Marie came, slowly and reluctantly, with a backward smile for Tom Benson, and a murmured, “To-morrow afternoon then, and we’re staying in town at that big hotel with the queer German name.”
Betty watched them go as she might have watched the curtain dropping on the last scene of a tragi-comical play. Tom Benson broke into her revery with a laughing comment.
“Your friend Miss O’Toole is an accomplished little flirt, all right,” he announced.
“She isn’t my friend,” Betty told him severely, “and it takes two to flirt, Tom Benson. So, as a favor to me, you’re not to call on her in town. You can come over here and see her day after to-morrow if you want to. It looks to me as if I had been tumbled into the job of chaperoning her through the first half of her freshman year at Harding, so I propose to start her out right.”
“Why the first half of the freshman year only?” demanded Tom curiously.
“Because,” explained Betty, “mid-years come then—at Harding. Seems to me I have heard that they come about the same time at Yale, but I suppose they don’t worry a distinguished scholar like you.”
“The fair Marie doesn’t act particularly studious,” admitted Tom. “But you can’t ever tell about these pretty college girls.” Tom smiled meaningly at Betty, for whose brains he professed a vast admiration.
“Well, I wasn’t flunked out at freshman mid-years,” Betty told him, “but if I didn’t think Miss Marie O’Toole would find half a year of Harding all she wants, for one reason or another, I certainly shouldn’t be contemplating acting as her special tutor.”
“Are you considering it?” demanded Tom in amazement.
Betty nodded calmly.