She rushed into the room pouring out:  “I’m afraid you’ll think the teachers have been shabby in not coming near you, but we wanted to give you a chance to get settled.  I am Vida Sherwin, and I try to teach French and English and a few other things in the high school.”

“I’ve been hoping to know the teachers.  You see, I was a librarian——­”

“Oh, you needn’t tell me.  I know all about you!  Awful how much I know—­this gossipy village.  We need you so much here.  It’s a dear loyal town (and isn’t loyalty the finest thing in the world!) but it’s a rough diamond, and we need you for the polishing, and we’re ever so humble——­” She stopped for breath and finished her compliment with a smile.

“If I could help you in any way——­Would I be committing the unpardonable sin if I whispered that I think Gopher Prairie is a tiny bit ugly?”

“Of course it’s ugly.  Dreadfully!  Though I’m probably the only person in town to whom you could safely say that. (Except perhaps Guy Pollock the lawyer—­have you met him?—­oh, you must!—­he’s simply a darling—­intelligence and culture and so gentle.) But I don’t care so much about the ugliness.  That will change.  It’s the spirit that gives me hope.  It’s sound.  Wholesome.  But afraid.  It needs live creatures like you to awaken it.  I shall slave-drive you!”

“Splendid.  What shall I do?  I’ve been wondering if it would be possible to have a good architect come here to lecture.”

“Ye-es, but don’t you think it would be better to work with existing agencies?  Perhaps it will sound slow to you, but I was thinking——­It would be lovely if we could get you to teach Sunday School.”

Carol had the empty expression of one who finds that she has been affectionately bowing to a complete stranger.  “Oh yes.  But I’m afraid I wouldn’t be much good at that.  My religion is so foggy.”

“I know.  So is mine.  I don’t care a bit for dogma.  Though I do stick firmly to the belief in the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man and the leadership of Jesus.  As you do, of course.”

Carol looked respectable and thought about having tea.

“And that’s all you need teach in Sunday School.  It’s the personal influence.  Then there’s the library-board.  You’d be so useful on that.  And of course there’s our women’s study club—­the Thanatopsis Club.”

“Are they doing anything?  Or do they read papers made out of the Encyclopedia?”

Miss Sherwin shrugged.  “Perhaps.  But still, they are so earnest.  They will respond to your fresher interest.  And the Thanatopsis does do a good social work—­they’ve made the city plant ever so many trees, and they run the rest-room for farmers’ wives.  And they do take such an interest in refinement and culture.  So—­in fact, so very unique.”

Carol was disappointed—­by nothing very tangible.  She said politely, “I’ll think them all over.  I must have a while to look around first.”