Page:Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall.djvu/130

122 Tom was in the army; doesn't it?" cried Helen.

"It will be nice to have him over," said Ruth, agreeing. "But I suppose we'll have to meet him in the office? Or can we walk out with our 'brother'?" and she laughed.

"We'll go to Triton Lake; Tom will take us," said Helen, decidedly.

"I guess Mrs. Tellingham will have something to say about that, my dear."

Helen seemed to have forgotten the little difficulty that had troubled her chum and herself the night before, and Ruth said nothing further about the Infants forming a society of their own. At least, she said nothing about it to Helen. But Sarah Fish and Phyllis Short, and some of the other Infants, seemed determined to keep the idea alive, and they all considered Ruth Fielding a prime mover in the conspiracy. It was noised abroad that neither the F. C.'s nor the Upedes were getting many new names enrolled for membership.

Saturday morning the remainder of the expected new girls arrived at Briarwood, and with then came the last of the older scholars, too. There was an assembly called for two o'clock which Mrs. Tellingham addressed. She welcomed the new-comers, greeted the returning pupils, and briefly sketched the plans for the school year then beginning. She was a quick, briskly-speaking