As a matter of fact, Will did not wait until he had seen the Hilton House dance to become enamored of Harding College. When he and Nan arrived they announced that they had only stopped over for the evening, and should go west on the sleeper that same night. But as they were sitting in the Belden House parlor, while Nan and Betty discussed plans for showing Will as much as possible of the college in one evening, Mary Brooks sauntered through the hall, ostensibly on her way to do an errand at the Westcott House. Of course Betty called her in, and five minutes later Will announced that he couldn't think of not occupying the room which Miss Brooks had been good enough to engage for him; and he and Mary went off to the gymnasium gallery, which is as near as man may come to the joys of a "girl dance" at Harding. There Betty promised to join them as soon as Miss Hale arrived to spend the evening with Nan. And Miss Hale had no sooner appeared than Nan telephoned for her trunks and made a dinner engagement that would keep her until the next night at least. In the morning Will remembered that John Parsons was still at Winsted, and announced that he should spend the following day on an exploring tour over there. And Mr. Parsons insisted that you could not see Winsted properly unless you had some Harding girls along, and as the first snow of the season had just fallen, he organized a sleighing party, with Nan and Miss Hale as chaperons. Then Will gave a return dinner at Cuyler's, which took another day, so that a week sped by before Betty's guests could possibly get away from Harding.
"And now," said Betty to Will on the afternoon before the one set for their departure, "I think you'd better stay another week and see me."
"Wish we could," said Will absently. "I haven't had time to call on Miss Waite. I've only been snow-shoeing once with Miss Ayres, and I've got to have another skate with Miss Kittredge. She's a stunner on the ice. I say, Betty, you don't suppose she'd get up and go before breakfast, do you? I'd ask her to cut chapel, only I promised to take Miss Brooks."
"Indeed!" said Betty, with feigned indignation. "I guess that on the whole it's a good thing you're going to-morrow."
"Now why do you say that? Haven't I behaved like a scholar and a gentleman?" demanded Will gaily.
"It's your conduct as a brother that I object to," returned Betty severely. "Nobody pays any attention to me. Nan's gone off sleighing with Roberta, and you're only enduring my society until Dorothy King finishes her Lab, and you can go off walking with her. Then I shall be left to my own devices."
"To your studies you mean, my child," corrected Will. "Do you think that Nan and I would be so inconsiderate as to come down here and break up the regular routine of your college work?"
"How about the regular routine of Dorothy King's work?" inquired Betty saucily. "And Mary Brooks's?"
Will took out a card from his pocket and consulted its entries industriously. "I have only one date with Miss Brooks to-morrow, and none at all with Miss King, more's the pity."
"It's queer," said Betty reflectively. "You never can prophesy what girls men will take to. Now I should have supposed that you'd like Nita Reese and Eleanor Watson best of all the ones you've met. They're both so pretty."