Jean had on her blanket wrapper and had taken down her hair, but Olive, still fully dressed, kept darting from her own bedroom to Jean’s and Frieda’s, peering out both doors for a sign of the wanderer.

Finally Jean turned to her. “Come on, Olive, I don’t care in the least what Miss Winthrop does to Frieda when she finds out how she has behaved, but you and I must go to look for her.”

Jean and Olive were half-way out in the hall, where the lights were now being turned low, when a figure brushed by them. “Please let me get into my own room,” a voice said peevishly, and nothing loath, the three figures returned inside the room. “Begin undressing at once, Frieda Ralston,” Jean commanded, “and don’t say one word in explanation or excuse until Rebecca Sterne has gone by our room, for it is just barely possible that she may not have seen you sneaking along the hall.”

Jean spoke in tones of the utmost severity and even Olive gazed upon the youngest ranch girl with an expression of disapproval.

The preceptress’s knock came at this very instant.

“Whatever are you doing in your ball gown, Frieda?” Miss Sterne inquired, with her head on one side, gazing about through her large horn spectacles that Olive had so promptly disliked, like a wise old owl.

“And you, Miss Ralston, why aren’t you in your own room?” she continued, “you know you are not expected to enter another girl’s sleeping apartment after the hour for retiring.”

Without replying Olive promptly slipped back into her own room and rapidly began making ready for bed, not returning to talk to Jean or to Frieda even when Miss Sterne’s retreating footsteps were far out of hearing.

And only once in the next ten minutes did she understand what the other two ranch girls were saying and then it was Jean’s tones that were the more distinct.

Frieda was quietly slipping off a pale blue silk stocking and slipper, keeping her eyes fastened conscientiously on the floor, when Jean, now in her night gown, planted herself before her. “Where have you been all this time, Frieda Ralston, and why didn’t you and Mollie Johnson say good-night to Miss Winthrop when the rest of us did?”

Frieda looked up, her eyes, almost the color of her blue stockings, swimming in tears. “I was in the back hall, Jean, and I didn’t dream of its being so late. Do you think Miss Winthrop noticed?” the culprit faltered.

Jean cruelly bowed her head. “What is there that goes on in this school, Frieda, that escapes Miss Winthrop?” she inquired. “I suppose you will be able to explain to her in the morning why you were in the back hall instead of in the parlor with her guests, as you never seem to care to tell anything to Olive or to me any more. Please hurry to bed.”

Frieda was very angry at Jean’s superior air, but her own heart was quaking and her lips trembling, so that she could not answer back in the cool fashion she desired. “Mollie Johnson was with me,” she managed to say, “and two boys.”

Jean might have been the late Empress Dowager of China or the present Czarina of Russia, so majestic was her manner as she sat up in bed with her arms folded before her.

“I had no idea you were alone, Frieda,” she said firmly, “but will you please tell me why you went to the back hall when you knew perfectly well that Miss Winthrop was trusting you to behave like a lady and remain in the rooms where she was receiving her guests. I don’t know what Ruth and Jack will say.”

Frieda began to cry softly. “We were so hungry, Jean,” she murmured, struggling to braid her long locks of flaxen hair. “You see, we had only ices and cake for the party, and about eleven o’clock Tom Parker, the boy I was with, said he wished he had a sandwich, and I was just as hungry for one, so we found Mollie and another boy and slipped out of the dining room. Mrs. White, the housekeeper, was up and back in the pantry and she gave us cheese and pie and all sorts of good things.” And now Frieda’s courage returning in a small measure, she turned out the electric lights, hopping into bed. “I am not going to be treated like a criminal, though, Jean Bruce, so I shan’t tell you anything more,” she ended, burying herself under the cover.

So half an hour passed and supposedly the three ranch girls were sound asleep, though in reality the three of them were still wide awake.

Jean and Olive were both worrying over Frieda, not yet understanding the real facts of her escape, and Frieda was longing with all her might for some one to sympathize with her and help her in her scrape, some one who would let her cry herself out.

By and by Olive crept softly from her room to Jean’s bedside. “Jean, has Frieda explained things to you?” she whispered.

Jean sighed. “She said they were hungry, she and Mollie and two boys, and that they went into the pantry and had something to eat, but she didn’t say why they stayed in the back hall afterwards. They couldn’t have kept on eating pickles and cheese for over an hour.” And both girls giggled softly in spite of their worry, for was it not like little greedy baby Frieda to have required extra food just as she was constantly doing on their long trip through the Yellowstone the summer before?

“Well, it all sounds pretty simple, Jean,” Olive comforted, “and I don’t think Miss Winthrop will be very angry when she hears that the pantry was the difficulty, for she knows how good the housekeeper is to all the little girls.”

“It isn’t the pantry that worries me; it’s the back hall.” Jean’s voice became low and impressive, “What do you suppose that Frieda Ralston could have to talk about to a—boy?”

A stifled sob at this moment shook the bed-clothes and both older girls started, guiltily. Reaching over, Olive patted the outside of the blanket.

“Were you talking to the boy, Frieda?” she inquired in a sterner manner than was usual to her, “or were all four of you just sitting around having a jolly time together?” Now that Frieda’s sobs assured the other two girls that she was awake, they were glad enough to be able to go on with her cross-examination.

“I was talking to the boy all by myself,” Frieda’s reply was unhesitating though somewhat choked. “Mollie and the other boy were sitting on a higher step and the servants were around, but no one told us how late it was.”

“Well, what were you talking about that you found so interesting that you could not hear the clock strike twelve, or the ‘Home, Sweet Home’ waltz, or the good-byes being said?” Jean demanded fiercely.

This time Frieda made not the least effort to restrain her sorrow, for the bed fairly shook with her weeping. “We were talking about worms!” she sobbed.

“Worms!” Olive and Jean repeated in chorus, believing that they could not have heard aright.

“Oh, yes, worms and flies,” the culprit continued. “You see, we got to talking about fishing and Tom Parker said he loved it better than most anything he ever did and some summers he goes way up into the Maine woods and fishes in the lakes for trout. He uses flies for bait always, but I told him that we fished with worms in Rainbow Creek and sometimes when it wouldn’t rain for a long time we used to have to dig way down under the ground to find them. I told him too how once I started a fishing worm aquarium and kept all the worms I could dig up in a glass bowl to sell to Jim and the cowboys whenever they wished to go fishing.”

Frieda did not further endeavor to outline her grown-up conversation with her first admirer, feeling too angry and too puzzled to go on for the minute, for her former irate judges were now holding their sides and doing their level best to keep from shrieking with laughter.

“And I was afraid she was talking sentiment instead of fishing worms,” Jean whispered in Olive’s ear.

Around to the other side of the bed Olive went to tuck the covers more closely about Frieda. “Go to sleep, baby, and dream of Jack,” she comforted, “and perhaps Miss Winthrop will never hear of your mistaking the time for saying good-night.”

“And if she does hear, you’ll ask her to forgive me,” Frieda returned sleepily, “for I believe she likes you, Olive, better than most any of the girls. I have seen her looking at you so strangely every now and then.”

In another half minute Frieda was fast asleep, not feeling so penitent over her escapade as the two older ranch girls supposed. But Frieda had always been a good deal spoiled and, as Miss Winthrop had not noticed her failure to say good-night, no further scolding impressed her fault upon her mind. Perhaps this was unfortunate, for it is better that both little girls and big receive their punishment for a fault so soon as the fault is committed, in order not to keep on growing naughtier and naughtier until Fate punishes us for many sins at once.