these contributions
for the last. Miss Bent will now read to you 'Storied West Rock!'"

Miss Bent began immediately, and though the hands of the clock crept
on to fifteen minutes past nine, not a girl there watched them; all
were intent on the absorbing interest of the story.

When it was finished, Miss Bent said, "This is so excellent that I
feel fully justified in departing from the promise Miss Ashton made
you, that your pieces should not have the name of the writer given;
with her leave, it gives me great pleasure to say, this touching and
excellently written story was composed by one of our own seniors,
Susan Downer."

"Three cheers for Susan Downer!" cried Kate Underwood, springing from
her seat; and if ever boys in any finishing school gave cheers with
greater gusto, they would have been well worth hearing. Even Susan
found herself cheering as noisily as the rest, and would not have
known it, if Dorothy, her face radiant with delight, had not stopped
her.

Then followed the spread, "the pleasantest and the best one that was
ever given in Montrose Academy," the girls all said.

CHAPTER XVI.

STORIED WEST ROCK.

When Marion Parke went back to her room the night after Miss Ashton's
entertainment, she was in a great deal of perturbation. The title of
Susan Downer's story, on its announcement, had filled her with
surprise, for since her coming to the school she had never before
heard West Rock mentioned. When she had asked about it, no one seemed
even to have known of it, and that Susan should not only have heard,
but been so interested as to choose it for the subject of her story,
was a puzzle! But when the story was read, and she found it, in all
its details, so exactly like her father's, her surprise changed to a
miserable suspicion, of which she was heartily ashamed, but from which
she could not escape. Sentence after sentence, event after event, were
so familiar to her, nothing was changed but the names of the women who
figured in the story.

The first thing she did after coming to her room was to take the
magazine from under the Bible, and open to the story. There was an
ink-blot on the first page, which some one had evidently been trying
to remove with the edge of a knife. It must have been done hastily,
for the leaf was jagged, and most of the ink left on.

This Marion was sure was not there the last time she had opened the
magazine; some one had dropped it recently. Who was it?

She has