She felt something against her hands--against her breast--she was
tangled up in it! Something had fouled her, and she had failed, for
Corinne swept by at that moment.

And then the girls caught her--Jennie and many of her own class, as well
as some of the older girls. They were cheering her, and praising her
work--for it was the tape she had run against.

The race was finished and Nancy had won!

Three-quarters of the school were on the ice. Something like three
hundred girls can make a lot of noise!

And there was only a tiny group that broke away from the main body and
went home in the sulks because Nancy had won the race. Of course this
was the Montgomery clique.

"I can tell you right now who _won't_ be president of our class,"
whispered Jennie to Cora Rathmore before the latter got away in Grace
Montgomery's train.

"I suppose you think Nancy Nelson will!" snapped Cora.

It was the first time the idea had come into Jennie's mind.

It was only three days before the breaking up for the holidays.
Everybody was so enthusiastic about Nancy, that Jennie's work was half
done for her.

To see the quietest girl in the school, yet the one who stood highest in
her own class, praised and feted by the seniors, made Nancy's
fellow-classmates consider her of more importance than ever before.

So Jennie's work was easy. She went among the freshies and
whispered--first to one alone, then to two together, then to little
groups. And the burden of her tale was always the same:

"The Madame will stand for her--you see! She's the best little sport
there is in the class. She's scarcely had a mark against her, yet she's
no goody-goody.

"See how she stood for those other girls who treated her so meanly--and
never opened her mouth. Why, the Madame could have burned her at the
stake and Nance would never have said a word to incriminate that
Montgomery crowd.

"And there won't be a teacher to object. She's on all their good books.
Me? Of course I've an axe to grind," and Jennie laughed. "She's my
roommate, and if she gets the 'high hat' I'll hope to bask in her
reflected glory."

Jennie Bruce was an excellent politician. Had it lain with the girls
alone, lively Jennie might have been president of the freshman class
herself. But the girls knew that the Madame would never allow it.
Jennie's record for the weeks she had been a student at Pinewood Hall
precluded such an honor.

The day before the break-up the members of the f