The girls of the Misses Carter’s school, watching from the windows as the sedan came to a stop at the entrance, saw a slight figure in a badly fitting suit swing out of the car the moment Jeems opened the door. Before he could stoop for her old calfskin bags the new girl had seized them herself and with a bulging piece of luggage in each hand leaped up the steps ahead of him. There was a rush from the drawing-room windows. The next moment she was standing in the hall, eager eyes on the faces filling the doorway. They looked mighty pretty. Then the bags dropped to the floor with a thump. A lean hand was thrust out to enclose the plump white one of the younger Miss Carter, and a soft Texan voice was drawling, “Howdy, Ma’am, I sure am glad to be here.” Then, striding after the floating form of the younger Miss Carter, the new girl was gone up the wide staircase. “The cowgirl from Texas, or the Girl of the Golden West,” laughed a mischievous voice. “That your new roommate, Lois?” Lois Wainwright shook a blonde head; her pretty face hardened. “Not if I can help it. I can get along without her in my young life. As a matter of fact I didn’t come here to be forced into any such association.” “Oh, come, Loie, don’t be a snob!” A long-legged, handsome girl spoke from the depths of an easy chair where she sprawled with a book. “Besides, what do you know about that girl? She’s probably a peach. And she may be the very person that you may need most in your young life, old kiddo.” * * * * * Upstairs, Raquel Daniels followed Miss Isaphine Carter down carpeted halls strangely soft to unaccustomed feet. Her nostrils widened like a colt’s at the unfamiliar odor of this new atmosphere, a mingling of scented clothing, fine housekeeping, imperceptible to the careful but accustomed nose of Miss Isaphine, ever on the alert for forbidden things--cigarettes, strong perfumes, bubbling fudge after bedtime. At the ranch there was only the odor of fresh alfalfa blossoms to cover the smell of frying meat or sizzling frijoles. “This will be your room, dear child.” Miss Carter was switching on the lights. Raquel blinked. How pretty! It was prettier than anything at San Antone’s big store. Prettier somehow than Raquel’s own room at home, and she had thought hers was surely the handsomest set of furniture in the world when Dad bought it for her last year. “You will have a charming roommate, Lois Wainwright, one of our sweetest girls,” Miss Carter smiled professionally. “You had better dress for dinner now, dear, and then come down to the drawing-room as quickly as you can.”