"It probably did not occur to them," was Vera's opinion. "If it had, they might have tried it. It is strictly forbidden here. The hazers would certainly be expelled. President Matthews is down on it with both feet. A niece of his was hazed at college and contracted pneumonia. She died of it and he has been doubly opposed to it since then."

"I am glad I was saved midnight visits from sheeted ghosts or some such eerie horror," laughed Marjorie. "It wouldn't have done them any good if ever they had hazed me. I would have refused to do one single thing they told me to do. It wouldn't have been a specially pleasant experience to waken suddenly and find the room inhabited by spooks. Still I wouldn't have been afraid of them. I am glad to be a soph. I am past the grind and hazing stage. Do tell the girls about Row-ena Farnham, Jeremiah. You promised them you would."

"And so I will," affably consented Jerry. "I think I'll save it for dessert, though."

"I think you won't," quickly objected Leila. "Be nice and tell us now.

Dessert is afar off. The sherbet and the salad stand between it."

Having come to a speedy selection of their dinner, immediately they were seated at table, they were now finishing the toothsome old-fashioned chicken pot-pie and its palatable accompaniments which was one of Baretti's most popular specialties.

"All right children, I will humor you," Jerry made gracious concession, as other protesting voices arose. "Understand this is no news to the Lookouts here a.s.sembled."

"We don't mind hearing it again. We're the pattern of amiability,"

Muriel made light a.s.surance.

"Charmed, to be sure," beamed Ronny.

"I'll take your word for it." Jerry did not appear specially impressed by such overwhelming forbearance. "To begin with, the Macys spend their summers at Severn Beach. The Farnhams have a regular castle at Tanglewood, a resort about ten miles from Severn Beach. It is needless to say that Row-ena and I do not exchange visits. I am happy to say I never saw her at Severn Beach. Think what the beach has been spared."

"One afternoon Hal took me to Tanglewood in his sailboat. He went to see a couple of his chums about arranging for a yacht race. I didn't care to go with him to the cottage. I knew they didn't want me b.u.t.ting in while they planned their race. I stayed down on the sands near the boat. Hal had promised to be back by four o'clock.

"I watched the bathers for a while. There were only a few in the water that day," Jerry continued. "Finally, I thought I would go up to a large pavilion at the head of the pier for an ice. I sat in the pavilion eating a pineapple ice as peacefully as you please. All of a sudden I realized someone had stopped beside my chair; two someones by the way.

One of them was Row-ena Quarrelena Fightena Sc.r.a.pena; the other," Jerry paused impressively, "was our precious hob-goblin, Miss Cairns."

CHAPTER III.

GATHERING CLOUDS.

"Really!" came in surprised exclamation from Vera.

"Hmm! What a congenial pair!" was Helen Trent's placid reception of the information.

"Like walks with like." Leila's tones vibrated with satirical truth.

"Knaves fall out, but to fall in again."

"I know it," agreed Jerry. "One would naturally suppose that Miss Cairns would have no use for Row-ena after the net she led her into. Not a bit of it."

"It must have been a shock, Jeremiah, to look up suddenly and find yourself in such company." Helen could not repress the ghost of a chuckle.

"It was. They were lined up for battle. I saw that at a glance. Row-ena was half laughing; a trick of hers when she is all ready to make a grand disturbance. Leslie Cairns looked like a j.a.panese thundercloud. I never said a word; just sat very straight in my chair. I went on eating my ice as if I didn't know they were there. Like this."

Jerry gave an imitation of her manner and facial expression on the occasion she was describing.

"I thought they might give it up as a bad job and go away, but they stayed. Then Row-ena started in with a regular tirade about Marjorie and all of us. I can't repeat what she said word for word. Anyway, she called us all liars. I don't remember what I said, but it must have been effective. I certainly handed Row-ena my candid opinion of herself. She saw she was getting the worst of the argument and declared she wouldn't stay and be so insulted. She started out of the pavilion, calling Miss Cairns to come along. The fair Leslie wouldn't budge. She told Row-ena to go on, that she had something to say to me. That was the first remark she had made. Then she asked me in her slow, drawling way if I would listen to something she had to say to me. I said I would not. I had heard too much as it was. I got up and beat it and left her standing there. I was so sore I forgot to pay for my ice. I had to send Hal back with the money. As I started away from the pavilion, I saw Row-ena getting into a dizzy-looking black and white roadster. I think the car belonged to Miss Cairns. It looked like her. I suppose she and dear Row-ena had been out for a ride and simply happened to run across me in the pavilion.

"Now comes the most interesting part of the story." Jerry glanced from one to another of her attentive little audience. "Three days afterward the postman left me a letter. The address was typed, so was the letter.

When I opened it, I soon knew the writer. Here it is." Jerry produced a letter from a white kid bag she was carrying. "The distinguished writer of this letter is Leslie Cairns. I brought it along to read to you because what she has to say includes all of us. It's what I would call an open declaration of war. Listen to this:

"'Miss Macy:

"'Since you refused to listen to me the other day, I must resort to pen and ink to make you understand that when I have anything to say to a person I propose to say it. It isn't a case of what you want.

It is a case of what I want. To begin with, I knew all about you and your pals before ever you came to Hamilton. My friend, Miss Farnham, heard that you were to enter Hamilton and warned me against all of you. I had you looked up, as I have powerful ways and means of doing this.

"'As your friend, Miss Dean, the lying little hypocrite, had made my friend, Miss Farnham, so much trouble at high school, I decided to even her score for her. At first I did not intend to allow you to enter Hamilton at all. When I say "you" I include those dear chums of yours. My father could easily have arranged to keep you out of Hamilton. Then I concluded it would be better to let you come here and make things lively for you.

"'I proposed that call on you ninnies on your first evening at college. We arranged matters so as to fuss you self-satisfied freshies a little and keep you from your dinner. We didn't care anything about meeting you, but we thought we might as well look you over. Miss Weyman gave it out that she would meet your party with her car on purpose to keep other students away. We wanted you to be a little bit lonesome. When you said in your room, that you saw Miss Weyman's car at the station, we thought perhaps you might have seen through the joke. But you were so thick. You didn't.

"'Miss Weyman had no intention of wasting good gasoline on you. She loaded her car with girls on purpose. There was no room to spare.

She stopped it above the station yard and stayed there until after the train had come in. After a while she drove into the yard and out again. Not one of us set foot on the platform. It was a clever bluff and served you precisely right.

"'I haven't either the patience or the will to tell you all the clever stunts we put over on you simpletons last year. Believe me, when I say, it isn't a circ.u.mstance compared to what we intend to do this year. You came back at us in March in a way we will not forget or overlook. You think you are pretty strongly intrenched because you and your crowd are quite pally with certain upper cla.s.s students who pose as wonders of smartness. Well, don't build too much on your popularity. Popularity sometimes has a habit of vanishing over night.

"'It seems too bad to be wasting time and paper on you, but I am square enough to let you have the truth straight from the shoulder.

You girls have made us trouble from the start, and I predict that it will not be long before Hamilton will be too small to hold your crowd and mine. Your crowd will be the one to go; not the Sans. I am not afraid to tell you this, because there is nothing in this letter that you can get me on.

"'Leslie Cairns.'"

"That is so like Leslie Cairns." Leila's blue eyes flashed their profound contempt. "She loves to boast of her own ill-doing. She thinks it gives her a standing among her friends. She poses as being afraid of nothing and no one.

"That is truly an outrageous letter!" Vera's voice rang with shocked indignation. "I wonder at her boldness in writing it."

"Ah, but consider! It is a typed letter. Would you mind letting me look at the signature, Jerry?" Helen requested.

"With pleasure." Jerry willingly surrendered the typed letter to Helen.

The latter studied the signature shrewdly. "I don't think this is Leslie Cairns signature," she said, shaking her head. "That is about the way I thought it would be."

"Humph!" Leila had evidently caught Helen's meaning. The others looked a trifle mystified.

"But Leila just now said the letter sounded like Leslie Cairns!" Jerry exclaimed. "She wrote it. I am sure of that. Her name is signed to it.

Why then----" Jerry stopped. "Oh, yes," she went on, in sudden enlightenment. "I begin to understand."

"Of course you do," returned Helen. "In the first place," she explained to her puzzled listeners, "this letter has neither date nor place of writing. It is typed and signed 'Leslie Cairns,' but I am almost positive she did not sign it. She has either disguised her hand or another person has signed her name to it at her request, you may be sure. Object--if Jerry decided to make her any trouble at Hamilton over the letter, she would say she had nothing whatever to do with the writing of it."

"It would take a whole lot of nerve to do that. After what happened last year, she could hardly hope to be believed." This was Muriel's view of the matter.

"Still, if the letter were typed and not signed by her, there would be no proof that she wrote it unless someone had seen her write it." Helen argued. "We are positive she wrote it, because the contents of the letter tally with the Sans' att.i.tude and actions toward Marjorie and you Sandfordites. Yet, what would hinder her from saying that some friend of yours, to whom you had told your troubles, or, that even one of you five girls wrote that letter, simply for spite? I do not say that she would do so. I only say she might. She is capable of it."

"I agree with you, Helen. Leslie Cairns would stand before President Matthews and declare up and down that she never dreamed of writing such a letter, if it pleased her to do it." Leila spoke with conviction. "She took chances, of course, of being called to account for the statements she made in the letter. Undoubtedly, she had her whole course of action planned out before ever she wrote it. While she couldn't be sure you wouldn't make a fuss about it, because of the way Ronny brought the Sans to book last March, she could plan the best way to brazen it out if she got into difficulties over it.

"Just imagine! She had a grudge against the Lookouts before ever she met them. Leila and I were always suspicious of the way Natalie Weyman acted about meeting you at the station. We could not fathom the object of such a performance. We both thought there was more to it than appeared on the surface." Vera nodded wisely.

"And all on account of the maliciousness of Row-ena Farnham. Why, none of us had seen her for over two years! We supposed she belonged to our departed high school days." Muriel's tones betrayed decided umbrage.