ame of solitaire. She
was the team and made every score.

Miss Watson and Doctor Weldon stood in the gallery looking on.

"Hester Alden is a brilliant person," said Miss Watson. "She will amount
to something if she continues."

"She can do little in mathematics. She'll pass on about seventy-five per
cent," said Miss Laird. She had long since erased Hester's name from her
good books, for Miss Laird knew only angles and equations, fixed values
and ratios, and had no conception of nor admiration for a mind which was
not as her own.

Miss Watson laughed at this remark. She was more liberal-minded than
Miss Laird and was not disappointed to find that her girls were not all
of the same type.

"You can open an oyster with a pen-knife as well as a chisel," she said.

Miss Laird glanced at the speaker. She was logical but not witty. Seeing
that she did not grasp the meaning, Miss Watson continued.

"Taking the oyster as each one's little world, you know, Miss Laird. I
have known men and women who have achieved a wonderful amount of success
and happiness who could not have made seventy per cent on one of your
examinations."

Doctor Weldon had listened in silence. She had sat watching Hester
during that intense first half. She read deeper than either of her
teachers.

"I am fearful for Hester," she said at last. She spoke so low that only
Miss Watson heard her. "She is too easily hurt, and she'll fight off
showing it until she drops from exhaustion. If I know the girl, her good
playing this evening is not so much for love of the game, as it is to
hide the fact that something has gone wrong."

"Rather an excellent trait. Do you not think so?" said Miss Watson.
"Personally, I despise a whiner, and haven't a bit of sympathy for a
girl who goes about asking for pity. Pride is a good thing when it helps
us cover up our own bruises."

"It is very fine, if it is not overdone. You know you cannot keep all
the steam in a boiler under high pressure. There must be a safety valve
or--trouble. I hope Hester will not be too intense. Intense folk need
such a lot of self-control, or they make every one miserable about
them."

The conversation stopped at this point. The practice game was over and
Miss Watson went below and into the cage to see that the girls were
taking the necessary precautions in regard to wraps.

"Hester Alden will play at Exeter," was the general opinion at the close
of the game.

"I am sure of that," said S