"Don't you remember, Veronica," said Migwan, "when you became a
Winnebago you took the gull for your symbol, because it flew over the
ocean and you wanted to follow it home?"

A memory of that day came back to the girls, of Veronica's bitter
homesickness, and how desperately sorry they had been for her, and yet
how helpless they had felt before her aristocratic mien. There was a
great difference in her now, all the more noticeable because they had
not seen her for a year. She was thinner and her eyes were larger and
more pansylike than ever, but she was much more talkative and animated
than she used to be. Very little of the old superior bearing remained,
and the looks that she bent upon Nyoda were those of an humble and
adoring slave. Proof positive of the change that had taken place in her
was the prank she had played upon them that night in masquerading as the
cook--she who had once refused to help prepare one of the famous suppers
in the House of the Open Door, disdainfully remarking that cooking was
work for servants, not for ladies.

At Migwan's remark Veronica stirred restlessly and made an emphatic
gesture with her hand as she replied firmly, "That was all nonsense. I
gave up the gull as a symbol long ago. It had such a screaming, ugly cry
instead of a song. If I am to be one of the Song Friends I must have a
song bird for a symbol. I have changed to the red winged blackbird,
because that was the first American bird I learned to know by his song,
outside of the robin. His voice always sounded so gay and free, singing
over the open fields, that he seemed to be a symbol of the freedom and
happiness which one finds in America. When he sings 'O-ka-lee! O-ka-lee!
O-ka-lee!' I always think he is singing 'Liberty! Liberty! Liberty!'"

The four Winnebagos exchanged glances as Veronica uttered this