“You’re a trifle early, but come on in.  You’re to have a seat here by me, with Elise and A.O. just around the corner.  Now tell me what has happened to give you that ‘glorious morning face,’ as Stevenson puts it.  You look as if you had found some rare good fortune.”

“I have, but I didn’t know I showed it.”  Mary’s hands went up to her face as if she expected to feel the expression that Betty saw.  “I am so happy to think that I’m to be at your table.  And I’m glad that I can stop playing dumb for awhile.  Oh, but it has been funny up in our room this morning.  I took your advice, and I want to tell you about it before the other girls come down.”

Betty laughed heartily as Mary pictured herself in bed under the umbrella, and smiled understandingly when she told about finding a make-believe chum in Lloyd’s picture.

“I know, dear,” she answered.  “I used to do that way with god-mother’s picture when I was a lonely little thing at the Cuckoo’s nest.  I’d whisper my troubles and show her my treasures, and feel that she kept watch over me while I slept.  It comforted me many a time, when there was no one else to go to, and is one of my dearest recollections now of those days when I felt so little and lonesome and uncared for.”

“How Jack would laugh at me,” exclaimed Mary, presently, “if he knew that one of my air-castles had collapsed.  He is always teasing me about building sky-scrapers without any foundation.  On my way out here Mrs. Stockton told me a lot of stories about her school days.  She roomed with the Judge’s sister, and she heard so much about him and he heard so much about her through this sister, that they got to sending messages to each other in her letters.  Then they exchanged photographs, and finally they met when he came on the Commencement, and the romance of their lives grew out of it.  I kept thinking how romantic it would be to have your brother marry your dearest chum, someone you already loved like a sister—­and that if my room-mate turned out to be lovely and sweet and charming, all that I hoped she’d be, how interesting I could make it for Jack.  There’s no society at all in Lone-Rock, and he never can meet any nice girls as long as he stays there.”

“And you don’t think he would be interested in Ethelinda?” asked Betty mischievously.  “An heiress and a girl with such a distinguished air?  She certainly has that even if she doesn’t measure up to your standard of beauty.  He might be charmed with her.  You never can tell what a man is going to like.”

“Not that—­that—­clam!” Mary answered warmly, with an expression of disgust.  “I know Jack!  You’ve no idea how she can shut herself up in her shell.  She never would fit in our family and I know he’d never—­”

The signal announcing breakfast made her stop in the middle of her sentence, for at that same instant the girls began to file in.

“Well, it’s good-bye, ‘Betty.’  I must begin talking to ‘Miss Lewis’ now.”  Giving Betty’s hand a quick squeeze under the table, she drew herself up sedately.