“Talk with Miss Dean yourself, Gus,” calmly advised Charlotte. “You will find out in about two minutes that she is a perfect darling. Miss Macy is nice, too. Both of those girls are true blue.”
“You and Flossie act like a couple of geese about those seniors,” criticized Anna Perry, who chanced to be present at the discussion.
“The two sensitive plants.” Charlotte indicated Gussie and Florence with a wave of the hand.
It being a rainy Saturday afternoon, the five girls were sitting about Calista’s and Charlotte’s room drinking the fruit lemonade which Calista had just finished making.
Augusta and Florence both giggled at Charlotte’s fling, by no means offended.
“Don’t care,” defied Gussie. “When I am sore at anyone it is because I have good reason to be. No one can ridicule me and get away with it.”
“You talk like an offended potentate, Gus,” Calista told her.
“Why shouldn’t I, if I want to?” Gussie demanded.
“Why? Because you are a lowly freshman. You ought to be meek along with the lowly; only you aren’t.”
“I guess not. Don’t intend to be ever. I am just as important in my own way as any of those old seniors.”
“No, you are not,” Calista contradicted with great decision. “None of us are—yet. Those girls have three more years of accomplishment to their credit than we. That’s the way I look at it. Besides, I hear they are the best-liked crowd on the campus. Miss Dean is considered the sweetest, kindest girl at Hamilton. Miss Lynne is a wonderful dancer. All of them have something especial they are noted and prized for in college. They have done noteworthy things. We are lucky to be noticed by them.”
“Not when they merely notice us to poke fun at us,” persisted Gussie stubbornly.
“You are hopeless.” Calista threw up her hands in despair. “You will have to learn the truth of what I’ve said for yourself. I see that plainly.”
“I’ll never learn it, for I don’t see things as you do, at all,” Gussie retorted, determined to have the last word.
A few days afterward Augusta announced proudly at the dinner table that she had been invited to the freshman frolic. She was greatly elated to find that she had been the first of the group of five Bertram girls, who usually kept together, to be invited to the merry-making. More, she crowed over the fact that her escort-to-be was a junior. Announcing, however, that it was Elizabeth Walbert who had invited her, she met with the disapproval of Calista and Charlotte.