in the jolly,
hail-fellow style which went straight to her bruised heart and soothed
her wounded feelings sooner than she knew.

She kept her place at the little table in the cafe with Rosamond, of
course, but after the first day she did not go into her room at
tea-time, going instead into the big room downstairs where the girls
and their guests came every afternoon to consume thin bread and butter,
and innumerable cups of tea and packs of petite-beurres. Rosamond had
thought her own dainty service with an exclusive friend all that could
be desired, but Patricia rejoiced in the atmosphere of the club room
with its great grand piano and the groups of interested girls, with a
sprinkling of equally interested and clever guests. The steaming,
gleaming samovar with Doris Leighton's friendly face behind it brought a
warmth to her heart the first afternoon that Constance had insisted on
her cutting the hour with Rosamond and going with her to the tea-room
below.

She found the easy chat and gay banter of the friendly groups the more
to her taste, because she had come from a rather trying quarter of an
hour in Rosamond's room, where Mary Browne--with an _e_ as she always
explained carefully--was being shown the purchases which had seemingly
consoled Rosamond for her withdrawal.

Mary Browne, a slim, dark-eyed, good-looking girl with a bored manner,
was lounging in a chair, looking with reverent yearning at the articles
as they were exhibited--Rosamond trying each on and enlarging on its
points of excellence.

Mary Browne, though of the purest blood, was, as she put it, "rather
strapped," and wore her shapely garments longer than even Patricia did.
Her soul was in the matter, as anyone could see by the way in which she
looked at each article, murmuring tensely through her aristocratic
teeth, "It's a stair. It's a _star_."

Patricia had just come from a flying visit to little Rita Stanford, whom
she had suspected, from certain little sounds coming over her open
transom, to be crying, and the contrast to that heroic little person
putting aside her fresh grief to try to be entertaining to the newcomer
in her hall made Patricia suddenly rather contemptuous of this
worshipful attitude toward the mere accessories of life.

She had sprung up with relief when Constance's knock gave her the chance
to escape, and in spite of Rosamond's rather absent protests, she had
gone downstairs with Constance.

The tea-room was very full tha