et these old friends, and she introduced them to the Littell girls
and Libbie and Frances in the happy, tangled fashion that such
introductions usually are performed. Names and faces get straightened out
more gradually.

The stage in which they found themselves, for the seven girls insisted on
sitting near each other, was well-filled. They had started and were
lurching along the rather uneven road when Betty found herself staring at
a girl on the other side of the bus.

"Where have I seen her before?" she puzzled. "I wonder--does she look
like some one I know? Oh, I remember! She's the girl we saw on the
train--the one that took Bob's seat!"

Just then a girl sitting up near the driver's seat leaned forward.

"Ada!" she called. "Ada Nansen! Are you the girl they say brought five
trunks and three hat boxes?"

"Well, they're little ones!" said the girl sitting opposite Betty. "I
wanted to bring three wardrobe trunks, but mother thought Mrs. Eustice
might make a fuss."

So the girl's name was Ada Nansen. Betty was sure she remembered their
encounter on the train, if for no other reason than that Ada studiously
refused to meet her eye. Betty was too inexperienced to know that a
certain type of girl never takes a step toward making a new friend
unless she has the worldly standing of that friend first clearly fixed
in her mind.

"What gorgeous furs she has!" whispered Norma Guerin. "Do you know
her, Betty?"

Betty shook her head. Strictly speaking, she did not know Ada. What she
did know of her was not pleasant, and it was part of Betty's personal
creed never to repeat anything unkind if nothing good was to come of it.

"I can tell Bob, 'cause he knows about her," she said to herself. "Won't
he be surprised! I do hope she hasn't brought a huge wardrobe to school
to make Norma and Alice feel bad."

Though both the Guerin girls wore the neatest blouses and suits, any
girl could immediately have told you that their clothes were not new
that season and that the little bag each carried had been oiled and
polished at home.

That Ada Nansen's trunks were worrying Norma, too, her next remark
showed.

"Alice and I have only one trunk between us," she confided to Betty.
"Mother said Mrs. Eustice never allowed the girls to dress much. I made
Alice's party frock and mine, too. They're plain white."

"So's mine," said Betty quickly. "Mrs. Littell wouldn't let her daughters
have elaborate clothes, and the Littells have oce