he girl.

"No, I haven't any horse," she replied simply. "You have to have your
own horse."

"But you can have a horse if you want to ride," the trust officer
hastily remarked. "Riding is a very good exercise, and I should think it
would be fine in this country."

Here was something tangible that a man could get hold of. The girl
looked pale and probably needed healthful exercise. If other girls had
their own horses, she could have one. It was really ridiculous how
little she was spending of her swelling income. And he proceeded at once
to take up this topic with Miss Thompson, who presently arrived upon the
scene. Mr. Ashly Crane was much more successful in impressing the head
mistress of Herndon Hall with the importance of the ward of the
Washington Trust Company than in probing the heart of the lonely little
girl. He gave the elegant Miss Thompson to understand clearly that Miss
Adelle Clark was to have every advantage that money could buy, not
merely music and art as extras, but horses,--he even put it in the
plural,--a groom, and if she wanted it a private maid, which he was told
was never permitted. Miss Thompson quickly gathered from his tone and
his words that Miss Adelle Clark's expectations were such as to insure
her the most careful consideration in every respect, and if Herndon Hall
could not provide her with all the advantages to which wealth was
entitled, her guardians would quickly remove her from the school. Miss
Thompson accompanied the trust officer to the door out of earshot of
Adelle and assured him haughtily that Herndon Hall which sheltered a
Steigman of Philadelphia, a Dyboy of Baltimore, not to mention a Miss
Saltonsby from his own city, knew quite as well as he what was fitting
under the circumstances. However, they shook hands as two persons from
the same world and parted in complete understanding. Adelle had already
slipped off with her armful of roses.

XIII

From the moment, when she emerged upon the corridor that led to the
schoolrooms with that huge bunch of American Beauty roses in her arms, a
new period of her school life began. The girls, of course, had seen from
their desks the arrival of the motor-car and its single occupant,--a
Man,--and the older girls who had peeked into the drawing-room reported
that Mr. Ashly Crane was a very smart-looking man, indeed. When a woman
first receives flowers from a man, an event of importance in her
existence has happened. Senorita Dian