The group of girls who had happened to meet at the corner of Maple Street and Central Avenue that morning was like the groups their mothers had sometimes formed, years before, on the same corner. This is to say, it was not unlike any other group of young but marriageable maidens pausing together by chance at a corner in the “best residence section” of a town of forty or fifty thousand inhabitants, anywhere in the land. Three of these seven girls were on their way homeward from ‘downtown’; three were strolling in the opposite direction; and the seventh, seeing the two parties meet and begin their chatter with loud outcries, had come hurrying from a quiet old house near by to join them. The six made a great commotion. Their laughter whooped on the whirling autumn wind that flapped their skirts about them; their gesturing hands fluttered like the last leaves of the agitated shade trees above them; their simultaneous struggles for a hearing, shattering the peace of the comfortable neighbourhood, were not incomparable to the disorderly uproar of a box of fireworks prematurely exploding on the third of July. The seventh girl, who had come across the lawn of the quiet old house on the corner to join them, also shouted, begging to be told the cause of so much vociferation. “What’s happened? What on earth’s the matter?” she cried, going from one to another of the clamorous damsels and trying to make herself heard. “What is it? What’s going on? What’s it all _about_?” One or two took cognizance of her with a nod and a hasty greeting, “Hello, Elsie,” but found no more time for her; and the rest paid no attention whatever to her or to her eager inquiries. They were too busy shouting, “But listen, my dear!” or “I never in all my _life_!” or “My dear, you never _saw_ anything like it!” though the smallest of them, a pretty brunette with the most piercing voice of all, did at last begin an explanatory response to the repeated entreaties of this Elsie. “Paul Reamer said——” But, as if realizing the waste of so much energy upon a person unconcerned in the matter, she immediately turned to the others, shrieking, “_Listen!_ For Heaven’s sake, _listen_! He said he’d be along before we got halfway _home_! He said——” Then even the small brunette’s remarkable voice was merged in the conglomerate disturbance, and Elsie was no wiser than before. She continued to go from one girl to another, shouting, “What _about_ Paul Reamer? What’s he _done_? What _about_ him?” But for all the response she got she might have been both invisible and inaudible.