"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?"



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.