Patty’s sunny disposition and invariable good humour exerted a beneficial influence on Lorraine, though the effects were slow and gradual. But the girl herself was trying to be more optimistic in her general attitude toward life, and to a degree she was succeeding.

But one afternoon she came up to Patty’s apartment to sit with her for a while, and the expression of her face was quite as dark and gloomy as of yore.

Patty noticed this at once, but did not remark it; instead, she began chatting in a merry vein, hoping by this means to cheer up her dismal caller. But it was of no avail, for Lorraine evidently had a trouble of some sort on her mind.

At last she exclaimed, in a stormy way, “I just hate Elise Farrington!”

“Oho,” thought Patty to herself, “so that’s the trouble, is it?”

But aloud she only said: “Why do you hate her? She doesn’t hate you.”

“Yes she does. She just snubs me right and left, and she doesn’t invite me to her Casino, or anything.”

“Now look here, Lorraine, you are unjust and unfair. Elise doesn’t snub you, or if she does, it’s because you don’t give her a chance to be nice to you. You’re my friend, but Elise is my friend, too, and I want fair play all around. I’ve seen you with Elise Farrington, and you snub her worse than she does you; and I don’t wonder she doesn’t invite you to see her!”

Patty didn’t often scold Lorraine as hard as this, but her sense of justice was aroused, and she determined to give it full play for once.

Lorraine began to cry, but Patty knew they were not tears of repentance, so she went on:

“It’s perfectly silly, Lorraine, the way you act. Here you might just as well belong to the Grigs, and have lots of good times; but just because you prefer to consider yourself snubbed at every tack and turn, when nobody means anything of the sort at all, of course you can’t belong to a club whose only object is to be merry and gay.”

“I don’t want to belong to your old Grigs! I think they’re silly, and I hate ’em all!”

“You do want to belong, and you don’t think they’re silly! Now look here, Lorraine, I’m just about at the end of my patience. I’ve done everything I could for you, to make you more like the other girls, and though you’re nicer in some ways than you used to be, yet you’re so foolishly sensitive that you make yourself a lot of trouble that I can’t help. I don’t mind telling you, now that we’re on the subject, that the girls are all ready to take you in as a member of the Grigs, if you’ll be nice and pleasant. But we don’t want any disagreeable members, or any members who insist on thinking themselves snubbed when nobody had any such intention.”

Lorraine stopped crying and looked at Patty with a peculiar expression.

“Do you really mean,” she said, “that you’d take me into the Grigs if I were not so bad-tempered?”

“Well, since you choose to put it that way, that’s just about what I do mean,” said Patty, politely ignoring the fact that Lorraine had declared she didn’t want to be a Grig.

“Well, then I will be better-natured, and stop being so hateful to the girls. Just make me a Grig and I’ll show you.”

“No, Lorraine, that won’t do; you’ve got to prove yourself first. Now, I’ll tell you what—you be real nice to Elise and make her like you, or rather, let her like you, and then there’ll be no trouble about getting you into the society.”

“All right,” said Lorraine, hopefully, “but what can I do? Elise won’t speak to me now.”

“Oh, pshaw! yes, she will. I’ll guarantee that she’ll meet you half-way. Now here’s a plan; you must do something like this. Get your mother to let you invite Elise to come to see you some afternoon, and then invite the Harts and me, too, and have a real jolly afternoon. They’ll all come, and then if you’re nice and pleasant, as you know perfectly well how to be, the girls can’t help liking you. Oh, Lorraine, you’re such a goose! It’s a great deal easier to go through the world happy and smiling than to mope along, glum and cross-grained.”

“It is for you, Patty, because you’re born happy, and you can’t help staying so. But I’m different.”

“Well then un-different yourself as soon as you can. It’s silly—that’s what it is—it’s worse than silly—it’s wicked not to be happy and gay. I’ve fooled with you long enough, and now I’m going to make you behave yourself! Laugh now, laugh at once!”

Patty’s gaiety was infectious, and Lorraine laughed because she couldn’t help it. Then they fell to making plans for the little afternoon party, and Lorraine’s spirits rose until there was nothing to choose between the merriment of the two girls.

“And I’ll tell you what,” said Patty; “we’re making a scrap-book for Roger Farrington; he’s in the hospital, you know. And if you will have some funny pictures or stories ready to put in it, you needn’t worry any further about Elise’s liking you. She’s the most grateful girl for little things I ever saw.”

“Oh, I can do that,” said Lorraine; “I’d love to.”

Before Lorraine invited the girls to visit her, Patty had talked with each one and made them promise to accept the invitation, and do all that they could to help along the good cause, which, as she explained, was a truly Griggish one.

So the four girls went to Lorraine’s one afternoon, all in a merry mood. The little party was a great success, for Lorraine at her best was a charming hostess, and her mother was very kind and hospitable.

Each girl brought some contribution for Roger’s scrap-book, and Patty was secretly delighted when she found that Lorraine’s donation was quite the jolliest of all.

Lorraine was clever with her pencil, and with her needle, and she had designed some funny little football players by cutting pictures of football celebrities from the papers. These she had dressed up in bits of real material, had made the footballs of real leather, and made tiny silk flags in college colours.

Elise was delighted beyond all measure at the clever little figures, and when Lorraine, a little bashfully, offered a poem she had written to go with them, the girls all declared she was a genius. It was a humor............