And she wanted Isobel, too. Between the two girls had sprung a wonderful understanding. Isobel was grateful that Jerry had not humiliated her by mentioning the debate, or the many other little meannesses of which she had been guilty; Jerry was glad that Isobel had not raked them up--it was so much nicer to just know that Isobel liked her now. Isobel was a very different girl since her accident--perhaps Uncle Johnny, alone, knew why. She had decided very suddenly that she _did_ want to go to college. The week before she had "squeezed through" the college entrance exams--luck she did not deserve, she had declared with surprising frankness. And after college she planned to study interior decorating. Everyone wondered why they had not thought before of such wonderful summer plans. Mrs. Westley would go with Tibby to Cousin Marcia's at Ocean Point in Maine--"quiet enough there"; Graham was going to a boys' camp in Vermont, and Isobel and Gyp could divide their time between Sunnyside and Cobble. "We are not consulting Mrs. Travis," laughed Mrs. Westley. "Oh, she'd _love_ them to be there," cried Jerry with conviction. "And anyway, if she frowns, we'll move on to Wayside, and _we_ know the trail in between, don't we, Jerry?" "Say, Jerry," Graham thought it the psychological moment to spring a request he had been entertaining in his heart for some time. "Will you let me take Pepper to camp? Lots of the boys have dogs but none of them are as smart as Pep." Jerry could not answer for a moment. In her picture of her homegoing, Pepper had had his part; but--it would be another link---- "Of course you may take him. He'll love--being with you." Long ago she had reconciled herself to sharing Pepper's devotion with Graham. "Oh, I think that's the wonderfulest plan ever made," exclaimed Gyp rapturously--Gyp, who with her mother had visited some of the most fashionable summer and winter resorts. "I want to sleep up on--where is it, Jerry--and see the sunrise. How will we _ever_ exist until school's over!" "Examinations will help us do that," laughed Isobel. "And Class-day and Commencement. And who's going to win the Lincoln Award?" CHAPTER XXV THE LINCOLN AWARD "Who's going to win the Lincoln Award?" That question was on every tongue at Highacres. That interest rivaled even the excitement of Class-day and its honors; of the Senior reception, Commencement itself. It shadowed the accustomed interval of alarm that always followed examinations. Everyone knew that the contest was close; no one could conjecture as to whom the honor would fall, for, though one student be a wizard in trigonometry, he might have failed dismally in the simple requirement of setting-up exercises or drinking milk. "I've eaten spinach until I feel just like a cow out at pasture," declared Pat Everett disgustedly, "and what good has it done! For I was only _eighty-five_ in English!"