rcia clasped the extended hand with fervor. "'Forever and always,'"
she repeated. And through all their high school days that followed she
kept her word.

Three unusually silent young women met in Miss Archer's living-room
office the next morning and awaited their opportunity to see the
principal.

"Miss Archer will see you," Marcia Arnold informed them after a wait of
perhaps five minutes, and the trio filed into the inner office.

"Good morning, girls," greeted Miss Archer, viewing them searchingly.
"Miss Stevens, I am glad that you have returned, but I am sorry to say
that during your absence I have heard a number of unpleasant rumors
concerning you."

Constance flushed, then her color receded, leaving her very white.

Before the principal could continue, Marjorie's earnest tones rang out.

"Miss Archer, Miss Stevens and I had a misunderstanding. When you asked
me about it I could not tell you. It has since been cleared away. My
butterfly pin has been found, but it was not the one Miss Stevens wore.
See, here are the two pins. Mine has no pearls at the tips of the wings."
She extended her open palm to the principal. In it lay two butterfly
pins, precisely alike save for the pearl-tipped wings of the one.

Miss Archer looked long at the pins. Then she lifted them to meet the
blue and the brown eyes whose gaze was fastened earnestly upon her. What
she saw seemed to satisfy her. She held out her hand to Marjorie and
Constance in turn.

"They are very alike," was her sole comment, as Marjorie returned
Constance's pin. Then Miss Archer turned to Mignon.

"I am sorry I accused Miss Stevens of taking my bracelet," murmured
Mignon, sulkily. "I have it in my possession. Here it is." She thrust
out an unwilling wrist, on which was the bracelet.

"I am glad that you have exonerated Miss Stevens from all suspicion."
Miss Archer's quiet face expressed little of what was going on in her
mind. "I am also thankful that an apparently serious matter has been so
easily settled." She did not offer her hand to Mignon, who left the
office without answering.

A moment later, Marjorie and Constance were in the outer office standing
at Marcia Arnold's desk. "It's all settled, Marcia, with no names
mentioned," she said reassuringly. "Good-bye, we'll see you later.
We'll have to hurry or we'll be late for the opening exercises."

In the corridor outside the study hall, Marcia and Constance paused by
common consent and faced each