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“Yes, very–for those that have homes to go to,” said Ruth drearily.

Carol felt a quick pang of pity and self-reproach. “Haven’t you?” she asked.

Ruth shook her head. In spite of herself, the kindness of Carol’s tone brought the tears to her eyes.

“My mother died a year ago,” she said in a trembling voice, “and since then I have had no real home. We were quite alone in the world, Mother and I, and now I have nobody.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry for you,” cried Carol impulsively. She leaned forward and took Ruth’s hand in a gentle way. “And do you mean to say that you’ll have to stay here all through the holidays? Why, it will be horrid.”

“Oh, I shall not mind it much,” said Ruth quickly, “with study and practice most of the time. Only now, when everyone is talking about it, it makes me wish that I had some place to go.”

Carol dropped Ruth’s hand suddenly in the shock of a sudden idea that darted into her mind.

A stray girl passing through the hall called out, “Ruth, Miss Siviter wishes to see you about something in Room C.”

Ruth got up quickly. She was glad to get away, for it seemed to her that in another minute she would break down altogether.

Carol Golden hardly noticed her departure. She gathered up her letters and went abstractedly to her room, unheeding a gay call for “Golden Carol” from a group of girls in the corridor. Maud Russell was not in and Carol was glad. She wanted to be alone and fight down that sudden idea.

“It is ridiculous to think of it,” she said aloud, with a petulance very unusual in Golden Carol, whose disposition was as sunny as her looks. “Why, I simply cannot. I have always been longing to ask Maud to visit me, and now that the chance has come I am not going to throw it away. I am very sorry for Ruth, of course. It must be dreadful to be all alone like that. But it isn’t my fault. And she is so fearfully quiet and dowdy–what would they all think of her at home? Frank and Jack would make such fun of her. I shall ask Maud just as soon as she comes in.”

Maud did come in presently, but Carol did not give her the invitation. Instead, she was almost snappish to her idol, and the Princess soon went out again in something of a huff.

“Oh, dear,” cried Carol, “now I’ve offended her. What has got into me? What a disagreeable thing a conscience is, although I’m sure I don’t know why mine should be prodding me so! I don’t want to invite Ruth Mannering home with me for the holidays, but I feel exactly as if I should not have a minute’s peace of mind all the time if I didn’t. Mother would think it all right, of course. She would not mind if Ruth dressed in calico and never said anything but yes and no. But how the boys would laugh! I simply won’t do it, conscience or no conscience.”

In view of this decision it was rather strange that the next morning, Carol Golden went down to Ruth Mannering’s lonely little room on Corridor Two and said, “Ruth, will you go home with me for the holidays? Mother wrote me to invite anyone I wished to. Don’t say you can’t come, dear, because you must.”

Carol never, as long as she lived, forgot Ruth’s face at that moment.

“It was absolutely transfigured,” she said afterwards. “I never saw anyone look so happy in my life.”

* * * * *

A fortnight later unwonted silence reigned at Oaklawn. The girls were scattered far and wide, and Ruth Mannering and Carol Golden were at the latter’s home.