“It looks to me as though you were on the right road,” encouraged Grace. “The only thing to do is to keep on writing. The more you write the easier it will become—that is, if you are really gifted. Kathleen has great faith in you. You must show her that it is well founded.”
“How inspiring you are, Miss Harlowe.” Mary looked her gratitude at Grace’s hopeful words; then she added in a slightly lower tone: “I’m so glad everything went so beautifully for Evelyn. I saw her twice in ‘The Reckoning.’ She looked beautiful, and her acting was so clever. She—she told me of her own accord about”—Mary hesitated—“things. It would have hurt me dreadfully if Evelyn had not come back to Overton. I love her dearly.”
Grace nodded sympathetically. She understood the remarkable effect of Evelyn’s beauty upon Mary. Still, she reflected, it had not been potent enough to lure Mary from standing by her colors at the crucial moment. Grace realized that this poor orphan girl, whose only home was Harlowe House, possessed a steadfast, upright nature that must in time win her not only scores of loyal friends, but the respect of all who knew her, as well.
A sudden trill from Kathleen caused them to quicken their steps. The others were standing in front of Vinton’s, waiting for them. Once inside the pretty tea room that had been the scene of so many of their revels, with one accord they made for the alcove table.
“Shades of Arline Thayer,” laughed Emma. “I am haunted by her. I can see her sitting in that chair, her little hands folded on the table, saying, ‘What are we going to eat, girls?’ She loved this alcove and every stick and stone of Vinton’s. She never cared so much for Martell’s.”
By this time they had seated themselves at the round table and begun to order their luncheon. Vinton’s was productive of reminiscences, and they were soon deep in the discussion of past events, grave and gay, that had dotted their college life. Evelyn and Mary were for the most part listeners, but Grace, Patience, Emma and Kathleen fairly bubbled over with by-gone college history.
“I love to hear about the things that happened to Miss Harlowe and Miss Dean when they were students,” confided Mary to Evelyn under cover of a general laugh over one of Emma Dean’s ridiculous reminiscences.
“So do I,” nodded Mary, then she added in a still lower tone, “Have you noticed the girl at the table near the door, Evelyn. She came in about ten minutes ago, and she’s watched this table every second since she came.”
“Yes, I noticed her. She’s pretty, isn’t she? That’s a stunning suit she is wearing. Her hat is miles above reproach, too.” Evelyn could not repress her admiration for beautiful clothes.
At that moment Kathleen spoke to her and she turned to answer the latter’s question. When next her eyes turned toward the pretty girl it was just as they were leaving the tea shop. Evelyn was the last member of the sextette to pass the table. She glanced at the girl only to note that she was searching a small leather bag frantically, a look of indescribable alarm in her eyes. “It’s gone,” she said, half aloud.