"If only it wasn't against the rule we might crawl under the fence just ahead there where the hole is."
Ethel Blue looked at the place with longing eyes. Dogs had burrowed their way under the pickets and had worn, out a hole that seemed big enough for thin people to get through. She turned to Ethel Brown.
"It would be wrong to do it," she said, "but it would save us a long distance, because there's a short cut right to the Amphitheatre just over there inside."
Ethel Blue was open to temptation to do anything that required daring, for she was trying hard to gain courage by following the Bishop's advice and by attempting little adventures about which she felt timid.
"I'm almost dead," groaned Ethel Brown plaintively. "Do you think they could possibly catch us? You know they tell a story of a fat woman who found a place like this and squeezed her way in and when she was all in a fence guard appeared and made her squeeze herself out again."
"She was trying to cheat the Institution out of her entrance money. We aren't doing that; we've got our gate tickets."
Somehow that made the matter seem better, though in their inmost hearts the girls knew that they were not doing what was right. Yet with a look around and a gasp of excitement they pushed their flowers through ahead of them and then struggled through themselves.
"There isn't anybody in sight," exclaimed Ethel Brown in the low voice of guilt, scanning the grounds as she helped Ethel Blue get on her feet.
"We've done it, anyway," answered Ethel Blue, and she even felt a touch of pride, in the adventure, for at least she had not been frightened.
They took their contribution to the Amphitheatre and helped the others, who had been at work for some time, to arrange the flowers around the edge of the platform. The result was beautiful and the group was delighted when a hearty voice said suddenly, "Is this the United Service Club? I want to thank you for doing this for us. We've never looked so fine as this before on Old First Night."