For a week before Thanksgiving there was great excitement among the schoolgirls on account of the approaching football game. The "Four" were as excited as the others, although not so many of their own particular friends were in the Harvard team. It was to be a game with Princeton, one of the great University matches, and for special reasons there was the deepest interest in the match. Those girls who had brothers in college, or even cousins or friends, held themselves with more dignity than any of the others, and those who had relatives in the team "were too proud for anything," as Brenda said. The game was to be played in Holmes' Field, and tickets were not easy to get, because the seats were far less numerous than now on the great Soldiers' Field. The girls were making up little groups to go to the game with youths of their acquaintance as escorts, under the chaperonage of older people. A few who had received no invitation were especially miserable, and took no trouble to disguise their feelings.

Edith at this time became unusually popular, because it was known that her mother had given her permission to arrange a large party to accompany her to the game, and every girl was hoping for an invitation—every girl, at least who had not been invited elsewhere to go in some other party.

Now Edith was of a generally generous disposition, and not inclined to limit her favors, of whatever nature, to any particular set of girls. For this reason she had to bear many a reproof from Belle, and even occasionally from Brenda, both of whom were inclined to be more exclusive.

So it happened that the general harmony of "The Four" was somewhat disturbed when Nora one day at recess exclaimed,

"Who do you suppose is going with us to the game?" For of course in the minds of the others there could be but one "game," and that the one to which they all wished to go.

"Why, who is it?" cried Brenda, and "Who is it?" echoed Belle.

"I know that you can't guess."

"Oh, don't be silly, Nora, it wouldn't be worth while to guess about something you'll know all about so soon, except that you speak as if it were some one we might not care to have, and if that's the case, I declare it's too bad," said Belle.

"If it's anything like that," broke in Brenda, rather snappishly, "I will just tell Edith what I think."

"It—that," cried Nora, "didn't I say that it was a person, a girl, if I must be more definite, Ruth Roberts, if I must tell just who it is."

"Oh," cried Belle, and "Ah," echoed Brenda.

"You need not look so surprised," rejoined Nora, "and if you take my advice, you will not say anything to Edith; she ought to have her own way in arranging her own party, and you know when she makes up her mind it is of no use to talk to her about it."

"Well, I don't care," rejoined Brenda, "it's hard enough to have Julia tagging about everywhere, but why in the world we should have Ruth Roberts, when we never see her anywhere except at school, I really cannot understand, and I don't see how you and Nora can like it either."

"Why Ruth Roberts is as pleasant a girl as there is in school, and yet she would have a terribly lonely time, if it were not for Edith and Julia; nobody else ever thinks of speaking to her."

"Well, why should we, she lives out in Roxbury or some other outlandish place, and she doesn't even go to our dancing school or know people that we know. There isn't a bit of sense in knowing people that we'll never see when we're in society," responded Belle, while Brenda echoed, "Yes, that's what I think, too."

Nora smiled pleasantly, and her eyes looked brighter than ever under the rim of her brown felt hat, with its trimmings of lighter brown. Nora's temper was not easily ruffled. Then Belle added a final word.

"Oh, it's clear that this is all Julia's doings; ever since Ruth went into her Latin class they have been awfully intimate. But I don't see," turning rather snappishly towards Brenda, "why the rest of us have got to take up Ruth Roberts just because your Cousin Julia is so devoted to her."

Now this was a little too much, even for Brenda, who generally did not contradict Belle, and she answered with vigor, "Really you are growing perfectly ridiculous, Belle; I haven't anything to do with it, but I must say that I think that Julia has a right to choose her own friends. Ruth Roberts is all right, and anyway I'm thankful to have Julia take a fancy to anybody, it leaves us a great deal freer to do as we like. I should think that you would see that yourself."

"Oh, well," said Nora laughing, "the whole thing is not worth quarreling about. I'm glad to hear you talk so sensibly, Brenda. If you hadn't, I was going to tell Belle that it seems to me that Edith has a right to ask any one she wishes. She is always very good to us all, and just think how many tickets her father has bought for this game!"

"Yes, I know, but still——"

"The least said, the soonest mended," said Nora, though to tell you the truth, the quotation did not sound especially appropriate. "The least said, the soonest mended, and let us all go to the game with a crimson flag in each hand to wave for the winners."

"Crimson," cried Belle, "I am going to carry an orange scarf, and perhaps an orange flag."

"What for? why I never heard of such a thing!" exclaimed Nora.

"Nor I!" cried Brenda, "at a Harvard game!"

"Isn't it a Princeton game, too," asked Belle, "two or three of the boys I used to know in New York are in that team, one of them is a kind of cousin of mine."

"Oh," said Nora, "I didn't know that you thought that people had to be so very devoted to cousins."

Even Belle herself could not help smiling at this, which was very appropriate, following so closely, as it did, her own remarks about Julia.

"You can see yourself that this is different," she answered. "I should call it very impolite if there were no orange flags shown at the game."

"Well, you have the most ridiculous ideas, hasn't she, Brenda?"

Brenda nodded assent, and Nora continued, "I never knew that people had to think that about politeness in college games; why it's a duty to do everything you can to help your own side——"

"I never said that Harvard was my side," interrupted Belle, "didn't I tell you that I have a cousin on the Princeton team."

"You'd better not say anything of that kind to Philip, or to Edith, either, they are both perfectly devoted to Harvard, and they expect their party to give great encouragement to the Harvard team. Why, Belle, I cannot imagine your doing anything else."

"I'm not a child," responded Belle very crossly, walking away from Nora and Brenda, "I do not need to be told what to do."

What Nora or Brenda might have answered, I cannot say, for hardly had Belle disappeared within the house, when Edith herself appeared, with Julia and Ruth.

Ruth was a pretty and amiable girl, about Julia's age, and therefore a little older than "The Four." She had been in the school for two years before the coming of Julia, but in all that time she had had only a speaking acquaintance with the other girls. Many of them would probably have been surprised had any one told them that they were very selfish in leaving their schoolmate so entirely to herself. It was not because they did not like her. They were merely so very much wrapped up in their own affairs, that they hardly noticed that she was often left to herself. Ruth lived in the suburbs, and as Belle had said, outside of school the other girls seldom saw her. At recess each little group had so many personal things to talk about that an outsider would have been decidedly in the way, and would, perhaps, have been a little uncomfortable in joining them. No one gets a great deal of enjoyment from reading a single chapter in the middle of a book, and so it is often hard to be a mere listener when the tongues of half a dozen girls are vigorously discussing people and events of which the listener has not the slightest knowledge.

Ruth herself was very independent, and as she was more interested in her studies than many of the girls at Miss Crawdon's she had acquired the habit of studying during recess. Since after school she spent more time than most girls of her age in outdoor sports, it did her no great harm to pass the half-hour of recess in this way. Ruth, as well as Julia, had undertaken to prepare for college, and it had been a great delight to her to have the latter placed with her in one or two special classes. Julia's liking for her had made Edith take a little more interest in her than would otherwise have been the case, but the ball game was the first important event in which she was included with the others of Julia's set. She naturally was pleased at the prospect of going with the others, for like Julia, she had never seen a great football game.

No one who saw the hearty way in which Nora and Brenda greeted Ruth, as she came up with Edith and Julia, could for a moment have imagined that she had been under discussion. The mercurial Brenda for the moment was so annoyed by Belle's proposed championship of Princeton, that she was unexpectedly cordial to Ruth, and almost to her own surprise found herself urging Ruth to come to town early on the Saturday of the game, to take luncheon with her and Julia.

The latter expressed her thanks in a glance towards her cousin, as Ruth accepted very gracefully, and Nora exclaimed, "What fun we are going to have; you know we are all invited to dine at Edith's that evening. Oh dear! I can hardly wait for Saturday."

"I know it," replied Brenda, "it's less than a week, too, but it seems an awfully long time."

Then they gossiped a moment in a very harmless fashion about the prospects of Harvard, and Edith quoted one or two things that Philip had said, and Nora told them that her father was perfectly sure that the crimson would win, and as they trooped into the dressing-room when the bell rang, Belle was surprised to see Brenda leaning on Ruth's arm.