case of the son,
Sylvia's "type" was in the ascendent; but it must be set down to
Sylvia's credit that the circumstance of successful competition gave
her no satisfaction. She often heartily wished Eleanor out of it. She
could never meet the candid sweetness of the other's eyes without a
qualm of discomfort, and she suffered acutely under Eleanor's gentle
amiability.

Once or twice when Mrs. Draper was too outrageously late at an
appointment for tea, the two girls gave her up, and leaving the house,
walked side by side back across the campus, Sylvia quite aware of the
wondering surmise which followed their appearance together. On these
occasions, Eleanor talked with more freedom than in Mrs. Draper's
presence, always in the quietest, simplest way, of small events and
quite uninteresting minor matters in her life, or the life of the
various household pets, of which she seemed extremely fond. Sylvia
could not understand why, when she bade her good-bye at the driveway
leading into the Hubert house, she should feel anything but a rather
contemptuous amusement for the other's insignificance, but the odd
fact was that her heart swelled with inexplicable warmth. Once she
yielded to this foolish impulse, and felt a quivering sense of
pleasure at the sudden startled responsiveness with which Eleanor
returned a kiss, clinging to her as though she were an older, stronger
sister.

One dark late afternoon in early December, Sylvia waited alone in the
candle-lighted shrine, neither Eleanor nor her hostess appearing.
After five o'clock she started home alone along the heavily shaded
paths of the campus, as dim as caves in the interval before the big,
winking sputtering arc-lights were flashed on. She walked swiftly and
lightly as was her well-trained habit, and before she knew it, was
close upon a couple sauntering in very close proximity. With the
surety of long practice Sylvia instantly diagnosed them as a college
couple indulging in what was known euphemistically as "campus work,"
and prepared to pass them with the slight effect of scorn for
philanderings which she always managed to throw into her high-held
head and squarely swinging shoulders. But as she came up closer,
walking noiselessly in the dusk, she recognized an eccentric,
flame-colored plume just visible in the dim light, hanging down
from the girl's hat--and stopped short, filled with a rush of very
complicated feelings. The only flame-colored plume in La Chance was