fore the Hall, and had drawn her down the
walk toward the Ninety-five Oak. Katherine was a fine, frank girl whose
talk about the University and her love for the campus and its life
stirred the new girl's pulses. She could listen with unguarded eagerness
to this Junior because she knew her to be a student. Pocahontas slipped
her arm wistfully 'round her friend's waist. To room with Miss Graham
would have been perfect happiness.

"Of course you'll go," declared Katherine, when she had heard the
Freshman's confidence regarding the reception. "It's slow, sometimes,
but you'll meet the people you want to know."

So out came the plain graduation-dress, folded carefully away since the
night she read the valedictory, three months ago; she sewed a rip in the
gloves saved from the same occasion, and she took out the fan which her
grandmother had given her, a wonderful fan she had considered it until
she saw a few of Lillian's.

In the gymnasium where glistening bamboo and red geraniums screened the
chest-weights along the walls, and feathery branches of pepper climbed
luxuriantly over the inclined ladders, she found the crowd
characteristic of this occasion,--the Freshman men at one end, the
Freshman girls at the other, and between them a neutral zone of old
students chatting gayly, oblivious of the purpose of the affair. Oh, but
the reception committee! Save for these indefatigable martyrs, the
Freshman sexes might have gazed wistfully at each other across the lines
of upper class-men until the lights dipped and never been able to bow on
the Quad next day. Important-looking persons with silk badges and
worried faces circulated in a grim endeavor to "mix things up." One of
these wild-eyed people would dash into the crowd and haul some
struggling upper class-man over to the feminine section. With his victim
in tow, he would open conversation feverishly:

"Name, please?"

"Miss Newcome."

"Ah, permit me to introduce Mr. Oldman. Miss Newcome, Mr. Oldman. Isn't
it warm to-night? Fine talk of the Doctor's, wasn't it? Well, you must
excuse me; we're very busy," the last words dying in the distance as he
sped away.

Pocahontas contrasted this chill with the warmth of church socials at
home. She felt disappointed and dreadfully alone. Her sober-minded
room-mate was bobbing like a pigeon before Professor Grind,
enthusiastically telling him "how much inspiration she got from his
courses;" Katherine Graham was lost in a swirl of up