progressed too smoothly. Nothing burned or boiled over or refused to
cook,--incidents which always add the spice of adventure to a chafing
dish spread. Nobody had come in a kimono. There was no bed to loll back
on, no sociable sparcity of plates, no embarrassing interruptions in the
way of heads of uninvited guests poked in the door and apologetically
withdrawn; and the anxious pucker of hospitality on the face of the
little hostess imposed an added restraint and formality upon the oddly
assorted company of guests. Beatrice Egerton played with her rings,
yawned without dissimulation, and wished she had stayed at home; Eleanor
bravely parried Nettie Dwight's incisive questions about "her set"; and
Betty, stirring and talking to the cousins and Dora, had time to admire
Eleanor's self-control and to wonder pityingly if there were many girls
in Harding College so completely "out of it" as these four seemed to be.
And yet they were not unhappy; they were enjoying Dora Carlson's
sugaring-off as though it had been a delightful college spread instead of
a dull and dreadful party.

When the biscuits, that Dora had made herself, were done and the sugar
boiled to the right consistency, everybody began to brighten up, and the
refreshment feature bade fair to be a real success. It was too late in
the spring for snow, so Dora had provided some little cakes of ice on
which to wax the sugar. They were not quite so good a substitute as might
have been desired, for they had a fashion of slipping dangerously over
the plates, and then the hot sugar slipped and spread on the ice and had
to be dexterously coaxed to settle down in one place and melt out a cool
bed for itself, as it does easily enough in snow. But all this only added
to the interest of the occasion. One sophomore cousin lost her cake of
ice on the floor, and she showed more animation than she had in all the
rest of the evening together, in spite of Betty's valiant efforts. Then
Nettie Dwight suggested that they grain part of the sugar, so, when