CHAPTER XVII“HAF ANYBODY SEEN MY UMBREL?”
It was the last week in February, and in a few days the school dance was to be given. One afternoon a dozen or more girls were gathered in Ethel’s room to see her dress which had been sent out from town. It was as dainty an affair as one could wish to see, and many were the admiring glances cast upon it, and many the praises it received. Possibly it was a trifle elaborate for a girl of fifteen, for it was made of delicate white chiffon over pale yellow satin, and exquisitely embroidered with fine silver threads. But Ethel looked very lovely in it as she preened herself before the mirror, and was fully aware of the fact.
“What are you going to wear, Toinette?” she asked.
“I’ve never worn anything but white yet,” answered Toinette. “At Miss Carter’s all my dresses were ordered by Miss Emeline, and she said I ought not to wear anything else till I was eighteen. I hope Miss Preston won’t say the same.”
“I should think you would have hated to have the teachers say just what you must wear, as well as what you must study. Didn’t your father ever send you any clothes?”
“Papa was too far away to know what I wore or did,” answered Toinette, rather sadly.
“Aren’t you glad he is home again?” asked quiet little Helen Burgess, who somehow always managed to say soothing things when one felt sort of ruffled up without knowing just why.
“You had better believe I am!” was the emphatic reply. “What will you wear, Helen?”
“The same thing I always wear, I guess. I haven’t much choice in the matter, you know.”
Toinette colored slightly at her thoughtlessremark, for she had not paused to think before speaking. All the girls knew that Helen’s purse was a very slender one, and that it was only by self-sacrifice and close economy that her parents were able to keep her at such an expensive school. She made no secret of her lack of money, but worked away bravely and cheerfully, always sunny, always happy, with the enviable faculty of invariably saying the right thing at the right time. She had pronounced artistic tendencies, and Miss Preston was anxious to encourage them in every possible way. Her great desire was to go to Europe and there see the originals of the famous paintings of which she read. Each year Miss Preston went abroad and took with her several of the girls whose parents could afford such indulgences for them, and Helen longed to be one of them, although she never for a moment hoped to be.
She did really remarkable work for a girl of her age, and was improving all the time, but the trip over the sea seemed as far off as a trip tothe moon. Toinette was somewhat of a dilettante, and pottered away with her water-colors with more or less success. But she admired good work, and was quick to see that Helen was a hard student, and to respect her for it. Although so unlike in disposition, as well as position, a warm regard had sprung up between them, and Toinette spent many hours watching Helen work away at her drawing. The girl’s ambition was to illustrate, and there was hardly a girl in the school who had not posed for her, and the drawings in her sketch-book were excellent.
Toinette had never been taught to think much about others, and so it is not surprising that, while she admired Helen, and wished that she could have those things she so longed for, it never occurred to her that perhaps there were other and more fortunate girls who might have helped a trifle if they chose to do so. That she, herself, had it within her power to do it never entered her head till the girls began to talk about their new dresses, and what put itthere then would be hard to tell. Nevertheless, come it did, and when she heard Helen speak so composedly of wearing to the school dance,theevent of the season, in their eyes, the same dress which had done service for many a little entertainment given through the winter, and which gave unmistakable signs of having done so, she realized for the first time what it must mean to be deprived of those things which she had always accepted as a matter of course.
Still, no definite plans took shape in her head regarding it, and it is quite possible that none might ever have done so had not something occurred within a short time which seemed to be the hinge upon which her whole after-life swung.
As the girls were in the midst of their chatter about the new gowns a tap came at the door, and Fraulein Palme looked in to ask:
“Haf anyone seen my umbrel? I haf hunt eferywhere for him, and can’t see him anywhere.”
“No, Fraulein, we haven’t seen it,” answered several voices.
“Where did you last have it?” asked Ruth.
“Right away in my room a little while before I am ready to go out. I go down to the post-office and must get wet without him.”
Two or three of the girls went into the hall to look for the missing umbrella, and others went back to Fraulein’s room with her to make a more exhaustive search. But without success.
“Have you more than one?” asked Edith.
“No, it is but one I haf got. It is very funnee,” and poor Fraulein looked sorely perplexed.
“Take mine, Fraulein. Yours will turn up when you least expect it,” said Toinette.
“What did it look like, Fraulein?” asked Cicely.
“Chust like thees,” was the astonishing answer, as absent-minded Fraulein held forth the missing umbrella, which all that time she had held tightly clasped in her hand, and which had been the cause of Edith’s question as to whether she had more than one, for she supposed, of course, thatthe one Fraulein was so tightly holding must either be one she did not care to carry, or else one she was about to return to someone from whom she had probably borrowed it.
The shout which was raised at her reply speedily brought poor Fraulein back to her senses, and murmuring:
“Ach, so! I think I comeveruckt,” she hurried off down the hall with the girls’ laughter still ringing in her ears.
CHAPTER XVIIITHE LITTLE HINGE
The day before the dance was to be given Toinette wrote her second letter, arguing that when everybody else had so much to occupy their thoughts they would have little time to notice other people’s doings, and the letter could be mailed without exciting comment. Waiting until the very last moment, she ran down to the mail-basket to slip the letter in it unobserved. As ill-luck would have it, Miss Preston also had a letter to be slipped in at the last moment, and she and Toinette came face to face. It was too late to retreat, for the letter was in her hand in plain view, so, forced into an awkward position, she made a bad matter worse. Dropping the letter quickly into the basket, she said:
“Just a note for papa about something I want for the dance to-morrow, Miss Preston; I didn’t think you’d care, and I hadn’t time to do it earlier,” and, with flaming cheeks, she turned to go away.
“Wait just one moment, dear,” said Miss Preston, “I’ve something to say to you. Walk down to my room with me, please,” and she slipped her arm about the girl’s waist.
No more was needed, and all the suspicion and rebellion in Toinette’s nature rose up to do battle with—windmills. It was a hard young face that looked defiantly at Miss Preston.
“Toinette, dear, I want to have a little talk with you,” she said, as she locked the door of her sitting-room, and, seating herself upon the divan, drew Toinette down beside her.
Toinette never changed her expression, but looked straight before her with a most uncompromising stare.
“You said just now that you did not think Iwould care if you sent a note to your father; why should I, sweetheart?”
It must have been a stubborn heart, indeed, which could resist Miss Preston’s sweet tone.
“Oh, I don’t know, but teachers always seem to mind every little thing one does,” replied Toinette, sulkily.
“It seems to me that this would be entirely too ‘little a thing’ for a teacher or anyone else to mind. Don’t you think so yourself?”
“Well, of course, I didn’t think you would mind simply because I wrote to papa, but because I posted the letter without first letting you read it,” answered Toinette.
Now, indeed, was Miss Preston learning something new, and not even a child could have questioned that her surprise was genuine when she exclaimed:
“Read your letters, my dear little girl! What are you saying?” and a slight flush overspread her refined face.
It was now Toinette’s turn to be surprised as she asked:
“Isn’t that the rule here, Miss Preston?”
“Is it anywhere? I can hardly believe it. One’s correspondence is a very sacred thing, Toinette, and I would as soon be guilty of listening at another person’s door as of reading a letter intended for another’s eyes. Oh, my little girl, what mischief has been at work here?”
While Miss Preston was speaking Toinette had risen to her feet, her eyes shining like stars, and her color coming and going rapidly. Now, taking both Miss Preston’s hands in her own, she said, in a voice which quivered with excitement:
“Is thattrulytrue, Miss Preston? Aren’t the girls’ letters ever read? Haven’t mine been?Doyou trust me like that?”
Miss Preston looked the girl fairly in the eyes as she answered:
“I trust you as I trust the others, because I feel you to be a gentlewoman, and, as such, you wouldbe as reluctant to do anything liable to cast discredit upon yourself as I would be to have you. I do not wish my girls to fear but to love me, with all their hearts, and to trust me as I trust them. I do not expect you to be perfect; we all make mistakes; I make many, but we can help each other, dear, and remember this: ‘Love casteth out fear.’ Try to love me, my little girl, and to feel that I am your friend; I want so much to be.”
Miss Preston’s voice was very sweet and appealing, and as she spoke Toinette’s eyes grew limpid. Miss Preston still held her hands, and, as she finished speaking, the girl dropped upon her knees and clasped her arms about her waist, buried her face in her lap and burst into a storm of sobs. All the pent-up feeling, the longing, the struggle, the yearning for tenderness of the past lonely years was finding an outlet in the bitter, bitter sobs which shook her slight frame.
Although Miss Preston knew comparatively little of the girl’s former life, she had learnedenough from Mr. Reeve, and observed enough in the girl herself, to understand that this outburst was not wholly the result of what had just passed between them. So, gently stroking the pretty golden hair, she wisely waited for the grief to spend itself before she resumed her talk, and, when the poor little trembling figure was more composed, said:
“My poor little Toinette, let us begin a brand new leaf to-day—‘thee and me,’ as the Quakers so prettily put it. Let us try to believe that even though I have spent thirty more years on this big world than you have, that we can still be good friends, and sympathize with each other either in sunshine or shadow. To do this two things are indispensible: confidence and love. And we can never have the latter without first winning the former. Remember this, dear, I shall never doubt you. Whatever happens, you may rest firm in the conviction that I shall always accept your word when it is given. Our self-respect suffers when we are doubted, and one’s self-respect is a very precious thing, and not to be lightly tampered with.”
“LET US BEGIN A BRAND NEW LEAF TO-DAY.”
“LET US BEGIN A BRAND NEW LEAF TO-DAY.”
She now drew Toinette back to the couch beside her, put her arm about her waist, and let the tired head rest upon her shoulder. The girl had ceased to sob, but looked worn and weary. Miss Preston snuggled her close and waited for her to speak, feeling sure that more was in her heart, and that, in a nature such as she felt Toinette’s to be, it would be impossible for her to rest content until all doubts, all self-reproach could be put behind her.
She sat perfectly still for a long time, her hands clasped in her lap, and her big, brown eyes, into which had crept a wonderfully soft expression, looking far away beyond the walls of Miss Preston’s sitting-room, far beyond the bedroom next it, and off to some lonely, unsatisfied years, when she had lived in a sort of truce with all about her, never knowing just when hostilities might be renewed. It had acted upon the girl’s sensitive nature much as a chestnut-prickleacts upon the average mortal; a nasty, little, irritating thing, hard to discover, a scrap of a thing when found—if, indeed, it does not succeed in eluding one altogether—and so insignificant that one wonders how it could cause such discomfort. But it is those miserable little chestnut-prickles that are hardest to bear in this life, and so warp one’s character that it is often unfitted to bear the heavier burdens which must come into all lives sooner or later.
CHAPTER XIX“FATAL OR FATED ARE MOMENTS”
“Nobody has ever spoken to me as you have, Miss Preston,” Toinette began presently, “and I can’t tell you how I feel. Maybe heaven will be better, but I don’t believe I shall ever feel any happier than I feel this minute. It seems as though I’d been living in a sort of prison, all shut up in the dark, and that now I am out in the sunshine and as free as the birds. But I must tell you something more: I can’t rest content unless I do. The letter I posted to-day wasn’t to papa, I sent it to Howard Elting, in Branton, and it isn’t the first I’ve written him, either. I didn’t lie about the other one, Miss Preston; I was ready to mail it, but lost it; I don’t know how. Somebody must have found itand posted it, for he got it and answered it, and I was so puzzled over it that I wrote again. That was the letter you saw me post. Now, that is the truth, and I know that you believe me.”
Toinette had spoken very rapidly, scarcely pausing for breath, and when she finished gave a relieved little sigh and looked Miss Preston squarely in the eyes. Truly, her self-respect was regained.
Will some of my readers say: “What a tempest in a teapot?” To many this may seem a very trivial affair, but how small a thing can influence our lives! A breath, the passing of a summer shower, may help or hinder plans which alter our entire lives. And Miss Preston was wise enough to understand it. Here was a beautiful soul given for a time into her keeping. Now, at the period of its keenest receptive powers, a delicate and sensitive thing needing very gentle handling.
Stroking the head again resting upon hershoulder, as though it had found a safe and happy haven after having been tossed about upon a troubled sea, she said, quietly:
“I posted the letter, dear; I found it in the hall where it had been dropped; it never occurred to me that there was any cause for concealment; the girls all correspond with their friends; it is an understood thing. I recognized your writing, and, as I had friends at Branton, I wrote to ask if they knew the person written to. They replied that they did, and told me who he was. Knowing how few friends you have, I wrote to this boy asking him to come to our dance to-morrow night, because I thought the little surprise might give you pleasure, and you would be glad to welcome an old friend. Does it please you, my little girl?”
“Oh, Miss Preston!” was all Toinette said, but those three words meant a great deal.
The dressing-bell now rang, and Toinette sprang up with rather a dismayed look. As though she interpreted it, Miss Preston said:
“You are in no condition to meet the other girls to-night, dear. They cannot understand your feelings, and, without meaning to be unkind or curious, would ask questions which it would embarrass you to answer. You are nervous and unstrung, so lie down on my couch and I will see that your dinner is brought up. I shall say to the other girls that you are not feeling well, and that it would be better not to disturb you.” Then, going into her bedroom, Miss Preston quickly made her own toilet. She had just finished it when the chimes called all to dinner, and, stooping over Toinette, she kissed her softly and slipped from the room.
Some very serious thoughts passed through Toinette’s head during the ensuing fifteen minutes, and some resolutions were formed which were held to as long as she lived.
A tap at the door, and a maid entered with a dainty dinner. Placing a little stand close to the couch, she put the tray upon it, and thenasked: “Can I do anything more for you, Miss Toinette?”
“No, thank you, Helma. This is very tempting.”
When Miss Preston came to her room an hour later she found the tray quite empty, and Toinette fast asleep. Arranging the couch pillows more comfortably, and throwing a warm puff over the sleeping girl, she whispered, softly: “Poor little maid, your battle with Apollyon was short and sharp, but, thank God, you’ve conquered, even at the expense of an exhausted mind and weary body.”
It was nearly midnight when Toinette opened her eyes to see Miss Preston warmly wrapped in her dressing-gown, and seated before the fire reading. The lamp was carefully screened from Toinette, who could not at first realize what had happened, or why she was there, but Miss Preston’s voice recalled her to herself.
“Do you feel rested, dear?” she asked. “Don’t try to go to your room; just undressand cuddle down in my bed with me to-night; I’ve brought in your night-dress.”
Toinette did not answer, but, walking over to Miss Preston, just rested her cheek against hers for a moment. Twenty minutes later she was fast asleep in her good friend’s bed.
The following day all was bustle and excitement at Sunny Bank, for great preparations were being made for the dance in the evening, and understanding how much pleasure it gave the girls to feel that they were of some assistance, she let them fly about like so many grigs, helping or hindering, as it happened.
They brought down all the pretty trifles from their rooms, piled up sofa pillows till the couches resembled a Turk’s palace; arranged the flowers, and rearranged them, till poor Miss Preston began to fear that there would be nothing left of them. However, it was an exceedingly attractive house which was thrown open to her guests at eight o’clock that evening, and the girls had had no small share in making it so.
A very complete understanding seemed to exist between Toinette and Miss Preston now, for, although no words were spoken, none were needed; just an exchange of glances told that two hearts were very happy that night, for love and confidence had come to dwell within them.
CHAPTER XX“NOW TREAD WE A MEASURE.”
Shall we ever grow too old to recall the pleasure of our school dances? Then lights seem brighter, toilets more ravishing, music sweeter, our partners more fascinating, and the supper more tempting than ever before or after.
The house was brilliantly lighted from top to bottom, excepting in such cosy corners as were specially conducive to confidential chats, and in these softly shaded lamps cast a fairy-like light.
Miss Preston, dressed in black velvet, with some rich old lace to enhance its charms, received her guests in the great hall, some of the older girls receiving with her.
There were ten or more girls who were takingspecial courses, and these were styled “parlor boarders,” and at the end of the school term would enter society. Consequently, this dance was looked upon as a preliminary step for the one to follow, and the girls regarded it as a sort of “golden mile-stone” in their lives, which marked off the point at which “the brook and river meet.”
A prettier, happier lot of girls could hardly have been found, and none looked lovelier, or happier, than Toinette. Her dress, a soft, creamy white chiffon, admirably suited to her golden coloring, had been sent to her by her father, whose taste was unerring. No matter how many miles of this big globe divided them, he never forgot her needs, and, if unable to supply them himself, took good care that some one else should do so. So the dress had arrived the night before, and Miss Preston had been able to give her another pleasant surprise for the dance. And now she looked as the lilies of the field for fairness.
She was whirling away upon her partner’s arm, when, chancing to glance toward the door, she beheld something which brought her to an abrupt stand-still, much to her partner’s amazement. Miss Preston stood in the doorway, and, standing beside her, with one hand resting lightly upon his hip and the other raised a little above his head, and resting against the door-casing, stood a tall, remarkably handsome man. His attitude was unstudied, but brought out to perfection the fine lines of his figure.
Hastily exclaiming: “Oh, please, excuse me, or else come with me,” Toinette glided between the whirling figures, and, forgetful of all else, cried out in a joyous voice: “Papa, papa Clayton, wheredidyou come from?”
It was so like the childish voice he had loved to hear so long ago, that he started with pleasure.
During the brief holiday Toinette had spent with him he had missed the spontaneity he had known in the little child, and, without being able to analyze it, felt that something was wantingin the girl. She had been sweet and winning, yet under it all had been a manner quite incomprehensible to him, as though she did not feel quite sure of her position in his affections. Her laugh had lacked the true girlish ring, and her conversation with him seemed guarded, as though she had never quite spoken all her thoughts.
He had been immeasurably distressed by it, for he could not understand the cause, and bitterly reproached himself for not being better acquainted with his own child. In the merry girl who now stood before him, her eyes shining, her cheeks flushed with excitement, her voice so joyous, he saw no trace of the listless one he had placed in Miss Preston’s charge two months before.
Slipping one arm about her, he snuggled her close to his side, as he answered:
“A blue-coated biped left a good, substantial hint at my office not long since, and this is what came of following it.”
“Youdid it! I’m sure of it,” laughed Toinette, shaking her finger at Miss Preston, as the latter said: “I leave you to a livelier entertainer, now, Mr. Reeve, while I go to look after some of my guests who may not be so fortunately situated,” and she slipped away, Toinette calling after her: “You are responsible for most of the nice things which happen here. Oh, daddy,” dropping unconsciously into the old childish pet name, “I’ve such stacks of things to tell you. But, excuse me just one second, while I find a partner for that boy I’ve left stranded high and dry over there; doesn’t he look miserable? Then I’ll come back,” and, kissing her hand gaily, she ran off. Returning a moment or two later, she said:
“There! he’s all fixed, and is sure to have a good time with Ethel and Lou; they’re not a team, but a four-in-hand. Now, come and have a dance with me, and then we’ll go off all by ourselves and have the cosiest time you ever dreamed of. I feel so proud to have you all tomyself,” she added, as they glided away to the soft strains of the music, “so sort of grown-up and grand with such a handsome partner.”
“Hear! hear! Do you want to make me vain? I haven’t been accustomed to hearing such barefaced compliments. They make me blush.”
“I really believe theydo,” answered Toinette, throwing back her head to get a better look at him, and laughing softly when she saw a slight flush upon his face. “Never mind, it is all in the family, you know.”
“Perhaps I have other reasons for feeling a trifle elated,” he said, as the dance came to an end and he followed Toinette to one of the cozy corners. Springing up among the cushions, she patted them invitingly, and said:
“Come, sit down here beside me, and let me tell you all about the loveliest time of my life. Oh, daddy, Idoso love to be here, and you don’t know how good Miss Preston is to me. She is good to us all, but, somehow the other girls don’t seem to need so much setting straight asIhave. I think I must have been all kinked up in little hard knots before I came here, and Miss Preston has begun to untie them. She hasn’t got all untied yet, but I feel so sort of loosened up and easy that everything seems lots more comfortable.”
“I FEEL SO SORT OF GROWN UP AND GRAND.”
“I FEEL SO SORT OF GROWN UP AND GRAND.”
Clayton Reeve did not smile at Toinette’s odd way of explaining her feelings. He knew it to be a fourteen-year-old girl who spoke, and that her thoughts, to be natural, must be put into her own words.
On she rambled, telling one thing after another, and, while they were talking, Helen Burgess stopped near their snuggery. It was too dimly lighted for her to discover them, and the next thing they knew they were unwitting eavesdroppers, for Helen was talking very earnestly to one of her boon companions, a day-pupil at the school, and one of the brightest in it, but, like Helen, not embarrassed with riches. For some time the girls had been saving their smallallowances toward the purchase of cameras, but so slowly did the sums accumulate that it was rather discouraging for them. They were now talking about their respective ways of procuring the sums of money needed, and the trifle they had managed to save, and the small amounts they earned in one way or another, to augment the original sums, seemed so paltry to Toinette, who never stopped to ask whence came the five-dollar bills so regularly sent her each week, and who, had a fancy entered her head for one, would have walked out and bought a camera very much as she would have bought a paper of pins.
CHAPTER XXICONSPIRATORS
Mr. Reeve would have risen from his snug corner and discovered himself to the girls, but Toinette laid her finger upon her lips to enjoin silence, and, although he could not quite understand her desire to play eavesdropper, he complied. From the subject of the cameras the girls went on to Helen’s work in the art class, for Jean was much interested in that also, and they often built air-castles about the wonderful things they would do when that fabulous “stone ship” should sail safely into port. They talked earnestly for girls of thirteen and fifteen, and Mr. Reeve could not fail to be impressed by the strength of purpose they seemed to possess, and, having a good bit of stick-to-ativenesshimself, admired it in others. Moreover, he had been forced to make his own way in life when young, and could sympathize with other aspiring souls.
Presently the two girls moved away, and then Toinette whispered: “I don’t know what you think of me for making you play ‘Paul Pry,’ but I had a reason for it, and now I’ll tell you what it was.”
“I inferred as much, so kept mum.”
“Well, you see, since I’ve been here I’ve waked up a little, and, somehow, have begun to think about other people, and wonder if they were happy. At Miss Carter’s school everybody just seemed to think about themselves, or, if they thought of anybody else, it was generally to wonder how they could get ahead of them in some way. But here it is all so different, and everybody seems to try to find out what they can do to make someone else happy. I can’t begin to tell you how it is done, because I don’t know myself; only itis, and it makes youfeel sort of happy all over,” said Toinette, trying to put into words that subtle something which makes us feel at peace with all mankind, and little realizing that its cause lay right within herself; for a sense of having done one’s very best and a clear conscience are wonderful rosy spectacles through which to see life.
“Go on, I’m keenly interested, and these little confidences are very delightful,” said her father, with an encouraging nod and smile.
“So I began to want to do little things, too, and, do you know, daddy, you’d be really surprised if you knew what a lot of ways there are of making the girls happy if you only take the trouble to look for them. For instance, there is Helen Burgess, the larger of the girls you saw just now: we have become real good friends, and she is very clever, and draws beautifully. But she has so little to do with that she can’t afford to get the things the other girls have to work with, nor have the advantages they have. She and Jean have been trying ever so long to getcameras, for they think that they could take pretty views of Montcliff and sell them to the people who come here in the summer, and I’m sure they could, too. It does not make so much difference to Jean, for, although she isn’t rich, she isn’t exactly poor, either, you know, and has a good many nice things, but Helen never seems to have any. So I thought I’d have a little talk with you and get you to send out a cute little camera for each of them and never let them know where they came from. Wouldn’t that be great fun? But I want to pay for them. You can use ten dollars of my money, and not send me my allowance for two weeks; I’ve got enough to last.”
“And what will my poverty-stricken lassie do meantime?” asked Mr. Reeve.
“Oh, she is not so poverty-stricken as you think,” laughed Toinette. “She won’t suffer. And then I wanted to ask you if there wasn’t some way of helping Helen in her art work. She wants so much to go abroad with Miss Preston, buthas no more idea of ever being able to do so than she has of going to the moon. What would it cost, papa? Isn’t there some way of bringing it about? Couldn’t you have a talk with Miss Preston and find out all about it, and then we could plan something, maybe.”
Toinette had become very earnest as she talked, and was now leaning toward her father, her hands clasped in her lap, and her expressive face alive with enthusiasm.
Mr. Reeve hated to spoil the pretty picture, but said, in the interested tone so comforting when used by older people in speaking to young folk: “I am sure we can evolve some plan. I shall be very glad to speak to Miss Preston before I return to the city, and haven’t the slightest doubt that great things will come of it.”
“How lovely! You’re just a darling! I’m going to hug you right here behind the curtains!” cried Toinette, as she sprung up and clasped her arms about his neck.
“Haven’t you one or two more favors you’d like to ask?” said Mr. Reeve, suggestively.
“No, not another one, just now,” she answered, laughing softly. “Too many might turn your head, and mine, too. But it is so good to have you home once more. You don’t know how lonely I’ve been without you, daddy. There wasn’t anyone in the world who cared two straws for me till you came back and I came here. But I’ve got you now, and I’m not going to let you go very soon again, I can tell you. You are too precious, and we are going to have lovely times together by-and-by when I grow up, aren’t we?”
“We are not going to wait till then, sweetheart; we are going to begin right off, this very minute. I can’t afford to waste any more precious time; too much has been wasted already,” he said, as he raised the pretty face and kissed it, and then, drawing her arm through his, added: “Now let me do the honors. Introduce me to your friends, and let me see if seven years’knocking about this old world has made me forget the ‘Quips, and Cranks, and Wanton Wiles, Nods, and Becks, and Wreathed Smiles’ I used to know.”
They left the snuggery, and, blissfully conscious of her honors, Toinette presented her father to the girls. Just how proud they were of the marked attention he showed to each I’ll leave it to some other girls to guess. He danced with them, took them to supper, sought out the greatest delicacies for them, and played the gallant as though he were but twenty instead of forty-two. “He treated us just as though we were the big girls,” they said, when holding forth upon the subject the next day.
Twelve o’clock came all too soon.
Mr. Reeve remained over night, and the following day found an opportunity to have a long talk with Miss Preston—a talk which afforded him great satisfaction for many reasons.
Toinette, with several of the other girls, escortedhim to the train, and gave him a most enthusiastic “send-off.”
In the course of a few days a package was delivered at the school. Had bomb-shells been dropped there they could hardly have created more excitement. Jean’s house was only a few blocks from the school, and one Saturday morning—for the cameras were obliging enough to choose that day to appear—Mrs. Rockwood’s sitting-room was the scene of the wildest excitement.
CHAPTER XXII“WE’VE GOT ’EM! WE’VE GOT ’EM!”
Mrs. Rockwood was in her sitting-room one morning. It was Saturday, and a day of liberty for Jean. She had gone over to the school to spend a few hours with Helen, and Mrs. Lockwood did not expect her home until lunch-time, but, happening to glance from her window about ten o’clock, what was her surprise to see two figures approaching, one with a series of bounds, prances and jumps, which indicated a wildly hilarious and satisfied frame of mind in Jean, and the other with a subdued hop and skip, and then a sedate walk, which, although less demonstrative, was quite as indicative of a very deep and serene happiness to any one familiar with Helen.
A moment later the front door slammed, and two pairs of feet came tearing up the stairs as though pursued by Boer cavalry, and two eager voices cried:
“We’ve got ’em! We’ve got ’em! We’ve got ’em!” and both girls came tearing into the room to cast themselves and two very suggestive looking parcels upon Mrs. Rockwood.
“What in this world has happened?” she asked, in amazement, for both girls were breathless, and could only point at the parcels in her lap and say: “Open them! Open them, quick!”
Mrs. Rockwood was a woman who entered heart and soul into her daughter’s pleasures, and nothing was ever quite right in Jean’s eyes unless her mother shared it. Every little plan must be talked over with her, and it was pretty sure not to suffer any from one of her suggestions. Helen spent a great deal of time with Jean and was devoted to Mrs. Rockwood. Consequently, when the cameras arrived at the schoolthat morning, and they found out that there was really no mistake, but that they were certainly intended for the persons whose names were so plainly written upon the boxes, and sent in Miss Preston’s care, they could hardly wait to get over to Jean’s house to show their treasures to her mother. Many had been the surmises as to whom had sent such beauties, but Toinette kept a perfectly sober face, and no one suspected the secret.
Carefully removing the wrappings, Mrs. Rockwood brought the contents of the boxes to view. She was as much surprised as the girls, and exclaimed: “Why, who could have sent them to you, and how did anyone learn that you were so anxious to have them? Such beauties, too!”
“That is the funniest part of it all, for we never told a soul, and didn’t mean to till we had them, and now here they are. I believe St. Nick must have heard us wishing for them,” said Helen.
“And tobothof us, and justalike! Think ofit! Oh, moddie, isn’t it lovely?” and Jean threw her arms about her mother’s neck by way of giving vent to her feelings.
“I’m as delighted as you and Helen are, dear, only I wish we might learn who our benefactor is.”
“Yes, isn’t it too bad. Well, it may crop out later. I thought first it must be Miss Preston, but she said that she did not know any more about it than we did,” said Helen.
“Now, when may we take our pictures, and what shall we take?” cried Jean.
“You suggest something, Mrs. Rockwood; it will be nicer if you do it,” said Helen, dropping down upon her knees beside Mrs. Rockwood, and placing her arm around her friend’s waist.
Mrs. Rockwood drew her close to her side as she replied:
“Let me examine these treasures which have arrived so mysteriously, read the directions concerning them, and then we’ll see what we’ll see,” and she began to read: “Take the camerainto a perfectly dark closet, where no ray of light can penetrate (even covering the keyhole), and then place within it one of the sensitive plates, being careful not to expose the unused plates. Your camera is now ready to take the picture, etc.” “That is all very simple, I’m sure, and if the taking proves as simple as are the directions you need have little apprehension of failure. But your directions add very explicitly that you mustnotattempt to take a picture unless the day is sunny. So I fear those conditions preclude the possibility of your taking any upon this cloudy day, and you will have to possess your souls in peace till ‘Old Sol’ favors you.”
“Oh, dear, isn’t that too bad! I thought we could take some right off. Don’t you think we might at least try, mamma?”
“I fear they would prove failures; better wait a more favorable light.”
As though to tantalize frail humanity, “Old Sol” remained very exclusive all day, and, even though Helen remained till evening in the hopethat he would overcome his fit of sulks, nothing of the kind happened, and she was forced to go back to the school without one.
“Just wait till Monday, and we’ll do wonders; see if we don’t,” said Jean, as she bade her farewell, little dreaming what wonders she was destined to do with her magical box ere the sun set Monday night.
“I’ll ask Miss Preston to let me come over at four o’clock on Monday, and then we’ll go out in the little dell and get a lovely picture. You know the place I mean: where that old clump of fir-trees stands by the ruined wall,” said artistic Helen.
But when Monday arrived unforeseen difficulties arose for Jean. The day was the sunniest ever known, and, while waiting for Helen to come, she got out the precious camera to set the plates.
“Why, mamma, there isn’t a dark closet in the whole house; not a single one,” cried Jean, coming into her mother’s room as she was dressingto go out on Monday afternoon. “Now, where in this world am I to open my plate-box, I’d like to know?”
Mrs. Rockwood laughed as she turned toward Jean, whose face was the picture of dismay. “True enough, there isn’t. Now, who would have supposed that the architect who designed this house, and put a window in every closet, could have been so short-sighted as not to anticipate such a need as the present one?”
“But what am I to do?” desperately.
“Try putting a dark covering over the windows.”
“I have, but it’s just no use, for I can’t get it pitch dark to save me.”
“And to think that barely forty-eight hours ago I was congratulating myself that every closet in the house could be properly aired. Alas! how do our recent acquisitions alter our views?”
“Now, moddie, don’t laugh, but stop teasing me, and just think as hard as ever you canhowI am to find a dark place.”
Mrs. Rockwood thought for a few moments, and then said:
“I have it! Mary’s pot-closet, under the back stairs; that is as dark as a pocket, I’m sure.”
“There! I knew you’d find a way; you always do. Just the very place, and now I’m going straight down to fix it. Good-bye,” and, kissing her mother, away she flew.