Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College Part 9

After dinner more conversation followed. It was eight o'clock before Grace remembered her theme. "What shall I write about?" she demanded.

"You promised to supply the inspiration."

"So I will," returned Mabel cheerfully. "Why don't you write about--" She paused, frowning slightly. "After all my vaunted promises I'm not able to suggest anything on the spur of the moment," she confessed laughingly. "Why don't you take some incident in your own life or that of your friends and write a story about it?" she proposed after a moment's silence.

"I don't believe I could ever write a story," confessed Grace. "I think I'll write a little discussion about girls and their ideals."

"That sounds interesting," commended Mabel. "Go ahead with it. You may sit at this table, if you like."

Grace seated herself, nibbled at the end of her fountain pen reflectively, then began to write. Mabel busied herself with her own work. At last Grace shoved aside the closely written sheets of paper.

"It's done," she cried, in a triumphant voice. "Now we can talk."

"May I read it?" asked Mabel.

"Of course, if you wish to," laughed Grace. "It isn't worth the trouble, though."

Mabel picked up the theme and began to read. Grace rose, and strolling over to the bookcase fell to examining the various bindings. Her friend's flattering comment, "It's splendid, Grace. I had no idea you could write so well," caused her to look up in surprise from the book she held in her hand.

"I don't think it is very remarkable," she contradicted. "It hasn't a shred of literary style."

"It's convincing," argued Mabel.

"That is because I felt strongly on my subject. When it comes to anything that lies near my heart I am always convincing. Father says I put up the most convincing argument of any one he knows," smiled Grace.

"He always declares he is wax in my hands. I hope you will make me a visit and meet my father and mother, Mabel," she added.

"I surely will," promised Mabel. "We must correspond after I leave college. I wish you could go home with me for one of the holiday vacations. Can't you manage it?"

"I am afraid not this year," returned Grace doubtfully. "Father and Mother wouldn't object, but they miss me so during the year that I feel as though my holidays belonged to them. I am an only child, you know."

"So am I," returned Mabel. "I am also extremely popular with my father.

If I can tear myself away from him to make you a visit, surely you ought to be equally public spirited."

"I'll think it over," laughed Grace. "Oh, dear!" she exclaimed a moment later, glancing at the little French clock on the chiffonier, "I must go. It is twenty minutes to ten. How the time has slipped away."

"Thank you," bowed Mabel. "Such appreciation of my society is gratifying in the extreme. I'll invite you again."

"See that you do," retorted Grace. "Have you any engagement for Sat.u.r.day afternoon? If you haven't, then suppose we have luncheon at Vinton's; then go for a long walk. We can stay out all afternoon, stop at the tea shop for supper and come home on the street car, or walk in, if we choose. We might ask Frances and Anne to join us. Miriam and Elfreda are going out for a ride. Miriam has a horse here this year. She had her choice between a horse and a runabout and she took the horse. The moment Elfreda found out she had one, she wrote home about it. Now she has a riding horse, too."

"I had my own pet mount, Elixir, here during my freshman and soph.o.m.ore years. The latter part of my second year I didn't take him out enough to exercise him. So I ordered him sent home. He is a beauty. Jet black with a three-cornered white spot in the middle of his forehead. He's an Arabian, and Father paid an extravagant price for him. He shakes hands and does ever so many tricks that I taught him. When you go home with me, you shall see him."

"I'd love to have a riding horse," confessed Grace, "but Father can't afford it. I've never asked him, but I know he can't. We have no car either."

"Make me a visit and you can ride Elixir every day," bribed Mabel.

"I'd love that!" exclaimed Grace fervently as she slipped into her coat and settled her hat firmly on her fluffy hair. "Good night, Mabel. Come and see me soon. Don't forget our Sat.u.r.day walk."

"I'll go to the door with you," announced Mabel. "No, I won't forget our walk. I'll tell Frances about it to-morrow, before she has a chance to make any other plans. She is a popular young person, and elusive in the matter of dates."

"There are others," retorted Grace, with a significant glance at her friend.

"So there are," agreed Mabel innocently.

On the way home Grace wondered if there were any way in which she might help Laura Atkins. True to her promise, she went at once to interview Elfreda on the subject of the eccentric freshman. She found Miriam and the stout girl busily engaged in trying to put together a puzzle that Elfreda had unearthed in the toy department of one of the Overton stores that afternoon. Puzzles were the delight of Elfreda's heart. But, once put together, they immediately ceased to be of interest.

"This is a wonder!" she exclaimed at sight of Grace. "It is worth having. Neither Miriam nor I can put it together."

"I have a harder one for you to tackle," smiled Grace. Then she recounted her conversation with Mabel Ashe.

"You have altogether too much faith in my powers of persuasion,"

grumbled Elfreda, secretly pleased, nevertheless.

"But that is much better than if we had no faith at all," reminded Grace.

CHAPTER VIII

THE INVITATION

The next morning Grace made a startling discovery. It was directly after breakfast that she made it. Having fifteen minutes to spare before going to her first recitation, she decided to reread her theme. What one wrote always read differently after one had slept over it. What seemed clever at night might be very commonplace when read in the cold light of the morning. Grace reached for the book in which she had placed her theme.

It was not there. Going down on her knees, she looked first under the table, then under the chiffonier, then turned over the books on the table, then, darting to the closet, searched the pockets of her long coat.

"Where can it be?" she cried despairingly. "I am sure I had it when I came into the hall last night. I couldn't have lost it on my way across the campus. I'll run down and ask Anne. Perhaps she picked it up and put it away for me."

Grace hurried downstairs as fast as her feet would carry her. To her low inquiry in Anne's ear she received a disappointing answer. Anne, who was just finis.h.i.+ng her breakfast, replied that she had not even seen the theme. She rose at once to accompany Grace upstairs. The two girls searched in every nook and corner of the room. "I wanted to hand it in this morning," lamented Grace. "Now I'll have to write it all over again. I don't believe I can remember much of it, either. I'll have to explain to Miss Duncan, too, and ask her to give me until to-morrow to write it."

"Perhaps it will be found yet," comforted Anne.

"No danger of it, unless I lost it in the street. Then there's only one chance in a thousand of its turning up," declared Grace gloomily. "I don't see how I happened to be so careless."

"When must it be handed in?" questioned Anne.

"This morning," answered Grace dolefully. "I'll have to rewrite it to-night and from memory, too."

"Why don't you choose another subject?" was Anne's advice.

"No." Grace shook her head positively. "I can do better with the old one. I'm not going to bother about asking if any one has found it. My name was on it. If I made a fuss over it some one might say it was only an excuse, that I hadn't really lost it, but just wished to gain time. I hope Miss Duncan won't think that."

"No one in this house would say so," contradicted Anne loyally.

"But suppose Alberta Wicks or Mary Hampton heard of it? They might circulate that rumor. I hate to seem so suspicious, but an ounce of prevention, you know. I will write it over and say nothing further about it." Having made up her mind on the subject Grace promptly dismissed it from her thoughts.

Miss Duncan did look rather suspiciously at Grace as she related her misfortune. Grace's gray eyes met hers so fairly and truthfully, however, that she was forced to believe the young woman's statement. She gave the desired respite rather ungraciously and Grace took her place in cla.s.s, relieved to think she had got off so easily. That night she rewrote the theme. It did not give her as much trouble as she had antic.i.p.ated. She laid down her fountain pen with alacrity when it was finished and carefully blotted the last sheet. "Now I can begin to think about the reception," she announced. "What are you going to wear, Anne?"

"My new pink gown," said Anne promptly. "As long as I was extravagant enough to indulge in a new evening dress I might as well wear it. The soph.o.m.ore reception is really the most important affair of the year, to us, at least."

"I'm delighted to have an opportunity to show off my pale blue chiffon frock," laughed Grace. "I've been in ecstasies over it ever since it was made. Have you seen that white gown of Elfreda's? It's perfectly stunning. I stopped in her room for a minute last night. She was trying it on. It's the prettiest gown she's had since she came here. Ask her to show it to you."