t you pay her traveling expenses. I would accept those for her
without the slightest embarrassment, but I agree that the matter would
better be kept private between us."

"You are a real fairy godmother!" exclaimed Adam, shaking her hand
warmly. "Would it be less trouble for you to invite her room-mate
too,--the pink-and-white inseparable?"

"No, thank you, I prefer to have Rebecca all to myself," said Miss
Maxwell.

"I can understand that," replied Adam absent-mindedly; "I mean, of
course, that one child is less trouble than two. There she is now."

Here Rebecca appeared in sight, walking down the quiet street with a
lad of sixteen. They were in animated conversation, and were apparently
reading something aloud to each other, for the black head and the curly
brown one were both bent over a sheet of letter paper. Rebecca kept
glancing up at her companion, her eyes sparkling with appreciation.

"Miss Maxwell," said Adam, "I am a trustee of this institution, but
upon my word I don't believe in coeducation!"

"I have my own occasional hours of doubt," she answered, "but surely
its disadvantages are reduced to a minimum with--children! That is a
very impressive sight which you are privileged to witness, Mr. Ladd.
The folk in Cambridge often gloated on the spectacle of Longfellow and
Lowell arm in arm. The little school world of Wareham palpitates with
excitement when it sees the senior and the junior editors of The Pilot
walking together!"

XXV

ROSES OF JOY

The day before Rebecca started for the South with Miss Maxwell she was
in the library with Emma Jane and Huldah, consulting dictionaries and
encyclopaedias. As they were leaving they passed the locked cases
containing the library of fiction, open to the teachers and
townspeople, but forbidden to the students.

They looked longingly through the glass, getting some little comfort
from the titles of the volumes, as hungry children imbibe emotional
nourishment from the pies and tarts inside a confectioner's window.
Rebecca's eyes fell upon a new book in the corner, and she read the
name aloud with delight: "_The Rose of Joy_. Listen, girls; isn't that
lovely? _The Rose of Joy_. It looks beautiful, and it sounds beautiful.
What does it mean, I wonder?"

"I guess everybody has a different rose," said Huldah shrewdly. "I know
what mine would be, and I'm not ashamed to own it. I'd like a year in a
city, with just as much money as I wanted to spend, horses and