"It is odd, Polly, but I don't feel as wretched as I should have expected I would," Betty explained, speaking as much to herself as to her companion. "I think perhaps it is intended for me to have my illusions shattered earlier in life than other people have them--I think possibly because I have been vainer and more foolish. At first I presume I used to have a kind of unconscious satisfaction in our having more money than other people and in being able to do almost anything for my friends that I wished. Then when the money went away I thought, well, perhaps money does not make so much difference if one has an old family and a name of which one may be proud. But in these last few hours, sitting here by myself I have begun to appreciate more fully what our Camp Fire organization is trying so hard to teach us. It is that all we girls are alike in the essential things, only that some of us have been given better opportunities and more friends. There is only one thing that really counts, I suppose, and that is not so much what other people do for us, as what we are able to do for ourselves, what kind of women we are able to grow into. So you see that though I believe I was struggling to save the old Ashton house because all my distinguished ancestors had been living there for generation after generation and I wanted to have babies of my own to inherit it some day, now I am even happier because perhaps I have saved it for Dick and mother by my plan and maybe it will repay them a little for all they have done for me." "I don't think the debt is on your side, dear," Polly returned loyally. But already Betty had risen from her stool and was looking around for her cloak and cap. "Let us hurry home now; we shall have a glorious walk!" she exclaimed. "I have been away from mother long enough and I do want to write to Esther. She has got to come to see me for a few days, or else I am going to her. Don't worry; I shall not forget the seven points of our Camp Fire star." CHAPTER XXIII FAREWELLS One morning in May two months later two girls were in the much-discussed back bedroom overlooking the Ashton garden. It was very much the same kind of cheerless day outdoors that it had been when they had first met each other after a lapse of many years. And then of course neither one knew of the closeness of the tie between them. However, at the present moment they were busily engaged in packing two steamer trunks that were standing open before them. "I never shall get all this stuff in if you don't come and help me, Esther," Betty protested in the spoiled fashion of an earlier time. And since Esther never would cease to believe that the whole world should be grateful to Betty for the honor of her presence in it, it is doubtful whether her methods of spoiling "The Princess" ever would be entirely given up.