"I wonder?" murmured Nan, somewhat moved herself by the incident.

As the days went by, Nan Sherwood wondered more and more about Rhoda Hammond. Was she deserving of some sympathy for her situation in the school or not? Frankly, Nan was puzzled.

Of course Rhoda was being absolutely left out of all the social good times and larks of the girls who should have been her mates.

Likewise in cla.s.ses and in indoor athletics she seemed out of place.

She had been schooled mostly at home, it appeared. Nan understood--although Rhoda did not say as much--that her mother had personally conducted much of her education until the last two years. Then she had had a governess.

The latter seemed to have been an English woman with rather old-fashioned ideas. Rhoda was grounded well in certain branches and densely ignorant in others which Dr. Prescott considered essential.

And in the athletic cla.s.ses!

"Why, I thought these Western cowgirls were just like boys--that they were even born with an ability to pitch a ball underhand, for instance, which we girls are not," sighed Laura. "And look at that thing! She doesn't know how to do anything right."

"Oh, not as bad as that," said Nan, smiling.

"Stop trying to make excuses for her, Nan Sherwood," commanded the red-haired girl sharply. "I won't have it. She never saw a basketball game before. She can scarcely lift herself waist-high on the parallel bars. Couldn't chin herself five times in succession on the trapeze to save her life. Why! she might as well be her own grandmother, she knows so little about athletics."

"Huh!" added Bess Harley with equal disgust, "I heard her tell Mrs.

Gleason she thought such things were only for boys. She's a regular sissy!" But this made her hearers laugh.

Nan joined in the laughter, but she added:

"You get into a wrestling match with her and see if she's a sissy.

She has developed her muscles by other means than gymnasium tricks.

She is so very wiry and strong--you have no idea!"

"But she walks so funny," remarked Lillie Nevins.

"Perhaps that is because she has walked so little," said Nan, wisely.

"Humph!" Amelia Boggs commented, "has she been used to being pushed in a baby carriage?"

"Distances are long out in the cattle country. Everybody rides, I guess," Nan observed.

"Well," one of the older girls remarked, "she's no material for basketball, or any other team. She can't even run, it seems. I guess we'll have to pa.s.s her up."

Nor did Rhoda seem to mind being "pa.s.sed up." At least, if she missed the companionship of her schoolmates, she did not show it.

Perhaps Nan Sherwood worried more about Rhoda than Rhoda did about herself.

There came a day, however, when the girls of Lakeview Hall saw something in the girl from Rose Ranch that they were bound to admire. Rhoda Hammond possessed one faculty that raised her, head and shoulders, above most of her schoolmates who so derided her.

CHAPTER VI

THE MEXICAN GIRL

The schoolwork was in full swing by this time, and almost every girl seemed to be doing well. "Dr. Beulah," as her pupils lovingly called the head of the school (though not, of course, to her face), went about with a smile most of the time; and even Mrs. Cupp was less grim than usual.

There was an early January thaw that spoiled all outdoor sport for the Lakeview Hall girls. Skating, bobsledding, skiing, and even walking, was taboo for a while, for there was more mud in sight than snow. The girls had to look for entertainment on Sat.u.r.day in other directions.

Therefore it was considered a real G.o.dsend by the girls of Corridor Four when Lillie Nevins told them of the new shop at Adminster.

Adminster was about ten miles from Freeling, the little town under the cliff, where the Lakeview Hall girls usually shopped.

"It must be a delightfully funny store," said the flaxen-haired Lillie. "It's full of those Indian blankets, and bead-trimmed things, and Mexican drawn-work, and pottery. Oh! ancient pots and pitchers--"

"Made last year in New Jersey?" scoffed Laura Polk.

"No, no! These are real Mexican. Doctor Larry's girls told me about it. They have been over there and bought the loveliest things!"

There was a good deal of talk about this. It was at the supper table. Nan and Bess were just as much interested as the other girls, and they determined to go to the Mexican curio shop if they could obtain permission.

Nan noticed that for once Rhoda seemed interested in what the other girls were saying. Her brown eyes sparkled and a little color came and went in her cheeks as the discussion went on.

The girl from Tillbury was tempted to invite Rhoda to go with her on Sat.u.r.day. Yet she felt that Rhoda was not in a mood to accept any overture of peace. The Western girl treated Nan herself well enough; but Nan could not offend her older friends by showing Rhoda Hammond many favors.

So many of the girls asked permission to visit Adminster on the next Sat.u.r.day afternoon that Mrs. Cupp allowed Miss March, one of the younger instructors and a favorite of the girls, to accompany them.

It was quite a party that picked its way down the muddy track into Freeling's Main Street where the interurban trolley car pa.s.sed through toward Adminster. The girls under Miss March's care all but filled the car when it came along; but they were hardly settled when they spied Rhoda Hammond already sitting in a corner by herself.

"Why, Rhoda," said Miss March, rising and going to the Western girl as the car started, "I did not get your name as one of my party."

"No, Miss March," said Rhoda coolly.

"Did you obtain permission to leave the school premises? That is a rule, you know."

"Yes, Miss March," said Rhoda, "I obtained permission."

"From whom, Rhoda?" asked the instructor, rather puzzled.

"I telegraphed yesterday to my father. He sent a night letter to Dr. Prescott, and she got it this morning. She gave it to me. Here it is," said the Western girl, taking the crumpled message from her handbag and handing it to the teacher.

Miss March looked amazed when she had read the long message. "Dr.

Prescott, then, granted you this privilege which he asks here?"

"Yes, Miss March," said Rhoda coldly, and Miss March went back to her seat.

"Did you ever?" gasped Bess to Nan and Laura. "Why, it must have cost five dollars or more to telegraph back and forth."

"Humph! she certainly doesn't know the value of money," commented Laura. "She is more recklessly extravagant than Linda."

The rest of the girls paid no further attention to Rhoda. They were having too good a time among themselves. As there were few other pa.s.sengers on that car to Adminster, the Lakeview Hall pupils came very near to taking charge of it. The conductor was good-natured, and the girls' fun was kept in bounds by Miss March.

All the time the Western girl sat in her corner and looked out of the front window at the dreary landscape. It seemed too bad, Nan Sherwood thought more than once, that Rhoda should have allowed herself to become so frankly ignored by her schoolmates.