year instead of for the first time in her life. Questions were on everybody's lips, but her only answer was, "Oh, Elizabeth overslept and I'm helping out." Just as she had finished her own breakfast she was called out into the hall to sign for an express package which had just arrived for her. When she opened it she found an enormous bunch of violets with a card bearing the name, Frederick Manning Thornton. She buried her face in the heart of the bouquet and breathed deeply of the fragrance, then she held them up against her dress, exclaiming, "A perfect match, nothing could be better," and she hastened upstairs to put them in water until it was time to start. After she had placed them in a vase she thought she would show them to Elizabeth. She knocked lightly on the door to see if she were asleep, and a cheery little "Come in" made her open the door. "See what I've brought to you," said Jean before she knew what she was saying. "Let me draw the table up to the bed and put the violets where you can see them. Now I'm going down for your breakfast." "Why, Jean, where did these violets come from?" "Oh, from an unknown admirer of yours who does not wish his name revealed. Now, what would you like for your breakfast?" "Jean, I know these flowers were intended for you to wear to the game and I shall not let you leave them here. What has possessed you this morning? You're not at all like yourself." "It's just that I'm nearly beside myself because I'm going to see Tom, blessed Tom! I guess if you were miles and miles away from your family you'd be beside yourself at the prospect of seeing your only brother in the East. I'm going to bring him out here to-morrow, so you must get better before then." "Truly, I'm better now, Jean, and I'm sure when you return to-night you'll find me all well again. But I shall insist upon your wearing your violets." "No, Elizabeth, they're for you, to remind you of me when I'm gone." "I don't need these to remind me of you, Jean; there are so many other reminders everywhere." Mrs. Thompson insisted upon taking up Elizabeth's breakfast to her and Jean hurried to Chapel, for it was late. Just outside Merton she met Marjorie Remington and Lill Spalding on their way in town. "Why don't you come in with us, Jean; we're going to cut all day. Come along and be a sport." "No, I'm not going to cut any more than's absolutely necessary. I don't need to go in until the 10.23," said Jean. "Oh, very well. Seems to me you're getting awfully conscientious all of a sudden," and as she hurried away Marjorie proceeded to tell Lill of the incident of the breakfast table. Jean slipped into Chapel a little late and then went into the philosophy class. At length it was ended and she was on her way to Merton. She had time for a look into Elizabeth's room and found her more comfortable, although still in bed. When she reached the station it was thronged with girls going to the game, and until the train arrived they all talked excitedly about their seats and escorts. Most of the girls were to be the guests of Harvard men and of course would sit on the Harvard side, but a few, like herself, had brothers or cousins at Yale. She discovered another freshman, Jessica Goddard, attired in blue, and she ran up and greeted her with, "Good, Jess, you're Yale, I know! Come and sit with me and tell me all about the Yale players. I know almost nothing about them and Brother will be sure to expect me to be well informed." The twelve minutes passed rapidly and before Jean had heard half enough they were out of the train and a part of the vast throng at the North Station. They had taken only a few steps before Jean heard her name called several times and turning she saw Tom and his room-mate and Constance Huntington running up the platform back of her. "How did you get by us, Jean?" said Tom. "We stood right by the gate and didn't see anything of you until Connie spied you walking up the platform. We were looking for a girl with a bunch of violets and you haven't any." "Well, I'll tell you about those later on," said Jean, "but now please introduce me to your room-mate so I can thank him for sending them to me." Introductions followed and Jean apologized for not wearing the violets. "My room-mate was ill and I left them with her," she said. "In that case," replied young Mr. Thornton, "you certainly deserve another bunch as soon as we can locate a florist's shop." "Why, Tom, how did you happen to be here at the station? You told me in your telegram to be at the Touraine." "Mrs. Nutter kindly offered us her automobile for the morning, so we decided to come down here and surprise you. She is in the machine just outside the station, so perhaps we'd better hustle out there. We are going to ride around the city till lunch-time. The game's at two, so we won't have any time for sight-seeing after lunch." After they had taken their places in the machine they were whirled away into the crowded thoroughfare. Lunch was hastily eaten and at one o'clock they were on their way to Cambridge. Thousands of automobiles raced along Massachusetts Avenue; cabs and hansoms, electric cars, everything was taxed to its utmost as it sped on to the game. Mrs. Nutter tried to point out places of interest, but no one seemed to care much for anything but the game. When they reached the Stadium they found both sides of the street lined with automobiles, so Mrs. Nutter had her chauffeur leave them at the main entrance and then take the car up the long line till space could be found to park it. It took a long time for the little party to reach their seats, for the surging crowd ahead of them demanded attention, but each and all jostled along without a shade of impatience. Jean thought she had seen numberless girls at college, but now it seemed as if all the girls together would not have filled a single section. Where could they all have come from? At last they were seated in a section which the boys declared couldn't be better and they had a good half-hour to view the crowds and the players before the game began. Tom and his room-mate recognized fellows all around them, for almost every one in Yale had come to the game and they took great pleasure in pointing out the celebrities. "See, there's Tad Bronson, two rows below us, captain of next year's baseball team. Isn't that girl with him a peach? They say they're engaged. She came all the way from Chicago for the game." "There's Prexy down in the front row, and that man just rising is Prof. Hamilton. He flunks more men in college than all of the rest of the profs together." "See, here comes our fellows, Tubbie Spencer in the lead. Wait till you see how he can play. What's the matter? Why don't we give them a cheer? Well, here's Billy Knowlton, cheer leader for this section; he'll start 'em up," and in a moment the most deafening noise that Jean had ever heard rose from the Yale side. Cheer followed cheer, and songs were occasionally intermingled. Jean found herself joining in as excitedly as the boys and in a little while knew all the Yale players and most of the Harvard ones. Promptly at two o'clock the referee blew his whistle and the two elevens lined up for the first kick-off. From then until ten minutes after four there was not a dull moment. The ball was back and forth over the field, first on Harvard's ground and then on Yale's. The playing was more even than it had been for years and at the end of the second half the score was 6-5 in favor of Harvard. Jean was so disappointed she could hardly keep back the tears that had started to her eyes, and she cried out, "I think it's a downright shame! To think you should be beaten at my first Harvard-Yale, Mr. Thornton! I just hate Harvard." "Yes, it is hard luck, and my greatest regret is that I can't look forward to next year to see Yale trim them. That's the worst of being a senior; everything you do this year is for the last time. I envy you being a freshman with four good years ahead of you. They're the best years of your life, take my word for it. I'd give a good deal if I were beginning it all over again. Of course I shall always try to go to the big games, but it will never be the same as when you're an undergraduate. See the fellows down there forming the procession. They'll march up and down the Stadium several times and throw their hats up over the goals. No one ever expects to get his own hat back, but it's all part of the game. They'd better celebrate to-day, for they may not have another chance again." The little party stood and watched the long procession of undergraduates take possession of the great Stadium as they marched up and down, across and around the field. When they reached either goal every hat was off and tossed up over the cross-bar and caught again by the nearest man as it came down. After fifteen or twenty minutes of this the procession passed out of the gate, the leaders carrying the victorious eleven upon their backs, and soon they were lost from sight, although their shouting and singing could be heard long after. It was almost dark when Mrs. Nutter and her guests took their places in the automobile. They had been obliged to wait a long time for the machine, as there were so many others ahead of them. However, they made up for lost time by tearing with the highest speed toward Boston. As they were crossing Harvard Bridge Jean begged them to stop a moment, for the three bridges spanning the Charles seemed to be but parallel lines of bright lights which in the darkness presented a most novel appearance. She saw the lighted dome of the State House for the first time and exclaimed upon its height and brilliancy. "I wish I had to cross Harvard Bridge every night, it is so beautiful here," she said as they started off again. A table had been reserved for them at the Touraine and they found themselves among a merry throng of young people, most of them the supporters of the crimson and jubilant over their victory. Here and there were Yale men and their guests and the men and girls circulated from one table to another renewing acquaintances. It was a little late when they arrived at the theater and the play had already begun. The house had been bought up by the Yale men and decorations of blue were everywhere. The singers had touches of blue in their costumes and sang the good old Yale songs, and at the end of the second act threw hundreds of rolls of blue confetti out over the audience. No one pretended to know anything about the comic opera itself, for there was so much Yale music introduced, so many jokes about the football players and the game, so much applause and singing on the part of those in the audience that the real plot, if there could be said to be one, was almost lost sight of. As the boys wished to take the midnight express out of Boston, Tom suggested that they leave before the last act was quite over. The party were to see Jean safely landed at Ashton and then motor back to Boston. Jean was disappointed that Tom could not stay over Sunday, for she had promised herself the pleasure of taking him to Vespers and introducing him to her friends. He promised her that pleasure later in the year and reminded her that they were to have five days together the next week. The two talked over trains and plans for meeting in New York and the others became very quiet, for the day had been a long one in spite of its many pleasures, and they were content to make themselves as comfortable as possible in the machine and let the others do the talking. It was after eleven when they drew up in front of Merton, and Jean and Tom alighted. Good-nights were said and promises made for future reunions, and as Jean stepped into the hall Tom sang out, "Good-by till Wednesday. I'll meet you in the Grand Central at four. If I'm not at the train you sit down by the Inquiry Office and wait till I come. The trains are apt to be crowded at holiday time and one can't tell when they will arrive. So long; hope you'll find your room-mate better. Give her my bestest," and he hastened back to the others and they were off and away before Jean had reached 45. Although she entered the room very quietly Elizabeth heard her and called her into the bedroom, which she entered, asking, "How do you feel, Elizabeth?" "Oh, ever so much better, Jean. I shall be all right in the morning. My headache has gone entirely. I got up this afternoon, but didn't go out of the room. So many of the girls were away that I wasn't really needed in the dining-room. Was everything as nice as you expected?" "Yes, Elizabeth, I think it has been the happiest day this year so far. There's so much to tell you it can be our main topic of conversation for the rest of the term. However, I'm not going to begin until to-morrow, for I'm so tired I can't see straight. I'll just put out the lights in the other room and then I'm ready for bed." "Oh, Jean, I forgot to tell you that there are two notes for you on your desk. Some one brought them this afternoon and I left them where you could find them as soon as you came in." "Thank you," said Jean, and she dragged her weary feet out into the other room. She went straight to her desk and turned on the little desk light, which revealed two envelopes bearing the college seal. "They look suspicious," she said to herself. "Faculty notes; I recognize the writing on one of them. Well, I won't open them to-night. I've had a perfect day and these would spoil it all. I'll wait till morning before I read them," and she left them exactly where Elizabeth had placed them, and putting out the lights was soon in bed. She awoke very early next morning, almost before it was light, for in spite of her weariness she could not seem to sleep. Something had disturbed her usual placid slumber, but she could not just remember what it was. Then it came over her that something unpleasant waited for her on her desk. She crept softly into the other room and sat down at the desk and slowly opened the notes. The first one was from Mlle. Franchant; a warning in French with the suggestion that the subject be dropped at Christmas if there was not a decided improvement. The second was from the Office informing her that she had overcut in Chapel and also in gymnasium classes and asking her to report at the Dean's Office Monday at half-past eleven o'clock. How long she stared at the messages before her she did not know, but when she could no longer see them for the blinding tears she dropped her head on her arms upon the desk and sobbed, "I do care, I do care!" And when some time after Elizabeth came out into the room she found her still there. She did not try to comfort her, but left her to fight it out with herself. CHAPTER VII THE THANKSGIVING HOLIDAYS Jean was on her knees bending over her steamer trunk. On either side of her were huge piles of clothes and she was having great difficulty in choosing what to take with her. It was Tuesday just after supper, and Jean had decided to devote the evening to her packing, for she was to start at noon the next day. Marjorie Remington had offered to help her pack and although Jean felt that she had done it more to see her clothes and hear what she was going to do in New York than to render her any real assistance she had not declined her offer. She did not wish to incur Marjorie's ill-will any more than was necessary, for already several little things had been said and done which hurt Jean more than she was willing to admit. And not only against Jean had Marjorie made her unkind remarks but against Elizabeth as well, and Jean felt that Marjorie availed herself of every opportunity to prejudice her against her room-mate. Marjorie had been exceedingly careless of her own behavior of late, and after the Harvard-Yale game had stayed in town all night at her aunt's without first gaining permission to do so. She was severely reprimanded for this and warned that a second offense would not be tolerated. And, although no one knew it, she had received two faculty warnings, but had made up her mind to ignore them. A little after eight o'clock she hurried into Jean's room exclaiming, "Sorry, Jean, but I can't help you pack after all, Jack's just come out to call. I hadn't the least idea he would come to-night, but he's such an uncertain quantity I never can tell what he's going to do next. However, he's so good-looking and such a dear I can forgive him for 'most everything. Hope you'll have a gay time in the big city. Wish I were going over, too, but I've decided to go to my aunt's. You see, Jack isn't going home, either, for he only has the day and he's promised to give me one good time if I'll stay in Boston. Here comes that pious room-mate of yours. Positively, she gets on my nerves more every day. I don't believe she's half as innocent as she pretends to be, either, and I wouldn't trust all my perfectly good things to her the way you do. Good-by," and as she left the room Elizabeth entered. "Oh, Jean, please let me help you with your packing. When do you ever expect to wear all these clothes? There's enough for a month instead of a few days. I've never seen half of these before." "No, some of them haven't been out of my trunk before. I've been saving them for this visit, as I expect to be on the go every minute I'm away and I'll need plenty of good-looking things. Would you take this chiffon, or does it look too soiled?" Before Elizabeth could answer there came a knock at the door and a telegram was handed to Jean. When she opened it she could hardly believe her eyes. It was from Tom and said: "Visit postponed. Aunt Sarah very sick. Stay at college. "TOM." She did not say a word, but passed the telegram over to Elizabeth to read and then sank helplessly down on the floor beside her trunk. When astonishment had given place to anger, she burst out, "Did you ever hear of anything like that? Why did Aunt Sarah take Thanksgiving of all times in the year to be sick? To think I've been waiting all this time to go on and visit her and see Tom and have the time of my life and then have to give it all up and stay here with the rest of lonely freshmen! Pleasant prospect, isn't it?" "Oh, Jean, I'm very sorry it's happened. Of course it's a disappointment. But there will be a lot of the other girls here, and you're all invited down to Miss Emerson's for dinner. It won't be like New York with your own people, but I'm sure she will do everything she can to make the day a pleasant one for you. I almost hate to ask you, but would you rather go home with me to Newburgh than stay here at college? I haven't very much to offer you in the way of good times, but I should love to have you see my home and know my people if you won't mind putting up with all our inconveniences. I can show you real old New England country life in the winter, for they have snow there already, and it's been good skating, too. There are hardly any young people, and what there are will not be at all like those you have always known. You won't need any of those fine clothes you had planned to take to New York, but you can put a few waists and a thick dress and sweater into your suit-case and come along without any more preparations. It's very cold up there, so you want to take plenty of warm clothes. I have planned to start from the North Station at four o'clock, but we won't reach home until late in the evening, as we have to drive a good seven miles. There is no station at Newburgh, but we leave the train at Wilton Junction and probably Brother will meet us there to drive us home in the sleigh. Don't decide to-night, Jean; think it over and tell me in the morning. I think I'll go to bed early to-night. How good it seems not to have any lessons to prepare! Before I go, can I help you put away your clothes?" "Yes, if you will, Elizabeth, and I sha'n't wait until to-morrow to accept your invitation. I am terribly disappointed not to go to my aunt's, but I think it will be splendid to go home with you. I've never been sleighing or skating in my life, and all I know about it is what I've read in books. Thank you so much for wanting me to go with you. Will you put this box in on my dresser if you're going into the bedroom?" The two girls worked rapidly together, and soon had cleared away the piles of clothes Jean had deposited upon the floor. They felt so in the mood for cleaning that they dusted and put to rights both rooms so that they might look presentable during their absence. As Jean was dusting her dresser she opened the box which she had asked Elizabeth to place there and after examining its contents carefully she said, "Elizabeth, have you seen anything of my coral beads? They aren't here with my other things, and I'm sure I had them in the box. I wore them this afternoon to Bertha Merrill's tea and I thought I put them in here when I changed my dress. Perhaps they're mixed up with some of the things we put in the trunk. I think I'll look around a little to-night, for they must be somewhere in the room." Both girls searched everywhere they knew of, but they could find no trace of the beads. "It's the strangest thing I ever heard of," said Jean. "We can't do much until after vacation, for every one will go away to-morrow. I'll put a notice on our bulletin board and report the loss to--who's the proctor on our floor this week?" "Grace Hooper," said Elizabeth. "Well, I'll run down to her room a minute and tell her about it and then I'll be ready to turn in." When she returned she told Elizabeth that Grace Hooper and Mary Boynton thought it best to say or do nothing about the loss of the beads until college began again Monday morning. Perhaps by that time the beads would have been found and they would be saved the unpleasant duty of investigation. When the two girls stepped into the train at the North Station the next day they found it crowded to the utmost with happy travelers returning home for the holidays. There did not seem to be any seats together, so they stood their suit-cases at one end of the car and perched upon them to wait until some of the passengers should alight at the first station. Several of the college girls they knew were homeward bound on the same train and joined them, using their bulging cases as seats. It began to snow lightly soon after the train started, and as they went farther north they found evidences of recent snow storms, and when they reached Wilton Junction they found it piled up in great drifts round the station. As they alighted from the train they looked in vain for "Brother Dick" or Dr. Fairfax. "Don't be alarmed, Jean, I never know when any one will meet me. You see, doctors are likely to be called out any time miles and miles, and when you've got only one horse on the place you get used to waiting. Let's go into the station and keep warm, and for excitement we can get weighed or read the time-tables on the wall." Huddled round a great old-fashioned stove in the center of the room were a dozen or so people waiting for belated trains. They forgot the cold or disappointment at missing their train when they saw the two girls. It was not often they had such a good-looking stranger as Jean Cabot to gaze upon. She did make a picture there in her dingy surroundings with her long fur coat and little fur turban with two iridescent quills stuck jauntily through the front. The blackness of the fur as it rested against her hair intensified its golden hue and the fair whiteness of her skin. From one corner where he apparently had been dozing arose a long-legged, lackadaisical-looking fellow, who strolled up to where the two girls were standing. "Why, how d'ye do, Miss Fairfax. Home for the holidays?" was his greeting, and all the time he was stealing glances at Jean. Elizabeth coolly replied to his question and introduced him to Jean. He hardly had time for more than a few casual remarks before Elizabeth heard some sleigh-bells and going to the door saw her father outside in his little low sleigh. "May I call on you before you return to college?" asked the young man as he carried their heavy suit-cases to the waiting sleigh. "Why, yes, if you care to," replied Elizabeth as she and Jean stepped up to the sleigh. "Father, I've brought my room-mate, Jean Cabot, home with me for the holidays. She expected to go to New York to visit her aunt, but at the last moment she had to give it up, as her aunt was sick. I know you are always glad to welcome one more, so I invited her up here." "Very glad to know you, Jean. Hope you'll excuse my not getting out to help you," said Dr. Fairfax, "but I'm so bundled up I don't believe I could ever get back again if I once got out. It's been a terribly cold day up our way, and I drove ten miles the other side of our hill before I came down for you. I've been over to Judge Morton's, Elizabeth, to see his mother. She's a pretty sick woman, and I almost doubt if I can pull her through this time." "Oh, that accounts for Franklin Morton's being at Wilton Junction. What a contemptible snob that fellow is! I've seen him hundreds of times driving through the village, and have known him ever since he first spent his summers at Gorham, but he's never spoken five words to me until to-night when he saw the prospect of meeting Jean. Did you hear him ask if he might call on us? I imagine him in our little farmhouse! Well, I guess we needn't borrow trouble, for he would never come, especially as his grandmother is very sick. "Now, Father, what about Dick? I hoped he would come down with you to the station." "Lucky he didn't now, isn't it, Jean, for how could we four have ridden home in this little sleigh? Pretty tight squeeze as it is. To tell you the truth, dear, I'm a little worried about Richard's case, for he doesn't seem to get his strength back as I wish he would. Typhoid does pull any one down so, it's a hard fight to get back again. He's been a wonderfully patient boy through it all, but I think sometimes he gets discouraged about himself, although he never says anything to us. I don't know what he would do without your letters, girl. I verily believe he knows them all by heart, and he talks about your friends there as though they were his own. He'll feel right at home with this young lady here, for next to you, Elizabeth, Jean has been of most interest to him, and he's wondered so many times if he could ever see her. "Here, Jean, is where we begin to climb our hill at the top of which is our little village. I think now that it has stopped snowing the moon will soon appear, and if it does you will see one of the finest winter pictures I know of. I ride for miles and miles around this whole country, but I know of no more beautiful views than this hill affords us in winter as well as in summer. "See, there's the moon peeping behind that cloud now." Slowly the old horse pulled his heavy load up the long hill, and before the ascent was half made the full moon was shining brightly, shedding its beauty over the snow-covered country. Gaunt trees threw long black shadows across the tiny thread of a road, while here and there were deserted buildings almost hidden from view by the great drifts of snow. There was hardly a sound but the tinkle of their own sleigh-bells and the crunching of the runners on the snow. Peace and quiet and beauty were everywhere, as far as the eye could reach. Jean could hardly believe her eyes. Here was something she had read about but never seen, and the wonder of it threw its spell over her. Indeed, all three became gradually silent, apparently engrossed with their own thoughts, the doctor wondering how his aged patient was rallying under the treatment he had suggested, Elizabeth, deeply troubled by her father's words about her brother, and Jean lost in contemplation of the strange and wonderful scene before her. Jean was the first to break the silence. "Oh, Elizabeth, how I wish Miss Hooper were riding with us to-night! About two weeks ago when I was walking with her through the Willows she said she wanted me to go there with her again when there was snow on the ground and a moon, for it is so beautiful. But I am sure nothing could be as wonderful as this hill to-night. I wish I could give her a good description of its beauty." "Why don't you write to her while you are here and tell her about it? I know she would appreciate it, for she told me she was to stay at Ashton over the holidays." "I think I will write to her to-night and tell her all about this wonderful ride. It seems now as if I could ride on forever, but I see lights over there, so we must be approaching the village. Why, it seems as though we were on top of the world up here!" "We'll be home in half an hour, Jean; our house is right over there," and Elizabeth pointed to a little group of lighted houses at her right. It did not take long to reach the rambling old farmhouse where Fairfaxes had lived for the last hundred and fifty years. The front door was opened as the sleigh turned into the yard and a fresh young voice rang out: "Welcome home, Sister! Hurry up and come in, for I am tired of waiting for you. I thought you'd never get here." The doctor warned the owner of the voice not to stand longer in the cold, and so he disappeared from view. It did not take the girls long to get into the house and reach the blazing fire in the huge fireplace. Mrs. Fairfax greeted them cordially and then brother and sister were in each others' arms. Then in a moment Elizabeth introduced Jean, and after one look at her Richard burst out, "You're just as I thought you'd be. Wishes do come true. All the afternoon I've been wishing you'd come up here on our hilltop with Sister to visit us instead of going to New York to visit your aunt. Now take off your things and let's have supper." When the doctor came into the living-room it was the signal to repair to the dining-room, where a steaming supper awaited them. Jean thought she had never tasted anything as good in all her life, and as the cold ride had whetted her ordinarily good appetite she did justice to everything Mrs. Fairfax had prepared. As often as she dared she stole glances at Richard Fairfax and she thought she had never before seen such an attractive although pathetic face. It was deathly white, with almost perfect features, but one could never forget the eyes. They were deep-set and dark and brilliant, but when he spoke or was interested when some one else was speaking they fairly seemed to flash fire. The conversation at table was general, and when they arose Dick suggested that they sit round the fireplace in the living-room and he would draw the couch up and lie upon it, for he was much more comfortable there than in the hard, stiff-backed chairs. Mrs. Fairfax and Elizabeth went into the kitchen to wash the dishes and make the last preparations for the morrow's dinner, while Jean and Richard and Dr. Fairfax made themselves comfortable before the blazing wood fire. "Let's not have a light at first, Father," said Richard; "I love the firelight best and I think Jean will, too, after she sees how nice it is. Now, Father, will you please recite us your poem about the firelight?" In his pleasing, deep-toned voice Dr. Fairfax gave the simple two-versed poem he had written on the firelight, and when he finished Dick pleaded, "Oh, don't stop, Father, please give us all my favorites, it's just the night for poetry." And one poem followed another until the doctor insisted that it was some one else's turn. "Now, Jean," said Richard, "won't you give us something you have learned at college?" "Oh, I can't. I don't know any poems. I've never learned them." "What, never learned poetry? Don't you love it? Why, I think there's nothing in all the world to compare with it. I spend hours and hours reading my favorite poets until I know their best poems by heart. I wish I could write myself. I mean to some day if--" but his voice broke and Dr. Fairfax said, "Perhaps, Jean, before you go, Richard will let you read some of his own poems. He's a little particular who hears them, but possibly you can persuade him to let you read them. I've got to go out to the barn now to lock up for the night, so I'll leave you here together a little while. I fear it's been a hard day for Jean and Elizabeth, so we mustn't keep them up too late. But doesn't it seem good, Dickie-boy, to have them here? It's really living again." Left to themselves the two talked together, mostly about Jean's life in California. Just as she was in the midst of a description of a camping trip in the mountains Elizabeth hurried into the room. "What are you two talking about so excitedly? Don't you want the lamp lighted now and some more wood put on the fire? It's almost out. I came in to ask Jean if she would like to go out into the kitchen to see the turkeys and the other preparations, but you're having such a good time I hate to disturb you." "Oh, I can finish this another time, Elizabeth; I'd like to go with you." When Jean saw the size of the turkeys and the quantities of other things piled up on the tables she exclaimed, "Why such an amount of food? We'll never eat that in a week." "Wait till you see all there are to eat it and you won't think this is too much. I'll wager there won't be anything worth eating left over by Friday. I think I'm about ready for bed, Jean. How about you?" "Quite ready, thank you. Is it late? I've lost all track of time." "Yes, it's nearly twelve o'clock. It will be very cold up in our room, although I've lighted a fire in the stove, so I think we'd better take up these freestones to keep our feet warm. Let's go in and say good-night to father and Dick." When the lights were out and Jean was thinking over the events of the day she could not but admit to herself that she had come into the midst of a family life wholly unknown to her before. She recognized a depth and earnestness that were lacking in most of the families with whom she was acquainted. Although she saw evidences of the lack of this world's goods, there was a certain refinement and culture and an appreciation of the things that make life worth while. She began to realize a little the absence of purpose in her own life, and she saw for the first time what she might do with all that was hers to use. Thanksgiving morning was not as cold as the preceding ones and gave promise of a pleasant day. The family arose early in spite of the late hour of their retiring, and at breakfast Dr. Fairfax suggested that they all attend the Thanksgiving service in the Congregational Church. "By the way, Elizabeth," he said, "Mrs. Walton wants to know if you will play the organ to-day. She hurt her wrist yesterday and won't be able to play for several weeks. She would like to have you sing a solo, too, if you can get some one to play for you." Elizabeth blushed a little and Jean said, "Why, Elizabeth, I never knew you could play and sing. Why haven't you said something about it at college?" "There were always so many others who did things better than I that I didn't think any one wanted me. I only play and sing a little, but it helps out here where there are so few to do anything. Will you play my accompaniment if I sing this morning?" "I have never played on an organ in my life, Elizabeth." "But there is a piano, too, which we use in the Sunday school, and you can play that." "Why, yes, if you'd like to have me, but we'd better practise together before the service begins." "Yes, let's go into the other room now and run over one or two selections." At ten o'clock the five took their places in the big double-seated sleigh and started for the church, a half-mile down the road. Many a sleigh heavily loaded with old and young passed them, and it did not take long for some one to discover Elizabeth and welcome her home. "Why," said Jean, "you know everybody, Elizabeth." "Yes, it isn't hard in a little town like this, especially when one's father is the only doctor. I've driven with him ever since I can remember." They stopped before a severe white church on slightly elevated ground. Dr. Fairfax helped the others to alight and then drove the horse around to the sheds in back of the church. Elizabeth and Jean went immediately to the choir loft, where they were welcomed by the few singers that had already arrived. It seemed to Jean as though most of them were Elizabeth's cousins, of one degree or another, and she began to believe that everybody in town was related to everybody else. When the congregation began to take their places, Jean took a seat in the audience near the upright piano, which occupied most of the space to the right of the pulpit. The church was old and severe in every line, evidently built in the early days when worship did not demand comfortable surroundings. The pews were high and narrow, with faded red cushions and stools. By a quarter of eleven every pew was filled and the old white-haired preacher began the service. Jean watched Elizabeth at the organ and marveled at the melody she seemed to be getting out of the wheezy old instrument, which was pumped intermittently by a rosy-cheeked youngster whose mind may have been more on the feast awaiting him at home than on the hymns of praise. When it came Elizabeth's turn to sing, she left the organ and stood in the center of the choir-loft and waited for Jean to strike the opening chords on the piano. Although Jean was a skilled performer on the piano it must be confessed that she trembled a little as she began to play, but when Elizabeth's sweet voice broke into song it gave her confidence, and it seemed the most natural thing in the world for Elizabeth to be singing and she to be playing in the little village church at Newburgh. She never remembered much that the old preacher said in his eloquent sermon, for during it all she seemed to be in somewhat of a haze, but afterward she summed it up in three thoughts: the blessedness of home; the joy of the home-coming; and the satisfaction of the parents in knowing that their children have found life worth while and are making something out of it. There was a general handshaking after the benediction, and before she left Jean thought she knew every person in the church. It did not take her long to see how interested every one was in Elizabeth, and how glad they were to have her with them again. She had a pleasant greeting for them all, and never forgot to ask about the ones left at home. As they drew up into the Fairfax yard again they found sleighs, single and double, already there and more following them. "You see, Jean, it's our turn this year to have the relatives at our house," said Dr. Fairfax. "Ours is a pretty big family, and we're counting on twenty or thereabouts to-day. Everybody helps and 'many hands make light work,' you know. You must feel that you're one of the family to-day, Jean, for we're always glad of one more." There were twenty-six to sit down to the Thanksgiving dinner, nineteen at the large table and seven children at a little one placed in the kitchen. Jean decided that she had never before seen such quantities of food, for in addition to the preparations Mrs. Fairfax had made, every one of the guests had contributed what he thought to be his share. There were turkeys and chickens, vegetables of all kinds, puddings, pies, cakes, fruit, nuts, and candy passed and repassed until all declared they could eat no more. After dinner there were games and music and the children went outdoors to slide. About six o'clock Mrs. Fairfax suggested supper, but she could find no one inclined to eat except the children, who came in hungry again after their vigorous exercise. Some of the families having a long distance to ride felt obliged to leave at seven, and from then until ten o'clock there was a general departure. When the last sleigh drove out of the yard Elizabeth dropped into her father's old armchair with, "Oh, I'm tired, but wasn't it splendid?" The next two days were filled with happy experiences for Jean. She coasted on a neighboring hill, drove over to "Aunty" Wilbur's for a "left over" Thanksgiving dinner, went down to Cousin Mary Fairfax's to a candy-pull, and helped Elizabeth in her household duties. She fairly reveled in the outdoor life and the beauty of the hilltop, and declared that for the first time since she had left California was she really living. Before she realized it, Saturday night came and the visit was almost at an end. After supper, Jean and Dick found themselves alone again before the fireplace and Dick asked that she finish her story of the camp in the mountains which had been interrupted Wednesday evening. When she finished the narrative, she timidly asked Dick if he would read her some of his poems. "No, I'll not read them to you, but I'll recite them to you if you care to have me." In his sweet, low voice, very similar to his father's, he recited one after another of his poems, short little things, to be sure, but full of feeling and the promise of what was to come later on. "Splendid," said Jean, when he had finished; "I know you're going to make something of this gift, aren't you?" "Yes, if I ever have an opportunity. I want to study and have the best education it's possible to get. Since I've had the fever I've wondered if I shall ever get to college. I'm not nearly as strong as I used to be, and sometimes it seems as if I never would be again, but I must live, I must amount to something. I've got too much to live for to give up now." "What do you intend to do with your education, Richard?" "I don't know yet, Jean, but a man can do anything if he's educated. Then the whole world's open to him, but when he's not it closes its heavy gates to him and he can beat against them in vain. What are you fitting yourself for, Jean?" [Illustration: "I DON'T KNOW YET, JEAN, BUT A MAN CAN DO ANYTHING IF HE'S EDUCATED."--_Page 152_.] "Why, Dick, I'm almost ashamed to tell you. I've never thought anything about the real purpose of college. I came to Ashton because my father and brothers thought it the best place for me to go. I'm only going to be there one year, and after that I think I'll study music. So far this year I've amounted to nothing; I haven't done any studying and received two faculty warnings. That's pretty serious, you know, but I'm going back Monday morning with the firm determination to do something. You and Elizabeth are an inspiration to me and I'm not going to waste any longer the opportunities that are waiting for me. And don't you get discouraged and worried about not going to college. You're going, I know you are, and next year, too. I've made up my mind to that, and in the meantime I shall need lots of encouragement as an inspiration from you on your hilltop. You'll never know all that this visit has meant to me, and I thank you all for taking me right into your family. This is a secret for us alone, Dick. Please don't say anything about it to the others, for maybe they wouldn't understand, but here's my hand on it, Dick. You've my promise that from now on I'll make something more of myself." CHAPTER VIII THE CORAL BEADS Monday morning at half-past eleven o'clock Jean reported at the office in answer to the summons she had received. The clerk, Miss Stetson, led her into the dean's private office and there she found Miss Thurston awaiting her. As yet Jean had met her only in a social way and she felt a little ashamed at the thought of what brought her there. "Good morning, Miss Cabot. Take this chair here by the window. I have a little matter to talk over with you. I find you have cut Chapel ten times since the opening of college, which is altogether too many times. Do you realize that only thirteen cuts are allowed for the whole first semester? Chapel-cutting is a very serious offense here and I hope I shall not have to speak to you about it again. And then in the matter of gymnasium, Miss Matthews reports an utter lack of interest on your part in the classes and frequent absences. Gymnasium is required work and should be completed satisfactorily freshman year. I'm afraid, Miss Cabot, that you are not taking college seriously enough." "I agree with you, Miss Thurston; I have not taken it seriously enough in the past, but from now on I intend to go at things differently. I do not think you will ever need to call me here again. I'm sure I shall never be an honor pupil, but I mean to do the best that's in me. It will be hard work, for I have practically all the work of the past three months to make up besides a condition in French to remove." "Yes, it will be hard, Miss Cabot, but I have the confidence that you can do it if you've made up your mind to it. That's all for to-day, thank you." As Jean left the office she started off in the direction of the library. There were some references in English literature which she wanted to look up as soon as possible. To tell the truth, it was the first time she had been to the library except the evening she had rescued Elizabeth from spending the night there, and she knew nothing about the system. However, she found Natalie Lawton in the magazine room and told her what she wanted. "Why, Jean, aren't you getting rather studious all of a sudden? Come right over here into the English department. You can take any of the books down to read here, or if you want to take books home for a week's use ask the librarian for a card and have the book charged. I always prefer to do my hard studying in my room, for there are so many girls down here talking and walking round that I can't ever get my mind on what I'm reading. After you get your books I want to talk to you a minute about basket-ball. When you're ready, come out to the desk and I'll help you." After Jean found the two books she needed and had obtained permission to keep them a week she and Natalie left the building and strolled slowly up to Merton. "I wonder if you've ever thought about athletics at college, Jean. I think you ought to make something, sure. It's up to you to choose what appeals most to you and try for all you're worth to make it. Every girl ought to do something for her college and her class, and it's only the exceptional girl that can do more than one thing well. Some make the glee club, some basket-ball, some the crew, some the track team, and some tennis. I've been thinking it over lately and I've decided that you're just the sort for basket-ball. If you don't make the college team perhaps you can make the 1915 team, and its really more fun to make that than the other, for the freshman-sophomore basket-ball game is the biggest thing of the year. Basket-ball practice begins this week and I want to see you out Wednesday afternoon. Next to tennis, basket-ball is the very best sport I know of. You've got to try for tennis, too, in the spring, but that's a long way off. Will you go out for basket-ball?" "Yes, Natalie, if I have the time, but I've got to devote myself a little more to study from now on, so don't expect me to practise very often. I'll make an awful try, for I've always wanted to be able to play basket-ball. I've never been in a game in my life, so of course I couldn't hope to make anything." "Lots of girls make the teams who have never played till they came here. It's good hard practice does it. To change the subject, what kind of a time did you have in New York?" "I didn't go. Tuesday night I got a telegram from Tom saying my aunt was sick and our visit was all off." "But you didn't stay at college, did you?" "No; I went home with Elizabeth and had a perfectly wonderful time. I've never been in the country before, and of course there was something new for me to do all the time. And she has the nicest family I've ever met. None of us here at college half appreciate Elizabeth. I have discovered lots of things about her that I never would have dreamed of, and I think you other girls will, too, as you come to know her. Are you going right in to supper or will you come up to my room while I brush up a bit?" "I think I'll just stop a minute in Clare Anderson's room to help her a little on her algebra. She asked me this noon if I'd go in before supper. Poor little thing, she's having a terrible struggle with it and I pity her from the bottom of my heart. You ought to thank your lucky stars that you're not taking mathematics. Here we are at her room. See you later," and the two girls parted on the second floor. After supper it was Jean's turn to play for the dancing, so Marjorie Remington did not have an opportunity to talk to her, although she had tried to ever since dinner. The minute Jean arose from the piano Marjorie hurried up to her and asked her to come up to her room for a few moments. "I hear you didn't go to New York after all, Jean, but to your room-mate's instead," said Midge, after they were comfortably seated in 47. "What possessed you to spend five perfectly good days with that stick? You knew I was going to be in Boston at my aunt's and would love to have you with me. I should think you would have thought of that and come and told me. I never enjoyed myself more in all my life. Jack certainly outdid himself to give me a good time. "What on earth could you find to do up in the country with Elizabeth? I think I'd prefer staying in my room here for a vacation to having to visit with such a little, insignificant goody-good as she is." Jean had listened as long as she could, and she stood up and started for the door, saying, "Marjorie, Elizabeth is my room-mate and I love her dearly and shall not stay here a minute longer to hear you abuse her. Unless you are willing to show her some respect I do not care for your friendship," and she walked out into the hall. "Jean, pardon me," said Marjorie, hastening after her, "I didn't realize you two were such great friends. When did all this happen? Must have been rather sudden. By the way, have you found your coral beads?" "Why, Marjorie, how did you know I'd lost them?" "Oh, I heard all about it. A little bird told me," said Marjorie, as she shut the door into her room. When Jean entered her own room she found Elizabeth waiting for her. She was sitting at her desk and held in one hand Jean's coral beads. "Oh, Jean, what do you think! I've found your coral beads, but in the queerest place. I just went to my desk to get my fountain pen which I keep in the little drawer at the right, and there were the beads. How do you suppose they got there? Some one must have put them there, but you don't believe I did it, do you?" "No, indeed, Elizabeth. You'd be the last person in the world to put them there." Without another word Jean turned and almost ran up to Grace Hooper's room and fortunately found her alone. "Gracie, did you tell any one besides Mary Boynton about my losing my beads?" "No, Jean; don't you know we decided it was best to say nothing about it. Have you found them?" "Yes, they were only misplaced, so please don't say anything more about it to anybody. I'm glad now that I didn't put up a notice on the bulletin board; it would have caused so much talk. Good-by. I can't stop; I've a lot of studying to do," and she hurried on to Mary Boynton's room, where she found Mary and her room-mate hard at their lessons for the next day. "Please excuse me, Ethel, if I take Mary out in the hall to whisper to her a moment." When they shut the door behind them Jean began excitedly, "Mary Boynton, did you tell any one besides Grace Hooper about my losing my coral beads? I've found them again; they were only misplaced, and I'm sorry I bothered you about them. Did you tell any of the girls?" "No, Jean; to tell you the honest truth, I haven't thought about the matter since Tuesday night. You were coming to me Monday morning if you didn't find them, and when you didn't appear I decided you'd found them." "Well, please don't say or think anything more about the matter. Sorry to have taken you from your studying. Did you have a pleasant vacation?" "Yes; I went home with Ethel. Come up and see us when you can stay longer. Good night." Jean hastened down the corridor and up the stairs and along fourth floor until she came to Marjorie Remington's room. She hesitated a moment at the door and then hearing no voices she knocked. Marjorie appeared and looked a little surprised to see Jean back so soon, but she motioned her to a comfortable rocker and offered her a plate of fudge which looked as if it had just been made. Jean refused the chair and the candy and stood perfectly still in the center of the room, without saying a word. Marjorie, to relieve the situation, said, "I'm glad you've come back, Jean. Can't you sit down and talk to me? I'm awfully lonesome to-night." "No; I can only stay a moment, Marjorie. I came in to tell you that I've found my coral beads and to ask you why you put them in Elizabeth's desk." "Why, Jean, what do you mean? What have I got to do with your coral beads? I don't understand what you're talking about." "Well, if you will not answer my first question, will you tell me who told you I had lost my beads?" "I did tell you it was a little bird," answered Marjorie, laughingly. "This is no time for joking, Marjorie. I ask you once more to explain it to me." "And if I refuse?" "Well, if you refuse I shall give you my explanation." "Very well, your explanation then." "For some reason all the year you have disliked my room-mate and have tried to make her uncomfortable on every possible occasion. Lately you seem to have had the same feeling towards me. When you were talking to me last Tuesday evening as I was packing, you must have taken my coral beads when I went into the bedroom to get my opera coat, and sometime later, probably on Sunday, before we arrived home, you put them in Elizabeth's desk to point suspicion towards her. Fortunately I have come to know Elizabeth so much better these last few days than all the rest of the term that I am sure stealing is the very last thing she would resort to. It is true that she is poor and has none of the things that you and I have, in abundance, but she is honest and conscientious, and kind to every one with whom she comes in contact. No one knows what I have just told you but ourselves, and I ask you now to tell me why you did such a thing. You may be perfectly sure that I never shall say anything about it if you will promise never to do such a thing again." "Well, Jean, you're a regular old Sherlock Holmes. There isn't very much for me to say now. It's pretty much as you've said. I did take the beads and put them in Elizabeth's desk because I wanted you to believe she stole them. I've never liked her from the first time I saw her. I was provoked that she broke up our plans for the first night at college by coming in late. I'm jealous, horribly jealous, and I didn't want her to be your friend. I was disappointed because you didn't join Gamma Delt. I've wanted you all along for my best friend, and I saw I was gradually losing you. I haven't many friends and I couldn't stand yours. That's all. What do you think of me now?" Jean answered very slowly, "I'm very sorry, Marjorie. I had hoped from the first that we might be good friends. You were kind to me and seemed like a girl after my own heart. We still can be friends, I hope, but you must not injure me or any of my friends. We'll forget this incident and begin over again if you say so." "All right, Jean. Thank you for your kindness. I'm afraid I don't deserve it. You see what a nasty disposition I've got, but I'll try to conquer it in the future. Now won't you stay a while? I want to tell you about my good times in Boston." "No; not to-night, Marjorie; I'm going to study, but some other time I'll be glad to hear all about it. Good night." And then Jean opened her own door and said to Elizabeth, "Now, dear, I'm ready for the German lesson." CHAPTER IX THE CHAFING-DISH PARTY "Elizabeth, have the girls announced the date of the French play?" "Yes, I think it's December eighteenth, the Wednesday night before college closes. Of course you're going?" "Yes, and I've been thinking I'd invite Constance Huntington out for the play and have a rabbit afterward. I haven't made anything but fudge in my chafing-dish since I bought it, and it's about time I did. We could have ten or twelve of the girls in after the play and get permission to stay up a little later than usual. I think I'll write Connie to-day and invite her out. Would you mind sleeping with Anne Cockran that night so Connie could have your bed?" "Why, of course not, Jean; I'd be glad to do it and anything else I can to help you. Who's in the play?" "I don't know many of them, but Peggy Allison is to be a man and Alice Cunningham's got the star girl's part. They say she's a wonder when it comes to acting. Then Bess Atherton and Joe Knight and Fliss White and Mary Brownell are in it, but I don't know the rest very well. None of the girls from my division are in the club, for you have to be at least a soph, to be eligible and then only a small proportion of the upper-class girls make it, for you have to get high rank in French. Oh dear, I'd never make it if I studied a hundred years. I can't seem to get it through this stupid old head of mine, and as for talking it and acting it too--why, it's simply beyond my comprehension." Jean wrote her letter to Constance and soon received word that she would be delighted to accept the invitation and would be out early in the afternoon, but she would have to take the first train back in the morning as she had a lesson at noon. The morning of the eighteenth was dull and cloudy, and before noon it was snowing hard and had every appearance of a bad storm. Jean stood at the window after dinner and watched the whirling snowflakes. "She won't come, I know she won't come, if it snows like this, and after I've gone and made all those elaborate preparations I call it a mean shame. Lucky I went down to the Square yesterday and bought the food, for I shouldn't enjoy lugging things home to-day in this storm. Well, if she doesn't come we'll celebrate just the same. I hope it won't be so deep by night that we can't get up to the gym. I think I'll do my packing now, for I sha'n't have much more time before the train starts unless I sit up to-night after the girls go. You tell your people, Elizabeth, that I'm very much obliged for their dandy invitation for the holidays, but I simply can't postpone my New York visit again. But there are other vacations coming, and I'll be pretty glad to go home with you then. Here's a box I want you to put into your suit-case, but it's not to be opened until Christmas morning, and this letter's for Dick, but it's so valuable I won't trust it to Uncle Sam and I want you to put it in his stocking, or if he's too old to hang up his stocking you can put it under his plate at breakfast. I wonder when my box from home will arrive. Father wrote me he had sent it. We always hang up our stockings at home Christmas Eve and then have a big Christmas tree at night. It's the first time I've ever missed it, and unless I'm having an awfully good time in New York, I'll be pretty homesick." Jean worked hard at her packing and after she had finished she went downstairs to do a little practising. The piano was so arranged that she had a good view of Faculty Row and it must be confessed that she kept her eyes there as much as on her music. At last she saw Constance battling against the wind and the snow and she ran to the door to greet her. "Oh, I'm so glad you've come, Constance! I was afraid you couldn't get over here. Are the cars on time, or did you come by train?" "I went across the city on the Elevated and took the train out. It isn't deep enough yet to affect the trains, but it will be soon if it keeps up like this. The wind is so strong it's beginning to drift. By morning I may not be able to get back or you to go to New York. I thought I'd never get up the Row; as it is, my feet are soaked. Let me borrow your slippers and some dry stockings and I'll be all right. I'm crazy to see your room, Jean. Those snapshots you sent are mighty attractive, but I know the original's lots better." "Fine," said Constance after she had stepped into 45. "It's so simple, not packed brimful with the useless trifles one generally sees in college girls' rooms. You can find your way around in these rooms all right. You ought to see the box I live in. Positively we have to move some of our furniture out into the hall at night before we can get undressed and into bed. You don't mind if I look around, do you? I love new things. What a splendid picture of Tom! He didn't give me one; guess I'll have to remind him of it. What's this picture of an old farmhouse on your desk?" "That's my room-mate's home in Newburgh. You know I spent the Thanksgiving holidays there and quite fell in love with the place." "With the place or somebody on the place? Come, Jean, 'fess up'; don't keep any secrets from me." "Well, both, Connie; they're the nicest family I've met in the East. Here, put on these stockings and slippers and dry your feet on the radiator or you'll catch your death-o'-cold. Then we'll go downstairs and see some of the girls. I've invited a few up here after the play, but I promised one or two who are very anxious to meet you that I'd take you in to see them before supper. I hope you'll like the girls out here. I think they're a mighty jolly lot. My room-mate is studying algebra in one of the freshman rooms, but she'll be back before long. She's quiet, but there's ever so much to her." Presently they started down to Peggy Allison's room and found she and Natalie had made tea for them and had sandwiches, nuts and candy. "You'll spoil our appetites for supper, Peggy, with all this glorious feed." "Just as well, Jean," said Peggy; "it's Wednesday night and we always have beans. I think baked beans on Saturdays and Wednesdays, too, is the limit." "Well," said Natalie, "let's not go down for supper. We can stay here and eat all we want to. I don't believe Peg will eat anything, she's so excited. She's been rehearsing all the afternoon, and all the morning she worked on the scenery. She's got a stunning costume and make-up. Wait till you see her and you'll say she's the handsomest cavalier you've ever set eyes on, and fall in love with her on the spot. Isn't it a shame it's storming so hard? I don't believe half of the guests will come, but perhaps Mlle. Franchant will let them repeat it after vacation. It's a shame after everybody has worked so hard." "Thanks for your invitation for supper, Nat, but I think Constance and I had better go downstairs, for I want her to see our dining-room and the girls. Why, there's the bell this minute and we intended to go into some of the other rooms. Good luck to you, Peggy; I know you'll be the bright and shining star. Oh, where is your seat, Natalie? Ours are in 'G.' We freshmen in the house got some together. Don't forget you two are coming up to our room after the play. I've got permission for us to stay up till eleven o'clock, so if the play is late, hustle down as soon as you can." The play was held in the gymnasium, and by eight o'clock it was crowded to the doors in spite of the storm. The girls were greatly disappointed that they could not wear their best-looking gowns, but it was dangerous to risk them in the drifting snow, so most of them wore light waists with their dark skirts. The French play always was considered one of the events of the year and anticipated by the whole college. This year the play presented was "Andromaque," and given wonderfully well. Of course the most interesting parts were those where the girls took the parts of men. As the masculine element were not invited to attend the performance, the girls felt free to dress as fancy prompted them and, as Natalie had said, "did make perfectly stunning men." All the girls did well, and unless one were prejudiced, one had to admit that one girl did no better than another. There was so much applause and encoring that it was nearly ten before the last act began. For some time Jean had been getting nervous and every little while whispered to Constance, "If they don't finish soon we won't have any time for the rabbit. Usually we can't have company in our rooms after ten, but to-night is a special occasion and the girls can stay till eleven. An hour isn't very long for a party." "This is great, Jean," said Constance; "I don't understand one word of French, but I think it's stacks of fun to watch them. It's the first time I've ever seen girls play men's parts. Never mind if we don't have time for the rabbit; it isn't the best thing in the world to be eating at eleven o'clock at night, you know." "Well," said Jean, "I shall be disappointed if we don't make it. I've been wanting some for ages. Oh, I know this must be the end. Wasn't it splendid? Now I feel lots better that it's over. Come on, girls! Hustle up; you've all got to help me. Don't get lost in the snowdrifts, for it wouldn't be any fun to-night to have to hunt you up." The six freshmen and Constance went down to the Hall together and up into 45; a little later came Marjorie Remington and Sallie Lawrence and Grace Hooper and Natalie Lawton. "Where's Peggy?" asked Jean. "She'll be here in a moment; she stopped to wash off a little of the paint and get into some decent clothes." "Oh," said Grace Hooper, "why didn't she come the way she was? Wasn't she perfectly adorable? I'd be only too glad to let her make love to me. I'm going to try for the French club next year." "Now, Grace," said Jean, "make yourself useful as well as ornamental. Please beat this egg. You'll have to use a fork; it's the nearest thing to an egg-beater I can find. Marjorie, will you put the crackers on the plates? Sallie, cut up the cheese, will you?" and she gave everybody something to do. By the time the work was all distributed, Peggy burst into the room crying, "_J'ai faim, j'ai faim, mes chères enfants._ Oh, I forgot, I mustn't make so much noise; it's after ten and some of the girls are trying to get to sleep, but I'm so tickled the old French play is over at last that I could shout for joy. Wasn't it awful there where I forgot? I knew I should, for I did at every rehearsal. Here, Jean, what is there for me to do?" "Nothing, Miss Star Actress, or should I say Mr. Star Actor; you have entertained us so well all the evening that we'll let you continue to do so until we've something to eat. Oh, dear, I haven't a bit of alcohol; I knew I'd forget something. Who's got some to spare? Midge, you're the nearest, please skip over to your room and get some." When Marjorie returned with a huge bottle, Jean filled the lamp of her chafing-dish, not noticing that she was spilling some drops of the alcohol on the papers she had left on the table after undoing the numerous packages. She put the ingredients into the dish and they lighted the lamp. All went well for a moment or two and she kept stirring the melted butter and cheese. Now that their work was done the girls felt freer to talk and left Jean to herself. She went over to her closet to take out a box of chocolates which she had hidden there and then circulated them among the girls. When she returned to the table she saw that some of the alcohol which she had dropped on the platter was burning. Thinking it would do no harm she let it burn until it blazed up and caught the papers near by that had been wet with the drops of alcohol. In a moment they were all ablaze and the girls were so frightened that they stood still without knowing what to do. Danger threatened Merton and perhaps all Ashton, and something must be done at once. Quick as a flash Jean pushed the burning papers onto the platter and took hold of it firmly with both hands. "Somebody open the south window, quick!" she cried. For a second no one seemed to know just which was the south window or whether there was any window in the room. Then Elizabeth ran to the window and opened it wide and Jean in a flash was in front of it and threw the blazing platter and its contents down into the snow below. [Illustration: "SOMEBODY OPEN THE SOUTH WINDOW, QUICK!"--_Page 178_.] As soon as the danger was over the girls realized what Jean had done. "How could you do it, Jean? How did you think of it? Oh, look at your hands and face; you've burned them!" they all cried. "No; I haven't. Not badly; just one thumb and it doesn't hurt much. I guess I've singed my eyebrows and a little of my front hair, but the rabbit is spoiled. Isn't it a shame? But I'm not going to let that perfectly good chafing-dish stay down in the snow and get buried up and stay there all vacation. I'm going to put on my rubber boots and a short skirt and sweater and go down and get it. I don't want any of you to come with me. I know how to unbolt the door, and no one will ever know anything about it if you'll keep it to yourselves. Here, Elizabeth, pass the sandwiches and olives and other eats. I'm determined, though, that you shall have a rabbit and I've got enough stuff here to make another even if there's only enough for one cracker apiece; that's better than nothing." "But," protested Peggy, "you won't have time; it's almost quarter of eleven now, and you know we must get back to our rooms at eleven surely or we'll never get permission again." "Well, girls," said Jean, "I shall make that rabbit to-night if I'm expelled to-morrow. You must go, I suppose, at eleven, but we two can stay up as long as we please in our own room if we're not disturbing any one else. Constance and I will eat all we can to-night, and I'll see that the rest of you get yours to-morrow. Cold rabbit is as good as hot; some like it better, particularly if it's thick and leathery. Aren't these rubber boots grand? I never thought when I bought them last month that I should dedicate them hunting for lost chafing-dishes and rabbits in snowdrifts. Well, here goes, switch the light over to the south window and watch me discover the North Pole, or the chafing-dish. Just wet this handkerchief first, will you, Nat, so I can wind it round my throbbing thumb. How's that for alliteration, freshies; wouldn't that please Miss Whiting?" After winding the wet handkerchief around her thumb she put on some heavy gloves and was ready to start. The corridors were dark, for all the lights had been put out at half-past ten. She groped her way along the banisters and managed somehow to reach the lower hallway. It seemed as though every step had made the long stairs creak and protest against what she was doing, and she was sure when she hit against a hall chair that she would awaken Mrs. Thompson. She waited a few moments and listened, but apparently Mrs. Thompson was sleeping peacefully, little dreaming of what was happening just outside her sacred domain. She finally located the great bolt and in a moment had the door open. She moved over the door-mat to prevent the doors closing, for if the wind should blow them together again she would not be able to open them unless one of the girls came down and helped her. Out on the steps her courage failed her for a moment, for the snow was whirled in every direction by the terrific wind, but she stepped down into it and instantly was up to her knees. She decided to give it up and return to the girls, but she hated to be defeated in anything, so attempted it again. She could hardly walk, but had to scuff along, making her own path. It was a long way down the east side of the dormitory and then round the corner to the south side. The light from 45 shone brightly and guided her to the spot where she expected to find the chafing-dish. At last she reached it and saw the tray sticking up in one place and not far from it the standard and a little farther the two dishes and cover. She gathered them in her arms and started back, after waving to the girls in the upper windows. After she had gone two or three steps she realized that she hadn't found the alcohol lamp, and as that was a very important item, she put the other parts down again and began to hunt for the lost one. It was nowhere to be found and had probably fallen out when she threw the burning mass from the window, and being the smallest part and the lightest had undoubtedly gone the greatest distance, and being the hottest as well, it probably sank down deep in the snow. She was about to give up when her fingers groping around on the surface found what she wanted so badly. Now that she had it all she returned the same way she had come, but it was easier now because she had only to retrace her footsteps. Still, it was no easy task and took some little time. Just as she reached the stone steps she heard the campus clock ring out eleven strokes. She entered the door and closed it as cautiously as possible and put the mat in its proper place. Then she groped her way up the three flights of stairs and was soon in 45, breathless but triumphant. "Here it is, girls, and some of the cheese is still in the dish; have some?" "Jean, you're a hero," said Peggy, "but we mustn't stay another minute; it's already struck eleven. Sorry to have missed the rabbit, but the other things were delicious and your adventure such a novelty in the way of entertainment. Don't do it again, for it's rather dangerous unless one has your nerve. Good night. Tell us the rest of the story in the morning." "All right, but 'Mum's the word,' girls," said Jean, as she followed them to the door. "At our first reunion after vacation I'll tell you all about the hairbreadth escapes I had in the mad pursuit of the rabbit. Isn't that a thrilling subject for my next English theme? Quietly, now; don't make any noise; don't anybody stub her toe or trip on the stairs." "And now," said Jean, as she came back into the room, "I'm going to finish that rabbit if I don't get a particle of sleep to-night. You can retire gracefully, if you so desire, to Elizabeth's bed and I'll stick to my post of duty till the rabbit dies." "No," said Constance, "I'm not a bit sleepy; I'd rather watch you, but first can't I put something on those burns?" "No, thanks, Connie, they aren't half bad, and if I keep something wet on my thumb it will be all right." Into the chafing-dish went all of the remaining ingredients, few to be sure, but enough to half fill the dish. There was no egg but Jean decided to risk it without. She stirred and stirred, but it refused to thicken, and as the college clock struck twelve she decided it never would. "Well, we can put a little in these saucers and eat it with a spoon and perhaps by morning what we leave in the dish will thicken enough to spread on crackers. I mean that every girl shall have a souvenir of the great and glorious occasion." They put a little in the saucers and broke in some cracker. Constance took a mouthful and exclaimed, "Oh, Jean, the mustard! How much did you put in?" "Why, just what the rule said, of course." "It must be a funny rule, for it's so awfully hot you never can eat it." "Well, I should say so," said Jean, after a taste. "Let's hope it will cool off by morning. Anyway, I've done what I said I should; it's made and we've eaten some. Now let's go to bed at once. I shall leave all the dishes and cleaning up until morning. Fortunately I have two spare hours before train time and my trunk is all packed. Isn't this room a mess? Let's retire gracefully to our downy couches and forget what we've left behind. Do you think my eyebrows, or rather what there is left of them, look badly?" "No one would ever know what had happened unless you told them. I think you got out of it mighty easily. It's a wonder you weren't burned badly, or the curtains didn't catch and start a fire. What a terrible night to have been burned out. Ough! I don't like the idea at all. Are you sure everything is all right out in the study?" "Why, of course, you big silly. Now calm yourself and get into bed, and we'll talk it over in the morning." The first thing Jean did after the rising bell awoke her from a sound sleep was to go out into the study and look into the chafing-dish. Yes, the rabbit had hardened and looked anything but attractive. She took two crackers and put the rabbit between them, making a somewhat bulky sandwich in its proportions but nevertheless edible. With Constance's assistance she made twelve of them and wrapped each one in some tissue paper and tied them with narrow white ribbon. Slipping on her kimona and bed shoes she put the packages into a small basket and hastened out in the hall and stopped at the room of each of her guests of the evening before. To each girl she presented a neat package and wishes for a Merry Christmas. Constance and she were a little late at the breakfast table but took their places without a smile or look at any of the twelve girls who were awaiting their arrival. Unless one had looked very carefully one would not have perceived that Jean's right thumb was carefully done up in a white bandage. Aside from this there was no indication of the incidents of the previous evening. Breakfast talk centered on the excellence of the French play the night before and the acting of Peggy Allison. Just before breakfast was over Mary Boynton arose and announced two important notices before the departure of the girls for the Christmas holidays. "The Merton House Entertainment Committee have planned a costume party for January thirteenth, to be limited to the girls of the dormitory. Every girl is expected to be in costume. For further particulars apply to Helena Burrage, Florence Goodnow, and Mabel Addison. "The proctors for the two weeks beginning January sixth, have been appointed as follows: first floor, Lena Hutchinson; second floor, Rebecca Chapin; third floor, Mary Andrews; fourth floor, Jean Cabot; fifth floor, Sarah Dillon. They will meet for a few moments after breakfast in the reading-room." Then the girls filed out and hurried upstairs for last preparations. The proctors consulted together a few moments and were given instructions as to their duties and then were dismissed. Jean and Constance decided to go to Chapel and clean up afterwards. It took till nearly ten before the last dish was washed and wiped, and Constance had to hurry for the train. "You must be sure to visit me after vacation, but I'll promise you no such exciting times as you gave me. My best to Tom. Thanks for your hospitality," she said as she boarded the train. Jean watched until the train was out of sight and then went up to ten o'clock recitation. At twelve she boarded a crowded train and left Ashton and its problems behind her. CHAPTER X THE COSTUME PARTY The Christmas holidays passed all too quickly and were crowded to the utmost with good times. It was with a little reluctance that Jean took the noon train from New York on Wednesday, January eighth, for Boston. Tom went with her to the station and saw her safely aboard. There were many of the college girls on the train and as she went through the Pullman looking for her chair she heard Marjorie Remington calling her. "Here's a vacant chair beside me, Jean. Come over and sit down in it, even if it isn't yours, and if any one comes in later to claim it you can move over into your own. I want to hear about your good times, and I've got just stacks to tell you." The girls kept up a spirited conversation all the way to Boston and one incident followed another in rapid succession until Marjorie said, "Before we reach Boston I want to tell you a secret, Jean, but first you must promise me not to tell a soul at college." Jean promised faithfully, and Marjorie continued, "Jack and I are engaged. Here's my ring, but I don't dare wear it openly yet, so I shall put it on a chain and wear it around my neck under my dress where no one can see it. You see, father and mother don't quite approve of Jack and wouldn't allow me to announce my engagement, especially while I'm in college, but we couldn't wait any longer and Jack gave me the ring Christmas in a box of candy, so no one suspected. Isn't it a beautiful diamond? You know, Jack has plenty of money in his own name, but father doesn't always approve of the way he spends it. We haven't made any plans yet, but I think we'll be married in the fall. Jack graduates in June, and I surely am not coming back to Ashton another year. I almost fear I'll flunk out at midyear's, but I'm going to dig hard from now on, for I want to be in the East until June and if I should flunk it would be home for me and no Jack. "To think you haven't met him yet! Well, you will to-day, for he's going to meet me at the train if he possibly can. He had to go back earlier than I, for Harvard began last week. I think I'll stay in town for an early dinner, but I'll be out before eight. I suppose you're looking forward with joy to your duties as proctor of fourth floor. I don't envy you your honor; I suppose it will be thrust upon me soon, for it must be getting pretty near my turn. Well, I sha'n't bother you, for it's study for mine every minute till midyear's. The costume party is the only dissipation that I can allow myself. I made the dandiest costume at home, but I can't tell you what it is. Did you make one?" "No, I haven't had time even to think about one, but I'll fix up something myself, or hire a costume in town. Like you, I'm going to study as hard as I can so I sha'n't have time for anything else. I'm awfully surprised to hear you're engaged. Do you think it's just right to keep it from your father and mother? I should think you'd want them to know about it first. I should if it were I." "But I shouldn't dare tell them now. I'm hoping they'll feel all right about it later. We're almost in Boston now. I do hope nothing will keep Jack from meeting me." Marjorie was not to be disappointed, for Jack was at the station to meet her, and she proudly introduced him to Jean. He invited her to accompany them up town for dinner, but she declined and left them at the Elevated. When she arrived at Merton she found Elizabeth had not come, but she knew the last train from Wilton Junction reached Boston about eight and she felt sure Elizabeth would take that one. She was not mistaken, and about half-past eight Elizabeth arrived, very tired from her hard trip. After she had removed her hat and coat, she said, "Has Marjorie Remington returned yet, Jean?" "I don't know, Elizabeth. I came on with her from New York, but I left her in Boston and she said she was coming out after an early dinner. Why do you ask?" "I came out from Boston with a girl I thought was she, but she was with some fellow I never have seen out here. They were walking up the Row very slowly and as I passed them they were talking together very earnestly. From what I heard I could not believe it was Marjorie in spite of the fact that it looked so much like her." "Probably it was Jack Goodrich from Harvard. He lives in Detroit and he and Marjorie have always been good friends. Now tell me about your vacation." They began an exchange of experiences but were interrupted every few minutes by girls coming in to welcome them back. Nearly every one ended with, "Did you make your costume for Monday night?" It was late when Jean and Elizabeth found themselves alone without fear of further interruption. "Jean," said Elizabeth, "I want to thank you for what you did for us all at Christmas, and most of all for Brother's gift. He has written you, too, but I must tell you all that it means to me, for I feel as though it were benefiting me as much as him. To think that he can go to college next year! I can hardly believe it now, although I have thought and talked of little else all the vacation. How could you be so generous?" "Oh, let's not talk about it, Elizabeth. You know I have more spending money than I know how to use, and father helped some because I wrote him all about Dick and his patience and courage and talent. You can finish your course, too, perhaps, and Dick be in college at the same time. So let's not ever say anything more about it." The costume party was to be held in the dining-room, reading-room, and hall of Merton, and all the afternoon the girls strung Japanese lanterns and brought down furniture from rooms above to make as many cozy corners as space allowed. Supper was to be a little early, and after it was over the tables and chairs were to be moved out and the floors waxed. The electric lights were covered with red paper to dim their brightness, and the piano was moved out into the center of the living-room so that the music could be heard better in all the rooms. By eight o'clock most of the girls were downstairs, and in their costumes and masks presented an attractive appearance. Half of the girls wore men's costumes of all periods, and there were kings and queens, clowns and French dolls, Quakers and follies, peasant maids from many countries, shepherds and shepherdesses, Topsies, Marguerites and priests, nuns and dancing maids were present, and others too numerous to mention. A local pianist had been hired, and she was the only one in the room not in costume. Even Mrs. Thompson was somewhere in the merry throng. There was first a grand march to be followed by dancing until ten o'clock, when the unmasking was to take place and light refreshments served. Gradually, little groups of girls thought they recognized each other and surmised the identity of certain others. Jean and Elizabeth and Sallie Lawrence were resting after a strenuous Virginia Reel. "Who is that couple who have danced together all the evening, the tall monk and the demure sister of charity? Probably she thinks it's her duty to confess to him for her worldly dissipation. The sister of charity looks like Marjorie Remington, but who can the monk be? Marjorie doesn't generally remain so faithful to one partner," said Sallie. "It is Marjorie," said Jean; "I can tell her walk anywhere and I'm sure those are her pumps. She told me she bought them in Detroit this last vacation. I'm sure I can't imagine who her partner is. The tallest girl I know is Mary Stickney. It must be she, but isn't it queer Marjorie should care to dance so often with her? Probably she thinks it's more picturesque to dance with a monk. I remember asking Mary this afternoon if she was going to-night and she said she didn't believe so, but if she did she'd have to get up something very simple at the last moment. That monk's costume is surely the simplest one here." After several of the girls had asked the charming sister of charity to dance and she had shaken her pretty head and persisted in dancing with the monk, all the others began to wonder a bit and talk among themselves. "Who is the monk?" was on everybody's tongue, and it was pretty generally conceded to be Mary Stickney. Just before ten the monk and his fair partner slowly left the main room for a lemonade table at the end of the hall. Most of the others were dancing, but Jean, very tired with the excitement of the evening, had slipped alone into a little cozy corner just beyond the lemonade table. She did not intend to watch or to listen, but she could not help herself. When the two dancers were left to themselves, she heard Marjorie Remington say, "Hasn't it been splendid, Jack? Not a soul ever would suspect, for you certainly took every precaution. But I think you'd better go now, for it's almost time to unmask. Take off your robe and mask in the outer hall and you'll find your cap and coat and shoes in my suit-case there in the right-hand corner. You'll not meet any one, for everybody in the house is at the dance and it's too late for outsiders to be coming in. Still, be cautious. Let me know how you get back to Cambridge, and come out as soon as you can. Good night, dear. Don't let anything happen to you." And the black-robed priest disappeared from view and the demure little sister of charity sat down a few minutes in the dimly-lighted hall to rest. Jean did not leave the cozy corner until she was sure Marjorie had joined the dancers. She leaned back against the pillows, faint with astonishment and dismay. What should she do? One idea after another rushed through her brain and confused her more and more. She must act quickly, or it would be too late. Stealing into the outer hall she found the black robe and mask Jack had left there and she put them on over her Old Mother Hubbard costume. She knew she was not as tall as Jack was, but still there was not such a great difference and it was worth the risk. Slowly wending her way back into the main room, she found the sister of charity just about to dance with a Little Boy Blue. She put her arm round Marjorie and drew her away before Little Boy Blue realized what was happening. Marjorie herself was so astonished she could say nothing at first, but after a moment whispered, "Jack, how careless; you must go. We're going to unmask after this dance and if you're found here I'll be expelled to-morrow." But the monk answered never a word, but danced as smoothly and gently as though he had heard nothing. Again Marjorie whispered, "Oh, Jack, you must go! Don't wait another minute or I'm lost." Just then the music stopped and some one cried, "Masks off!" and there was a general pulling off of masks amid peals of laughter. As Marjorie gazed into Jean's face a look of terror settled over her own as she gasped "You!" but Jean said quietly, "We'll talk about it later up in your room. Don't leave until the others do," and she hurried away. There were many surprises at the unmasking, but the greatest was Jean's. Several of the girls, among them Elizabeth and Sallie, declared they had recognized her earlier in the evening in another costume, but she refused to answer except as she whispered in Elizabeth's ear, "Don't ask too many questions. Trust me; it's all right." Then the refreshments were served and still there was time for a few more dances. Jean went to the piano and offered to play so that the pianist might dance a little. Really, Jean needed to think and be away from the girls. She hardly knew what she was playing, so absorbed was she with the thought of what Marjorie had done and what she as proctor of fourth floor must do before very long. Such a thing could not be passed by unnoticed, and still what a terrible thing it would be to have Marjorie expelled through her. She had heard of people sacrificing duty for friendship, and she wondered what she would do when it came time to decide. Once the room seemed to grow black and she thought she would fall off the stool, but by a supreme effort she shook off the approaching faintness and finished the waltz she was playing. Then she arose and left the piano and walked over to Mrs. Thompson. "I think I will be excused, if you please, Mrs. Thompson. I feel a little tired. It's been a splendid party. Good night." Elizabeth was watching her and noticed her pallor and swaying body. "What is the matter, Jean? What has happened? This isn't a bit like you. Can I help you?" "No, Elizabeth; I shall be all right as soon as I get upstairs. Please don't leave until the others do." Then she crept up the stairs and when she entered her own room she closed the door and locked it. She quickly tore off the two costumes, leaving the black one on the couch where Elizabeth would be sure to see it; then she threw the Old Mother Hubbard dress into a trunk which was in her closet, closed the lid, and locked it. Putting on her kimona she sat down to think and wait for the girls to come upstairs. When Elizabeth entered the room, Jean was more like herself and talked gayly about the girls' costumes. "I'll go out in the corridor and put out the lights, and I've got a message to deliver to one of the girls, so don't wait up for me." She put out all the lights on fourth floor and then walked slowly up and down the corridor three or four times before knocking softly at Marjorie's door. Without waiting for her to reply, Jean entered the room and closed the door gently after her. "Marjorie, remember I come here to-night as proctor as well as friend. What you have done is awful. I can hardly think about it calmly. How did you dare think of such a thing? You've broken every rule of our house, you've deceived every girl here and Mrs. Thompson as well, you've committed an offense worthy of expulsion, you've disgraced yourself and all the rest of us. Now what's to be done? I'm the only girl who knows what has happened, although others were mystified at my being the monk and the Mother Hubbard, too. That will be forgotten in a day or two, but what you have done is of more serious import. You wonder why I dressed up in Jack's costume? I was tired of dancing and went out into the cozy corner beyond the lemonade table to rest a little. Before I had been there long you and Jack came and I could not help overhearing your conversation. After he had gone I knew you would go back to the other rooms alone and every one would wonder where your constant attendant had gone. Questions would be asked and you would have to give some sort of an explanation. The idea came to me to put on Jack's costume for the remainder of the evening and save you from a difficult position. Now I have given you an explanation of my conduct and I ask for one of yours." "There isn't one, Jean; except that when I told Jack about the party he suggested that he come out, too, dressed as a monk. He planned everything so well that I thought there was no danger and it was a lark. I was tired of dancing with girls and I longed for a dance with a real man, and you know Jack dances divinely. I guess Ashton is no place for me, after all, and you might as well have it out to-morrow and get me expelled. I don't mind leaving college, but I hate to go home and have Jack so far away. It's a long time till June, and I'll be awfully lonesome out there without him." "No, Marjorie; I don't want you publicly expelled. I'm sorrier for you than I've ever been for any one in all my life. I wish I were not proctor to-night, and I'd say nothing about it. As it is I shall not report you unless you refuse to comply with my plans. You are to leave college to-morrow. You'll say you were called home unexpectedly. I'll leave the reason to you, but I must see you on the train for Detroit and see the telegram you send home to your father to meet you. Jack is to know nothing about it until you write him from Detroit. You can pack what clothes you need and I will see that the other things are sent on at your request. You say that you never have cared for college, but I am sure you prefer to leave it honorably rather than in disgrace. Will you think it over to-night and let me know your decision in the morning? If you do not come down to breakfast I shall know you have decided to do as I suggest, and I promise you, under those conditions I shall never say a word to any one about the affair. I hope you'll do the right thing. Good night." Before noon the next day all Merton was talking about Marjorie Remington's sudden call home. Lill Spalding and Jean helped her pack and went in town with her to see her take the late afternoon train for Detroit. At night the excitement had somewhat subsided, for Marjorie's friends had been few and the others were little concerned with her affairs. There were much more serious matters pending, for midyear's examinations were only three weeks away and the midnight oil was already beginning to be burned. CHAPTER XI MIDYEAR'S The next three weeks the girls in Merton did study, as did most of the other girls. All the classes were having reviews and the whole college had settled down to good hard work. Social life had practically stopped, except for an occasional spread or tea, and society meetings on Monday nights were about the only diversions. When she felt she could afford the time Jean had gone to basket-ball practice, for she secretly longed to make the freshman team, but openly she said nothing about it. She knew everything depended upon the midyear marks, and although there had been a decided improvement in her work since Thanksgiving, still she knew it looked a little doubtful in French and German. However, she was confident that by June she would be doing at least passing work. About a week before the examinations began, Jean went over to Wellington one evening to study psychology with Lois Underwood, who was in her division. As it happened, several of the Wellington girls were in the same division and Lois called them in to the "quiz," as she called their evening's work. The girls really worked hard until about nine o'clock and had covered considerable ground when they began talking about hypnotism, a favorite subject of Miss Washburn, the psychology instructor. "I think Miss Washburn's positively daffy on the subject," said Jean; "I don't believe there's anything in it at all. She'll be sure, though, to ask us something about it in the exam. I suppose if we want to pass the course we'll have to agree with her whether we believe in it or not." "But I do believe in it," said Lois Underwood. "Bess and I have been reading up a lot on the subject and we have been experimenting on each other and find we can do lots of the things the books tell about. It's easy enough if you just make up your mind to it." The other girls laughed and scoffed at this, and declared Bess and Lois were getting daffy over the subject, too. "Well, all right, girls," said Lois, "if you don't believe it, I'll let Bess hypnotize me. You've all got to keep perfectly quiet and not laugh if she doesn't succeed at first, for we can't always tell what will be the result." "As I said before," Jean replied, "I don't believe there's anything in it, but I'm perfectly willing to be convinced." The girls shut their books and awaited the exhibition. Bess Johnson arose from her chair and looked steadily into Lois Underwood's eyes as she sat upright on her couch. "Put your mind upon sleep, Lois; sweet, gentle sleep. You're going to sleep for a little while." She stepped up close to her and began rubbing her forehead and temples, saying all the time, "You're beginning to feel sleepy, you know you will sleep, you can't help it. Now you're asleep, asleep, asleep." And at these words Lois fell over on the couch in a deep sleep. "Now, ladies and gentlemen, our fair victim is peacefully sleeping, and those of you who doubt the fact are at liberty to examine the sleeping beauty as carefully as you please. As a first test I will prick her arm with this needle and if she does not move or cry out you may draw your own conclusions." She pricked her arm with the needle, but not a movement was made or a sound heard and the girls looked at each other in astonishment. They spoke to her and shook her and pinched her and pulled her hair, but it was in vain, there was no evidence of life. "It is wonderful," said Jean; "I am forced to admit that there's something in it after all. Does every one else believe?" The rest of the girls declared they did, and then Jean suggested that Bess awaken her. "Very well, girls; it's perfectly simple," and she went up to the couch and began rubbing Lois's forehead and temples, saying firmly, "You are about to awaken, fair one; open thine eyes. Now you are awaking, you know you cannot help it. You are coming to life again, awaken." But Lois did not seem to open her eyes and did not move. She lay as rigid as when she first went into the sleep. Bess worked over her as hard as she knew how, but could not awaken her. Again and again she shook her until it seemed as though she must open her eyes if there was any life in her. "Oh, girls, what shall I do? I can't get her to wake up. It's never been like this before. Suppose she never comes out of it. I'll be a murderer. Oh, I promise you if she ever does wake up that I'll never try to hypnotize any one again!" "Hadn't we better call in the doctor or some of the older girls?" said Jean. "No, not yet; I'm afraid to. What would they say to me? And if I put her to sleep, I'm the only one that can awaken her. Don't you know that other people have no influence over them?" and she began again to work over her. It was no use, and now the other girls began to get as frightened as Bess, but there seemed nothing to do but to wait. At last the 9.45 warning bell rang and the girls knew they must leave, especially those who lived in other houses. With tears in her eyes Bess said good-night to the girls and begged them to say nothing about the matter, assuring them that she knew in time she could awaken Lois. After the door closed on the last girl, Bess returned to the sleeping girl on the couch. She was breathing deeply and so Bess did not despair of her life. She sat beside her and called and called to her to awaken. The moments flew by and the terrified girl felt that she must control herself before she could hope to control another. She must make a supreme effort to undo the harm she had done. She left the couch and walked slowly up and down the room, saying to herself, "Be calm; it must come out all right; she will awaken." After perhaps half an hour she sat down again on the couch and looked Lois hard in the face. Then she rubbed her forehead and temples exactly as she had done when she sent her into the stupor, and almost screamed, "You must awaken; you must awaken, Lois, or I shall go mad." There was not a sign of awakening, and heartsick and discouraged Bess sank upon her knees almost exhausted. She prayed softly to her Father in Heaven for help in this awful moment, and then for the last time whispered, "Oh, Lois, Lois, awaken!" and she saw her eyelids begin to move very slightly and then gradually open. "Oh, Lois, you're really awake again; you're awake again. I'm so thankful!" "'Thankful,' Bess, why, what do you mean? What are you doing on your knees by my couch?" "Nothing, Lois, except praying that you'd wake up. Don't you remember anything about to-night?" "No; all I know is that I'm very, very tired and I feel as though I could sleep a week. What happened?" "Why, to-night to prove to the girls that there was such a thing as hypnotism, I put you to sleep and I couldn't make you wake up. I've been frightened almost to death ever since and I'll never, never try to hypnotize anybody again as long as I live. I wish I'd never heard anything about the subject. But you're all right now, and that's all I care about. I've had the most awful experience of my life. Look and see if my hair has turned white. We'd better go to bed now, but I must let the other girls know the first thing in the morning, for they were all as frightened as I." When the psychology class met next morning it was a pretty sober little group that had studied together the night before, and two of them, at least, were a trifle pale. Miss Washburn could not understand what had fallen over the class, for it was generally very lively and at times troublesome. As luck would have it, after she had finished her lecture she called on Bess Johnson to talk on the subject of hypnotism. To the astonishment of the class (excepting, of course, her companions of the night before), who were accustomed to Bess' brilliant recitations, they heard her say, "I know nothing about it," and she turned as pale as though she had seen her father's ghost, and the question was passed on to Gertrude Jackson, next on the list, who discussed it at some length, until the bell rang and the class was dismissed. From psychology Jean went into her English class and took her usual seat in the extreme left-hand corner near the open door. It was theme day, and Miss Whiting was to read some examples of what she considered good and bad themes. Jean listened in vain for one of hers among the good ones, for she had tried hard and was beginning to enjoy her English work. But among the themes Miss Whiting considered poor because of their faulty construction and poor English she recognized two of her recent attempts. She was hurt, and the tears sprang to her eyes to think of Miss Whiting's reading two of her themes before the entire class, as though one wouldn't have been enough! Of course everybody would know they were hers, although she overlooked the fact that no names were mentioned with the criticisms. She felt her face turning scarlet and tears rolling down her cheeks. She couldn't stay there to hear more of her awful themes read and she didn't dare ask Miss Whiting to be excused. She gave one glance at the open door and her mind was made up. Knowing Miss Whiting was very near-sighted, she stole very quietly out of the room before Miss Whiting or hardly any of the girls were aware of it. No sooner out than she regretted her childish action and she wished she were back in the room. She wandered over to the library, determined to wait until the recitation was over and then go to Miss Whiting and apologize. After the class was dismissed and just as Miss Whiting was gathering up the papers on her desk, Jean walked up to her, smiling sweetly. "I've come to offer you an apology, Miss Whiting. I purposely left your class last hour in the midst of your reading. I felt so badly when you read two of my miserable little themes that I thought I couldn't stand it a moment longer, and as my seat is near the door I took French leave when you were not looking in my direction. It was a very silly thing to do, and I realized it the moment I was out of the room. I'm very sorry and hope you will accept my apology." "Why, certainly, Miss Cabot. How very thoughtful of you to come and tell me, for unless you had I should have known nothing about it. Let us sit down a moment and talk over your work. This will be a good time for conference, if you can spare the time." "Yes, indeed," said Jean, as she sat down in the chair beside Miss Whiting. "Let me see, Miss Cabot, do you care for the subject of English? It seems to me I had got the impression that you did not. Just lately, though, I have noticed a slight change for the better, in your theme work. You seem to be grasping things as though you wouldn't let go. I hope you won't. Things about you are beginning to interest you, and you're describing them excellently. However, your constructions are faulty, but that is a common fault in freshman work, and I read your theme because it furnished criticism applicable to so many other papers. You must not take criticism so to heart, for it is given always with the hope of helping others. I thank you again for coming to tell me what you did. Shall we walk down together? I go as far as Miss Thatcher's." When Jean entered the dining-room one of the freshmen called out, "Were you ill in English, Jean?" "Yes, temporarily indisposed, but I'm better now, thank you," and smiling, she took her seat. When the examination lists were posted, Jean found she had psychology and German on Tuesday, French and English on Wednesday, and music on Thursday. Each examination was to last from two to three hours and was to cover all the work of the first semester. The only one she did not dread was music, and she trembled most at thought of French and German. Monday she crammed and crammed on her German verbs and vocabularies, and at supper declared she would not take another look at them, for she had planned to spend the entire evening reading over psychology notes. When Elizabeth came upstairs after supper, she said she was going to spend the night in Mabel Livingston's room, so they could study mathematics together. Mabel's room-mate was away from college that night, so Elizabeth could have her bed. She collected her books and kissed Jean good-night, warning her not to sit up all night to study. "After you go, Elizabeth, I'm going to lock the door and I won't open it if people knock all night," she called out to Elizabeth as she left the room. She propped herself up on the couch and drew up the table with her drop-light upon it, and opened her psychology note-book to begin reading her notes. How small her writing looked and how many pages there were to be read! Soon the lines and words began to run together, and all unbeknown to her the note-book slipped to the floor but landed so softly that she did not hear it at all. The next thing she knew she was sitting up on the couch staring first at the burning light on the table and then at the bright sunshine pouring into the window and then at the open note-book on the floor, and finally at herself fully clothed as though ready for recitation. She looked at her watch and found it had stopped, but she listened for sounds around her and she heard girls talking and walking about as though it were the middle of the day. "What has happened?" she asked herself. "Am I another Rip Van Winkle?" She jumped up, unlocked the door and ran into the next room. "What time is it, Ann?" she asked. "Ten minutes past eight, Jean. Where were you at breakfast?" "Well, if this isn't the greatest joke you ever heard about. I haven't had any breakfast. I lay down on my couch last night right after supper to study for my psychology exam and the next thing I know it's ten minutes past eight and I've been asleep all that time and haven't done a bit of studying. I've had these clothes on since yesterday morning and haven't combed my hair yet, but I've got to go to Chapel, for I don't dare cut and my exam comes the first thing afterward, and I haven't looked at it. What shall I do? If she'll only ask me something I know, which is little enough, I admit, I'm saved. Seems to me I dreamed she asked us to write fully on the subject of memory and give illustrations. I'll just look over the headings on that subject," and she sat down where she was and opened her note-book and read strenuously until the chapel bell rang. She smiled to herself as she walked into Miss Washburn's room and saw the blue books on the desks. "To think I've studied just ten minutes for a three-hour exam!" she said to herself. But when she took up the printed list of questions and read the very first, "Outline, develop fully, and give illustrations of the subject of memory," she smiled still more and said, "Well, if I hadn't fallen asleep just when I did, I'd never have dreamed we'd have that question. As it is, I'm all prepared and it's the only thing I know anything about," and she wrote over two hours and felt confident that she had passed in a good paper. The German examination which followed was much harder, and it seemed as though every time she tried to think of the parts of an irregular German verb the corresponding French word popped into her head. Right ahead of her sat Anne Cockran, writing away at such a rapid rate that Jean felt sure she knew the correct answer to every question and she wished once or twice that she could get a glimpse of her paper. Once she leaned forward a little and as she did so her glance fell on Olive Windman, who was sitting a little ahead of her to the right. Jean saw her take a little paper covered with very fine writing from the front of her shirt-waist and conceal it in her lap. She looked quickly at Fräulein Weimer, but found her busy correcting notebooks; then she looked down at the paper in her lap and began writing again. It was the first time that Jean had seen open cheating, although she knew it occurred again and again. The very idea of looking at Anne Cockran's paper faded as quickly from her mind as it had entered it, and she blushed at the thought of what she might have done. At the end of the examination, Fräulein Weimer announced that she had reason to suspect certain members of the class of dishonesty, and all those who had given or taken help in any way during the examination might not pass in their examination books. How thankful Jean was that the number did not include herself, and she was shocked as she laid down her examination book on the table to find that it rested on one marked "Olive Windman." The French examination next day was hard from beginning to end, and although she did her very best she felt she had failed. English was easy, and she finished in less than two hours. Her music examination took most of Thursday afternoon, for part of it was on the piano and the rest on harmony. When she had written the last note and signed her name she breathed several deep sighs of relief and started for the gym. There were two whole days of vacation for her, for she had no more examinations and she meant to put most of her time into basket-ball practice, as the list of freshman candidates was to be posted the next Monday, and she hoped against hope to see her name among them. Monday was registration day for the second half-year, and every one reported at the office at the appointed time to find her marks and the number of hours she would be allowed to take second half. When Jean received her notification she found she had passed in everything but her French and she was requested to see Mlle. Franchant at once. With fear and trembling she approached her room, for she felt she was about to be told that she must drop French for the rest of the year. She peeped into the room and saw there were no other students there, so then she walked up to Mlle. Franchant's desk, where she sat writing a letter. "Come right in, Mlle. Cabot. I want to speak to you just one moment. I had to report a failure in your French work first semester, but it is not so bad a one that you must drop the subject. You have improved since I warned you and I think with good hard work you will pass at the June examination. If I can help you in any way I shall be glad to do so." "Thank you," said Jean, and she left the room saying to herself, "Well, I've lost my chance at basket-ball, but I'll pass that subject in June or know the reason why." CHAPTER XII BEFORE THE FRESHMAN-SOPHOMORE GAME After dinner, Peggy Allison seized Jean by the arm and insisted that they go up on the hill to see if the lists of basket-ball candidates were posted. Jean knew in her heart that her name would not be among them, for the one fast rule of Ashton was that no girl was considered eligible for athletic contests unless her work was satisfactory in every department. For a moment she wanted to refuse Peggy, but she felt she must know about her disappointment sooner or later, and she might as well tell her now. So they walked slowly over to the gym and Peggy found Jean very quiet. "What's the matter, Jean? What's troubling you?" "Nothing, except I'm awfully disgusted with myself and you will be, too, for you aren't going to find my name among the basket-ball candidates. I didn't pass in my French, so of course I can't play. I knew all along it was going to be a toss-up whether I'd get through or not, but I hoped that lately I'd done well enough to make up for my poor beginning. However, I've made up my mind to one thing, and that is if I can't try for the basket-ball team I'll do something here before I leave." "That's the proper spirit, Jean. I'm awfully sorry about your French, but every one admits that Mlle. Franchant is the hardest marker in college and flunks more freshmen than all the other profs together. But there's tennis left for you in the spring and the big tournament in June. Why don't you try to take the championship away from Natalie?" "Oh, I couldn't beat her, but I'll go into the tournament if my French is all right. I'll study it morning, noon, and night and I'll pass it, too, for I've made up my mind. I'm not going over to basket-ball practice any more. Not that I'm grouchy because I can't play, but I'm going to put that time into studying. I'll be the very greasiest grind you ever saw, with a towel around my throbbing head as I burn the midnight oil night after night and drive my little room-mate to distraction. Speaking of Elizabeth, do you know, she's doing splendid work in oratory. In class last week she astonished every one. She gave that little poem 'Carcasson,' and when she had finished, Miss Moulton said, 'Excellent, Miss Fairfax, I'm going to ask you to give that to us again next week; it's something for us to anticipate.' And Elizabeth told me afterward that when class was dismissed that day 'Moultie' stopped her and congratulated her and told her she hoped she would enter prize speaking. Elizabeth said that she shouldn't think of such a thing, for in the first place she would never dare to get up in the chapel before every one, and in the second place she hadn't the time to put into it. But later on I'm going to try to persuade her to enter, and I think she will." "I hope she will, Jean. Look at those girls around the bulletin board. We'll never get within a mile of it." "Oh, yes, we will, Peg; wait a minute," and before they realized it both girls were gazing at the long list of names. There were two Merton House girls among them, Anne Cockran for the freshmen, and Sallie Lawrence for the sophomores, and as Jean saw their names she hid her own disappointment by saying gayly, "Oh, isn't it splendid that there are two Merton girls? I hope they'll make the teams. Won't it be exciting to have the two rivals in the house before the game?" "Oh, Jean, you'll find excitement enough before the game and after it, too, for from now on there'll be plenty of spirit between you freshies and the sophs. Be on the watch, for you never can tell what the sophs will do next. You must be particularly careful about your flags and the class banquet, for those are the really great tests of strength or weakness of the freshmen class. Who's your chairman of the flag committee?" "Florence Cummings, over in North, and I'm fortunate or unfortunate enough, whichever you consider it, to be on the committee with four others. We haven't met yet, but I think there's a meeting next week." "Well, it's a mighty hard committee to serve on, and I don't envy you one bit. I hope you'll come out all right and win and float your flags, but make up your mind for some excitement." The two girls spent the rest of the afternoon walking over to Lookout Hill and the conversation changed from basket-ball and class rivalry to everything imaginable which could interest two such wide-awake college girls. Classes settled down again after the excitement of midyear's, and if there were heartaches and bitter disappointments most of them were covered up with good resolutions and hard work. The girls who had failed and were obliged to return home were missed for a little and then forgotten. The seniors were realizing that it was their last half-year and were crowding as much as possible into it; the juniors seemed to be devoting themselves to social activities; and the lower classes were developing class spirit and two rival basket-ball teams. It had been a custom from time immemorial at Ashton to have an annual basket-ball game between the freshmen and sophomores to decide which class might carry its flags for the rest of the year at all college events. If the freshmen were defeated in the game they gave up their flags to the sophomores, and if the sophomores were defeated they gave their flags to the freshmen. For several days before the game, and especially the one immediately preceding, each class strove to have one of its flags in some conspicuous place where it could remain without being hauled down by the rival class. It always took carefully laid plans on the part of the freshmen, and great precaution in executing them to outwit the wily sophs, and few freshmen classes could boast among their victories the successful raising of their flag. Then after the basket-ball game, as soon as possible, the freshman class held a banquet, either to celebrate its victory or find consolation in its defeat. If the sophomores could prevent the banquet from taking place, all the more glory for them, and they watched and plotted and made life miserable for the anxious freshmen. Classes come and classes go, but customs live on forever, and 1914 and 1915 were no exceptions to the rule and had made great preparations for the fray. Jean Cabot and the other members of the flag committee held secret meetings for days and days at Edith McAllister's house. When Edith came to Ashton, her mother, being the only other member of her family, had come with her and hired a small house in the shadow of the college where the two lived happily together. Mrs. McAllister had a sewing machine and could help the girls with their sewing. They had over a hundred and fifty small flags to make in order that every girl in the class might have one to carry to the game, besides several large ones to display in the gymnasium. The college color was blue, and 1915 had chosen white as its class color, so the numerals, 1915, were to be of white and sewed on the blue background. The flags were made of cheese-cloth and had to be cut out and hemmed and then the numerals were to be stitched on. Only a few of the girls knew how to run a sewing machine, so it took some time to get them done. But at last they were finished and the next thing was to know what to do with them, for if one of the sophs scented them out and captured them they were lost forever and the freshmen disgraced. Finally it was decided to lock them in a small trunk which belonged to Mrs. McAllister, and the trunk was to be placed in the attic and the door locked and the two keys put on a ribbon and worn round Mrs. McAllister's neck night and day. The one flag which the freshmen hoped to fly before the game was entrusted to the chairman, Florence Cummings, who sewed it on to her petticoat the day she carried it to her dormitory. All the other flags, however, were to remain in their hiding-place until the day of the game. Each dormitory had girls from both classes to act as spies and watch all proceedings and report suspicious actions to a general committee. Jean was chosen from the freshman class in Merton and found her hands full. On the day before the game, very early in the morning, it was whispered around the Hill that the sophomore flag was flying in the middle of the "Pond," as the girls called the small open reservoir, just back of the college buildings, which supplied a neighboring city with water. It did not take long for the rumors to be verified, and in a few moments nearly every girl in college had been to the "Pond" to see the small blue and orange flag floating in the water. There was much speculation as to how it could have been placed there, for the water, which was some ten feet below the surface of the ground, was held in by solid walls of masonry which seemed impossible to scale. But there was the flag, holding its head as high as any of the sophs who said nothing, but went about their recitations with a satisfied smile upon their faces which seemed to say, "You see our flag; well, get it if you can." The freshmen said nothing, but one could see disappointment on every face. The flag committee held an animated session at Mrs. McAllister's and then started out to work. Not a sign of a freshman flag all day long and apparently there was to be no attempt to remove the sophomore one, for to the casual observer that seemed impossible. There was not a boat nor a ladder, nor a rope anywhere in evidence around the "Pond," and the grumbly old watchman sat in his little box of a house at the northwest corner placidly smoking his pipe as though nothing had happened, all the while refusing to offer any suggestions to the numberless inquiries which poured in upon him. At nightfall the flag was still where it had been all day and the lofty sophs felt the victory was theirs, for the freshmen, to all appearances, had given up the attempt to capture it. There was tense excitement in all the dormitories during supper and the early hours of the evening, but it seemed to subside a little as bedtime approached. As Elizabeth and Jean turned out their lights and crept into bed, Elizabeth said, "Isn't it a shame, Jean, to be defeated at the very outset? It looks bad for the game in spite of all belief in signs. They say the even-year classes never are lucky, you know. Aren't you tired after such a strenuous day? I for one will be glad when the suspense is all over and the game is won or lost. You'll be worn to a thread if you do much more running around." "Yes, I am tired, Beth; but it's worth while working for the class. Luck does seem against us now, but don't give up yet; there's plenty of time for things to happen. Good night," and Jean turned on her pillow as though to sleep. Shortly after twelve o'clock, if one had been looking she might have seen girls hurrying from the different dormitories in the direction of Mrs. McAllister's house. On the small porch stood Edith and her mother ready to welcome the girls. "Come into the house and drink some hot coffee before we start, for it's bitter cold in spite of the fact that it's March. What time do you expect your man?" The girls were so excited that they declared they did not want the coffee, but preferred to wait on the porch for the arrival of the automobile which was to bring Mr. Doherty, professional swimmer and diver. "He promised to be here at quarter-past twelve," said Florence Cummings, "but I'm sure it's that now. What if he shouldn't come after all, and spoil our plans? I wish I'd offered him more money, but he seemed perfectly satisfied with my proposition. I think I'd almost be tempted to jump in myself if he didn't come. I don't just like the idea of an ice-cold bath, but I could do the swim all right. Are the ladder and rope here? Joe said he would bring them down after ten." "Yes," said Edith, "they're in the cellar with the lantern. Isn't it fortunate that there isn't a moon? It's dark as a pocket, so no one can see us. I can hear an automobile now. It must be the Hon. Mr. Doherty." In a moment a small roadster drew up in front of the porch and a stalwart youth alighted and approached the group. Florence Cummings greeted him with, "Good evening, is this Mr. Doherty? It's so dark I can hardly see you, but I'm Miss Cummings who interviewed you this afternoon." "Yes, Miss Cummings, it's me." "I was beginning to fear you weren't coming. You see it's very important work you have to do for us to-night and I think we'd better begin at once. Everything is ready and we will do exactly as you suggested this afternoon." "Yes, mum. I'm sorry to be late, but my auto broke down just after I was leavin' Boston and it took me some time to fix it, but I'm ready now." And then the little procession started, Mr. Doherty carrying one end of the long ladder and two of the girls helping on the other end. The other girls followed in the rear with Mrs. McAllister to chaperon them. They took a long roundabout way to avoid crossing the campus, and all waited a moment at the foot of the hill while Jean hastened up to the "Pond" to see if by any chance some of the sophs were on guard. Not a trace could she find of a girl, so she ran back to the others who anxiously awaited her. Then they all, silently and cautiously, followed her up to the spot agreed upon for the work. They had chosen the end of the reservoir farthest away from the college, and Mr. Doherty let down the long ladder until it reached the water. The heavy ropes which were tied securely around the ends of the ladder he trailed along the ground and tied firmly around the base of a tree which stood near by. Then taking off his overcoat and suit of clothes which covered his woolen bathing suit, he crept down the ladder and silently dropped into the water and swam toward the center of the reservoir. It took him some time to locate the little flag and loose it from its anchor, but finally it was done and he swam back and climbed the ladder and dropped the flag into Florence Cummings' lap. Then he drew up the ladder, untied the ropes, wrapped his fur coat around him and they hurried back to Mrs. McAllister's where the swimmer took a hot bath and a rub-down and drank what seemed to the girls gallons of coffee. Then he jumped into his automobile and was off to the city. It took the girls several moments to realize that what they had been working for so hard really had been accomplished and the coveted sophomore flag was here in their possession. "Now what shall we do with it?" said Florence Cummings. "I think the best place for it is in the trunk with the others," said Jean, and the rest agreed. Thereupon Mrs. McAllister removed the keys from her neck and Edith and Florence took two candles and went up to the attic and placed the flag with the others, after which they came downstairs for the last consultation of the flag committee. Although they had captured the sophomore flag they had not yet displayed their own, and to be effective it must be in evidence on the following morning and there remained but a few hours before sunrise. It was finally decided to fly it from the top of one of the dormitories. It would look like a tiny speck at such a height, but it would be beyond the reach of the enemy if carefully guarded until noon, when hostilities were to stop until the game itself. To make everything fair, lots were to be drawn and the girl drawing the piece of paper marked "3" was to have the honor of flying the flag from her dormitory. Mrs. McAllister cut the pieces of paper and marked them and then held them out to the girls. "Come, draw quickly, girls," and she approached Jean, who stood nearest her. Without hesitation Jean drew the paper nearest her and after one look waved the tiny white paper over her head, crying, "The die is cast! That flag shall fly from Merton or I'll die in the attempt. Come, fellow-conspirators, let us away that I may begin this bloody business," and the girls started back to the dormitories, Mrs. McAllister and Edith accompanying each one to the doors of the dormitories, where accomplices from within awaited their arrival. Anne Cockran had been chosen to guard Merton and she fairly pulled Jean into the reading-room to hear about the night's adventure. "No, not to-night, Anne, we've too much to do; we got the flag all right but now you've got to help me fly our flag from Merton. Don't ask me any questions, just do as I say and I'll tell you the rest in the morning. Get some sweaters and heavy coats and meet me at the roof-stairway as soon as you can." Each girl went silently to her room and collected as much heavy clothing as she could find and met as agreed upon at the stairway on the fifth floor which led to the flat roof above. "Now," said Jean, "I mean to go up on the roof and nail this flag to this flag-stick and tie it to the front projection of the roof where it can be seen by every one on the Row. After I have fastened it securely I shall come down to the stairs and lock the door with the key inside. I shall put these pillows and sweaters and coats on the stairs and make myself as comfortable as possible and stay there until twelve o'clock, so that our flag may be safe. When I want a little air I can go up on the roof or just keep the door open a bit. I've got plenty of crackers, so I won't starve. It's lucky to-morrow is a holiday, for I won't be cutting and no one can say I am breaking rules. It's only a few hours now till breakfast, so I must get a little sleep and you, too, Anne, or you'll be in no condition for the game. I'm all right; don't worry about me; 1915 will fly its flag, even if we are beaten at the game. We've broken one tradition and perhaps we can the others," and Jean, shut the little door, locked it and went up on the roof to execute her plans. She had a little electric light which she flashed every now and then to guide her over the flat pebbly roof until she found the corner projection. She nailed the flag to the flag-stick and tied it securely to the iron cornice. Her fingers seemed almost frozen when she finished, but her heart beat wildly as she thought that for the first time she was really doing something worth while for 1915. If she couldn't play basket-ball she could do this much, which was a victory, too, though in a smaller way. She got back to the stairway and settled down on her improvised couch, but, try as she might, sleep would not come. It seemed ages to her before the breakfast bell rang and then to satisfy her nervous hunger she munched some hard, dry crackers. She knew now that in a few moments the loss of the sophomore flag would be discovered and the freshman flag flying from Merton would enrage every Ashton sophomore and bring joy to the hearts of the freshmen. Suddenly, it seemed to grow close on the stairs and Jean opened the upper door and breathed in the cool morning air which refreshed her. One look at the flag assured her that it was safe and still waved proudly in the breeze. She gazed out over the college and admitted to herself that she was beginning to love it all, and was so glad that she was a part of it, even though only a very small, insignificant part. With the fresh air and renewed courage she went back to the stairs and waited. She heard the girls go up and down the corridors and she longed to ask them about the flag, but remained perfectly quiet. Presently she heard the sound of whispers and stealthy footsteps outside the door and then some one tried the knob. They evidently expected to find the door locked, for they shook and twisted the knob and rattled the door as if they meant to do business. She heard one girl say, "It's no use; the key's in the lock and we can do nothing unless we break the lock. Now's our only chance while the freshies are at mass meeting. Couldn't we get some tools somewhere? What do burglars generally use, anyway, when they break open locks?" "I don't know," some one answered, "but couldn't we get something sharp and a screw-driver and then unfasten the screws and take off the lock on this side and push the handle through, then perhaps we could push the key out and pry open the lock. Let's go down into the basement and see if we can beg, borrow, or steal some tools from Joe. We'll tell him we want to fix our trunks. We must hurry, though, for those freshies will be back here soon and on guard again," and they hurried down the corridor. Jean had listened to their plans with increasing fright. Suppose they did break open the lock, what could she do then? They did not suspect that she was there, and probably thought it would be smooth sailing if they could but open the door. She went up on the roof to see if by any chance she could find something to brace the door but all that presented themselves to her eyes were two brooms which some careless girl had left on the roof after sweeping her rugs, and an iron shovel which had probably been used last to shovel a path through the snow so that the maids could do their sweeping. Jean seized all three implements of warfare and hurried back again to the stairs and braced the shovel and then the brooms against the door. She knew the brooms would not do much good but she had more faith in the shovel. If the sophs were determined to get in at any costs, she would give them a hard struggle. Before long the sophomores returned and in addition to the tools, she felt sure they had brought more girls to help out. There was a scraping of a file and the turning of the screw-driver and Jean knew they were working as hard and as fast as they could. She wondered how near twelve o'clock it could be and if the mass meeting would ever be over. If they would only hurry, for in a few moments it might be too late! From the conversation outside the door the girls seemed confident that they would succeed, and were glorying in their luck. Just then Jean heard many footsteps on the stairs and a shout and as she listened she heard a tremendous shout of, "Rah, Rah, Rah, Freshmen; Rah, Rah, Rah, 1915; Rah, Rah, Rah, Jean Cabot; Rah, Rah, Rah, the flag," and she recognized Elsie Gleason's voice saying, "Unlock the door, Jean; it's twelve o'clock and we've won! We've come to thank you for what you've done. Come out where we can see you." When Jean opened the door she saw the hallway and the stairs filled with the freshmen, who sent up cheer after cheer for what she had done, but there was not a trace of a sophomore except the tools which they had dropped in their hasty flight. All Jean could say was, "Thank you, girls. I've only done what all of you would have done if you'd had the opportunity. I must go down now and get ready for the game, and I'm hungry, too. Is lunch ready?" Then the long procession turned and led Jean to her room, where it gave one mighty last cheer and then dispersed, and Jean closed the door upon them and sank down upon her couch and cried for real joy. CHAPTER XIII THE GAME The game was scheduled to begin at three o'clock, but long before that hour the great gymnasium was crowded with enthusiastic supporters of the rival teams. The sophomores and seniors with their friends filled the right side of the balcony, while the freshmen and juniors with their friends were at the left. At one end of the floor was erected a platform for the faculty, while on narrow benches on either side of the floor the teams and officials were to sit. The gymnasium had been gayly decorated with the blue and white of 1915 and the blue and orange of 1914; and huge banners were hung from the iron railing of the balcony. As Jean was on the flag committee she stood at the door and helped distribute flags to the freshmen. At last every one had been given out, and she hurried to her seat. Elizabeth and she were both fortunate enough to draw seats in the front row, not side by side, but only separated by two other freshmen, Mary Boyce and Ruth Witham. As she crowded her way down through the masses of girls she was stopped again and again to be congratulated by those who had just heard of what she had done. "Why, Jean, who would have thought it of you?" said Peggy Allison as Jean pushed by her. "It's lots better than making the team. Come down to the Inn with me after the game. I want you to meet my cousin, Miss Murray, from Radcliffe. I'm giving just a little supper for her, and it will be grand to have such a heroine as you with us." "Oh, nonsense, Peggy! I wish you wouldn't talk about it; it's nothing, but I shall be awfully glad to go down to the Inn with you. I'm starving already. You might introduce me to your cousin, though, instead of taking it for granted that we know each other." "Oh, I beg your pardon, Jean, but I'm so excited over what you've done that I have forgotten everything else. Allow me to introduce you to my cousin, Miss Janet Murray, Radcliffe 1914. Miss Murray, allow me to introduce you to Miss Jean Cabot, Ashton 1915. There, is that perfectly proper, Jean? Don't forget to meet us after the game." "All right," said Jean, "and I'm very glad to have met you, Miss Murray," and she finally reached her seat. No sooner had she sat down than the class cheer leader arose and said, "Ready, girls; three long cheers for Jean Cabot," and the gym resounded with the three long rahs with Cabot at the end. Jean blushed a little and then began to look about her, apparently unconscious of the sensation her appearance had created. She thought she had never before seen anything as exciting as the scene the gym presented now. There were rows upon rows of girls with their bright-colored flags and streamers, their faces aglow with excitement. Most of them were sitting down, but those not fortunate enough to secure seats stood in the back rows and leaned this way and that for a better view. It did not make much difference as long as they were there. Down among the faculty there seemed to be as much enthusiasm as in the balcony, only in a more subdued manner. Jean looked at Miss Hooper to see if she wore the white carnations she had sent to her that morning, and smiled to herself as she saw her holding them in her hands and waving them every little while as she recognized a freshman or upper-class girl in the balcony. Miss Emerson had many carnations and daffodils, too, the flower that the sophomores decided best matched their class color, and she noticed that almost all the faculty wore or carried some flowers or ribbons to show their preferences. "Oh, Mary, isn't it wonderful?" said Jean, as she seized Mary Boyce's hand, "and to think I might perhaps have played with them if I had only studied harder. You better believe I'll study harder next--" but she stopped, for the door of the dressing-room opened and the girls ran out upon the floor. "Why, Jean," said Ruth Witham, "what dandy suits the girls have. Are they new?" "Yes," said Jean, "it's a surprise. The girls made them all themselves. Doesn't Anne Cockran look too sweet for anything? Isn't she little? But she surely can make baskets if she ever gets half a chance." Just then the freshmen broke into a round of cheers for the team and every member on it, and in turn the sophomores gave their cheers. The two teams practised a few minutes at both goals and promptly at three o'clock Miss Matthews blew her whistle and the girls lined up ready for play. "Ready, sophs?" and Sallie Lawrence replied, "All ready." "Ready, freshmen?" and Bess Johnson replied, "All ready." The ball was tossed into the air, the whistle blown and the game was on. "Good," said Jean; "they're off; keep your eye on Bess Johnson. Isn't she tall? She ought to be able to put the ball right into the basket by just reaching up her hands," and as she said this, Bess Johnson, the freshman captain, with her superior reach touched the ball first and sent it spinning toward the sophomore goal. Anne Cockran, freshman forward, rushed in pursuit of the ball, but missed it and a sophomore guard captured it and passing it quickly to the center who, eluding her long-armed opponent, continued its course toward the freshman goal by sending it into the arms of a waiting forward. Before she could be covered, she tossed it up to the basket where for a moment it poised upon the edge and then rolled in. A goal in less than two minutes of play! A deafening shout arose from the sophs, and not to be outdone the freshmen followed suit, although Jean declared to the girls around her that she didn't see anything to cheer for. "To keep up their courage," said Elizabeth. "Don't be discouraged, Jean; they've only begun playing." "That's all right, Beth, but I'm superstitious about some things, and I firmly believe that the side which gets the first basket always wins the game." "Who told you that?" asked Ruth Witham. "Nobody," replied Jean, "but I believe it, and you see how it works out to-night." Although the sophomores had got a basket so easily during the first minutes, it was not so easy getting another. The freshmen did not intend to allow them to continue gaining points, and settled down to good steady playing. Both sides were pretty evenly matched, and their passing and guarding were excellent. The sophomore team was a little heavier than the freshman one, and perhaps lacked a little of the agility of the lighter girls. The ball went back and forth over the floor with an occasional attempt at a basket, until suddenly Anne Cockran got the ball in her possession and turning quickly to measure the distance to the basket, slipped and fell to the floor and for a moment lay there perfectly still. "Time!" shouted Bess Johnson, the freshman captain, and Miss Matthews blew her whistle. After the college doctor examined Anne carefully he found that she had twisted her ankle, and of course could not play the rest of the game. Very reluctantly Anne left the floor amid a deafening cheer, and if one had been in the gallery she might have heard many a freshman murmur to her neighbor, "Oh, isn't it a shame! And she's our best player. We've lost now, surely." After the doctor had bound up Anne's ankle and wrapped her in a big bath-robe, he carried her out to the players' bench, where she was to watch the rest of the game, even if it broke her heart not to be out on the floor playing. Bess Johnson called for "Phil" Woodworth to take Anne's place, and the game was on again. Quickly the ball was put into play and there was such rapid passing and clever blocking on the part of each team that one seemed to have little advantage over the other. The playing grew more furious, and several times the referee had to interfere in order to put the ball back into play. Finally, in one of these scrimmages almost under the sophomore goal, the ball rolled out from under the feet of two struggling contestants straight toward Phil Woodworth. Unguarded for the moment, she sprang quickly forward, seized the ball and, in her slow, hesitant manner aimed at the basket. The ball dropped into the basket, but not a second too soon, for at that very moment the timer's whistle blew for the end of the first half. There was a tense silence for a moment, followed by tumultuous cheers by the freshmen as they realized that the work of the substitute had tied the score. "Oh, I'm so excited I can't sit here another second!" said Jean. "Let's stand up a little while; my foot's asleep, I've kept it so long in one position. I'd like to walk a little, but there's such a crowd I never can get through it." "Better not try, Jean," said Ruth, "there isn't time, anyway, and it's fine to watch the crowd. Wasn't that splendid for Phil Woodworth? After all, it does count to be a substitute. Her room-mate, Grace Littlefield, told me just to-day that when the regular team was chosen and Phil didn't make it she was so disappointed that she declared she'd never play basket-ball again, and it took a lot of coaxing on the part of the girls to get her to promise she'd be sub. Why, I'd give everything I possess in the world to be down there playing, even as one of the subs! Poor Anne! How do you suppose she feels?" "Pretty sore, Ruth, and of course awfully disappointed, but she'll get her numerals all right, won't she? She certainly deserves them," said Mary Boyce. "Oh, girls, look!" said Jean. "There's Miss Emerson and Miss Thurston going over to speak to Anne. My! isn't that an honor! Think of Miss Thurston condescending to console an insignificant freshman! Actually, she is the coldest, most unsympathetic individual I ever ran up against." "Yes," said Elizabeth, "and she's just in the act of giving her some flowers one of her fond admirers sent her, and Miss Emerson is sharing her carnations, too. Doesn't she look dear in that new gray dress? I think she's the sweetest college president that ever lived, and I wish I could do something to have her give me even one little carnation, to say nothing of a whole bunch of them. Doesn't a game like this just make you want to do things for old Ashton? I'll be a loyal supporter even if I can do nothing more." "Oh, you'll do something, my fair Elizabeth," said Jean, "and before very long, too. How much more time is there? I wish they'd begin. I want somebody to do something. I hate a tie score." "Here come the girls," said Mary, as the girls took their positions and the whistle sounded; "now for some good fast playing." With the changing of the goals, the tactics of the sophomore team seemed to change, and their superior weight and greater experience began to break down the freshman defense. They had quickly scored two goals to the freshmen's one and added another point, when an excited freshman, through too strenuous holding, committed a foul. "Why don't they play more carefully?" said Jean. "They're just throwing the game away." And as if to add strength to her remark, the referee at that moment declared another foul and another point was added to the sophomore total. "Oh, I don't want to see the rest of the game," wailed Jean. "I can't see the sophs beat us so badly. Why can't our girls do something?" At the toss-off which followed, Bess Johnson gave a signal with her left hand and instead of sending the ball towards the sophomore goal she tossed it back into the hands of one of the guards, who, in obedience to the signal, had rushed forward. Catching the ball before it had touched the floor, she threw it accurately to a waiting forward who, before the bewildered sophomores had recovered from this unusual strategy, threw the ball into the basket. The score was now 8-4 in favor of the sophs. Encouraged by the success of this play, the freshmen redoubled their efforts, but to little purpose, as they were already beginning to show the effects of their strenuous play, so that except for one point added to their score by a sophomore foul they could do little more than successfully defend their goal. The game was rapidly drawing to a close when the ball going out of bounds was awarded to Bess Johnson to throw in. Closely guarded by the waving arms of her opponent, she glanced quickly over the floor and at that moment saw the agile form of Louise Harrison as, eluding her opponent, she rushed down with arms outstretched to catch the ball. With quick movement she threw it over the shoulder of her antagonist toward the rapidly moving figure, who, though going at full speed, caught it fairly. But she had not a moment to consider passing it to another nearer the goal, as two sophs rushed towards her. The basket seemed very far away indeed, but with quick concentration and taut muscles she threw with all her might. It seemed an interminable moment as the ball soared through the air, but at last with a little spiral drop it settled into the waiting net. [Illustration: WITH A QUICK MOVEMENT SHE THREW IT OVER THE SHOULDER OF HER ANTAGONIST.--_Page 258_.] Time was up, and the sophomores had won, but by the scantest of margins, the final score being 8-7 in their favor. It took a moment or two for the freshmen to recover from their defeat, and then they cheered as lustily for the sophs as though it had been their own victory. Then there was a wild rush for the gymnasium floor and the balcony was emptied of all its occupants. The sophs formed a procession, and some of the strongest girls carried their captain, Sallie Lawrence, off the floor amid shouts and cheers, and the freshmen, not to be outdone, seized Bess Johnson and followed suit. When the teams came out of the dressing-rooms again the sophs sent up a mighty shout. "The freshman flags, the freshman flags, we want the freshman flags!" As they shouted, each girl seized the hand of the one nearest her and they formed a circle round the gymnasium. When they dissolved the circle some of the cheer-leaders erected from convenient apparatus what most closely resembled a funeral pile in the center of the floor, and then called for the freshmen to form a line. Sallie Lawrence hastened to the piano and struck up the Funeral March and the freshmen slowly approached the pile and each girl dropped her flag and passed on out of the building. "Well, I don't care a bit," said Jean to an animated group of freshmen outside the gymnasium. "If they did win it was only by one point, and our girls really did some wonderful playing. Why, that shot of Bess Johnson's was worth the whole game. Isn't she a star?" Then looking around her she whispered, "Now to get ready for our banquet; if we can only succeed in that we won't mind losing the game." CHAPTER XIV THE BANQUET The freshman banquet was always held as soon after the game as possible in the hotel of some neighboring town, easy of access but out of the reach of the sophs. It took a great deal of clever planning to escape their vigilant watch, and many a time freshman classes never succeeded in gathering at this festive occasion, but 1915 was a very energetic class and determined at any cost to outwit their rivals. They agreed among themselves that the banquet should be held the following Monday evening at Langley Inn, Southtown, about twelve miles from Ashton, and the girls were to assemble there before six o'clock. No two girls were to be seen leaving the Hill at the same time, and they could take the train, the electric cars or walk to near-by towns and leave from there. Miss Hooper and Miss Moulton of the faculty were to chaperon them and bring them back to college when the celebration was over. A little after six o'clock on the evening agreed upon, Lois Underwood, chairman of the banquet committee, walked through the reception-rooms of the Langley Inn to assemble the girls into the dining-room. "Are we all here, girls? I'll call the roll first and let every girl reply, 'Here,' as her name is called." It did not take long to discover that Bess Johnson, basket-ball captain and star of the recent game, Edith McCausland, class president, and Jean Cabot, heroine of the flag-raising, were the only ones missing. "Who knows anything about these girls?" asked Lois, anxiously. Instead of an individual answer, there was a universal shout of "The sophs! They've captured them." "Well," said Lois, "perhaps we had better wait a few moments before we begin to eat, for they may only have been delayed. If any thing has happened to them we shall be terribly disappointed, but as so many of us are here we will carry out our original plans, and hope for the best about the missing ones." Just then one of the maids entered the reception-room. "Is Miss Lois Underwood here? She is wanted at the telephone in the office." "Oh, probably it's from one of the girls. I'll be right back in a minute and tell you what has happened." But when she returned, her face did not look as though she were pleased with the message she had received. "It was Jean Cabot telephoning, but all she said was, 'I sha'n't be at the banquet to-night.' Probably one of those horrid sophs has her imprisoned, and made her telephone that without any explanation, so it would be all the harder to bear." "Are you sure it was Jean talking?" asked Elizabeth Fairfax. "Perhaps a soph did it to deceive us." "No; I recognized Jean's voice all right, in spite of the tone of anger. I call it mighty hard luck, for Jean was to reply to the toast, 'How I Raised the 1915 Flag.' Of course it's an old story with most of you now, but none of us will ever get tired of hearing Jean tell it in that inimitable style of hers." Again a maid summoned Lois to the telephone, and she returned again with a downcast face. "It's Edith McCausland this time and all she said was, 'Don't expect me at the banquet to-night,' and before I could ask her the reason she had hung up the receiver." "And are you sure it was Edith talking this time?" asked another doubting freshman. "Yes, quite sure, for no one could mistake her deep-toned voice. Another of our speech-makers gone. Well, all I've got to say is that some of the rest of you will have to speak impromptu, for we must have toasts even if the sophs have stolen our famous after-dinner speakers." As the maid appeared smiling a third time at the door Lois said, "You needn't tell me I'm wanted at the telephone again, for I know it's Bess Johnson this time to give me the same old message. I'm not going to answer, for it's only giving more satisfaction to the sophs, and they can keep ringing all night if they want to, but I'll not answer them. Tell them Miss Underwood is too busy to answer the telephone. Come, girls, let us go into the dining-room. Take any seat you wish; we won't try to find our place cards, for we haven't any. Let's sing our class song as we march in. Nell Butler, will you please go to the piano and play for us?" Obliging Nell, who always was called upon to furnish music at all the freshman doings, hurried to the piano and struck the opening chords of the class song, and then the girls broke into song and marched double-file into the long dining-room. There were two large tables and one smaller one intended for the speakers and guests of honor. Lois showed Miss Hooper and Miss Moulton to their seats and then called out, "Anne Cockran, Phil Woodworth, Mary Williamson, Stell Leavitt, Clara Hawkins, Vera Montgomery, Gertrude Hollis, this way, please," and when they sat down there were still the three empty seats which were to have been occupied by the missing girls. "We want these seats filled, too," said Lois. "Betty Horton, you come over here, for you'll have to sing for us; and, Florence Cummings, here's a seat for you; prepare to tell us how you made the glorious 1915 flags we've lost forever; and, Eleanor Whitcomb, join the other celebrities; because of your sophomore room-mate you can talk on, 'What I Know about the Sophomores, after Rooming with One for Seven Months.' There, that looks better to have the table full. Ladies, be seated," and at the signal every girl sat down and seizing her knife rapped three times on the table with it, as they sang out, "Rah, rah, rah; rah, rah, rah; rah, rah, rah, the freshmen." Then they began to eat, and quantities of good things rapidly disappeared. One would almost have wondered how they could eat so much, for it sounded as though each girl was keeping up a continual conversation with her neighbor, and every one admits it is somewhat difficult to eat and talk at the same time, but a college girl can do almost everything and perhaps did not find this difficult. Anyway, they continued to eat until about eight o'clock and then Lois called on Miss Hooper to respond to the toast, "The Freshman as Seen by the Faculty." Miss Hooper, in spite of her predilection for mathematics, had a keen sense of humor and kept the girls in gales of laughter as she summoned up the funny mistakes of freshmen she had known, without making her remarks at all personal. The girls clapped and clapped when she finished, and many a one was glad to see this side of their mathematics instructor which was entirely lacking in class-room. "Now," said Lois, "we'll hear from Anne Cockran on 'How I Enjoy Being an Invalid.'" Anne couldn't stand up, and so leaned against her chair and very briefly but brightly gave her views of the game after she had been obliged to sit on the benches and watch the others. One girl after another was called upon and all sounded the praises of 1915 and told what it had to be thankful for, even if the game had been lost. They sang between the speeches, and with so much cheering and singing many began to get hoarse. Just after Eleanor Whitcomb had sent the girls into gales of laughter over her humorous description of the sophs as judged by her room-mate, the door from the hallway opened to admit the proprietor, who ushered in Mlle. Franchant and the three missing freshmen. Instantly every girl arose and cheered and cheered in spite of tired throats. Room was made at the center table and the four late arrivals were given the places of honor. "Everything's eaten," said Lois Underwood, "except what you see on the tables, but help yourselves freely to that. Only don't eat too long, for we're crazy to hear what happened to you and how you succeeded in finally getting here. Elizabeth Johnson, you're next on the programme; please give us an account of yourself." Bess arose and slipped off her long black cloak, revealing a somewhat soiled and torn shirt-waist. "You see, girls, I'm not dressed just exactly right for a banquet, but take me as you find me and you'll understand everything when I've finished. "We're here at last, although we never expected to be and it's been rather difficult getting here. Some way or other the sophs found out that we were to have the banquet to-night and they suspected we three girls would speak. They evidently decided it was too late to break up the banquet entirely, but the next best thing seemed to be to kidnap us and keep us locked up until it was too late to think of leaving the Hill. I left Wellington about three o'clock and walked down back of the dormitory, intending to take the electrics over at Canton Corners for Boston and then take the train at the South Station. "Before I had gone very far Elsie Atherton overtook me and asked me where I was going. Not daring to say 'in town,' I told her I was going for a little walk, for I hoped she would leave me at the Corners, and then I could walk farther down the street to take the car. But she replied that she was out walking, too, and suggested that I go down to her aunt's on Oliver Street for a few moments, as she had an errand to do there. I knew I had several hours ahead of me and that it would be less suspicious if I went with her than if I refused and boarded a car. I consented, and we soon reached her aunt's house. A maid let us in and said that Mrs. Wolcott was upstairs and wished us to go to her room. I followed Elsie up the stairs and we entered what I supposed was Mrs. Wolcott's room. Instead of meeting Mrs. Wolcott, a masked figure approached me and before I could realize what was happening I was seized by several other masked figures and blindfolded. Then I was commanded to sit down and my hands and feet were bound securely to the chair. Some one whispered in my ear, 'Now get to Langley Inn if you can,' and they left the room and locked the door behind them. "How long I sat there I do not know, but I twisted and turned and tried every way to free myself, but it was no use. In course of time the door was unlocked and some one else was brought in and bound to a chair as I had been, and I heard again the whisper, 'Now get to Langley Inn in time for your banquet if you can.' And then the door was locked. It did not take me long to discover that my companion in misery was Jean Cabot, and we were comparing our experiences and trying to plan our escape when the door opened again and a third victim was brought in, securely fastened as we had been, and given the same suggestion that had been given to us. "For the third time the door was closed and locked and we were left to darkness and ourselves. It took only a moment to discover that the new arrival was Edith McCausland, but before she could tell us of her experiences we heard the key in the lock and we waited for the fourth victim. The electric light was turned on and we heard one of the girls, who we afterward decided was Sallie Lawrence, take down the telephone receiver and call up 'The Langley Inn.' When the line was connected we were each forced to say that we would not be at the banquet. No one answered my call, so I concluded Lois had begun to suspect foul play and would have nothing more to do with it. After the telephoning was over we were warned not to try to escape, for it would be impossible, and if we were quiet and submissive we would be released before ten o'clock. We said nothing and were soon left to ourselves again. "We decided to make every effort to free ourselves, and after much straining and striving, Edith McCausland got one hand free. She had her old clothes on and in her shirt-waist pocket was a penknife which she had used that afternoon in the lab. With this she finally managed to cut the ropes from her other hand and then from her feet and she was free. Although it was pitch dark she succeeded in freeing Jean and me, and we breathed freely again and felt that half the battle was won. We did not dare to turn on the lights for fear the girls would see us, for we suspected they might be somewhere within sight of the room or perhaps in the very house itself. We groped around until we found the windows and as quietly as possible opened them. Jean discovered that the window she had opened was not far above the ground, and better still, had a stout trellis which reached to the very sill. She decided to try to crawl down it, for even if it would not hold her weight the distance to fall would not be very great and she was willing to risk it. Once out of the house the way would be clear. "Very slowly and cautiously she stepped down upon the trellis, which proved perfectly capable of holding her weight, and in a moment she was on the ground. We followed suit, and in my haste to be out I forgot to close the window and I'm wondering now if the cold air from the window has chilled the whole house. Anyway, I didn't go back to close it. We crept back of the house without saying a word and walked fully five minutes before we stopped to get our bearings and hold a consultation. Edith knew where we were and told us that a short cut would take us up back of Faculty Row. If we could only get one of the faculty to chaperon us we could telephone for an automobile and get out to the banquet before it was too late. We knew Miss Hooper and Miss Moulton were out here, so we determined to ask Mlle. Franchant to go with us, knowing her fondness for the freshmen. We stumbled through backyards and over fences and finally reached Mlle. Franchant's house. We told her our story and persuaded her to chaperon us out here. We telephoned for an automobile and here we are at last, a little the worse for wear, perhaps, but loyal members of 1915," and she sat down amid vigorous clapping and shouts of "Bravo!" Lois then called upon Edith McCausland to tell the story of her capture. "My story is very similar to Elizabeth's," she said, "except the first part. I had an afternoon lecture and when I came out of College Hall and was on my way to West, Helen Humphrey overtook me and asked me if I would like a short automobile ride. You know she rooms next to me and we've always been very good friends. Her aunt had offered her machine to her that afternoon and it would be at West in about fifteen minutes. I pleaded an engagement, but she urged so hard I thought I might go for an hour or so and then take a late train in town. After we had ridden until it was almost dark, Helen suggested that we stop for a moment at her aunt's house. I was on pins and needles, for I knew I must hurry or I'd never make the train. Still, it seemed the only polite thing to stop a moment and thank her aunt for the ride. "When we rang the bell we were admitted by a maid, who sent us upstairs. The rest of the story you know, for Bess has told you. It's been the most exciting experience I've ever had, but now that we're here and have fooled those horrid sophs, I don't mind the rest. But there's one consolation, girls, we'll be sophs ourselves next year and we ought to take all this in the right spirit, as no real harm has been done by our enemies," and Edith sat down as though she were very, very tired. The girls were impartial in their applause and gave Edith her full share and then Jean was called upon for her story. "I had planned," she began, "to leave Merton very early after dinner and spend the afternoon in town with my cousin at the hospital where she is training. After I had dressed and was just about to start, Gertrude Vinton came in to talk a little while, and when she discovered where I was going she decided to go in town with me, for, strange to relate, she has a friend training at the Massachusetts General, too, who knows Cousin Nan very well. She suggested that we visit the girls and then have lunch up town and go back to Ashton together. I tried to think of various excuses, but couldn't persuade her to change her mind. So there was nothing to do but for us to go in town together, and I made up my mind that I could lose her after we reached the hospital. "But she stuck to me closer than a brother and insisted that we see both girls at the same time if possible. When we arrived at the hospital we found her friend was on duty, so we both had one hour with Nan. We would have stayed longer, but Nan was obliged to report at four o'clock for ward work. Just as we were discussing where to go for lunch, Gertrude began to feel sick and declared she should faint if she couldn't lie down immediately. Nan took us into one of the little waiting-rooms and brought water and restoratives to revive her, and although she did not faint she declared she was in great pain and must get back to college as quickly as possible. She said she was subject to terrible attacks of indigestion, so she wanted to be in her own room in East rather than in a hospital in town. Nothing would do but I must go out to college with her. On the train she said almost nothing, but curled up in the seat as though she were suffering intensely. I pitied her and tried to make her as comfortable as possible, although inwardly I was raging because I was not on my way to our banquet. "When we reached the station, Gertrude said she felt better and thought she could walk to East if we went slowly, and I helped her. Strange to relate, we met no one on the Row or in the dormitory. Gertrude rooms alone on the first floor, and so we were soon in her room. She lay down on her couch a few moments and then asked me if I would go down to the other end of the corridor and ask Ethel Fullman to come in and help her. Of course Ethel Fullman is a soph, but not a particle of suspicion entered my innocent little head and I walked into her room as big as life to tell her how sick Gertrude was and how much she wanted her to go up to her room to help her. As I entered her room I found myself in the midst of five sophs and before I could tell my story they had seized me and blindfolded me and covered my mouth so I could make no outcry. I tried my best to break away, but they were too many for me, and I soon gave it up as useless. Some one put a long cloak over me and I was led for what seemed miles and miles. Finally we stopped, and were admitted to the house which the other girls have described to you. There's no need of my saying more, except that I think Mlle. Franchant was a jewel to come out here with us, and I move that we all rise and show her how much we appreciate what she has done." Every girl jumped to her feet and the walls echoed and reëchoed with the cheers for the popular French instructor. After the speeches of the three heroines of the evening other speeches seemed out of the question and Lois suggested that the rest of the time be devoted to dancing and singing. At ten o'clock they left the hotel and took the train for Boston, and, after crossing the city they boarded the last train for Ashton. It was a very quiet lot of freshmen that crossed the campus and entered the various dormitories, for they were very tired, but they felt a certain exaltation. Although they had been defeated in the basket-ball game, they felt that they had shown their superiority over the sophs in the other two events. When Jean and Elizabeth finally reached their room, Elizabeth said, "You must be dead tired, Jean, with all you've been through. I can hardly move, myself, and I've done nothing all these exciting days but just look on. What a heroine you are, Jean. You're getting to be one of the most popular girls in 1915." "Not at all, Elizabeth, and if I were, perhaps it's not the only kind of popularity I want. 'Some men are born great, others achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon 'em.' You know the quotation; well, perhaps it's true in my case." "Which one, Jean?" "Oh, there ought not to be a question in your mind. Good night. Please don't waken me in the morning. I'm going to take one of my seven remaining cuts," and she went to sleep with her head full of banquets and kidnapings and flag-raisings and basket-ball games. CHAPTER XV MR. CABOT'S VISIT All college days are not as exciting and as full of the unusual as those centering around the freshman-sophomore basket-ball game. It took but a little while to settle down to the regular routine of recitations and hard study. This was the time to do the best work of the year, for June was not far off, and that meant hot nights and hotter days when studying, except for an occasional examination, seemed out of the question. This does not mean that the girls did nothing else but study during the spring term, but it was what they concentrated most of their energy upon. Jean was studying hard, particularly upon her French, for she had not forgotten her promise to Richard Fairfax and to herself. Some days it was harder than others, and she wondered if, after all, it was worth while if her college education was to end in June. On one of these days when the morrow's assignments seemed harder than usual and she was just a little discouraged about ever getting them, she decided to go down to the post office for the afternoon mail which came in at four o'clock, not that she expected a letter particularly, but she needed the exercise and change of air. There were plenty of girls she might have asked to accompany her, but to-day she wanted to be alone. She apparently was not in much of a hurry, for she went out of her way and circled around the laboratories before starting in the direction of the post office. Leisurely she entered the office and gazed into her box and there indeed was a letter. But when she found it was from her father that changed matters entirely. She could not wait until she reached home to read it, but she sat right down in the office on the edge of the window sill and tore open the envelope and began reading the letter. It was very brief, but told her that unexpected business called him to the East and he was starting as soon as possible and would wire her when he reached Boston. Her joy knew no bounds; her father actually coming to see her and perhaps already on his way. Oh, how glad she would be to see him, and then she said aloud, "He will take me back home with him; I can't stay here and see him go back alone. Two months more here aren't worth it. I shall miss the girls and the good times and Tom's graduation, but they're nothing in comparison with father and California and the boys. Yes; I shall persuade him to take me back. I know I can do it. He can't refuse me when he sees how badly I want to go," and she hurried back to Merton to tell Elizabeth and the others the good news. As she ran up the corridor to her room, she saw Miss Hooper just turning away from the door. "Oh," gasped Jean, "isn't Elizabeth at home? I left her in the room when I went down for the mail. I'm sorry neither of us were here to receive you. Won't you come in now with me?" "Yes, Miss Cabot, I shall be delighted to, for although I came to see you both I wanted particularly to talk with you. Perhaps Miss Fairfax will return before long." Jean opened the door and led her to the most comfortable chair by the window. The conversation was general for a while and then Jean could not keep her secret any longer. "Oh, Miss Hooper, I've just received a letter from my father and he's coming East on business and will be in Boston in a few days to see me. I'm so excited I can hardly wait to see him. Just think! It's a long time from September to April." "How splendid!" said Miss Hooper. "Of course you are very anxious to see him, and no doubt he is as anxious to see you. How very _à propos_, too; I came to talk to you about something particular which you may care to talk over with your father, so I'll tell you now without waiting any longer. I came to ask you if you would like to spend the summer abroad with me and perhaps one or two of the girls. I generally plan to go over every two or three years and have decided to go this year. I knew you liked to travel and could afford to do so, and hoped you would like to go with me. We need not join any excursion party, but take things leisurely and go where our inclination leads us. I have always wanted to spend a summer in the British Isles, but have never had the opportunity before. If we started the last of June, right after commencement, we should have almost three months, for college does not open until late next fall. You wouldn't mind giving up going home for one summer vacation when there are three more to come, and especially if your father is coming to see you now. What do you think of the idea?" For a moment Jean could not speak and then she burst out, "Why, Miss Hooper, I wouldn't give up going home to California for anything in the world! Why, do you know, ever since I got father's letter I have been thinking of only one thing, and that was to beg him to take me home with him when he goes. You know, I've never intended to stay here more than one year, and so I can't see what difference it makes whether I go back home now or in June. And how can you want me to go abroad with you? I'm not the kind of girl you'd like to travel with; I've never been half decent to you since I came. I've tried to, sometimes, but I never can forget how foolishly I acted at the very beginning of the year when I left your mathematics class. If there's ever been one thing which has made me want to return to college another year, it was to apologize to you and take mathematics I over again with some credit to myself and to you. I have been ashamed of myself whenever I have allowed myself to think of it, and I now humbly offer you my apology." "And I accept it, Jean. May I call you Jean? I felt very bad when I discovered you had left the class and several times I was tempted to ask you the reason, but I thought sometime it would come out all right and you would tell me about it. From the very first I've wanted your friendship and your confidence and I have tried many times to gain it. I felt there was a reason for your attitude towards me and that sometime you would tell me what it was. Will you tell me now?" "There is not much to tell, Miss Hooper, but what there is you shall hear now. The first day of the mathematics class you may remember that I was late, and when I entered your room you spoke to me, as you had a perfect right to do, about my tardiness, and reminded me that the class began at nine o'clock and not several minutes after. Then you called on me for the Binomial Theorem, and because I could not remember it you called upon the next girl and after she recited correctly you, indirectly perhaps, blamed me because I did not know it. I am extremely sensitive, I admit, and was keenly hurt because I thought you had criticized me too harshly before the entire class. I realized that my foundation in mathematics was very poor, and I feared my work would be an utter failure, particularly as I had begun in such a way. I acted upon the impulse of the moment and got permission to drop the subject and substitute psychology in its place. Many a time I have regretted it, but it is done and I have been the one to suffer the penalty. It is a very poor explanation, Miss Hooper, but such as it is, I hope you will accept it." "Yes, Jean, and I see how much to blame I was, too. My greatest weakness has always been my sarcastic tongue, which I can never quite seem to control, try as I will, and I fear I have caused many another girl unhappiness through my thoughtlessness. I feel that I am as much to blame as you and I offer you my apology. Will you accept it?" "Yes, indeed, Miss Hooper." "And now, Jean, that we are talking along this line may I speak a little about your college course? I have been interested in you from the start, and I have followed your work in all the departments very carefully. I know how badly you got behind the first three months and the warnings you received. I know the fresh start you took and the steady progress you have made ever since, and the splendid all-around freshman you are showing yourself to be. I do not want it to stop there. I want you to come back to Ashton for another year, anyway, and, if possible, for the whole four years. You have an influence with the girls; you're a born leader and can accomplish great things or small things as you choose. I think you prefer the great things and it will take longer than this short year to accomplish them. I am not thinking of your taking my particular course, as you have said you wish to do, that in itself is a little thing, but it is the principle of the thing, for if you conquer that you will conquer the bigger obstacles that must beset your path. Education is not a four years' college course; it is life, and there are always going to be mathematic courses, which, though unpleasant, must be taken up and finished, and the way you meet them then depends upon the start you make now. "I realize that home means a great deal to you, and so it does to all of us while we have it, and the memories of it last us long after we have lost it, but it will mean all the more to you later on. I know what I am telling you, Jean, for I've lived and learned myself. I'm begging you with all my heart and soul to come back to us and be the fine, splendid woman your father and brothers expect you to become. Perhaps I've said more than I should, but I'm so anxious for you, Jean." "No, Miss Hooper, it's been splendid to hear you talk like this; it's as my mother would have talked; it's what I've needed all these years. I've always done pretty much as I wanted to, without considering any one but myself. You're right, I ought to come back and do what father and my brothers want me to do and what you want me to do and what I want to do myself. Yes, I admit it to you now; I've struggled against it all the year. Every time I've said I wasn't coming back I knew it wasn't right. Something in me always said, 'You are coming back; you know you are,' but I wouldn't listen and tried to deceive myself and everybody else, but I can't any longer. I'm coming back and take Mathematics I. and French, too, if I fail at June, and I'm going to work with all that's in me for dear old Ashton College. "Oh, thank you, Miss Hooper, for coming just when you did, for I think if I had seen father first it would have been harder for me to decide the right way. And now that I feel so differently about coming back, perhaps I shall change my mind about the summer vacation. You quite took my breath away by asking me to go with you. I couldn't believe that you would want to travel with any one as silly as I have continually shown myself to be. You said perhaps there would be one or two other girls. Have you asked any one else?" "No, Jean, because I wanted to find out first how you felt about it, and if you cared to go I wanted you to suggest others that you would like to have with us. Do you know of any one?" "Yes, I know of one whom I should prefer above all others and who would enjoy it more than all others, but I'm not going to tell you who it is just now, if you don't mind. I've got to think it all over, and after father has come and we have had a good talk together, I'm going to take him to your room, if I may, and tell you my decision. I'm very favorably inclined, though, at the present moment." "I agree with you that it would be best to leave it until your father comes and you can talk it over with him. I shall be very glad to have you bring him to see me as often as you care to while he is here. This has been a splendid afternoon, Jean, and I thank you for it from the bottom of my heart and I hope it is the beginning of many others." "I think you are the one to be thanked, Miss Hooper, and not I." "Well, perhaps we both can accept the other's thanks if we feel that we need to, and now I must hurry on or I shall be late for supper and that is a very poor example for a matron to set her girls. Come and see me often. Good-by for to-day," and she hurried down the corridor, leaving Jean smiling at the door. About a week after this conversation took place a telegram came informing Jean that her father would arrive in Boston on the next day, Wednesday, and she was to meet him at the train. It was a very happy and excited girl who watched the New York express empty its passengers at the South Station, and she was beginning to fear he had been delayed somewhere along the way, for at first she could not find him in the hustling crowd. But after a while, away down the platform, she caught sight of him waving his hat as he saw her up beside the gate. It was a joyful meeting, and how their tongues did fly! Mr. Cabot had been to New Haven to see Tom and Jean insisted upon hearing all about that. They sat down in the big waiting-room and talked and talked and looked at each other to be sure it was really they. "I can't believe you're really here, Daddy; it seems as though I were dreaming. Just pinch me and see if I am asleep or awake." A hearty pinch assured Jean that she was awake, but she exclaimed, "Oh, but it's good to have you here with me!" "Let me look at you, Jeannie dear; you're changed somehow. You look the same and still there's something in your face I've never seen there before. What is it?" "Nothing, Father, that I know of. I'm just glad I'm alive and you're with me, that's all. How long can you stay with me? I want to know, for there are so many things I want you to do and see." "I must go back to New York to-morrow night, Jean, for I have an appointment there the following day. How would you like to go back with me, girlie?" "Do you mean New York, Father, or California?" "Well, when I spoke I meant New York, but how about California?" "I should like to go to New York all right, but not to California. I did want to go badly only last week, but it's all over now and I've changed my mind and I want to stay at college the rest of the year and the other three years, too. And I've something to ask you, Dad, about this summer." And then she told him about Miss Hooper's plans for the trip abroad, and they got so interested in it that they forgot entirely where they were and what time it was. "Why, Father," exclaimed Jean, "here we're wasting perfectly good time sitting in an old railroad station when we might be up town or out at college! Look at the clock; we've been sitting here over two hours. Why, we won't get any supper if we don't hurry. You can stay with me at Merton for supper, and then I've engaged a room for you at the Inn for the rest of the time. I had hoped you would stay over Sunday, anyway. Just think of all the things I want to show you! When can I do it all?" "If there isn't time this trip we'll have to do what we can and leave the rest till next winter, for if you're going away from us all summer I'll surely have to find a business call east again soon after you return. Perhaps we had better start now." There followed a busy twenty-four hours for Jean and her father. He insisted upon meeting all the girls Jean had written him about and he talked with them about the events of the year, for he was perfectly familiar with them through Jean's long, breezy, confidential letters which reached him every Friday regularly. He was introduced to Mrs. Thompson and some of the faculty; he was shown the college buildings, the rare volumes and art treasures in the library, but he wanted most to see the corridor where Elizabeth had fallen asleep. He considered that second only in interest to the roof-stairs where Jean had guarded the flag. He visited the "Pond," and Mrs. McAllister's house, and the society rooms and every other place Jean could find time to take him. She had promised Miss Hooper that her father and she would have afternoon tea with her at four o'clock and she proudly ushered him into the tiny reception-room at Wellington, which was for Miss Hooper's private use. They talked about everything in general and Miss Hooper carefully avoided all mention of the European trip until Mr. Cabot said, "I think we ought not to stay much longer, Jean, for you know I must take the 6.17 train for Boston, so hadn't we better tell Miss Hooper what we have decided about Europe?" "Yes, Father, but suppose you tell her." "All right, dear; I'm very glad to do so. I'm very grateful to you, Miss Hooper, for the great interest you seem to have taken in my motherless little girl. She's a good girl, though, and I don't blame any one for taking an interest in her. If she wants to go to Europe with you for the summer, I tell her she can go, although we'll miss her terribly out home. She's the light of our house, you know, and it's going to be pretty lonesome without her, but I want her to see the world and make the most of herself, for nothing but the best will suit us. We're pretty particular, that's why we sent her east, and we want her to stay till you've given her all you've got to give and she feels she's learned enough to come back to California and take care of us. She said you wanted some one else to go with you and she does, too, and when I asked her who it was to be, it didn't take long for her to say 'Elizabeth Fairfax.' So I'm going to send her along with Jean, and I want you to do the same for both of them. Give them whatever you think is best for them and plenty of it. Jean doesn't want Elizabeth to know anything about it yet, for she's planning a surprise, but I'm telling you now so that you can go ahead with your plans and be ready to start the day after Tom's commencement. He's counting on having Jean there that day, for she's got to represent the family, so I shouldn't want to disappoint him; but after June twentieth, the sooner the better. Wish I could go with you, but I can't leave the business this year. "Just one more cup of tea, thank you, and we'll be going. This is the best tea I've had since I can remember. Have you learned how to make it, Jean?" "Yes, Father, I can make tea, but not like Miss Hooper's. Every one says she makes the best tea in college. Now we must go," and after a rather protracted leave-taking they almost ran for the train. As Miss Hooper was washing her tea-dishes and putting them away, she hummed a little song to herself and said, "No wonder Jean Cabot is such a splendid girl. How can she help it with such a father?" And as Jean and her father hastened to the little station, Mr. Cabot said to Jean, "Mighty fine woman, that Miss Hooper, mighty fine woman. Almost makes me want to study mathematics myself." In a few moments he was on the train, waving good-by to Jean, and if she had not had this great new happiness in her heart it would have been very hard to let him go back home without her, but she smiled bravely through her tears and walked back to Merton apparently as happy as ever. CHAPTER XVI PRIZE-SPEAKING Jean spent the spring vacation with Elizabeth up on "Olympus," as she called their hilltop village, and she found the beauty and new experiences of the spring as fascinating as those of the winter. Although every waking hour seemed filled to the brim, still it was a restful change and the two girls returned to college with new strength and enthusiasm to begin the last term of the year. They would need it all, too, for this is the hardest term of the year, with the hot, drooping days of May and June, and still hotter nights, when studying seems almost impossible and one is content to sit in the darkness and watch the stars and dream such dreams as float through college girls' heads on nights in June, when all the world is theirs. On the Monday after they returned to college, both girls went up to oratory class in the afternoon and sat back to enjoy the hour, knowing it was not their turn to mount the platform and hold forth. Jean sat near the open window and was breathing in the balmy air and watching some greedy robins snatch at the worms in the damp, new grass. She had almost forgotten there was such a thing as oratory until Miss Moulton's clear, penetrating voice brought her back to consciousness again. "Of course you know, young ladies, that prize-speaking is an annual event at Ashton, and it is a great honor to participate in it. Any member of the oratory classes is eligible. In the freshman divisions I have made it a rule that every girl must do one of two things: either she must learn a new selection or choose one already learned during the year and present it to the committee of the faculty chosen to judge the preliminary speakers; or she must write an original poem or prose selection and present it before the freshman oratory classes. The preliminary prize-speaking will take place in the chapel on the evening of May twelfth at eight o'clock. The annual prize-speaking will take place at three o'clock on the afternoon of June sixth. The classes will meet May twenty-eighth for the afternoon of original work. I hope you will all take great interest in this work and feel free to consult me at any time about it. Unless there are some questions to be asked now, we will consider the class excused." As the girls left the class-room there was but one topic of conversation, for Miss Moulton had filled their minds with but one thought. Neither one of her propositions pleased the majority of the girls, for one looked as difficult as the other. Of course a few were delighted with what she had said, for they had been anticipating the event and in their hearts had secret hopes of being the prize winner, even though there were upper-class girls to compete with them. The chapel steps looked so attractive in the afternoon sunshine that three or four of the girls wandered over there to sit down for a few moments to discuss the question. "What are you going to do, Jean?" said Anne Cockran as she limped up to join the girls. Although it had been a long time since her accident, she could not walk easily yet. "Don't ask me, Anne; I don't know. I don't like the idea of exhibiting my limited oratorical ability before the faculty, but positively I haven't an original idea in my head. I'll have to think it over." "Why, nonsense, Jean," said Bess Johnson, "everybody knows that original sonnet you wrote for Miss Whiting last month was the cleverest thing in our whole division. When Miss Whiting condescends to praise anything we freshmen do, you can take it from me that it's pretty good. You don't need to hesitate about going in for the original stunt." "Elizabeth," said Anne, "you've just got to try for the prize, for there isn't a girl in our whole division that can hold a candle to you. If you give that little poem, 'Carcasson,' with which you won Miss Moulton's heart last term, you'll melt the faculty to tears, and they'll put you on the finals before you've finished the second verse." "Oh, Anne, you flatterer, why I couldn't compete with you or a half-dozen more of the girls in our division, to say nothing of the upper-class girls," replied Elizabeth, smiling. "I'm trying for credit in my German, and perhaps history, and it takes every spare moment I can get to do my collateral reading. It seems as though Miss Evans tried to see how much work she could pile on us. I think I'll try at the preliminaries, though, because it's easier than working on something original. I can give something I learned last term, 'Carcasson,' if you all like that so well." "Like it?" said Jean. "Why, Beth, it's by far the best thing anybody has done in class this whole year and you've just got to give it, and I know you'll make the finals, and if you do, why, we'll all insist upon your trying for all your worth for the prize. Why shouldn't a freshman win it? Think of the honor for the class. You've been saying lately you wished you could do something for 1915, and here's your chance. Why, I think it's an honor just to be on the finals even if you don't win the prize. Who knows how many are generally chosen?" "Eight, I think," said Bess Johnson. "I was looking over Edith Thayer's memorabilia the other day and saw a last year's programme. Edith spoke last year, but didn't win a prize. As I remember it, there were eight speakers. Anyway, there were somewhere near that number." "What is the prize, Bess?" asked Anne. "Miss Moulton forgot to say anything about that, and I think it's the most important item." "The first prize is twenty-five dollars in gold and the second and third ten dollars each. Of course it's the honor more than the money that counts," said Bess, whose idea of money values was very hazy, being abundantly supplied by an indulgent father. Although Elizabeth said nothing she thought the twenty-five dollars would help her a great deal if, by any chance, it came her way, for she needed a new dress and hat for class-day, but she hated to ask her father for anything more this year. "Well," said Jean, "this loafing here will never do for me. It's society meeting to-night and I've got a theme to write before supper. If any of you want to see me, come right down to the room and make yourselves comfortable, but don't talk to me until I've finished my theme. I think the subjects get worse and worse every week. Where do you suppose Miss Whiting ever finds them? I should think her poor head would ache many a time before she found some to really suit her. I wonder if she ever corrects half of the themes." "I doubt it," said Bess; "they say Mary Dudley corrects the themes in the daily theme course, for she's doing special work in the English for her degree." All the girls seemed to have plenty to do, and Jean went down to 45 alone and worked on her theme for the next day and finished it just as the supper bell rang. When the preliminary prize-speaking took place, it was surprising how many entries there were, especially among the freshmen, for undoubtedly most of them had decided that this was the lesser of the two evils offered them by Miss Moulton. From the large number there were eight chosen for the finals and among them was Elizabeth Fairfax, the only freshman thus honored. There were three seniors, two juniors, two sophomores and the one freshman, and 1915 was jubilant over the fact that one of its members was chosen. When Elizabeth first heard of it she was a little frightened and declared she never could do it, but when she saw how all the freshmen felt the honor that was hers in being chosen to represent them, she determined to enter the contest with all the best that was in her and prove to them that she was as loyal to 1915 as any of the rest of them. She spent hours and hours with Miss Moulton and finally decided upon a selection which, like the others, was to be kept secret until the programme was announced. Every minute that she could spare from her regular work she put upon her selection, and as the fatal day drew near she went again and again to the chapel and mounted the platform to move the empty seats with her eloquence. Miss Moulton gave all the girls equal coaching, and worked harder, perhaps, than all the girls together. When she had heard the last girl rehearse her selection for the last time, she closed the chapel door behind her with a bang and locking it said to herself and the clinging ivy on the tower wall, "I wish there were eight prizes so they all could have one, for they all deserve one, still I hope--" But she did not finish, for in the gathering dusk she recognized Elizabeth Fairfax's slender figure advancing toward her. "Oh, Miss Moulton, can I have just one more rehearsal to-night? There's one place toward the end that troubles me." "No, Miss Fairfax, not to-night; you are tired and nervous and you must do nothing more. Take my advice and think no more of your selection to-night; go to bed early and have a good night's sleep and to-morrow morning you will have forgotten all about these imaginary troubles. It's always darkest just before the dawn, you know, so let's not think any more about prize-speaking. I'm very tired to-night, too, but I'm going home to read some really thrilling detective story or something equally absorbing until I get sleepy, and then away to bed in spite of all the work I ought to do. I advise you not to do any studying to-night, for you are excused from to-morrow's lessons. Good night, Miss Fairfax. I wish you a restful night and success to-morrow," and the two went their separate ways. There could not have been a more beautiful June day than the one chosen for prize-speaking. The sun shed its warmth and brightness over everything, and the little green leaves danced merrily in the soft summer wind. The rain of a few days before had freshened the grass and the flowers until it seemed as though they were outdoing themselves for this special occasion. Merry little red and gray squirrels ran up and down the great tall trees and then across the wide paths, out of sight to another tree, and some of the bolder birds sang lustily as if proud of their share in the day's festivities. All nature seemed to be clapping its hands to applaud the eight nervous speakers concealed somewhere in the rear of the chapel. Prize-speaking Day is properly considered the forerunner of Class Day and Commencement, hence the friends of the college make every effort to attend this annual event. Long before three o'clock the seating capacity of the chapel seemed taxed to its utmost, and the gallery had to be opened to accommodate the waiting throng. Members of the various oratory classes had been chosen as ushers and were pretty indeed in their white dresses, with sprays of green ivy twisted in their hair, and they carried batons wound with white and green ribbons. Jean was one of the two representatives of the freshman class and was enjoying every moment of her ushering, for it was the first time she had ever served in this capacity, as only the upper-class girls ushered at Vespers on Sunday afternoons. A few minutes after three o'clock, Miss Emerson welcomed the guests to the exercises of the afternoon and announced the entire programme of the days to come. Then she informed them that the three judges were from neighboring colleges and at the close of the speaking she would announce their decision regarding the prize. In conclusion, she asked that there be no applause, and then took her seat with the other members of the faculty in the front row of seats usually occupied by the seniors. One after another of the speakers came upon the platform, did their very best, thrilled their listeners and then took their seats on the front row of the annex which had been reserved for them. Last on the programme was Elizabeth Fairfax and she was to give Tennyson's "Lady of Shalot." When she came upon the platform she looked very small and white, and her simple muslin dress was the one she had worn the year before at her high-school graduation. Instead of coming to the front of the platform as the others had done, she stood back almost in the center of the stage, where it was a little dark in spite of the brilliance of the outdoor world. She stood for a moment without uttering a sound, and more than one of the vast audience thought she must have become stagestruck and forgotten the lines, but soon her sweet, clear voice began: "On either side the river lie Long fields of barley and of rye, That clothe the wold and meet the sky;" And she held every listener spellbound as she told the sad sweet story of the Lady of Shalot as though she were inspired, and when she finished with: "But Launcelot mused a little space: He said, 'She has a lovely face; God in his mercy lend her grace, The Lady of Shalot.'" For a moment there was absolute silence, and then followed tremendous applause in spite of what Miss Emerson had said. Every one looked at her neighbor as much as to say, "There's not a question but that she deserves the prize. I never heard anything like it." So there was not great surprise a little later when Miss Emerson in her quiet way announced the prize-winners and first called upon Miss Elizabeth Fairfax to come to the platform. In presenting her with the tiny box which held the twenty-five dollars in gold, she congratulated her upon her excellent work and said that for the first time in her memory the first prize had been given to a freshman, consequently she might be doubly proud of what she had done. Elizabeth thanked her, and very white and trembling took her place with the other speakers. This ended the exercises and as the audience arose many went forward to offer their congratulations. Jean seized Elizabeth and whispered, "You were just wonderful, but I knew you'd do it. Oh, I'm so proud of you and I wish Dick could have been here," and she gave her place to a long line of girls and faculty, who were waiting their turn to speak to her. When Elizabeth went up to her room from the supper-table that night she was tired but very happy, for her dream of doing something worth while for 1915 was realized. She walked slowly down the corridor and opened the door, expecting to find Jean there, for she did not see her in the reading-room with the other girls as she passed by the open door. She did not see Jean in 45, but she gave a little gasp at the sight which did meet her gaze. The study-table which usually stood in the center of the room was drawn up between the couch and Elizabeth's desk. It had been cleared of the books and lamp which usually adorned it and was one mass of brilliant bloom. There were roses and carnations and sweet peas and lilies of the valley filling the room with their sweetness. For several moments Elizabeth just gazed and then walking up to the flowers found there were cards attached to each bouquet. The roses were from Jean, the carnations from Miss Hooper, the sweet peas from Merton House girls, and the lilies from Miss Moulton. Elizabeth had never had so many flowers in all her life before and could not quite believe they were all hers. She buried her face in the great American Beauty roses and was whispering a secret to them when Jean came out from the bedroom. "Well, little room-mate, what do you think of yourself now? I couldn't stay away another minute. The flowers came while we were at supper and I hustled upstairs the minute I was through so I could have them arranged before you came. Then after everything was ready I waited and waited, but I thought you never would come. When at last I heard you coming down the hall, I hid in the bedroom to see what you would do. You looked just about as surprised as when Miss Emerson called you to the platform this afternoon." "Of course I was surprised, Jean. I never had so much happen to me in one day before in all my life and I can hardly believe it's true. How I wish Father and Brother could know all about it and see what you've done for me! I must sit down and write to them now so the letter will go out the first thing in the morning." "Before you write your letter, Elizabeth, I want to ask you something. Come over here on your couch and sit down, for you are tired, and we can enjoy the flowers there just as well as standing up in the middle of the room." "All right, Jean, but let me take one of your roses with me. It's the first time I've ever had an American Beauty of my very own. How good you were to give them to me! You must have known how badly I have wanted one." In a moment the two girls sat down upon Elizabeth's couch and in Elizabeth's hand was a beautiful, long-stemmed rose. "What are you going to do this summer, Beth?" asked Jean. "I don't quite know yet," Elizabeth answered. "I feel as though I were needed at home so that mother can go away to visit her people in Vermont, but I wish I could find some work to do, for I want to earn the money for next year to help father all I can. Some of the girls are talking about waiting on the table at the beach or at the mountains and I thought of applying, too. Christine Newell is going to the White Mountains and says she went last year and earned fifty dollars. She wants me to go there with her, but I haven't decided yet." "Before you decide, Elizabeth, I want to tell you something, and perhaps it will alter your plans a little. Miss Hooper is going abroad for the summer and has invited me to go with her. When father was here I told him about it and my decision to stay at Ashton for the four years. He was so delighted that he consented to the trip abroad for the summer and said I might take any girl with me that I chose. Now I have chosen you, Elizabeth, and I want you to say you will go to the British Isles with Miss Hooper and me for your vacation. I have known about it ever since father was here and it has been awfully hard to keep it a secret, but I wanted to wait until after prize-speaking, for I made up my mind that if you didn't win the first prize I should offer you this as a consolation prize, and if you did win the prize then this would be my own special prize. What do you say, will you accept my prize, too?" At first Elizabeth could not speak and just looked straight at Jean as if to determine whether or not she was jesting. "Why, Jean Cabot! What are you talking about? I spend a whole summer in Europe? Why, you must be dreaming. I've never been out of New England and don't expect to go to Europe till I've taught years and years. Why, all the money I have in the world is this twenty-five dollars I won to-day and I need that to buy my class-day dress and hat and shoes. Where do you suppose I'd ever get the money? Why, it takes more than it does to go to college." "You big goosie, you don't understand. You needn't consider the money; I'm going to take you for my companion and it isn't to cost you a penny. Father would like to go himself and would if it wasn't for business, so he wants you to go with me in his place. Don't you see now what I mean?" "Yes, Jean, but why do you want me? There are so many of the other girls like Peggy and Natalie and Sallie, who have traveled and know more about the world than I. I'm pretty green, you know, when it comes to society." "Nonsense, Elizabeth; if I hadn't wanted you more than any one else I shouldn't have asked you. Is it 'yes' or 'no'? Quick!" "Why, you take my breath away, Jean. I can't believe you want me to go with you." "Yes, I do, I tell you, and you must say 'yes,' for I shan't take any other answer. Now write your letter home and tell them what you are going to do, or rather get their permission to do what you wish to do. After you finish the letter we'll take it down to the office and then go over to Miss Hooper's room for a minute. You want to thank her for the flowers she sent you, and I want to tell her that you are going with us. She will tell you what her plans are, and from now on we must do a lot of reading with her about the places we are to visit, for we don't want to appear to be perfect ignoramuses in the land of our forefathers. Of course you know English history from A to Z, but I can never tell one king from another and always mix up all the battles and wars, so it's good hard reading from now on for me." "Of course you know I'd like to go, Jean, but it's so sudden I can't quite grasp it all, but I'll write home and tell them all about it, and when I hear from them I can tell you definitely." "I'm going to write a letter to your father this very minute, too, and tell him what I think about the matter. Let's see who will finish first." Both pens scratched away at a merry rate, and each girl found so much to say that the college clock struck eight before either one realized it. "There, I've finished," said Jean. "How about you?" "I have a little more on this page and then I'll be ready. You collect the letters on the hall windows and go downstairs and register and I'll be through by that time." After the letters were dropped into the box outside the post office, Jean exclaimed, "There, that's off my mind! Now to tell Miss Hooper." They found Miss Hooper alone in her study lying on the couch because of a severe headache. The girls insisted that she remain there in spite of her protests. "We're only going to stay a minute, anyway, Miss Hooper. I've come to tell you that Elizabeth has consented to travel with us this summer." Elizabeth opened her mouth to say something, but Jean began again, "She hasn't really said she would go, but she's written home and after she hears from her father she'll tell us 'yes' pretty quickly. Won't you, Elizabeth?" "I think it's wonderful, Miss Hooper, but it's just like Jean, always doing something to give pleasure to other people. I want to thank you, too, for the beautiful flowers you sent me. I don't deserve all the good things that have come to me to-day." "If you didn't deserve them, dear, I am sure they never would come to you. We shall be a very congenial trio, I am sure, this summer, and I wish you both would come to see me Wednesday evening next so we can talk over our plans. I have a list of reading to give to you. Jean tells me you are a lover of history and literature, Elizabeth, so perhaps you have read my list already. If so, we shall depend upon you for a great deal of our information, for there is very little time left in which to do a great deal of work. I am sorry I do not feel better to-night, for we might have begun now." "No, Miss Hooper, we must not stay a moment longer," said Jean. "Elizabeth is tired, too, and we both have a little studying to do before ten o'clock bell. I hope your head will be better in the morning. Good night." "Good night to both of you, and thank you for coming," said Miss Hooper, and the two girls left Wellington and strolled slowly homeward in the shimmering moonlight. As they neared Merton, Elizabeth broke the silence. "I hate to go indoors, Jean, and have this splendid day end. I am inclined to believe it's all been a dream. Pinch me and let me see if I'm really awake." "Oh, you're awake all right, Elizabeth," said Jean, but she gave Elizabeth's arm a vigorous pinch to assure her that she really was awake. "It's only the beginning of a whole summer of splendid days if you'll only say you'll go with us." "I'll go, of course," said Elizabeth, "if father thinks it's all right," and the two girls left the summer moonlight behind them and climbed the stairs to 45. CHAPTER XVII THE TENNIS TOURNAMENT It did not take long for a letter to come back to the two girls from Dr. Fairfax, gladly giving his consent to the proposed plan for the summer and expressing his gratitude to Jean and her father for giving so much happiness to his "little girl," as he always called Elizabeth in spite of the fact that she had long since grown up. Both girls were highly elated over the prospects of their trip, and for the first few days could hardly keep their mind on anything else. However, they both were determined to make the most of the last days of college and each found her different interests absorbing. Elizabeth had been putting all her spare time on her extra work in history and Jean hers on the tennis courts. Ever since warm weather had made outdoor sports possible, the indoor gymnasium work had ceased, and the girls athletically inclined found plenty to interest them out of doors. Ashton could well boast of its splendid tennis courts directly back of the gymnasium, and on any pleasant day one would find the courts crowded. Jean had been out from the first day the courts were ready for use, and was easily acknowledged to be one of the best players in college--without a question the best player in the freshman class. Several of the upper-class girls, among them Natalie Lawton, Madeline Moore, and Avis Purrington, were working hard and had announced their intentions of going into the tournament. All along Jean had also secretly determined to enter, if it were a possible thing, and she wanted to win, too. It was her last chance to really do something for 1915, freshman year. The only obstacle that stood in her way was her fear of failure in French, but when she went to Mlle. Franchant late in May and asked her concerning her work, her joy knew no bounds when she was told that her mark was a passing one and she could enter the tournament. On the night of the twelfth of June, the day before the tournament began, several of the tennis enthusiasts were down in Natalie Lawton's room discussing the events of the next day. "What do you think of the weather, Nat?" said Peggy to her room-mate, who stood at the window, apparently lost in thought as she gazed out into the dark and cloudy night. "Doesn't look very promising, girls, does it? It will be a shame if it rains. We have had such perfect weather all the month it seems as though it might last two days longer. The courts are in perfect condition now and a heavy rain will spoil everything. How's your courage, Jean? You've drawn first round, haven't you, against Cora Hammond? I'm in the other court against Avis Purrington. How's your shoulder to-night?" "A little lame, Nat," said Jean, "but I'm going to rub it well and turn in early, for I need the sleep all right. I'm dead to the world. If you don't mind, I think I'll say good night now, rival. Are any of the rest of you coming upstairs with me? You all need sleep, so take my advice and stop eating that candy and get a good night's sleep." "Well, who ever heard of such nerve?" said Natalie. "The idea of a little freshie giving advice to us seniors and juniors. But then, I guess you're right in spite of your age, for I admit I'm tired, too. Suppose we all follow suit and turn in." "Good night, girls," called out Peggy. "Good luck to you all, although, of course, you can't all win the prize. By the way, what is the prize?" "Why, Peggy," said Natalie disgustedly, "you know perfectly well that there isn't any prize. It's the honor of the thing. Isn't that enough?" "Yes," said Peggy; "I'd forgotten about it. Well, 'Happy dreams,'" and then the girls scattered to their different rooms. In spite of the gloomy outlook of the weather the night before, the morning of June twelfth was as perfect as its predecessors had been, and all that the tennis players could wish for. The preliminaries were to be played throughout the day, as the programmes of the girls allowed. On the next morning were to come the semi-finals and in the afternoon the finals, when excitement always ran highest. About twenty of the girls had entered the tournament and most of them were speedy players. There were only two freshmen--and the others upper-class girls. Although Natalie Lawton had won the championship the year before, it had been with great difficulty, and her opponent, Madeline Moore, was all the more anxious to win out this year. Popular sentiment had picked Natalie Lawton, Madeline Moore, or Jean Cabot as the winner this year, so it was not at all surprising to the student body as a whole to learn that at the end of the preliminaries these three and a hitherto unsuspected sophomore, Mabel Hastings, were to play in the semi-finals on the following morning. It was rather a coincidence that each of the four classes should have a representative. The semi-finals took place at ten o'clock, and there were some of the hardest sets ever played at Ashton. Jean was playing Mabel Hastings and won after five sets, 7-5, 1-6, 6-8, 6-3, 6-1 and Natalie Lawton won from Madeline Moore in three sets, 6-2, 6-2, 6-1; so Natalie and Jean were left to fight for the finals in the afternoon. Jean was so excited that she declared she could eat no dinner, and hurried to her room to lie down and rest until the finals, which were to begin at three o'clock. Elizabeth carried up her dinner and compelled her to eat all that she had brought her, knowing how much she needed nourishment after her violent exercise of the morning. Then Jean lay quietly in her room, although she could not sleep from excitement, and she waited for the minutes to pass until it should be half-past two o'clock. It seemed as though every girl in college had turned out to see the finals. The early comers had filled the few seats which the ground afforded; the rest either sat on the grass or stood in little groups near by. Here and there among the white dresses could be seen the severely dark clothes of a man, for it was one of the few events to which the "masculine element" could be invited. This event was followed so closely by Class Day and Commencement that some of the favorite brothers or cousins or friends of the seniors were inveigled into coming a little earlier, ostensibly to witness a tennis tournament, but in reality to bask a little longer in the sunshine of the Sweet Girl Graduate. Promptly on the stroke of three, Jean and Natalie, in their immaculate white linens, walked coolly out upon the courts and the play began. By the toss of the racket Jean won the first serving and sent one of her usual swift balls into the opposite court. Natalie was there to receive it and sent it back as swiftly as it had come. Both girls seemed very evenly matched, but Natalie, by deep driving to Jean's backhand, won the first game. Her luck changed at this point though, and Jean jumped into the lead of 3-1. Natalie seemed spurred on by this, and by more hard, deep driving soon had Jean on the run. She played into the net oftener and with this style of play the lead changed to Natalie at 4-3. The eighth game was very close. Jean got to 30-40 on Natalie's serve, but fast driving on Natalie's part won her the game, making the score 5-3 in her favor. Jean won her serve in the next game and even got an advantage in the tenth, but then the last year's champion rose to the occasion and by taking a net position, won three successive points and the first set with a score of 6-4. There was a rest of fifteen minutes before the second set, and the two players left the court and retired to the gymnasium. The crowds out of doors circulated around the grounds, introducing their guests and talking over the remarkable playing of both girls. At the end of the fifteen minutes the players returned and, changing courts, began the second set. This set was not as close as the first one but was as full of spectacular playing. Natalie took the net oftener and by splendid smashing ran the score up to 4-1 in her favor. Weakening a little in the next game, she failed to return Jean's excellent service, so Jean took advantage of it and won her second game in the set. This seemed almost to enrage Natalie, and she went after the last two games in whirlwind fashion and outplayed Jean in every way, making the final score of the second set 6-2. It was all over before Jean realized it, and she had lost, and Natalie had won the college championship for a second time. [Illustration: NATALIE WENT AFTER THE LAST TWO GAMES IN WHIRLWIND FASHION.--_Page 328_.] She saw the girls hurrying toward Natalie, but she was determined to be the first to congratulate her, so she dropped her racket and ran as fast as she could to the spot where the almost exhausted champion had dropped. "Congratulations, Natalie," she said; "you certainly deserve the championship, and I'm mighty glad you won it." All Natalie could say was, "Thank you, Jean, but I hate to take it away from you, for you wanted it so badly." "Don't you worry about that," said Jean, smiling bravely. "I've got three more years to try for it, and you've only one. I'll have it yet, see if I don't. And I'd rather have you win it than any one else in college. We kept it from the sophs, anyway, and there's a lot of consolation in that. I'm monopolizing you, Nat, for all the girls are waiting to offer you their congratulations. It was splendid; that's all I've got to say." Jean had to acknowledge to herself that she was terribly disappointed, but as soon as she realized she had lost, she decided to make the most of it and not let any one else see her real feelings in the matter. She smiled in her most friendly manner to all of the girls who came to compliment her on her splendid playing, and to offer their sympathy for her defeat. She was as much surrounded as the real champion and accepted all of the homage in a most gracious way, although she secretly longed to be away from it all and alone by herself to have it out once for all. It was some time before she could leave the girls, for it was an ideal day to linger out of doors and no one seemed to be in a hurry to leave the courts. At last she managed to tear herself away from a gushing freshman and her fond mamma who was visiting Ashton for the first time, and felt the necessity of seeing everything and everybody worth while, and started down towards Merton hoping that she would not be held up again. She had gone but a little way when she heard some one calling to her from behind. At first she pretended not to hear, but the calls became louder and more insistent, so she turned around and saw Anne Cockran hurrying towards her and waving for her to stop. There was nothing to do but wait, so she stopped right where she was until Anne caught up with her. "I've been looking everywhere for you, Jean. Where have you been? Every time I got my eye on you on the courts you were completely surrounded by fond admirers and I couldn't get within ten feet of you. Finally I got discouraged and went over to talk with Bess Allison and some friends of hers, and when I left them and looked for you there wasn't a trace of you anywhere." "I was held up by that gushing Gladys Norton and her mother, and thought I never should get away from them, and when I finally managed to extricate myself I was so tired of people and conversation that I made a bee-line for Merton." "Which means," broke in Anne, "that you wish I hadn't butted in to bother you some more. That's just the reason you didn't stop when I called to you. Well, cheer up, Jean, I'll not bother you long; I just wanted to talk to you a few moments, but I'll leave it until another time if you want me to." "No, Anne dear, of course not; but it was just because I was tired and disappointed and felt a little grouchy at every one. You know how you felt the night of the freshman-sophomore basket-ball game when you got hurt and couldn't play any more. We both know what it is to be disappointed, don't we? But I'm better already with just seeing you this short time, so tell me what you wanted to and I promise you my undivided attention." "I wanted to ask you something rather than tell you something, and I'm just a little afraid to do so. You know room-drawing comes the day before Class Day and I wanted to know if you had made your plans for room-mate next year. I want to ask you to live with me. I'm sort of tired of Merton and perhaps one of us will draw another house and choose the other for room-mate. I don't want to room with Sallie another year. She's a dandy girl and we've had a good year together, but isn't just exactly my style, and then besides, she's a soph and we are always at swords' points when it comes to class spirit. But you are just the girl I want. We're in the same class and society and we like the same things and the same people and we both want to make basket-ball next year and I'm going in for tennis, too. I've never played a game in my life, but after to-day's games I wouldn't miss it for anything. Of course you don't want to room with Elizabeth another year. She's all nice enough and a fine student, but not at all your style. She'll probably want a single, anyway, won't she?" "I don't know, Anne," said Jean very thoughtfully. "Well, anyway, Jean, it doesn't make any difference to us what she wants to do, the main thing is that I want to room with you. What have you to say about it?" "Why really Anne, I haven't thought anything about next year. I've been so happy these days with things just as they are that I guess I thought everything was going on as it is now. When we are contented we don't want to change, do we? It's awfully nice of you to say that you want to have me room with you and I appreciate it, but honestly, Anne, I can't do it. Why, if Elizabeth will have me, I want to go on rooming with her. I couldn't really stay at college without her. She's my safety-valve and inspiration and all that sort of thing. She brings out the best that's in me and I need her more than anything else in the whole college, and then, besides, I think the world of her. She's the most lovable girl you can imagine, after you get to know her. I admit she doesn't go in for clothes and men and good times generally, but she's clever and she's going to amount to something before she leaves this place. I haven't asked her yet; but if she's willing I want her for my room-mate next year, and it doesn't make much difference where we room. I've grown very fond of Merton, but I'd prefer Wellington where Miss Hooper lives. "By the way, I'll tell you a secret. Miss Hooper and Elizabeth and I are going to travel together this summer in the British Isles. Isn't that splendid? Now, Anne, please don't be angry with me because I won't room with you. You see how it is. We can be the same good friends as ever, can't we, even if we're not room-mates?" "Yes, I suppose so," said Anne, "but I'm disappointed and I can't get over it in a minute. I can't understand what you see in Elizabeth; she seems to have hypnotized you from the very first of the year. She's all right and sweet and good enough, but I can't understand your awful crush on her." "There, there," said Jean, "don't get so excited or you'll be saying things you'll be sorry for later on. Will you come up to 45 until supper time? I want to get into some fresh clothes. I feel as though I'd been through a Turkish bath. Wasn't it frightfully hot in the sun? It was right in my eyes the last game. Isn't Nat a perfect wonder at the game?" "Yes, but so are you, and I was just boiling that you didn't win. You put up a much better game than she did all through the 'prelims' and semi-finals; you had all the hardest players up against you, and by the time you got to the finals you were all tired out. I think you deserve as much credit as Natalie, even if she did win at the end." "My goodness, Anne, but you've got it in for everybody this afternoon! Come upstairs with me and eat some candy and see if that will sweeten you a little." "All right, I will, thank you; I haven't had any candy for an age. I'm dead broke since I bought my Class-Day hat and I don't get another cent until I go home. I'm afraid I'll even have to borrow some money to buy my ticket home unless Dad will be favorably impressed by my last frantic appeal for a little more money." The girls finished a large box of chocolates, and by supper time Anne was in a much better mood, although still disappointed because Jean was not to room with her. When Jean came up from supper that night a little later than usual she found Elizabeth at her desk writing a letter. She stole softly up behind her and put her hands over her eyes and called out, "Guess who's your room-mate next year, Elizabeth." "Oh, is it you, Jean? I've been wanting all day to ask you about it, but I didn't quite dare. I heard some of the girls talking about the room-drawing last night when I was waiting on table, and that was the first time I knew anything about it. I thought things would go on just the same every year unless one wanted to change." "And do you want to change, Elizabeth?" "No, Jean, but I wasn't so sure about you. There are so many of your other friends, you know." "Well, Elizabeth, I'm perfectly satisfied with my present room-mate and don't intend to change her for any one else. I wish we might room in Wellington so we could be near Miss Hooper, but wherever we are we'll be together, won't we? Now I must write a letter to Tom about Class Day, for he wants to know everything he's expected to do, and if I don't get the letter mailed in the morning he won't have time to make any elaborate preparations. Have you any message to send him?" "Why, no, Jean; I'll save them until I meet him Class Day. Now get to writing, for it will be ten o'clock before you know it and you must be tired after your strenuous day." "Yes, I am tired," said Jean, "but this letter must be written if it takes till midnight," and she wrote several pages of full particulars about Class Day to Tom, who was to be her special guest on that day. He was to take her back with him for Yale Commencement and then see her safely to New York, where she was to meet Miss Hooper and Elizabeth the day before sailing. CHAPTER XVIII CLASS DAY Class Day at Ashton always came on a Friday with Commencement the following Wednesday, and although the undergraduates were not generally expected to remain over for the latter event, they all took great interest in the former and made it the gala day of the year. Each girl had the privilege of inviting as many guests as she wished, but it pretty generally narrowed down to one, except in the case of the graduates who had all their mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters, uncles and aunts, cousins, and friends to entertain besides "the one" who generally hung around in the background, endeavoring to be gracious when the opportunity presented itself. On the night before Class Day, Jean and Elizabeth were busy in their room with their clothes for the following day. Jean was not satisfied with Elizabeth's hat which she had brought out from town that very afternoon. "Now, Elizabeth, do your hair low as you intend to wear it to-morrow and let me see what I can do in the way of trimming hats. I don't like this shape at all the way it is now. It's not at all becoming, and I want you to look your prettiest to-morrow. The roses are a beautiful pink, but they want to come down lower on the hat." While she was talking, Elizabeth had been fixing her hair and had coiled it low on her neck. "Does that suit your Majesty now? You're altogether too fussy about my personal appearance. Who do you suppose will notice me in all the crowd? If I had a man coming over from Harvard or Yale it would be different, but wandering about by myself no one will know whether my hair is up or down or whether my hat is the latest thing from New York or trimmed at home by the country milliner." "Why, Elizabeth, how can you talk so? Remember Tom is going to be your guest as well as mine. We three are going to do things together, so you'd better make up your mind to look your prettiest, for Tom is mighty particular when it comes to girls. There, your hair looks much better and the hat fits down closer to your head. I'm going to take off the bow and put it on the other side after I've put the roses down flat around the crown. They're too stiff, sticking up in the air. Now look in the glass and see how you like the effect." "Oh, it does look ever so much better, Jean. Just stick in some pins where you want things to go and I'll do the sewing." "No, you won't; I'm going to finish it. Who says I can't trim hats?" Just then there came a vigorous knock at the study door. Jean seized the hat from Elizabeth's head, and still holding it in her hand hastened out into the other room just as Peggy Allison, acting upon Jean's cordial, "Come in," entered the room. "Going into the hat business, Jean? I wish you'd take a look at my hat. I'm awfully disappointed in it now that I've got it out here. It doesn't look at all as I expected it would. Guess it will have to do, though. I haven't time to bother with another. That's the trouble with waiting until the last moment to do things, but I do hate buying hats in Boston. What time do you expect Tom, Jean?" "He's coming over from New York on the midnight, so he'll probably be out here between ten and eleven o'clock. I told him there was no need of coming before ten, anyway, and I'll be busy until that time with our chain, for we have left part of it until morning to finish, as our daisies gave out. Is your part finished?" "Yes; we were through about five o'clock and were tired as dogs. Oh, by the way, Jean, Nat wants to see you a moment about the spread tickets right away, so I'll excuse you and visit a little while with Elizabeth if she isn't too busy to talk with me." "All right, Peggy; I'll go down there this minute and take my hat along to finish. Beth, please hand me my sewing-bag on the couch. Thank you," and then she ran down the stairs with a knowing smile on her face. About an hour later Jean burst into 45 and found Elizabeth alone. "Come, Beth, I'm ready to have you try on your hat again. I've finished it, and when I tried it on Natalie it looked simply stunning. Come over to the glass where you can see yourself." As Elizabeth went over to where Jean was standing, Jean caught sight of a small bow of green ribbon pinned conspicuously on the left side of Elizabeth's white shirt-waist. "Oh, Elizabeth," she cried, "are you really pledged to Gamma Chi? It's too good to be true! Now I've got everything I've wanted. You're to room with me next year, spend the summer with me in Europe, and be initiated into Gamma Chi when we return in the fall. I've known all the year that when the girls came to know you as well as I did, they'd want you to join Gamma Chi, but I didn't tell them, for it was much better that they should find it out for themselves. Oh, isn't it splendid! You're my sister now, you know, forever." "But, Jean, didn't you know anything about it until just now? You don't act so awfully surprised." "Oh, yes; I have known since last society meeting that you were to be invited to join, but just when I didn't know, for it was Peggy Allison's duty to ask you. But the minute she came into the room to-night and kindly invited me to leave, I knew what was about to happen. Were you surprised yourself and are you pleased?" "Yes, Jean; I was surprised, but it's only one more of the things I thought could never happen to me. It seemed all right that you and the other girls should do them, but I seemed different from you all. I am glad to join, for I've wanted to go with you on the Monday nights when you went to society. You society girls always seemed better friends than those outside, and I felt I was missing something. I can't see, though, why they should want me to join." "Well, I shan't tell you again, for fear of making you too conceited. It's enough to know that they do want you, and now you're to become a good, loyal member of Gamma Chi. Oh, you must wear your ribbon all day to-morrow. It will show off nicely on your white dress. Is there anything else I can do to help you? We mustn't leave anything until to-morrow, for there's so much to be done then. Directly after breakfast you must go up to the gym to help finish our daisy-chain. I'm going out before breakfast to help gather more daisies, so if I don't get back in time to eat breakfast, just save me a roll and a glass of milk. Tom will arrive on that half-past ten train, probably, and I must meet him, for he doesn't know anything about the Hill." "Do you suppose he'll get lost, Jean, if you don't happen to meet him? What makes you take the time to go to the train?" "Why, do you suppose I'd let him come all that distance without meeting him? What are you thinking about, Elizabeth?" "Well, don't try to do too much to-morrow, for you've got to save some strength for your week at New Haven. Tom, being so particular about girls, will want his sister to look her prettiest, especially as she's to be the solitary representative of his large family. There's the bell! Hadn't we better stop talking and go to bed?" "Yes, Beth, I suppose so; but I'm not a bit sleepy to-night. I could sit up till midnight and just talk. You go to bed. I think I'll just read a little more of this story and perhaps I'll get sleepy." "Oh, don't read any more, Jean; you'll be sleepy enough after you once get into bed. It's excitement that makes you feel so wide awake." "All right, dear, I'll do as you say. You see I do need you to make me take care of myself," and the two happy but tired girls were soon in their beds and asleep. Jean had set the alarm clock for half-past five o'clock, and dressing in some old clothes started for the field back of the dormitories where it was white with daisies. She was chairman of the committee to make the daisy-chain, and was anxious that it be a success. She found four of the other girls ahead of her filling great baskets which they had brought for the purpose. After they had picked all they could possibly carry they went up to the gymnasium and began weaving the chain. When they arrived, it was long after the breakfast hour, but one girl, more thoughtful than the others, had brought a box or two of crackers and so saved her starving companions. More girls arrived every few minutes, and all worked hard, so that they were able to finish the long chain about half-past nine o'clock. They looked much the worse for wear and their dresses were wet and stained from the flowers, and Jean's hair was fast coming down round her face and neck. Her dress was badly torn in the front where she had stepped upon it in her haste to get into the gymnasium. As she and Elizabeth and Anne were hurrying down the Row to Merton, Anne, looking down toward the station, spied a young man coming in their direction, with a suit-case in his hand. "Here comes some one's man," she said. "Hope he's early enough. Evidently some one forgot to meet him." "Why, girls," exclaimed Jean, "there's something strangely familiar about him. I do believe it's my brother Tom. He must have taken an earlier train than I wrote him about. What a sight I am to meet him! I had planned to dress in my very best and go down to the ten-thirty train, and here I am looking more like a tramp than anything else. It is Tom, and I can't help how I look; I'm going to meet him," and she ran down the Row and was soon in her brother's arms, while the other girls hurried into the dormitory away from sight. "Oh, Tom, I'm so glad to see you! Don't look at me. I'm ashamed to have you find me like this, but I've been working since six o'clock on our daisy-chain. I didn't expect you for another hour. What do you mean by coming out at this time of day?" "Well, sister, you see I got in town very early this morning and didn't have a thing to do after I finished my breakfast. Time began to hang heavily on my hands, and then, too, I wanted to see you, so I came out here on the first train I could get, but I'll go back if you are so disturbed at my early arrival." "Of course I was only fooling, Tom; don't get so sarcastic. I'm delighted that you're here, only I'm a little ashamed to have you find me in such messy-looking clothes. But let's not stand here on the Row talking. Come up to the Hall. I'll find Peggy Allison and send her downstairs to talk with you while I get into some good clothes. I have a room engaged for you down at the Inn and we'll go down there before lunch. Peggy's going to have a Harvard man out to-day and we've planned that you two will be together during the exercises this afternoon, for we have to sit with our classes. "Before I forget it, Tom, I want to ask you to be particularly nice to Elizabeth. She's never known many college boys and didn't invite any one to be her guest to-day. I told her you were going to be her guest as well as mine, so please help me give her a royal good time. She's a mighty nice girl after you get to know her. At first she's a bit shy, but when you get her interested in something she's as lively as the next one. She's been invited to join Gamma Chi, and that shows she's all right, for only the nicest girls in college belong to that society." "Isn't that a little conceited, Jean, considering the fact that you belong to it yourself? However, if you and Peggy Allison are samples of the girls who are members, it's all right. "So this is Merton, the famous Merton. I call it a pretty fine sort of dormitory for a girls' college, of course not to be compared with ours, but rather decent, just the same. Are you going to live here next year, too?" "No; you see we had room-drawing yesterday and my name commencing with 'C' comes near the top of the list and I drew a room in Wellington where Miss Hooper is matron." "I suppose because you're a soph you've chosen a single." "No, Tom, I've a double, and Elizabeth is going to room with me again next year and every year, I hope. After you know her you'll understand why I want her. Now go into the reading-room and make yourself comfortable and I'll see if I can find Peggy and send her down to you." "Don't worry, Jean. I don't have to be amused. I'm perfectly able to take care of myself if you don't find her." But Peggy was available and perfectly willing to devote herself to Tom Cabot, of whom she was very fond in spite of the few times she had met him. About half an hour later Jean and Elizabeth came downstairs dressed in their soft white muslins and flower-bedecked hats. They did look attractive and Tom beamed approvingly upon them and was most gracious as Jean introduced Elizabeth. Then she said, "Now we'll go down to the Inn and then we're ready to show you the sights. You've got to see everything while you are about it, so we'd better hurry, for lunch is to be served half an hour earlier than usual to-day." They went to the Inn and found it thronged with guests and students and it was very fortunate for Tom that Jean had engaged his room several weeks in advance. After he had deposited his suit-case they started out on their tour of inspection. Tom kept the girls busy with questions about everything in sight, and insisted upon knowing the name of every good-looking girl they met. Once in a while they stopped for introductions, and dropped into Miss Hooper's room in Wellington for a few moments. "It's a mighty nice place, for a girls' college," said Tom as they finally entered Merton just as the bell sounded for lunch; "there's only one place I know of that's better and that's--" "Yale, of course," said Jean; "you needn't bother to tell us. Are you ready for lunch now?" "Ready! I should say I was; I'm nearly starved. I could eat half a dozen lunches. It's hours since I had my breakfast. Lead me to the food quickly or I perish. Am I going to be the only man among all you handsome girls? Not that I mind at all, but I'd like to know beforehand so I won't make any awful breaks to disgrace forever the House of Cabot." "Don't worry, Tom; there'll be plenty of men besides you. Most of the girls will have their out-of-town guests here. Elizabeth is to wait on table, but we'll see her again after lunch. I've got to find Mrs. Thompson to see where we are to sit, for we won't have our regular seats to-day, as lunch is to be served in the reading-room as well as in the dining-room." Lunch over, a lot of the young people met in the hall and introductions were pretty general. Peggy's man, Mr. Paul Thorndike, Harvard 1912, and Tom became good friends at once and agreed to stick together closer than brothers until the Tree Exercises were over, when the girls were to meet them and take them to the spreads. They strolled up the hill to the trees where the exercises were to be held, and found the grounds fairly alive with the Class-Day guests in their best summer gowns and hats. Beyond the space allotted for the classes were rows upon rows of settees for as many of the guests as could be accommodated, and the others leaned up against the chapel or College Hall or walked back and forth in the background. Just after two o'clock the three lower classes appeared in view carrying a long white daisy-chain. The band, concealed behind the trees, began to play softly, and at the sound of the music the girls swayed back and forth, lifting their chain in the measure of the music and then danced in and out of the trees and finally formed two long lines on either side of the opening to the space roped off for the tree exercises. The chain was held high above their heads, and all at once every voice broke into "Alma Mater" and the stately seniors in their black caps and gowns marched down between the rows of girls and stood by the seats nearest the "Grand Old Elm," as the tree was called, under whose branches the temporary platform had been erected. Then the other classes dropped their chain upon the ground and marched two by two to their places. They had been singing "Alma Mater" all this time and when every girl stood by her seat all finished the verse they were upon and sat down together. There was an address of welcome by the class president and then the tree oration, followed by the class history, which was extremely funny from beginning to end and boasted of all 1912 had done in her four glorious years at Ashton, and ended with the distribution of gifts to the undergraduates. There were class songs and class yells, and after the senior class ode the Class-Day marshal proposed that they cheer all the buildings. Forming as they had done at the beginning of the exercises, the under-class girls cheered the seniors as they passed through the double lines and headed the long procession that hurried on from one building to another. Not one was forgotten, and many a throat ached when they finished and disbanded at the chapel steps. Each girl then hastened to find her guests and go on to the society and private spreads which were to be held in the society rooms and some of the college buildings. "Did you think we would never finish?" said Jean, as she and Elizabeth and Peggy hastened up where Tom and Mr. Thorndike were leaning against College Hall. "No," said Tom; "I enjoyed every moment. You've sure got some clever girls in this college. That was one of the best tree orations I ever listened to. Please introduce me to Miss Mary Frances Buffington. I'd like to talk with her. What's next on the programme?" "We're going now to Gamma Chi spread in our club rooms, then after you've eaten all you can there, I've tickets for the Alpha Delt spread and the Tennis Club spread in the gym, and Madeleine Moore has invited us to a private spread in her room over in South. Of course we don't have to take them all in, but I think it will be loads of fun, for everywhere we go we will meet different people, to say nothing of the eats, which of course will appeal to Tom more than anything else. I propose for once to see if I can satisfy him on that score." At all the spreads they found food and interesting people in abundance and laughed and talked and made and renewed acquaintances to their hearts' content. Every one was gay and happy and filled with the college spirit and was young at heart if not in years. Fathers and mothers and even grandparents mingled with young girls and men and seemed to be as much a part of it all as their sons and daughters. Where is there another place in the world so productive of good-fellowship and joy as a college class day? From Madeleine Moore's upper room, where they went last, they sat by the windows and listened to the Glee Club singing the old college favorites. Old girls who were back for the day joined the singers on College Hall steps and swelled the chorus to two or three times its usual size. Every now and then the tinkle of the mandolins and guitars could be heard above the sweet voices of the girls and then was lost in the heavier choruses. It was almost dusk when the last notes died away and there still remained the dance in the gymnasium. Tom left Jean and Elizabeth at Merton to dress for the dance, and he hurried to the Inn to get into his dress-suit. When the three strolled across the campus again in the direction of the gym, a perfect fairyland met their astonished eyes. Thousands of bright Japanese lanterns were strung about the entire grounds and swayed gently back and forth in the soft summer breeze. Here and there were the moving forms of belated dancers like themselves, moving mysteriously through the semi-darkness. "I hate to leave such beauty," said Elizabeth. "I don't care anything about the dancing, so why not leave me here on one of these benches, Jean? You and Tom can go in and dance and stop for me when you come home." "Well, I should say not," answered Tom. "Haven't you promised me part of the first dance and as many more as I want? Do you think we're going to leave you here for some prowling night-watchman to abduct? No, you've got to stay with us till the very last moment and perhaps between some of the dances we'll stroll out here for a cool breath." When they finally reached the gymnasium, they found it literally packed with dancers, but they waded their way through the crowds, and Tom began the dance with Elizabeth, for Paul Thorndike had noticed Jean's entrance and begged her for the dance. It was not much pleasure for any one, as there was so little room that one was continually stepped on or crowded against a passing couple. "I think about half an hour of this will be enough for me, Jean," said Tom, after the first dance. "I'm as fond as anybody can be of dancing, but this is too much for me. Let's go up in the gallery and watch the others." So up they went into the gallery and watched the whirling mass below them. It was much more fun, and many of their friends followed suit and joined them. Occasionally some of them went down on the floor, but returned almost exhausted with the struggle. About half-past ten o'clock, Elizabeth suggested that they take her home if they would not let her go alone, and she found Tom and Jean were both as ready to go as she. When they stepped out into the fairyland of the campus, Jean exclaimed, "I agree with you, Elizabeth; this is much better than in that crowded, stifling gymnasium. Let's walk around out here for a while until we cool off." It was beautiful out there in the cool stillness with only the muffled music breaking it occasionally, and all three became strangely silent for such very talkative young people. Jean broke the silence by exclaiming, "I know now what Cousin Nan meant that first night when she and I stood just here and she said, 'Dear Old Ashton! How I love it all and how I hate to leave it, for it has done so much for me!' Then I couldn't understand what she meant and I smiled to myself as I listened to her, but now it's different and I can say all that she said, only I'm so glad I am coming back next year, and the next, and the next, for three whole years. This going to college is the best thing in a girl's life, isn't it, Elizabeth?" By this time they had reached Merton and good-nights had to be said, but Tom and Jean were to take an early morning train and had all the day to talk things over. Although it was very early when the train drew out of the little station, Elizabeth was there to see the two off, and as the train started, Jean called from the platform, "Good-by, Beth, see you in New York a week from to-day. Don't let Miss Hooper lose the train, for you know she has all our tickets and we can't go to Europe without her. Good-by!" and the train steamed away as a very happy freshman started back to Merton to think things over. It may be that some of the readers have become so interested in the doings of Jean and Elizabeth that they would like to know what they and Miss Hooper did during the summer of 1912 in the British Isles. For the benefit of these it may be stated that a second volume, entitled "Jean Cabot in the British Isles," will appear, giving their experiences in that delightful country. * * * * * * Transcriber's note: The spelling and punctuation of the original have been preserved. Obvious punctuation errors and misprints have been corrected. Blank pages have been deleted. The third sentence of Chapter XV has been retained as it appears in the original publication.