nd for telling me the things you have. You have done me good. You
are a breath of fresh sweet air."

"It's my powder," she said complacently. "It does smell good, doesn't
it? It cost a dollar a box. I borrowed the dollar from Aunt Grace. Don't
let on before father. He thinks we use Mennen's baby--twenty-five cents
a box. We didn't tell him so, but he just naturally thinks it. It was
the breath of that dollar powder you were talking about."

She moved her fingers slightly in his hand, and he looked down at them.
Then he lifted them and looked again, admiring the slender fingers and
the pink nails.

"Don't look," she entreated. "They're teaching me things. I can't help
it. This spot on my thumb is fried egg, here are three doughnuts on my
arm,--see them? And here's a regular pancake." She pointed out the
pancake in her palm, sorrowfully.

"Teaching you things, are they?"

"Yes. I have to darn. Look at the tips of my fingers, that's where the
needle rusted off on me. Here's where I cut a slice of bread out of my
thumb! Isn't life serious?"

"Yes, very serious." He looked thoughtfully down at her hands again as
they lay curled up in his own. "Very, very serious."

"Good-by."

"Good-by." He held her hand a moment longer, and then turned suddenly
away. She watched until he was out of sight, and then slipped up-stairs,
undressed in the dark and crept in between the covers. Lark apparently
was sound asleep. Carol giggled softly to herself a few times, and Lark
opened one eye, asking, "What's amatter?"

"Oh, such a good joke on p'fessor," whispered Carol, squeezing her twin
with rapture. "He doesn't know it yet, but he'll be so disgusted with
himself when he finds it out."

"What in the world is it?" Lark was more coherent now.

"I can't tell, Lark, but it's a dandy. My, he'll feel cheap when he
finds out."

"Maybe he won't find it out."

"Oh, yes, he will," was the confident answer, "I'll see that he does."
She began laughing again.

"What is it?"

"I can't tell you, but you'll certainly scream if you ever do know it."

"You can't tell me?" Lark was wide awake, and quite aghast.

"No, I can't, I truly can't."

Lark drew away from the encircling arm with as much dignity as could be
expressed in the dark and in bed, and sent out a series of deep breaths,
as if to indicate that snores were close at hand.

Carol laughed to herself for a while, until Lark really slept, then she
buried her head in the pillow