Patty had the grace to blush slightly. "I was a trifle embarrassed," she admitted; "but when I reflected upon how sorry she would have been to find out how little I knew, and how glad she will be to find out how much I know, my conscience was appeased."
"Have you been studying?" asked Georgie.
"Studying!" Patty lifted up the corner of her pillow and exhibited a blue book. "Two days more of this, and I shall be the chief authority in America on Anglo-Saxon roots."
"How do you manage it?"
"Oh," said Patty, "when the rest-hour begins I lie down and shut my eyes, and they tiptoe over and look at me, and whisper, 'She's asleep,' and softly draw the curtains around the bed; and I get out the book and put in two solid hours of irregular verbs, and am still sleeping when they come to look at me. They're perfectly astonished at the amount I sleep. I heard the nurse telling the doctor that she didn't believe I'd had any sleep for a month. And the worst of it is," she added, "that I am tired, whether you believe it or not, and I should just love to stay over here and sleep all day if I weren't so beastly conscientious about that old grammar."
"Poor Patty!" laughed Georgie. "She will be imposing on herself next, as well as on the whole college."
Friday morning Patty returned to the world.
"How's Old English?" inquired Priscilla.
"Very well, thank you. It was something of a cram, but I think I know that grammar by heart, from the preface to the index."
"You're back in all your other work. Do you think it paid?"