e to the occasion. "I hope you
are happy now, Berenice," she said. "But I do not see how you can be
after such an act. You have deliberately done what you could to ruin
Hester's reputation and what have you gained by it? Nothing at all,
except those who have heard, care just a little less for you."

During these remarks, Helen had sat silent on a heap of cushions piled
high on the floor. At Berenice's first words, she had grown pale but she
listened without a word. What could she say or do? While Mellie spoke,
she decided the course she would take. If the girls misunderstood her
meaning, well and good. She loved Hester. It was a queer worthless sort
of love which would make no show of sacrifice for its object. She
reasoned thus while Mellie was speaking. Then she looked from one girl
to the other.

"What startling things you say, Berenice. What pin have you reference
to?"

"Your heirloom with the diamond in it?"

"Oh, that," with an air of assumed indifference. "Is that the one that
you have in mind? Yes, I found that three weeks ago. Where do you think
I found it?" She looked about at the girls, but gave them no opportunity
to answer. "I found it in a little box along with some other trinkets.
The box had been put on the closet floor and got pushed back in the
corner. I was hunting about for some hooks and eyes and came across it
quite by accident."

A sigh of relief was felt. The girls had been sitting with every muscle
rigid. Now, they relaxed and a buzz of laughter and talk began. Berenice
was far more discerning than the other girls there. Something in Helen's
manner was beyond her comprehension.

"Did you really know then that Hester Alden had your pin and was wearing
it?"

Helen nodded brightly as she replied. No one noticed that she ignored
the second question that Berenice had put to her.

"Why, certainly, I knew that Hester had it. You take up very strange
ideas, Berenice. I'd put Hester and the pin from your mind from this
minute. I give you my word of honor that I knew that Hester had the
pin."

Erma laughed delightfully. Her voice ran the scale and came back with an
echo of triumph in it. Her plan had succeeded beyond her most sanguine
expectations.

"I have forgotten the girls," she said, "and the cocoa almost gone."
Going to the hall, she called to Sixty-two. "Hester Alden, are you and
Mame going to stay there all night? The bell will ring in a few moments,
and you will have no chocolate."