"It's more than a mere dormitory, of course." She cleared a space between them, and took up a dessert-spoon. "Here's the vestibule and entrance-hall," she began, drawing with the spoon on the table-cloth; "and here's where the stairs run up. Off to this side--John, do take some of these glasses away--off to this side"--with a wider sweep of the spoon--"is a sort of parlor and reception-room--quite a good size, you see. Right next to it is the dining-room--so that they can be thrown together, when the girls receive." "Good," said Bingham; "nothing more civilizing than receptions." "On this side of the dining-room," pursued Mrs. Bates, "is going to be a sort of alcove--Jane, dear, just push me over that salt and pepper. There!" She planted the two bottles in her alcove; "that's the tank for tea, and this is the tank for coffee. Practical, don't you think?"--to Bingham. "First-rate. And I suppose you have a screen that you can put in front." "Precisely." She laid a tiny spoon across her alcove. "Hardwood floors down-stairs, throughout. Up-stairs, bedrooms for fifty girls, and each one shall have a closet, if possible. We begin the foundations in five or six weeks--as soon as the frost is out." Susan Bates cleared a larger space, and appropriated more knives and forks and spoons, and went on in a lower tone for Marshall's ear alone. Jane strained to catch her words. She, saw her father blush once, slightly, and then smile, as if partly flustered--as Jane herself phrased it. "What a dear good old sentimental soul she is!" thought the girl. "I'll bet a cent she is asking pa to put up a dormitory for boys on the other side of the campus!" Mrs. Bates presently carried Jane and her mother into the library, leaving the men behind to contemplate a litter of disordered wineglasses and dishevelled napkins, and to smoke themselves out, in the course of half an hour, to the women. Mrs. Bates's talk, here as heretofore, was frankly personal. On a previous occasion she had talked to Rosy's mother about Rosy; now she exacted that Rosy's mother should talk to her about her own boy Billy. "The best boy in the world; his father says he's making a splendid business man." She took a cabinet photograph from over the fireplace. "There; this is the latest, but it doesn't do him any kind of justice." "Well, he's got a real _good_ face," said Eliza Marshall. "And a real good-looking face, too," rejoined his mother, quickly. "Jane, dear, run up to my room and get the one before this--that's something like; second drawer on the left. And stop eying those books; you can't get at them with anything less than a cold-chisel! "But why should you depend on pictures?" Mrs. Bates observed, presently. "See the boy yourself. Go down-stairs next time he calls. Oh, he will call again, I assure you," concluded Susan Bates, archly. "Tell him to inquire for ma, and send in a card for her, too," whispered Jane. "Rosy's getting awfully sticky." "'Sticky'?"