“Can’t, won’t do what?” Barbara sat on the couch and drew her room-mate comfortingly close. “Megsy, please begin at the beginning.”
Margaret put her hand in a pocket of her rose-colored sweater-coat and drew out a crumpled letter.
“It’s from some-one way out on that terrible Arizona desert,” she said, “and it informs me that my father appointed a Mr. Davis as my guardian and that the elderly gentleman, having given the matter due thought, believes that it is time for me to come to his home and take the place that my father wished me to occupy, that of a rancher’s adopted daughter.”
Barbara gazed at her friend, almost unable to comprehend. “Megsy, does this mean that you and I are to be parted? That you are to leave Vine Haven Seminary forever?”
For a brief moment Margaret sat as though stunned, but her room-mate’s words roused her to action. Springing up in a sudden tempest of anger, she tore across the room, threw open the desk and began to write rapidly.
“There!” she exclaimed a few moments later. “I have written my answer.”
“Read it,” Barbara begged, and in a hard cold voice, very unlike her own, that was merry and musical, Margaret read:
“My Dear Mr. Davis:—
“You undoubtedly have written with the kindest of motives, but the picture you present is not in the least attractive to me. A ranch house on a desolate desert twenty miles from town is not a home which I wish to enter.
“It is better for me to be honest and tell you at once that I do not care to be your adopted daughter. I have a sufficient income on which to live and I shall remain at Vine Haven Seminary until I have graduated. Soon after that I will be eighteen and you will no longer be responsible for my actions.”