“You surely do look peachy in it,” Barbara remarked admirably. “It doesn’t matter what I put on, my squint and my freckled pug nose spoil it all.”
“Oh, you’re not so bad!” Esther said generously. “I heard one of the cadets at our closing dance say that he thought your squint was adorable.”
“Lead me to him!” Barbara jumped up as though about to start in search of her unknown admirer, but sank back again when she recalled that she was on a steamer which was chugging down the Hudson at its best speed.
“Do be serious, girls. See, I’ve made out a long list of things that I shall need.” Jane held up her notebook for inspection. But Esther closed hers and replaced it in her natty alligator traveling bag. “I’ll select my wardrobe after I have had my father’s consent,” she said. “You might as well stop planning now, Jane, as we are nearly to the Battery.”
Esther was right and in another five moments all was confusion on the small steamer. When they had safely crossed the gang plank, Merry detained them long enough to say, “Girls, before we part, let’s plan to meet at my home next Friday. Since you will all have to travel so far, suppose you come early and stay to lunch. Then we can make our final plans. How I do hope that we can all go.”
“I know that I can,” Jane replied confidently. “I always do as I wish, and nothing could induce me to spend another summer with my young brother and sister. They’re so boisterous and bothersome. As for Dan, he’s so eager to make high grades at college that he always is deep in a book.”
“Why Jane Abbott,” rebuked Esther. “I think your little sister is adorable. I’d give anything if I were not an only child.” Jane merely shrugged. “Au revoir,” she called over her shoulder. “I’ve got to catch the ferry.”
CHAPTER II.
THE MOST SELFISH GIRL
The girls who had been inseparable friends during the four years at the fashionable Highacres Seminary parted at the Battery to go in as many different directions.
Marion Starr’s home was far up on Riverside Drive, while Barbara Morris’ millionaire father had an extensive estate on Long Island. Esther Ballard, the only daughter of devoted parents, resided in the house of her grandfather, Colonel Ballard, on Washington Square, while Jane Abbott’s family of four lived in the same rambling, picturesque wooden house that Mr. Abbott’s father had built for his bride long before his name had become so well known on Wall Street. Edgemere, a pretty little town among the Jersey hills, Mr. Abbott deemed a good place to bring up his younger girl and boy, and so, although Jane often pleaded that they move to a more fashionable suburb, in Edgemere they had remained. Nor would her father tear down the old home to replace it with one finer, for his beloved wife, who had died at the birth of little Julie, had planned it and had chosen all of the furnishings. “Some day you will have a home of your own, Jane,” he had told his proud older daughter, “and then you may have it as fine as you wish.”