ANNE AND GRACE COMPARE NOTES
During the walk home from the links, Grace kept continually thinking, "I
knew it was Miriam. She gave them to Julia." She replied rather
absent-mindedly to Miss Post's comments, and left the older girl with the
impression that Miss Harlowe was not as interesting as she had at first
seemed.
Grace escaped from the supper table at the earliest opportunity, and
seizing her hat, made for Anne's house as fast as her feet would take her.
Anne opened the door for her.
"Oh, Anne, Anne! You never can guess what I know!" cried Grace, before she
was fairly inside the house.
"Of course, I can't," replied Anne, "any more than you can guess what I
know."
"Why, do you know something special, too?" demanded Grace.
"I do, indeed. But tell me your news first, and then I'll tell you mine,"
said Anne, pushing Grace into a chair.
"Mine's about Miriam," said Grace soberly.
"So is mine," was the reply, "and it's nothing creditable, either."
"Well," began Grace, "you know I went over to the golf links to-day with
Ethel Post of the senior class."
Anne nodded.
"We were sitting on a bench resting after the game, and the subject of
basketball came up. Before I knew it, she was telling me all about finding
the list of signals you lost last fall. She gave them to one of our class,
you can guess who."
"Miriam," said Anne.
"Yes, it was Miriam. I always suspected that she had more to do with it
than anyone else. She gave Julia the signals, because she wanted to see me
humiliated, and fastened suspicion on you to shield herself. She knew that
I had boasted, openly, that my team would win. When Julia gave me the
statement that cleared you in the eyes of the girls, she told me that she
was under promise not to tell how she obtained the signals. But I'm sure
she knew that I suspected Miriam. What do you think we ought to do about
it?"
Grace looked anxiously at Anne.
"I don't know, yet," Anne replied. "Now listen to my news. I have felt
ever since the game that your getting locked up was not accidental. I
don't know why I felt so, but I did, nevertheless. So I set to work to
find out if any one else had been around there that day. I went to the
janitress and asked her if she had noticed any one in the corridors before
halfpast one. That was about the time that people began to come, you know.
She said she hadn't. She was down in the basement and didn't go near the
upstairs classrooms until after two o'clock. But when she did go up there
she found this."
Anne held up a curious scarab pin that Grace immediately recognized. It
was one that Miriam Nesbit often wore, and was extremely fond of.
"It's Miriam's," gasped Grace. "I wonder why----" She stopped. The reason
Miriam had not made her loss known was plain. She was afraid to tell where
and when she had lost her pin.
"I see," said Grace slowly. "It looks pretty bad, doesn't it? But why
didn't the janitress take it straight to Miss Thompson? That's what she
usually does with articles she finds."
"She missed seeing Miss Thompson that Saturday," said Anne. "When I hunted
her up early Monday morning, in order to question her, she asked me if I
had lost a pin. She said she had just returned one to Miss Thompson, and
told me where she found it. I asked her to describe the pin, and at once
recognized it. Every girl in school knows that scarab of Miriam's. There
is nothing like it in Oakdale.
"For a minute I didn't know what to do. Don't you remember when Miriam
first had it? She showed it to Miss Thompson, and Miss Thompson spoke of
how curious it was. I knew that Miss Thompson would not be apt to forget
it. I hurried up to her office and found her with the pin in her hand. She
had sent for Miriam, but the messenger came back with the report that
Miriam wasn't in school. She laid the pin down and said, 'What is it,
Anne?' So I just asked her if she would let me have the pin. Of course,
she looked surprised, and asked me if I knew to whom it belonged. I told
her I did. Then she looked at me very hard, and asked me to tell her
exactly why I wanted it. But, of course, I couldn't tell her, so I didn't
say anything. Then she said: 'Anne, I know without being told why you want
this pin. I am going to give it to you, and let you settle a delicate
matter in your own way. I am sure it will be the right one.'"
"Anne Pierson, you bad child!" exclaimed Grace. "To think that you've kept
this to yourself ever since the game. Why didn't you tell me?"
"I wanted to think what to do about it, before telling even you," Anne
replied. "Yesterday I had a long talk with David. He knows everything
that Miriam has done since the beginning of the freshman year. He feels
dreadfully about it all. I think you and I ought to go to her and tell her
that we are willing to forget the past and be her friends."
"It would do no good," said Grace dubiously. "She would simply laugh at
us. I used to have dreams about making Miriam see the evil of her ways,
but I have come to the conclusion that they were dreams, and nothing
more."
"Let's try, anyway," said Anne. "David says she seems sad and unhappy, and
is more gentle than she has been for a long time."
"All right, we'll beard the lion in her den, the Nesbit on her soil, if
you say so. But I expect to be routed with great slaughter," said Grace
with a shudder. "When do we go forth on our mission of reform?"
"We'll call on her to-morrow after school," Anne replied, "and don't
forget that you once made the remark that you thought Miriam had a better
self. You told me the day you read Julia Crosby's statement to the girls
that you wouldn't give her up."
"I suppose that I shall have to confess that I did say so," laughed Grace.
"But that was before she locked me up. She is so proud and stubborn that
she will probably take the olive branch we hold out and trample upon it.
After all, it really isn't our place to hold out olive branches anyway.
She is the one who ought to eat humble pie. I feel ashamed to think I have
to tell her what I know about her."
"So do I," responded Anne. "It's horrid to have to go to people and tell
them about their misdeeds. I wouldn't propose going now if it weren't for
David. He seems to think that she would be willing to behave if some one
showed her how."
"All right," said Grace, "we'll go, but if we encounter a human tornado
don't say I didn't warn you."
"That's one reason I want to go to her house," replied Anne. "If we
approach her at school she is liable to turn on us and make a scene, or
else walk off with her nose in the air. If we can catch her at home
perhaps she will be more amenable to reason. But, if, to-morrow, she
refuses to melt and be forgiven, then I wash my hands of her forever."