She tried her best to get asked to ride in that car. Come, Connie, be yourself and help me get ready. I was going to ask to borrow your red hat. It’s just the thing I need with my new red dress. Do be good. I’m in a terrible hurry. I promised I’d be ready in ten minutes. Aw, come on, Connie, and be a good sport!”

Constance turned with troubled gaze and helped her get ready. After all, if that was what Doris wanted out of life, what business was it of hers?

She loaned her the red hat, she hunted her gloves, and she produced a new pair of silk stockings of the right shade when Doris discovered a run in one of hers at the last minute.

She watched furtively from the windows as the great purring car arrived at the entrance below the window, shiny and luxurious, bright with chromium trimmings. Its top was down and the sunshine glanced from every polished point. There was about it a nonchalant air of tremendous power, and Constance could not help but admire the beautiful thing.

Doris, bright faced and apologetic for going, kissed her lightly and tripped downstairs. Constance saw the young man help her in. He was good-looking, there was no denying that, but the very tilt of his hat denoted recklessness and a kind of disregard of conventionalities. He wasn’t Doris’s kind.

Doris looked up and waved a blithe farewell; the car darted off with a roar and became a mere speck in the distance of the road that wound away below the campus.

Constance turned away from the window and looked around her blankly. She had come to a brief spot where there was nothing she actually had to do that minute, and there came the thought that college life was almost over. It would be easy to be melancholy about it, but she didn’t intend to give in to any more doldrums. So she caught up an armful of books to be returned to the library and hurried downstairs.

There were plenty of the girls around the campus, gathered in little groups. Three of them invited her to play tennis, a fourth summoned her to join a hike, two more begged her to go into town on a shopping trip and help them pick out new dresses.

But Constance did not feel inclined to join any of them. She had a sudden desire to rest herself. She decided to get a good book from the library and just lie down and read, perhaps take a nap and be fresh for the evening. She knew the evening would be a fun one. Several men friends were driving up from New York.

So presently she wended her way to the library, returned her armful of books, and set herself to find the right book to read herself to sleep with.

She had browsed for half an hour from shelf to shelf before she came on the book she wanted, a new novel, a bestseller just a few weeks before. What luck to find it in! That couldn’t have happened if it were not so near to commencement, with so many duties and a gorgeous day out besides.

She took her book and started for the dormitory, but several classmates idled in just then and they paused to talk together, luxuriating in the fact that there were no quiet rules to be kept in the library today. It was almost another half hour before Constance turned away from them and started toward the door again, resolved to get her resting time now at all cost.

But just at that instant a young freshman rushed in at the door calling for her, her face white and distraught, her eyes wide with panic.

“Is Constance Courtland here?” she called out before her eyes had accustomed themselves from the out-of-doors to the dim light of the library.

“Yes?” said Constance with apprehension in her voice. Her hand flew to her throat involuntarily. “What’s the matter, Nan?”

“Oh, come quick, won’t you? It’s Doris. She’s hurt! Terribly hurt! The doctor says she can’t possibly live but a few hours and she wants you right away, Constance.”

“But how did it happen?” chorused the other girls in horror.

“They went over the cliff!” said the breathless freshman. “They say Casper Coulter was killed instantly, and there isn’t a particle of hope for Doris!”

The freshman was panting and stopping for breath. Constance seemed rooted to the floor, her face gone white and stricken. For an instant her head reeled and she felt as if she were falling.