Wyatt, and what sort of a girl was she?' will the
answer be what you would wish?"

Patty considered. "Ye-yes; I think, on the whole, they'd stand by me."

"This morning," the bishop continued placidly, "I asked a professor in
an entirely casual way about a young woman--a class-mate of your
own--who is the daughter of an old friend of mine. The answer was
immediate and unhesitating, and you can imagine how much it gratified
me. 'There is not a finer girl in college,' he replied. 'She is honest
in work and honest in play, and thoroughly conscientious in everything
she does.'"

"Um-m," said Patty; "that must have been Priscilla."

"No," smiled the bishop, "it was not Priscilla. The young woman of whom
I am speaking is the president of your Student Association, Catherine
Fair."

"Yes, it's true," said Patty, critically. "Cathy Fair hits straight from
the shoulder."

"And wouldn't you like to go out with that reputation?"

"I'm really not _very_ bad," pleaded Patty, "that is, as badness goes.
But I couldn't be as good as Cathy; it would be going against nature."

"I am afraid," suggested the bishop, "that you do not try very hard. You
may not think that it matters what people think now that you are young,
but how will it be when you grow older? And it will not be long," he
added. "Age slips upon you before you realize it."

Patty looked sober.

"You will soon be thirty, and then forty, and then fifty."

Patty sighed.

"And do you think that a woman of that age is attractive if she deals in
subterfuges and evasions?"

Patty squirmed a trifle, and dug a little hole in the pine-needles with
her toe.

"You must remember that you cannot form your character in a moment, my
dear. Character is a plant of slow growth, and the seeds must be planted
early."

The bishop rose, and Patty scrambled to her feet with a look of relief.
He took the pillow and the book under his arm, and they started down the
hill. "I have preached you a sermon, after all," he said apologetically;
"but preaching is my trade, and you must forgive an old man for being
prosy."

Patty held out her hand with a smile as they stopped before the door of
Phillips Hall. "Good-by, bishop," she said, "and thank you for the
sermon; I guess I needed it--I _am_ getting old."

She climbed the stairs slowly, and, hesitating a moment outside her own
room, where the sound of laughing voices through the transom betokened
that the clan was gathered, she kept