Norma had indeed chanced to make one girl friend, and one of whom Leslie and Alice, and even Annie, heartily approved. Caroline, the seventeen-year-old daughter of the Peter Craigies, was not a dÉbutante yet, but she would be the most prominent, because the richest, of them all next winter. Caroline was a heavy-lidded, slow-witted girl, whose chief companions in life had been servants, foreign-born governesses, and music-masters. Norma had been seated next to her at the international tennis tournament, and had befriended the squirming and bashful Caroline from sheer goodness of heart. They had criticized the players, and Caroline had laughed the almost hysteric, shaken laugh that so worried her mother, and had blurted confidences to Norma in her childish way.

The next day there had been an invitation for Norma to lunch with Caroline, and Mrs. von Behrens had promptly given another luncheon for both girls. Norma was pleased, for a few weeks, with her first social conquest, but after that Caroline became a dead weight upon her. She hated the flattery, the inanities, the utter dulness of the great Craigie mansion, and she began to have a restless conviction that time spent with Caroline was time lost.

The friendship had cost her dear, too. Norma hated, even months later to remember just what she had paid for it. In August a letter from Rose had reached her at Newport, announcing Rose's approaching marriage. Harry Redding's sister Mary was engaged to a most satisfactory young man of Italian lineage, one Joe Popini, and Mrs. Redding would hereafter divide her time between the households of her daughter and her son. Harry, thus free to marry, had persuaded Rose to wait no longer; the event was to be on a Monday not quite two weeks ahead, and Norma was please, please, please to come down as soon as she could.

Norma had read this letter with a sensation of pain at her heart. She felt so far away from them nowadays; she felt almost a certain reluctance to dovetail this life of softness and perfume and amusement in upon the old life. But she would go. She would go, of course!

And then she had suddenly remembered that on the Monday before Rose's wedding, the Craigies' splendid yacht was to put to sea for a four- or five-days' cruise, and that Caroline had asked her to go—the only other young person besides the daughter of the house. And great persons were going, visiting nobility from England, a young American Croesus and his wife, a tenor from the Metropolitan. Annie had been delighted with this invitation; even Leslie, just returned from California and Hawaii, had expressed an almost surprised satisfaction in the Craigies' friendliness.

If they got back Friday night, then Norma could go down to the city early Saturday morning, and have two days with Rose and Aunt Kate. But if the yacht did not return until Saturday—well, even then there would be time. She and Rose could get through a tremendous lot of talking in twenty-four hours. And the voyage certainly would not be prolonged over Saturday, for had not Mrs. Craigie said, in Norma's hearing, that Saturday was the very latest minute to which she could postpone the meeting for the big charity lawn party?

So Norma and the enslaved Caroline continued to plan for their sea trip, and Norma commissioned Chris to order Rose's wedding present at Gorham's.

Mrs. von Behrens had been a trifle distant with the newcomer in the family until now, but the day before the cruise began she extended just a little of her royal graciousness toward Norma. Like Leslie, Norma admired her Aunt Annie enormously, and hungered for her most casual word.

"You've plenty of frocks, Kiddie?" asked Annie. "One uses them up at the rate of about three a day!"

"Oh!"—Norma widened her innocent eyes—"I've a wardrobe trunk full of them: white skirts and white shoes and hats!"

"Well, I didn't suppose you had them tied in a handkerchief!" Annie had responded, with her quiet smile. "See if that fits you!"

They had been up in Mrs. von Behrens's big bedroom, where that lady was looking at a newly arrived box of gowns. "That" was the frail, embroidered coat of what Norma thought the prettiest linen suit she had ever seen.

"It's charming on you, you little slender thing," Annie had said. "The skirt will be too long; will you pin it, Keating? And see that it goes at once to my mother's house."

Keating had pinned, admired. And Norma, turning herself before the mirror, with her eyes shy with pleasure and gratitude, had known that she was gaining ground.

So they had started radiantly on the cruise. But after the first few miraculous hours of gliding along beneath the gay awnings that had all been almost astonishingly disappointing, too. Caroline, to begin with, was a dreadful weight upon her young guest. Caroline for breakfast, luncheon, and dinner; Caroline retiring and rising, became almost hateful. Caroline always wanted to do something, when Norma could have dreamed and idled in her deck chair by the hour. It must be deck golf or deck tennis, or they must go up and tease dignified and courteous Captain Burns, "because he was such an old duck," or they must harass one or two of the older people into bridge. Norma did not play bridge well, and she hated it, and hated Caroline's way of paying for her losses almost more than paying them herself.

Norma could not lie lazily with her book, raising her eyes to the exquisite beauty of the slowly tipping sea, revelling in coolness and airiness, because Caroline, fussing beside her, had never read a book through in her life. The guest did not know, even now, that Caroline had been a mental problem for years, that Caroline's family had consulted great psycho-analysts about her, and had watched the girl's self-centredness, her odd slyness, her hysteric emotions, with deep concern. She did not know, even now, that the Cragies were anxious to encourage this first reaching out, in Caroline, toward a member of her own sex, and that her fancies for members of the opposite sex—for severely indifferent teachers, for shocked and unresponsive chauffeurs—were among the family problems, a part of the girl's unfortunate under-development. Caroline's family was innocently surprised to realize that her mind had not developed under the care of maids who were absorbed in their own affairs, and foreigners who would not have been free to attend her had they not been impecunious and unsuccessful in more lucrative ways. They had left her to Mademoiselles and FrÄuleins quite complacently, but they did not wish her to be like these too-sullen or too-vivacious ladies.

So they welcomed her friendship with Norma, and Caroline's passionate desire to be with her friend was not to find any opposition on the part of her own family. Little Miss Sheridan had an occasional kindly word from Caroline's mother, a stout woman, middle-aged at thirty-five, and good-natured smiles from Caroline's father, a well-groomed young man. And socially, this meant that the Melroses' young protÉgÉe was made.

But Norma did not realize all this. She only knew that all the charm and beauty of the yacht were wasted on her. Everyone ate too much, talked too much, played, flirted, and dressed too much. The women seldom made their appearance until noon; in the afternoons there was bridge until six, and much squabbling and writing of checks on the forward deck, with iced drinks continually being brought up from the bar. At six the women loitered off to dress for dinner, but the men went on playing for another half hour. The sun sank in a blaze of splendour; the wonderful twilight fell; but the yacht might have been boxed up in an armoury for all that her passengers saw of the sea.

After the elaborate dinner, with its ices and hot rolls, its warm wines and chilled champagne, cards began again, and unless the ocean was so still that they might dance, bridge continued until after midnight.

Norma's happiest times had been when she arose early, at perhaps seven, and after dressing noiselessly in their little bathroom, crept upstairs without waking Caroline. Sunshine would be flooding the ocean, or perhaps the vessel would be nosing her way through a luminous fog—but it was always beautiful. The decks, drying in the soft air, would be ordered, inviting, deserted. Great waves of smooth water would flow evenly past, curving themselves with lessening ripples into the great even circle of the sea. A gentle breeze would stir the leaves of the potted plants on the deck and flap the fringes of the awnings.

Norma, hanging on the railing, would look down upon a group of maids and stewards laughing and talking on the open deck below. These were happy, she would reflect, animated by a thousand honest emotions that never crept to the luxurious cabins above. They would be waiting for breakfast, all freshly aproned and brushed, all as pleased with the Seagirl as if they had been her owners.

On the fifth day, Friday, she had been almost sick with longing to hear some mention of going back. Surely—surely, she reasoned, they had all said that they must get back on Friday night! If the plan had changed, Norma had determined to ask them to run into harbour somewhere, and put her on shore. She was so tired of Caroline, so tired of wasting time, so headachy from the heavy meals and lack of exercise!

Late on Friday afternoon some idle remark of her hostess had assured her that the yacht would not make Greble light until Monday. They were ploughing north now, to play along the Maine coast; the yachting party was a great success, and nobody wanted to go home.

Norma, goaded out of her customary shyness, had pleaded her cousin's marriage. Couldn't they run into Portland—or somewhere?—and let her go down by train? But Caroline had protested most affectionately and noisily against this, and Caroline's mother said sweetly that she couldn't think of letting Norma do that alone—Annie von Behrens would never forgive her! However, she would speak to Captain Burns, and see what could be done. Anyway, Mrs. Craigie had finished, with her comfortable laugh, Norma had only to tell her cousin that she was out with friends on their yacht, and they had been delayed. Surely that was excuse enough for any one?

It was with difficulty that Norma had kept the tears out of her eyes. She had not wanted an excuse to stay away from Rose's wedding. Her heart had burned with shame and anger and helplessness. She could hardly believe, crying herself to sleep on Friday night, that two whole days were still to spare before Monday, and that she was helpless to use them. Her mind worked madly, her thoughts rushing to and fro with a desperation worthy an actual prisoner.

On Saturday evening, after a day of such homesickness and heavy-heartedness as she had never known before in her life, she had realized that they were in some port, lying a short half mile from shore.

It was about ten o'clock, warm and star-lighted; there was no moon. Norma had slipped from the deck, where Caroline was playing bridge, and had gone to the lowered gang-plank. Captain Burns was there, going over what appeared to be invoices, with the head steward.

"Captain," Norma had said, her heart pounding, "can't you put me on shore? I must be in New York to-morrow—it's very important! If I get a coat, will you let me go in when you go?"

He had measured her with his usual polite, impersonal gaze.

"Miss Sheridan, I really could not do it, Miss! If it was a telegram, or something of that sort——But if anything was to happen to you, Miss, it would be—it really would be most unfortunate!"

Norma had stood still, choking. And in the starlight he had seen the glitter of tears in her eyes.

"Couldn't you put it to Mrs. Craigie, Miss? I'm sure she'd send someone—one of the maids——"

But Norma shook her head. It would anger Caroline, and perhaps Caroline's mother, and Annie, too, to have her upset the cruise by her own foolish plans. There was no hope of her hostess's consent. What!—send a girl of eighteen down to New York for dear knows what fanciful purpose, without a hint from parent or guardian? Mrs. Craigie knew the modern girl far too well for that, even if it had not been personally extremely inconvenient to herself to spare a maid. They were rather short of maids, for two or three of them had been quite ill.

The launch had put off, with Captain Burns in the stern. Norma had stood watching it, with her heart of lead. Oh, to be running away—flying—on the train—in the familiar streets! They could forgive her later—or never——

"Norma, aren't you naughty?" Caroline had interrupted her thoughts, and had slipped a hand through her arm. "Buoso is going to sing—do come in! My dear, you know that last hand? Well, we made it——!"

The next two days were the slowest, the hardest, the bitterest of Norma's life. She felt that nobody had ever had to bear so aching a heart as hers, as the most beautiful yacht in the world skimmed over the blue ocean, and the sun shone down on her embroidered linen suit, and her white shoes, and the pearl ring that Caroline had given her for her birthday.

What were they doing at Aunt Kate's? What were they saying as the hours went by? At what stage was the cake—and the gown? Was Rose really to be married to-morrow—to-day?

In New Brunswick she had managed to send a long wire, full of the disappointment and affection and longing she truly felt, and after that she had been happier. But it was a very subdued little Norma who had come quietly into Aunt Kate's kitchen three weeks later, and had relieved her over-charged heart with a burst of tears on Aunt Kate's shoulder.

Aunt Kate had been kind, kind as she always was to the adored foster-child. And Norma had stayed to dinner, and made soft and penitent eyes at Wolf until the agonized resolutions of the past lonely months had all melted out of his heart again, and they had all gone over to Rose's, for five minutes of kissing and crying, before the big car came to carry Norma away.

So the worst of that wound was healed, and life could become bright and promising to Norma once more. Autumn was an invigorating season, anyway, full of hope and enchantment, and Caroline Craigie, by what Norma felt to be a special providence, was visiting her grandmother in Baltimore for an indefinite term. The truth was that there was a doctor there whose advice was deemed valuable to Caroline, but Norma did not know that. Norma did not know the truth, either, about Mrs. von Behrens's sudden graciousness toward her, but it made her happy. Annie had become friendly and hospitable toward the newcomer in the family for only one reason. As a social dictator, she was accustomed to be courted and followed by scores of women who desired her friendship for the prestige it gave them. Annie was extremely autocratic in this respect, and could snub, chill, and ignore even the most hopeful aspirants to her favour, with the ease of long practice. It made no difference to Annie that dazzling credentials were produced, or that past obscurity was more than obliterated by present glory.

"One truly must be firm," Annie frequently said. "It devolves upon a few of us, as an actual duty, to see that society is maintained in its true spirit. Let the bars down once——!"

Norma, a negligible factor in Annie's life when she first appeared, had quite innocently become a problem during that first summer. While not a Melrose, she was a member of the Melrose family, making her home with one of the daughters of the house. Annie might ignore Norma, but there were plenty of women, and men, too, who saw in the girl a valuable social lever. To become intimate with little Miss Sheridan meant that one might go up to her, at teas and dinners, while she was with Mrs. Melrose, or young Mrs. Liggett, or even Mrs. von Behrens herself, in a casual, friendly manner that indicated, to a watching world, a comfortable footing with the family. Norma was consequently selected for social attention.

Annie saw this immediately, and when all the families were settled in town again, she decided to take Norma's social training in hand, as she had done Leslie's, and make sure that no undesirable cockle was sown among the family fields. She would have done exactly the same if Norma had been the least attractive of girls, but Norma fancied that her own qualities had won Annie's reluctant friendship, and was accordingly pleased.