n her heart.
She had worked so hard and so patiently up to the very last minute in
the hope of winning her diploma that, on the very morning of the
hoop-rolling, she had been granted the privilege of staying on through
commencement festivities and so keeping her loss of standing as much as
possible to herself. After listening to Betty's and Eleanor's stories
and talking to Miss Harrison herself, Miss Ferris was fully convinced
that the Blunderbuss was not morally responsible for the thefts she had
committed, and so she was unwilling to send her home at once and thus
expose her to the double disgrace that her going just then would
probably have involved. So she found her hands very full until the
girl's mother could be sent for and the sad story broken to her as
gently as possible.

It was the one unrelieved tragedy in 19--'s history; there seemed to be
absolutely no help for it,--the kindest thing to do was to forget it as
soon as possible.

CHAPTER XVII

BITS OF COMMENCEMENT

But Betty Wales couldn't forget it yet. It stood out in the midst of the
happy leisure and anticipation of senior week like a skeleton at the
feast,--a gaunt reminder that even the sheltered little world of college
must now and then take its share of the strange and sorrowful problems
that loom so much larger in the big world outside. But even so, it had
its alleviating circumstances. One was Miss Ferris's hearty approval of
the way in which Betty and Eleanor had managed their discovery, and
another was Jean Eastman's unexpected attitude of helpfulness. She
assumed her full share of responsibility, discouraging gossip and
speculation about the thefts as earnestly and tactfully as Betty
herself, and taking her turn of watching the Blunderbuss at the times
when Miss Ferris couldn't follow her without causing too much comment.
Betty and Eleanor tried to accept her help as if they had expected
nothing else from her, and Jean for her part made no reference to that
phase of the matter except to say once to Betty, "If Eleanor Watson can
stand by her I guess I can. Besides you stood by me, and I didn't
deserve it any more than this poor thing does. Please subtract it from
all the times I've bothered you."

Betty was very generous with the subtraction. She was in a generous
mood, wanting to give everybody the benefit of the doubt that, with a
good deal of a struggle, she had managed to give Georgia. Of course the
vindicating of the little fr