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a very good New York family,--he had known her father who had been something of a figure in finance until the crash of ninety-three,--and the head of Herndon Hall was reputed to have an excellent "formative" influence upon her girls. And certainly that raw little specimen who had presented herself in his office needed all the "formative influence" she could get! "We must give her the best," he pronounced easily, "for she is likely to be a rich woman some day." It may be seen that President West agreed with Mrs. Gardiner's practical interpretation of the catechism. After his interview with Adelle he said to the trust officer,--"She needs--everything! Herndon Hall will be the very thing for her--will teach her what a girl in her position ought to know." These remarks reveal on his part a special philosophy that will become clearer as we get to know better Miss Annette Thompson and Herndon Hall. The officers of the trust company felt that in sending their ward to this fashionable girls' school, they were doing their duty by her not only safely but handsomely, and thenceforth dismissed her from their thoughts, except when a subordinate brought them at regular intervals a voucher to sign before issuing a check on behalf of Adelle.... "Terribly crude little piece," the president of the trust company said of Adelle, thinking of his own vivacious daughters, who at her age had been complete little women of the world, and of all the other pretty, confident, voluble girls he met in his social life. "She has seen nothing of life," he said in extenuation, by which he meant naturally that Adelle Clark had never known how "nice people live," had never been to dancing-school or parties, or country clubs or smart dressmakers, and all the rest of what to him constituted a "suitable education" for a young girl who was to inherit money. * * * * * Meanwhile the "crude little piece" returned to her old home, somewhat shaken in mind by what had happened to her. It never entered her little head to argue with the august officers of the trust company, who stood to her as the sacred symbol of Authority. She must buy a trunk, pack it, and be at the Eclair Hotel in B---- by noon on the following Friday. Those were her orders. She looked wonderingly at the two hundred dollar check which Mr. Gardiner had given her for the expense of making herself ready. She had never before seen two hundred dollars. She kne
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