Page:Fidelia, (IA fidelia00balm).pdf/51



DIFFICULT and embarrassing bit of business, in connection with Fidelia Netley, was what detained Alice with Myra up there in Myra's room in Willard, which Nell Gould and Fidelia had just left. And the girls were unable to get to that business quickly; for after Fidelia closed the door on her departure, Alice and Myra gazed at each other in silence for several moments after Miss Netley's definite, clicking tread had diminished down the hallway. Both girls, for the instant, were holding breath; then Myra parted her lips with an audible gasp and laughed.

"Tell me the exact truth, Alice; how does she make you feel?"

"She's one of the most beautiful girls I have ever seen," Alice said in her quiet, considering and utterly honest way.

"Of course she is; but that's not how she makes you feel," Myra rejoined. "A peacock's perfectly stunning."

"She's not like a peacock," Alice put in, too quickly. "There's lots to that girl, I know."

"No, you don't; you just try to feel it because she's a Tau Gamma and practically wished onto us whether we like it or not and you're congenitally cursed with the determination to make the best of anything; then