The blue and silver uniforms of the Salsette cadets were much in evidence, and Betty’s first thought was of how nice Bob Henderson would look in uniform.

“There’s our friend!” whispered Tommy Tucker, directing Betty’s attention to the severe-looking elderly woman whom he had so bothered on the train.  “Gee, do you suppose she goes to Shadyside?  I thought it was a girls’ School!”

“Oh, do be quiet!” scolded Bobby Littell “Tommy, you’ve got us in a peck of trouble—­she’s one of the teachers!”

“How do you know?” demanded Tommy.  “Who told you?”

“Well, if you’d keep still a minute, you’d hear,” said the exasperated Bobby.

Sure enough, a pleasant, fresh-faced woman, hardly more than a girl, was escorting the gray-haired woman to a waiting touring car.

“You’re the last of the staff to come,” she said clearly.  Mrs. Eustice was beginning to worry about you.  Will you tell her that I’m coming up in the bus with the girls?”

“All right, you win,” admitted Tommy.  “Why couldn’t she say she was a teacher instead of acting so blamed exclusive?  Anyway, she probably won’t connect you girls with me—­all boys look alike to her.”

“She has a wonderful memory—­like a camera,” surmised Bobby gloomily.  “You wait and see.”

“Girls, are all of you for Shadyside?” The young woman had come up to them and now she smiled at the giggling, chattering group with engaging friendliness.  “I thought you were.  We take this auto-stage over here.  Give your baggage checks to this porter.  I’m Miss Anderson, the physical instructor.”

“Salsette boys this way!” boomed a stentorian voice.

“Good-bye, Betty.  See you soon,” whispered Bob, giving Betty’s hand a hurried squeeze.  “We’re only across the lake, you know.”

“You chaps, move!” directed the voice snappily.

With one accord the group dissolved, the boys hastening to the stage marked “Salsette” and the girls following Miss Anderson.

There were two stages for the Academy and two for Shadyside, and a smaller bus which, they afterward learned, followed the route to the town, which was not on the railroad.

“Betty, darling!”

A pretty girl tumbled down the stage steps and nearly choked Betty with the fervency of her embrace.

It was Norma Guerin, and Alice was waiting, smiling.  Betty was delighted to meet these old friends, and she introduced them to the Littell girls and Libbie and Frances in the happy, tangled fashion that such introductions usually are performed.  Names and faces get straightened out more gradually.

The stage in which they found themselves, for the seven girls insisted on sitting near each other, was well-filled.  They had started and were lurching along the rather uneven road when Betty found herself staring at a girl on the other side of the bus.

“Where have I seen her before?” she puzzled.  “I wonder—­does she look like some one I know?  Oh, I remember!  She’s the girl we saw on the train—­the one that took Bob’s seat!”