As early in the morning as she dared Eleanor had gone over to get back
her theme "that should never have gone in," and to ask permission to try
again. But Miss Raymond had been up betimes, working over her new batch
of papers, and she met Eleanor's apologies with amused approval of
sophomores, who, contrary to the popular tradition about their cock-
sureness, were inclined to underestimate their abilities, and imagine,
like freshmen before midyears, that their work was below grade. So there
was nothing for Eleanor to do but submit gracefully and leave the theme.
It did not occur to her to caution Miss Raymond against reading it to her
class.

In spite of hard struggles and little disappointments like Helen Adams's,
it really takes very little to make a college reputation. One brilliant
recitation may turn an unassuming student into a "prod."; and on the
strength of one clever bit of writing another is given the title of
"genius." This last distinction was at once bestowed on Eleanor. She was
showered with congratulations and compliments. Her old school friends
like Lilian Day and Jean Eastman hastened to declare that they had always
known Eleanor Watson could write. Solid, dependable students like Dorothy
King and Marion Lawrence regarded her with new respect; awed little
freshmen pointed her out to one another as "that awfully pretty Miss
Watson, who is a perfect star in themes, you know"; and her own class,
who had cordially disliked her the year before, and not known what to
think of her recent friendliness, immediately prepared to make a class
heroine of her and lauded her performance to the skies.

But Eleanor would have none of all this "pleasant fuss," as Mary Brooks
called it. Suddenly and most inexplicably she reverted to her sarcastic,
ungracious manner of the year before. She either ignored the pretty
speeches that people made to her, or received them with a stare and a