When Gertrude Willis rapped on a closed door in the east wing, there was no response and so she turned the knob and entered the room which was unoccupied. Trudie then told the new pupil which was to be her side and bade her good-night.

When she was alone, Matilda stood looking out of the window into the darkness. For a moment a rush of loneliness swept over her heart. The stars seemed so faint and far away, while over the prairie they had seemed so near and brilliant. Then she smiled as she thought bravely, “I mustn’t be homesick, for wonderful things are going to happen to me, and every one has been so kind.”

Humming a little tune, the new pupil unpacked her old-fashioned and much-battered suit-case, and a few moments thereafter she climbed into her bed.

Then the door opened and a tall, flaxen-haired girl entered. She might have been pretty had it not been for a haughty, disagreeable expression. She gave a disdainful glance toward the occupied bed and retired behind her sheltering screen.

Only that evening had she heard who was to be her roommate and she had been waiting until this late hour to see Madame Deriby, who had at last sent word that she could not see Geraldine until the morning. Long after Matilda, truly weary from her long journey, was peacefully sleeping, the haughty English girl lay awake planning what she would say to the matron. She, a Barrington, to be asked to share her room with a farmer’s daughter. Such a slight was unbearable! If Madame Deriby did not know of her father’s position in England, then his daughter would inform her at the very first opportunity.

Hours before the rising bell rang in the Linden Hall Seminary Matilda was awake, for out on her wide prairie every one was astir at early dawn. She did not want to disturb her roommate, the haughty Geraldine Barrington, and so she lay quietly gazing out of her window at the tree-tops and the shining sky, but she saw neither, except vaguely, for in fancy she was out on the prairie watching the sun rise, hearing the morning call of the meadow-larks and orioles and bobolinks. Even the harsh-voiced cowbirds and the thieving crows were there in her memoried picture, for they all meant home to her. She could see her brother Basil, the handsomest lad in all the world, she thought, as he swung into his saddle and herded the cattle down by the river.

Her older brother, Cedric, she knew would be swinging along after the plow with Shep bounding in front of the horses. Then, in imagination, she looked into the kitchen. She was sure that the boys found it hard to keep house without her. For a moment a rush of regret brought tears to her eyes.

“Oh, how selfish I was to leave those dear brothers of mine with no one to get supper for them when they come home so tired at night.”

The girl in the other bed had awakened and she heard a half-stifled sob from Matilda’s corner. She curled her lips contemptuously. “Silly, sniffly thing,” she said to herself. Then a bell rang, and they both arose and dressed behind their sheltering screens. Geraldine Barrington finished her toilet hastily and without one glance at the new pupil she swept out of the room.

Matilda smiled to herself. This girl had not the power to hurt her. Instead she thought happily of the kind friends whom she had met the day before, and when she went out into the corridor, one of these hurried forward to meet her. “Good-morning, Starr,” Gertrude called. “I hope that you slept well.”

“I did indeed, thank you,” Matilda said brightly. “Gertrude, you know the old saying, ‘The dream you dream in a strange bed will come to pass some day.’”

“What was it?” Rosamond Wright asked as they joined the others at the entrance to Apple-Blossom Alley.

“It would be utterly impossible to have this dream come true,” Starr replied merrily, “for I dreamed that Geraldine Barrington begged me to be her friend and roommate, while the truth of the matter is, she has not even given me a kindly glance, so you see dreams go by contraries.”

While they were talking, the girls trooped down the broad front stairs. The matron in the lower hall smiled a greeting to them. The girls curtsied and chorused, “Good-morning, Madame Deriby.”

That good woman was pleased to see the Bishop’s protÉgÉe so differently clad. She felt sure that one of the Sunnyside girls had loaned her a uniform.

“I am glad that they are kind to poor Matilda,” she thought as she turned into her office, “for I am almost certain that her unfortunate roommate will not be.”

As soon as the door was closed, there came a rap upon it and when Madame Deriby reopened it, she found an angry and indignant Geraldine Barrington standing outside.

“Come in,” she said kindly, feeling almost sure that she knew what the visitor had to say, nor was she wrong.

“Madame Deriby,” the girl began, “I wish to notify my father that I want to be removed from this school at once. In England I was never called upon to associate with any one in a class beneath me, and I certainly shall not begin doing so now. What would my friends at Barrington Manor think of me, if they knew that I was rooming with a girl named Matilda Jane Perkins, who wears a plaid shawl for a coat, a beaver cap for a hat, and thick woolly mittens instead of gloves. I had told you, Madame Deriby, that I did not care to make the acquaintance of any one here. My father pays my tuition, not to have me humiliated, but in order that I may continue my education while he is obliged to be in the States.”

The matron listened gravely to this indignant torrent of words and when the girl paused, she said not unkindly, “Be seated, Geraldine. I am sorry that you have been so distressed, and if there were a single unoccupied room in the school, I would gladly give it to you. It would be impossible for me to communicate with your father for the next two weeks, as he has informed me, and you, too, I believe, that he will be traveling on the desert and will not expect mail for a fortnight.”

Geraldine tossed her head. “Well, if I am obliged to stay in this school for that long, I at least will not sleep in the same room with a farmer’s daughter.”

There was a sad expression in Madame Deriby’s grey eyes. For a moment she was thoughtful and then she said: “There is a small room in the cupola which is unoccupied. I will have it prepared and you may sleep there to-night if you prefer.”

“I most certainly do prefer,” the girl replied as she rose and left the office.

An hour later, when she returned to her room, planning to pack her trunk preparatory to having it moved to the cupola, she found Matilda seated in an easy-chair on her own side of the sunny bay-window. She held a pad and pencil and was writing a letter to her far-away brothers. The prairie girl heard the door open and some one enter, but, acting upon the advice of her counselors, she did not glance up, but continued her writing as though she were alone. Geraldine deliberately turned her back toward her roommate. Matilda glanced at the flaxen head and there was a sad expression in her wonderful eyes.

“Poor girl!” she thought. “How much happier she would be if she could forget that she is a Barrington and realize that really we are all of us just folks.”

At that moment there came a rap on the door and Peggy Pierce called, “Starr, are you there? We want you to come to Apple-Blossom Alley.”

When Matilda was gone, Geraldine happened to glance at the writing-desk on the other side of the room. There she saw a small red book which was lying open as though it had recently been written in. The English girl would have scorned any one else who would have done a thing so dishonorable, but so great was her curiosity to know what this plebeian girl could have written in her diary that she deliberately locked the door and picking up the small book, she read: “March the 6th. Linden Hall is such a wonderful place and many of the girls have been so kind, especially Adele Doring and Gertrude Willis. My roommate, Geraldine Barrington, is the most beautiful girl in the school, or at least she would be if she had a pleasanter expression. She is very haughty and proud and the girls say that is probably because she is English, and yet my own dear mother was born in England and lived there until she was seventeen and she was very kind to every one; but perhaps Mother did not belong to the haughty class. I am certainly glad that she did not, for they are not very pleasant to live with.”

Geraldine tossed her head as she thought: “Well, I certainly agree that her mother did not belong to my class in England. I cannot imagine any one who would marry a Perkins associating with the Barringtons. She belonged to tradespeople or the serving class, no doubt. Perkins is the name of my chum’s butler.”

A door down the corridor opened and voices were heard approaching.

Geraldine quickly closed the book and slipped it back into its place on the desk.

She had just unlocked the door and seated herself when a flock of girls trooped into the room. They pretended not to see her though of course they did. She had whirled her chair about and her back was toward them.

“Oh, Starr, what a pretty room you have,” Peggy Pierce exclaimed as she sat on the window-seat and heaped the sofa pillows back of her. Geraldine flushed. Those were her very own pillows and she did not care to have them crushed, but she wisely decided to say nothing.

“Sit down, every one,” Peggy called, “and let’s tell Starr all about the rules of the school. It never would do to have her breaking them.”

The girls sat on the floor, tailor-fashion, and from their twinkling eyes it could be plainly seen that a spirit of mischief possessed them.

“What would happen to me if I did break a rule?” Starr inquired.

Peggy lowered her voice to a stage whisper as she said, “Something dreadful, I can assure you. You would be sent to the cupola room, and there isn’t any one of us brave enough to stay there all night.”

Geraldine was of course listening, although she pretended to be reading. She knew that they were talking about the very room which Madame Deriby had said that she might occupy that night.

“Why wouldn’t one want to sleep there?” asked the innocent Starr.

“Because,” Peggy replied in a hollow whisper, “that room is haunted. Some folks say they don’t believe in ghosts, but they’d better sleep in the cupola for a few nights and see what they’ll see, and hear what they’ll hear. Nina Best had it last and she told Madame Deriby she just wouldn’t sleep there another night. I don’t know who is to have it next.”

Peggy gave a mischievous sidelong glance at the back of Geraldine’s head, but that girl pretended to be deeply interested in her book.

“Is there a story about the ghost?” Starr asked. “Tell it to us.”

Luckily Peggy had an active imagination.

“Yes,” she said in a hollow voice. “It was midnight when Nina was awakened by the creaking of her door. She knew that she had locked it before retiring. Frightened, she sat up and flashed on the light. There was no one in the room and the door was closed and locked. Thinking that it might have been her imagination, she tried to sleep and was just dozing, when she heard stealthy, creeping steps coming across the floor. Again she flashed on the light and again there was no one there.

“Nina then decided to leave the light burning for company. After a time, as nothing had happened, she fell asleep, when suddenly she was awakened by a low moaning sound, the light went out and in the darkness she could see a white figure drifting toward her bed. She tried to move, but could not, and then an icy cold hand was laid on her forehead.

“Nina says that she screamed so loud that in another moment Miss Sharpleigh and Miss Merritt were at the door rapping to be let in. Nina was a nervous wreck the next day and left school to recuperate. I surely don’t envy the girl who is to have the cupola room next. For myself I would prefer a flesh and blood roommate whoever she might be,” Peggy concluded with a mischievous glance at Matilda.

Geraldine sprang up and taking her hat and coat she hurriedly left the room.

“Well, I guess I scared her ladyship enough,” Peggy declared. “There wasn’t a word of truth in what I was saying. I just made it up as I went along.”

“Poor Geraldine!” Matilda laughed. “Now she will have to choose between a farmer’s daughter and a ghost.”

Just then a bell rang and Peggy leaped to her feet, declaring that it was her practice hour, and the other girls went with her.

When Matilda was alone, she stood for a moment looking out of the window. She saw a little wood in a shimmer of spring green down the hillside, and, since she had always lived on a prairie, she longed to know what a wood looked like.

“If only I had a hat and coat like other people,” she thought, “I would take a walk by myself.” Then she added wisely, “The girls, whose friendship is worth having, do not care what I wear, and moreover, every one is busy at this hour, and no one will notice me.” So thinking, she took her plaid shawl from the closet and twined it about her head and shoulders. Then she started out. She met no one in the corridors or garden and soon she reached the edge of the little wood. She stood for a moment looking about her truly awed. She had been brought up on a treeless prairie and this was the first time in her fifteen years that she had entered a wood. There was a shimmer of pale green on the twigs that would soon be in full leaf. The ground was moist and ferns were beginning to uncurl. A warm breeze wafted to Matilda an exquisite fragrance. Her wonderful eyes brightened. Surely there must be some wild flower in blossom, she thought, and eagerly she went deeper into the wood to find it. The hill became steeper and in places it was rocky. Again that exquisite fragrance and she paused to breathe deep of it. Then it was that she spied something pink among the dry, brown leaves. Stooping, she found that loveliest of spring flowers, a clump of trailing arbutus.

“Oh, you sweet, sweet thing,” she whispered as she held the blossoms close. “How I wish that I might find a spray for each of the girls who have been so kind to me.” She continued her search, looking under the leaves. She was nearing a heap of rocks, when from the other side came a low moaning sound. Matilda stood very still and listened. Fear was unknown to this prairie girl, but for one fleeting second she recalled the story of Peggy’s ghost. Then, when the sound was repeated, she hurried in that direction. Beyond a clump of bushes was the figure of a girl lying on the ground. Matilda saw that it was Geraldine Barrington. Forgetting everything but her desire to help, she hurried to the side of her roommate.

“Oh, Miss Barrington,” she exclaimed, “you have hurt your ankle, haven’t you? Let me get you into a more comfortable position and then I will run back to the school for assistance.”

“I don’t want to go back to the school,” Geraldine declared angrily. “I have left that place forever. I was just on my way to the Linden Station when I slipped and wrenched my ankle. I was going to Buffalo on the next train and have Madame Deriby send my things.”

“And all because you do not want to be my roommate,” Matilda said sorrowfully. Then she added brightly, “I’ll tell you what, Miss Barrington, let me help you back to the school and then I will ask Madame Deriby to permit me to move into the cupola and you shall have your room again all by yourself.”

Geraldine looked up in surprise. She endeavored to rise but fell back with a groan. “Do lie still,” Matilda urged. “I’ll run down to the road. I see a farmer driving this way and I am sure that he will help us.”

It proved to be kind Mr. O’Rourke on his way to the seminary with the weekly supply of eggs and butter, and with his help Geraldine was carried to the wagon and made comfortable on the straw. Half an hour later, just as the girls were flocking out of the study hall, they were amazed to see no less a personage than Geraldine Barrington being helped into the school by a farmer and her hated roommate, Matilda Perkins, but the girls of Linden Hall were to hear of something much more surprising before the fortnight was over.