owship this coming year."

The murmur this time swelled to a soft tumult of fluttering and
whispering, which broke here and there into a muffled clapping, for
everybody liked Berta. But when more faces turned in joyous nodding
toward the back pew they found no answering smile. Berta in panic had
slipped down the aisle and vanished through the swinging doors into the
dusky corridor.

"Ah, Miss Abbott!" The messenger girl overtook her at the foot of the
broad staircase. "Here is a special delivery letter for you. It was
brought from town five minutes ago."

Berta glanced at the address. Yes, it was from her sister-in-law as she
had expected. Eva was always falling into foolish little flurries and
rushing to consult friends and relatives by mail or wire or word of
mouth. Possibly this important communication was a request for advice
about the babies' pique coats. It could wait for a reading till Berta had
found a safe refuge from the girls who would certainly surround her as
soon as chapel was over. They would follow Robbie and Bea.

Where could she go to escape the enthusiasm? Her room would be the first
point of attack, and Bea's the second. Ah, now she recalled Miss Thorne's
speech about calling for the commencement essay at this hour. She might
as well go there now and wait till her critic should return from
services, if indeed she had attended them to-night.

At the door Berta knocked and bent her head to listen, then knocked
again. Still no answer. She waited another minute, her eyes absently
hovering over the plants that banked the wide window there at the end of
the transverse corridor. The evening breeze sweet from loitering in
clover fields drifted in through the open casement. Miss Thorne was very
fond of flowers. That was a queer trait in a person who seemed to care so
little for persons. There always seemed something frozen about this
gray-haired, immobile-faced woman with her stern manner and steely eyes.
Sometimes Berta thought of her as like a dying fire that smoldered under
smothering ashes.

Berta turned the knob gently and entered. A faint rosy glow from the
lowered drop-light shone on the piles of papers and scattered books on
the library table. The curtains rippled in the sudden draught caused by
the opening of the door, and a whiff of fragrance from a jar of
apple-blossoms on the bookcase floated past the visitor. Berta glanced
around with a little shrug that was half a shiver. A room frequently