“My word!” exclaimed Ada suddenly. “Look at this funny package coming up the walk!”
The girls all looked in the direction Ada indicated and saw the strangest-looking girl trudging up the path, carrying a suitcase and a hatbox. She was short and very fat, and vulgarly overdressed in clothes far too old for a girl of her years—a velvet coat, gray suede shoes and stockings, and a large hat trimmed with ostrich plumes. She seemed hot and out of breath.
When she came abreast of the girls she stopped.
“Excuse me,” she said, “but will you tell me where to go? I’m the new girl who was coming to-day.”
“The new girl?” laughed Ada. “Don’t you know there are several other freshmen—thirty-five to be exact?”
The stout girl looked as if she were not listening. “My name’s Lily Andrews—I’m from New York. Don’t you—any of you know where my room is?”
Marjorie’s face fell. So this was her room-mate! This ill-mannered, over-dressed, unattractive young lady, whose whole bearing stamped her as “newly rich!” Why should she, Marjorie, have the bad luck to draw something like this, when Ruth had fallen in with one of the most popular and influential girls of the school?
However, she answered, “Yes, I know where your room is, Miss Andrews, for I’m the freshman who is to room with you. I’ll take you to it. There’s just time before the second bell rings.”
Marjorie took Lily’s suitcase and the two girls walked off together.
“Poor Marjorie!” sighed Ada, “I hope she has the good sense to drop her.”