Priscillahad seen Horace only once since the football game, and then for a short and unsatisfactory interview. Immediately after, Horace had left town for one of those trips which so cleverly combined business and pleasure, a combination of which Horace seemed to have the secret. A long letter which might have been an excerpt from the Journal of Another Disappointed Man gave her no address to which to write him, and the best she could do was to promise herself to be very, very kind to Horace on his return. She owed him that for the wrong she had done him.
The days went by without any further word from Horace, and Friday rounded out a full week since she had last seen him. Priscilla and Peggy walked home from class together with that sense of leisure Friday afternoon brings to each student, no matter how much must bedone before Monday morning. They paused at Peggy's door and Peggy urged hospitably, "Come on in."
"I think I'd better go home and see if mother's there, and if she wants anything. We haven't seen our maid for three days."
"Well, we'veseenSally, if that's any comfort," laughed Peggy. "But she's been about as much good as if she'd been at the North Pole. A woman she knows was knocked down by an automobile and taken to the hospital, and all Sally has been good for since is to dramatize the affair. First she's the automobile speeding recklessly on, and then she's the poor victim. You never saw anything so realistic as the way she drops on the kitchen floor."
Priscilla laughed, but disapprovingly. "I don't see how you folks put up with her, Peggy. She'd drive me crazy."
"Well, there's no denying she's a trial at times, but Sally has her good points. She's devoted to us all, for one thing, and that isn't very common these days. And besides," added Peggy simply, "if we didn't keep her I don't know how the poor thing would get along."
The two girls had been together all day but they lingered, loath to separate. "Listen, Peggy," Priscilla exclaimed. "Come home with me. Like enough mother will have an errand for me to do and then we can go together. Don't you love outdoors when it's still and cold like this?"
"Yes, love it. I'll go and see if we need anything in the way of groceries, and I'll join you in about a minute."
Peggy hurried up the walk and Priscilla went on her way. The evening paper lay folded on the porch of her home and she picked it up and tucked it under her arm before she slipped her key into the latch. She found the kitchen empty and ran upstairs, calling her mother. But only the echoes answered, and Priscilla realized that except for herself the house was empty.
Priscilla seated herself to wait for Peggy, picking up the paper she had thrown on the library table. Her eye ran mechanically over the columns. She turned the sheets, her thoughts still busy with the day's happenings, and with vague plans for the morrow. Thenunexpectedly a familiar face flashed out at her from the page, set above head-lines that seemed fairly to shriek their news.
Young Hitchcock Surprises FriendsSociety Man Marries in New York
Priscilla, sitting motionless, read the news over several times. Then her eyes began moving down the column. Even when she saw Horace's name written out in full, her sense of unreality persisted. The reporter had treated the matter humorously, following the precedent which makes love and marriage the most popular theme for jests. That the lady in question had become Mrs. Hitchcock just three days after meeting her future husband furnished a partial excuse for the levity.
"Mr. Hitchcock denies that there is anything hasty in his romantic marriage," wrote the reporter. "When asked if he considered a three days' acquaintance a sufficient prelude to matrimony, he smilingly replied that he preferred three thousand years. In explanation of his enigmatic remark, Mr. Hitchcock gave his viewson reincarnation, while in the background Mrs. Hitchcock blushed assent. Both are convinced that, to quote Mr. Hitchcock, 'they were soul mates when the pyramids were in building, lovers in Babylon—'"
Priscilla suddenly crumpled the paper in her hand. The familiar phrases were like a dash of cold water, rousing her from her daze. "I'm free," she cried, "I'm free! I'm free!" and broke into violent weeping.
Peggy rang several times without attracting attention. When at length she put her finger to the button and held it there, Priscilla woke to the realization that there was some one at the door. She crept downstairs, unconsciously holding fast to the paper that had announced her release, and admitted a justly incensed Peggy.
"I'm afraid you need some of those artificial ear-drums, Priscilla—Why, what's happened?" Peggy's attempted irony changed to affectionate concern, as she saw Priscilla with her tear-streaked cheeks and eyes inflamed and swollen. She threw her arms around her friend, her imagination running the gamut ofpossible calamities. "Oh, what is the matter?" she pleaded.
It seemed to Priscilla that a verbal explanation was beyond her. Dumbly she held out the crumpled sheet. Peggy caught sight of Horace's smug smile, snatched the paper from Priscilla's hand, and read the incredible story at a glance. The blood rushed to her brain, dying even her ears crimson. Rage shook her. For the instant, the gentle Peggy was a silent fury.
Priscilla roused herself to the need of explanation. "Peggy!"
Peggy whirled upon her. "My dear, it is the most abominable thing I ever heard of, but you couldn't have cared for him, Priscilla. Oh, tell me you didn't."
"We—well, we were engaged."
"Engaged," choked Peggy. She took a backward step, looked at Priscilla's disfigured face, and dug her nails deep into her palms. "Oh, I wish I were a man," she breathed in a voice hardly recognizable.
Priscilla uttered a choked laugh. Combined with the fact that the tears were still runningdown her face, this did not tend to allay Peggy's apprehensions. But as the laugh seemed to unlock Priscilla's tongue, her distressed friend was not long kept in suspense.
"I suppose I looked as if I were heart-broken," exclaimed Priscilla, laughing and crying. "Yes, we were really engaged, Peggy, but you can't imagine what a nightmare it has been."
"A nightmare," gasped Peggy. "Your engagement a nightmare!" She put her hands to her head as if the unexpected information acquired in the last few minutes had crowded it to the bursting point.
"Wait, Peggy! I've had a dreadful time, but it's been my own fault. I blame myself for everything that has happened. If it hadn't been for my silly vanity—"
"Vanity—" interrupted Peggy, and sniffed her scorn.
"Oh, you can sneer, Peggy Raymond, but I've been a silly little fool. In the first place, I made myself miserable because nobody wanted me."
"Priscilla," Peggy interrupted again, "I believeyou ought to go to bed. You're talking as if you were delirious."
"I know perfectly well what I'm saying, Peggy. You were engaged to Graham, and Nelson was in love with Ruth and Bob Carey was getting very attentive to Amy, and I was the only one left out and I resented it."
"Do you mean," cried Peggy incredulously, "that you don't know that you're so handsome that people are always turning to look after you when you pass?"
Priscilla laughed. "I won't choke you off, Peggy. After that news—" she nodded significantly toward the paper. "I fancy I can stand a little flattery and not be injured. But anyway I was sour and sore when Horace began to call. I knew exactly what Horace was, Peggy, but I shut my eyes to it. I wouldn't criticize him even in my thoughts. I wouldn't let you laugh at him—"
"Don't I know it!" Peggy drew a long breath. "That was one of the things that made me anxious."
"Well, when he told me—that he cared for me, I just snatched at him, Peggy. I was perfectlydelighted that somebody thought I was attractive. And I was such a silly little fool that I actually gloated over being the second girl out of us four to get engaged. Peggy, I'm terribly ashamed to tell you all this, but now's the time to finish up the subject and be done with it."
"Priscilla darling, I can understand everything except your feeling that way about yourself."
"Of course I wasn't happy," Priscilla went on. "I don't know whether Horace was or not. He always talked in a dreadfully pessimistic fashion, but I rather think—"
"Just a pose," interpolated Peggy witheringly. "Even when he was a little boy, Horace was always playing a part."
"Once or twice I tried to tell him I thought we had made a mistake. When I thought of going on and on through the years it didn't seem as if I could bear it. And then he talked so dreadfully, Peggy, and I was afraid he'd kill himself."
"No such luck," snorted Priscilla's audience. It was hard to believe that it was really Peggymaking such a speech and looking so fierce and angry. Priscilla interrupted her story by a little hysterical laugh.
"The last time was only two weeks ago at the foot-ball game. He was so disagreeable that I tried again to get out of it, and then he took it so to heart that I gave up all hope of ever being free. When I read that account today, and it came over me all at once that I needn't ever see Horace Hitchcock again, it seemed as if I'd die of joy. I believe I should have, too, if I hadn't begun to cry."
Peggy was still scornful. "The idea of your sacrificing yourself for such a fellow as Horace."
"Only because I was to blame, Peggy. As long as my silly vanity had got me into such a scrape, I thought nothing was too bad for me."
"Didn't it ever occur to you that two wrongs didn't make a right? If you were wrong in getting engaged to Horace when you didn't love him, marrying him without love would be a million times wickeder."
Priscilla took the reproof meekly. "Perhaps so. Anyway, I have learned my lesson. Thewrong man is so much worse than no man at all that now I'm perfectly resigned to being an old maid."
Peggy sniffed derisively. "You talk about your silly vanity. You certainly were silly enough, but when it comes to vanity, why, Priscilla Combs, you're the most painfully modest girl I know. The timid violet is a monster of arrogance compared to you. I adore Ruth and Amy, as everybody knows, but when it comes to looks, they're simply not in it alongside you. You're handsome, Priscilla, just as Horace's dreadful old aunt said, and you're talented and you're charming, and lots of men would fall in love with you in a minute if they thought they had the ghost of a chance."
Priscilla clapped her hands over her ears and blushed till Peggy's eloquence lost itself in laughter. "I'm not going to be punished by having to marry Horace," she said, when at length she judged it safe to lower her defenses. "But I shan't get off scott-free. Just think, Peggy, how many people in this city will be sorry for me, because I've been jilted by Horace Hitchcock."
Itwas mid-afternoon on a crisp February day when Graham called Peggy on the phone. In his preliminary "Hello" she detected an unwonted note of excitement.
"Hello, Graham. Yes, it's Peggy."
"I want you to take dinner with me to-night."
"Take dinner? Why, I can't possibly, Graham. I've got quite a lot of cramming to do for the mid-year examinations. And I haven't even looked at my lessons for to-morrow."
"Hang your lessons."
Peggy pricked up her ears. "What did you say?" she queried incredulously.
"I said, 'Hang your lessons,' and I'll add, 'Hang your examinations.' I've got to see you and have a long talk."
One of the advantages of habitual faithfulness to duty is that the rare relapse into irresponsibility comes as a delightful holiday.Peggy's face suddenly crinkled into a charming smile. It was a pity Graham could not see it.
"Oh, well," she said demurely, "if it's terribly important—"
"It is."
"Then I suppose I must let you have your way."
"I'll call for you at half past six and we'll dine at the McLaughlin."
"The McLaughlin! You haven't happened to come into a fortune since last evening, have you!"
"Not exactly. It's a celebration."
"What for?"
"That's telling. See you at six-thirty, Peggy darling. Good-by." And Graham rang off in a hurry, as if he feared her powers of persuasion, and suspected that if he gave her half a chance she would have the whole story out of him over the wire.
Peggy went back to her books with a smile which proved her thinking of something very different from history or economics. She was well aware that she would go to the class nextday without her usual careful preparation, but having made up her mind to accede to Graham's request, she had no intention of spoiling her pleasure by thinking of slighted tasks. And though she made a valiant effort at concentration in the short time left her for study, her attempt was not particularly successful. The dinner was a celebration, Graham had said. She racked her brain to recall some anniversary that had momentarily escaped her recollection, but without results.
Peggy was dressed by six o'clock, having spent an unprecedentedly long time over her toilet. The McLaughlin, though not the largest hotel in the city, was one of the most exclusive, and the costumes seen in the dining-room were frequently of an elegance compared with which Peggy's little evening frock was almost dowdy. But neither at the McLaughlin nor elsewhere was one likely to see a face more charming than that which looked back at Peggy from her mirror, so that her haunting fear that Graham might be ashamed of her was entirely unfounded.
Mrs. Raymond left the dining table to seethe young couple off. "Have a good time, dears," she said, and was pleased but not surprised when Graham followed Peggy's example, and stooping kissed her. She stood at the window looking after them as they went down the street. What a dear boy Graham was! In the far-off, nebulous future when Peggy began to think of being married, she could trust her to Graham without a fear. And then they would live near, where she could see Peggy every day. Mrs. Raymond told herself she would not have anything different.
"Mother," called Mr. Raymond's voice from the dining-room, "your dinner's getting cold."
Meanwhile Peggy, tilting her head on one side like an inquisitive canary, was asking Graham, "What is it we are going to celebrate?"
"Washington's birthday and the Fourth of July, Christmas and New Year's."
"Now, Graham, really I want to know."
"I'll tell you when the time comes. It's not the sort of thing to be sprung on the street."
"Oh, how interesting!" But though Peggy stopped asking questions, her curiosity grewprodigiously. Silent as Graham was as to the occasion of this unwonted festivity, she realized that there was about him an atmosphere of suppressed excitement. Sometimes, when his eyes were on her, he seemed to be looking through her at something big in the distance. Peggy was at the age when thrills and mysteries are always welcome. She climbed aboard the street-car all a-tingle with pleasurable excitement.
The dining-room at the McLaughlin impressed Peggy with its grandeur. The hour was still early for fashionable diners, and less than half of the tables were occupied. But the rows of waiters in black clothes and gleaming shirt fronts, and the scrape of violins in the background, gave Peggy an uneasy sense of being out of place. But Graham, convinced that he was escorting the queen rose of the rose-bud garden of girls, walked to his place as sure of himself as a young prince. And what he saw in Peggy's eyes was not of a sort to lessen his self-confidence.
Peggy soon perceived that her customary little hints regarding economy were to haveno weight on this particular occasion. Graham began with oysters and then appealed to Peggy as to her choice in soups. And perceiving that he was determined to be extravagant, for all she could say or do, Peggy gave herself up to enjoying the fruits of his extravagance. This was clearly Graham's night. Peggy decided not to ask again about his secret till he told her of his own accord.
Peggy and Graham sitting at a table"PEGGY LOOKED AT HIM WITHOUT REPLYING"
"PEGGY LOOKED AT HIM WITHOUT REPLYING"
As a matter of fact, Graham seemed in no hurry to take her into his confidence. The meal went on through its leisurely courses, the tables about them gradually filling, till the attentive waiter set their dessert before them—French pastries with small cups of deliciously fragrant coffee. Peggy tasted and sipped and smiled, and looked across the table with such an air of radiant happiness that if Graham had kept the smallest fragment of a heart in his possession, he would have been forced to surrender it on the spot.
He laid down his fork and leaned toward her. "Peggy, I've got my promotion."
"Oh, Graham!"
"They want me to go to South America fortwo years," Graham continued, speaking with curious breathlessness. "They're not asking me to stay permanently, you understand. But they want a man here who's thoroughly familiar with conditions down there."
Peggy looked at him without replying, all the radiant happiness drained from her face. South America! Her sensations were almost the same as when he went to France, except that now she had no patriotic ardor to sustain her. He was to be away two years, and yet his mood was exultant, and he seemed to expect her congratulations.
Peggy rallied her courage and lifted her eyes with a wan little smile. "When—when do they want you to go?" Her fork clattered against her plate, and she laid it down. She conceived on the instant an intense loathing for French pastry.
"In July."
"Oh!" Peggy winked hard. It would be a shame to spoil that beautiful dinner by crying. And besides, it was a long time before Graham would have to go, from February to July. Then a dreadful thought wrung her heart. Ifsix months was a long time, what of two years?
Graham's face seemed to waver as he leaned toward her across the little round table. His voice sounded far-off and unfamiliar. "What do you say, Peggy? Shall we go?"
"I—I—what are you talking about Graham?"
"You're always saying how you'd love to travel. Don't you see this is your chance."
"Do you—do you mean—"
"Yes, of course I do. Won't you marry me, Peggy, and go along? I can't leave you for two years. I can't. When I came back from the other side I promised myself I'd never be separated from you again by anything less than a world war. If I went by myself, Peggy, it would be going into exile for two years. But with you along, it would be a two-years' honeymoon. Think what it would be to see those new countries together."
"I suppose it would be a good thing for our Spanish," said Peggy, and the inane remark set them both to laughing, which undoubtedly was a good thing. When the paroxysm was over, Peggy wiped her eyes and struggled to bereasonable. "But, Graham, I don't graduate till the twelfth of June."
"And I don't sail till the sixth of July. Loads of time."
"But I always meant to earn my living for a few years after I graduated, before—"
"I wouldn't have stood for that, Peggy, not if I was making enough to take care of you, and I shall be."
Peggy was breathing fast. It was hard to realize that she and Graham were sitting there in the McLaughlin dining-room, discussing the question of whether or not they should be married in July. For except on one memorable occasion, when Graham had been on the point of going across and Peggy had been ready to marry him at a moment's notice, she had felt about her marriage much as her mother did, as if it belonged to the misty, distant, indeterminate future. And now the six months she had assured herself was a long time had dwindled down almost to nothing. July! It was incredibly, overwhelmingly near.
"We'll have to see what father and mother think." She tried to make her voice matter-of-fact,but it had an unnatural tension. Graham on the other side of the little table, nodded agreement.
"Of course we'll see what they think. But we know they can say only one thing. It's such a reasonable solution that only one opinion is possible. Don't you like your dessert, Peggy? Won't you have some ice-cream?"
Peggy protested she liked her desert, and finished it without tasting a morsel. Then they went home and proceeded to bomb the peaceful Raymond household with Graham's astounding proposition. And while Mrs. Raymond began by pronouncing it out of the question, before the evening ended she was driven to admit the reasonableness of Graham's plan. It was true that Peggy's marriage would follow rather closely on the heels of her graduation, but thanks to common-sense hours of sleep, and an abundance of outdoor exercise, she had come through her four years' college course in radiant health. A separation of two years just now would be hard for both, and especially for Graham. Indeed Graham frankly declared that he would not go without Peggy, and yetto refuse such a chance was to prejudice his future success.
When Peggy went to bed that night she knew the whole thing was settled. To be sure, both her father and mother had warned her against a hasty decision, insisting that she take plenty of time to think the matter over. But Peggy knew what the final verdict would be, and she was sure Graham also knew it, by the triumph in his eyes as he kissed her good night.
Changes! She lay in her little white bed and thought of the new life opening before her, strange countries, unfamiliar tongues, alien customs, even the dear, friendly constellations replaced by unknown stars. And the queerest part of all was that she herself would no longer be Peggy Raymond, but a strange young woman, Margaret Wylie by name. Peggy gave a little incredulous laugh. It was astonishing how the world had turned upside down since morning.
Thewedding day was set for the second of July, and after that decision had been reached, Peggy professed a complete loss of interest in the subject. When Graham consulted her on details more or less important, she gave him a reluctant attention.
"I tell you, Graham, I don't want to think about it. I never did enjoy mixed flavors. I shall have years and years of being Mrs. Graham Wylie, fifty or sixty probably, and there's only a few months left of my college life."
"If you feel so keenly on the subject," teased Graham, "we'd better postpone our wedding, and let you take a post-graduate course of ten years or so."
"That won't be necessary. I know I shall love my wedding clothes, and my wedding day, and being married to you, and everything. Butif I let myself think of that, I'll spoil this, don't you see? It would be like eating ice-cream with soup."
"I suppose I shall be allowed to call occasionally."
"Don't be silly! Of course I should be wretched if I didn't see you every day. But unless you have to settle something very important about South America, don't ask my opinion. Up to the twelfth of June, I'm a college senior, first, last and all the time."
Peggy was as good as her word. As far as her conversation revealed, she never looked beyond Commencement Day. And if it was inevitable that her thoughts should be more unruly than her tongue, her mental excursions into the future were surprisingly few. Peggy had never been a girl to discount to-day in favor of to-morrow, and this life-long habit aided her in her determination to extract the full flavor from the present.
While Peggy had thoroughly enjoyed her college life, college associations had naturally never meant to her what they mean to a girl who leaves home to complete her education.Although she was popular in her class, her closest friends were the girls who had been her intimates long before her high-school days, even, and she enjoyed her home so thoroughly that it never occurred to her to regret having missed the associations of dormitory life. But now she gave herself so unreservedly to her college interests that no on-looker would have dreamed that any event of special importance had been scheduled for early July.
As a matter of fact, Peggy could hardly have done justice to her varied duties in connection with Commencement, had she brought to them a divided attention. Her knack at rhyming had resulted in her election as class poet, and the same gift, doubtless, had caused her to be chosen one of the editorial staff of the Annual, gotten out each spring by the senior class. Moreover she had a part, though a small one, in the class play that was to be given out-of-doors and promised to be one of the most interesting features of commencement week. Since even for seniors there were lessons to be learned, and examinations to be passed, it is no wonder that Peggy found herself quite occupied withoutgiving thought to the great changes on ahead.
While she struggled with her poem, which she was determined as all class laureates, to make a masterpiece, and scribbled off jokes for the Annual and practised for the play, and studied in her odd minutes, the days had a most disconcerting fashion of shooting by without regard to speed regulations. Every Saturday night awoke in Peggy's mind the same incredulity. Another week was gone—only it couldn't be, for it was no time at all since last Sunday morning. She had an unreasonable impulse to clutch at the flying hours and hold them fast.
But the last spring of her college life was not to be altogether a season of flowers. One afternoon at the close of recitations, Peggy hunted up Ruth who had agreed to go with her for a call on Mary Donaldson.
"Ruth, I'm sorry, but Priscilla and I are going to be busy until after dinner time, probably. It's the Annual again."
"That old Annual takes so much time," scolded Ruth, objecting on principle to anythingthat separated her from Peggy for these few precious weeks. Poor Ruth was trying to imitate Peggy's example and not look ahead, but there were times when the coming desolation settled over her spirits like a chilling fog. With Peggy and Graham in South America, and Nelson in Oklahoma, Ruth felt that existence would be flat and flavorless.
"Yes, I know it takes time." Peggy resolutely ignored the undertone of tragedy in Ruth's voice. "But somebody has to do it, and anyway, it's fun."
It was due to her lingering to cheer the despondent Ruth that Peggy was the last of the Annual staff to reach the class room, which for that particular evening had been promoted to the dignity of an editorial sanctum. Peggy made her entry on a somewhat hilarious scene. Everybody was laughing, or so Peggy thought. Had she been more observant she would have noticed that Priscilla's face wore no smile, but a look of anxiety, bordering on distress.
"What's the joke?" inquired Peggy, as she took her seat. Though the gathering was made up of college seniors and was therefore a dignified,deliberative assembly, its proceedings were sometimes as informal as if they had been merely a group of high-school girls.
By way of answer, a sheet of card-board that evidently had made the rounds was put in her hand. Peggy looked at it curiously. At the top, under the heading, "The Misfit," was a clever caricature representing a small man attired in garments much too large for him. His broad-brimmed hat came down over his ears, his overcoat trailed on the ground, while the umbrella he carried was more than double his height. But the artist had avoided giving the impression that he was a masquerading child by bringing into prominence a somewhat scraggly mustache.
Peggy smiled appreciatively at the undoubted humor of the drawing and gave her attention to the verses below. But though they showed quite as much ability as the illustration, the effect of reading them was to erase the smile from her lips, leaving her gravely attentive. The laughter had quieted. She was aware that the girls were all watching her, and though she did not raise her eyes, she knew instinctivelythat Priscilla's face wore a look of apprehension.
The previous spring, one of the most popular men in the English department had resigned to devote himself to literary work, and his place had been nominally filled by a young man with good credentials but no experience. He had proved a great disappointment, for whatever his attainments, he lacked the ability to impart; while in contrast to the enthusiasm which Professor Baer's lectures had aroused, his classes seemed veritable refrigerating plants. Peggy knew that the seniors who had taken his courses were complaining bitterly that they had been "stung," and had congratulated herself that her own work in English had been continued with another member of the faculty.
In the verses before her, all the resentment of the students toward an incompetent teacher, following an able and popular one, was expressed with diabolical cleverness. The fact that the present incumbent was named Fox, and that he followed Professor Baer, had already been the theme of innumerable jokes, and the author of the verses had used it as themotive of her lines, so that there was no chance that even the outsider would remain ignorant of the instructor satirized.
Peggy read the verses over more than once in order to gain time. She was sorely tempted to say nothing. Peggy was under no illusions regarding the path of the reformer. It was vastly easier, vastly pleasanter, to let things go. It was not that she had any cowardly shrinking from hard knocks, but now, almost at the close of her college life, she was not in the mood to antagonize any one. She loved everything about the college, its gray stone buildings draped in ivy, its campus dotted with stately trees, the class-rooms and the laboratories, the dignified president, the professors and the girls—oh, most of all, the girls. She loved to believe in their affection, their admiration. Never in her life had popularity meant as much to her as now. And yet in spite of her distaste, she knew she had no choice. She must disagree, antagonize, anger.
When she lifted her eyes, the room was very quiet, almost as if every one knew what she was going to say. "Awfully clever, aren'tthey?" Peggy spoke very deliberately. "What are they for?"
A dark-eyed girl across the room took it on herself to answer, and as soon as her lips parted, Peggy knew her for the author.
"I'd intended it for theAtlantic Monthly," she smiled with frank sarcasm. "But I think perhaps it's better suited to the Annual. What do you say?"
"I'm afraid I don't think it's at all suited to the Annual."
There was a little chorus of protests. "You never were in his classes, Peggy," cried some one from the rear seat. "If you'd endured what we have at the hands of that man, you'd love every line."
A burst of approving laughter showed how completely the sympathies of this group of girls were with the speaker. Half-whispered comments were being exchanged. "The stupidest lectures!" "The greatest waste of time!" Peggy was perfectly able to understand this point of view. She struggled to make the girls see hers.
"Of course that's not right. If I had beenin his class I'd have been perfectly ready to go to President Eaton, and tell him how unsatisfactory everything was. But to take this way of doing it—" she looked down at the mocking lines and said with a visible effort, "Don't you think it seems a little bit cowardly—and cruel, too?"
Priscilla came to her friend's assistance. "If the faculty knew about those verses, I'm sure we'd never be allowed to put them in the Annual."
"How's the faculty to know?" demanded the criticized author, Ida Craig, with much asperity.
"Don't you think," suggested Peggy with all the diplomacy she could muster, "that since they leave it all to us, we're put on our honor to see that nothing gets in that they could object to?"
Ida smiled disagreeably. "After all," she said, "you're not the editor-in-chief, you know."
The rudeness gave Peggy the courage that she needed. "No, of course. I haven't any more voice than any of the rest of you. But if the poem goes in, I shall ask you to accept my resignation."
"In other words," exclaimed Ida, "If you can't have your own way, you'll take your dolls and go home."
"No indeed," Peggy was trying to speak calmly, but her voice shook, "But if my name appears among the editors of the Annual, it'll be taken for granted that I approve of all that is in it. I'm not willing to stand for anything like this."
"Nor I," said Priscilla. "I agree with Peggy."
Ida Craig leaned toward the girl nearest her. "Miss Combs is nothing if not original," she said in an echoing stage-whisper audible to every one in the room. But the editor-in-chief, dismayed at the prospect of losing two of her most reliable aides, hastily interposed.
"Now we mustn't get personal, girls," she said. "You know how the newspapers are always trying to make out that the members of women's organizations do nothing but quarrel. I think college graduates ought to disprove that sort of thing." She looked at Peggy rather appealingly. "I suppose you're willing to abide by the will of the majority," she said.
"If the majority vote to include 'The Misfit,'" returned Peggy, "Of course that settles it." And then as the face of the editor-in-chief brightened, she added, "But I shall have to resign, because the vote of the majority can't decide a question of right and wrong for me."
"Oh," said the editor-in-chief rather blankly, and then she quickly rallied. "We'll decide that question when we come to it," she said. "Will the meeting please come to order."
The mooted question was not put to vote till the end of the hour. "All in favor of including 'The Misfit' in the Annual," said the editor-in-chief, after the motion had been duly made, "please signify it by saying 'aye.'"
"Aye," chimed two defiant voices, that of the author and her dearest friend in the class.
"Those opposed, 'No.'"
There was a murmur of 'noes,' indicating that Peggy had won her fight, but she had none of the elation of the victor. She realized that several had not voted, and that those who had espoused her side had acted from motives of policy rather than conviction. Ida Craig wasplainly offended, and as for the rest, Peggy suspected that they failed to make the fine distinction between standing up for one's principles and being determined to have one's way.
Those closing weeks of college life were not all she had hoped. Peggy fancied a reserve in the friendliness of her friends. She became unnaturally sensitive, imagining slights where none existed. She was troubled by the thought that Priscilla shared in her partial eclipse of popularity, and inclined to regard her uncompromising conscience as a decided inconvenience, if nothing worse.
But Peggy's stand was to have a tragic justification. Three weeks before Commencement the Annual came from the binders, looking very attractive in its cover of blue and white, the college colors. The editorial force had been called together to make the necessary arrangements for placing it on sale. Peggy and Priscilla had an early class Wednesday morning, and as they entered the hall on their way to the cloak-room, they encountered Phyllis Riordan, the Annual's editor-in-chief.Phyllis' greeting was more than cordial, but Peggy hardly noticed that, in her concern for the girl herself.
"Why, Phyllis," she cried. "What's the matter? You're as white as a sheet."
Phyllis looked from one to the other. "You haven't heard about Mrs. Fox?"
"What about her?" The question came simultaneously from two pairs of lips.
"She died last night."
Peggy and Priscilla uttered a shocked exclamation. They were both but slightly acquainted with the girlish wife of the unpopular professor of English, but intimacy was not needed to point the tragedy of the news. Her voice curiously tense, Phyllis continued.
"It seemed she had serious heart trouble, and the doctor thought she ought to live in a milder climate. Professor Fox has resigned, and they were to locate in southern California. And Oh, Peggy Raymond—"
She turned suddenly toward Peggy, and caught both of her hands. "Since I heard the news last evening, I haven't been able to think of anything else. Peggy, do you realizewhat it would have meant if we had let that poem of Ida's go in? We'd have had to destroy the whole edition of the Annual. We couldn't have done anything else."
Peggy changed color slightly, but did not speak.
"You've saved our lives," declared Phyllis, her eyes bright with tears. "If it hadn't been for you, we'd have been in the worst box of any class since the college was founded. And when I think how brave you were, standing out against us all—"
"Why, Phyllis," Peggy interposed, "I wasn't brave at all. This—this dreadful thing that has happened doesn't make me a bit more right than I was in the beginning. And I knew it, too, and yet I wasn't satisfied. I've been ready to wish I hadn't done it a hundred times. And when you call me brave, you make me desperately ashamed, for nobody knows as well as I do what a coward I've been."
"If you're cowardly, Peggy," cried Priscilla, up in arms at once, "I'm sorry for the rest of us."
"Heavens, I should say so," agreed Phyllis.And then as the signal bell sounded, the girls rushed for the cloak room. Blended with Peggy's sorrow and her sense of humility, was a gratifying certainty that the last three weeks of her college life would be all she had dreamed.
Thesenior banquet was the most intimate and, in the opinion of many, the most delightful festivity of Commencement. No guests were invited. The only member of the faculty present was the honorary member of the class, a charming woman, who taught Greek and talked slang—as an antidote, she was wont to say. And because it was so strictly a class affair, a great deal of fun was in order which would have been impossible before ever so limited an audience.
"What I like about it is that it's frankly selfish," Peggy told Priscilla. And then noticing Priscilla's expression of incredulity, "I don't mean selfish in the mean sense, just the nice, comfortable, homey sort. All the rest of Commencement we're thinking about other people, the Board of Trustees, and the fathers and mothers, and the audience and the public.It's a comfort that there's one thing where we don't have to think of any one but ourselves, and we can be as silly as we please."
The first class to graduate had established a precedent which every succeeding class had strictly followed, that all engagements were to be announced at the class banquet, Commencement week. If for any reason it was preferred that such announcements should be regarded as confidential, it was understood that the members of the class would be put to torture rather than reveal a word. So strictly had a few such items of news been guarded—in some instances for several years—that the ability of a woman to keep a secret had apparently been satisfactorily demonstrated by the graduates of Peggy's alma mater. As a rule, however, the graduate who announced her engagement at the class banquet was willing that all the world should know the joyful news.
The banquet was held in the college gymnasium, the long tables being arranged in a hollow square. After the feasting was over, the waiters were dismissed and the doors closed to ensure perfect secrecy,—after whichevery girl engaged in the class was expected to take her stand in the central enclosure, carrying with her a photograph of her fiancé, the back of the said photograph being duly inscribed with her name and his. And as if this were not enough, each was required to state in a few well-chosen words the qualities which differentiated her particular young man from all the rest of mankind. At the conclusion of this unique ceremony, the photographs were passed about and duly inspected, and then a vote was taken to determine the handsomest. The gentleman so honored was presented with a stick-pin, which his betrothed took charge of until such time as she chose to deliver it.
As the girls dispatched their deviled crabs and chicken salad and ice cream, and other incongruous and indigestible dainties, the thoughts of many turned expectantly toward the ceremony immediately following the banquet. It was true that some of the engagements were no secret. Graham Wylie, for instance, had been Peggy Raymond's devoted cavalier ever since she graduated from high school. And there were girls in the dormitorieswho heard so frequently and at such length from certain men friends that they were assumed to be engaged whether they admitted it or not. But on the other hand there were always surprises enough to render the occasion exciting.
The ice cream was dispatched at last, along with the cakes and candies. The little coffee cups were emptied. The waiters cleared the tables and withdrew, closing the door according to instructions. And then from here and there in the long rows of diners, one laughing girl after another rose, and made her way into the vacant space enclosed by the tables.
Priscilla's eye followed Peggy on her way, blushing, laughing, and looking to Priscilla's fond eyes the embodiment of girlish loveliness. And then some one called her name. "Why, Priscilla Combs!"
Priscilla turned. A classmate that she knew only slightly was leaning across the table. "Why aren't you going with the others?" she cried.
"I?" Priscilla colored to the roots of her hair. "I'm not eligible."
"Oh, come!" retorted the other archly. "This isn't any time for prevarication, you know. You're expected to tell the truth."
Some one caught the speaker by the arm, and as she turned, hissed a terse statement in her ear. Only too well did Priscilla know the import of that whisper. Inaudible as it was, its news might as well have been shouted. The girl who had innocently assumed Priscilla's engagement was now hearing that Horace Hitchcock, after paying Priscilla every attention, had met some one he liked better in New York, and had married her after three days' acquaintance.
Priscilla held her head high. She saw hervis-à-vischange color and lift startled eyes. When she found Priscilla regarding her, the girl lost her head. "Oh, excuse me," she gasped.
"Why certainly," laughed Priscilla. "I'm like the man who was asked to change a twenty-dollar bill. I appreciate the compliment." But for all her cheerful air, the thing rankled. Would they never be done pitying her because she had been jilted by HoraceHitchcock. It was impossible to explain, but it really seemed to Priscilla that some of them might suspect what a relief the termination of that unacknowledged engagement had been.
There were now a dozen girls in the enclosure. The appearance of some was greeted with loud cries, intended to convey reproach, or incredulity. Excited comments ran around the tables. "Look, there's Cynthia, after insisting that there wasn't a thing between them." "Why, there's Anne Gordon." "Now who in the world—" And while the eager inspection went on, the twelve girls in the middle stood rather close together as if each found it a help in that trying moment to feel she was not alone.
The talk and laughter quieted when the president rapped for order. Eloise Hayden was the first to be called on to introduce her fiancé to her attentive classmates. Eloise was one of the girls who affect the modern pose of matter-of-factness. She was so afraid of undue sentimentality that she went too far in the other direction, like one who is so determined to be straight as to bend backward. As Eloise'sname was spoken, she stepped out from the group, and held up to view the photograph she carried.
"Friends and classmates, I am introducing John Mackenzie Rowe. As you see, he is no beauty, and he'll never wear the stick pin unless it's given for a consolation prize. But on the other hand, he isn't bad looking enough so he needs to wear a mask when he goes on the street."
The momentary silence as Eloise stopped for breath was filled by a chorus of groans, Eloise's classmates disapproving her extreme lack of sentiment. Quite unabashed by this demonstration, Eloise continued.
"John and I live in the country, as some of you know. The only thing between his father's place and my father's place is a privet hedge, not high enough to be a barrier. We've lived on the two sides of that hedge since he was thirteen and I eleven. I suppose if any other boy had lived there, I should now be engaged to him. And if any other girl had lived where I do, he would have been engaged to her."
The signs of displeasure redoubled. Mingled with the groans were hisses, and Eloise, who liked nothing better than to stir her friends to protest against her nonchalant attitude, continued blithely:
"Our engagement is in every way a sensible one. Neither of us thinks the other perfect, so we won't have the usual disillusionment and disappointment after we are married. I'm sorry I shan't be able to introduce John to you to-morrow, but he wrote me that if he came he would have to put off a business trip, and I wrote him, 'Business first.'"
The demonstrations of disapproval were now so marked that Eloise considered this a good place to stop. She laid down the photograph for the girls' inspection and stepped back, seemingly very well satisfied with her performance.
Judith West, a plump pink and white girl, looking, thanks to her bobbed hair and round face, not a day over fifteen, was next to be called on. Judith blushed rosily as she held up the photograph of a handsome young man in a lieutenant's uniform.
"This is Philip Carpenter," she announced in a faint, frightened voice. "And all I can say is that he's as good as he looks."
"He looks good enough to eat," encouraged an admiring voice from a side-table.
"He is," declared Judith. "At least—well, you know what I mean. He's just as nice as he can be, and after I'd seen him once, nobody else in the world had the least chance."
As this impressed the class as the proper attitude for an engaged girl, the applause was hearty, and the blushing Judith interpreted it as afinishto her remarks, and retreated in charming confusion. But the applause dropped into instantaneous silence as Anne Gordon arose. Anne's appearance in the enclosure had surprised every one.
"I haven't much of a photograph to show you," said Anne holding up a kodak picture in which three diminutive figures appeared seated under an apple tree. "The one in the middle is Elmer Wharton. He looks very tiny, but believe me, he's longer than our engagement."
Anne stopped to laugh, and the class laughed with her.
"I had a letter from Elmer yesterday," Anne continued, "a very particular letter. I can't say it was a great surprise to me, though you all seem so astonished. And in this letter Elmer told me a number of things he meant to say to me as soon as I got home. But I thought of to-night, and I couldn't see why I shouldn't be engaged the day before Commencement as well as the day after. So I telegraphed him,yes."
Amid the shrieks of laughter due to this frank acknowledgment, Peggy was called, and she held up her photograph with an engaging pride.
"I fancy there aren't many of you who need to be introduced to Graham Wylie, for he's been very much in evidence ever since I entered college. I don't know any way of doing justice to the subject, but when I feel strongly about anything, I'm very likely to drop into poetry, like Mr. Wegg."
Peggy, who had been brought up on Dickens as if she had been a girl of the fifties, had forgotten how few of her contemporaries had ever heard of Mr. Wegg. Warned of her slipby the blank faces that looked back at her, she began to recite the lines she had written in sheer desperation the previous evening, after she was supposed to be in bed.