"Yes," said Betty, meekly.
"And I'll go and bribe the new maid, who hasn't learned the rules yet, to send you up some breakfast," put in Madeline, the watchful.
Nita went off to make her bed and Dorothy to see Mary's prom. dress which had just been sent on from home. Presently the new maid appeared with toast and coffee and regrets that "the eggs was out, miss," and Betty sat down at her desk to eat, while Helen, the Elizabethan lyrics quite forgotten, rocked happily beside her.
"Helen," said Betty, a spoonful of hot coffee held aloft in one hand, consternation hiding her dimples, "what in the world shall I do? I told you I hadn't studied anything, and I can't flunk now."
"Oh, they won't call on you to-day," said Helen hopefully, counting the Dramatic Club pins that made Betty's shirt-waist look like a small section of a jeweler's window.
"Aren't they pretty?" said Betty, touching them lovingly. "I hope the girls know which is which, because I don't. The one with the pearl gone is Bob's, of course, and Dorothy's is marked on the back, and that's Mary's, because she always pins it on wrong side up. One of the others is Christy's, and one is that sweet Miss West's—she writes poetry, you know, and is on the 'Argus.' Wasn't it lovely of her to pin it on me?"
"I should think anybody would be glad to have you wear their pin," said
Helen loyally, if ungrammatically.
"But to think the society wanted me!" said Betty in awe-struck tones. "Helen, you know they never do take a person unless she amounts to something, now do they? But what in the world do I amount to?"
"Does being an all-around girl count?" asked Helen. "Because the senior that is such a friend of Eleanor Watson's said you were that, and that's what you wanted to be, isn't it? But I think myself," she added shyly, "that your one talent, that we used to talk about last year, you know, is being nice to everybody."
The journey to chapel was a triumphal procession. The girls said such pleasant things. Could they possibly be true, Betty wondered. Nan would be pleased to know that she was somebody at last, even if she had missed the team both years, and was always being mistaken for a freshman. Sitting beside Dorothy, with the eight pins on her shirtwaist, and a guilty consciousness that Miss Mills, who taught "Lit. II" was staring at them from the faculty row, Betty resolved that she was going to be different—to keep her room in order, not to do ridiculous things at ridiculous times, and always to study Monday's lessons.