"No, you don't--you lean on a man; yes, you do--ever so slightly. I noticed it when we were dancing together yesterday. And you dance standing up straight instead of bending over a little. Probably some old lady on the side-line once told you that you looked so dignified that way. But except with a very small girl it's much harder on the man, and he's the one that counts." "Go on." Bernice's brain was reeling. "Well, you've got to learn to be nice to men who are sad birds. You look as if you'd been insulted whenever you're thrown with any except the most popular boys. Why, Bernice, I'm cut in on every few feet--and who does most of it? Why, those very sad birds. No girl can afford to neglect them. They're the big part of any crowd. Young boys too shy to talk are the very best conversational practice. Clumsy boys are the best dancing practice. If you can follow them and yet look graceful you can follow a baby tank across a barb-wire sky-scraper." Bernice sighed profoundly, but Marjorie was not through. "If you go to a dance and really amuse, say, three sad birds that dance with you; if you talk so well to them that they forget they're stuck with you, you've done something. They'll come back next time, and gradually so many sad birds will dance with you that the attractive boys will see there's no danger of being stuck--then they'll dance with you." "Yes," agreed Bernice faintly. "I think I begin to see." "And finally," concluded Marjorie, "poise and charm will just come. You'll wake up some morning knowing you've attained it and men will know it too." Bernice rose. "It's been awfully kind of you--but nobody's ever talked to me like this before, and I feel sort of startled." Marjorie made no answer but gazed pensively at her own image in the mirror. "You're a peach to help me," continued Bernice. Still Marjorie did not answer, and Bernice thought she had seemed too grateful. "I know you don't like sentiment," she said timidly. Marjorie turned to her quickly. "Oh, I wasn't thinking about that. I was considering whether we hadn't better bob your hair." Bernice collapsed backward upon the bed. IV On the following Wednesday evening there was a dinner-dance at the country club. When the guests strolled in Bernice found her place-card with a slight feeling of irritation. Though at her right sat G. Reece Stoddard, a most desirable and distinguished young bachelor, the all-important left held only Charley Paulson. Charley lacked height, beauty, and social shrewdness, and in her new enlightenment Bernice decided that his only qualification to be her partner was that he had never been stuck with her. But this feeling of irritation left with the last of the soup-plates, and Marjorie's specific instruction came to her. Swallowing her pride she turned to Charley Paulson and plunged. "Do you think I ought to bob my hair, Mr. Charley Paulson?" Charley looked up in surprise. "Why?"