“Thanks, Ann. You are a loyal Beta Alpha Tau. I’m certainly glad that we got you in! Well, now, after what I am going to say has been said, and of course Aline will know anyhow, having been here a year, what we Bats are after,—then the way will be paved for you to have a serious little talk with her. Just tell her the facts, Ann, for they are certainly complimentary, the interest the girls took and how they want her. But I want a lot of our girls to meet her beforehand, anyhow, for the ‘psychological effect’.”
“I’m so glad, Alice, that you thought of this, because while we do want to hurry it up, it ought to be done in the right way. Goodbye. I’ll tag on to Aline and tell her that I want to see her about something, if I can’t get her away from her crowd in any other way.”
“Very well, Ann, goodbye till after dinner! The rushing season for Aline will be short I hope.”
“Yes; and I’m so glad that you think we’ll have a special feast to celebrate her coming in,—if she does, and I’m pretty sure of it, on account of her mother you know.”
Ann ran happily over to her suite, to hug Marta in the excess of her emotions, and to tell her about the plan of attack.
CHAPTER IX
AT “POLLY’S” ONCE MORE
How hard it was to study these first days, when so much of importance to the Beta Alpha Taus and the other sororities was “hanging in the balance”! Marta and Ann scored success in their work only by early rising. It was fortunate for Ann that her heaviest work had been done in her first year. She still had a few extra hours to make up, but they were divided between the first and second semesters and were in studies which were not particularly hard for Ann. She concentrated her powers during regular study hours, rose an hour early, and spent the rest of the time, those happy hours between lessons and meals, in the service of the Beta Alpha Taus and the “Owls”, her literary society. It was great fun to “cast dull care away”, as she told Marta, and have a good time with the girls. Walks, rowing, canoeing, swimming, climbing the hills, usually with some new girls in tow,—everything took on a new pleasure and excitement. The “rushing season” was decidedly thrilling.
But alas for “best-laid plans” again! The desired hurrying of Aline into the ranks of Beta Alpha Tau was not so easily accomplished. That evening, after dinner, Aline responded pleasantly to the overture of the Bats. It was natural enough that Ann should be with her, and some of the other members of the Jolly Six; but she naturally noticed the fact that attention was being paid her by the senior and junior girls of the sorority. Not for nothing had Aline spent a year in a girls’ school.
When, noticing that all the girls, with the exception of two new girls, were Betas, she was about to refuse an invitation to Alice’s suite and slip away, Alice informed her that she was particularly desired. “You do not know my especial brand of fudge,” she said, and Ann joined in, with the remark that no one who ever tasted it was known to refuse a second invitation. “Come on, Aline. We won’t stay but a minute if you have anything important to do. I’ve got to get to work, too.”