“Don’t you dare to think I’m crying, Arthur Hamilton,” she managed to say between her sobs.  “I said I wouldn’t, and I won’t,” and then realizing the absurdity of what she was saying, she laughed as unrestrainedly as she had cried.

The sight of Mrs. Hamilton’s worried face and Arthur’s helpless alarm brought her to her senses, and she said penitently, “Do forgive me for being so foolish.  I’ve tried so hard not to cry that when I felt Aunt Mary’s arms around me it just had to come out.”

“Darling, the best place for you is in bed, and I shall see that you’re tucked in all ‘comfy,’” said Mrs. Hamilton tenderly.

As she started up the stairs, Ruth turned to Arthur who was slowly following.  “I really do believe you saved my life,” she said earnestly.  “I was so frightened and tired and achy that I couldn’t have gone many more steps if that blessed old voice hadn’t led me.”

“Oh, some one would have found you before long,” answered Arthur, who hated to take any undeserved credit to himself.

“Perhaps,” assented Ruth doubtfully.  “At any rate it would have been a trifle cold sitting there waiting to be found, and I prefer to think you saved my life.  It makes me feel much more important.”

“Ail right, we’ll call it so then,” said Arthur with a laugh.  “And now we’re square again, as we were on the night when we first ate dinner together, for if I saved your life you have certainly saved my common sense.”

“I must say I like it to hear you compare your common sense with my life.  However, I’ll shake hands on it,” and with a laughing good-night Ruth followed Mrs. Hamilton into the pink room.

Arthur thumped along into his own room and went happily to bed, feeling that girls were pluckier that he had thought them, and that even crutch-bearers could accomplish something in the world.

CHAPTER XIII

MISS CYNTHIA

“Come down to the pond with me this afternoon,” said Dorothy as she and Ruth parted on their way home from school a few days after the skating-party, “and we’ll go into a quiet comer and practice until you feel sure of yourself.”

“All right; I’ll go,” Ruth answered, “but I can’t stay long; I must study for at least an hour before dinner.”

“Well, be at my house by two, and then we shall have the pond almost to ourselves for a while, and we’ll be ready to go home by the time the crowd gets there.”

Dorothy was a good teacher and in the hour they spent on the pond Ruth gained both skill and confidence.

“I never shall be nervous again about it,” she said with enthusiasm as they took a last swing around the pond together.  “It’s like so many other things; you have to get the feeling of it before you can really enjoy it.”

“That’s so,” assented Dorothy; “you probably never will lose it now.  My, but it’s growing colder every minute, isn’t it?  Let’s hurry home, and I’ll make some hot chocolate.  You’ll have plenty of time before you need to study.”