"Miss Archer will see you," Marcia Arnold informed them after a wait of perhaps five minutes, and the trio filed into the inner office.
"Good morning, girls," greeted Miss Archer, viewing them searchingly. "Miss Stevens, I am glad that you have returned, but I am sorry to say that during your absence I have heard a number of unpleasant rumors concerning you."
Constance flushed, then her color receded, leaving her very white.
Before the principal could continue, Marjorie's earnest tones rang out.
"Miss Archer, Miss Stevens and I had a misunderstanding. When you asked me about it I could not tell you. It has since been cleared away. My butterfly pin has been found, but it was not the one Miss Stevens wore. See, here are the two pins. Mine has no pearls at the tips of the wings." She extended her open palm to the principal. In it lay two butterfly pins, precisely alike save for the pearl-tipped wings of the one.
Miss Archer looked long at the pins. Then she lifted them to meet the blue and the brown eyes whose gaze was fastened earnestly upon her. What she saw seemed to satisfy her. She held out her hand to Marjorie and Constance in turn.
"They are very alike," was her sole comment, as Marjorie returned Constance's pin. Then Miss Archer turned to Mignon.
"I am sorry I accused Miss Stevens of taking my bracelet," murmured Mignon, sulkily. "I have it in my possession. Here it is." She thrust out an unwilling wrist, on which was the bracelet.
"I am glad that you have exonerated Miss Stevens from all suspicion." Miss Archer's quiet face expressed little of what was going on in her mind. "I am also thankful that an apparently serious matter has been so easily settled." She did not offer her hand to Mignon, who left the office without answering.
A moment later, Marjorie and Constance were in the outer office standing at Marcia Arnold's desk. "It's all settled, Marcia, with no names mentioned," she said reassuringly. "Good-bye, we'll see you later. We'll have to hurry or we'll be late for the opening exercises."