But she never had a chance to say what she thought. Suddenly, before any of the convivial little party realized what was happening, the door of 513 was pushed open and the “Terrible Three,” as Arden later nicknamed them, stood within the room.
“What’s this? Freshmen meeting in your room, Miss Blake!” Toots Everett was very stern. “You girls who don’t belong here will go at once to your own rooms and don’t do any more of this visiting. Jessica, confiscate the fruit-cake!”
Jessica made a noble attempt, but there was no fruit-cake. The red and gold box was empty. All that remained were a few crumbs for the mice. Arden smiled sweetly at Pips MacGovern, Terry was grinning most enjoyably, and Sim’s round eyes outdid themselves in roundness.
The offending freshmen quickly vanished to their own rooms, while the three sophomores were speechless with indignation. Toots finally found her voice to say frostily:
“This is the third time we have met, Miss Westover, Miss Blake and Miss Landry. This meeting is somewhat to your advantage. But we sophomores will not forget. You three will report to me, Miss Everett, in my room tomorrow after classes. The program has been changed. Hazing will begin officially tomorrow!”
Waiting an ominous moment to see if the threatening words had any actual effect, the three sophomores then silently left the room.
“Well, that’s that!” remarked Sim.
“Wasn’t she dreadful!” murmured Terry.
“It’s going to be fun, girls!” Arden exclaimed. “I’m not a bit afraid of being hazed. Now, let’s unpack the rest of our things, and then we must write some letters home. They will all be so anxious to know what happened on our first day at Cedar Ridge.”
“Such a lot has happened,” murmured Sim, looking doubtful. “I’m afraid we haven’t exactly endeared ourselves to those sophs.”
“Who cares?” laughed Terry.
“After hazing is over they’ll be our good friends,” declared Arden. “It’s part of their stock in trade to seem very gruff and terrible now, but we needn’t worry about that. Let’s get at our letters. You’ll have to lend me something to write on, Sim. I don’t seem to have any paper in my suitcase. There’s some in my trunk. I suppose that’ll be up tomorrow.”
“I expected this, Arden,” Sim laughed. “I brought some extra stationery for you. See that you write your mother a nice long letter. No more ten-word telegrams.”
The room was soon quiet except for the scratching of pens on paper. It was very serene around Cedar Ridge College now, and quiet in the farm and orchard grounds that formed part of the old estate which had been transformed into a seat of learning.
The girls had been told that night letters might be placed on a table at the end of their corridor, whence they would be taken up by one of the porters or janitors in time for the early morning mail.
“Well, I’ve finished!” said Terry, sealing her last envelope.
“So have I,” said Arden.
“Let’s take them out and leave them on the table,” suggested Sim. “The folks will get them tomorrow night.”
As the three walked down the dimly lighted corridor, they saw two other freshmen going back to their room after having deposited their mail on the table over which glowed a small light.
This table was at the end of the corridor nearest the old apple orchard, which formed part of the college farm. The girls had heard something of the college farm, and there had been a veiled threat that the freshmen had to gather apples for their sophomore hazers.
The big window in the corridor was open. And as Arden and her two chums dropped their letters upon the table they thrust their heads out for a breath of the fresh night air.
“I wonder what sort of apples grow in that orchard?” mused Sim.
“They must be very choice,” suggested Arden.
“How do you know?” asked Terry.
“Don’t you remember, that good-looking porter with the cute little mustache who took up our bags, was gazing so soulfully out of the window into this same orchard?” suggested Arden. “There was such a queer, rapt look on his face, I’m sure, though I could see only the back of his head.”
“Oh, my word!” mocked Sim. “Aren’t we getting poetical and humorous all of a sudden!”
“Hark!” cautioned Terry in a whisper.
From the dark orchard below them and to the northeast of the college building sounded a cry of alarm and fright floating through the murky blackness. It was a cry as if someone was in danger.
“Oh!” gasped Sim. “Whatever was that?”
Then, with one accord, she and her chums ran back to their room and closed the door but did not lock it. For it was against the rules of Cedar Ridge to lock bedroom doors. Miss Anklon had impressed this on the freshmen. Terry, however, insisted on dragging a chair against the portal, bracing the back of it under the knob so it would be difficult to gain access.
The three girls gazed at one another with fear in their eyes.
Was there danger abroad in the blackness of the night?
“What could that have been?” gasped Terry, sinking on her bed.
“Then you heard it, too?” asked Arden.
“Of course! We all heard it!” declared Sim. “A shout or groan in that dark orchard as if someone were suffering. Do you think there could have been a fight among the help? You know they have a resident farmer here at Cedar Ridge and several laborers. They might have had a bout—or something.”
Suddenly all three burst out laughing. They couldn’t help it. The looks on their faces were so queerly tragic. And Terry said:
“I think we’re making a lot out of nothing. Probably what happened was that a porter—the blue-eyed porter—was trying to lug in some faculty baggage the back way and it fell on his toes.”
“Well, whatever it was, don’t let’s go spreading scandal around the college so early in the term,” warned Arden. “We must keep the secret of the orchard to ourselves—if there is a secret.”
“Guess we’ll have to,” yawned Sim. “For who knows what the secret is?”
“That taxi-man seemed to hint at something,” murmured Terry.
“Oh—bosh!” exploded Arden. “I guess we’re all just worked up and nervous because this is our first night and we’ve had to stand a lot of annoyance so soon—those sophs and all that.”
“Well spoken, my brave girl!” declaimed Sim. “Let’s forget it.”
It was this thought which gradually quieted the palpitating hearts and the excited breathing of the three. After they had listened, more or less cowering on their beds, and heard no sounds of any general alarm, they finally prepared to retire for their first night at Cedar Ridge.
“After all,” said Terry, “it may have been some skylarking boys trying to steal the college apples.”
“Maybe,” agreed Sim.
“It didn’t sound like boys to me,” declared Arden. “It was more like a man’s shout.”
“Well, we don’t need to worry about it,” went on Terry. “But if those snobby sophs think we’re going in that orchard in the dark, after what we just heard, to get apples for them, they can have my resignation.”
“And mine!” echoed her chums.
Sleep was actually in prospect, and final yawns had been stifled when a scratching in one corner of the room aroused the tired girls.
“We must get a trap for those mice,” Terry sleepily murmured. “I suppose they smell the fruit-cake crumbs.”
“All very well to trap ’em,” chuckled Sim, “but who’s going to take ’em out of the trap after they’re caught or strangled to death?”
“Oh, stop!” pleaded Arden. “Let the poor mice have the crumbs. Maybe they need them.” Which seemed sound advice well given.
The morning of a new day dawned bright and cool. Fall had only lately checked the glories of summer, and the heavily clumped shrubbery about the college seemed strong enough to withstand many wintry blasts before giving up its well-earned beauty.
“Oh, look, girls!” exclaimed Arden, first of the trio out in the corridor ready for breakfast. She pointed a slim finger, well manicured, at the table near the end of the passage.
“What?” asked Sim. “Has the orchard noise of last night materialized?”
“No. But they didn’t collect our letters for the mail,” said Terry.
“Something must be wrong with the system,” spoke Sim. “Though it isn’t to be wondered at, in the confusion of opening night. But can’t we take them ourselves and drop them into the post office after breakfast? The office is just off the college grounds across the railroad tracks. Can’t we do that?”
“I don’t see why not,” reasoned Arden.
Breakfast was rather a cold and grim meal compared to the excitement of the supper the night before. It was finally eaten, however, and then, it being too early for any classes yet and no orders having been issued about chapel attendance, the three from room 513 started for the little post office outside the college grounds.
Arden looked completely happy. Surroundings were so important to her. Wearing a light wool dress, dull blue in color and with most comfortable walking shoes on, she urged her chums forward. All of the girls were simply dressed. In keeping with the traditions at Cedar Ridge, hats gave place to mortar-boards and, even in freezing weather, they would be donned with a gay defiance of winter winds.
“Come on, girls!” Arden was excited. “I must be at Bordmust Hall at nine. My adviser is going to help me arrange my schedule of classes. I hope we can get together at least on a few.”
“We all have to be there,” said Terry, adding with a sigh: “I suppose I’ll have an eight-thirty class every day, worse luck!” Morning sleep was so good.
“Oh, swimming pool!” chanted Sim as they passed the building now turned to so base a use as that of a vegetable cellar. “When first I saw thee——”
“Have patience!” interrupted Arden. “Look who’s coming this way!”
A white-haired old gentleman, clad somberly in black, was slowly approaching along the path that led from the front campus down to the railroad tracks and across to the post office. His hands were clasped behind his back and, with head bent down, he seemed to observe only the ground at his feet.
“Who is he?” whispered Sim.
“He must be Rev. Henry Bordmust, the resident chaplain here. Shall we speak—or just bow respectfully?” Terry looked to Arden for advice.
“I don’t believe he even sees us. He looks as though he were thinking deeply. Let’s wait and see if he speaks to us.” After this advice, Arden stepped a little in advance of her two chums to invite the clergyman’s attention.
The daydreaming chaplain had met and was passing the girls now; still without a sign of recognition. But he was saying something—muttering to himself as old men often do. The girls overheard a few words.
“Dear, dear! The orchard! The old orchard!” he murmured. Mentally he seemed to be wringing his hands in real distress. “Why doesn’t he come out of it?”
Rev. Henry Bordmust sighed and passed the freshmen, his eyes still on the path at his feet, as oblivious of the trio as if it did not exist.
“Did you hear that?” mumbled Terry as they walked on.
“He was talking about the orchard—where we heard the noise last night,” spoke Sim. “What can he mean?”
“I heard one of the seniors talking about him,” volunteered Arden. “He is said to be—queer—says things no one can understand. And he often gives the girls awful scoldings over nothing—and sometimes asks you in to have tea with him, most unexpectedly.”
“Well, I wish he’d invite us in to tea this afternoon,” murmured Sim with new energy. “And I wish he’d explain what he means about someone coming out of the orchard. I hope that weird noise doesn’t play any tricks tonight.”
“Oh, perhaps we misunderstood him,” suggested Terry. “The chaplain can’t know anything about a mysterious noise in our college apple orchard.”
“Hardly,” agreed Sim. “Well, he certainly never saw us. I don’t believe I’d like to have tea with him.”
“Oh, I think he looks sweet,” declared Arden.
“Then you won’t need sugar in your tea,” laughed Terry. “But let’s hurry and mail these letters. It would never do to be late for our first class.”
They had reached the tracks of the Delawanna Railroad, the line that ran from New York to Morrisville, the small city nearest the college. From force of habit the girls stopped and looked up and down the rails for the possible approach of a train. Soon they would know when each one was expected. It was a tradition that by the time one was a senior at Cedar Ridge no watch was necessary, so familiar did the students become with the passage of the trains.
The post office was a small one-roomed building with a stove in the center. Two windows, one for the sale of stamps and the other for the mailing of parcels, broke the stretch of tiers of glass-fronted boxes behind which the business was carried on. For the post office served the town as well as the college.
The side walls were literally papered with police posters offering rewards for the arrest, or information leading to the arrest or apprehension, of various persons—criminals—men and women. The posters were from the police departments of several cities, New York among them. Many of the placards were adorned with profiles and front views of the oddest faces the girls had ever seen.
“Oh, for the love of stamps!” gasped Arden when they had dropped their letters in the slot and were looking at the posters. “What nightmares!”
“Aren’t they awful!” agreed Terry.
“Not a good-looking man among them,” was Sim’s opinion. “I’ve heard about these posters. They’ve been here, some of them, for I don’t know how long. It’s a sort of a game among the girls to see who can find the funniest face.”
“Let’s try it,” suggested Arden, laughing. Suddenly she ceased her mirth and stood as if fascinated in front of a poster showing the full-face picture of a young man. He was rather good-looking and quite an exception to the other portraits so publicly displayed. His face, like most of the others, was smooth, unadorned by beard or mustache.
“Terry!” impulsively exclaimed Arden. “Look! Haven’t you seen that face before?”
Terry considered carefully before slowly answering:
“No, I don’t believe I have. It isn’t a bad face, though.”
“Rather interesting,” agreed Sim. “What’s he wanted for, murder or bank robbery?”
“Neither,” answered Arden. “Listen.” She read from the poster:
“One thousand dollars reward for information as to the whereabouts of Harry Pangborn.” Then followed a general description, the age being given as twenty-three, and there was added the statement that the young man had suddenly disappeared from his home on the estate of his grandfather, Remington Pangborn, on Long Island.
Part of the poster consisted of a statement from the attorneys of Remington Pangborn—thelateMr. Pangborn, it was made plain.
“Harry Pangborn,” the statement read, “is not wanted on any criminal charge whatever. He disappeared from his friends and his usual haunts merely, it is surmised, because he was expected to assume the duties and responsibilities of the large estate he was about to inherit from his grandfather. It is understood that he stated he did not want the inheritance just yet. Of a high-strung and nervous temperament, Mr. Pangborn is believed to have gone away because the responsibilities of wealth are distasteful to him and also, perhaps, because he seeks adventure, of which he is very fond. If this meets his eye or if anyone can convey to him the information that he will be permitted to assume as much or as little of the estate as he wishes, a great service will have been done. All that is desired is that Harry Pangborn will return to his friends and relatives as soon as possible. His hasty action will be overlooked. It is rumored that Mr. Pangborn may be in the vicinity of Morrisville, though he may have gone abroad, as he was fond of foreign travel.
“Information and claims for the above reward may be sent to Riker & Tabcorn, Attorneys, New York City, or to the local police department in the municipality where this poster is displayed.”
The girls, crowding about Arden, read the poster with her. Then Sim said:
“Maybe it was in the movies that you saw someone who reminds you of him, Arden. Harry Pangborn isn’t bad looking, compared to all the others.” With a sweeping gesture she indicated the various poster exhibits.
“Why, he’s positively handsome when you put him alongside of Dead-eye Dick, here,” laughed Terry. “As for Two-gun Bobbie——”
“I’m serious, girls,” interrupted Arden. “I’m sure I’ve seen this young man somewhere before. Now, if we could only locate him or tell the lawyers where to look for him and get this reward money, wouldn’t it be just wonderful?”
“Grand!” agreed Terry. “But wake up, my dear. You’re dreaming!”
“And I’ve just thought of something else!” went on Arden, oblivious of the banter.
“What?”
“If we did collect this money we could donate it to the college to have the swimming pool repaired.”
“That’s sweet of you and a good idea, Arden, but I don’t believe we could do it,” objected Sim. “Besides, I don’t exactly believe what it says on this poster. It seems very silly for a young fellow to disappear just when he’s coming into a lot of money—a fortune.”
“Perhaps he was made to disappear,” suggested Terry, her eyes opening wide.
“Oh! You mean—kidnaped?” asked Arden.
“Yes.”
“Worse and more of it!” laughed Sim.
“Well, anyhow, we could try, couldn’t we?” Arden asked. “You’d help, wouldn’t you, Terry?”
“Yes, indeed I’ll help. I’ve always fancied myself in the rôle of a detective, spouting pithy Chinese philosophy and generally getting underfoot.”
“Now, Terry, just be serious for once. And Sim, you also. You know how disappointed you were when you found out the swimming pool was——”
“Kapoot!” chuckled Sim, supplying Arden’s evident lack of a word with the latest Russian expression. “Go on!”
“Well,” resumed Arden, pouting a little, “you never can tell. Maybe we could do it. It isn’t impossible. Stranger things have happened. And I just know I’ve seen that young man on the poster somewhere before. If I could only remember where! Did either of you ever have that feeling?”
“Lots of times. I’m for you, Arden!” declared Sim. “I’ll do what I can and whatever you say. This mysterious Harry Pangborn may very well be right around here.”
“Around Cedar Ridge!” shrilled Terry.
“Certainly! Why not? If the authorities didn’t think it likely that he might be in this vicinity, why did they put the poster up here in the post office? And they mentioned Morrisville,” challenged Sim.
“There’s something in that,” Terry admitted.
“Oh, if he should be in hiding around here and we could find him and claim the thousand dollars reward,” breathed Arden, “wouldn’t it be just wonderful! And what a sensation when we magnanimously turned the money over to the college for the swimming pool. Oh, oh!”
“Would you do that for dear old Alma Mater when you don’t know her so very well?” asked Sim, who, with her chums, was still gazing at the poster of the good-looking but missing heir of the Pangborn estate of millions.
“I’d do it for you, Sim, dear,” murmured Arden. “I want you to be happy here, since I teased you so to come.”
“And you think I won’t be happy without the swimming pool?”
“Will you?”
“Not as happy as I would be with it.”
“But even admitting that this missing young man may be around here,” suggested Terry, “what chance have we of finding him? We have so much college work to do. For, after all, we were sent here to learn something,” she sighed.
“Granted,” laughed Arden. “But we may find time for a little detective work on the side as well as for hazing. Oh, it’s a wonderful prospect!” She swung around in a few dance steps right there in the old post office.
“Well, we’d better be getting back,” suggested Sim after this. “Oh, look at the clock!” she gasped. Then followed a hurried sending of some picture postcards they had bought; cards on which they marked with an X the location of their room.
The three chums were bubbling with life, laughter, and merriment as they turned to leave the little building, but their mirth was turned to alarm as a stern voice assailed them.
“Young ladies!”
They looked around to see Rev. Dr. Henry Bordmust sternly regarding them from the doorway.
“Yes, Dr. Bordmust,” Sim almost whispered as the chaplain appeared to be waiting for formal recognition.
“You are freshmen!” he accused, with a glance at their mortarboards, the tassels of which told the tale. “You know you are not permitted over here—in the post office. It is against the college rules—for you freshmen. Return at once! You must! You must!”
He appeared strangely stirred and angry, and his dark brows, shading his bright little eyes, bent into a frown. But somehow, after that first booming and accusative “young ladies,” the chaplain seemed exhausted, as though the anger pent up in him had taken something from his none too profuse vitality. He was an old man. Now he essayed a wintry smile and added, as he gently waved them out with motions of his thin white hands:
“That is to say, you shouldn’t have come here. You—er—have no need to be—er—frightened at this first infraction of the rules, but—er—another time you may be—er—campused for such action.”
Then, having seen that the three were on their way out, Dr. Bordmust turned to the window, evidently to buy some stamps for the letters he held in one hand. He murmured to himself in those queer, quavering, meaningless tones:
“Too bad; too bad! I can’t always be watching! Dear me!”
Wonderingly, Arden and her chums looked at the shrinking figure in black as they passed out of the door. But Dr. Bordmust gave them no further attention.
Sim, who was hurrying after Arden and Terry up the steep hill on top of which was perched Bordmust Hall, uttered a series of frightened exclamations.
“Oo-oo-oo! Oh, my! Oh, but I was frightened. Wasn’t he angry!”
“Since Dr. Bordmust is our chaplain, it was probably what might be called righteous anger,” suggested Arden.
“What do you suppose he meant when he spoke about not always watching?” asked Terry.
“I don’t know,” Arden had to admit. “The girls say Dr. Bordmust is really queer at times. I suppose it is because he’s such a profound student. He knows such a lot, all about Egypt, so many languages, and they say ancient history is an open book to him.” Arden was fairly sprinting along the boardwalk that made the steep path up to Bordmust Hall a little easier. What with talking and hurrying, her breath was a bit gaspy.
“Well, don’t ask me what it all means,” begged Terry. “I can’t even guess. But, oh! I do hope I’m not going to be late for this first class.”
“So say we all of us,” chanted Sim.
“They can’t be too severe at the very beginning,” murmured Arden.
Bordmust Hall, where most of the class sessions were held, crowned with its classic architecture the summit of the long slope which formed the eminence of the broad acres about Cedar Ridge College. It was behind the main, or dormitory, building in which were housed the executive offices and the residence rooms of the faculty. To the southwest of the hall, and easily viewed from the steps, was the unused pool. To the northwest, and in line with the main building, was the beautiful Gothic chapel with its wonderful stained-glass windows. Near the chapel was the unimposing home of the chaplain, Rev. Dr. Bordmust; one of whose ancestors had partly endowed Cedar Ridge. For this reason the hall was named for him.
At the foot of the slope on which the hall stood were the rambling fields and gardens where much of the farm produce for the college tables was raised. The nearest of the farm-lands, so called, was the orchard, part of which could be seen from the southeast windows of the dormitory. And it was this orchard that the taxi-man had indicated in such a warning manner. It was this orchard into which Tom Scott, the good-looking porter, had been staring the night of the arrival of Arden Blake and her chums. So much had been crowded into the comparatively short time the three freshmen had been at college that they had almost forgotten the strange orchard. Even now they had no chance to consider the matter, for they, with many other girls, were hastening to their first classes.
They gave a momentary glance toward the orchard, with its quaint gnarled trees. The morning sun was glinting on red, dark-green, and golden russet apples which the gardener and his men had not yet started to gather.
Arden, especially, gazed searchingly at the orchard. Apple trees grow in such strange shapes and huddle so closely to themselves, as if each one guarded a secret. There was a puzzled look in Arden’s blue eyes as she tried to guess what might be hidden by those trees and the tall hedge surrounding them.
Sim was gazing rather sorrowfully at the pool building, but Terry was smiling, perhaps because everything seemed, for the moment, at least, to be so filled with good and pleasant life.
“Go on in, kids!” Sim urged her two chums. “I’ll be along in a minute or two. I just want to take a look at—I just want to—oh, well, go on. Don’t wait for me.”
“But won’t you be late?” objected Arden.
“No, I have some time to my credit.”
As her surprised friends watched, Sim left them and hurried down across a stretch of smooth lawn toward the disused swimming pool.
“Too bad,” murmured Arden.
“What is?” asked Terry.
“I really think Sim feels more keenly than we realize about the pool. But she’s such a good sport. Look at her! Going to view the ashes of her hopes or the collapse of her dreams or something equally tragic.”
“Don’t let’s say anything about this,” proposed Terry. “If Sim cares so much, I’m sure she’d rather not talk about this little visit.”
Arden agreed and, taking Terry’s arm, they hurried into the hall.
Sim reached the pool building and tried to get some idea of the wreck within by peering through a window. But the sill was too high to afford a view, even if the window had not been made of heavily frosted glass, quite opaque.
Then she stepped back and gazed up at the copper and glass domed roof. Around the top of the building were set at intervals glazed tiles depicting nautical scenes. Dolphins were diving merrily as if to tantalize sea horses with necks proudly arched, and mermaids flicked their tails disdainfully at Father Neptune.
“I may as well try the door,” Sim murmured. “I’d like to see what it’s like inside, though it will probably break my heart!”
After several hard pushes to the extent of her strength, she succeeded in swinging back the door. She found herself in a sort of vestibule, but the inner door of this opened easily, and then Sim stood almost on the edge of the abandoned pool.
A peculiar smell assailed her, as of a place long shut up, but at the same time it had something of out-of-doors about it, the odor of clean earth and ripe vegetables.
“It isn’t as bad as Toots said,” mused Sim. “At least, it looks as though there isn’t so very much the matter. It isn’t filled with vegetables, either; just a few bags as yet, though they probably will bring in more when they pick the apples. This must have been a beautiful pool once.”
The bottom of the pool was tiled a pea green, a color which must have given the water a most cooling tone on a hot day. But the white tile sides no longer gleamed, and in more than one place jagged dark cracks ran crazily down the walls like streaks of black lightning. Sim looked at the cracked tile and concrete edge at her feet. The depth was still indicated, though there was no water in the pool—5 feet.
“This is the shallow end, of course,” Sim thought, and she walked slowly around the edge and toward the melancholy spring-boards to which some strips of cocoa-fiber matting still clung.
“How quiet it is in here,” Sim murmured. “Like a museum after hours—or an Egyptian tomb.” She shivered a little, though it was warm in the natatorium.
In the deep end several filled burlap bags were piled up, and in each corner were barrels of cabbages leaning against the walls.
“I thought, from what Toots said, the whole place would be filled to the brim with cabbages and turnips,” Sim said to herself, smiling a little ruefully. “I wonder how long this pool is, or should I saywas?”
She began to measure the length with her eyes, mentally swimming with long, smooth strokes while her feet churned up and down.
“About seventy-five yards long, I guess,” she went on. “And about twenty-five across. A lovely size. I could do three lengths a day here and really enjoy it. Let’s see how deep it is from the end of the board.”
She walked gingerly out on the diving plank, choosing the center one for there were three at the deep end, tiered at different heights. It was difficult to estimate, without water in the pool and with the barrels and bags of vegetables scattered about, how close the different boards came to the surface of the filled space. Sim decided that the plank she was standing on was the lowest.
She permitted herself a little pre-diving, teetery bounce on the very end, half fearful lest the dried wood should crack beneath even her light weight. But it held, and Sim gave a bolder jump.
“A straight dive—cutting the water about there!” With her eyes Sim indicated to herself just the spot where her finger tips should enter the water—had there been any water there.
She jumped again and came down safely, with no warning cracking of the dried plank. Then she balanced herself on the very tip of the board before, mentally, springing into the air. Now she performed a most ambitious jump, but this time the stiffened wood snapped back suddenly. Sim was thrown to one side, and she swung her arms around and around like a child on its first roller skates, trying desperately not to topple backward.
But her motions only caused the board to quiver more violently, and in a split second Sim slipped off and clung, with her finger tips only, to the edge of the plank, while the hard-tiled bottom of the pool, seemingly miles below, waited to receive her.
“Oh, gosh! What’ll I do?” poor Sim thought. “Those tiles don’t look very soft, and I’ll drop in a minute!”
Her fingers ached from their stiff clinging grip, and her arms were quickly tiring. She decided she must soon let go for after a futile attempt to sling one leg up over the side edge of the board it bent so alarmingly that she feared it would snap. She began to swing to and fro like a pendulum, hoping she might cast herself upon a bag of vegetables which would serve to break her fall, when, suddenly, she felt her wrists firmly gripped by two hands, and she looked up to see Tom Scott, the porter-gardener, smiling down at her. He was kneeling on the end of the plank.
“Don’t jump!” he warned. “I’ll pull you up. It’s rather the reverse of ‘don’t shoot, I’ll come down,’ isn’t it?” he said lightly. He could not have taken better means to quiet Sim’s excited nerves than with Mr. Crockett’s little coon banter.
With what seemed no effort at all, Tom Scott lifted her up and held her clear of the end of the board so her legs did not scrape against it. Then he carefully walked back with her toward the middle of the plank, where there was no danger of its breaking, set her down, and stood grinning at her. A nice grin it was, too, Sim thought later.
She managed to produce a weak, embarrassed smile.
“Thank you so much!” she said a bit stiffly. The man must think her crazy. “I—I slipped! I—er—I was—that is, I was trying——” To cover her confusion she looked at her red finger tips.
“Hurt?” he inquired.
“Broke two or three nails,” Sim responded ruefully. “I’m very glad you came along. I might have sprained an ankle if I had let go, for this end must be nine feet deep.”
“The water, when there is any, is over nine feet deep nearest this wall,” said Tom Scott. “You certainly would have been jarred a bit, to say the least.”
“Then I must thank you again. But please don’t mention to anyone that you found me in such a silly fix, will you?” Sim begged. She was quickly regaining her lost composure. “I just wanted to get a look at the pool and foolishly walked out on the board. I imagined myself poising for a dive and I slipped off. You won’t tell?”
“Of course I won’t,” Tom agreed, somewhat gayly, it seemed. “I came in to get a few of the early apples we have stored here. One of the cooks asked me to. I imagine there are going to be pies. But, honestly, I won’t tell a soul.”
“Thank you,” Sim murmured.
The young gardener walked up to the middle of the pool and with athletic ease jumped down in it near several bags of vegetables. He picked up one containing apples, heaved it up on the edge and jumped up himself. Then, slinging the sack up on his shoulder, he walked toward the door, giving Sim a friendly backward glance as he went out.
“What a nice young man!” said Sim to herself. “He doesn’t seem like a gardener at all. No brogue and no accent of any kind. I wish I could tell Arden and Terry, but I’d rather die than have them know of this dizzy adventure. I must have looked perfectly stupid hanging there on the end of the plank!”
The clanging of a distant bell brought Sim back to reality, and as she looked at her wrist watch she left all thoughts of pools and good-looking rescuing gardeners behind her. For it would need a swift dash to get her to Bordmust Hall before she would be late for her class.
Girls of various sizes, types, and descriptions were hurrying into the building, and their clothes, of all colors, gave a luster otherwise lacking in the dull, sand-colored structure. The freshmen were easily distinguished from the other students by the fact that they were all carrying or scanning yellow cards which told them in what rooms to report for their first classes.
Sim was surprised to see Arden and Terry still outside the hall.
“I thought you had to hurry in to class,” she said, hoping they wouldn’t notice her broken nails.
“Wrong number,” remarked Terry. “We went in and were told to come back in fifteen minutes, so we came up for air.”
“Where were you?” asked Arden, glancing sharply at Sim.
“Oh—just walking around. I think I’m about in time for my class. Let’s go in.”
The three found they were to be separated for the morning session though the first class in the afternoon would find them in the same room for English literature.
“And we must try to sit together,” called Arden to Sim and Terry as they parted.
Inside the hall all was confusion. Girls were running hither and yon. Stairways were crowded with students going up or coming down, and all were excited. Doors were suddenly pushed open by uncertain freshmen and again by oversure sophomores. The latter, in a spirit of fun, several times sent a poor “frosh” up to the top floor when she should have remained on the first.
Another warning bell rang and, almost at once, the corridors were empty and quiet. Inside their classrooms the three girls from 513 looked, listened, and answered somewhat in a daze. That first day always remained more or less of a hazy recollection. Something of an organization was arranged, the roll was checked and corrected, names were asked and given, everyone was on edge and nervous, even the instructors. Strange faces, many of them timid, looked on other strange faces, also somewhat timid.
Then came welcome noon, and the rush out of Bordmust and some of the other study buildings to the dining hall was comparable only to the New York subway rush at five o’clock.
The afternoon classes were attended by all more pleasantly and with less strain. To their delight, Arden, Sim, and Terry managed to get into the same room and sat near one another.
As they were leaving Bordmust Hall, at the close of the afternoon session, Arden heard someone say:
“Here come our three!”
Toots Everett, Jessica, and Pip were regarding the other trio with sardonic smiles and, as Terry said later, “with murder in their eyes.”
“Good afternoon, freshies! How about a little song for my friends, here?” Jessica was mockingly speaking. “A song befitting your talents. Arden Blake, come here!”
Arden stepped forward, blushing. “I can’t sing,” she quavered.
“You shall learn. Your friend here, with the red hair, looks like a singer. And while you two sing, Sim Westover shall dance. On with the dance, freshies!”
The trio from 513 looked at one another in dismay, but there was no help for it. Amused seniors and juniors had gathered to see the fun. From the classmates of Arden and her chums two kinds of advice was forthcoming, the “don’t-you-do-it!” and “go-on-be-sports!”
Finally, in a weak and uncertain voice, Arden and Terry, after a moment of embarrassed consultation, sang one verse from their prep-school song; something about “Bring Me Violets for My Hair,” while Sim tapped about more like a sparrow than a swan.
At last it was over.
“Not bad,” commented Toots.
“I’ve seen worse,” said Pip.
“But not much,” was Jessica’s opinion.
Then the sophomores delivered a rhyming ultimatum. They stood with their heads together and chanted:
“From yonder orchard, old and green,Where, ’tis said, strange things are seen,You three, upon this fatal day,Must gather apples while ye may.At once repair to that dread spot,And in your quest dare pass it not.Then bring, for our symbolic use,Fair apples with but smallest bruise.Ten perfect fruits, no less, must weYour mentors have, in time for tea.”
“From yonder orchard, old and green,
Where, ’tis said, strange things are seen,
You three, upon this fatal day,
Must gather apples while ye may.
At once repair to that dread spot,
And in your quest dare pass it not.
Then bring, for our symbolic use,
Fair apples with but smallest bruise.
Ten perfect fruits, no less, must we
Your mentors have, in time for tea.”
There was a dramatic pause, following this delivery, and then, as though they had rehearsed it, as, indeed, they had, the three sophomores picked up the books they had deposited on the ground in front of them while singing, and marched away, leaving the trio from 513 the center of an excited and thrilled group.
“What does it all mean?” asked Sim.
“Is it part of the hazing?” asked Terry.
“Must we really go after the apples?” asked Arden in astonishment.