The first few days of her presidency she had enjoyed with a frank egotism that had pleased Peggy and had caused Katherine many amused smiles.
But she was accustomed to it all now. There is no class in college so breathlessly eager to bestow devotion as the first class, and when the admired person is one of their very own, an added quality of loyalty and unswerving devotion creeps in.
“I just don’t believe that girl ever did a mean or silly thing in her life,” the voice followed Gloria as she started downstairs, with the rest of her party in her wake.
“I don’t believe she’d have any use for a minute for a girl who didn’t live right up to her ideals. You know, she’s one of the advantages of college,—she and girls like her—we can see what we might be anyway, even if few of us really come within a mile of it.”
Was there a trace of bitterness about that vivid and gracious mouth of Gloria’s? Did she really hurry a little to be out of earshot of those praises that, however ridiculous, would once have been sweet?
At the foot of the stairs she waited for Mrs. Moore. She bade her good-bye prettily, saying she must remain downtown for some shopping, and that she hoped they’d all see Mrs. Moore in Hampton again—a great many times.
“My dear, I want to thank you for a beautiful luncheon,” Mrs. Moore smiled up into the lovely face with that quaint way she had. “I do indeed wish I might stay right now, and live in town somewhere so that I could get to know the girls better. And I think a sort of Everybody’s-Mother would be a good thing for many of the students.”
But if she had hoped to bring a hint of the desire for confidence from Gloria she was disappointed.
Gloria’s eyes took on that odd grey blankness again, and though she nodded politely and pressed Mrs. Moore’s hand warmly, there was not a trace of that electric circuit between them which it was so easy to establish with Peggy and Katherine or most of the other girls.
“She’s very cold—and proud,” mused Mrs. Moore, glancing in a puzzled way at the retreating back of Gloria.