Bert's surroundings were different, her home influences being wholly worldly, her mother desiring nothing more of her daughter than that she should move among the best circles, finally making a brilliant marriage. Bert had not only dutifully but eagerly explored those aristocratic precincts, and had enjoyed herself hugely, as she observed everything in her own original and critical way, amusing herself with her own conclusions. Her wit and breeziness made her always welcome, and she could even enliven the clammy atmosphere of a young ladies' luncheon, as there was always sure to be grateful laughter at her end of the table. This success was exhilarating for a while, until she began to discover that she got very little for her pains. She herself needed stimulating; she demanded equal exertion from others; "why should she be interested in uninteresting people?" she should like to know. She didn't find out. She was already very privately admitting to herself that she "would like to shake the best circles from center to circumference." But the poor girl did not know what might be the social result, and to make a break had never occurred to her as a possibility until Nan's audacity suggested it. So, while Bert sat on the other side of her father's desk and signed letters in her most elegant hand, "Mitchell & Co., per B.," wondering if the junior members of the firms to which she had been writing would ever guess who "B." was, or if they would conclude it stood for some stupid, round-shouldered Brown or Bates or Baker,--Nan sped down to Cathy's to be the first to announce Bert's business career, as Evelyn's new cares detained her at home. [Illustration: THE "B." OF MITCHELL & CO.] Nan found Cathy filling a fireplace with a yellow glory of golden-rod. "That's lovely!" commented Nan. "But what if you want a fire some of these cool evenings?" "Why, that's the beauty of my idea; the fire is all ready to light under these, and when we want one all we have to do is to let the whole thing burn up; the golden-rod will be dried by that time, and then I can get more. See?" "Good; that's sensible; for if there is anything I hate, it is a grate too fine to have a big, roaring fire in it. You always were an artist in flowers. But that isn't what I came to remark. What do you suppose Bert has done now?" Then followed a long talk, such as only girls are equal to, during which Bert's clerkship and Evelyn's housekeeping venture were discussed, and Nan's own plans divulged. "Oh, me!" Cathy sighed hopelessly. "This is all very soul-stirring; I only am behind. I can't dash about and assert myself as you girls do, and besides, I think it is my duty to stay at home with Mother."