At the table were several rivals of Bridgette’s in the dress competition, and an undercurrent of tension prevailed despite the girls’ cordial relationships. Privately, everyone agreed that Bridgette’s design would top the list of Most Beautiful Designs and win the coveted invitation to fly out to Edith Head’s studio in California for a chat. This consensus was in contrast to earlier reservations about her choice of style, color, and fabric. The selections were considered unpatriotic. Experts had long agreed that during wartime, fashion elements should be restrained, refined, and unadorned, but Bridgette’s view differed. Color and luxury of fabric and embellishments were a great foil against the ugliness of war, she maintained. The instructor had shaken her head at her most gifted student’s obstinacy, but it was Bridgette’s decision, and she had given her the go-ahead to make the biggest mistake of her four-year tenure at Stephens College.

Now it appeared that Bridgette’s elegant, unabashedly glamorous scarlet jersey creation might win the day against the gowns of the other girls who had heeded the established mantra. Bridgette had experienced many competitions—debate, chess, sports—and had learned never to anticipate victory before it happened. Something could always come along to gum up the works, and sneaking a taste of dessert before it was served robbed it of its full flavor later, as her grandmother would caution. So today she concentrated on another “last” of her college experiences. Never again would she eat the dining hall’s tasteless rice pudding.

Talk centered on the speculated arrival of Edith Head and how long she would stay. Bridgette noticed that Gladys, usually the more talkative of the pair, had sunk into a strange, reflective mood, made more puzzling by her sudden move to get up from the table.

“Where are you going?” Bridgette asked.

“To the Pennant to see that all is in order with my family’s rooms. I’ll see you later.”

Bridgette stared after her, surprised that she had not been asked to go along. Her roommate hardly went anywhere without her, and now that Bridgette’s packing was done, she would have enjoyed getting off campus as a break from all the family activity that made her wish that her grandmother had come.

After lunch, Bridgette decided to make a last pass by the campus post office. After today, the combinations to the seniors’ mailboxes would be changed, and they’d no longer have access to them. Unexpectedly, she’d received two letters, an official-looking one with a return address in Washington, D.C., and, equally surprising, one from Steve Hammett, a classmate and her tormentor from junior high school, the guy responsible for her hated nickname, Slugger. She opened Steve’s first.

Dear Bridgette,