"Ah, permit me to introduce Mr. Oldman. Miss Newcome, Mr. Oldman. Isn't it warm to-night? Fine talk of the Doctor's, wasn't it? Well, you must excuse me; we're very busy," the last words dying in the distance as he sped away.
Pocahontas contrasted this chill with the warmth of church socials at home. She felt disappointed and dreadfully alone. Her sober-minded room-mate was bobbing like a pigeon before Professor Grind, enthusiastically telling him "how much inspiration she got from his courses;" Katherine Graham was lost in a swirl of upper class-men. The Freshman had half turned toward the dressing-room when out of the press came Jack Smith, big, wholesome-looking, still smiling with some memory of his latest conversation. Why did Hannah stop? It was certainly bold,—doubtless it was half-unconscious,—but stop she did, and a committee-man, wheeling suddenly, caught Smith, dashed through the preliminaries, and the Sophomore had added Hannah Grant Daly to the list of his acquaintances.
Now "Cap" Smith had not come to this reception to meet Freshman girls—at any rate insignificant ones with spectacles and sandy hair; but no one could have told that he had not begged to be presented to this one.
"I'll have to ask you the same question we put to all," he began, smiling pleasantly; "what's your major?"
She would have given much to have answered something clever or interesting, as no doubt other girls did, but she could only stammer:
"Education."
"You've answered so promptly I'll let you off the rest of the text,—there are forty-two questions in all, each more inquisitive than the last."
The Freshman giggled; she did not know just why, unless it was that his face and merry way inspired jollity.
"Have the committee on irrigation attended to you yet?"
"I don't know; I have registered," she faltered.