d
a word with Jerry; however, after the debate, no introduction seemed
necessary. When Jerry saw him approach a flood of color dyed her
cheeks--not from shyness, but because she did not know what to do with
her unshod feet!

"Will you dance this, Miss Travis?"

Jerry lifted eyes dark with laughter. She did not look in the least
"perfectly miserable." "I--I--can't!" She put out the tips of her
unstockinged toes. Then she told him how she had had to wear Gyp's
pumps. "And they hurt so dreadfully that I slipped them off and now
_nothing'll_ get them back on. I guess I've got to stay here the rest of
my life."

There was something so refreshing in Jerry's frankness and
unaffectedness that Dana King sat down eagerly beside her.

"Let me sit here and talk, then. Say, what on earth was the matter with
you the night of the debate? Was it your shoes--_then_? You _could_ have
talked--I know!"

He spoke with such conviction that Jerry's eyes shone.

"No, it wasn't--entirely--my shoes. Something _did_ happen--but I can't
tell. Isn't this the jolliest party? I never went to one before--like
this. There aren't this many people in all Miller's Notch."

Isobel, watching Jerry's corner, grew very angry when she saw that Dana
King lingered with Jerry. She wondered what on earth Jerry could be
saying that made him laugh so heartily; they were acting as though they
had known one another all their lives.

Just as Dana King was asking Jerry what she would do if the midnight
hour struck and found her slipperless, Mrs. Allan discovered them. _She_
had to hear about the pumps, too.

"You blessed child, I'll get a pair of Pat's--they'd fit anything!" She
returned in a few moments, two shiny, patent-leather toes protruding
from the folds of her spangled scarf. Pat's pumps slipped easily over
Jerry's poor swollen feet.

"There, now, Cinderella, let's go and get some ice cream." And Dana King
led Jerry through the dancers, past Isobel and a fat boy whose curly red
head only reached to her shoulder, to the dining-room where, around
small tables, boys and girls were devouring all sorts of goodies.

The party was spoiled for Isobel; not so for Gyp who, besides having had
the jolliest sort of a time herself, was bursting with satisfaction
because Jerry had "captured" the most popular boy in the room.

"He sat out _six_ dances with you--I counted! He took you to _supper_ I
heard him ask you, Jerry Travis, if you were going out to the scho