“Of course I shall; I would not miss it for anything. Then you have really passed your final examination, and are going to receive your diploma?” he said, bending a look of pride on her.
“Indeed I have. You did not suppose I should fail, did you, if I really set about it?” she asked, with a little accent of scorn on the disagreeable word.
“I did not know, dear. I was confident that you would do your best; but you told me you were only received upon conditions, and I sometimes feared the work might be too hard for you.”
“I should not have begged to be allowed to enter the senior class if I had not felt confident that I could do justice to myself,” Star answered, quietly, as she buttered her roll. “I considered the matter thoroughly before I applied. I had already read almost as far in Latin as the whole course demanded, and my French, thanks to papa’s care, was nearly equal in pronunciation to monsieur’s own. The review of some of the studies of the junior class, with which I was not familiar, and the training for teaching, were all that was very hard for me.”
She spoke lightly, but he well knew that she had labored unremittingly upon those reviews, and that she had spent many extra hours with one of the “critic” teachers, who had kindly offered to assist her, in order that she might be up to the mark in the practice of “model school-teaching.”
Thus she had persevered and overcome every obstacle until the goal was reached, and to-day she would receive her diploma.
And so Uncle Jacob had gone to the great chapel with other interested friends, and watched the dear girl with glistening eyes while she so creditably performed the part assigned to her, feeling that she was an honor to her class, and in his eyes, at least, the gem of them all.
That evening there was to be a grand reunion in a commodious hall near by, where graduates of previous years were to meet the senior class of to-day, to offer their congratulations on their success and their good wishes for their future career.
Star had no fine clothes in which to make a show of herself, and was obliged to go clad in the same simple lace bunting that she had worn during the day; but she gave herself an air of elegance by substituting some bright flowers for the knots of blue ribbon, and excitement lending a rich color to her cheeks and light to her eyes, no one thought of criticising her garments.
Jacob Rosevelt, too, dressed in a full new suit of handsome broadcloth, with a satin neck-tie and light kid gloves, did not look much like the bent, shabby old man who had arrived, dusty and travel-stained, at Mr. Richards’ mansion a little less than a year ago.