with the grace of a meal-bag. Miss Sallie, with provident
foresight, always ordered them a size too large in order to allow her to
grow and Harriet invariably wore them out, before she had established a
fit.

"What on earth becomes of Harriet Gladden during vacation?" Priscilla
once wondered on the opening day.

"They keep her on ice through the summer," was Patty's opinion, "and she
never gets entirely thawed out."

As a matter of fact this was, as nearly as possible, what they did do
with her. Miss Sallie picked out a quiet, comfortable, healthy
farmhouse, and installed Harriet in charge of the farmer's wife. By the
end of three months she was so desperately lonely, that she looked
forward with pleasurable excitement to the larger isolation of term
time.

Patty, one day, had overheard two of the teachers discussing Harriet,
and her reported version had been picturesque.

"Her father hasn't seen her for years and years. He just chucks her in
here and pays the bills."

"I don't wonder he doesn't want her at home!" said Priscilla.

"There isn't any home. Her mother is divorced, and married again, and
living in Paris. That was the reason Harriet couldn't go abroad with the
school party last year. Her father was afraid that when she got to
Paris, her mother would grab her--not that either of them really wants
her, but they like to spite each other."

Priscilla and Conny sat up interestedly. Here was a tragic intrigue,
such as you expect to meet only in novels, going on under their very
noses.

"You girls who have had a happy home life, cannot imagine the loneliness
of a childhood such as Harriet's," said Patty impressively.

"It's dreadful!" Conny cried. "Her father must be a perfect _Beast_ not
to take any notice of her."

"Harriet has her mother's eyes," Patty explained. "Her father can't bear
to look at her, because she reminds him of the happy past that is dead
forever."

"Did Miss Wadsworth say that?" they demanded in an interested chorus.

"Not in exactly those words," Patty confessed. "I just gathered the
outline."

This story, with picturesque additions, lost no time in making the
rounds of the school. Had Harriet chosen to play up to the romantic and
melancholy role she was cast for, she might have attained popularity of
a sort; but Harriet did not have the slightest trace of the histrionic
in her make-up. She merely moped about, and continued to be heavy and
uninteresting. Other more exciting