Blinded and dripping, Joe made a frantic effort to head the bottle another way, and in the attempt turned a liberal portion over Bert, who was standing near.

“I was just about to say,” continued Charlotte calmly, “that boys always do everything in such a complete way.”

“Well they know when not to talk,” growled Joe, mopping himself with a napkin, and frowning darkly at the offending young lady.

It was a supper of gayety, and good things to eat.  The boys were so proud of their cooking that they disliked to let the conversation wander from that particular subject, and brought it back by some skilful remark whenever they thought the interest of the girls was flagging.  Each club toasted the other, and Jack toasted the ladies, ending with the sentence, which became a byword in Glenloch, “Girls are all right if you only know how to manage ’em.”

“What a lot of dishes,” said Betty with a sigh as they rose from the table.

“We will now show you how the powerful masculine mind handles the problem of dishes,” proclaimed Phil.

“Do those dishes worry us?  Not at all,” added Bert as the boys lifted the table bodily and put it in a comer of the room.

“Now you see ’em,” said Joe, helping to unfold two screens borrowed for the occasion, “and now you don’t.”

“Yes, but they’re there all the same,” argued Dorothy unconvinced.

“Mrs. Flinn will change all that, little sister,” answered her brother condescendingly.  “We have bribed her to spend to-morrow morning cleaning the club room, and she thinks we are ’blissed young gintlemen.’”

“Get over on the piano stool, Art, and give us that new music you were playing last night,” begged Joe.

“No, don’t play new things,” implored Dorothy.  “Play some college songs.”

And so Arthur played and they all sang; some on the pitch and some off, but all happy, and each one deeply satisfied with his own share of the performance.  At last, swinging around on the piano stool, Arthur looked at Ruth and said mysteriously, “You may as well tell them your news now, Ruth.”

Every one turned to look at Ruth with such sudden interest that the color flashed into her face.

“It isn’t enough to make you all look so curious,” she laughed.  “It’s only that I can’t have many more parties with you, because my father has sent for me, and I am to sail on the ‘Utopia’ a month from to-day.”

There was a moment of mournful and incredulous silence; then Dorothy said indignantly, “I call that a mean shame; you were promised to us for a year, and that would make it next October.”

“I know.  But you see father will be ready for me sooner than he thought, and much as I should love to spend the summer here, I do want to be with him.”

“Strange,” murmured Joe.

“And—­and there’s more news,” continued Ruth.  “Uncle Jerry and Miss Burton are going to be married a week before I sail, and go over with me for a wedding trip,”