“He feedeth upon the lilies, just the lilies, the row part——” repeated Katherine dutifully.
“No, no; it’s all wrong,” said Gladys impatiently. “Begin again.”
“My beloved is mine——”
“Katherine! Oh-h-h-h Katherine! Are you up there?” the voice of Slim suddenly called from below.
The girls all started guiltily and fell into confusion. “Sh! Hide the Bible, quick!” cried Hinpoha in a sibilant whisper, darting forward and snatching it from Katherine’s hand and concealing it under the bear rug.
“What are you girls doing up there?” came from below.
“Oh, nothing,” floated down the illuminating reply from above.
If Nyoda had not been so completely engrossed in her private affairs just at this time she would have noticed the subtle undercurrent which seemed to have caught hold of the toes of the entire feminine half of the senior class at Washington High. It was not the Winnebagos only. In fact, they had caught it from the others. Every class has its epidemic, be it tonsillitis, friendship link bracelets or Knox hats. This year it was fortune telling. Where the mystic rite described above originated nobody could exactly tell, but in less than a week every girl in the class had been initiated into the secret, and was busy discovering what her future initials were to be. The performance was always carried on behind locked doors or in places otherwise secure from adult eyes, and was often interrupted right at the most exciting point by approaching footsteps, but questions as to how the innocent maids had been improving the shining hour invariably brought out the reply, “Oh, we weren’t doing anything—much.” Missing keys and books of family worship led to embarrassing questions once in a while, but somehow the situation was always bridged over and parents and teachers never really did find out what the fascinating something was that drew their young friends off into groups by themselves from which they emerged to day dream instead of getting their lessons and to make mysterious references to certain initials.
The book and key oracle reigned supreme for several weeks and then gave place to the horoscope. For ten cents in stamps a certain seer dwelling in a remote town in Oregon offered to “cast” the principal events, past, present and future, in the lives of all young lady correspondents. It was not long before intimate heads were bent over scraps of paper comparing horoscopes. Hinpoha’s was acknowledged by all to be the gem of the collection.
“You have a brilliant future before you,” it read. “You will have a romantic love affair and will marry your first lover. He is a great scholar who will afterwards become president. You will meet him when you are very young.” Then followed a dozen lines more of brilliant prophecy. The special friends of Hinpoha, who had been allowed to peep at her fortune, Gladys, Sahwah, Katherine, Nakwisi and Medmangi, and one or two others, who had fore-gathered ostensibly to rehearse a school song, sat back and regarded their fortunate friend with awe. None of their fortunes had contained anything so dazzling.