“I know you have—St. Vitus’s dance,” groaned Dorothy. “I have been expecting the announcement for ever so long.”
“Miss Smartie!” responded Tavia. “You’ll see.”
She flew about, whispering to the other graduates. In half an hour, just as Dorothy and Tavia themselves were in their nighties and boudoir caps, a knock came at the door, it flew open, and there filed into Nineteen almost the whole class with arms full of a “great debris” of articles, as Tavia called them, which had plainly been torn from the walls of the various rooms.
“Come on, Doro,” giggled Tavia. “This is a donation party. We’re going to donate to the girls who are left such adornments, and the like, as we do not wish to carry away with us. You know—‘We who are about to die salute you,’ and all that. Come on!”
Dorothy entered into the spirit of the affair. There were many trophies and pictures that would merely gather dust in the attic at North Birchlands, she knew; she grabbed for these, and the procession took up its march from room to room.
The lights had been left turned on in the halls; even if the girls were in bed they were routed out to receive the donation from the departing class. Mrs. Pangborn—even Miss Olaine—were conveniently blind and deaf.
Tavia made the most extravagant speeches. The most ridiculous presents were given with a ceremony that convulsed everybody. It was a fine, hilarious time.
“Oh, and the last bit of fun we shall ever have in old Glenwood Hall,” said Cologne, sadly, as empty-armed at last, the big girls made their way back to Nineteen.
“We’ll never have so much fun again, no matter where we go,” sighed Ned Ebony.