It was Margaret who on tip-toe crossed the narrow hall which the girls called Apple Blossom Lane. Ever so lightly she tapped on the door opposite. If Virginia were really asleep, she could not have heard, but she was awake, sitting in the easy chair close to the open window through which a breeze from the sea was wafting.
“Come in, dear,” her smile was welcoming. “I thought you planned taking a nap.”
Virginia moved over, for that deep comfortable chair was wide enough for two slender girls. “I knew that Eleanor had gone home,” Margaret began, “directly after the reading, and, since you were alone I thought—well, I guess I felt a little home sick. Babs is a dear, but Virg, you and Malcolm are all the real home folks that I have. I hope we’ll never be separated again, not even by a narrow hall.”
Virginia slipped her arm about her brother’s ward and the golden head and the brown rested close together. For a time they were silent, just content to be together. After a time Megsy spoke. “We’re not coming back next year, are we?”
“No, dear. I am not. I feel that the home on the desert needs me. I want you to come, if you wish, but I shall be glad if you are content at V. M. with me.”
Impulsively Margaret turned and clung to her friend. “Oh, Virg,” she half sobbed, “I don’t know why I have doubted. You haven’t given me any reason to, but I sometimes thought perhaps you would rather have Eleanor Pettes or someone older and wiser than I am for your very dearest friend. I’ve tried to be glad but I’ve been so—so foolishly lonesome.”
“Why, little-big sister, I never dreamed that you felt left out. In the very beginning, I would have chosen you for my roommate, don’t you know that dear? But who else would have wanted to room with Winona? No one understands her as I do, and then, there was Babs. She began at once to prattle about your rooming together as you had done the year before.”
“Oh, I know I have been silly, and I’m awfully sorry, Virg. It wasn’t that I thought you ought to like me best. I don’t think I’m anywhere near nice enough for that, and you’re heaps wiser, but just the same I wanted to be loved best. It’s horribly selfish, isn’t it?”
Virginia held her companion in a closer clasp. She was thinking of the mother and father love that they both of them had lost.
“No, dear, it is not selfish for us to want our sisters and our brothers to love us best and we do, deeply, truly, sincerely.” She kissed Margaret and rose, for there had been a sudden stir in the corridors. The hour of rest was over and an excited hum of voices told that the girls were preparing to dress for the party which was one of the great events of the school year.