`` She 's the sort of girl who can take a joke . I 've seen her eyes shine over tricks we 've played on the professors before now . She 'll just laugh . Besides , she does n't like the Old Fellow a bit . I know from the way she acts with him . She 's always so cool and stiff when he 's about , not a bit like she is with the other professors . '' Well , Ruggles wrote the letter . At first he tried to pass it off on me as his own composition . But I know a few little things , and one of them is that Ruggles could n't have made up that letter any more than he could have written a sonnet . I told him so , and made him own up . He had a copy of an old letter that had been written to his sister by her young man . I suppose Ruggles had stolen it , but there is no use inquiring too closely into these things . Anyhow , that letter just filled the bill . It was beautifully expressed . Ruggles 's sister 's young man must have possessed lots of ability . He was an English professor , something like Micky , so I suppose he was extra good at it . He started in by telling her how much he loved her , and what an angel of beauty and goodness he had always thought her ; how unworthy he felt himself of her and how little hope he had that she could ever care for him ; and he wound up by imploring her to tell him if she could possibly love him a little bit and all that sort of thing . I copied the letter out on heliotrope paper in my best imitation of the Old Fellow 's handwriting and signed it , `` Yours devotedly and imploringly , George Osborne . '' Then we mailed it that very evening . The next evening the Cad girls gave a big reception in the Assembly Hall to an Academy alumna who was visiting the Greek professor 's wife .
It was the smartest event XXXXX the term and everybody was there -- students and faculty and , of course , Sylvia Grant .
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