d begun to impress
upon the young brains growing into maturity the idea that soon it would
be their task to take over the problems that were now vexing the world's
greatest statesmen and its wisest and most courageous women. A tendency
was manifesting itself among young people to equip themselves to take a
worthy part in the struggles yet to come. Classmates who had looked with
toleration upon Linda's common-sense shoes and plain dresses because
she was her father's daughter, now looked upon her with respect and
appreciation because she started so many interesting subjects for
discussion, because she was so rapidly developing into a creature well
worth looking at. Always she would be unusual because of her extreme
height, her narrow eyes, her vivid coloring. But a greater maturity, a
fuller figure, had come to be a part of the vision with which one looked
at Linda. In these days no one saw her as she was. Even her schoolmates
had fallen into the habit of seeing her as she would be in the years to
come.

Thus far she had been able to keep her identities apart without any
difficulty; but the book proposition was so unexpected, it was such a
big thing to result from her modest beginning, that Linda realized
that she must proceed very carefully, she must concentrate with all her
might, else her school work would begin to suffer in favor of the book.
Recently so many things had arisen to distract her attention. Many days
she had not been able to keep Eileen's face off her geometry papers;
and again she saw Gilman's, anxious and pain-filled. Sometimes she found
herself lifting her eyes from tasks upon which she was concentrating
with all her might, and with no previous thought whatever she was
searching for Donald Whiting, and when she saw him, coming into muscular
and healthful manhood, she returned to her work with more strength,
deeper vision, a quiet, assured feeling around her heart. Sometimes,
over the edge of Literature and Ancient History, Peter Morrison looked
down at her with gravely questioning eyes and dancing imps twisting his
mouth muscles, and Linda paused a second to figure upon what had become
an old problem with her. Why did her wild-flower garden make Peter
Morrison think of a graveyard? What was buried there besides the feet of
her rare flowers? She had not as yet found the answer.

This day her thoughts were on Peter frequently because she intended to
see him that night. She was going to share with him a