fluting in melodious minor cadences.

Patricia started and looked up with a sunny smile.

"Was I humming?" she asked genially. "I didn't know I was making any
noise at all. I'm awfully sorry to have gotten on your nerves. I was
thinking about some exercises, and I must have thought out loud."

Miss Green, much mollified by Patricia's ready acknowledgment, beamed
over her round spectacles.

"I am sure Miss Kendall has the best intentions possible to any
agreeable young lady," she said in a hushed though ceremonious manner.

She paused so long, regarding Patricia with her head on one side, that
Patricia was afraid she was going to orate further, and visions of a
premature initiation flitted uneasily through her nimble mind. Miss
Green, however, said nothing further, taking up her tools and going on
with her work with a complacent and benignant smile in her little pink
mouth.

Griffin, who was just behind her, winked solemnly at Patricia and then
shook her head sadly, as if to indicate that the monitor was in her
opinion hopelessly incorrigible.

"Doesn't Greeny make you a bit weary?" she asked, as she slipped over
beside Patricia as the gong was about to sound. "She's so drearily
ornate."

"Oh, I don't know," replied Patricia easily. "She's kind, anyway. I
think if she were thin, people wouldn't find her half bad. Fat people
never seem quite as human as the rest of us."

"Stuff!" said Griffin energetically. "She'd be simply awful if she
were thin. Aren't you coming in to see Naskowski's lion-tamer? He's
showing it in the clay room."

"I'll be along later. I've got something to attend to first," promised
Patricia, inwardly quaking lest the other should offer to wait for her;
but she went off with the crowd that was hurrying into the clay room,
and Patricia was free to arrange her surprise.

Diving under her stand, she fished out the bundle and opened it with
trembling fingers.

"If I can only get them all placed before they come back," she said to
herself, as she unwrapped each little bulky parcel. "I hope Naskowski
gives me time."

CHAPTER IV

THE INITIATIONS

"Wasn't it the flattest thing you ever saw?" said Patricia,
disgustedly, as they waited for Judith at the side door. "I thought it
was going off well when Griffin opened the ball by finding her little
figure poked away there on the stand back of her head, and made such a
cute speech to it, but the rest of them certainly behav