as written in large letters, "Quits. Who
is going to the Kappa Phi dance at Winsted?"

"I'm dreadfully afraid mother won't let me go though," said Betty as
they hammered in the pins with Helen's paper-weight. "And anyhow it's
not for three whole weeks."

When the drawing was securely fastened, Betty surveyed it doubtfully. "I
wonder if we'd better take it down," she said at last. "I don't believe
it's very dignified. I'm afraid I oughtn't to have asked Mr. Parsons to
call his friend back, but I did so want to meet both of them and crow
over Mary. And it was they who suggested the walk. Katherine, do you
mind if we take this down?"

"Why, no, if you don't want to leave it," said Katherine looking
puzzled. "I'm afraid Mr. Hughes didn't have a very good time. Men aren't
my long suit. But otherwise I think we did this up brown."

Just then Eleanor came up, and Katherine gave her an enthusiastic
account of the afternoon's adventure. Betty was silent. Presently she
asked, "Girls, what is a back row reputation?"

"I don't know. Why?" asked Eleanor.

"Well, you know I stopped at the college, Katherine, to get my history
paper back. Miss Ellis looked hard at me when I went in and stammered
out what I wanted. She hunted up the paper and gave it to me and then
she said, 'With which division do you recite, Miss Wales?' I told her at
ten, and she looked at me hard again and said, 'You have been present in
class twelve times and I've never noticed you. Don't acquire a back row
reputation, Miss Wales. Good-day,' and I can tell you I backed out in a
hurry."

"I suppose she means that we sit on the back rows when we don't know the
lesson," said Helen who had joined the group.

"I see," said Betty. "And do you suppose the faculty notice such things
as that and comment on them to one another?"

"Of course," said Eleanor wisely. "They size us up right off. So does
our class, and the upper class girls."

"Gracious!" said Betty. "I wish I hadn't promised to go to a spread on
the campus to-night. I wish---- What a nuisance so many reputations
are!" And she crumpled the purple cow and the green dragon into a
shapeless wad and threw it at Rachel, who was coming up-stairs swinging
her gym shoes by their strings.

CHAPTER VI

LETTERS HOME

Betty was cross and "just a tiny speck homesick," so she confided to the
green lizard. Nothing interesting had happened since she could remember,
and it had rained steadily for four day