elcoming Mary, with all the natural excitement of her peculiar
situation. Grace wanted her to try on her pale green organdie, because
it would go so beautifully with her topaz eyes. Madaline insisted her
baby blue was much more attractive, as one of Mrs. Dunbar's pictures
showed a girl with brown braids gowned in heavenly blue, while Cleo
offered her choicest frock, the coral pink with all the
dinglely-danglely pink rose-buds dropping around the tunic. But Mary
shook her head, and declined all the kindly offered finery.

"You see," she exclaimed, her eyes fairly glaring in unrestricted
admiration at the gorgeous display of clothes, "I have to wear white.
Reda says if I do not I shall get the fever and die as Loved One did."

"Oh, how perfectly ridiculous!" exclaimed Cleo. Then, fearing Mary
would take offense, she hastened to add: "I am sure Reda is simply
superstitious. I have known a child who wore white until she was
seven, because her mother favored that as a sort of prayer, a
consecration, and of course that was all right when its meaning was
sincere, but to wear white to ward off a fever looks uncanny, foolish.
Can't you put on a color if you choose?" and the beautiful pink dress
threw a covetous glow up into Mary's classic face.

"Oh, of course I could," she demurred, "but----"

"But we wouldn't ask you to," and Cleo gave the sign for returning the
pretty gowns to their respective closets, by putting the pink voile on
its white silk hanger. "White is lovely, and it becomes you
beautifully. Don't you think so, girls?"

They did, of course, and when just then Jennie called them to the
dining-room for the spread, so delightful on any summer evening, Mary
seemed to forget the terrors of that hour, when Professor Benson so
barely escaped the trap that had been set for him at the Imlay Studio.

CHAPTER XI

A CRY IN THE NIGHT

It was while Jennie served a dainty sherbet--an extra, considering ice
cream and cake were a sufficiently delightful treat--that Cleo slipped
out into the library where Mrs. Dunbar was writing letters. Grace and
Madaline were outdoing each other in entertaining the guest, and
altogether the evening was one of enjoyment, especially for Mary. Her
eyes were now almost as bright as those of the girls who surrounded
her, and had Reda been able to see her, she surely could not have
honestly warned her against "being like other girls." Only that
occasional shadow of fear that cro