twenty taciturn strangers. Winona bore for awhile with the stony
silence, then--rather frightened at the sound of her own voice--she
announced:

"I suppose we're all going in for this same exam.!" It was a trite
commonplace, but it broke the ice. Everybody looked relieved. The
atmosphere seemed to clear.

"Yes, we're all going in--that's right enough," replied a ruddy-haired
girl in spectacles, "but there are only two scholarships, so nineteen of
us are bound to fail--that's logic and mathematics and all the rest of
it."

"Whew! A nice cheering prospect. Wish they'd put us out of our misery at
once!" groaned a stout girl with a long fair pigtail.

"I'm all upset!" shivered another.

"It's like a game of musical chairs," suggested a fourth. "We're all
scrambling for the same thing, and some are bound to be out of it."

The ruddy-haired girl laughed nervously.

"Suppose we've got to take our sporting luck!" she murmured.

"If nineteen are sure to lose, two are sure to win at any rate," said
Winona. "That's logic and mathematics and all the rest of it, too!"

"Right you are! That's a more cheering creed! It doesn't do to cry
'Miserere me' too soon!" chirped a jolly-looking dark-eyed girl with a