If only she had a sister, or some one! Dear Aunt Zoruiah was so horrid about such things that it was impossible to talk to her! CHAPTER VI. "Do you know how to skate?" Sybil Brandon asked of Joe as the two young girls, clad in heavy furs, walked down the sunny side of Beacon Street two days later. They were going from Miss Schenectady's to a "lunch party"--one of those social institutions of Boston which had most surprised Joe on her first arrival. "Of course," answered Joe. "I do not know anything, but I can do everything." "How nice!" said Sybil. "Then you can go with us to-night. That will be too lovely!" "What is it?" "We are all going skating on Jamaica Pond. Nobody has skated for so long here that it is a novelty. I used to be so fond of it." "We always skate at home, when there is ice," said Joe. "It will be enchanting though, with the full moon and all. What time?" "Mrs. Sam Wyndham will arrange that," said Sybil. "She is going to matronize us." "How dreadful, to have to be chaperoned!" ejaculated Joe. "But Mrs. Wyndham is very jolly after all, so it does not much matter." "I believe they used to have Germans here without any mothers," remarked Sybil, "but they never do now." "Poor little things, how awfully lonely for them!" laughed Joe. "Who?" "The Germans--without their mothers. Oh, I forgot the German was the cotillon. You mean cotillons, without tapestry, as we say." "Yes, exactly. But about the skating party. It will be very select, you know; just ourselves. You know I never go out," Sybil added rather sadly, "but I do love skating so." "Who are 'ourselves'--exactly?" "Why, you and I, and the Sam Wyndhams, and the Aitchison girls, and Mr. Topeka, and Mr. Harrington, and Mr. Vancouver--let me see--and Miss St. Joseph, and young Hannibal. He is very nice, and is very attentive to Miss St. Joseph." "Is it nice, like that, skating about in couples?" asked Joe. "No; that is the disagreeable part; but the skating is delicious." "Let us stay together all the time," said Joe spontaneously, "it will be ever so much pleasanter. I would not exactly like to be paired off with any of those men, you know." Sybil looked at Joe, opening her wide blue eyes in some astonishment. She did not think Joe was exactly one of those young women who object to a moonlight _tête-à-tête_, if properly chaperoned. "Yes, if you like, dear," she said. "I would like it much better myself, of course." "Do you know, Sybil," said Joe, looking up at her taller companion, "I should not think you would care for skating and that sort of thing." "Why?" asked Sybil. "You do not look strong enough. You are not a bit like me, brought up on horseback." "Oh, I am very strong," answered Sybil, "only I am naturally pale, you see, and people think I am delicate." But the north wind kissed her fair face and the faint color came beneath the white and through it, so that Joe looked at her and thought she was the fairest woman in the world that day.