PROMPTLY at the time agreed upon, Mary took her station by the glove counter, almost sure that Gay would be late. It was one of the Warwick Hall traditions that something tragic always happened to Gay's clothes at the last moment, to delay her departure. But she had scarcely seated herself and deposited her suit-case on the floor beside her when the door opened and Gay came breezily into the store. Her hat was awry and her hair disheveled. "On time for once," she exclaimed triumphantly with a glance at the clock. "But I couldn't have been if Roberta hadn't come to the rescue. She brought me down in their carriage. It's Roberta Mayrell," she explained, as they made their way as rapidly as possible down the crowded aisle. "She isn't really one of the Army girls, but she lives just outside the Post and has always been counted in everything there, since she was old enough to talk. I've been telling her all about you on the way down." "Well, I hope she'll find me as interesting as the alligators," began Mary, remembering the speech she had overheard from the hotel balcony. But Gay was stopping to apologize to an old lady whom she had bumped into, and did not hear the remark. The next moment they were outside and at the curbstone, where a carriage drawn by two Kentucky horses was in waiting, and Roberta was stepping down with outstretched hands to welcome her. Roberta at close range was even more fascinating than when seen from a hotel balcony, and Mary, sitting between the two girls as they drove along towards Government Hill, had much the same feeling that a thirsty Bedouin has when after miles of desert journeying he finds himself beside the well of a green oasis. They were fairly bubbling over with high spirits, and it was impossible to be with them and not share their exhilaration. Before they had gone two blocks the weight of care and anxiety that had been resting on Mary's shoulders ever since Jack's accident, began to slip off. It almost gave her a sense of having wings, to be so light and care free. The last eight months with their constant association with suffering and anxiety about finances had been like a hard march through the sands. Now the sudden substitution of something frivolous and young was so refreshing that she giggled almost hysterically in her enjoyment of it. "Oh, we forgot to tell you," exclaimed Gay as they came in sight of the parade grounds. "There's to be a hop at the gymnasium to-night for the visiting polo team. They got it up on short notice. Lieutenant Boglin told me about it when I invited him to come to dinner. He asked if he might take you, and I said he might, for of course you won't want to miss it, and old Bogey is quite the nicest officer in the bunch when it comes to giving a girl a good time." Mary's face wore such a comical expression of blended delight and dismay that Roberta laughed, and Gay stopped the refusal that Mary was beginning to stammer out by putting both hands over her ears.