“We’re going to win that loving cup,” declared Hinpoha in a tone of finality. “This is our chance to show what we’re made of. Up until now we’ve been doing little easy ‘Give Services.’ At last we’re up against something big. Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their party. The WINNEBAGOS have never fallen down on anything yet that they undertook and they’re not going to now. We’re going to win that contest. Won’t Nyoda be proud of us?”
We cheered until the windows rattled and then Migwan brought us to earth with a thud. “How are we going to do it?” she asked soberly. We all fell silent and donned our thinking caps. Minutes passed but nobody sprouted a bright idea. Suggestion after suggestion was made, only to be turned down flat.
“We might give a circus,” suggested Hinpoha rather doubtfully. “Remember the circus we gave at home last year?”
“There have been nine circuses of various kinds already this year,” wet-blanketed Agony. “You couldn’t hire anybody to attend another.”
“Masquerade as seeresses and give select parlor readings of people’s futures,” suggested Oh-Pshaw. “We could charge five dollars for a reading.”
“Been done already,” said Migwan. “Anyway, the faculty have forbidden it. The girls that did it last year scandalized a prominent Trustee’s wife by telling her that her daughter was going to elope with an Italian count before the month was out. The daughter had married a minister the week before, only the girls didn’t know it, and the Trustee’s wife got so excited she sat down on a two-hundred-dollar Satsuma vase and smashed it and tried to sue the seeresses for damages. Then, of course, she found out they were students and the faculty put an end to parlor seeresses.”
That’s the way it went. Not a plan was suggested but what turned out to be old stuff or not practicable.
“Oh, for an idea!” groaned Agony, beating her white brow with the palm of her hand.
“We might go round with a hand organ,” suggested Oh-Pshaw in desperation. “Gladys could be the monkey and pass around a tin cup.”
“Thanks, I wouldn’t think of aspiring to such an honor,” I replied modestly.