“Listen to Alice’s French, and punning, too!”
“Wait a minute, Ann,” called Alice, as Ann, happy in the thought of Aline, was about to leave, with Katherine and Lucile, it happened.
Ann waited for Alice, who put her arm over Ann’s shoulder as they walked toward the buildings. “You know, don’t you, Ann, that it is best not to be too precipitate in a thing of this sort?”
Ann looked inquiringly at Alice. “You mean not to take it for granted that Aline is ready to fall into our arms at once?”
“Yes. The girls, of course, will not do or say one thing till they get the report from you.”
“I have been wondering how to manage it,” said Ann. “I know Aline pretty well by this time, especially since we came very near to being suite-mates. Still, the Bats haven’t paid her any particular attention since the first of last year.”
“We did then, didn’t we? That makes it a little better.”
“Yes, but then we thought that it was not best to bid her,—she was so surrounded with the Sig-Eps and so intimate with Eleanor, though they didn’t room together. Of course I did not know about it then, but I heard Katherine and Dots talk about it.”
Alice walked along without saying anything further for a few moments. “How would it do, Ann, if after dinner we get hold of Aline, some of our crowd, maybe go outdoors, or bring her around to our suite, as it happens; and then when you go back to your building, I will stroll along with you and perhaps say something about our having found out that she had not joined the Sig-Eps, and being glad of it, or something like that—you never can tell what is best to say until the times comes.”
“That is one reason why you are at the head of the Betas, Alice,” said Ann. “You always do know just the nice thing to say!”