"Then," said Betty, looking appealingly at Clara and Barbara, "I guess we can safely go on thinking that our play will be still better. 19-- is the biggest cla.s.s that ever graduated here, and it's certainly one of the brightest."

Everybody laughed at this outburst of patriotism and the atmosphere brightened immediately, so Betty felt that perhaps she was of some use on the committee even if she couldn't understand all Clara's easy references to glosses and first folio readings, or compare Booth's interpretation of Shylock with Irving's as glibly as Rachel did.

Just then there was a smothered giggle outside the door and six l.u.s.ty voices chanted, "By my troth, our little bodies are a-weary of these hard stairs," in recognition of which pathetic appeal the committee hastily dismissed the subject of Shylock in order to hear what the impatient Portias had to say. They did so well, and there was such a lively discussion about the respective merits of Kate Denise, Babbie Hildreth and Nita Reese that the downcast spirits, of the committee were fully restored, and they went home to dinner resolved not to lose heart again no matter what happened, which is the most sensible resolution that any senior play committee can make.

When Betty got home she found a note waiting for her on the hall table addressed in Tom Alison's sprawling hand and containing an invitation to Yale commencement.

"I'm asking you early," Tom wrote, "so that you can plan for it, and be so much the surer not to disappoint me. Alice Waite is coming with d.i.c.k Grayson, and some of the other fellows will have Harding girls. My mother is going to chaperon the bunch.

"Do you remember my kid roommate, Ashley Dwight? He's junior president this year. He's heard a lot about Georgia Ames, real and ideal, and he's crazy to see what the visible part of her is like. I think he meditates asking her to the prom, and making a sensation with her. Can't I bring him up to call on you some day when the real Miss Ames will probably be willing to amuse Ashley?"

As Betty joyously considered how she should answer all this, she remembered the four box tickets for the Glee Club concert that Lucile Merrifield had promised to get her--Lucile was business manager of the mandolin club this year. Betty had intended to invite Alice Waite and two Winsted men, but there was no reason why she shouldn't ask Georgia, Tom, and the junior president instead. So she went straight to Georgia's room.

"All right," said Georgia calmly, when Betty had explained her project.

"I was going to stand up with a crowd of freshmen, but they won't care."

"Georgia Ames," broke in her roommate severely, "I should like to see you excited for once. Don't you know the difference between going stand-up with a lot of other freshmen, and sitting in a box with Miss Wales and two Yale men?"

"Of course I know the difference," said Georgia, smiling good-naturedly.

"Didn't I say that I'd go in the box? But you see, Caroline, if you are only a namesake of Madeline Ayres's deceased double you mustn't get too much excited over the wonderful things that happen to you. Must you, Betty?"

"I don't think you need any pointers from me, Georgia," said Betty laughingly. "Has Caroline seen you studying yet?"

"Once," said Georgia sadly.

"But it was in mid-year week," explained the roommate, "the night before the Livy exam. She mended stockings all the evening and then she said she was going to sit up to study. She began at quarter past ten."

"Propped up in bed, to be quite comfortable," interpolated Georgia.

"And at half-past ten," went on her roommate, "she said she was so sleepy that she couldn't stand it any longer. So she tumbled the books and extra pillows on the floor and went to sleep."

"Too bad you spoiled your record just for those few minutes," laughed Betty, "but I'll take you to the concert all the same," and she hurried off to dress.

At dinner she entertained her end of the table with an account of Georgia's essay at cramming.

"But that doesn't prove that she never studies," Madeline defended her protegee. "That first floor room of theirs is a regular rendezvous for all the freshmen in the house, so she's very sensible to keep away from it when she's busy."

"Where does she go?"

"Oh, to the library, I suppose," said Madeline. "Most of the freshmen study there a good deal, and she camps down in Lou Waterson's room, afternoons, because Lou has three different kinds of lab. to go to, so she's never at home."

"Well, it's a wonder that Georgia isn't completely spoiled," said Nita Reese. "Just to think of the things that child has had done for her!"

And certainly if Georgia's head had not been very firmly set on her square shoulders, it would have been hopelessly turned by her meteoric career at Harding. For weeks after college opened she was a spectacle, a show-sight of the place. Old girls pointed her out to one another in a fashion that was meant to be in.o.btrusive but that would have flattered the vanity of any other freshman. Freshmen were regaled with stories about her, which they promptly retailed for her benefit, and then sent her flowers as a tribute to her good luck and a recognition of the amus.e.m.e.nt she added to the dull routine of life at Harding. Seniors who had been duped by the phantom Georgia asked her to Sunday dinner and introduced her to their friends, who did likewise. Foolish girls wanted her autograph, clever ones demanded to know her sensations at finding herself so oddly conspicuous, while the "Merry Hearts" amply fulfilled their promise to make up to her for unintentionally having forced her into a curious prominence. But Georgia took it all as a mere matter of course, smiled blandly at the stories, accepted the flowers and the invitations, wrote the autographs, and explained that she guessed her sensations weren't at all remarkable,--they were just like any other freshman's.

"All the same," Madeline declared, whenever the subject came up, "she's absolutely unique. If the other Georgia had never existed, this one would have made her mark here."

But just how she would have done it even Madeline could not decide. The real Georgia was not like other girls, but in what fundamental way she was different it was difficult to say. Indeed now that the "Merry Hearts" came to know her better, she was almost as much of a puzzle to them as the other Georgia had been to the rest of the college.

CHAPTER XI

A DARK HORSE DEFINED

"Did you see Mr. Masters in chapel this morning with Miss Kingston?"

This was the choice tid-bit of news that 19-- pa.s.sed from hand to hand as it took its way to its various nine o'clock cla.s.ses.

"I thought he wasn't coming until to-morrow," said Teddie Wilson, who followed every move of the play committee with mournful interest.

"He wasn't," explained Barbara Gordon, "but he found he could get off better to-day. It's only for the Shylocks and Portias, you know. We can't do much until they're definitely decided, so we can tell who is left for the other parts."

"Gratiano and the Gobbos will come in the next lot," sighed Teddie.

"Seems as if I should die to be out of it all!"

Jean Eastman was just ahead of them in the crowd. "Poor Teddie!" Barbara began, "I only wish---" She broke off abruptly. She didn't want Jean for Shylock, but it would have been the height of impropriety to let even Teddie, whose misfortunes made her a privileged person, know it.

"It's a perfect shame," she went on hastily. "You don't feel half so bad about it as we do."

Ted stared incredulously. "Don't I? I say, Barbara, did you know there was a girl in last year's cast who had had a condition at midyears? She kept still and somehow it wasn't reported to Miss Stuart until very late, and by that time it would have made a lot of trouble to take her out. So they hushed it up and she kept her part. A last year's girl wrote me about it."

"I don't believe she had much fun out of it, do you, Ted?" asked Barbara. "Anyhow I'm sure you--"

"Oh, of course not," interrupted Ted with emphasis.

"What in the world are you two talking about?" demanded Jean Eastman curiously, dropping back to join them.

"Talking play of course!" laughed Barbara, trying to be extra cordial because she had so nearly said a disagreeable thing a minute before.

Meanwhile Ted, who felt that she should break the tenth commandment to atoms if she stayed in Jean's neighborhood another minute, slipped off down a side hall and joined a group of her cla.s.smates who were bound like herself for Miss Raymond's English novelists. They were talking play too, of course,--it was in the air this morning,--and they welcomed Ted joyously and deferred to her opinion as that of an expert.

"Who'll be Shylock, Teddie?" demanded Bob Parker. "That's the only thing I'm curious about."

"Jean," returned Ted calmly, "or at least the committee think so. I can tell by the way Barbara looks at her."

"Beastly shame," muttered Bob. "Why couldn't Emily and Christy have braced up and got it themselves?"

"Now, Bob," Nita Reese remonstrated, "don't you think you're a bit hard on Jean this time? I know she's a good deal of a land-grabber, but now she's gone into an open compet.i.tion just like any one else, and if she wins it will be because she deserves to."

"Ye-es," admitted Bob grudgingly. "Yes, of course it will. I know that as well as you do, Nita Reese. Just the same she's never any good in Gest and Pant, is she, Teddie?"

"In what?" demanded Helen Adams and Clara Madison together.

"Gest and Pant--short for Gesture and Pantomime, senior course in elocution," explained Teddie rapidly. "Oh, I don't know. I think she's done some pretty good things once in a while. And anyhow she can't fool the committee and Mr. Masters."

"Of course not," agreed Bob.