“Yes, but it may be some time before you get back what you send.”
“Then I suppose I’ll have to wear this coat as it is, till time to put on my winter coat.”
Madge nodded an affirmative. “Oh, it doesn’t look so bad,” she said, not very tactfully, for there was no consolation for Shirley in that remark.
“No one would ever know that it was new when I started away in June,” ruefully said Shirley, “and I tried to take care of it, too. Well, it can’t be helped. If it weren’t for the Sunday service, I could get along here on the campus without it. Luckily I did not catch it on anything to tear it. It will be all right after it is cleaned, I hope, for I shall have to wear it next spring again.”
While Shirley might feel uncomfortable at the start, she was too sensible to let any coat or hat spoil her enjoyment of the trip; but she did wish that she could make herself a little less conspicuous. She would slip into some seat and just stay there! Yet Shirley knew well enough that there was probably no new girl in any school who came into quicker prominence than herself. Seniors and freshmen, music students and irregulars of any sort by this time knew “Sidney Thorne’s double” and were enjoying the fun of trying to tell them apart by stares and looks that tried to be unnoticeable but were often felt, or seen, by both Sidney and Shirley. Sidney resented some of it and had told one of the freshman girls, in a half laughing but quite decided way to “do her staring at the new girl” not at her.
“But Sidney,” explained the freshman, who knew Sidney in Chicago, “I wanted to speak to you, and I had to look, to see if it were you or Shirley Harcourt.”
“Look at our clothes,” said Sidney. “I always wear something different, and she doesn’t, so far. Besides, we can’t look so much alike as you all seem to think! It is ridiculous.”
Sidney was in much the same sort of a mood today. Of course this girl would have to be in all the class affairs and it would not be as easy to avoid her as it was about the hall or in classes. Well, there she was, in that old coat and hat, and if Hope Holland was not with her, and Ollie Mason, too!
The sun was warm as Shirley traversed the walks of the campus between Hope and Olive, who had joined her to talk about the classical club program. Madge and Caroline were behind them, and Betty Terhune from a group in front called back that they were early enough to choose their seats. Between the tall trees, then down to the shore they briskly walked.
The Westlake looked prettier than ever, its deck smooth and clean, its sides shining. None of the teachers had yet arrived, but there were two men in charge of the boat. They saw that the girls were safely aboard and kept a wary eye out for a possible reckless one.