It was not often that any of the Ardmore girls, and especially a freshman, arrived during the opening week of the term in a private equipage. This car that came chugging down the hill to the entrance of Dare Hall was a very fine touring automobile. The girl in the tonneau, barricaded with a huge trunk and several bags, besides a huge leather hat-box perched beside the chauffeur, was very gaily appareled as well.
"Goodness! look at the labels on that trunk," whispered Dora Parton. "Why, that girl must have been all over Europe."
"The trunk has, at any rate," chuckled May.
"Hist!" now came from the excited Edith Phelps. "See the initials, 'R. F.' What did I tell you? It is that Fielding girl!"
"Oh, my aunt!" groaned the plump girl in the background, and she actually had to stuff her handkerchief in her mouth to keep from laughing outright again.
The car had halted and the chauffeur got down promptly, for he had to remove some of the "excess baggage" before the girl in the tonneau could alight.
"I guess she must think she belongs here," whispered Dora.
"More likely she thinks she owns the whole place," snapped Edith, who had evidently made up her mind not to like the new girl whose baggage was marked "R. F."
The girl got out and shook out her draperies. A close inspection would have revealed the fact that, although dressed in the very height of fashion (whatever that may mean), the materials of which the stranger's costume were made were rather cheap.
"This is Dare Hall, isn't it?" she asked the group of girls above her on the porch. "I suppose there is a porter to help—er—the man with my baggage?"