ers before her. "Wake up, Norn, and give me a criticism. Ju has
to go to bed and can't hold the pose much longer anyway."

"Pooh, I'm not a bit tired," protested Judith. "I sit this way every
night for _hours_."

Elinor laid down her brushes and turned in her chair. Her face lighted
as she saw the rough, vigorous outlines of Patricia's latest effort.

"That's the real thing, Miss Pat!" she said enthusiastically. "If you
can keep it up like that, you won't have to be ashamed of it, I can
tell you!"

She came and stood behind Patricia, her hands on her shoulders, eager
and interested.

"That shoulder is a little too high, and the head needs more fullness
at the top--Ju has lots of hair--but it's going along splendidly,
_splendidly_! Don't touch it again till Judith poses tomorrow. You
want to keep close to life and not make up anything."

Patricia, meek in experience of past failure, covered her work and put
it safely away.

"I'll go on with it when I'm rested and Judy is fresh," she said
contentedly. "If it goes on as rapidly as it has tonight, it will be
ready to turn in at the end of the week. We have until Saturday night
to put in our stuff, you know. You have to get yours in by noon, don't
you?"

Elinor nodded. "But I shan't have any trouble finishing in time, I'm
sure," she said with bright confidence. "I feel as though it were
almost going to do itself."

The spare hours of the rest of that week were devoted to the prize
designs, and both progressed so happily that their authors were filled
with a greater measure of content as the days sped.

"I'm going to take mine in to the Academy to work on this afternoon
while I wait for the night life," said Elinor on Thursday as they were
leaving the breakfast room. "I want to see how it looks among the big
casts and life studies. I'm afraid it won't show up very well among
the real things, but it may help me to see its faults and remedy them
while I still have time."

Patricia gazed approvingly at the dim, shadowy study of graceful
figures grouped in attentive attitudes about a reader in a landscape of
suggested loveliness that spoke to any observer with delicate symbolism.

"It's the best ever," she declared. "I'll 'wagger,' as Hannah Ann
says, that you lift the medal."

Elinor gave a gently contemptuous sniff as she stowed it away in its
corner. "No doubt--with all those experienced students competing!
Some of them have been there ten year