d first come to Gopher Prairie were nodding at her brusquely.

During the pause after the first game she petitioned Mrs. Jackson Elder,
"Don't you think we ought to get up another bob-sled party soon?"

"It's so cold when you get dumped in the snow," said Mrs. Elder,
indifferently.

"I hate snow down my neck," volunteered Mrs. Dave Dyer, with an
unpleasant look at Carol and, turning her back, she bubbled at Rita
Simons, "Dearie, won't you run in this evening? I've got the loveliest
new Butterick pattern I want to show you."

Carol crept back to her chair. In the fervor of discussing the game they
ignored her. She was not used to being a wallflower. She struggled to
keep from oversensitiveness, from becoming unpopular by the sure method
of believing that she was unpopular; but she hadn't much reserve of
patience, and at the end of the second game, when Ella Stowbody sniffily
asked her, "Are you going to send to Minneapolis for your dress for
the next soiree--heard you were," Carol said "Don't know yet" with
unnecessary sharpness.

She was relieved by the admiration with which the jeune fille Rita
Simons looked at the steel buckles on her pumps; but she resented Mrs.
Howland's tart demand, "Don't you find that new couch of yours is too
broad to be practical?" She nodded, then shook her head, and touchily
left Mrs. Howland to get out of it any meaning she desired. Immediately
she wanted to make peace. She was close to simpering in the sweetness
with which she addressed Mrs Howland: "I think that is the prettiest
display of beef-tea your husband has in his store."

"Oh yes, Gopher Prairie isn't so much behind the times," gibed Mrs.
Howland. Some one giggled.

Their rebuffs made her haughty; her haughtiness irritated them to
franker rebuffs; they were working up to a state of painfully righteous
war when they were saved by the coming of food.

Though Juanita Haydock was highly advanced in the matters of
finger-bowls, doilies, and bath-mats, her "refreshments" were typical
of all the afternoon-coffees. Juanita's best friends, Mrs. Dyer and Mrs.
Dashaway, passed large dinner plates, each with a spoon, a fork, and a
coffee cup without saucer. They apologized and discussed the afternoon's
game as they passed through the thicket of women's feet. Then they
distributed hot buttered rolls, coffee poured from an enamel-ware pot,
stuffed olives, potato salad, and angel's-food cake. There was, even in
the most strictly conform