purchases until,

   as Vi said dolefully, all their money was gone except enough to buy several plates of ice cream apiece.

   They were standing just outside the store where their last purchases had been made when Billie, looking down the street, gave a cry of delight.

   “Look who’s coming!” she exclaimed.

   “It’s the boys!” cried Vi. “Mercy, girls, we might just as well have spent the rest of our money, the boys will treat us to the ice cream.”

   “Goodness, Vi! do you want to spend your money whether you get anything you really need or wish for or not?” inquired Billie, with a little gasp.

   “What in the world is money for if not to spend?” asked Vi, making big and innocent eyes at Billie.

   Just then the boys came within speaking distance.

   “Well, this is what I call luck!” exclaimed Ferd Stowing.

   “Yes,” added Teddy, putting his hand in his pocket, “just hear the money jingle. A nice big check from Dad in just appreciation of his absent son! What do you girls say to an ice-cream spree? No less than three apiece, with all this unwonted wealth.”

   “Ice cream? I should say!” was Billie’s somewhat slangy acceptance.

   “Teddy,” suddenly asked Laura, “how does it come that you have any money left from Dad’s check?”

   “Check came just as we left the Academy, Captain Shelling cashed it for me, and we have just reached town.”

   “Oh! Well, maybe I’ll find one, too, when we reach Three Towers.”

   “So that’s it, is it, sister mine? Envy!”

   After that they ate ice cream to repletion, and at last the girls decided that there was nothing much left to do but to go back to the school.

   It was just as well that they had made this decision, for the sun was beginning to sink in the west and the supper hour at Three Towers Hall was rather early. As they started toward home, having said good-bye to the boys, the girls quickened their pace.

   It was not till they were nearing the path which, to Billie at least, had been surrounded by a mysterious 

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