or she had refused to
tell her name, or say one word--sat up and smoothed her waist.

Betty sighed with relief.

"Come on, that's right," she said encouragingly. "Don't mind about your
eyes, all the other new girls will have red ones too. Why when I was a
new girl," she said grandly, "I cried for weeks."

Polly and Lois and Angela gasped. Betty had never been known to shed a
tear. As for weeks of them, that was a bit extravagant. But the fib had
the desired effect. The new girl turned her large, drenched gray eyes on
Betty and studied her carefully.

"I reckon you looked something like a picked buzzard when you got
through," she said with a broad Southern accent.

There was an astonished silence for a second, then the girls burst into
peals of laughter. It was contagious, happy laughter, and the new girl,
after a hesitating minute, joined in. After that, it was an easy matter
to make conversation and to persuade her to leave her room.

The girls found out that she was Fanny Gerard, and had come straight
from South Carolina. Her father--she had no mother--had brought her to
school and then returned to the city by the next train. Unfortunately,
it had been Miss Hale, the Latin teacher--nicknamed the Spartan years
before by Betty, the only unpopular teacher in Seddon Hall--who had
shown Fanny to her room.

"She just opened the do' and pointed at that little old plain room with
her bony finger and said: 'This is you alls room, Miss Gerard,' and left
me. I tell you I like to died."

The tears threatened to burst forth again. Betty and Polly hastened to
explain that the Spartan was not even to be considered as part of Seddon
Hall. And they brought back the smiles when they explained that the
Bridge of Sighs was so named because the Spartan's room was at the end
of it.

All together, they made a very satisfactory cure and when they left
Fanny for the night, after having unpacked her suitcase for her, she was
quite bright and contented.

"What do you think of her?" Polly demanded, when she and Lois were
alone, after the good night bell.

Lois considered a minute.

"She's rare, and I think she's going to be worth cultivating. Certainly
she's funny," she said.

"Seddon Hallish, you mean?" Polly inquired.

"No, not exactly."

"She couldn't take Connie's place for instance?"

"Never in a thousand years!"

"Lois."

"Yes."

"You're thinking about the same thing I am."

"What are you thinking of?"

"The f