he said, slowly. "I'm quite serious,
and my food is going to be above question."

"Of course! And if you think Joan will make you ridiculous, you've got
another guess coming, Elspeth. Now, when do you open?"

"I have planned to open day after to-morrow." Elspeth spoke
hesitatingly, keeping her cool, businesslike glance on Joan.

"All right," Sylvia was tapping her fingers restlessly; "that's
Thursday. I'll get a girl I know to work on the costume to-night; we'll
buy books on palmistry on our way home. We'll give you just four days to
lure your public with scones, and then if you don't call Joan up, she'll
start a tea room herself across the way."

This made them all laugh, but there was an earnestness in their eyes.

And on Sunday night Elspeth spoke over the telephone.

"Could you come to-morrow at two, Miss Thornton?"

Joan, sitting close to the telephone, winked at Sylvia. They had all
been sitting up nights working, reading, and praying for that question.

"I think so," was the reply in quite an unmoved and businesslike tone.

"And remember, Joan," Sylvia cautioned later, "this is but a means to
fit you for a profession!"

"I'll remember," Joan twinkled, "in the meantime, I am going to enjoy
myself."

CHAPTER XI

"_Let us live happily, free from care among the busy._"

There was one of Sylvia's friends who, from the first, caught and held
Joan's imagination. That was Patricia Leigh.

Patricia rarely got further than the imagination--after that she was
idealized or suspected according to the person dealing with her.

Joan idealized Patricia--"Pat," she was always called.

The girl was fair and delicately frail, but never ill. She wrote verse,
when moved to do so, and did it excellently, and she never thought of it
as poetry.

When she was not moved to verse--and she had a good market for it--she
designed the most astonishing garments for her friends. She could, at
any time, have secured a fine position in this line and was frequently
turning away offers. When the designing palled upon Pat she fell back
upon her personal charm and enjoyed herself!

Patricia had, outwardly, a blood-curdling philosophy which she frankly
avowed she believed in, absolutely, though Sylvia warned Joan that it
was "bunk!"

What really was the case was this: Patricia was an adept at playing with
fire. Lightly she tossed the flame from hand to hand; gaily she laughed,
but at the critical moment Patricia ran!

S