onfide in! Why not shout it in a telephone?"

"Hold up, that's a raw deal," said Snorky rising wrathfully. "I may
have weakened under that awful stink, but I kept the secret, didn't I?
Didn't I stand up three hours against the whole blooming house and did
they ever get a word from me about Mosquito-Proof Socks, and in the
state of temper they were too? Oh, I say, come now, square deal you
know!"

Skippy considered him more favorably. Besides, he remembered that by
Saturday he would need to embellish his sartorial display with a few
treasures from his chum's wardrobe. He sat down and took his head in his
hands.

"Snorky, old fellow, you're right--I've got it bad."

"And you're going over to Princeton Saturday to meet her?" said Skippy,
who saw a trail.

"Her, what her?"

"Mimi Lafontaine, of course," said Snorky with a sudden intuition.

"Her name is Tina," said Snorky tragically. "Her first name. Perhaps
some day I can tell you her real name, not now."

"Rats, it is Mimi, and you're going over again to meet her at the game,"
said Snorky, who knew the Skippy imagination.

"So you think I'm going to Princeton," said Skippy looking at him
wisely. "I am--but from there I am making a cut for New York. Get the
point?"

"Oh, Tina's in New York?"

"She is." He hesitated a moment, and then weighing his words to give
full value to their dramatic significance, he added--"She is on the
stage."

"You're a thundering, whooping, common-a-garden liar," said Snorky, who
felt that his sympathies were being trifled with. "Where in blazes would
you know an actress anyhow?"

"And you asked my confidence!" said Skippy reproachfully. "Tina and I
grew up together. She ran away a year ago. It's a terrible story,
terrible! She's had the devil of a life, poor little girl. Gosh, if I
were only twenty-one!"

"Skippy, if you are faking it again this time," said Snorky, whose
confidence was shaken by the perfect seriousness of his chum's
melancholy. "If you are, dinged if I'll ever believe another word."

"See here--did I volunteer to tell you?" said Skippy, who rose with a
complete injured air. "That settles it. This is all you'll ever know."

And leaving Snorky in a ferment of curiosity he went to his desk, drew
out a sheet of paper and began to run his fingers through his hair.

Snorky, as a matter of fact, had hit the nail on the head, though of
course it would never do to have him suspect it. Skippy did not mind
confiding