"I bid to walk with the Little Colonel!"
"Come on, Elizabeth Lloyd Lewis, I'm waiting for you."
"Hurry up, Betty! I've got something to tell you!"
"Lloyd! Lloyd Sherman! Can't you hear? Is it really true that you are going to board here?"
With the two girls in their midst, trying to explain to a dozen different questioners in the same breath, when and why they had become resident pupils, the noisy procession moved on. Only one was left behind, a pale-faced child in spectacles, who, in spite of all their protests, stood looking after them, insisting she must wait for Sue Bell.
As the others moved away, the new girl beckoned to her with a friendly smile. "You're Janie Clung, aren't you?" she asked, as the little girl advanced a few steps, and then stood awkwardly rubbing one foot against the other.
"You see I couldn't help hearing your name. They spoke it so often. I am Ida Shane, from Clay County. Won't you sit here in the swing with me until the girl you are waiting for comes out, and tell me something about the school? It's so hard," she added, plaintively, "to be a stranger in a place where everybody else has so many friends. You seem to know every one here. From the way they all begged you to go with them, I imagine you must be very popular."
Much flattered by this last remark from one so much older than herself, Janie climbed into the seat in the swing, opposite the girl from Clay County, and scrutinized her shyly.
Ida Shane was very pretty, she decided. She must be nearly sixteen, or maybe more, for she wore her dresses long and her hair in a soft, fluffy pompadour. Then Janie's gaze wandered from her hair to a bewitching little dimple that came at the corner of Ida's mouth when she smiled, and she thought to herself that the slow, soft drawl in which Ida spoke was exceedingly musical and ladylike. She found herself talking in a lower tone than usual, and quite slowly, when she answered.
"You know, I think it is always best to be very particular in choosing friends when one goes to a new place," Ida remarked, in a confidential tone, which seemed to insinuate that Janie could be safely chosen. "I don't want to take up with everybody. That's why I want you to tell me which are the first families here in the Valley, and which are the girls whose friendship is worth while having."