Elfreda interrupted her with an emphatic: "That is just what I've been telling you. That's what I mean by danger signals. Those two girls will never forgive you for making them ridiculous the night they locked me in the haunted house. Last year they had to content themselves with simply being disagreeable, because they could find no particularly weak spot in our sophomore armor. They accomplished very little with Laura Atkins and Mildred Taylor. This year it's different." Elfreda paused to give full effect to her words. Then she ended slowly and impressively: "Don't think I'm trying to court calamity, but I am certain that perky little newspaper woman, as she styles herself, is going to prove a thorn in your side. You had better write to Mabel and explain matters, then leave Miss Kathleen West alone. She hasn't spoken to you since the day of the bazaar, so I can't see that your junior counsel is of any particular use to her." "Still, it seems a shame to give up; besides, it is the first thing Mabel ever asked me to do," demurred Grace. "I know, I've thought of that," continued Elfreda a little impatiently. "But I don't think you are justified in wasting your whole year's fun worrying about some one who isn't worth it. If Mabel knew, she would be the first one to indorse what I have just said." "I'm not wasting my year, Elfreda mine," contradicted Grace good-naturedly. "Just think what a nice time we had to-night! And I'm getting along splendidly with all my subjects. I belong to the Semper Fidelis Club, and am having the jolliest kind of times with you girls. That doesn't sound much like wasting my year, does it?" "I didn't say you had wasted it," retorted Elfreda gruffly. "I said, or rather intended to say, that you would be likely to waste it. You are the sort of girl who ought to have the best Overton can offer, because--well--because you deserve it. You think too much about other people, and not enough about yourself," she concluded shortly. "What a selfish Elfreda," laughed Grace, walking across the room and sitting down beside the stout girl, whose round face looked unusually severe. "One might think Elfreda Briggs never did an unselfish act in all her twenty-two years. Now I am going to give you a piece of your own advice. Stop worrying--about me. Whatever my just desserts are, they'll overtake me fast enough. Hurrah! Here is our little Anne. Did you have a nice time, dear, and what did you cook for supper?" "I always have a nice time at Ruth's," smiled Anne, "but, if you had seen the three cooks all trying to spoil the broth and succeeding beyond their wildest expectations, you would have been greatly edified." "I can imagine Arline Thayer gravely bending over that little gas stove of Ruth's," said Grace. "She had all sorts of splendid ideas about what we might make, but no one had the slightest idea as to how to make anything she proposed."