id it might have been
much worse. But it certainly was funny to see those chickens scattering
in every direction over the snow-covered fields," and Rhoda laughed at
the recollection.

"Gee, if a fellow had been there with a gun he might have had some
hunting," cried Walter.

"Oh, Walter, you wouldn't hunt chickens with a gun, would you?" asked
Nan, reproachfully.

"Don't know as I would," was the quick reply.

"Oh, but now we are together, won't we have lovely times," cried Bess.

"The very best ever," echoed Nan.

"Going to let me out?" demanded Walter.

"No, indeed, Walter, you are included."

The girls and Walter continued to compare notes, when all of a sudden
Rhoda uttered a cry.

"Girls, am I seeing a ghost?" she asked, staring straight ahead of her
toward a group of richly dressed people who were talking and laughing
together. "Or is that Linda Riggs?"

"Goodness, don't say it, Rhoda!" cried Bess in dismay. "It can't be
Linda!"

But it was! For at that moment the youngest of the much over-dressed
women in the group turned with a laugh to speak to someone behind her,
and the girls found themselves face to face with their schoolgirl enemy,
Linda Riggs.

For all their dislike of the girl, the chums would have spoken to her.
But Linda stared at them coolly for a second, and then deliberately
turned her back upon them and began to speak to a tall, gray-haired man
at her right, who the girls instinctively felt must be her father, the
railroad president.

"Those young ladies seemed to know you, my dear," they heard the tall
man say to Linda, as, flushed and indignant, the girls and Walter
pressed on through the crowd.

"They do," they heard Linda answer contemptuously, and with no attempt
to lower her voice. "But I prefer not to know them--especially that
Sherwood girl."

What the tall man said in answer, the girls could not hear, for they
were once more engulfed in a sea of chattering humanity whose din
swallowed up all individual sound.

Impulsive Bess wanted to turn back and tell "that horrible Riggs girl"
what she thought of her, but Nan put an arm about her angry chum and
hurried her on.

"But, Nan, I don't see how you can stand such things and never say a
word," cried Bess, indignantly. "I do believe you haven't any spirit. I
never could take an insult like that so calmly."

"I'm not a bit calm," replied Nan, gripping her bag fiercely. "Right
this minute, I'd like to get hold of Linda Rig