r the sophomore preparatory, which corresponded to the second
year in high school back home. And yet, after what her father had
written, she felt that she was not giving the Dean a square deal.

The odor of tobacco came through the library window, and acting on the
spur of the moment, she stepped around the corner of the veranda and
perched herself on the window sill.

"Are you busy, Uncle Cassius?" Anybody who was well acquainted with Kit
would have suspected the gentleness of her tone, but the Dean looked over
at her with a little pleased smile. Her coming was almost an answer to his
reverie.

"Not at all, my dear, not at all. In fact, I was just thinking of you. I
am inclined to think after all that we will begin with the geological
periods. I wish you to get your data assembled in your mind on prehistoric
peoples before we take up any definite groups."

"That's all right," Kit answered, comfortably. "I don't mind one bit. I'll
do anything you tell me to, Uncle Cassius, because," this very earnestly,
"I do feel as if I hadn't played quite fair. I mean in coming out here,
and landing on you suddenly, without warning you I was a girl, and I want
to make up to you for it in every possible way. I'll study bones and ruins
and rocks, and anything you tell me to, but I want to make sure first that
you really like me. Just as I am, I mean, before you know for certain
whether all this is going to 'take.'"

The Dean glanced up in a startled manner and looked at the face framed by
the window quite as if he had never really given it an interested scrutiny
before. Not being inclined to sentiment by nature, he had regarded Kit so
far solely from the experimental standpoint. Since she had turned out to
be a girl, he had decided to make the best of it, and at least try the
effect of the course of instruction upon her. The personal equation had
never entered into his calculation, and yet here was Kit forcing it upon
him, quite as plainly as though she had said:

"Do you like me or don't you? If you don't I think I had better go back
home."

"Well, bless my heart," he said, rubbing his head. "I thought that we had
settled all that. Of course, my dear, the reason I preferred a boy was
because, well"--the Dean floundered,--"because scientists hold a consensus
of opinion that through--hem--through centuries of cultivation, I may say,
collegiate development,--the male brain offers a better soil, as it were,
for the--er--er----"