iend."

Frankie Arling blushed. The junior did too.

"N-n-no danger," he stammered, without knowing exactly what he said.

"Why no danger?" asked Miss Hall, anxious to say something interesting.

For answer the junior looked at Perry with the deference due a teller.
Porter pouted--not like a child, but like a pigeon.

"Have some ice-cream, girls," he suggested, determined to convert the
junior's respect into awe.

No one declining, the "porter" played a part long before assigned him
in the Mt. Alban bank, and brought back a tray that had cost him eighty
cents.

"Do you remember, Miss Hall," he said, to still a beating of the heart
occasioned by the admiring glances of two strange girls in the circle,
"the social we had here just two years ago?"

"Oh, yes," replied Sadie, after pretending to look backward through a
great many sumptuous entertainments; "yes."

"All the boys were here. There was Bill Watson, myself, Mr. Castle,
Nel--"

"Yes, that reminds me," interrupted Sadie, "I saw Mr. Nelson on the
street in Hamilton the other day, and met him again in a cafe. Both
times he was with--"

Sadie hesitated. Frankie was looking astonishedly at her.

"Why, Ev--Mr. Nelson hasn't been moved, has he?"

The question and the expression of voice behind it seemed to give Sadie
an idea.

"I forgot--he comes from your town, does he not, Miss Arling?"

"Yes."

"Who was he with?" asked Perry, stupidly, "anyone we know?"

"Why--yes. Hazel Morton."

Frankie's question was not answered; but now she did not care to have
it answered. She had been in Mt. Alban three days, therefore she had
heard all about the Morton girl leaving a nice home to "be in a city
where she can act as she likes,"--which, Mt. Alban females ruled, was
wickedly.

It takes a girl, and especially one of Sadie Hall's stamp, to notice
embarrassment or disappointment in another girl. Frankie was rather
silent and downcast. She never talked much at any time, but even to
Perry, with whom she was sometimes quite speechless, she seemed more
than commonly quiet during the remainder of the evening. Of course,
Porter may have been considerably on the alert.

"Is she related to him or anything?" Sadie asked Perry, on the side.

"Well--no," he hesitated; "their families are old friends, though."

"I could tell her something very interesting about him," replied Sadie;
"he's been dismissed from the bank."

"What!"

"Sh-sh! Alfred wrote me abo