“I do,” Blanche answered, “but I’ve been down at Stanford the last four years, and have just finished this last semester.”
Mary’s eyes almost popped out of her head. “Why,” she began, incredulously, “I thought you—you—” She did not like to say she had thought that the sunny-faced girl before her had no appreciation of education because she liked to do useful, domestic things, too.
“You thought I could do nothing but cook?” Blanche finished, laughingly.
But Mary did not answer. Blanche Hallsey was certainly not much older than she, and yet, with all her college education, she had been in the kitchen all that hot morning, kneading bread and scouring silver for Mrs. Lane.
“If you decide to go to Stanford, I can write to some of the girls to look out for you,” Blanche went on, for she had not noticed Mary’s attitude of superiority the last few days.
“Oh, would you, please?” Mary Lane pleaded, in a tone that would have greatly surprised her mother had she heard it, for not even she guessed how the fear of going among strangers for the first time in her life had been haunting her diffident little girl.
It was several days, however, before Mary, with her forehead puckered into knots over the “ablative absolute,” could bring herself to knock at Miss Hallsey’s door, and ask for a little assistance.
But that was the beginning of the end of Mary Lane’s priggishness, and the first step toward a higher education in the true sense of the word. She passed her entrance examinations with honors, due, perhaps, to the patient coaching she received during the rest of the summer from Blanche Hallsey. She learned, too, besides irregular verbs, a great many other things fully as useful, topping off with what the college girl called “a classical course in cookery.”