Before going to bed they visited their neighbors. Mary and Anne’s room they found not unlike their own, only there were even more books about, and an adorable tea-table with brass kettle and little alcohol lamp, for Seniors were allowed to serve tea on Saturday afternoons. Dorothy’s room was in a sad state of upheaval, the Navajo rug, carefully spread on the floor, being the only sign of an attempt at settlement. Dorothy herself was curled up on the couch, deep in a magazine. Her room-mate had not returned she said, so why arrange things? Their ideas might not harmonize. The room opposite their own, occupied by Imogene and Vivian, was settled in a most unsettled manner. Virginia thought as she entered that never in her life had she seen so many things in one room. One entire wall was festooned with a dreaded fish-net, in which were caught literally hundreds of relatives, friends, and acquaintances; the other walls were covered with pennants. The couches were so piled with pillows that one could not find room to sit down; the dressers were loaded with costly silver toilet articles, and more friends in silver frames; even the curtains were heavy with souvenirs, which were pinned to them. There were no books, except a few school-books, tucked under the desk, and no pictures, save highly decorated posters, wedged among the pennants, where a few inches of bare space had not been allowed to remain uncovered. It all gave Virginia a kind of stifled sensation, and she was glad to return to their own room when the nine-thirty bell had rung. It was strange to crawl into her cot-bed opposite Priscilla; strange to talk in whispers for a few moments, and then to say “Good-night.” For a few more moments she wondered with a wave of homesickness, more for her father than for herself, what they were all doing at home. Were they sleeping while the mountains kept their silent night watch? No, that could not be, for the time was different. Colonel Standish had explained that to her on the journey East. Dear Colonel Standish! What was that difference? Was it two hours earlier at Hillcrest? Then it would be only eight o’clock at home. Or was it—? But her tired head, so weary from the day’s excitement, refused to reckon differences in time, and Virginia fell asleep. CHAPTER VII “PERTAINING ESPECIALLY TO DECORUM”