mystery."

And Anthony walked past and into his own room, closing the door
noiselessly behind him.

With a shrug of her thin shoulders Polly stood for another moment
regarding the shut door. "I am sorry to say it, but he has behaved a
great deal better than I expected," she thought to herself with a smile
at her own expense.

CHAPTER XIX

AN UNSPOKEN POSSIBILITY

The two friends were walking home from school together about ten days
later. They had both stayed until almost dusk engaged in different
pursuits.

Betty was doing some extra studying with Miss McMurtry, as she had
missed so much time and science was always her weakest point; while
Polly had been having an hour's quiet talk with her former elocution
teacher, Miss Adams. Probably she was the one person in Woodford,
excepting Betty, who sympathized in the least with Polly in her
escapade. Or if she did not exactly sympathize with her, she was sorry
for the retribution that she had brought upon herself. For Mrs.
Wharton had decreed that her daughter was not to leave Woodford again
and was not even to be permitted to study anything in the village with
the view of its being useful to her later in a stage career. The
subject was to be entirely tabooed until Polly reached twenty-one, when
if she were of the same mind, she might choose her own future. Of
course to an impatient nature three years and a few months over seemed
like an eternity, and except for Betty's sympathy and her frequent
talks with Miss Adams and the latter's accounts of her great cousin,
Margaret Adams, Polly believed existence would have been unendurable.

She was in such a state of excitement now over something which Miss
Adams had been recently telling her, that at first she hardly heard
what Betty was trying to say.

"I have her permission to tell you, Polly dear, because she wishes to
have your advice, as you have more imagination about getting out of
difficulties than the rest of us; but you have to promise first never
to mention it to anybody, not to a single other member of the Camp Fire
Club or to Rose or even Donna."

Polly laughed, putting her arm lightly across Betty Ashton's shoulder.

"What are you talking about, child?" she demanded. "I don't
particularly like that suggestion of my talent for getting out of
scrapes; but if the scrape has anything to do with Betty Ashton, then
all my talent is at her disposal, of course."

"But it has nothing to do with me