"No, I think I really haven't," Peggy said frankly. "But I certainly have had time to go to the telephone." Then suddenly her face brightened. "I know what we'll do, girls; we'll give her a telephone party."
"A telephone party," Amy repeated. "What do you mean by that?" The car for which they were waiting came along before Peggy could answer, and she finished her explanation hanging to a strap, while her three companions, similarly supported and swaying violently with each jerk of the car, listened absorbedly.
"College opens to-morrow, and the first day is never so very busy, so we'll call Mary up every hour. My hour will be between nine and ten. Priscilla, you take the hour between ten and eleven; and Amy, you can have the next one. I think we'd better omit the hour between twelve and one, for she'll probably be eating luncheon then. Ruth, you may call between one and two."
"But you said every hour, Peggy. Don't you think it would be rather over-doing it to call twice in one day?"
"I'm going to get hold of some of the other girls who were in Mary's class in high school, Elinor Hewitt, and Anna Joyce, and Blanche Eastabrook—"
"She's in New York."
"Well, Marian O'Neil isn't. And I'll see Aimee Dubois at college and tell her about it. Mary's telephone is going to work overtime to make up for its long idleness."
"What I don't understand," said Priscilla, "is if Mary was so lonely, why didn't she call us up?"
"I can understand that easy enough," replied Peggy. "She called us up to tell us she had a phone, and after that, it was our move."
"And I suppose," suggested Amy, "that there isn't a great deal to talk about, when you don't get out of an upstairs room from one month to another."