ok into her hand-bag and
closed it with a snap. Then she looked about her as if trying to find
something to talk about. Elizabeth sat mischievously silent and waited.

The caller seemed to get little inspiration from the furniture. "I was
sent to call by our Guild, of course," she remarked again, as though
she felt it necessary to account for her presence.

"How nice of them," murmured Elizabeth. "Do you do much of this sort
of work, Miss Kendall?"

"No, this is my first attempt, but I think I have taken it up pretty
thoroughly. It comes rather heavy on one who has so many social duties
as I have, but of course one does not expect these church calls
returned."

"Oh," said Elizabeth demurely, "I thought one always returned calls."

"Oh, not necessarily, I assure you," the lady remarked rather hastily.

"You see, I never received a church call before," said Elizabeth meekly.

The visitor looked at her a moment almost suspiciously, but the air of
childlike innocence was disarming. There was another long silence,
while Elizabeth sat with folded hands and vowed that if the
church-caller didn't speak before the clock struck twelve neither would
she. She was wickedly hoping she was uncomfortable.

Miss Kendall seemed to suddenly note some incongruity between
Elizabeth's fashionable attire and the life of a student. She looked
more like a milliner or dressmaker, she decided. "Do you study very
hard?" she inquired at last.

"Rather hard," was the sly answer.

"I suppose one must."

"Yes, one must." Elizabeth had suddenly decided upon her line of
action. She remembered how, whenever Noah Clegg's daughters went
a-visiting about Forest Glen, they would sit for a whole long afternoon
with hands primly folded, and reply to all remarks by a polite
repetition of the remarker's last statement, never volunteering a word
of their own. She could recall a long, hot afternoon when her aunt and
Annie had essayed alternate remarks upon the weather, the crops, the
garden, church, Sunday school, and the last sermon, to the verge of
nervous prostration without varying their visitors' echoing responses
by so much as one syllable. Elizabeth felt that Miss Kendall deserved
all the discomfort she could give her. She folded her hands more
primly and waited. Her victim glanced along the chromos on the wall.

"It's been very warm for November, has it not?" she said at last.

"Yes, very warm," said Elizabeth, also examining