A tall, fair-haired girl rose from the low rocker by the window, and came quickly forward, saying cordially, "Mercedes, I am glad you have come. I have been here three days and am beginning to be homesick. Isn't that a state of affairs? You don't look a bit as I thought you would. Has your trunk arrived yet? And this is Tabitha, our little kitty? You certainly must be our mascot. Your room-mate isn't here yet, so you can help yourself to whichever bed and closet hooks and bureau drawers you want. There really isn't any difference in the size of them, but it is supposed to be a great thing to have first choice." While the older girl talked she drew Mercedes inside the room, divested her of hat and satchel, jerked out the empty drawers of the dresser, and threw open the tiny closet door with such a hospitable air that the homesick child of the desert felt cheered and comforted at once, and Tabitha found herself wishing it had been her lot to share Bertha's room. It was lonely all by herself in the room that seemed bare in spite of its pretty furnishings, for nothing familiar greeted her eyes, and its unadorned walls looked quite depressing in their spotless creamy white. Carrie had disappeared, and Miss Pomeroy's steps were descending the stairway; so she closed her door quietly, observing that two or three curious faces were peering at her from across the hall; and with a feeling half homesick, half exultant, Tabitha hung up her hat and turned for a more studied survey of her surroundings. "Twenty-eight hooks in the closet, fourteen for me and fourteen for Chrystobel. Isn't that the loveliest name? I never heard of it before. I wonder if she will be as nice as she sounds! But of course she will. Carrie says the girls are all nice. Four drawers in the dresser, two little ones and two big ones. I will take the bottom big drawer and the little one nearest the window. Bertha says the drawers are the same size, but the bottom one _looks_ a little deeper. Here is a string, I will measure.--They are exactly the same. That's where you got fooled, Tabitha Catt! See what comes from being stingy?--I would like the bed nearest the window, but maybe I better leave that for Chrystobel.--Clear as crystal and sweet as a bell. I wonder if that is what her mother and father thought when they named her that. These rockers are i-den-ti-cally the same. That's fortunate. It won't be any temptation to choose the prettiest. We will have to tell them apart by putting bows on them. I will tie one of my red hair-ribbons on mine; there are four new ones in my box of ribbons. I wish they would bring up my trunk. I would like to unpack while I have nothing else to do. Wonder where Carrie is. Wish she would come in and talk to me, it seems so strange here all alone." There was a bold knock at the door, and thinking it might be her trunk, she flung it wide open with the words, "Bring it right in, please, and set it in--oh, I thought--"