"I think it's a fine idea," said Marian, leaning her elbows on the dining-room table while she listened with more animation in her pretty face than was often seen there. "Wouldn't it be queer to have them come back to you from nobody knows where?"
"You could tell by the postmark," remarked William practically, between spoonfuls of crackers and milk.
Lucy laughed, but she whispered to Marian, "Let's not talk about it any more, now," remembering William's gaping ears and her own assurance to Mr. Harding that her surmises about their departure would go no further.
Mrs. Gordon stayed for some time longer with Elizabeth, and when she did come down she heard Lucy moving about inside her room, and stopped at the door.
"Here's a letter I had from Bob, Lucy. I know you wish to read it. I met the postman on the boat."
"Oh, thanks, Mother," said Lucy, letting her hair, which she held ready to tie, fall back over her shoulders as she took the envelope eagerly from Mrs. Gordon's hand. She snatched out the letter and sank down on her sofa by the window to read in comfort.
"Of course you're all coming up for graduation," Bob wrote. "Don't forget how soon it is,—I can't remember it myself. If you don't hear from me before then it's only because we have so much to do that no day is half long enough. In these few months since war was declared they have been trying to put most of next year's work into our heads, as well as some of the new things the Allies have learned about fighting. Besides all that, I have helped edit this year's 'Howitzer.' We've combined the real class of '17 and our own class into one book, with their consent,—since we graduate only four months after they do. It's going to be a corker, too. I had my picture taken last week for it, and will send you one, if Lucy won't still say my hair looks like a scrubbing-brush.
"I'm awfully glad to get your letters, even if I don't write, and I'm crazy to see you all again. We spend most of the time we have, which isn't much, wondering what we'll do after graduation, and every one has his own little idea of what will happen to him,—nothing dull for any of us, I expect. Only we don't know anything for certain except the good news that we graduate in two weeks, so we're feeling like the fellow in the song who says, 'Oh, joy! Oh, boy! Where do we go from here?'