at the pretty girl working
away at her desk, she wondered what was going on behind the lovely mask.
But the look in Rosa's eyes, when she raised them, was both deep and
sly.

Rosa's hatred was indeed deep rooted. Whatever heart she had not
frivoled away in wilfulness had been caught and won by Forsythe, the
first grown man who had ever dared to make real love to her. Her
jealousy of Margaret was the most intense thing that had ever come into
her life. To think of him looking at Margaret, talking to Margaret,
smiling at Margaret, walking or riding with Margaret, was enough to send
her writhing upon her bed in the darkness of a wakeful night. She would
clench her pretty hands until the nails dug into the flesh and brought
the blood. She would bite the pillow or the blankets with an almost
fiendish clenching of her teeth upon them and mutter, as she did so: "I
hate her! I _hate_ her! I could _kill_ her!"

The day her first letter came from Forsythe, Rosa held her head high and
went about the school as if she were a princess royal and Margaret were
the dust under her feet. Triumph sat upon her like a crown and looked
forth regally from her eyes. She laid her hand upon her heart and felt
the crackle of his letter inside her blouse. She dreamed with her eyes
upon the distant mountain and thought of the tender names he had called
her: "Little wild Rose of his heart," "No rose in all the world until
you came," and a lot of other meaningful sentences. A real love-letter
all her own! No sharing him with any hateful teachers! He had implied in
her letter that she was the only one of all the people in that region
to whom he cared to write. He had said he was coming back some day to
get her. Her young, wild heart throbbed exultantly, and her eyes looked
forth their triumph malignantly. When he did come she would take care
that he stayed close by her. No conceited teacher from the East should
lure him from her side. She would prepare her guiles and smile her
sweetest. She would wear fine garments from abroad, and show him she
could far outshine that quiet, common Miss Earle, with all her airs. Yet
to this end she studied hard. It was no part of her plan to be left
behind at graduating-time. She would please her father by taking a
prominent part in things and outdoing all the others. Then he would give
her what she liked--jewels and silk dresses, and all the things a girl
should have who had won a lover like hers.

The last busy d