ed to say
nothing of what she had been privileged to hear. It was not hers to
tell.

Suddenly she divined, rather than saw, Mignon's elfish eyes fixed upon
her. "You met another girl, at noon, did you not, Miss Dean?" asked the
French girl, with an almost sarcastic inflection.

"Yes; Miss Stevens," was the composed answer. "We share the same locker.
She is a nice girl, too, and I like her very much, so, please, don't say
anything against her," she ended, in half-smiling warning.

Mignon La Salle's face grew dark. She recognized the challenging note in
the new girl's tone. Muriel, too, frowned. Susan Atwell sidled up to
Mignon, Irma Linton looked distressed and Geraldine Macy calmly curious
as to what would come next. It came in the way of a small tempest, for
the French girl lost her temper over Marjorie's retort.

She stamped her foot in childish rage, saying vehemently: "She is a
nobody, that Stevens person, and her family are vagabonds. You will make
a great mistake if you choose her for your friend." Then, her rage
receding as suddenly as it had come, she shrugged her shoulders
deprecatingly. "Pardonnez moi." She bowed to Marjorie. "I spoke too
strongly. It is not for me to choose Miss Dean's friends." Slipping her
arm through Muriel's, she drew her ahead of the others. Susan Atwell
took a hurried step forward and caught her other arm, leaving Marjorie
to walk between Irma and Geraldine.

"Don't mind her," said Jerry, in a low voice. "She has it in for that
Miss Stevens. She, the Stevens girl, did something, no one knows what,
to make Mignon angry with her. Mignon says Miss Stevens talked about her
and Muriel and Susan believed it, but Irma and I are not so silly."

Two blocks further on Marjorie bade good-bye to the five girls. She said
it without enthusiasm. Their carping, quarrelsome attitude had taken all
the pleasure from knowing them. She made mental exception in favor of
Irma and Jerry. The gentleness of the one and the sturdy, outspoken
manner of the other had impressed her favorably. But she was sorely
disappointed in Muriel.

Should she tell her mother of the disagreeable ending of her first day?
She decided not to do so. She would carry nothing save pleasant tales to
her captain to-day. And so that night, when she entered the living-room
and found her mother, in a becoming negligee, occupying the wide leather
couch by the window, she saluted, like a dutiful soldier, and included
in her report only