Peggy felt the time had come to discard the policy of evasion. She straightened herself, looking across the billowing bed-clothes, straight into her friend’s eyes. "Elaine hasn’t any reason to be ashamed of anything she has done." "What _is_ the matter, then?" "There’s nothing I can tell, Priscilla." "Nothing you will tell, you mean. If you know about it, it wouldn’t be any more than friendly to explain." "There’s nothing I can tell," repeated Peggy firmly. Priscilla found the reiteration irritating. "I suppose she’s confided everything to you, and expects that we’ll take your word for her. Well, I won’t, for one. We don’t know anything about her, except that she can be mighty disagreeable when she tries, and yesterday capped the climax. I sha’n’t have anything more to do with her till I know what it all meant." "That’s for you to decide." Peggy’s tone was decidedly cool. Her hands trembled as she twitched the coverlets into place. The intensity of her sympathy, kindled by Elaine’s pitiful story, perhaps rendered her incapable of doing full justice to Priscilla. Unfortunately her manner fired the jealous resentment which was Priscilla’s greatest weakness. "Of course if you’re going to take sides with her, Peggy Raymond, against your best friends, if you’re going to throw me over just because--" "How silly!" snapped Peggy. "O, please, Priscilla, don’t pull those bed-clothes up from the foot again." Priscilla’s face was white. "I see I’m in the way. That girl has spoiled our friendship. You’ve never been the same, Peggy, since Elaine Marshall moved to Friendly terrace." "How silly!" exploded Peggy, angered by the injustice of the charge and momentarily abandoning her usual tactful methods. "As if anybody but our two selves could spoil our friendship." She watched Priscilla’s dignified withdrawal without protest. She was tired of these scenes, she told herself. It was time Priscilla had a good lesson. She punched a pillow into place with a vehemence implying that she held it solely responsible for all that had occurred. As for Priscilla she closed the door behind her with the feeling that she had burned her bridges, and that no retreat was possible. All was over. She had been very fond of Peggy, but Peggy’s fashion of losing her head over every new girl who came to the Terrace was bound to grow tiresome. Peggy had clearly indicated on which side her sympathies lay. She had chosen Elaine in preference to the friend of many years standing. By the time Priscilla was at her own door she was ready to believe that she had been most unfairly treated. Priscilla was not the sort of girl to rest quietly under a grievance. Her first impulse was to assert herself, to prove to all observers how little she cared. Accordingly she burst in upon her mother with the request, "May I have some of the girls to luncheon next Saturday, mother? I don’t mean two or three; I’d like a dozen or so, a real party--"