"The letter will probably tell," answered Sara, striking a match to light the alcohol-lamp. "Go on, I am ready to listen."
"My dearest Helen," read Olive. "Here I am back at school in our sunshiny old south room in Baxter Hall, with the same jolly set of girls popping their heads out of their doors, all along the corridor, to joke with each other; the same old teachers and furniture and surroundings; the same dear old everything, with one exception—my old roommate.
"I know you are dying to hear about my new roommate. She is a freshman by the name of Susannah Talbot, but we have never called her that since the first day. You will find her photograph enclosed, and can see for yourself what a shy little rabbit she is.
"Elsie Gayland came into our room while I was showing Susannah where to put her things as she unpacked. You know how regardlessly outspoken Elsie is, and how thoroughly saturated with her music. She is worse than ever this year, and talks almost entirely in musical terms.
"'How are you two going to chord?' she said, abruptly, to Susannah. 'If Sophia were a sheet of music, she would be marked on every score, Fortissimo, because she is so forcible and aggressive. But you are just the opposite; it seems to me that Timoroso would just suit you. You do not object to a nickname, I hope? Everybody has to put up with one here.'
"Susannah blushed and managed to stammer out that she didn't mind, and ever since then she has been 'Timoroso' to us all. You know Elsie Gayland. She is the same old Elsie. What the Pied Piper was to Hamelin town, she is to this school. We all still flock after her in spite of ourselves, and no matter what she chooses to pipe for us, we dance after her.
"She has a new fad now—palmistry. Yesterday she showed me a book on the subject, that she studied all vacation. It is the weirdest looking thing, bound in black, with white serpents crawling all over the cover. It made me creep to look at it. She says that she is going to give a 'Palmistry Evening' soon, whatever that may be, and tell our fortunes. Timoroso has just come in and says that Elsie is waiting for me, so with 'these few broken remarks,' and a heart full of love, I must leave you for the present. Devotedly,
"Sophia."
As Olive laid down the letter and took up another, Sara exclaimed, "I see now why sister wanted us to read them. It is something about fortune-telling."
"The next letter is dated a week later," said Olive, beginning to read again.