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Rh tain how Marjorie had received the news at Ralph's hands and still anxious to learn.

"I've been in to see Marjorie," she began gayly. "I thought you might like to hear from her. I really pity you, my friend, if you have an engagement with her soon, for I do not think she is in an amiable frame of mind. Oh, she did not commit herself to me; Marjorie never is particularly communicative with us girls, you know; but her mother was more frank. She said in so many words that she did not approve of your new business, at all."

"I presume she knew that that would harm no one," said Ralph in his very stiffest tone.

And then Estelle launched forth with her history of the things that Marjorie did not say, and with the description of her face and manner, which last was calculated to do the most harm under the circumstances.

Estelle did not mean to speak other than the truth; she did not even mean to do mischief. She liked Marjorie Edmonds, but she liked Ralph Bramlett more; there were times when it seemed to her an angel's work to save him from Marjorie's coldness and hardness if she could. She had taken certain impressions from Marjorie's silence, and these impressions she gave to Ralph for facts. By the time he had left her at her own door, his soul was in a tumult of indignation. Somehow, he had gotten the impression, from what had been told him, that Marjorie posed before the girls