"Miss Harlowe, I have known Miss Eliot since she was a little girl," explained Miss Sheldon. "I am pleased to know that she is to live at Wayne Hall. I am sure she will be happy there. I understand that the Wayne Hall girls make a very congenial household."
"We try to," said Grace with a frank smile. "My three friends and I have never lived in any other house since our freshman days. Perhaps Miss Eliot will find her freshman year there as delightful as we found ours."
"My freshman year!" exclaimed Miss Eliot in evident surprise.
"Yes," returned Grace rather blankly. "Aren't you a freshman? I don't know why I thought so, but I supposed, of course, that——" She paused irresolutely.
Miss Sheldon and the tall girl exchanged openly smiling glances, then the latter turned toward Grace almost apologetically. "I am a freshman in one sense," she said. "I have never before been to college, but as far as work goes I studied with my father and was lucky enough to pass up the freshman year. I ran down here last June to talk things over and find where I stood. I'm a sophomore, if you please."
Grace burst into merry laughter. "Won't the girls be surprised!" she exclaimed. "We all thought you were a freshman."
"I hadn't stopped to think of what any one else thought of me," said Patience, "or I might have enlightened the girls at the breakfast table as to my superior sophomore estate. They'll find out soon enough. I have a great mind to let them stumble upon the truth gradually."
"Oh, do," begged Grace gleefully. "It will be great fun to let matters take their own course."
Miss Sheldon smiled indulgently, but made no comment. She was versed in the ways of college girls. She, too, had been a student at Overton.
"I should like to stay longer, Miss Sheldon, but I know you are very busy." Patience rose at last to go, Grace following her example. "Now that I have come to headquarters, been identified, had my thumb marks registered and become a unit in this great and glorious organization," went on the tall girl calmly, "I shall feel free to go forth and replace Mrs. Elwood's demolished china. I should like to put the new set on the washstand before I tell her of the accident. Good-bye, Miss Sheldon." She held out her hand. "May I come to see you soon?"