peculating as to her best opportunity, she decided that it should be at
the end of the morning recitations.

For once she would cut her recitation in Horace, which came the last
hour in the morning. Alicia had no recitation at that hour. She would
probably be in her room and alone. Jane also knew that Elsie Noble was
occupied with a class at that time.

If looks could have killed, Jane and Adrienne would undoubtedly have
been carried lifeless from the dining room that morning. At breakfast
Elsie Noble's thin face wore an expression of spiteful resentment, which
she made no effort to conceal. She was inwardly furious over her
failure to rally the four Bridge Street freshmen to her standard. In
consequence, she was more bitter against Jane and Adrienne than ever.

It further increased her rancor to hear Adrienne prattling with
child-like innocence to Dorothy Martin of the coming dance.

Knowing very well what she was about, the little girl kept up a
tantalizing chatter that was maddening in the extreme to the defeated
plotter.

Unacquainted with the true state of affairs, Dorothy's genuinely
expressed interest in the Bridge Street girls merely added fuel to the
fire.

"Ah, but they are indeed delightful!" Adrienne wickedly assured, her
black eyes dancing with mischief. "We shall be proud of our freshmen,
when we escort them to the dance. Shall we not, Jeanne?"

"Yes, indeed. You must meet them, Dorothy. You'll like them all
immensely. They're a splendid, high-principled lot of girls."

Signally amused by Adrienne's tactics, Jane could not resist this one
little fling at her discomfited tablemate. She hoped it would serve to
enlighten the latter in regard to at least one thing.

Her second recitation, spherical trigonometry, over, Jane hurried across
the campus toward the Hall, keeping a sharp lookout for Alicia. It was
just possible she might meet the latter on the campus.

Reaching the veranda, Jane lingered there. If she could waylay Alicia as
she came in, so much the better. With this idea paramount, she sat down
in a high-backed porch rocker and waited.

She could not help reflecting a trifle sadly that thus far her sophomore
year had run anything but smoothly. She had looked forward to peace,
whereas she was in the midst of strife. And all because Marian Seaton
did not like her. That dislike dated back to her initial journey across
the continent to Wellington. If she had not antagonized Marian then, she