“Look! Look quickly, at Abby Dunbar’s face,” whispered Dolly excitedly. “The murder is out! I would give a dime to hear what she is saying. There! Miss Van Gerder realizes that she has said something she will regret. I suppose Abby was pumping in the very persistent way she has, and Miss Van Gerder merely answered her questions. Oh, how could she have been so thoughtless, though? She might have known that Westover is one of the snobbiest colleges in the world.”
“There is no use trying to head her off now,” Beth declared disconsolately. “Still, I mean to have my talk with her anyway. If it be possible to repair the mischief, she will do it. Miss Dunbar is glaring at Margaret as if she would like to murder her!”
“Do you suppose that she remembers all the speeches she has made about Margaret’s aristocratic bearing? If she acts as contemptibly as I expect she will, I shall repeat some of those speeches for her benefit. I’ve been treasuring them in my memory.”
“I wish this meal would come to an end.”
To the two impatient girls, anxious to find out just what Miss Van Gerder had said, and what she would do in amends, dinner seemed a most interminable meal. It came to an end at last, however, and Beth, with her usual directness, walked at once to Miss Van Gerder. “Will you please come to my room a few moments? I wish very particularly to see you. I am Elizabeth Newby, and I am very fond of Margaret Hamilton,” and Beth was speaking the truth when she made that assertion, for she had come to like Margaret as she had not expected that she ever would.
Miss Van Gerder rose instantly, despite Abby Dunbar’s exclamation of annoyance. She had not been able to hear what Beth said, but she was not at all ready to resign her claim on the new arrival.
“Please don’t go, Miss Newby. Miss Van Gerder has just been telling me the most awful thing about Margaret Hamilton, and to think I begged her to room with me, and took her home with me this summer, and that we made her class president, it is too awful–and–”
Miss Van Gerder paused a moment, a rather dangerous light in her eyes. “I shall be glad if I can persuade you to relinquish your claims on Margaret, for I want her as a room-mate myself.” Then she passed on.
Beth squeezed her arm ecstatically, regardless of the fact that they had never been even introduced. “You are a darling, but, oh, what possessed you to tell that girl anything about Margaret?”
“How do you know I did? Oh, I suppose you were watching us. I noticed your eyes on us all through the meal. How do you happen to know anything more about Margaret than her room-mate?”