CHAPTER VII.GEOFFREY ENTERS COLLEGE.
August Huntress and his gentle wife, Alice, deserved to be happy, for they had devoted the best of their lives to the work of rearing the two children who had been so strangely thrown upon their care.
Of course it was but natural that their love for Gladys should be deeper, stronger, and more sacred than for Geoffrey, for they had taken her to their hearts as their very own when she was but a tiny babe, and having had no other children sent them to share their affection, their every hope had long been centered in her.
But they felt very tenderly toward the hapless boy who had first aroused their sympathy for his misfortune, and subsequently won their love by his gentleness and confidence in them.
Mr. Rivers, Geoffrey’s tutor, was very glad of the opportunity to remain with his pupil during the summer vacation, for it was simply a pleasure to teach one so eager for knowledge; while, too, being in limited circumstances, he needed the pecuniary benefit accruing from the arrangement.
Mr. Huntress sent them both into the country upon a farm, where they could have fresh air and country living to strengthen their bodies, while storing their minds with knowledge.
Mr. Rivers was most faithful in fulfilling his duties as a tutor, while Geoffrey was indefatigable as a student. He applied himself early and late; he dug to the very root of every problem and question, while he possessed the power of concentration to such a degree that he got over the ground much more rapidly than most students.
At the beginning of September he was pronouncedqualified to enter a private institution for young men, where the principal, after learning the circumstances regarding his early misfortune and inability to study, allowed him special privileges.
Here he remained for a year, overcoming every obstacle with an iron will and unflagging perseverance, and surprising every one by his progress.
He developed in other ways also, becoming more mature physically, and acquired a dignity and thoughtfulness almost beyond his years, yet at the same time possessing a peculiar gentleness and courtesy of manner that won every one.
At the end of the year he was qualified to enter college.
Mr. Huntress told him that he might remain where he was if he felt the least sensitiveness about entering a university; but he was ready and eager now to take his place in the world with young men of his own age. Geoffrey had a consciousness within him that he could hold his own anywhere, and he decided that he would go to Yale.
He passed his examinations, and was received without a condition, and he could not help experiencing a feeling of triumph that at last he was on the “home stretch,” so to speak, for the goal toward which he had for years so longingly and enviously looked.
Now he was only one year behind Gladys, and he hoped to be able to lessen the distance between them before he was through with his course. At all events, if his health was spared, he would now have a finished education, and would not need to feel that he was beneath her in point of intellect.
As for Gladys herself, she was as proud as she could be when Geoffrey told her of his success.
“Just to think of it,” she cried, with shining eyes and flushed cheeks, though a little mischievous smile played over her red lips; “only six years ago I taught you your letters, and now you are almost at the top of the ladder! Oh, Geoffrey, I’m afraid you are very smart!”
“Afraid, Gladys?”
“Yes, and please don’t drive your chariot too fast, even now. Why, if you had had the opportunities that have fallen to my lot, you would have been so far above me by this time that I should never have dared so much as to lift my eyes to you,” the young girl returned with mock humility.
He bent and looked earnestly into her eyes.
“Gladys,” he cried, under his breath, “I am sometimes almost glad that I was cast adrift upon the world.”
“Glad! Why, Geoff!” she exclaimed, astonished, and wondering at his intense mood.
“You think that rather an extravagant statement,” he said, smiling, “but if my life had run along smoothly in my own home, like that of other boys, I might never have learned what mettle there was within me, and besides, I might never have known you—you who have been my good genius and my inspiration.”
Gladys shot one startled glance up into those earnest eyes looking into hers, then her own quickly dropped, and a vivid scarlet shot up to her brow.
Geoffrey had never spoken like this to her before, and the suppressed passion in his voice betrayed volumes.
The unexpected glimpse of his heart set her own to beating with strange emotions.
She had always been fond of him in a sort of tender, compassionate way, which of late had developed into something of pride for his smartness, and the character he exhibited; but she had never dreamed that she could ever learn to regard him other than as a dear friend or brother, or that he would ever entertain but fraternal affection for her.
She was strangely affected by this discovery of a deeper sentiment.
Geoffrey entered Yale the first of September, and began his four years’ course there with the greatest of enthusiasm.
He had been hard at work at college a little over a week when, one evening, while he was deeply absorbed in the preparation of the morrow’s lessons, there came a quick, sharp rap upon his door.
He glanced up as the door opened, and was astonished to see half a dozen fellows from the sophomore class enter and station themselves at different points in the room, while one, who appeared to be the leader of the company, slowly advanced toward him.
In an instant it flashed upon Geoffrey that he was about to be subjected to that terror of all freshmen—hazing—it being before the days when the practice fell into such disfavor as at present.
For a moment he was indignant at this intrusion; then he said to himself:
“If they are not unreasonable I’ll make the best of it, and let them have their fun.”
He arose from his table and turned to meet the young man approaching him, a genial smile on his handsome face.
But, as if suddenly arrested by some supernatural power, both young men stopped transfixed, and gazed at each other with undisguised astonishment, while expressions of wonder passed from lip to lip among those who were looking on.
And it was no wonder, for those two standing in the center of the room might well have been twin brothers instead of utter strangers, for they appeared to be exactly alike in form, and feature, and bearing.
Both were fair, with nut-brown hair and blue eyes.
Both were tall and well-developed, with a proud bearing that would have made them conspicuous anywhere, although a critical observer might have noticed that Geoffrey was more firmly built, more muscular, perhaps; thus showing greater strength than the other.
The intruder was the first to recover himself, however, and remarked, with a toss of his fine head and a long-drawn breath:
“I say, Huntress, this is downright queer! We came to give you a little surprise party, and you’ve completely taken the wind out of our sails to begin with. I could almost swear that I was looking at my own reflection in a glass. Who are you, anyway? Give us a history of your antecedents.”
“Gentlemen, you have the advantage of me,” Geoffrey politely returned, as he glanced from face to face. “You appear to know me by name—be good enough to tell me whom I have the honor to entertain, then I shall be happy to answer your questions.”
“Well, I must say you’re a cool one for a ‘fresh,’” returned the other, with a light laugh, “but we can’t stop for formal introductions all round. Since I am master of ceremonies for the evening, I will introduce myself as Everet Mapleson at your service. I am a Southerner by birth—son of Col. William Mapleson, of ‘Vue de l’Eau,’ Virginia. Now, for your genealogy, young man.”
Geoffrey colored.
Young Mapleson’s tone was offensive in the extreme, while his manner said as plainly as manner could say, “I belong to one of the F. F. V’s—beat that record if you can,” and Geoffrey’s first impulse was to refuse to comply with his authoritative demand.
But he had heard something of the indignities which sophomores sometimes heaped upon unlucky freshmen, and after a moment of thought he quietly replied:
“My genealogy is not a remarkable one. I am an orphan, having lost my parents at a very early age, but I have been reared and educated by an uncle, Mr. Huntress, of Brooklyn, New York.”
“Is that so?” drawled the young Southerner, with languid insolence. “Then it’s a very singular coincidence, our being the double of each other. Why, one would be almost tempted to swear that the Mapleson blood flows in your veins; but since my governor and I are the very last of our race, that can’t be possible, and it can only be accounted for, I suppose, as a strange freak of nature.”
Geoffrey simply bowed in reply to these remarks; his blood began to boil at his visitor’s assumption of superiority, and his fingers began to tingle to take him by the collar and walk him out of the room.
“However,” young Mapleson resumed, rubbing his white hands and winking at his comrades, “we must not be diverted from the object of our visit. We have called upon you, Mr. Huntress, to test your powers of oratory; you will kindly favor us with a speech. Be seated, my fellow sophs.”
Everet Mapleson helped himself to the easiest chair in the room, and waved his hand toward his companions as a signal for them to do likewise.
Geoffrey saw by the expectant faces around him that there would be no reprieve for him, and though he inwardly rebelled against having his privacy thus unceremoniously invaded, and at being peremptorily ordered about by a conceited fellow younger than himself, as Mapleson evidently was, yet he knew he would get off easier if he made light of his uncomfortable situation and indulged their caprice, at least to a reasonable extent.