orchard to gather a scrapbasket full of apples, she discovered the door locked. In answer to her lively rat-tattoo and gay call over the transom, she heard the key turn.

Bea started to dash in; then after one glance stopped and fumbled uneasily with the knob. In her happy-go-lucky childhood with many brothers and sisters at home, tears had always an embarrassing effect.

“Let’s—let’s go to the orchard,” she stammered. “It’s lovely, and the fresh air will help your—your headache.” She had a boyish notion that anybody would prefer to excuse heavy eyes by calling it headache rather than tears.

Lila pointed to the bed which was half made up.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she demanded in agonized reproach. “I thought the maids attended to the beds here. I left the mattress turned over the foot all day long, and the door was wide open. Everybody in the neighborhood must have looked in and then decided that I was lazy and shiftless. They believe that I have been brought up to let things go undone like that. They do, they do! Miss Merriam just the same as said so. She poked in her head a minute ago and said, ‘Heigho, little one, time to make up your bed. It has aired long enough and the maid is not expected to do it.’ She said that to me! Oh, I hate her!” Lila caught her breath hard.

Bea opened her candid eyes wider in astonished curiosity. “But didn’t you want to know about the maid?”

“She mortified me. Do you know how it feels to be mortified? The—the awfulness—” Lila stopped and swallowed once or twice as if something stuck in her throat. “She might have told me in a different manner so as not to wound me so heartlessly. She isn’t a lady.”

“Please.” Bea twirled the door-knob in worried protest. “Don’t talk that way. She is my friend. We live in the same town. She’s nice, really. You’ve only seen the outside. Please!”

“Oh, well!” Lila raised her shoulders slightly. “She isn’t worth noticing, I dare say. Such people never are. I can’t help wishing that you were not acquainted with her. I want you all to myself. I’m glad she belongs to another class anyhow.”

Into Bea’s puzzled face crept a troubled expression. “You’re a funny girl, Lila,” she said; “let’s go to the orchard.”

On their way across the campus, they passed countless girls hurrying from building to building. Every doorway seemed to blossom with a chattering group, a loitering pair, or an energetic single lady on pressing business bent. Bea met every glance with a look of bright friendliness in her eager eyes and lips ready to smile, no matter whether she had ever been introduced or not. But Lila’s wild-flower face, in spite of its lovely tints and outlines, seemed almost icy in its expression of haughty criticism. No wonder, then, that this miniature world of college reflected a different countenance to each.

“Aren’t they the dearest, sweetest girls you ever saw!” exclaimed Bea as the two freshmen turned from the curving concrete walk into the road that led to the orchard.

“I saw only one who was truly beautiful,” commented her companion. “I expected to find them prettier.”

“Oh, but they are so interesting,” protested Bea in quick loyalty. “Nearly everybody appears prettier after you get acquainted. I’ve noticed that myself. It is better to dawn than to dazzle, don’t you think? Sue Merriam, for instance, improves and grows nicer and nicer after you know her. You will learn to love her dearly.”

“Never!”

At the tone Bea gave an involuntary whistle; then checked herself at sight of Lila’s quivering lips. “Oh, well, don’t bother. Let’s go on to the orchard. Look! There comes Roberta Abbott with about a bushel of russets. She is a funny girl too. To judge from her appearance, you would say she was sad and dignified. She has the most tragic dark eyes and mouth. But just wait till you hear her talk. Didn’t you meet her last night at Sue’s?”

“Yes.” Lila turned away to hide the flicker of jealousy, for she had learned long since how transparently every emotion showed in her features. “I think we ought not to waste any time now. And anyway I’d rather get acquainted with you all alone this afternoon.”

Bea stared. “You’re the funniest girl!” She walked on after waving a sociable hand at Roberta. “It is interesting to have friends that are different, don’t you think?”

“To have one friend who is different,” corrected Lila.

“All right,” laughed Bea. “Oh, see what a gorgeous glorious place this is, with the trees and scarlet woodbine and the lake sparkling away over there, and girls, girls, girls! But I don’t believe that there is a single other one exactly like you.”

During the next week this thought recurred to her more than once. By means of some diplomatic maneuvering, the two friends managed to have their single rooms exchanged for a double. After moving in, Lila seized a moment of solitude to plan a beautiful cozy corner for Bea. She dragged her own desk into a dusky recess and set Bea’s at an artistic angle at the left side of the sunniest window. Just as she was hanging her favorite picture above it, Bea came rushing in with her arms full of new books.

“Oh, no, no, no!” she exclaimed impulsively, “that won’t do at all. You must put it at the right so that the light will fall over the left shoulder. Otherwise the shadow of your hand will go scrambling over the paper ahead of your pen. Here, let me show you.”

By the time she had hauled the desk across to its new position, Lila had vanished. Bea found her huddled in a woe-begone heap behind the wardrobe door in her bedroom, and flew to her in dismay.

“Oh, Lila, dearie, did you smash your finger or drop something on your foot? There, don’t cry. I’ll get the witch-hazel and arnica and court-plaster. What is it? Where? Why-ee!” she gasped bewildered, “why, Lila!” for her weeping roommate had pushed her gently away and turned her face to the wall.

“I was doing it for you,” she sobbed. “I was trying to please you, and then you were so cr-cr-cruel! You were cruel.”

“Cruel?” echoed Bea, “why, how? I haven’t done a thing except buy the books I ordered last week. Yours were down in the office, too, but I didn’t have enough money for all, because Sue Merriam borrowed four dollars. She asked after you and said——” Bea hesitated, smitten with novel doubt that she ought to begin to think three times before speaking once where such a sensitive person was concerned.

Lila sat up in swift attention and winked away her tears. “Said what?”

“Oh, nothing much.” Bea wriggled. “Just talking.”

“I insist.”

“Oh, well, it doesn’t signify. I was only thinking——” Bea paused again before blurting out. “She said that roommates are good for the character.”

At this Lila rose with such an air of patient endurance that poor Bea felt clumsy, remorseful, injured and perplexed simultaneously. A cloud of resentful silence hovered over them both through the weary hours of the afternoon. Not until the ten o’clock gong sent the echoes booming through the deserted corridors, did Lila break down in a storm of weeping that terrified Bea. She found herself begging pardon, apologizing, caressing, explaining and repenting wholesale of rudeness about the desk, of selfish neglect in the case of the books, of disloyalty in giving ear to Miss Merriam’s gratuitous comments. This gale blew over, leaving one girl with darker circles under her eyes and a