ame out of the coeds'
dressing room; but as they entered the reception room her color and
sparkle suddenly returned to her. She turned to Roy with her gayest
expression. He smiled back at her with what Phil called "his deep,
black, velvety smile." Yet she really did not see Roy at all. She was
acutely conscious that Gilbert was standing under the palms just across
the room talking to a girl who must be Christine Stuart.

She was very handsome, in the stately style destined to become rather
massive in middle life. A tall girl, with large dark-blue eyes, ivory
outlines, and a gloss of darkness on her smooth hair.

"She looks just as I've always wanted to look," thought Anne miserably.
"Rose-leaf complexion--starry violet eyes--raven hair--yes, she has them
all. It's a wonder her name isn't Cordelia Fitzgerald into the bargain!
But I don't believe her figure is as good as mine, and her nose
certainly isn't."

Anne felt a little comforted by this conclusion.

Chapter XXVII

Mutual Confidences

March came in that winter like the meekest and mildest of lambs,
bringing days that were crisp and golden and tingling, each followed
by a frosty pink twilight which gradually lost itself in an elfland of
moonshine.

Over the girls at Patty's Place was falling the shadow of April
examinations. They were studying hard; even Phil had settled down to
text and notebooks with a doggedness not to be expected of her.

"I'm going to take the Johnson Scholarship in Mathematics," she
announced calmly. "I could take the one in Greek easily, but I'd rather
take the mathematical one because I want to prove to Jonas that I'm
really enormously clever."

"Jonas likes you better for your big brown eyes and your crooked smile
than for all the brains you carry under your curls," said Anne.

"When I was a girl it wasn't considered lady-like to know anything about
Mathematics," said Aunt Jamesina. "But times have changed. I don't know
that it's all for the better. Can you cook, Phil?"

"No, I never cooked anything in my life except a gingerbread and it was
a failure--flat in the middle and hilly round the edges. You know the
kind. But, Aunty, when I begin in good earnest to learn to cook don't
you think the brains that enable me to win a mathematical scholarship
will also enable me to learn cooking just as well?"

"Maybe," said Aunt Jamesina cautiously. "I am not decrying the higher
education of women. My daughter is an M.A. She can