aid Dolly, finally, when she decided that
Bessie was not going to answer her.

And now Bessie decided on a change of tactics. She had tried arguing
with Dolly, and it had seemed to do no good at all. It was time to see
if a little ridicule would not be more useful.

"I didn't say so, Dolly," she answered, very quietly. And she smiled at
her friend. "What's the use of my saying anything? I told you the truth
about what happened this evening, and you didn't believe me. So there's
not much use talking, is there?"

"You know I'm right, or you'd have plenty to talk about," said Dolly,
unhappily. "Oh, I wish we'd never seen Will Burns!"

"I wish we hadn't seen him until to-night, Dolly," said Bessie, gravely.
"You know, that trip in the automobile with Mr. Holmes the other day
wasn't very nice for me, Dolly. If they had caught me, as Mr. Holmes had
planned to do, I'd have been taken back to Hedgeville, and bound over to
Farmer Weeks--and he's a miser, who hates me, and would have been as
mean to me as he could possibly be. That's how we met Will Burns, you
know--because you insisted on going with Mr. Holmes in his car to get an
ice-cream soda."

"That's just what I said--you pretended to forgive me for that, and you
haven't at all--you're still angry, and you humiliated me before all
those people just to get even! I didn't think you were like that,
Bessie--I thought you were nicer than I. But--"

"Dolly, stop talking a little, and just think it over. You say you
didn't have a good time, and you mean that you didn't have a boy waiting
around to do what you told him all evening. Isn't that so?"

"All the other girls had boys around them all the time--"

"You went with Walter Stubbs, didn't you? And you told him that maybe
you'd come home with him and maybe you wouldn't--and that if anyone you
liked better came along you were going to stay with them. You didn't
know Will Burns was coming, did you?"

"No, but--I thought if he did come--"

"That's just it. You didn't think about Walter at all, did you. You
wanted to have a good time yourself--and you didn't care what sort of a
time he had! You just thought that if Will Burns did come he was sure to
want to be with you, and so, as soon as you saw him come in you sent
Walter off. Oh, you were silly, Dolly--and it was all your own fault.
Don't you think it's rather mean to blame me? We were together when Will
Burns was coming toward us, and I wanted to go away and let you