"I believe you'd win at that," he said so earnestly that every one laughed.
"It was a great triumph," said Jessica proudly, as she stood with Mabel and Anne in the locker-room while the girls resumed street clothing.
"And my new howl was a success, too."
"Glad to know that," said Grace. "There were so many different kinds of noises I couldn't distinguish it."
"There was one noise that started that was promptly hushed," said Anne.
"You heard it, too, didn't you Jessica?"
"Oh, yes, girls, I intended telling you before this," replied Jessica.
"Just before the last half started, Miss Thompson and Miss Kane came in and walked to the other end of the gallery. Well, Eleanor and her crowd saw them, and what do you suppose they did?"
"Hard to tell," said Nora.
"They hissed Miss Thompson. Very softly, you may be sure," continued Jessica, "but it was hissing, just the same. For a wonder, she didn't hear it, but every girl in the junior class did. They were sitting down front on the same side as Eleanor's crowd. You know what a temper Ruth Deane has and how ferocious she can look? Well, the minute she heard it she went back there like a flash, looking for all the world like a thunder cloud. She talked for a moment to Edna and Eleanor. They tossed their heads, but they didn't hiss any more."
"What did Ruth say to them?" asked Grace curiously. "It must have been something remarkable, or they wouldn't have subsided so suddenly."
"It was," giggled Jessica. "She told them that if they didn't stop it instantly, the juniors would pick them up bodily, carry them downstairs to the classroom and lock them in until the game was over."
"How absurd!" exclaimed Grace. "They would never have dared to go that far."
"I don't know about that," said Nora O'Malley. "Ruth Deane is a terror when she gets fairly started. Besides, she would have had both High Schools on her side. Even the boys like Miss Thompson."
"It was an effectual threat at any rate," said Jessica. "They left before the game was over. Perhaps they were afraid of being waylaid."
"I suppose they couldn't bear to see us win," said Grace. "But, O girls, I am so proud of our invincible team. It was a great game and a well-earned victory."
"We ought to celebrate," said Miriam. "Come on. Here we are at Stillman's."
Without waiting for a second invitation, the Phi Sigma Tau trooped joyfully into the drug store.
CHAPTER XVII
THE LAST STRAW
The days glided by rapidly. The Christmas holidays came, bringing with them the usual round of gayeties. Thanks to the Phi Sigma Tau, the lonely element of High School girls did not lack for good cheer. As at Thanksgiving, each member of the sorority entertained two or more girls on Christmas and New Year's, and were amply repaid for their good deed by the warm appreciation of their guests.
Tom Gray came down for the holidays, bringing with him his roommate, Arnold Evans, a fair-haired, blue-eyed young man of twenty, who proved himself thoroughly likable in every respect. He lost no time in cultivating Miriam's acquaintance, and the two soon became firm friends.
Tom gave a dinner to his roommate, inviting "the seven originals," as he expressed it, and Miriam, who felt that at last she really belonged in the charmed circle. David was even more pleased than his sister over the turn affairs had taken. To have Miriam a member of his own particular "crowd" had always been David's dearest wish, and the advent of Arnold Evans had done away with Miriam being the odd one. So the circle was enlarged to ten young people, who managed to crowd the two weeks'
vacation with all sorts of healthful pleasures.
There were coasting and sleighing parties, and on one occasion a walk to old Jean's hut in Upton Wood, where they were hospitably entertained by the old hunter, who had smilingly pointed to the wolf skins on the wall, asking them if they remembered the winter day two years before when those same skins held wolves who were far too lively for comfort. Then the story of their escape had to be gone over again for Arnold's benefit.
They had stayed until the moon came up, and, accompanied by the old hunter, had walked back to Oakdale in the moonlight.
After the holidays came the brief period of hard study before the dreaded mid-year examinations. Basketball enthusiasm declined rapidly and a remarkable devotion to study ensued that lasted until examinations began. By the last week in January, the ordeal was past.
Eleanor Savell had not yet returned to school. Whether or not she would be allowed to return was a question that occasioned a great deal of discussion among three lower classes of girls. Edna Wright and the other members of the sorority organized by Eleanor were loud in their expressions of disapproval as to Miss Thompson's "severity" toward Eleanor. They talked so freely about it, that it reached the principal's ears. She lost no time in sending for them, and after a session in the office, they emerged looking subdued and crestfallen; and after that it was noted that when in conversation with their schoolmates, they made no further allusion to Miss Thompson's methods of discipline.
There was a faint murmur of surprise around the study hall one morning, however, when Miss Thompson walked in to conduct the opening exercises, accompanied by Eleanor, who, without looking at the school, seated herself at the desk nearest to where the principal stood.
When the morning exercises were concluded, Miss Thompson nodded slightly to Eleanor, who turned rather pale, then rose, and, facing the school, said in a clear voice:
"I wish to apologize to Miss Thompson for impertinence and insubordination. I also wish to publicly apologize to the members of the Phi Sigma Tau for having accused them of treachery concerning a certain matter that recently came up in this school."
"Your apology is accepted, Miss Savell. You may take your own seat,"
said the principal.
Without looking to the right or left, Eleanor walked proudly up the aisle to her seat, followed by the gaze of those girls who could not refrain from watching her. The Phi Sigma Tau, to a member, sat with eyes straight to the front. They had no desire to increase Eleanor's discomfiture, for they realized what this public apology must have cost her, although they were all equally puzzled as to what had prompted her to humble herself.
Eleanor's apology was not due, however, to a change of heart. She still despised Miss Thompson as thoroughly as on the day that she had manifested her open scorn and dislike for the principal.
As for Grace and her friends, Eleanor was particularly bitter against them, and laid at their door a charge of which they were entirely innocent.
Eleanor had told her aunt nothing of her recent trouble in school, but had feigned illness as an excuse for remaining at home. After attending the basketball game her aunt had told her rather sharply that if she were able to attend basketball games, she was certainly able to continue her studies. Eleanor had agreed to return to school the following Monday, and had started from home at the usual time with no intention whatever of honoring the High School with her presence. She passed the morning in the various stores, lunched in town and went to a matinee in the afternoon. In this manner she idled the days away until the holiday vacation came, congratulating herself upon her success in pulling wool over the eyes of her long-suffering aunt.
But a day of reckoning was at hand, for just before the close of vacation Miss Thompson chanced to call at Mrs. Gray's home while Mrs.
Gray was entertaining Miss Nevin, and the truth came out.
When Miss Nevin confronted her niece with the deception Eleanor had practised upon her, a stormy scene had followed, and Eleanor had accused Grace Harlowe of telling tales to Mrs. Gray, and Mrs. Gray of carrying them to her aunt. This had angered Miss Nevin to the extent that she had immediately ordered Eleanor to her room without telling her from whom she had received her information.
For three days Eleanor had remained in her room, refusing to speak to her aunt, who, at the end of that time, decreed that if she did not at once apologize roundly and return to school her violin and piano would both be taken from her until she should again become reasonable.
In the face of this new punishment, which was the severest penalty that could be imposed upon her, Eleanor remained obdurate. Her violin and piano were removed from her room and the piano in the drawing room was closed. Still she stubbornly held out, and it was not until the day before the beginning of the new term that she went to her aunt and coldly agreed to comply with her wishes, providing she might have her violin and piano once more.
Aside from this conversation they had exchanged no words, and Eleanor therefore entered school that morning still believing the Phi Sigma Tau to be at the bottom of her misfortune.
In spite of her recent assertion that she could not forgive Eleanor, Grace's resentment vanished at sight of her enemy's humiliation. A public apology was the last thing that either she or her friends desired. Her promise to Mrs. Gray loomed up before her. If Eleanor really did believe the Phi Sigma Tau innocent, then perhaps this would be the opportunity for reconciliation. After a little thought, she tore a sheet of paper from her notebook and wrote:
"DEAR ELEANOR:
"The members of the Phi Sigma Tau are very sorry about your having to make an apology. We did not wish it. We think you showed a great deal of the right kind of courage in making the public apology you did both to Miss Thompson and to us. Won't you come back to the Phi Sigma Tau?
"YOUR SINCERE FRIENDS."
At recess Grace showed the note to her friends. She had signed her name to the note and requested the others to do the same. Here she met with some opposition. Nora, Marian Barber and Eva Allen were strongly opposed to sending it. But Jessica, Anne and Miriam agreed with Grace that it would be in fulfillment of the original promise to Mrs. Gray to help Eleanor whenever they could do so. So the Phi Sigma Tau signed their names and the note was passed to Eleanor directly after recess.
She opened it, read it through, and an expression of such intense scorn passed over her face that Nora, who sat near her and who was covertly watching her, knew at once that Grace's flag of truce had been trampled in the dust.
Picking up her pen, Eleanor wrote rapidly for a brief space, underlined what she had written, signed her name with a flourish, and, folding and addressing her note, sent it to Grace.
Rather surprised at receiving an answer so quickly, Grace unfolded the note. Then she colored, looked grave and, putting the note in the back of the text-book she was holding, went on studying.