lifted her head. "She hasn't any brother, but it is true
about her father. The doctor knows. She wonders how the story got out. It
was a secret. Mary changed her name. She--she fought me."

I heard Berta sigh again. It sounded loud. Lila sat staring straight in
front of her with such a horrified expression on her white face that I
shut my eyes quick.

When I opened them again, Miss Anglin stood in the doorway. I never was
so glad to see anybody in all my life. But we did not tell her then about
our classes in manners. We waited till one day in June when she asked us
how we had managed to win Mary out of her shell.

As I look back now I cannot possibly understand how we succeeded. It was
the most discouraging, hopeless, hardest work I ever stuck to. Over and
over again Berta and I would have given up if it had not been for Lila.
She said that she dared not fail. Of course Robbie Belle helped a lot in
her steady, beautiful way. Martha did her best too, partly because she
was so sorry about her share in the affair of the skates. In fact all the
girls were perfectly lovely to Mary after the doctor had persuaded her
not to throw everything up and run away to hide. By and by she realized
that it was no use to refuse to be friends.

Indeed she is a dear girl when you get to know her real self. Her
unfortunate manner--it was unfortunate, you know--had been a sort of
armor to shield her sore pride. She had been afraid of letting anybody
have a chance to snub her. That was the reason why she had seemed so
offish and suspicious and indifferent and lawless and queer.

Do you know, I never heard Robbie Belle say a sharp thing except once.
She said it that day when we were telling Miss Anglin about the classes.
It was: "Whenever I want to say something mean about anybody, I think I
shall call it a scientific analysis of character."

CHAPTER IX

THIS VAIN SHOW

It was the first evening at college in their junior year. Upon coming out
of the dining-room Lila caught sight of Bea waiting at the elevator door.
Dodging three seniors, a maid with a tray, and a man with a truck full of
trunks, she made a dash for the new arrival who in a sudden freak of
perversity danced tantalizingly just beyond reach.

"You imp! And I haven't seen you for three months. Help me!" she beckoned
to Berta who that moment emerged from dinner, "run around that side and
catch her."

But Bea, swiftly subsiding from her mischievous agility, stood