“The influence of Ruth and some of her friends has extended to our next class as well,” Mrs. Tellingham had said.  “Nettie Parsons and Ann Hicks will be of assistance, too, for another year.  I wish, however, that Ruth Fielding’s example and influence might continue through my time——­I certainly do.”

The girls of the East Dormitory held a meeting before breakfast and passed resolutions requesting Mrs. Tellingham to rearrange their duo and quartette rooms so that as many as possible of the West Dormitory girls could be housed with them.

“We’re all willing to double up,” said Sarah Fish, who had become leader of the East Dormitory.  “I’m perfectly willing to divide my bureau drawers, book-shelves, table and bed with any of you orphans.  Poor things!  It must be awful to be burned out.”

“Some of us haven’t much to put in bureau drawers or on bookshelves,” said Helen, inclined to be lugubrious.  “I—­I haven’t a decent thing to wear but what I have on right now.  I unpacked my trunk clear to the very bottom layer.”

However, as a rule, selfish considerations did not enter into the girls’ discussion of the fire.  When they looked at the ruined building, they saw mainly the loss to the school.  A loyalty is bred in the pupils of such an institution as Briarwood Hall, which is only less strong than love of home and country.

A new structure to house a hundred girls would cost a deal of money.

There was no studying done before breakfast the morning after the fire; and at the tables the girls’ tongues ran until Miss Brokaw declared the room sounded like a great rookery she had once disturbed near an old English rectory.

“I positively cannot stand it, young ladies,” declared the nervous teacher, who had been up most of the night.  “Such continuous chatter is enough to crack one’s eardrums.”

The girls really were too excited to be very considerate, although they did not mean to offend Miss Brokaw.  If the window or an outer door was opened, the very tang of sour smoke on the air set their tongues off again about the fire.

Once in chapel, however, a rather solemn feeling fell upon them.  The teacher whose turn it was to read, selected a psalm of gratitude that seemed to breathe just what was in all their hearts.  It gave thanks for deliverance from the terrors of the night and those of the noonday, for the Power that encircles poor humanity and shelters it from harm.

“We, too, have been sheltered,” thought Ruth and her friends.  “We have been guarded from the evil that flyeth by night and from the terror that stalketh at noonday.  Surely God is our Keeper and Strength.  We will not be afraid.”

When Helen played one of the old, old hymns of the Church she brought such sweet tones from the strings of the violin that Miss Picolet hushed her accompaniment, surprised and delighted.  And when they sang, Ruth Fielding’s rich and mellow voice carried the air in perfect harmony.