STHER WILLIAMS was attending the high school in Green

field. Three miles lay between the town and her father's little cherry farm, a lonely extent of road, gently descending from the hills, open to the wind in winter, at other times hot and unsheltered. No one liked to make the trip alone, so it happened that Esther became one of a little crowd of girls who, like her, attended Greenfield High School, and who relieved the tediousness of the walk by doing it together. Those who lived farthest away would start from their houses while the sky was still half dark and as they went along, they would pick up the other girls one by one. By the time they reached the Williams' farm, which was the nearest one to town, there would be six or seven girls walking down the road abreast, laughing and chattering together.

Naturally this little crowd came to have more in common than simply their daily walk together. At that age girls are always forming clubs and going about with one another. They wear their hair alike and copy each other's dresses so that everyone will know they are great friends. And Esther, now that she had reached this stage, felt that her childhood was at an end. She was contemptuous of her former self, remembering how shy she had been, how she had avoided the company of these girls who were now

her best friends. And she tried to forget that she had once enjoyed helping her father in the fields.

Now she had other interests and her days were full of excitement. On Saturday afternoons, after school was out, Esther and her friends would stay in Greenfield to do the shopping for their mothers. And you would see them walking about the streets in groups of two or three, going in and out of stores where the tradesmen knew them and asked after their families, boldly facing down any town girls they might happen to meet, and stopping on corners to talk with the boys of their acquaintance.

Esther's mind was full of these pleasures. She thought them. over whenever she was alone, recalling the things that had been said and done, burning with pleasure when she remembered some compliment that had been passed on to her. Wherever she went, her friends accompanied her in imagination. She thought up things to say which would delight and amuse them. She wanted to be completely one with them, to be as indispensable to her friends as they were to her. She saw no discord nor any possibility of it, and in her enthusiasm, she believed that they too were all as earnest as herself.

Esther and her friends had a good many experiences in common; they also shared a large number of opinions. There was hardly a person in town about whom they had not made up their minds. They never tired of ridiculing Horace Brinsmade, the director of the Presbyterian Sunday School, and one of the girls, who was a good imitator, used to mimic his compressed lips and over-earnest manner of talking. And they were equally at one in their praise of Miss Clark, the pretty young woman who taught them domestic science and whom they sometimes invited to their parties. But the strongest of all their mutual feelings was their hatred for Charlie Frazer, a young farmer who lived near them and whom they had all known and played with as children. He had been a bully all his life because he was bigger than the other boys his age, and much smarter and better looking. At present he was a senior at the high school and captain of the basket-ball team. About a year before, he had begun taking the town girls out and going to their parties. This popularity had led him to neglect the girls in Esther's crowd, and several times he had failed

to show up at their parties because some town girl had asked him to her house to play cards. Almost every Saturday night now, he put on a black suit and stiff collar and went to the dance at the Country Club.

To Esther and her friends this kind of thing was treason and they came to despise Charlie with all their hearts. They watched him like spies and talked him over among themselves. In everything he said and did they found something contemptible and mean. One of the girls continually invented lies about him. "I met him in the corridor this morning. Well, he looked right at me and went by with his nose in the air."

One night they were having a party at Helen Brady's house. Late in the evening Charlie Frazer came in, although he had not been invited. He was a tall fellow with blond hair and a very red, coarse-skinned face. He came into the room and instantly there was a change in the atmosphere. Helen Brady jumped up and ran towards him blushing.

"Why Charlie Frazer, what a surprise! Come right in."

"I was just going by and saw all of you sitting here. I thought I'd come in for a minute or two."

"Why sure, we haven't seen you in a long time. Come right in and sit down."

He walked to the middle of the room and looked around him. "What are you all doing, anyway? I never saw such a gloomy party. Let's have a game of cards."

His effect upon the little group was magical; its unity seemed entirely broken up. Before, every one had been occupied with himself or with his partner; now the girls became engrossed in trying to attract Charlie's attention, in trying to please him, and the boys sat still or stood about at the sides of the room, silent and indignant.

The table had been quickly cleared and a pack of cards produced from the cabinet. Charlie stood beside the table doing tricks with the cards. He laid them out in a row and told each of the girls to choose one. "Now", he cried, in a slightly arrogant manner, imitating the magicians one sees in vaudeville, "Now, if you ladies will just kindly remember the cards you have chosen and place them back in the pack-no, no, just anywhere-1 will show you

a great feat of magic. See, I shuffle them, I cut them twice, everything perfectly regular. Now-" He began extracting cards from the top of the pack and handing them about among the girls. A shout went up from them as they saw that the trick had succeeded. "How do you do it? I never saw anything so wonderful in my life. Come on now, show us how you did it."

When Charlie entered, Esther had been in the dining room helping Mrs. Brady serve up the ice cream. She saw everything through the door, felt the electric change which had come over the girls, and heard with disgust the affected note which had crept into their voices. She was shocked and her hands trembled so that she could hardly manage the plates. "How could they act this way?" she said to herself. "How could they make such a fuss over Charlie when they hate and despise him?" Her indignation rose, her heart pounded, and she felt tears coming into her eyes. Just then Mrs. Brady came in from the kitchen where she had been busy cutting the cake. "Whoever is that in there?" she asked, peering into the other room.

"It's Charlie Frazer", replied Esther, trying to keep the bitterness out of her voice. "He's just come in this minute."

"Well, I never! I thought he didn't come to your parties anymore. The girls don't like him, do they? I've heard Helen say the most awful things about him."

"That's just it!" cried Esther, giving way to her feelings. "They pretend to despise him but just look how they act towards him.'

Mrs. Brady laughed. "Well, girls are that way. You can't tell how they really feel. Probably they're only jealous of him." With a plate of ice cream in either hand, she sallied forth into the living room crying, "Well, Charlie Frazer, it's a long time since you've been in this house. Here! You must have the first dish of ice cream since you're the guest of honor."

Esther followed, resolving that she would not under any consideration speak to Charlie. But her resolution was unnecessary: he did not even notice her, so sitting down beside one of the boys, she ate her ice cream in silence.

Esther had promised to spend the night there with Helen Brady, and she looked forward to it now, thinking that she would take this opportunity to reproach her friend for her insincerity. When

the others had gone, the two girls went up the narrow stairs to a bedroom under the eaves. They sat down on the bed and began slowly to undress. Helen chattered so gayly that Esther's resolution began to fail her. She could not resist this lightness of mood. She realized how silly her words would sound, and not wishing to be thought over-earnest, she restrained them. Nevertheless, when Helen mentioned Charlie's name, Esther could not resist saying, "But, Helen, I thought you couldn't stand him."

"O Charlie's all right. He can really be awfully nice when he wants to. It's only when he puts on airs that I dislike him. Besides, he is certainly the best looking fellow in school."

They blew out the lamp and climbed into bed. For a long time they lay there, talking and laughing in low voices, their dark heads close together on the pillow. Listening to Helen's confidence, Esther forgot her resentment and replied with confidences of her own. Mrs. Brady called to them from her room, commanding them to be quiet and go to sleep. They lowered their voices, but their conversation became more and more intense. They were talking about the boys now, confiding their preferences and the reasons for them. A breath of wind blew into the room, passing over their faces, and Esther realized that she was very hot and excited. This troubled her a little but she was soon swept on by Helen's ardor. All barriers were down and they let the contents of their minds flow into one another without reserve. Esther admitted that she had once let one of the boys kiss her. Then Helen, after hesitating for a moment and clearing her throat, confessed in a halting, trembling whisper, that she had once entirely surrendered herself to Charlie Frazer, and that she knew from midnight confidences such as this one, that two of the other girls had also given themselves to him. "I'd never do it again," she mut-tered. "But I couldn't resist it that once. I was so curious."

Esther's head, which she had raised in her excitement, fell back on the pillow. A feeling of disgust went through her and she longed to crawl out of bed and run away from the house.

"Well, are you shocked?" asked Helen, who now began to feel an acute regret for having confided so much.

"O God, of course I am-"

"Well, you needn't be." Helen whined, tears arising from the