They haven't been paid for yet. I
haven't dared give father the bills, and I can never face mother. She
would never have allowed me to order anything like them. Well, you know
how badly I behaved at the house party, and how nice you all were to me,
even when I was so hateful.

"On New Year's Night, when we were coming from Nesbits, Henry Hammond
asked me for the class money. He said he had a chance to treble it, and
that it was too good an opportunity to be lost.

"I refused point blank at first, and then he talked and talked in that
smooth way of his until I began to think what a fine thing it would be
to walk into the class and say, 'Girls, here are fifteen hundred dollars
instead of five hundred.' I was feeling awfully cross at you girls just
then, because he made me believe that you were slighting me and leaving
me out of things. Besides, all of you had warned me against him, and I
wanted to show you that I knew more than you did.

"I didn't promise to give it to him that night, but the more I thought
of it the more I inclined toward his views, and the upshot of the matter
was that I drew it out of the bank and let him have it."

Marian paused and looked piteously at Grace. Then she said brokenly:

"He lost it, Grace, every cent of it. The week after I gave it to him he
told me that luck had been against him, and that it was all gone. When I
asked him what he intended to do about it he promised that he would sell
some real estate of his and turn the money over to me to give back to
the class. He said it was his fault for persuading me to do it, and that
I shouldn't suffer for it. But he never kept his word.

"Last week I asked him for the last time if he would refund the money,
and he laughed at me and said that I had risked it and ought to accept
my losses with good grace. I threatened to expose him, and he said if I
did I should only succeed in making more trouble for myself than for
him. He had only speculated with what I had given him. Where I obtained
the money was none of his business, and as long as I had appropriated it
I would have to abide by the consequences.

"Of course, I was desperate and didn't know what to do. I had no money
of my own, and I didn't dare ask my father for it. I had to tell some
one, so I told Eleanor."

"Eleanor!" exclaimed Grace aghast. "Oh, Marian, why did you tell her of
all people."

"I thought she was my friend," declared Marian, "but I soon found out
that she wasn't. A