The weeks immediately following the Christmas holidays were always hard ones at St. Helen’s. This year was no exception to the experience of every other year. The weather was cold and snowy, the girls were homesick, or, as was too often the case, half ill and listless from too many sweets and too much gayety during the vacation. Lessons were often poorly learned or not learned at all. In short, the St. Helen’s faculty dreaded January, and the St. Helen’s girls hated it.

“It’s the worst month in the whole year,” remarked Priscilla, standing by her window one Saturday afternoon, and watching a cold northeast storm whirl the snow-flakes from a gray, forbidding sky. “January’s the out-of-sorts month, and every one in this whole school is out-of-sorts, too. I wish it were Christmas over again!”

“So do I,” said Virginia from the other window.

Virginia had just caught the out-of-sorts epidemic. For a week at least after her return from Vermont, the memory of her own joyous Christmas had kept her happy. It had been such a lovely two weeks! She and her grandmother had grown to be such good friends. Virginia actually dared believe that her grandmother did not now disapprove of her in the least. She and Aunt Nan had had such a happy, jolly vacation; and even the Rev. Samuel Baxter had been most gracious, not once mentioning Korean missions or the sale of Bibles. But even memories were not proof against a general atmosphere of discontent, and she was beginning to be infected.

“There goes Dorothy in all this snow,” announced Priscilla a moment later. “She’s carrying books, too. Where’s she going, I wonder?”

She rapped on the window. Dorothy either did not hear or did not choose to. The latter would be more thoroughly in keeping with her January disposition.

“I know. She’s failed in geometry every day since we came back, and has to take private lessons with Miss Wells. Of course she didn’t tell me, but I know she’s failed because she’s in my division. Bess Shepard told me yesterday that Dorothy was going to take lessons with her of Miss Wells in the afternoon. Bess was sick, you know, and she’s making up lost time. That’s how I know.”

Priscilla turned suddenly from the window and sat down on the couch.

“Virginia,” she said, “I’m desperately worried about Dorothy. It isn’t being untrue to her to talk with you about her, because you are her friend, too. She isn’t a bit the way she was last year. She doesn’t seem to care about lots of things the way she did then and when she was at our house this summer. Don’t you think she’s different from what she was even in September?”

Virginia left the window and sat beside her roommate.

“Yes,” she said, “she is different. She laughs at things now that she didn’t then; and she seems to be afraid of taking sides about things. I mean, whether anything’s fair or not. She never likes to say what she thinks any more, like she used to.”

“That’s Imogene. I think it’s almost all Imogene.” Priscilla’s voice was lowered to a whisper. “Dorothy likes Imogene because she has such a don’t-care way about things, and because she has so much money, and dresses better than any girl in school, though I think her clothes are a sight! Mother thought Dorothy was different when she was here Thanksgiving. She noticed it. I wish Imogene Meredith had never come here!”

Virginia’s voice was also lowered. “She doesn’t give Vivian a chance either. I think Vivian’s dear and sweet; but Imogene makes her do everything she says, and poor Vivian’s so easily influenced, she does it. You know what I’m thinking about especially?”

Priscilla nodded. She knew. They were both thinking of the “Flood,” as St. Helen’s now termed it, and of how Imogene had tried to shift the blame from her own shoulders on those of poor Vivian and unconscious Virginia.

“Of course I know. I told you then ’twas just like her. And Dorothy knew about that, too. I’m sure she did! She’s so quiet whenever it’s mentioned, and looks ashamed. And lately Dorothy’s even been teasing Vivian, just as Imogene does, about that silly Leslie, who always gives Vivian extra large cakes at the ‘Forget-me-not.’ Oh, dear! I don’t suppose there’s anything I can do, but it worries me. Dorothy’s my best friend along with you, and I don’t want her to grow like Imogene. Can you keep a secret if I tell you one?”

“Of course, I can.”

“Well, Dorothy visited Imogene at Christmas time. Not the whole vacation, because she spent most of it with her aunt in New York. You know, her mother is dead, and her father is in California most of the time, so she spends vacations with her aunt. She was there for a week and a half, and then she went to Albany and visited Imogene, and that is why they came back together. They were late, too, because they stayed for a party Imogene gave. And the thing I mind most is that Dorothy never told she’d been there at all, just as though it were a secret. Only Vivian was at the party, and she mentioned it just as though I knew. Mother asked Dorothy to come home with me—mother feels sorry that she hasn’t really any family like ours—but Dorothy said her aunt wasn’t going to let her go anywhere this vacation. It isn’t that I minded her not coming to us, you know, but I don’t like to have her so much with Imogene, and, besides, I can’t see why they keep it so secret.”

Priscilla finished, troubled. Virginia was troubled, too, for she loved Dorothy, even though of late Dorothy had not seemed to care so much for her. She remembered the day she had first seen Priscilla and Dorothy at the station, and Dorothy’s resolutions in regard to grades.

“Dorothy hasn’t gotten all A’s the way she planned in September, has she?”

“I think she had B’s on her fall card, because she was ashamed of it, and wouldn’t show it to mother at Thanksgiving. I know she hasn’t done so well in class as she did last year. Miss Wallace and Miss Allan have reproved her more than once. And you know the house-meeting we had when Mary said The Hermitage couldn’t win the scholarship cup away from Hathaway unless some of us who were getting B’s, got A’s for a change? Well, Dorothy just cut Mary for two days after that, and she isn’t nice to her now. It does seem too bad when we’ve decided to try extra hard for the cup that Imogene and Dorothy pull us down. Even Vivian’s been getting A’s, and Lucile’s doing better all the time, isn’t she?”

“Yes, she is. Even in English she’s really trying; and she’s fine in French and Latin and geometry. Do you think Dorothy likes Miss Wallace as much as she used?”

“That’s Imogene again. She called Miss Wallace Dorothy’s ‘idol’ all the fall in that sneering way she has, and now Dorothy acts ashamed to show she loves Miss Wallace. She doesn’t go to see her the way she did last year. Last year, if she were troubled about anything, she went right to Miss Wallace. Oh, dear, what shall we do?”

Virginia did not answer for a moment. She was thinking.

“Isn’t life queer?” she said at last thoughtfully. “It all goes crooked when you most want it to go straight. But I have an idea, Priscilla. Let’s be Vigilantes!”

“Vi-gi-lan-tes! What’s that?”

“Why, don’t you know about the Vigilantes? No, I don’t suppose you do. Even Miss Wallace didn’t till I told her. Why, the Vigilantes were brave men in the early days when the Pioneers were just going into Montana and Wyoming and the other States out there. You see, when they discovered that those States had such rich lands for wheat, and hills for cattle, and gold mines—especially the gold—people just flocked there by thousands. And, of course, there were many thieves and cutthroats and lawless men who went, too, and they just became the terror of the country.

“They rode swift horses, and they knew all the passes in the mountains. When they heard a train of men and horses was coming from the mines, they would lie in wait in the mountains and come down upon them, steal their gold and horses and murder any who resisted. It wasn’t safe to take any journeys in those days.”

“Well, but why did the people allow it? Why weren’t they arrested?” Priscilla in her interest had forgotten all about being out-of-sorts.

“Why, you see the people couldn’t help it at first. The country was so very new that law hadn’t been made. The government did send judges out there; but there were so many lawless men that they threatened even the judges; and, besides, these robbers were perfectly wonderful shots, and they would scare the people so terribly that they were glad to get away with their lives.

“But by and by things grew so bad, and so many innocent persons who dared oppose the robbers were shot down, that some men banded together, and called themselves the Vigilantes. They pledged themselves to watch out for evil-doers, to stand for fair play, and to put a stop to robbery and murder. Of course, it was very hard at first, and many of the Vigilantes lost their lives; but pretty soon other bands were formed in the other towns, and they kept on, no matter how discouraged they were at times. They used to post signs on the roads that led to towns; and sometimes they would draw in red chalk on a cliff or even on the paving in town, warning the robbers and murderers that if they came into that place they would be captured.”

“What did they do if they captured them?”

“They most usually hung them to a tree. The big tall cottonwoods out there are called ‘gallows trees,’ because they used to hang so many to their branches. It seems wicked now, of course,” Virginia explained, seeing the horror on Priscilla’s face, “to kill them like that—sometimes even without a trial. But really, Priscilla, they couldn’t do anything else in order to save the good people from danger.”

“No, of course, they couldn’t. Mustn’t it have been exciting?”

“Exciting? I rather think it was exciting! Jim used to tell me about it. There was one place in Montana named Virginia City where there were many of the Vigilantes. You see, there were very rich gold mines there, and that meant there were lawless men, too. Jim was there once, and he could remember some of the Vigilantes. He said there was one awful man who had killed scores of persons, and who was the terror of the whole country. And the strangest part of it was, he was nice-looking and talked like a gentleman. The Vigilantes watched for him for ten years before they got him.”

“Did they hang him from a cottonwood, too?”

“Yes; and Jim said when they had put the rope around his neck, and were just going to lead his horse from under him he burst out laughing at them all, and said, ‘Good-by, boys. I’m mighty sorry I can’t tell you by and by how it feels to be hung. It’s the only Western experience I’ve never enjoyed.’”

“After all he certainly was brave to die like that, laughing. He had Margaret of Salisbury’s spirit. I always loved her, especially when she said if they wanted her head they must take it with her standing. Virginia, you know more thrilling stories than any one I ever knew. It just makes me wild to go away out there and visit you. Do you suppose I ever shall?”

“Yes, I just know you’re coming. I shouldn’t wonder if this very next summer. I feel it inside me. We can be Vigilantes for sure out there. That’s just where they belong. But don’t you think we could be sort of Vigilantes here—standing as they did for fair play and ”—she lowered her voice “watching out for evil-doers?”

Priscilla was enthusiastic over the idea. It seemed so different and original. Besides, it really did mean something to try to stand for fair play, and to watch out for anything—any evil influence, for example—that might harm those you loved.

“We’ll especially try to see that Vivian isn’t so easily influenced,” Virginia whispered, “and we’ll try our best to help Dorothy to be like she used to be. Only they mustn’t know we’re trying. That would spoil it all.”

“Shall we ask any one else to join?” asked Priscilla.

“We might ask Mary. She’s really a Vigilante anyway, being a monitor.”

“Suppose we tell her about it, and ask her to be adviser. You see, where she’s monitor, she can’t take sides just as we can, and maybe she’d think she’d better not join. It’s going to be a Secret Organization, isn’t it?”

“Oh, of course. Secret things always seem more important. Let’s draw up the constitution this minute. I like to feel settled.”

Pen and ink were found, and within fifteen minutes the composition of the organization was complete, Virginia being the Thomas Jefferson of the occasion.

“I’ll read it aloud,” said the author, “so that we can tell if it sounds right.

“‘We, the undersigned, on this 20th day of a sad January, do hereby announce in the sacred presence of each other, that we are Vigilantes of St. Helen’s. We are bound by our honor as friends and room-mates to secrecy, and to an earnest performance of our work as true Vigilantes. We deplore the evil influence of —— ——, and we promise to strive to off-set that influence especially in regard to —— —— and —— ——. We are going to try to stand at all times for fair play, and real friendship. We appoint —— —— as our trusted adviser. At present we are the sole members of the Vigilante Order.

“‘Signed

“‘Priscilla Alden Winthrop.

”‘Virginia Webster Hunter.’

“I put blanks instead of names,” explained Virginia, signing her name after Priscilla. “It seems more like an organization some way, and, besides, we understand. Now, we are real Vigilantes, Priscilla.”

They shook hands solemnly. The paper was sealed with an extravagant amount of sealing wax, and stuffed with much secrecy into a rent of Virginia’s mattress. Then the two Vigilantes, feeling much revived in spirits, invited the disconsolate Vivian to join them, and went for a walk in the snow.