that night that Elinor was taken ill; how she
had discovered through Doris' younger sister that Doris had made her
study for the Roberts prize from a little rough color sketch "just like
Elinor had."

"I'd heard her say the Saturday that Miss Jinny came to see us that she
never made sketches beforehand," said Judith, earnestly. "And she told
Patricia the very day Elinor fainted that she hadn't begun her study.
So I pretended to myself that we were all in a story, and I thought and
thought what I should make of it if I were reading about it all instead
of living in it. Then I saw that the thing to do was to find out if
Doris Leighton had the little color sketch that she used for her study,
and compare it with Elinor's."

Here Elinor gave a start, and then composed herself as Judith went on.

"I hunted and hunted for Elinor's, which I knew very well, for it was
made on the back of one of my old tablets, but I couldn't find it.
Geraldine couldn't find the one Doris used either, and then I got
awfully interested. I told Geraldine that I was making up a story and
I wanted to act it all out in life, and she was glad to help. She was
mad at Doris anyway, and so she hunted everywhere for her sketch, but
she couldn't find it. I was pretty near giving up then, for I thought
I was mistaken; but the men were just making ready to take out
Leighton's ashes when I thought, like a flash, 'There's where it would
be, if anywhere,' and I told Geraldine. So we got sticks and we
rummaged. My gracious, but it was dusty!"

Patricia gave a gasp of comprehension. "That's what made you so grimy
that day Mrs. Halden came in for tea!" she exclaimed.

Judith nodded. "We found it!" she went on, growing more excited as the
end approached. "We found it, all in little bits, along with other
stuff from Doris' waste basket!"

The girls looked at one another in shamed silence. The actual
discovery of the deception was so much more disconcerting than they had
foreseen. They seemed to visualize Doris Leighton as she tore those
guilty fragments and hid them in the rubbish, and the sight sickened
them.

Griffin held out a hand for Judith's envelope. "You'll verify these,
Kendall?" she said brusquely, pushing the bulky oblong across the table
to Elinor.

Spread out on the cloth, the scraps pieced perfectly into the study
that Elinor had made for the Roberts prize. The back showed the stamp
of the Keystone tablet, with Judith's name part