Itmust not be inferred that our life that winter was all intense and tragical; if it had been so we could not have endured it. There were patches of clear sky, and the sunlight of generous acts glinted through the storm. We had all merry hearts and good digestions, and these bore us up under our troubles with the buoyancy which is so mercifully granted to youth and inexperience. Then, too, our thoughts were not entirely taken up with ourselves and our own affairs. For a few days after this we saw nothing of Mr. Mudge, and our attention was partly diverted to another matter.One day, earlier in the school year, Mrs. Booth, of the Salvation Army, had addressed Madame’s school on the need of work among the poor of New York. One little parable which she gave made a great impression upon us. I cannot repeat Mrs. Booth’s eloquent language, but will give the main points of the story.“As a young girl,” said Mrs. Booth, “I was very selfish and hard-hearted. I did not care for the suffering and anguish of others. It was not that I was naturally cruel, but I did not think of them at all. I thought and cared only for myself, of parties and dresses, and of having a good time—and this Dead Sea of selfishness was numbing every generous impulse within me. My heart was growing to resemble a certain spring which my mother took me to see when a little child. I remember the walk through the wood beside a little brook which babbled over the stones, and how the light of the sky shone down into its clear amber waters, and the trees and the clouds were reflected in its quiet pools; how long mosses fringed its stones, and water plants made a little forest under its ripples; and how its depths were all alive with tiny fish andhappy living creatures seeking their food and sporting among the cresses. But we came presently to a spring quite apart and very different from the brook. The water was deep, and quiet, and clear, but when I looked into it I was struck by a death-like influence, weird and sinister. There were no minnows darting through the depths like silver needles, or craw-fish burrowing in the banks, or water beetles skimming the surface like oarsmen rowing their light wherries. There was no life to be seen anywhere. The very stones had a strange, unnatural look; they were white as marble; no mosses covered them, no water-lilies or algae grew through the deadly water. The very leaves which had fallen into the pool were white and heavy, as though carved in marble. The grasses which grew downward and dipped into the spring were marble grasses, more like clumsy branching coral than the delicate bending sprays above the waves. It was a petrifying spring, and everything dipped in its waters was presently coated with a fine, stony sediment and practically turned to stone.“So the deadly, petrifying spring of selfishnesswill turn the heart to stone, and while having the form of life it will be cold and hard and dead.”This was Mrs. Booth’s little parable, and while none of our hearts had been dipped in this petrifying spring, it woke us to new desires to do more for the suffering poor.Something happened a little after this talk, and several weeks previous to the robbery, which gave a direction to our impulses. Milly and I were returning from a shopping excursion one very cold and rainy Saturday, when we were approached by a poor girl who was selling pencils on a corner. “They are always useful,” I said; “suppose we take some.”“I should perfectly love to,” Milly replied, “but I haven’t a cent.”The girl had noticed our hesitation and came to us. “Please buy some, young ladies,” she said; “I haven’t had a thing to eat to-day.”“Then come right along with me,” said Milly. “Mother lets me lunch at Sherry’s, whenever I am out shopping.”The girl followed us but stopped beneath the awning of the handsome entrance. “That’s too fine a place for me, Miss,” she said. “Only swells go there. It costs theeyes out of your head just for a clean plate and napkin in there. How much do you s’pose now, a lunch would cost in that there palace?”“Not more than a dollar,” Milly replied cheerfully.“Glory!” exclaimed the girl, “if you mean to lay out as much as that on me, why ten cents will get me all I want to eat at a bakery on Third Avenue, and I’ll take the balance home to the children.”“That is just where the awkwardness of papa’s way of doing comes in,” Milly said to me. “You see,” she explained to the girl, “I’ve spent all my money to-day, but I can have a lunch charged here.”Still the girl hesitated. “I’m not fit,” she said, looking at her dripping, ragged clothes. We were sheltered from view by the awning, and in an instant Milly had taken off her handsome London-made mackintosh and had thrown it around the girl. “There, that covers you all up,” she said, “and your hat isn’t so very bad.”It was a tarpaulin, and, though a little frayed at the edges, its glazed surface had shed the rain and it was not conspicuously shabby.We passed into the ladies’ restaurant andseated ourselves at one of the little tables. Milly took up a menu and looked it over critically. “Now I am going to order a very sensible, plain luncheon,” she announced. “No frills, but something hot and nourishing. We will begin with soup. Papa would approve of that. He is always provoked when I cut the soup. Green turtle? Yes, waiter, three plates of green turtle soup.”“Please excuse me,” I interrupted. “I do not care for anything.”“No? Well, two plates. I usually loathe turtle soup, but I’m determined to be sensible and have a solid lunch. Some way, I don’t know why, I’m not very hungry this afternoon.”“Perhaps the ice-cream soda we had at Huyler’s has taken away your appetite,” I suggested.The soup was brought and Milly sipped a little daintily, as she afterward said merely to keep her guest company. The guest devoured it ravenously; she had evidently never tasted anything so delicious; but perhaps plain beef-stew would have seemed as good, for her feast was seasoned with that most appetizing of sauces—hunger.“What will you have next?” Milly asked politely, as the waiter removed their plates.“Whatever you take, Miss,” the girl replied. “I ain’t particular. I guess anything here’s good enough for me.”“I declare I don’t feel as if I could worry down another morsel,” Milly answered. “There is nothing so surfeiting as green turtle. It makes me almost sick to think of crabs or birds, or even shrimp salad. Let’s skip all that, and take the desert. Waiter, bring us two ices. Which flavor do you prefer?” she asked of the pencil vender, and again the bewildered girl left the choice to her hostess.“Strawberry, mousse, and chocolate are too cloying,” Milly remarked meditatively. “Bring us lemon water ice and pistache. Don’t you just dote on pistache?”“I never ate any, Miss.”“Then I shall have the pleasure of introducing you to something new. You’ll be sure to like it.”The girl did like it. She ate every morsel. Possibly something more solid would have proved as satisfying, but Milly was pleased with her evident appreciation.“Why don’t you eat the macaroons? Don’t you like them? Would you rather have kisses?”“If you please Miss, might I take them home to the children?”“Yes, I suppose so. It isn’t exactly good form to put things in your pocket, but they will be charged for just the same, even if we leave them, so take them, quick, now that the waiter is not looking.”Although the waiter was not watching us, some one else was. A faultlessly dressed gentleman approached at this juncture and greeted Milly in an impressive manner.“Why, Mr. Van Silver!” she exclaimed, a little fluttered by the unexpected meeting. “I haven’t seen you since last summer at Narragansett Pier.”“And whose fault is that?” Mr. Van Silver asked plaintively. “If young ladies will shut themselves up in convents, and never send their adoring friends any invitation to a four o’clock tea or a reception or even a school examination or a prayer meeting, where they might catch a glimpse of them, it is the poor adorer’s misfortune, and not his fault, if he is forgotten. Won’t you introduce me to your friends?”“Certainly. Tib, this is Mr. Van Silver. Mr. Van Silver, allow me to present you toTib—I mean to Miss Smith. I can’t introduce you to the other young lady, because I don’t know her name.”We had all risen and the last remark was madesotto voce. As we left the building Mr. Van Silver sheltered Milly with his umbrella and the waif followed with me. “Come with us to Madame’s,” I had said, “and perhaps we can do something for you.”As we walked on together Milly and Mr. Van Silver carried on a lively conversation, part of which I overheard, and the remainder Milly reported afterward. She first told him of how we had met our new acquaintance, and he seemed much interested.“And so you have just given her a very solid and sensible lunch, consisting of green turtle soup and ice cream.” He laughed a low, gurgling laugh and appeared infinitely amused.“And macaroons,” Milly added; “she has at least five macaroons in her pocket for the children.”“Oh! yes, a macaroon a piece for the children. I wonder if I couldn’t contribute a cigarette for each of them,” and he gurgled again in a purring, pleasant way.“You are making fun of me,” Milly pouted, in an aggrieved way.“Not at all. I think it was just like you, Miss Milly, to do such a lovely thing. You are one of the most kind-hearted girls I know,—to beggars, I mean,—but the young men tell a different story. There’s poor Stacey Fitz Simmons. I saw him the other day and he was complaining bitterly of your hard-heartedness. He said you hardly spoke to him at Professor Fafalata’s costume dance.”“How unfair! he was my partner in the minuet. What more could he ask?”“There’s nothing mean about Stacey. He probably wanted you to dance all the other dances with him. I told him that he was a lucky young dog to be invited at all. Why did you leave me out?”“I didn’t think that a grown-up gentleman, in society, would care for a little dance at a boarding-school, where he would only meet bread-and-butter school girls.”“Oh! I’m too old, am I? Well, I must say you are complimentary. And it’s a fault that doesn’t decrease as time passes. Well, I shall tell Stacey that there’s hope for him. You only care for very young men. Why did you send back the tickets which he sent you for the Inter-scholastic Games! You nearly broke his heart. He has been training for the pastsix months simply and solely in the hope that you will see him win the mile run.”“But I will see him. I wrote him that Adelaide’s brother, Jim, had already sent her tickets, which we should use, and as he might like to bestow his elsewhere, I returned them.”“‘Bestow them elsewhere?’ Not he. Stacey is constant as the pole. He’s as loyal as he is thoroughbred. He was telling me about the serenade that the cadet band gave your school last year. Some girl let down a scrap basket from her window full of buttonhole bouquets. He wore one pinned to the breast of his uniform for a week because he thought you had a hand in it; and you never saw a fellow so cut up as he was when he heard last summer that you had nothing to do with it, and even slept sweetly through the entire serenade.”“Stacey is too silly for anything. It is perfectly ridiculous for a little boy like him to talk that way.”“Little boy—let me see, just how old is Stacey, anyway! About seventeen. Six months your senior, is he not? At what age should you say that one might fall quite seriously and sensibly in love?”“Oh! not till one is twenty at least,” Millyanswered quickly; but she blushed furiously while she spoke.“Sensible girl! But to return to the subject of the Inter-scholastic Games. I am glad that you and your friend Miss Adelaide are going. They are to take place out at the Berkeley Oval, you know. I have no doubt that the roads will be settled and we shall have fine weather by that time. May I have the pleasure of driving you out on my coach?”“Certainly. That is, I must coax papa to write a note to Madame, asking her to let us go.”“I will call at the bank and see your papa about it to-morrow, and meantime do beam upon poor Stacey. And, by the way, here is something which you may as well add to the macaroons for those poor children,” and he pressed a dollar bill into Milly’s hand. Some one passed us rapidly at that instant and gave the young man so questioning a glance that he raised his hat, asking Milly a moment later if she knew the lady.“Why, that is Miss Noakes!” Milly exclaimed, in dismay. “You must not go a step further with us, Mr. Van Silver, or we will be reported for ‘conduct.’”“Far be it from me to gratify the evidentlymalicious desire of that estimable person to report you young ladies. Good-by until the games,” and with another bow he was gone.As we approached the school building we saw Professor Waite leaving by the turret door, and I asked him to allow us to enter by it, at the same time requesting him to buy some of our new friend’s pencils. He looked at the girl closely, and as Milly led the way with her I explained how we had found her.“She is a picturesque creature,” Professor Waite remarked. “I could make her useful as a model. The girls pose so badly and dislike to do it so much, it might be well to try this waif. Tell her to come on Monday, and if the class like her well enough to club together and pay a small amount for her services, we will engage her to sit for us.”He scribbled a line on one of his visiting cards for her to show Cerberus, as we called our dignified janitor, who was very particular about whom he admitted to the building; and I hastily followed ourprotégéto the Amen Corner, where I found Adelaide talking with her while Milly ransacked her wardrobe for cast-off clothing, finding only a Tam O’Shanter, a parasol, and some soiled gloves.“Can’t you find her a pair of rubbers?” Adelaide asked. “The girl’s feet are soaked.”“Do you keep your own rubbers?” the waif asked. “That was my father’s business.”“What do you mean?” inquired Adelaide.“My father was a rubber—a massage man for the Earl of Cairngorm.”“Oh!” said Adelaide, a light beginning to dawn upon her mind. “I meant rubber overshoes, not a bath woman.”“We call those galoshes,” said the girl, as Milly produced a pair which were not mates. “I’m sure you’ve given me a fine setting out, young ladies. I’ll do as much for you if I ever has the chance. Who knowses? Maybe some day I’ll be a swell and you poor. Then you just call on me, and don’t you forget it.” With which cheerful suggestion she left us, grateful and happy. I took her down to the main entrance, and, showing the card to Cerberus, explained that she had been engaged by Professor Waite, and was to be allowed to enter every morning. He granted a grudging consent, not at all approving of her appearance without the waterproof, and I flew back to the Amen Corner to join in the general conference. She had told Adelaide that her name was Pauline Terwilliger. Herfather had been English, her mother Swiss. They had knocked about the world as foot-balls of fortune, but had lived longest in London, where her father had died. Her brother had come to New York some years previous, and her mother had brought the family over on his insistence. But this brother had failed to meet them, as he had promised to do, on their landing at Castle Garden. Their mother had lost his address, and they were stranded in a strange city. They had advertised in the papers, and had left their own address at the Barge Office, but her brother had never appeared. They had taken a room in a tenement house, and the mother had obtained some work, scrubbing offices and cleaning windows. But she had taken cold and was now in a hospital, and Polo was trying to support the two younger children.“They are living in one of the worst tenement houses in Mulberry Bend,” said Adelaide. “I would like to give them a room in my house, but it is full; and cheap as the rent is, they could never pay it.”“The younger children ought to go to the Home,” I suggested.“The Home is full,” Winnie replied. “I called there to-day. Emma Jane says it justbreaks her heart to look at the list of applications waiting for a vacancy. Our dear Princess[2]has in mind a little old-fashioned house which fronts on a side street, whose yard backs against ours. She would like to have it rented as an annex. She says the Home ought to have a nursery for very little babies. You know it does not now take children under two years of age, on account of the expense of nurses; but this would be such a charming place for them, and we could call it the ‘Manger,’ and have it connected with the main building with a long glass piazza. The scheme is a perfect one. All it needs is money to carry it out. Unfortunately, that is lacking. I have corresponded with all our out-of-town circles of King’s Daughters. They are doing all they can, and have pledged enough, with our other subscriptions, to carry the Home through the coming year on its old basis; but there isn’t a cent to spare for a ‘manger.’”“Would all of the new house be taken up by the nursery?” Adelaide asked.“No; the Princess proposed that the upperstory, which consists of four little bedrooms, should be used as ‘guest chambers’ for emergency cases, convalescent children returned from hospitals, and children who, on account of peculiar distress,—like Polo’s sisters,—it seemed best to receive for a short time entirely free. The Princess thought that we might like to club together and pay for one such room, and then we could designate at any time the persons we would like to have occupy it. There is always a list of applicants, which would be submitted to us to choose from, in case we had no candidates of our own to suggest. The occupants of such a room would then be as truly our guests as if we entertained them in our own home. It would come in very nicely now in Polo’s case.”Milly gave a deep sigh. “I wish I could help you, girls, but you know just how I am situated.”Adelaide knitted her brows. “We must get up some sort of an entertainment. It makes me tired to think of it, but there’s no other way.”“And in the mean time, Emma Jane must find room for those children some way,” said Winnie. “I will call a meeting of the Hornetsin our corner to-night, and we will pledge ourselves to raise money enough for one guest chamber for these children, and until it is arranged for, Emma Jane must make up beds for them on the school desks, or we can buy aretroussébedstead for the parlor.”“Retroussébedstead! What’s that?” Milly asked, in a puzzled way.“Don’t be dense, Milly; it’s vulgar to speak of a turn-up nose, you know; and I don’t know why we should insult a parlor organ bedstead in the same way. If we can’t afford that sort of thing, they might turn the dining tables upside down; they would make better cribs than the children have now, I’ll venture to say.”“You will tuck them up, I suppose, with napkins and table-cloths,” Cynthia sneered. But Winnie paid no attention to the interruption.“They will not mind a little crowding, and the thing will march right along if we only plunge into it. They must not stay another night in that old tenement. Polo said there was a rag-picker under them, and a woman who had delirium tremens in the next room. I am going down to-morrow afternoon to take them to the Home.”A meeting of our own particular circle of King’s Daughters, which was made up of ourselves and the “Hornets,” took place that evening in the Hornets’ Nest. The Hornets were a coterie of mischievous girls rooming in a little family like the Amen Corner, but in the attic story under the very eaves. They took up the idea of the guest chamber with great enthusiasm, but they were nearly as impecunious as ourselves. Suddenly Little Breeze—our pet name for Tina Gale—exclaimed, “I have a notion! We will invite the school to a ‘Catacomb Party, and the underground Feast of the Ghouls.’”“How very scareful that sounds!” said Trude Middleton. “What is it, anyway?”“Oh! it’s a mystery, a blood-curdling mystery. It will cost everybody fifty cents, but it will be worth it. I want Witch Winnie to be on the committee of arrangements with me, and you must all give us full authority to do just as we please; and it is to be a surprise, and you must ask no questions.”“We trust you. Where’s it to be? In the sewers, or the cathedral crypts?”But Little Breeze refused to waft the least zephyr of information our way, and there was nothing for it but to wait.As we were returning rather noisily from the Hornets’ Nest, we passed Miss Noakes’s open door, and she rang her little bell in a peremptory manner. This meant that we were to report ourselves immediately to her, and we did so.“Young ladies,” said Miss Noakes in her most disagreeable manner, “before reporting you to Madame, I would like to give you an opportunity of explaining a very irregular performance. As I was returning from a meeting of the Young Women’s Christian Association this afternoon, I saw three occupants of your corner taking a promenade with a gentleman. This is, as you know, an infringement of school rules, and I would like to inquire whether the young man has any authorization from your parents for such attention.”“Only two of us were concerned in this matter,” I replied. “We met Mr. Van Silver quite by chance, and he very politely offered Milly the protection of his umbrella for a part of the way home, as she had none. He is an old friend of her family and thoroughly approved of by Mr. Roseveldt.”“How often have I told you young ladies never to go out, on the pleasantest day, withoutan umbrella or waterproof, since a storm may come up at any minute?”“I did take my waterproof,” Milly replied.“Then you had no occasion to accept the gentleman’s umbrella,” Miss Noakes said sternly.“But I gave it to Polo,” Milly stammered, quite fluttered.“Polo! Who is Polo? and how can you tell me, Miss Smith, that Miss Roseveldt and you were the only ones implicated in this disgraceful affair, when I saw three of you enter the turret door?”“The third girl was Polo, the new model whom Professor Waite has engaged to pose for the portrait class.”“A professional model? Worse and worse! and how comes it that you were walking with such a questionable character?”I related the entire story as simply as possible; but it was evident that Miss Noakes did not approve.“A most extraordinary performance,” she commented. “I feel it my duty to report it to Madame.”“You may spare yourself that trouble, Miss Noakes,” Adelaide replied. “Tib, Winnie, and I are going to tell Madame all about itat her next office hour. We want to ask her permission to get up a little entertainment in behalf of Polo’s little brother and sisters.”“And I shall suggest to Madame,” Miss Noakes added, “the advisability of inquiring into the character and antecedents of this girl, before she allows her to become an accredited dependent of her establishment, or authorizes the bestowal of charity upon her family. Artists’ models are often disreputable people with whom your parents would not be willing that you should associate, and I advise you not to become too intimate with a perfect stranger.”We had come through the ordeal on the whole quite triumphantly, but Polo had excited Miss Noakes’s enmity. She could never be won to regard her as anything but a vagabond, and always spoke of her as ‘that model girl’ in a tone that belied the literal signification of the words; and later, when by dint of spying and listening Miss Noakes learned that a robbery had been committed in the Amen Corner, her dislike and suspicion of poor Polo led to very painful consequences. The relation of which, however, belongs to a later chapter.
Itmust not be inferred that our life that winter was all intense and tragical; if it had been so we could not have endured it. There were patches of clear sky, and the sunlight of generous acts glinted through the storm. We had all merry hearts and good digestions, and these bore us up under our troubles with the buoyancy which is so mercifully granted to youth and inexperience. Then, too, our thoughts were not entirely taken up with ourselves and our own affairs. For a few days after this we saw nothing of Mr. Mudge, and our attention was partly diverted to another matter.
One day, earlier in the school year, Mrs. Booth, of the Salvation Army, had addressed Madame’s school on the need of work among the poor of New York. One little parable which she gave made a great impression upon us. I cannot repeat Mrs. Booth’s eloquent language, but will give the main points of the story.
“As a young girl,” said Mrs. Booth, “I was very selfish and hard-hearted. I did not care for the suffering and anguish of others. It was not that I was naturally cruel, but I did not think of them at all. I thought and cared only for myself, of parties and dresses, and of having a good time—and this Dead Sea of selfishness was numbing every generous impulse within me. My heart was growing to resemble a certain spring which my mother took me to see when a little child. I remember the walk through the wood beside a little brook which babbled over the stones, and how the light of the sky shone down into its clear amber waters, and the trees and the clouds were reflected in its quiet pools; how long mosses fringed its stones, and water plants made a little forest under its ripples; and how its depths were all alive with tiny fish andhappy living creatures seeking their food and sporting among the cresses. But we came presently to a spring quite apart and very different from the brook. The water was deep, and quiet, and clear, but when I looked into it I was struck by a death-like influence, weird and sinister. There were no minnows darting through the depths like silver needles, or craw-fish burrowing in the banks, or water beetles skimming the surface like oarsmen rowing their light wherries. There was no life to be seen anywhere. The very stones had a strange, unnatural look; they were white as marble; no mosses covered them, no water-lilies or algae grew through the deadly water. The very leaves which had fallen into the pool were white and heavy, as though carved in marble. The grasses which grew downward and dipped into the spring were marble grasses, more like clumsy branching coral than the delicate bending sprays above the waves. It was a petrifying spring, and everything dipped in its waters was presently coated with a fine, stony sediment and practically turned to stone.
“So the deadly, petrifying spring of selfishnesswill turn the heart to stone, and while having the form of life it will be cold and hard and dead.”
This was Mrs. Booth’s little parable, and while none of our hearts had been dipped in this petrifying spring, it woke us to new desires to do more for the suffering poor.
Something happened a little after this talk, and several weeks previous to the robbery, which gave a direction to our impulses. Milly and I were returning from a shopping excursion one very cold and rainy Saturday, when we were approached by a poor girl who was selling pencils on a corner. “They are always useful,” I said; “suppose we take some.”
“I should perfectly love to,” Milly replied, “but I haven’t a cent.”
The girl had noticed our hesitation and came to us. “Please buy some, young ladies,” she said; “I haven’t had a thing to eat to-day.”
“Then come right along with me,” said Milly. “Mother lets me lunch at Sherry’s, whenever I am out shopping.”
The girl followed us but stopped beneath the awning of the handsome entrance. “That’s too fine a place for me, Miss,” she said. “Only swells go there. It costs theeyes out of your head just for a clean plate and napkin in there. How much do you s’pose now, a lunch would cost in that there palace?”
“Not more than a dollar,” Milly replied cheerfully.
“Glory!” exclaimed the girl, “if you mean to lay out as much as that on me, why ten cents will get me all I want to eat at a bakery on Third Avenue, and I’ll take the balance home to the children.”
“That is just where the awkwardness of papa’s way of doing comes in,” Milly said to me. “You see,” she explained to the girl, “I’ve spent all my money to-day, but I can have a lunch charged here.”
Still the girl hesitated. “I’m not fit,” she said, looking at her dripping, ragged clothes. We were sheltered from view by the awning, and in an instant Milly had taken off her handsome London-made mackintosh and had thrown it around the girl. “There, that covers you all up,” she said, “and your hat isn’t so very bad.”
It was a tarpaulin, and, though a little frayed at the edges, its glazed surface had shed the rain and it was not conspicuously shabby.
We passed into the ladies’ restaurant andseated ourselves at one of the little tables. Milly took up a menu and looked it over critically. “Now I am going to order a very sensible, plain luncheon,” she announced. “No frills, but something hot and nourishing. We will begin with soup. Papa would approve of that. He is always provoked when I cut the soup. Green turtle? Yes, waiter, three plates of green turtle soup.”
“Please excuse me,” I interrupted. “I do not care for anything.”
“No? Well, two plates. I usually loathe turtle soup, but I’m determined to be sensible and have a solid lunch. Some way, I don’t know why, I’m not very hungry this afternoon.”
“Perhaps the ice-cream soda we had at Huyler’s has taken away your appetite,” I suggested.
The soup was brought and Milly sipped a little daintily, as she afterward said merely to keep her guest company. The guest devoured it ravenously; she had evidently never tasted anything so delicious; but perhaps plain beef-stew would have seemed as good, for her feast was seasoned with that most appetizing of sauces—hunger.
“What will you have next?” Milly asked politely, as the waiter removed their plates.
“Whatever you take, Miss,” the girl replied. “I ain’t particular. I guess anything here’s good enough for me.”
“I declare I don’t feel as if I could worry down another morsel,” Milly answered. “There is nothing so surfeiting as green turtle. It makes me almost sick to think of crabs or birds, or even shrimp salad. Let’s skip all that, and take the desert. Waiter, bring us two ices. Which flavor do you prefer?” she asked of the pencil vender, and again the bewildered girl left the choice to her hostess.
“Strawberry, mousse, and chocolate are too cloying,” Milly remarked meditatively. “Bring us lemon water ice and pistache. Don’t you just dote on pistache?”
“I never ate any, Miss.”
“Then I shall have the pleasure of introducing you to something new. You’ll be sure to like it.”
The girl did like it. She ate every morsel. Possibly something more solid would have proved as satisfying, but Milly was pleased with her evident appreciation.
“Why don’t you eat the macaroons? Don’t you like them? Would you rather have kisses?”
“If you please Miss, might I take them home to the children?”
“Yes, I suppose so. It isn’t exactly good form to put things in your pocket, but they will be charged for just the same, even if we leave them, so take them, quick, now that the waiter is not looking.”
Although the waiter was not watching us, some one else was. A faultlessly dressed gentleman approached at this juncture and greeted Milly in an impressive manner.
“Why, Mr. Van Silver!” she exclaimed, a little fluttered by the unexpected meeting. “I haven’t seen you since last summer at Narragansett Pier.”
“And whose fault is that?” Mr. Van Silver asked plaintively. “If young ladies will shut themselves up in convents, and never send their adoring friends any invitation to a four o’clock tea or a reception or even a school examination or a prayer meeting, where they might catch a glimpse of them, it is the poor adorer’s misfortune, and not his fault, if he is forgotten. Won’t you introduce me to your friends?”
“Certainly. Tib, this is Mr. Van Silver. Mr. Van Silver, allow me to present you toTib—I mean to Miss Smith. I can’t introduce you to the other young lady, because I don’t know her name.”
We had all risen and the last remark was madesotto voce. As we left the building Mr. Van Silver sheltered Milly with his umbrella and the waif followed with me. “Come with us to Madame’s,” I had said, “and perhaps we can do something for you.”
As we walked on together Milly and Mr. Van Silver carried on a lively conversation, part of which I overheard, and the remainder Milly reported afterward. She first told him of how we had met our new acquaintance, and he seemed much interested.
“And so you have just given her a very solid and sensible lunch, consisting of green turtle soup and ice cream.” He laughed a low, gurgling laugh and appeared infinitely amused.
“And macaroons,” Milly added; “she has at least five macaroons in her pocket for the children.”
“Oh! yes, a macaroon a piece for the children. I wonder if I couldn’t contribute a cigarette for each of them,” and he gurgled again in a purring, pleasant way.
“You are making fun of me,” Milly pouted, in an aggrieved way.
“Not at all. I think it was just like you, Miss Milly, to do such a lovely thing. You are one of the most kind-hearted girls I know,—to beggars, I mean,—but the young men tell a different story. There’s poor Stacey Fitz Simmons. I saw him the other day and he was complaining bitterly of your hard-heartedness. He said you hardly spoke to him at Professor Fafalata’s costume dance.”
“How unfair! he was my partner in the minuet. What more could he ask?”
“There’s nothing mean about Stacey. He probably wanted you to dance all the other dances with him. I told him that he was a lucky young dog to be invited at all. Why did you leave me out?”
“I didn’t think that a grown-up gentleman, in society, would care for a little dance at a boarding-school, where he would only meet bread-and-butter school girls.”
“Oh! I’m too old, am I? Well, I must say you are complimentary. And it’s a fault that doesn’t decrease as time passes. Well, I shall tell Stacey that there’s hope for him. You only care for very young men. Why did you send back the tickets which he sent you for the Inter-scholastic Games! You nearly broke his heart. He has been training for the pastsix months simply and solely in the hope that you will see him win the mile run.”
“But I will see him. I wrote him that Adelaide’s brother, Jim, had already sent her tickets, which we should use, and as he might like to bestow his elsewhere, I returned them.”
“‘Bestow them elsewhere?’ Not he. Stacey is constant as the pole. He’s as loyal as he is thoroughbred. He was telling me about the serenade that the cadet band gave your school last year. Some girl let down a scrap basket from her window full of buttonhole bouquets. He wore one pinned to the breast of his uniform for a week because he thought you had a hand in it; and you never saw a fellow so cut up as he was when he heard last summer that you had nothing to do with it, and even slept sweetly through the entire serenade.”
“Stacey is too silly for anything. It is perfectly ridiculous for a little boy like him to talk that way.”
“Little boy—let me see, just how old is Stacey, anyway! About seventeen. Six months your senior, is he not? At what age should you say that one might fall quite seriously and sensibly in love?”
“Oh! not till one is twenty at least,” Millyanswered quickly; but she blushed furiously while she spoke.
“Sensible girl! But to return to the subject of the Inter-scholastic Games. I am glad that you and your friend Miss Adelaide are going. They are to take place out at the Berkeley Oval, you know. I have no doubt that the roads will be settled and we shall have fine weather by that time. May I have the pleasure of driving you out on my coach?”
“Certainly. That is, I must coax papa to write a note to Madame, asking her to let us go.”
“I will call at the bank and see your papa about it to-morrow, and meantime do beam upon poor Stacey. And, by the way, here is something which you may as well add to the macaroons for those poor children,” and he pressed a dollar bill into Milly’s hand. Some one passed us rapidly at that instant and gave the young man so questioning a glance that he raised his hat, asking Milly a moment later if she knew the lady.
“Why, that is Miss Noakes!” Milly exclaimed, in dismay. “You must not go a step further with us, Mr. Van Silver, or we will be reported for ‘conduct.’”
“Far be it from me to gratify the evidentlymalicious desire of that estimable person to report you young ladies. Good-by until the games,” and with another bow he was gone.
As we approached the school building we saw Professor Waite leaving by the turret door, and I asked him to allow us to enter by it, at the same time requesting him to buy some of our new friend’s pencils. He looked at the girl closely, and as Milly led the way with her I explained how we had found her.
“She is a picturesque creature,” Professor Waite remarked. “I could make her useful as a model. The girls pose so badly and dislike to do it so much, it might be well to try this waif. Tell her to come on Monday, and if the class like her well enough to club together and pay a small amount for her services, we will engage her to sit for us.”
He scribbled a line on one of his visiting cards for her to show Cerberus, as we called our dignified janitor, who was very particular about whom he admitted to the building; and I hastily followed ourprotégéto the Amen Corner, where I found Adelaide talking with her while Milly ransacked her wardrobe for cast-off clothing, finding only a Tam O’Shanter, a parasol, and some soiled gloves.
“Can’t you find her a pair of rubbers?” Adelaide asked. “The girl’s feet are soaked.”
“Do you keep your own rubbers?” the waif asked. “That was my father’s business.”
“What do you mean?” inquired Adelaide.
“My father was a rubber—a massage man for the Earl of Cairngorm.”
“Oh!” said Adelaide, a light beginning to dawn upon her mind. “I meant rubber overshoes, not a bath woman.”
“We call those galoshes,” said the girl, as Milly produced a pair which were not mates. “I’m sure you’ve given me a fine setting out, young ladies. I’ll do as much for you if I ever has the chance. Who knowses? Maybe some day I’ll be a swell and you poor. Then you just call on me, and don’t you forget it.” With which cheerful suggestion she left us, grateful and happy. I took her down to the main entrance, and, showing the card to Cerberus, explained that she had been engaged by Professor Waite, and was to be allowed to enter every morning. He granted a grudging consent, not at all approving of her appearance without the waterproof, and I flew back to the Amen Corner to join in the general conference. She had told Adelaide that her name was Pauline Terwilliger. Herfather had been English, her mother Swiss. They had knocked about the world as foot-balls of fortune, but had lived longest in London, where her father had died. Her brother had come to New York some years previous, and her mother had brought the family over on his insistence. But this brother had failed to meet them, as he had promised to do, on their landing at Castle Garden. Their mother had lost his address, and they were stranded in a strange city. They had advertised in the papers, and had left their own address at the Barge Office, but her brother had never appeared. They had taken a room in a tenement house, and the mother had obtained some work, scrubbing offices and cleaning windows. But she had taken cold and was now in a hospital, and Polo was trying to support the two younger children.
“They are living in one of the worst tenement houses in Mulberry Bend,” said Adelaide. “I would like to give them a room in my house, but it is full; and cheap as the rent is, they could never pay it.”
“The younger children ought to go to the Home,” I suggested.
“The Home is full,” Winnie replied. “I called there to-day. Emma Jane says it justbreaks her heart to look at the list of applications waiting for a vacancy. Our dear Princess[2]has in mind a little old-fashioned house which fronts on a side street, whose yard backs against ours. She would like to have it rented as an annex. She says the Home ought to have a nursery for very little babies. You know it does not now take children under two years of age, on account of the expense of nurses; but this would be such a charming place for them, and we could call it the ‘Manger,’ and have it connected with the main building with a long glass piazza. The scheme is a perfect one. All it needs is money to carry it out. Unfortunately, that is lacking. I have corresponded with all our out-of-town circles of King’s Daughters. They are doing all they can, and have pledged enough, with our other subscriptions, to carry the Home through the coming year on its old basis; but there isn’t a cent to spare for a ‘manger.’”
“Would all of the new house be taken up by the nursery?” Adelaide asked.
“No; the Princess proposed that the upperstory, which consists of four little bedrooms, should be used as ‘guest chambers’ for emergency cases, convalescent children returned from hospitals, and children who, on account of peculiar distress,—like Polo’s sisters,—it seemed best to receive for a short time entirely free. The Princess thought that we might like to club together and pay for one such room, and then we could designate at any time the persons we would like to have occupy it. There is always a list of applicants, which would be submitted to us to choose from, in case we had no candidates of our own to suggest. The occupants of such a room would then be as truly our guests as if we entertained them in our own home. It would come in very nicely now in Polo’s case.”
Milly gave a deep sigh. “I wish I could help you, girls, but you know just how I am situated.”
Adelaide knitted her brows. “We must get up some sort of an entertainment. It makes me tired to think of it, but there’s no other way.”
“And in the mean time, Emma Jane must find room for those children some way,” said Winnie. “I will call a meeting of the Hornetsin our corner to-night, and we will pledge ourselves to raise money enough for one guest chamber for these children, and until it is arranged for, Emma Jane must make up beds for them on the school desks, or we can buy aretroussébedstead for the parlor.”
“Retroussébedstead! What’s that?” Milly asked, in a puzzled way.
“Don’t be dense, Milly; it’s vulgar to speak of a turn-up nose, you know; and I don’t know why we should insult a parlor organ bedstead in the same way. If we can’t afford that sort of thing, they might turn the dining tables upside down; they would make better cribs than the children have now, I’ll venture to say.”
“You will tuck them up, I suppose, with napkins and table-cloths,” Cynthia sneered. But Winnie paid no attention to the interruption.
“They will not mind a little crowding, and the thing will march right along if we only plunge into it. They must not stay another night in that old tenement. Polo said there was a rag-picker under them, and a woman who had delirium tremens in the next room. I am going down to-morrow afternoon to take them to the Home.”
A meeting of our own particular circle of King’s Daughters, which was made up of ourselves and the “Hornets,” took place that evening in the Hornets’ Nest. The Hornets were a coterie of mischievous girls rooming in a little family like the Amen Corner, but in the attic story under the very eaves. They took up the idea of the guest chamber with great enthusiasm, but they were nearly as impecunious as ourselves. Suddenly Little Breeze—our pet name for Tina Gale—exclaimed, “I have a notion! We will invite the school to a ‘Catacomb Party, and the underground Feast of the Ghouls.’”
“How very scareful that sounds!” said Trude Middleton. “What is it, anyway?”
“Oh! it’s a mystery, a blood-curdling mystery. It will cost everybody fifty cents, but it will be worth it. I want Witch Winnie to be on the committee of arrangements with me, and you must all give us full authority to do just as we please; and it is to be a surprise, and you must ask no questions.”
“We trust you. Where’s it to be? In the sewers, or the cathedral crypts?”
But Little Breeze refused to waft the least zephyr of information our way, and there was nothing for it but to wait.
As we were returning rather noisily from the Hornets’ Nest, we passed Miss Noakes’s open door, and she rang her little bell in a peremptory manner. This meant that we were to report ourselves immediately to her, and we did so.
“Young ladies,” said Miss Noakes in her most disagreeable manner, “before reporting you to Madame, I would like to give you an opportunity of explaining a very irregular performance. As I was returning from a meeting of the Young Women’s Christian Association this afternoon, I saw three occupants of your corner taking a promenade with a gentleman. This is, as you know, an infringement of school rules, and I would like to inquire whether the young man has any authorization from your parents for such attention.”
“Only two of us were concerned in this matter,” I replied. “We met Mr. Van Silver quite by chance, and he very politely offered Milly the protection of his umbrella for a part of the way home, as she had none. He is an old friend of her family and thoroughly approved of by Mr. Roseveldt.”
“How often have I told you young ladies never to go out, on the pleasantest day, withoutan umbrella or waterproof, since a storm may come up at any minute?”
“I did take my waterproof,” Milly replied.
“Then you had no occasion to accept the gentleman’s umbrella,” Miss Noakes said sternly.
“But I gave it to Polo,” Milly stammered, quite fluttered.
“Polo! Who is Polo? and how can you tell me, Miss Smith, that Miss Roseveldt and you were the only ones implicated in this disgraceful affair, when I saw three of you enter the turret door?”
“The third girl was Polo, the new model whom Professor Waite has engaged to pose for the portrait class.”
“A professional model? Worse and worse! and how comes it that you were walking with such a questionable character?”
I related the entire story as simply as possible; but it was evident that Miss Noakes did not approve.
“A most extraordinary performance,” she commented. “I feel it my duty to report it to Madame.”
“You may spare yourself that trouble, Miss Noakes,” Adelaide replied. “Tib, Winnie, and I are going to tell Madame all about itat her next office hour. We want to ask her permission to get up a little entertainment in behalf of Polo’s little brother and sisters.”
“And I shall suggest to Madame,” Miss Noakes added, “the advisability of inquiring into the character and antecedents of this girl, before she allows her to become an accredited dependent of her establishment, or authorizes the bestowal of charity upon her family. Artists’ models are often disreputable people with whom your parents would not be willing that you should associate, and I advise you not to become too intimate with a perfect stranger.”
We had come through the ordeal on the whole quite triumphantly, but Polo had excited Miss Noakes’s enmity. She could never be won to regard her as anything but a vagabond, and always spoke of her as ‘that model girl’ in a tone that belied the literal signification of the words; and later, when by dint of spying and listening Miss Noakes learned that a robbery had been committed in the Amen Corner, her dislike and suspicion of poor Polo led to very painful consequences. The relation of which, however, belongs to a later chapter.
Professor Waite raised the portière for her to pass.
Polocame on Monday and posed to the satisfaction of Professor Waite and of the class. Winnie was successful in entering the two children at the Home, and Adelaide had a happy thought for Polo herself, who was too old to be received there. One of the smallest apartments in her tenement had been taken by Miss Billings and Miss Cohens, two seamstresses, honest, industrious old maids, who had lived and worked together since they were girls. Adelaide called them the two turtle doves, the odd combination of their name suggesting the nickname, and their fondness for each other bearing it out.They were a cheerful pair, and their rooms were bright with flowers and canaries. One morning Miss Billings woke to find her friend dead at her side, having passed from life in sleep so peacefully that she neither woke nor disturbed the faithful friend close beside her.The poor old lady was very lonely and was glad to take Polo in. The young girl brightened her life, and her own influence on the nearly friendless waif was excellent. In the intervals of posing Miss Billings taught Polo how to cut and fit dresses. Polo helped her with her sewing, and Miss Billings promised to take her into partnership by and by. Polo was very happy and grateful, and the girls all liked her immensely. She was a character in her way, an irresistible mimic. She would take off Miss Noakes to the life, while she had a talent which I have never seen equalled for making the most ludicrous and horrible faces. She was almost pretty, and with Miss Billings’s help, made over the odds and ends of clothing bestowed upon her very nicely. Her one trinket was a string of coral beads and a little cross which her brother had sent her before she left England. She never gave up her faith in this brother. “Albert Edward’llturn up some day rich,” she said. She flouted the idea that he might be dead. “He ain’t the dying kind,” she said, when Cynthia suggested the possibility. “None of our family ain’t, except father. Why, I’ve been through enough to kill a cat, and I haven’t died yet.”She was especially devoted to Milly, to whom she felt, with reason, that she owed all her good fortune. Professor Waite found her remarkably serviceable as a model, from her versatility and ability to adapt herself to any character, giving a great variety of types for us to copy. When she wore the Italian costume, one would have thought her an Italian, and a complete change came over her when she donned the German cap and wooden shoes. “May be that’s because I’ve lived amongst all sorts of foreigners so much,” she said, “and Albert Edward always said I’d make an actress equal to the best. He said I had talent. I do pity them as hasn’t. I wouldn’t be one of the common herd for anything.”Polo was certainly uncommon. Her use of the English language had an individuality of its own. She hated Miss Noakes and said she had no business to be “tryannic” (meaningtyrannical). She spoke of native Americans as abor-jines (a distortion of aborigines), and intermingled these little variations of her own with cockney phrases which were new to our untravelled ears.She found difficulty in understanding our words and expressions, and once when Professor Waite told her to set up a screen she astonished us all by uttering a most blood-curdling yell, under the impression that he had commanded her to set up ascream.She disliked Cerberus, and to save her from his scornful scrutiny and contemptuous remarks, Professor Waite had a duplicate key made to the turret door, by which Polo entered each morning and mounted directly to the studio.She was very diverting, but much as we liked her we could not forget that we had assumed a grave responsibility in taking the support of her little sisters upon our hands, and we now began to actively agitate the plans for the Catacomb Party, which was to raise funds for the Annex with its “Manger and Guest Chambers.”One event of interest to us occurred before the evening of the Catacomb Party. Thiswas the Annual Drill of the Cadet School. All of the Amen Corner and the Hornets had invitations. We occupied front seats in the east balcony of the great armory, vigilantly chaperoned by Miss Noakes. Her best intentions could not prevent the young cadets from paying their respects to us during the intervals of the drill.The young men looked handsomely in their gala uniforms of white trousers and gloves, blue coats, and caps set off with plenty of frogging and brass buttons. They performed their evolutions with a precision which would have done credit to a regiment of regulars—and received the praise of General Howard, who reviewed them.Out of all the battalion there were two boys in whom we were chiefly interested: Adelaide’s younger brother Jim, color sergeant of the baby company, and Milly’s friend Stacey Fitz Simmons, the handsome drum-major.Winnie insisted that Malcolm Douglas must have been thinking of the practising of this cadet drum corps when he wrote:“And all of the people for blocks around,Boom-tidera-da-boom!Kept time at their tasks to the martial sound,Boom-tidera-da-boom!While children to windows and stoops would fly,Expecting to see a procession pass by,And they couldn’t make out why it never drew nigh,With its boom-tidera-da—boom-a-diddle-dee;Boom-tidera-da-boom!It would seem such vigor must soon abate;Boom-tidera-da-boom!But they still keep at it, early and late;Boom-tidera-da-boom!So if it should be that a war breaks out,They’ll all be ready, I have no doubt,To help in putting the foe to rout,With their boom-tidera-da-boom—Boom-tidera-da-boom—Boom-tidera-da—boom-a-diddle-dee,Boom-Boom-Boom!”Stacey was seventeen, tall for his age, with a little feathery mustache outlining his finely cut upper lip. He was elegant in appearance and manners, and we all admired and liked him with the exception of perverse, wilful Milly. Jim was thirteen and small for his years. The life of privation which he had led during a period when he had been lost, the account of which has been given in the previous volume, had stunted his growth, and given him an appearance of delicacy. But Jim was wiry, and possessed great endurance, and his drilling that evening was noticeable for its accuracy and spirit. Adelaide and Jim were deeply attached to one another. They wrote each other longletters every week, remarkable for their perfect confidence. As Jim’s letters give an insight not only into his life at the cadet school, but also into the relations which subsisted between several of the cadets and members of our own school, as well as into acontretempswhich introduced great consternation into the Catacomb Party, I will choose two from Adelaide’s packet and insert them before describing the mystic entertainment of the Council of Ten.Letter No. 1.Dear Sister:I like the barracks better than I did. I almost have gotten over being homesick, and the fellows are awfully nice now that I have come to know them. I miss mother, but I would rather die than let any one know it. I’ve put her photograph down at the bottom of my trunk, for it gave me the snuffles to see it, and Stacey Fitz Simmons caught me kissing it once, and I was so ashamed. He is one of the nicest fellows here, and he didn’t rough me a bit about it, only whistled, and said: “You’ve got a mighty pretty mother; I guess she takes after your sister. Pity there wasn’t more beauty left for the rest of the family.” He knows you, and I guess you must remember meeting him when you visited the Roseveldts last summer at Narragansett Pier. He asked if you and Milly Roseveldt were at the same school, and would I please send his regards when I wrote. He is one of the Senior A boys, and is going to college next year. I am only Middle C, but he is ever so good to me, I am sure I don’t know why. We are drilling, drilling all the time now for the annual drill at the Seventh Regiment Armory.Stacey is an awfully good fellow. He’s the head of everything. He’s drum-major, and you just ought to see him in his uniform leading the drum corps [Jim spelled itcore]. He’s the cockatooof the school. Stacey’s folks are rich, and his mother wrote the military tailor not to spare expense, but to get Stacey up just as fine as they make ’em, and I don’t believe there’s a drum-major of any of the crack regiments that can hold a candle to him for style. In the first place he has a high furry hat that looks like the big muffs they carried at the old folks’ concerts. Then he has a bright scarlet coat all frogged and padded and laced with lots of gold cord, and the nattiest trousers and patent leather boots. But his baton—oh, Adelaide! words cannot express. I don’t believe old Ahasuerus ever had a sceptre half as gorgeous, with a great gold ball on the top, and it will do your eyes good to see him swing it. Doesn’t he put on airs, though! Put on isn’t the word, for Stacey is airy naturally, and dignified, too. Buttertub says he walks as if he owned the earth. When he marches backward holding his baton crosswise, I’m always afraid that he will fall and that somebody might laugh, and that would kill him. But he never does fall. He seems to see with the buttons on the small of his back, and he stepped over a banana skin while marching to the armory just as dandified as you please. And he never fails to catch his baton when he tosses it into the air, and makes it whirl around twice before it comes down. He never bows to any of the fellows or seems to see them—except me. They are going to have Gilmore’s Band at the drill, and Stacey was practising leading them around the armory. I was in the lower balcony, hanging over and watching him. He was going through his fanciest evolutions when he passed me. He looked straight ahead and never winked an eye. I didn’t think he saw me till I heard him say, “How’s that, dear boy?” and I clapped so hard that I nearly fell over.Buttertub hates Stacey; he wanted to be drum-major himself.He calls Stacey wasp-waist, but it only calls attention to his own big stomach. He is always eating, and he won’t train, and he can’t run without having a fit of apoplexy. He weighs too much for the crew and he can’t even ride a bicycle, or do anything except the heavy work on the foot ball team and study. Yes, he can study; that’s the disgusting part.Stacy can do everything. He’s a splendid sprinter. There’s only one other boy in the school that can equal him, and that’s a red-headed boy they call Woodpecker. He has longer legs than Stacey and of course takes a longer stride, and that counts. But Stacey is livelier and puts in four strides to three of the Woodpecker’s, so they are pretty nearly equal. Stacey is a prettier runner, too. He does it just aseasy, while the Woodpecker works all over, armsandlegs, and bites on his handkerchief, and his eyes pop out, and when it’s all over he falls in a heap and looks as if he were dying, while Stacey takes another lap in better time than the last, just for fun.Stacey rides the bicycle, too, splendidly. He has one of those big wheels and he can manage it with his feet and do all sorts of tricks with his hands. He has been giving me points on bicycle riding. He picked out my safety for me, and has been coaching me how to manage it. He says I am the best rider for a little chap that he ever saw, and that he means to make me win the race at the inter-scholastic. I tell you Stacey is a trump. He’s an all-around athlete. He dances, and he rides, and he shoots in the summer when he goes hunting with his uncle; and he fences, and he’s stroke on the crew, and he’s our best high jump and there isn’t anything that he can’t do, except his lessons—sometimes—but they don’t count. He says that if it wasn’t for the beastly lessons school would be heavenly, and we all agree with him. Ricos said that he would head a petition to have lessons abolished and the boys would all sign it, but Stacey said that parents were so unprogressive he didn’t believe they would, and he was afraid the head master wouldn’t pay much attention to such a petition unless it bore the parents’ signatures.I’ve written an awfully long letter, but I like to write to you, and it was rainy to-day, and we couldn’t go to the grounds, and I’ve hurt my ankle by falling from my bicycle so that I could not practise in the gymnasium. Now don’t go and get scared, like a girl, and disapprove of athletics for such a little thing as that. It was only a little sprain, that will all be well before the drill, and I only barked my shin the least bit, nothing at all to what the Woodpecker does most every day.I hope I shall be big enough to go on the foot-ball team next year. I know you think it’s dangerous, but I’ve calculated the chances of getting hurt and they are so very slight that I guess I’ll risk it. Why, out of the whole eleven last year there were only nine that got hurt.Be sure you all come to the exhibition drill. I enclose two tickets and Stacey sends two more. He wants it distinctly understood that you and Miss Roseveldt are his guests. So you can give mine with my compliments to Miss T. Smith and Miss Winnie De Witt. I don’t send any for that Vaughn girl, for Buttertub knows her and told me he was going to invite her.No more at present,From your affectionate brother,James Halsey Armstrong.P. S. Stacey sends his regards to Miss Roseveldt.P. S. No. 2. And to you.Letter No. 2.The Barracks, April.Dear Sister:Wasn’t the drill splendid? I knew you would enjoy it. How I wish father and mother had been in New York so they could have seen it.You looked just stunning in that stylish hat. Stacey said so. You must excuse him if he didn’t pay you very much attention. He could only leave the band during the intermission and of course he had to be polite to Miss Roseveldt. Besides he said I stuck so close to you that he hadn’t any chance. He says he never saw a fellow so spooney over his own sister as I am. I tell him there aren’t many chaps who have such a nice sister as you are, and then we were separated so long that I am making up for lost time.I am glad you liked the French Army Bicycle drill. That was something quite new. Stacey was detailed to command it because he’s a splendid cyclist himself, and he knew how to put us through. I didn’t know till the day before that he wasgoing to call me out to skirmish. He said: “Jimmy, you can manage your wheel better than any one else except the Woodpecker, and I am going to have you two go through with a little fancy business that will bring the house down.” And didn’t it? When I fired off my gun going at full speed, they clapped so that I nearly lost my head. Ricos was mad because he wasn’t selected for the special manœuvres. Ricos is better for speed than I am, and he’s awfully quick-tempered—he’s a Spaniard, you know, and he said to me, “Never mind, youngster, I’ll pay you up for this at the inter-scholastic races.” I suppose he means to win the gold medal, and I told Stacey that I believed he would, and I should be thankful to be second, or even third, for there are the best cyclists from all the other schools in the city to contend against. But Stacey says, “He can’t do it, you know,” meaning Ricos; and our trainer says that if he enters me at all he enters me to win. So I am going to try my level best.Wasn’t Cynthia Vaughn stunning in that green dress trimmed with fur! Buttertub said she was the most stylish girl at the drill. Stacey made him mad by saying that she was hardly that, though, as a Harvard chap once said of some one else, he had no doubt that she was a well-meaning girl and a comfort to her mother!Ricos invited all the Hornets, and some one of them told him that you girls are going to have a great lark—a Catacombing Party. He thought it was to represent the games of the Roman arena with cats instead of lions and tigers. I told him it must be a mistake, and that if he supposed Madame’s young ladies, and my sister especially, would do anything so low as to look on at a cat-fight, he didn’t know what he was talking about. But Stacey said that there was something up, he knew, for when he asked Milly Roseveldt if the girls were going to have a Venetian Fête for the benefit of the Home, as they did last year, she said it was a sheet and pillow-case party this time, and boys were not admitted. He told her he would surely disguise himself in a sheet and pillow-case and come; but he only said so to tease her, and when he saw how distressedshe was he told her he was only fooling. Buttertub said Cynthia mentioned it too, and Stacey’s idea was a good one and he believed he should try it. But Stacey said he would like to see him do it and that he would have him court-martialled for ungentlemanly conduct, and reduced to the ranks if he attempted to play the spy at one of the girl’s frolics.Stacey wanted me to be sure to tell you to tell Milly Roseveldt not to worry about what he said, for the cadets are all gentlemen and wouldn’t think of going anywhere where they were not invited. That’s so as far as Stacey is concerned, but I don’t know about Ricos.Do tell me what you are going to do, anyway—and for pity’s sake don’t have any cats in it.Your affectionate brother,J. H. Armstrong.Jim’s misunderstanding of the Catacomb Party amused us very much. No one was alarmed by the boys’ threats to attend it but Milly, who insisted that she had no confidence in Stacey and believed him fully capable of committing even this atrocious act.As soon as the drill was over our interest centred on this party. The committee from our circle of King’s Daughters waited upon Madame, and obtained her permission for the projected entertainment. She stipulated, however, that it must be strictly confined to members of the school and no outsiders admitted.“The Literary Society,” she said, “will give its public entertainment in the spring, and we do not wish to have the reputation of spendingour entire time in getting up charity bazaars, and imposing on our friends to buy tickets. Anything in reason which you care to do among yourselves, I will consent to. It does young girls good to have an occasional frolic.”Emboldened by the unusually happy frame of mind in which Madame seemed to be basking, Winnie asked if we might act a play and have “gentlemen characters” in it. Formerly the assumption of masculine attire had been prohibited, and at one of our Literary Society dramas, a half curtain had been stretched across the stage, giving a view of only the upper portion of the persons of the actors. The young ladies taking the part of the male personages in the play, wore cutaway coats outside their dresses, and riding hats or Tam O’Shanter caps.Madame laughed as she recalled that absurd spectacle. “Since your audience is strictly limited to your associates, I think I may suspend that rule for this occasion,” she said leniently. “When do you intend to give the play? I cannot allow you to use the chapel. How would the studio do?”“If you please,” said Winnie, “we would like the laundry.”“The laundry!” Madame exclaimed in surprise.“Yes, Madame. Tina Gale explored the lower regions under the school building one day, and the furnace room, and the long dim galleries connecting the coal bins, the cellars, and the laundry seemed to her so mysterious and pokerish that she thought it would be a nice idea to call it a Catacomb Party, especially as the girls have been so much interested in Professor Todd’s early history of the Christian Church.”Madame’s eyes twinkled as she heard this, for Professor Todd had been generally voted a prosy old nuisance; but Winnie was earnestness itself.“Very well,” said Madame kindly. “I do not want the girls to think that I am a cruel tyrant, or unduly strict or suspicious. [“She was thinking of the way in which she arraigned Adelaide for corresponding with Professor Waite,” Winnie commented afterward.] If your committee will submit the programme to me, I have no doubt I shall be able to approve of everything. Let me see—the laundry will be your circus maximus, or theatre. Where will you have your refreshments?”We had not thought of that.“I will give you the key to the preserve closet; it is at the end of the drying-room, andyou may make a raid upon it for your provisions. Only please be careful not to waste or destroy any more than you can dispose of. I will have some tables placed in the drying-room, and you may partake of your collation there.”This was all we needed. The preparations for the Catacomb Party went merrily on.Trude Middleton dramatized Cardinal Wiseman’s novel, “Fabiola.” We who had remained at school during the Christmas Holidays had read it aloud together, and its thrilling pictures of the persecutions of the martyrs, the games of the arena, and all the life of imperial Rome, had made a deep impression upon us. Trude Middleton had a genius for writing, and Little Breeze distributed the parts, rehearsed the play, took the rôle of the sorceressAfra, and acted as stage manager. The classical costumes were easily arranged. Professor Waite showed us how to drape crinkled cheese cloth and to manage the folds of peplum and toga, to trace a key-pattern border, to fillet our hair, and lace our sandals. The rehearsals were carried on in the most secret manner. Only the actors knew exactly what the play was to be. Expectancy was on thequi vive. Winnie hadwritten some mysteriously attractive admission tickets, and had ornamented each one with a tiny white wire skeleton. These tickets the ten sold to the other members of the school to the number of one hundred and twenty, not a single member of the school declining to patronize us.The sale of these tickets had been materially aided by a manifesto, printed in red ink, supposed to simulate blood, and left dangling conspicuously from the wrist of old “Bonaparte” (Bonypart), the anatomy class skeleton.This manifesto read as follows:The Council of Ten, in secret session assembled, hereby summon you, each and all, severally and individually, to the Torture Chambers of the Inquisition (otherwise known as the studio), on the ringing of the great tocsin (sometimes called the eight o’clock study bell). At that hour let each be prepared to render up her earthly goods to the amount of one ticket, vouching for fifty cents; and having donned a winding sheet, and likewise a winding pillow-case as headgear, submit to the office of the Inquisition, which will transform her, with that happy despatch due to long experience, into a disembodied spirit. At the same time the Arch Witch Winnie will turn back the clock of Time to the first century, and each ghost, being first securely blindfolded, will be led by a spirit guide, experienced in the charge of personally conducting spirits, into the great amphitheatre of the Coliseum, where she will mingle with the most renowned personages of ancient Rome, and will be permitted to live a short and exciting life under the cheerful persecution of the amiable and playful Cæsars.After the final scene of the gladiatorial combat in the arena each spirit will be led by her guide through the grewsome and labyrinthine Catacombs—faint not! fear not! to theFeast of the Ghouls!Thence, conducted by Orpheus with his lute, and Beatrice, the guide of Dante, they will cross the Styx and join in theDance of the Deadin the shadowy Purgatorio.At the stroke of midnight each spirit who has passed through this ordeal with a steadfast mind will be wafted to upper regions to the rest of the blessed.Signed by the Council of Ten, as represented by Witch Winnie, of the Amen Corner, and Little Breeze, of the Hornets; and sealed with the great seal of our office, this —— day of —— 18—.Seal.These preparations were going on simultaneously with the investigation of the robbery, and served in a measure to relieve the tension to which we were all subjected. Still the trouble was there, and we never quite forgot it. Mr. Mudge called twice, and made inquiries, from which Winnie inferred that he was hopelessly puzzled. Milly was sure that he had found a clew, but if so, he did not impart his discoveries.The mystic evening arrived. Cynthia, who, for some reason inexplicable to us, was in a highly self-satisfied and gracious mood, invited Polo to sleep with her in order that she mightbe able to attend the party. It was necessary to prefer this request to our corridor teacher, Miss Noakes, who gave us a very grudging consent; but we cared very little for her iciness since we had effected our wishes.The girls met in the studio, where all were draped in sheets, a small mask cut from white cotton cloth tied on, and a pillow case fitted about the back of the head in the fashion of a long capuchin hood. When thus robed our dearest friends were unrecognizable. Then, marshalled by Winnie, the company of spectres paraded through the hall and down the main staircase. Miss Noakes and the other teachers stood in their doors and watched the procession, but as it was known that we had Madame’s permission no attempt was made to stop us, and we passed on unabashed. Arrived at the lower floor each of the guests was securely blindfolded and conducted by one of our ten down the cellar stairs, and through winding passages to the laundry, which had been converted for the evening into an auditorium, sheets having been hung on clothes-lines across one end, and the space in front filled with camp chairs brought from the recitation rooms. The set tubs on one side of the improvised stage were fitted up as boxes,while a semi-circle of clothes-baskets marked the space assigned to the comb orchestra. As fast as the girls arrived in the laundry they were seated, and when the last instalment was in position the lights were turned nearly out, and they were told to remove the handkerchiefs which bandaged their eyes. At the same time the comb orchestra, led by Cynthia, struck up a dismal dirge-like overture, broken in upon at intervals by a tremendous thump with a potato masher on the great copper boiler. The curtain was drawn slowly aside, the lights suddenly turned on, and the play began. Adelaide made a very beautifulFabiola. Winnie acted the part ofPancratiuswith great expression. Milly looked the saintlyAgnesto perfection. I wasSebastian. We did not indulge in all the dialogue with which the book is overloaded. Our play was rather a series of tableaux, for which I had painted the scenery with the assistance of the other art students. Professor Waite had borrowed various classical properties from his brother artists for us. The plaster casts of the studio were made to serve as marble statues, and Madame had sent us several palms in urn-shaped pots.When the play was nearly over, Polo, whohad acted as doorkeeper, made her way behind the scenes and took my attention from the prompter’s book with the horrified whisper, “If you please, there are two girls out there that are boys.”“Who? Where? How do you know it?” I asked in a breath.“They came in at the end of the procession, without any guides, and sat down near the door, apart from the others. One is little enough to be a girl, but the other is taller, even, than Miss Adelaide.”“It is Snooks,” Winnie exclaimed. “Just like her to come spying and speculating here to see what we are up to.”“If that’s so, Miss Noakes has bigger feet than I ever gave her credit for,” Polo replied; “and she wears boots too.”“Then those cadets have actually dared!” Winnie exclaimed, and Milly gave a little shriek. “Oh, that horrid Stacey Fitz Simmons!”“Hush!” commanded Winnie. “We will make them wish they had never been born. Oh, I will manage these gay young gentlemen. Go back to your post, Polo. Keep the door locked, and be sure that no one leaves exceptin the regular order and conducted by her guide.”A few moments later and the curtains were drawn at the close of the final act, tremendous applause testifying the approval of the audience. Winnie now stepped to the front of the curtain and announced that the ghosts must now each submit once more to be blindfolded and “to be led through the grewsome and labyrinthine catacombs to the Feast of the Ghouls.”Little Breeze and Milly first led away two of the girls, and then Winnie stepped boldly up to the taller of the two suspected intruders and offered to blindfold him. The rogue could only follow the example of those who had preceded him, and submit with a good grace, as any other course would have led to detection. I followed with the shorter impostor, tying the handkerchief very tight, and detecting the odor of cigarettes as I did so. Winnie beckoned to me to follow, and conducted her victim to the root cellar, a dark, unwholesome little room, with a small orated window—a veritable dungeon. We led our prisoners into the centre of this gloomy cell, and, making them kneel onthe cemented floor, bade them remain there until the coming of the ghouls. Hastening from the place, we chained and padlocked the door securely.“Now that we have secured our prisoners, what do you propose to do with them?” I asked of Winnie.“Call the Amen Corner together after supper to deliberate on their fate. In the mean time they are very well off where they are. I fancy they will hardly care to repeat this experiment.”We returned to the laundry and continued the ceremony of leading our guests to the supper. When all had been led in, the bandages were removed from their eyes, and they found themselves before tables provided with plates, knives, and forks, but no edibles. Little Breeze, beating upon a tin pan with a great beef bone, called the meeting to order, and, indicating the preserve closet, announced that the ghouls would now search the neighboring tombs for their prey. At the same time the door of the preserve closet was thrown open, and Trude Middleton set the example by capturing a can of peaches. The girls fancied that they were robbing the pantry, and this gave zest to the performanceto a few of the more reckless ones, but the rest held back, and Winnie found it necessary to circulate the whisper that even this apparently high-handed proceeding was authorized by Madame, before the raid became general. A very heterogeneous repast, consisting of pickles, crackers, dried apples, canned fruit, prunes, dried beef, and lemonade hastily mixed in a great earthen bowl, was now participated in by the hilarious ghouls. One bowl of the lemonade was ruined, after the lemons and sugar were mingled, by a ludicrous mistake. Milly, mistaking it for water, filled the bowl from a jar of liquid bluing. The error was discovered when we began filling some empty jelly tumblers with the strange blue mixture, and, fortunately, no one was poisoned by drinking the ghoulish liquor.Under cover of the confusion I managed to tell Adelaide of the captives in the cellar, and later in the evening, while the ghosts were engaged in a Virginia Reel in the long underground passage leading from the furnace room to the other end of the school building, met in solemn conclave to deliberate on their fate. Adelaide was for delivering the keys to Madame with a statement of the case. Cynthia argued strongly in favor of releasingthe young men, sending them home, and saying nothing about it. While we were in the midst of the argument, a far away cry was heard. It was from Polo, who had been left to guard the door of the root cellar. We rushed to the spot, only to find that the rusty staple had yielded to the efforts of two athletic boys, one of whom was heavy of weight as well as strong of muscle, and had been forced out of the wall, and our captives had escaped. Polo had followed them in their flight, and returned breathless to report that they had made a dash, not for the outside door, but straight up the great staircase to the studio and had then descended the turret staircase, showing clearly that they had made their entrance in the same way.We talked the matter over for a long time. How could they have known of this staircase, and have timed their coming so as to follow the procession of sheeted ghosts as they left the studio for their march to the lower regions? The suspicion instantly suggested itself that some one of the ten had furnished the information, and this suspicion deepened to certainty as we considered the excellence of their disguise, the sheets draped exactly as ours had been, the pillow-case Capuchinhood fitted about the mask cut from cotton cloth. How, too, could they have entered, since Polo declared that she had locked the turret door when she came in that afternoon, and had left the key on a nail in the studio?“Show me the nail,” Winnie commanded promptly, and Polo led her to the studio. The nail was there, but the key had gone. We descended the staircase and found the lower door locked.As we were returning to the studio we heard the door open and Professor Waite mounted the stairs, as was his usual custom at this time. “Heigho!” he exclaimed, “what are you all doing in the studio at this time of night? Oh! I forgot; this is the evening of the lark. Has it been a jovial bird? Why do you all look so solemn? By the way, Polo, I found your key in the lock on the outside of the door. It was very careless of you to leave it there; you must not let such a thing happen again. Some thief might have entered the house. I met two young men running with all their might as I came across the park. They made something of a detour to avoid me—I thought at the time that they had a suspicious look. Ifyou are so thoughtless a second time I shall take the key from you.”“I didn’t leave it there,” Polo protested. “I hung it on the nail, Miss Cynthia saw me. Didn’t you, Miss Cynthia?”But Cynthia had gone, and as the quarter-bell struck we were all reminded that we must descend to our dancers to be present at the unmasking and close the frolic. We hurried unceremoniously away without replying to Professor Waite’s questions.After we had dismissed our guests, we adjourned to the Amen Corner and we again discussed the affair. It was agreed that it was sufficiently serious to report to Madame, and to this there was only one dissenting voice—that of Cynthia’s. It was too late to disturb Madame that night, but we presented ourselves at her morning office hour and told her all the circumstances of the case.She looked very grave, but did not blame us. “I am very sorry,” she said, “that some one of my pupils has abused my leniency in this way. It will of course make me hesitate to grant you such frolics in the future. The matter shall be thoroughly investigated and the offender severely punished. Again I must ask you to keep this affair strictlyamong yourselves. You have kept the secret of the robbery wonderfully; be equally discrete with this. We do not as yet know certainly that these young men were cadets, and I shall not make any complaint to the head master until we have ascertained the culprits. Mr. Mudge will call to-morrow. He writes me that he has found a clue to the robbery, and we will place this matter also in his hands. You have done right to bring it directly to me, and your action only confirms the confidence I have always reposed in the Amen Corner. Be assured that the truth will out at last. Meantime don’t talk this over too much, even among yourselves, for Tennyson never wrote truer lines than these:I never whispered a private affairWithin the hearing of cat or mouse,No, not to myself in the closet alone,But I heard it shouted at once from the top of the house.Everything came to be known.”
Polocame on Monday and posed to the satisfaction of Professor Waite and of the class. Winnie was successful in entering the two children at the Home, and Adelaide had a happy thought for Polo herself, who was too old to be received there. One of the smallest apartments in her tenement had been taken by Miss Billings and Miss Cohens, two seamstresses, honest, industrious old maids, who had lived and worked together since they were girls. Adelaide called them the two turtle doves, the odd combination of their name suggesting the nickname, and their fondness for each other bearing it out.They were a cheerful pair, and their rooms were bright with flowers and canaries. One morning Miss Billings woke to find her friend dead at her side, having passed from life in sleep so peacefully that she neither woke nor disturbed the faithful friend close beside her.
The poor old lady was very lonely and was glad to take Polo in. The young girl brightened her life, and her own influence on the nearly friendless waif was excellent. In the intervals of posing Miss Billings taught Polo how to cut and fit dresses. Polo helped her with her sewing, and Miss Billings promised to take her into partnership by and by. Polo was very happy and grateful, and the girls all liked her immensely. She was a character in her way, an irresistible mimic. She would take off Miss Noakes to the life, while she had a talent which I have never seen equalled for making the most ludicrous and horrible faces. She was almost pretty, and with Miss Billings’s help, made over the odds and ends of clothing bestowed upon her very nicely. Her one trinket was a string of coral beads and a little cross which her brother had sent her before she left England. She never gave up her faith in this brother. “Albert Edward’llturn up some day rich,” she said. She flouted the idea that he might be dead. “He ain’t the dying kind,” she said, when Cynthia suggested the possibility. “None of our family ain’t, except father. Why, I’ve been through enough to kill a cat, and I haven’t died yet.”
She was especially devoted to Milly, to whom she felt, with reason, that she owed all her good fortune. Professor Waite found her remarkably serviceable as a model, from her versatility and ability to adapt herself to any character, giving a great variety of types for us to copy. When she wore the Italian costume, one would have thought her an Italian, and a complete change came over her when she donned the German cap and wooden shoes. “May be that’s because I’ve lived amongst all sorts of foreigners so much,” she said, “and Albert Edward always said I’d make an actress equal to the best. He said I had talent. I do pity them as hasn’t. I wouldn’t be one of the common herd for anything.”
Polo was certainly uncommon. Her use of the English language had an individuality of its own. She hated Miss Noakes and said she had no business to be “tryannic” (meaningtyrannical). She spoke of native Americans as abor-jines (a distortion of aborigines), and intermingled these little variations of her own with cockney phrases which were new to our untravelled ears.
She found difficulty in understanding our words and expressions, and once when Professor Waite told her to set up a screen she astonished us all by uttering a most blood-curdling yell, under the impression that he had commanded her to set up ascream.
She disliked Cerberus, and to save her from his scornful scrutiny and contemptuous remarks, Professor Waite had a duplicate key made to the turret door, by which Polo entered each morning and mounted directly to the studio.
She was very diverting, but much as we liked her we could not forget that we had assumed a grave responsibility in taking the support of her little sisters upon our hands, and we now began to actively agitate the plans for the Catacomb Party, which was to raise funds for the Annex with its “Manger and Guest Chambers.”
One event of interest to us occurred before the evening of the Catacomb Party. Thiswas the Annual Drill of the Cadet School. All of the Amen Corner and the Hornets had invitations. We occupied front seats in the east balcony of the great armory, vigilantly chaperoned by Miss Noakes. Her best intentions could not prevent the young cadets from paying their respects to us during the intervals of the drill.
The young men looked handsomely in their gala uniforms of white trousers and gloves, blue coats, and caps set off with plenty of frogging and brass buttons. They performed their evolutions with a precision which would have done credit to a regiment of regulars—and received the praise of General Howard, who reviewed them.
Out of all the battalion there were two boys in whom we were chiefly interested: Adelaide’s younger brother Jim, color sergeant of the baby company, and Milly’s friend Stacey Fitz Simmons, the handsome drum-major.
Winnie insisted that Malcolm Douglas must have been thinking of the practising of this cadet drum corps when he wrote:
“And all of the people for blocks around,Boom-tidera-da-boom!Kept time at their tasks to the martial sound,Boom-tidera-da-boom!While children to windows and stoops would fly,Expecting to see a procession pass by,And they couldn’t make out why it never drew nigh,With its boom-tidera-da—boom-a-diddle-dee;Boom-tidera-da-boom!It would seem such vigor must soon abate;Boom-tidera-da-boom!But they still keep at it, early and late;Boom-tidera-da-boom!So if it should be that a war breaks out,They’ll all be ready, I have no doubt,To help in putting the foe to rout,With their boom-tidera-da-boom—Boom-tidera-da-boom—Boom-tidera-da—boom-a-diddle-dee,Boom-Boom-Boom!”
“And all of the people for blocks around,Boom-tidera-da-boom!Kept time at their tasks to the martial sound,Boom-tidera-da-boom!While children to windows and stoops would fly,Expecting to see a procession pass by,And they couldn’t make out why it never drew nigh,With its boom-tidera-da—boom-a-diddle-dee;Boom-tidera-da-boom!It would seem such vigor must soon abate;Boom-tidera-da-boom!But they still keep at it, early and late;Boom-tidera-da-boom!So if it should be that a war breaks out,They’ll all be ready, I have no doubt,To help in putting the foe to rout,With their boom-tidera-da-boom—Boom-tidera-da-boom—Boom-tidera-da—boom-a-diddle-dee,Boom-Boom-Boom!”
“And all of the people for blocks around,Boom-tidera-da-boom!Kept time at their tasks to the martial sound,Boom-tidera-da-boom!While children to windows and stoops would fly,Expecting to see a procession pass by,And they couldn’t make out why it never drew nigh,With its boom-tidera-da—boom-a-diddle-dee;Boom-tidera-da-boom!
It would seem such vigor must soon abate;Boom-tidera-da-boom!But they still keep at it, early and late;Boom-tidera-da-boom!So if it should be that a war breaks out,They’ll all be ready, I have no doubt,To help in putting the foe to rout,With their boom-tidera-da-boom—Boom-tidera-da-boom—Boom-tidera-da—boom-a-diddle-dee,Boom-Boom-Boom!”
Stacey was seventeen, tall for his age, with a little feathery mustache outlining his finely cut upper lip. He was elegant in appearance and manners, and we all admired and liked him with the exception of perverse, wilful Milly. Jim was thirteen and small for his years. The life of privation which he had led during a period when he had been lost, the account of which has been given in the previous volume, had stunted his growth, and given him an appearance of delicacy. But Jim was wiry, and possessed great endurance, and his drilling that evening was noticeable for its accuracy and spirit. Adelaide and Jim were deeply attached to one another. They wrote each other longletters every week, remarkable for their perfect confidence. As Jim’s letters give an insight not only into his life at the cadet school, but also into the relations which subsisted between several of the cadets and members of our own school, as well as into acontretempswhich introduced great consternation into the Catacomb Party, I will choose two from Adelaide’s packet and insert them before describing the mystic entertainment of the Council of Ten.
Letter No. 1.Dear Sister:I like the barracks better than I did. I almost have gotten over being homesick, and the fellows are awfully nice now that I have come to know them. I miss mother, but I would rather die than let any one know it. I’ve put her photograph down at the bottom of my trunk, for it gave me the snuffles to see it, and Stacey Fitz Simmons caught me kissing it once, and I was so ashamed. He is one of the nicest fellows here, and he didn’t rough me a bit about it, only whistled, and said: “You’ve got a mighty pretty mother; I guess she takes after your sister. Pity there wasn’t more beauty left for the rest of the family.” He knows you, and I guess you must remember meeting him when you visited the Roseveldts last summer at Narragansett Pier. He asked if you and Milly Roseveldt were at the same school, and would I please send his regards when I wrote. He is one of the Senior A boys, and is going to college next year. I am only Middle C, but he is ever so good to me, I am sure I don’t know why. We are drilling, drilling all the time now for the annual drill at the Seventh Regiment Armory.Stacey is an awfully good fellow. He’s the head of everything. He’s drum-major, and you just ought to see him in his uniform leading the drum corps [Jim spelled itcore]. He’s the cockatooof the school. Stacey’s folks are rich, and his mother wrote the military tailor not to spare expense, but to get Stacey up just as fine as they make ’em, and I don’t believe there’s a drum-major of any of the crack regiments that can hold a candle to him for style. In the first place he has a high furry hat that looks like the big muffs they carried at the old folks’ concerts. Then he has a bright scarlet coat all frogged and padded and laced with lots of gold cord, and the nattiest trousers and patent leather boots. But his baton—oh, Adelaide! words cannot express. I don’t believe old Ahasuerus ever had a sceptre half as gorgeous, with a great gold ball on the top, and it will do your eyes good to see him swing it. Doesn’t he put on airs, though! Put on isn’t the word, for Stacey is airy naturally, and dignified, too. Buttertub says he walks as if he owned the earth. When he marches backward holding his baton crosswise, I’m always afraid that he will fall and that somebody might laugh, and that would kill him. But he never does fall. He seems to see with the buttons on the small of his back, and he stepped over a banana skin while marching to the armory just as dandified as you please. And he never fails to catch his baton when he tosses it into the air, and makes it whirl around twice before it comes down. He never bows to any of the fellows or seems to see them—except me. They are going to have Gilmore’s Band at the drill, and Stacey was practising leading them around the armory. I was in the lower balcony, hanging over and watching him. He was going through his fanciest evolutions when he passed me. He looked straight ahead and never winked an eye. I didn’t think he saw me till I heard him say, “How’s that, dear boy?” and I clapped so hard that I nearly fell over.Buttertub hates Stacey; he wanted to be drum-major himself.He calls Stacey wasp-waist, but it only calls attention to his own big stomach. He is always eating, and he won’t train, and he can’t run without having a fit of apoplexy. He weighs too much for the crew and he can’t even ride a bicycle, or do anything except the heavy work on the foot ball team and study. Yes, he can study; that’s the disgusting part.Stacy can do everything. He’s a splendid sprinter. There’s only one other boy in the school that can equal him, and that’s a red-headed boy they call Woodpecker. He has longer legs than Stacey and of course takes a longer stride, and that counts. But Stacey is livelier and puts in four strides to three of the Woodpecker’s, so they are pretty nearly equal. Stacey is a prettier runner, too. He does it just aseasy, while the Woodpecker works all over, armsandlegs, and bites on his handkerchief, and his eyes pop out, and when it’s all over he falls in a heap and looks as if he were dying, while Stacey takes another lap in better time than the last, just for fun.Stacey rides the bicycle, too, splendidly. He has one of those big wheels and he can manage it with his feet and do all sorts of tricks with his hands. He has been giving me points on bicycle riding. He picked out my safety for me, and has been coaching me how to manage it. He says I am the best rider for a little chap that he ever saw, and that he means to make me win the race at the inter-scholastic. I tell you Stacey is a trump. He’s an all-around athlete. He dances, and he rides, and he shoots in the summer when he goes hunting with his uncle; and he fences, and he’s stroke on the crew, and he’s our best high jump and there isn’t anything that he can’t do, except his lessons—sometimes—but they don’t count. He says that if it wasn’t for the beastly lessons school would be heavenly, and we all agree with him. Ricos said that he would head a petition to have lessons abolished and the boys would all sign it, but Stacey said that parents were so unprogressive he didn’t believe they would, and he was afraid the head master wouldn’t pay much attention to such a petition unless it bore the parents’ signatures.I’ve written an awfully long letter, but I like to write to you, and it was rainy to-day, and we couldn’t go to the grounds, and I’ve hurt my ankle by falling from my bicycle so that I could not practise in the gymnasium. Now don’t go and get scared, like a girl, and disapprove of athletics for such a little thing as that. It was only a little sprain, that will all be well before the drill, and I only barked my shin the least bit, nothing at all to what the Woodpecker does most every day.I hope I shall be big enough to go on the foot-ball team next year. I know you think it’s dangerous, but I’ve calculated the chances of getting hurt and they are so very slight that I guess I’ll risk it. Why, out of the whole eleven last year there were only nine that got hurt.Be sure you all come to the exhibition drill. I enclose two tickets and Stacey sends two more. He wants it distinctly understood that you and Miss Roseveldt are his guests. So you can give mine with my compliments to Miss T. Smith and Miss Winnie De Witt. I don’t send any for that Vaughn girl, for Buttertub knows her and told me he was going to invite her.No more at present,From your affectionate brother,James Halsey Armstrong.P. S. Stacey sends his regards to Miss Roseveldt.P. S. No. 2. And to you.
Letter No. 1.
Dear Sister:
I like the barracks better than I did. I almost have gotten over being homesick, and the fellows are awfully nice now that I have come to know them. I miss mother, but I would rather die than let any one know it. I’ve put her photograph down at the bottom of my trunk, for it gave me the snuffles to see it, and Stacey Fitz Simmons caught me kissing it once, and I was so ashamed. He is one of the nicest fellows here, and he didn’t rough me a bit about it, only whistled, and said: “You’ve got a mighty pretty mother; I guess she takes after your sister. Pity there wasn’t more beauty left for the rest of the family.” He knows you, and I guess you must remember meeting him when you visited the Roseveldts last summer at Narragansett Pier. He asked if you and Milly Roseveldt were at the same school, and would I please send his regards when I wrote. He is one of the Senior A boys, and is going to college next year. I am only Middle C, but he is ever so good to me, I am sure I don’t know why. We are drilling, drilling all the time now for the annual drill at the Seventh Regiment Armory.
Stacey is an awfully good fellow. He’s the head of everything. He’s drum-major, and you just ought to see him in his uniform leading the drum corps [Jim spelled itcore]. He’s the cockatooof the school. Stacey’s folks are rich, and his mother wrote the military tailor not to spare expense, but to get Stacey up just as fine as they make ’em, and I don’t believe there’s a drum-major of any of the crack regiments that can hold a candle to him for style. In the first place he has a high furry hat that looks like the big muffs they carried at the old folks’ concerts. Then he has a bright scarlet coat all frogged and padded and laced with lots of gold cord, and the nattiest trousers and patent leather boots. But his baton—oh, Adelaide! words cannot express. I don’t believe old Ahasuerus ever had a sceptre half as gorgeous, with a great gold ball on the top, and it will do your eyes good to see him swing it. Doesn’t he put on airs, though! Put on isn’t the word, for Stacey is airy naturally, and dignified, too. Buttertub says he walks as if he owned the earth. When he marches backward holding his baton crosswise, I’m always afraid that he will fall and that somebody might laugh, and that would kill him. But he never does fall. He seems to see with the buttons on the small of his back, and he stepped over a banana skin while marching to the armory just as dandified as you please. And he never fails to catch his baton when he tosses it into the air, and makes it whirl around twice before it comes down. He never bows to any of the fellows or seems to see them—except me. They are going to have Gilmore’s Band at the drill, and Stacey was practising leading them around the armory. I was in the lower balcony, hanging over and watching him. He was going through his fanciest evolutions when he passed me. He looked straight ahead and never winked an eye. I didn’t think he saw me till I heard him say, “How’s that, dear boy?” and I clapped so hard that I nearly fell over.
Buttertub hates Stacey; he wanted to be drum-major himself.
He calls Stacey wasp-waist, but it only calls attention to his own big stomach. He is always eating, and he won’t train, and he can’t run without having a fit of apoplexy. He weighs too much for the crew and he can’t even ride a bicycle, or do anything except the heavy work on the foot ball team and study. Yes, he can study; that’s the disgusting part.
Stacy can do everything. He’s a splendid sprinter. There’s only one other boy in the school that can equal him, and that’s a red-headed boy they call Woodpecker. He has longer legs than Stacey and of course takes a longer stride, and that counts. But Stacey is livelier and puts in four strides to three of the Woodpecker’s, so they are pretty nearly equal. Stacey is a prettier runner, too. He does it just aseasy, while the Woodpecker works all over, armsandlegs, and bites on his handkerchief, and his eyes pop out, and when it’s all over he falls in a heap and looks as if he were dying, while Stacey takes another lap in better time than the last, just for fun.
Stacey rides the bicycle, too, splendidly. He has one of those big wheels and he can manage it with his feet and do all sorts of tricks with his hands. He has been giving me points on bicycle riding. He picked out my safety for me, and has been coaching me how to manage it. He says I am the best rider for a little chap that he ever saw, and that he means to make me win the race at the inter-scholastic. I tell you Stacey is a trump. He’s an all-around athlete. He dances, and he rides, and he shoots in the summer when he goes hunting with his uncle; and he fences, and he’s stroke on the crew, and he’s our best high jump and there isn’t anything that he can’t do, except his lessons—sometimes—but they don’t count. He says that if it wasn’t for the beastly lessons school would be heavenly, and we all agree with him. Ricos said that he would head a petition to have lessons abolished and the boys would all sign it, but Stacey said that parents were so unprogressive he didn’t believe they would, and he was afraid the head master wouldn’t pay much attention to such a petition unless it bore the parents’ signatures.
I’ve written an awfully long letter, but I like to write to you, and it was rainy to-day, and we couldn’t go to the grounds, and I’ve hurt my ankle by falling from my bicycle so that I could not practise in the gymnasium. Now don’t go and get scared, like a girl, and disapprove of athletics for such a little thing as that. It was only a little sprain, that will all be well before the drill, and I only barked my shin the least bit, nothing at all to what the Woodpecker does most every day.
I hope I shall be big enough to go on the foot-ball team next year. I know you think it’s dangerous, but I’ve calculated the chances of getting hurt and they are so very slight that I guess I’ll risk it. Why, out of the whole eleven last year there were only nine that got hurt.
Be sure you all come to the exhibition drill. I enclose two tickets and Stacey sends two more. He wants it distinctly understood that you and Miss Roseveldt are his guests. So you can give mine with my compliments to Miss T. Smith and Miss Winnie De Witt. I don’t send any for that Vaughn girl, for Buttertub knows her and told me he was going to invite her.
No more at present,From your affectionate brother,James Halsey Armstrong.
P. S. Stacey sends his regards to Miss Roseveldt.
P. S. No. 2. And to you.
Letter No. 2.The Barracks, April.Dear Sister:Wasn’t the drill splendid? I knew you would enjoy it. How I wish father and mother had been in New York so they could have seen it.You looked just stunning in that stylish hat. Stacey said so. You must excuse him if he didn’t pay you very much attention. He could only leave the band during the intermission and of course he had to be polite to Miss Roseveldt. Besides he said I stuck so close to you that he hadn’t any chance. He says he never saw a fellow so spooney over his own sister as I am. I tell him there aren’t many chaps who have such a nice sister as you are, and then we were separated so long that I am making up for lost time.I am glad you liked the French Army Bicycle drill. That was something quite new. Stacey was detailed to command it because he’s a splendid cyclist himself, and he knew how to put us through. I didn’t know till the day before that he wasgoing to call me out to skirmish. He said: “Jimmy, you can manage your wheel better than any one else except the Woodpecker, and I am going to have you two go through with a little fancy business that will bring the house down.” And didn’t it? When I fired off my gun going at full speed, they clapped so that I nearly lost my head. Ricos was mad because he wasn’t selected for the special manœuvres. Ricos is better for speed than I am, and he’s awfully quick-tempered—he’s a Spaniard, you know, and he said to me, “Never mind, youngster, I’ll pay you up for this at the inter-scholastic races.” I suppose he means to win the gold medal, and I told Stacey that I believed he would, and I should be thankful to be second, or even third, for there are the best cyclists from all the other schools in the city to contend against. But Stacey says, “He can’t do it, you know,” meaning Ricos; and our trainer says that if he enters me at all he enters me to win. So I am going to try my level best.Wasn’t Cynthia Vaughn stunning in that green dress trimmed with fur! Buttertub said she was the most stylish girl at the drill. Stacey made him mad by saying that she was hardly that, though, as a Harvard chap once said of some one else, he had no doubt that she was a well-meaning girl and a comfort to her mother!Ricos invited all the Hornets, and some one of them told him that you girls are going to have a great lark—a Catacombing Party. He thought it was to represent the games of the Roman arena with cats instead of lions and tigers. I told him it must be a mistake, and that if he supposed Madame’s young ladies, and my sister especially, would do anything so low as to look on at a cat-fight, he didn’t know what he was talking about. But Stacey said that there was something up, he knew, for when he asked Milly Roseveldt if the girls were going to have a Venetian Fête for the benefit of the Home, as they did last year, she said it was a sheet and pillow-case party this time, and boys were not admitted. He told her he would surely disguise himself in a sheet and pillow-case and come; but he only said so to tease her, and when he saw how distressedshe was he told her he was only fooling. Buttertub said Cynthia mentioned it too, and Stacey’s idea was a good one and he believed he should try it. But Stacey said he would like to see him do it and that he would have him court-martialled for ungentlemanly conduct, and reduced to the ranks if he attempted to play the spy at one of the girl’s frolics.Stacey wanted me to be sure to tell you to tell Milly Roseveldt not to worry about what he said, for the cadets are all gentlemen and wouldn’t think of going anywhere where they were not invited. That’s so as far as Stacey is concerned, but I don’t know about Ricos.Do tell me what you are going to do, anyway—and for pity’s sake don’t have any cats in it.Your affectionate brother,J. H. Armstrong.
Letter No. 2.
The Barracks, April.
Dear Sister:
Wasn’t the drill splendid? I knew you would enjoy it. How I wish father and mother had been in New York so they could have seen it.
You looked just stunning in that stylish hat. Stacey said so. You must excuse him if he didn’t pay you very much attention. He could only leave the band during the intermission and of course he had to be polite to Miss Roseveldt. Besides he said I stuck so close to you that he hadn’t any chance. He says he never saw a fellow so spooney over his own sister as I am. I tell him there aren’t many chaps who have such a nice sister as you are, and then we were separated so long that I am making up for lost time.
I am glad you liked the French Army Bicycle drill. That was something quite new. Stacey was detailed to command it because he’s a splendid cyclist himself, and he knew how to put us through. I didn’t know till the day before that he wasgoing to call me out to skirmish. He said: “Jimmy, you can manage your wheel better than any one else except the Woodpecker, and I am going to have you two go through with a little fancy business that will bring the house down.” And didn’t it? When I fired off my gun going at full speed, they clapped so that I nearly lost my head. Ricos was mad because he wasn’t selected for the special manœuvres. Ricos is better for speed than I am, and he’s awfully quick-tempered—he’s a Spaniard, you know, and he said to me, “Never mind, youngster, I’ll pay you up for this at the inter-scholastic races.” I suppose he means to win the gold medal, and I told Stacey that I believed he would, and I should be thankful to be second, or even third, for there are the best cyclists from all the other schools in the city to contend against. But Stacey says, “He can’t do it, you know,” meaning Ricos; and our trainer says that if he enters me at all he enters me to win. So I am going to try my level best.
Wasn’t Cynthia Vaughn stunning in that green dress trimmed with fur! Buttertub said she was the most stylish girl at the drill. Stacey made him mad by saying that she was hardly that, though, as a Harvard chap once said of some one else, he had no doubt that she was a well-meaning girl and a comfort to her mother!
Ricos invited all the Hornets, and some one of them told him that you girls are going to have a great lark—a Catacombing Party. He thought it was to represent the games of the Roman arena with cats instead of lions and tigers. I told him it must be a mistake, and that if he supposed Madame’s young ladies, and my sister especially, would do anything so low as to look on at a cat-fight, he didn’t know what he was talking about. But Stacey said that there was something up, he knew, for when he asked Milly Roseveldt if the girls were going to have a Venetian Fête for the benefit of the Home, as they did last year, she said it was a sheet and pillow-case party this time, and boys were not admitted. He told her he would surely disguise himself in a sheet and pillow-case and come; but he only said so to tease her, and when he saw how distressedshe was he told her he was only fooling. Buttertub said Cynthia mentioned it too, and Stacey’s idea was a good one and he believed he should try it. But Stacey said he would like to see him do it and that he would have him court-martialled for ungentlemanly conduct, and reduced to the ranks if he attempted to play the spy at one of the girl’s frolics.
Stacey wanted me to be sure to tell you to tell Milly Roseveldt not to worry about what he said, for the cadets are all gentlemen and wouldn’t think of going anywhere where they were not invited. That’s so as far as Stacey is concerned, but I don’t know about Ricos.
Do tell me what you are going to do, anyway—and for pity’s sake don’t have any cats in it.
Your affectionate brother,J. H. Armstrong.
Jim’s misunderstanding of the Catacomb Party amused us very much. No one was alarmed by the boys’ threats to attend it but Milly, who insisted that she had no confidence in Stacey and believed him fully capable of committing even this atrocious act.
As soon as the drill was over our interest centred on this party. The committee from our circle of King’s Daughters waited upon Madame, and obtained her permission for the projected entertainment. She stipulated, however, that it must be strictly confined to members of the school and no outsiders admitted.
“The Literary Society,” she said, “will give its public entertainment in the spring, and we do not wish to have the reputation of spendingour entire time in getting up charity bazaars, and imposing on our friends to buy tickets. Anything in reason which you care to do among yourselves, I will consent to. It does young girls good to have an occasional frolic.”
Emboldened by the unusually happy frame of mind in which Madame seemed to be basking, Winnie asked if we might act a play and have “gentlemen characters” in it. Formerly the assumption of masculine attire had been prohibited, and at one of our Literary Society dramas, a half curtain had been stretched across the stage, giving a view of only the upper portion of the persons of the actors. The young ladies taking the part of the male personages in the play, wore cutaway coats outside their dresses, and riding hats or Tam O’Shanter caps.
Madame laughed as she recalled that absurd spectacle. “Since your audience is strictly limited to your associates, I think I may suspend that rule for this occasion,” she said leniently. “When do you intend to give the play? I cannot allow you to use the chapel. How would the studio do?”
“If you please,” said Winnie, “we would like the laundry.”
“The laundry!” Madame exclaimed in surprise.
“Yes, Madame. Tina Gale explored the lower regions under the school building one day, and the furnace room, and the long dim galleries connecting the coal bins, the cellars, and the laundry seemed to her so mysterious and pokerish that she thought it would be a nice idea to call it a Catacomb Party, especially as the girls have been so much interested in Professor Todd’s early history of the Christian Church.”
Madame’s eyes twinkled as she heard this, for Professor Todd had been generally voted a prosy old nuisance; but Winnie was earnestness itself.
“Very well,” said Madame kindly. “I do not want the girls to think that I am a cruel tyrant, or unduly strict or suspicious. [“She was thinking of the way in which she arraigned Adelaide for corresponding with Professor Waite,” Winnie commented afterward.] If your committee will submit the programme to me, I have no doubt I shall be able to approve of everything. Let me see—the laundry will be your circus maximus, or theatre. Where will you have your refreshments?”
We had not thought of that.
“I will give you the key to the preserve closet; it is at the end of the drying-room, andyou may make a raid upon it for your provisions. Only please be careful not to waste or destroy any more than you can dispose of. I will have some tables placed in the drying-room, and you may partake of your collation there.”
This was all we needed. The preparations for the Catacomb Party went merrily on.
Trude Middleton dramatized Cardinal Wiseman’s novel, “Fabiola.” We who had remained at school during the Christmas Holidays had read it aloud together, and its thrilling pictures of the persecutions of the martyrs, the games of the arena, and all the life of imperial Rome, had made a deep impression upon us. Trude Middleton had a genius for writing, and Little Breeze distributed the parts, rehearsed the play, took the rôle of the sorceressAfra, and acted as stage manager. The classical costumes were easily arranged. Professor Waite showed us how to drape crinkled cheese cloth and to manage the folds of peplum and toga, to trace a key-pattern border, to fillet our hair, and lace our sandals. The rehearsals were carried on in the most secret manner. Only the actors knew exactly what the play was to be. Expectancy was on thequi vive. Winnie hadwritten some mysteriously attractive admission tickets, and had ornamented each one with a tiny white wire skeleton. These tickets the ten sold to the other members of the school to the number of one hundred and twenty, not a single member of the school declining to patronize us.
The sale of these tickets had been materially aided by a manifesto, printed in red ink, supposed to simulate blood, and left dangling conspicuously from the wrist of old “Bonaparte” (Bonypart), the anatomy class skeleton.
This manifesto read as follows:
The Council of Ten, in secret session assembled, hereby summon you, each and all, severally and individually, to the Torture Chambers of the Inquisition (otherwise known as the studio), on the ringing of the great tocsin (sometimes called the eight o’clock study bell). At that hour let each be prepared to render up her earthly goods to the amount of one ticket, vouching for fifty cents; and having donned a winding sheet, and likewise a winding pillow-case as headgear, submit to the office of the Inquisition, which will transform her, with that happy despatch due to long experience, into a disembodied spirit. At the same time the Arch Witch Winnie will turn back the clock of Time to the first century, and each ghost, being first securely blindfolded, will be led by a spirit guide, experienced in the charge of personally conducting spirits, into the great amphitheatre of the Coliseum, where she will mingle with the most renowned personages of ancient Rome, and will be permitted to live a short and exciting life under the cheerful persecution of the amiable and playful Cæsars.After the final scene of the gladiatorial combat in the arena each spirit will be led by her guide through the grewsome and labyrinthine Catacombs—faint not! fear not! to theFeast of the Ghouls!Thence, conducted by Orpheus with his lute, and Beatrice, the guide of Dante, they will cross the Styx and join in theDance of the Deadin the shadowy Purgatorio.At the stroke of midnight each spirit who has passed through this ordeal with a steadfast mind will be wafted to upper regions to the rest of the blessed.Signed by the Council of Ten, as represented by Witch Winnie, of the Amen Corner, and Little Breeze, of the Hornets; and sealed with the great seal of our office, this —— day of —— 18—.Seal.
The Council of Ten, in secret session assembled, hereby summon you, each and all, severally and individually, to the Torture Chambers of the Inquisition (otherwise known as the studio), on the ringing of the great tocsin (sometimes called the eight o’clock study bell). At that hour let each be prepared to render up her earthly goods to the amount of one ticket, vouching for fifty cents; and having donned a winding sheet, and likewise a winding pillow-case as headgear, submit to the office of the Inquisition, which will transform her, with that happy despatch due to long experience, into a disembodied spirit. At the same time the Arch Witch Winnie will turn back the clock of Time to the first century, and each ghost, being first securely blindfolded, will be led by a spirit guide, experienced in the charge of personally conducting spirits, into the great amphitheatre of the Coliseum, where she will mingle with the most renowned personages of ancient Rome, and will be permitted to live a short and exciting life under the cheerful persecution of the amiable and playful Cæsars.
After the final scene of the gladiatorial combat in the arena each spirit will be led by her guide through the grewsome and labyrinthine Catacombs—faint not! fear not! to the
Feast of the Ghouls!
Thence, conducted by Orpheus with his lute, and Beatrice, the guide of Dante, they will cross the Styx and join in the
Dance of the Dead
in the shadowy Purgatorio.
At the stroke of midnight each spirit who has passed through this ordeal with a steadfast mind will be wafted to upper regions to the rest of the blessed.
Signed by the Council of Ten, as represented by Witch Winnie, of the Amen Corner, and Little Breeze, of the Hornets; and sealed with the great seal of our office, this —— day of —— 18—.
Seal.
These preparations were going on simultaneously with the investigation of the robbery, and served in a measure to relieve the tension to which we were all subjected. Still the trouble was there, and we never quite forgot it. Mr. Mudge called twice, and made inquiries, from which Winnie inferred that he was hopelessly puzzled. Milly was sure that he had found a clew, but if so, he did not impart his discoveries.
The mystic evening arrived. Cynthia, who, for some reason inexplicable to us, was in a highly self-satisfied and gracious mood, invited Polo to sleep with her in order that she mightbe able to attend the party. It was necessary to prefer this request to our corridor teacher, Miss Noakes, who gave us a very grudging consent; but we cared very little for her iciness since we had effected our wishes.
The girls met in the studio, where all were draped in sheets, a small mask cut from white cotton cloth tied on, and a pillow case fitted about the back of the head in the fashion of a long capuchin hood. When thus robed our dearest friends were unrecognizable. Then, marshalled by Winnie, the company of spectres paraded through the hall and down the main staircase. Miss Noakes and the other teachers stood in their doors and watched the procession, but as it was known that we had Madame’s permission no attempt was made to stop us, and we passed on unabashed. Arrived at the lower floor each of the guests was securely blindfolded and conducted by one of our ten down the cellar stairs, and through winding passages to the laundry, which had been converted for the evening into an auditorium, sheets having been hung on clothes-lines across one end, and the space in front filled with camp chairs brought from the recitation rooms. The set tubs on one side of the improvised stage were fitted up as boxes,while a semi-circle of clothes-baskets marked the space assigned to the comb orchestra. As fast as the girls arrived in the laundry they were seated, and when the last instalment was in position the lights were turned nearly out, and they were told to remove the handkerchiefs which bandaged their eyes. At the same time the comb orchestra, led by Cynthia, struck up a dismal dirge-like overture, broken in upon at intervals by a tremendous thump with a potato masher on the great copper boiler. The curtain was drawn slowly aside, the lights suddenly turned on, and the play began. Adelaide made a very beautifulFabiola. Winnie acted the part ofPancratiuswith great expression. Milly looked the saintlyAgnesto perfection. I wasSebastian. We did not indulge in all the dialogue with which the book is overloaded. Our play was rather a series of tableaux, for which I had painted the scenery with the assistance of the other art students. Professor Waite had borrowed various classical properties from his brother artists for us. The plaster casts of the studio were made to serve as marble statues, and Madame had sent us several palms in urn-shaped pots.
When the play was nearly over, Polo, whohad acted as doorkeeper, made her way behind the scenes and took my attention from the prompter’s book with the horrified whisper, “If you please, there are two girls out there that are boys.”
“Who? Where? How do you know it?” I asked in a breath.
“They came in at the end of the procession, without any guides, and sat down near the door, apart from the others. One is little enough to be a girl, but the other is taller, even, than Miss Adelaide.”
“It is Snooks,” Winnie exclaimed. “Just like her to come spying and speculating here to see what we are up to.”
“If that’s so, Miss Noakes has bigger feet than I ever gave her credit for,” Polo replied; “and she wears boots too.”
“Then those cadets have actually dared!” Winnie exclaimed, and Milly gave a little shriek. “Oh, that horrid Stacey Fitz Simmons!”
“Hush!” commanded Winnie. “We will make them wish they had never been born. Oh, I will manage these gay young gentlemen. Go back to your post, Polo. Keep the door locked, and be sure that no one leaves exceptin the regular order and conducted by her guide.”
A few moments later and the curtains were drawn at the close of the final act, tremendous applause testifying the approval of the audience. Winnie now stepped to the front of the curtain and announced that the ghosts must now each submit once more to be blindfolded and “to be led through the grewsome and labyrinthine catacombs to the Feast of the Ghouls.”
Little Breeze and Milly first led away two of the girls, and then Winnie stepped boldly up to the taller of the two suspected intruders and offered to blindfold him. The rogue could only follow the example of those who had preceded him, and submit with a good grace, as any other course would have led to detection. I followed with the shorter impostor, tying the handkerchief very tight, and detecting the odor of cigarettes as I did so. Winnie beckoned to me to follow, and conducted her victim to the root cellar, a dark, unwholesome little room, with a small orated window—a veritable dungeon. We led our prisoners into the centre of this gloomy cell, and, making them kneel onthe cemented floor, bade them remain there until the coming of the ghouls. Hastening from the place, we chained and padlocked the door securely.
“Now that we have secured our prisoners, what do you propose to do with them?” I asked of Winnie.
“Call the Amen Corner together after supper to deliberate on their fate. In the mean time they are very well off where they are. I fancy they will hardly care to repeat this experiment.”
We returned to the laundry and continued the ceremony of leading our guests to the supper. When all had been led in, the bandages were removed from their eyes, and they found themselves before tables provided with plates, knives, and forks, but no edibles. Little Breeze, beating upon a tin pan with a great beef bone, called the meeting to order, and, indicating the preserve closet, announced that the ghouls would now search the neighboring tombs for their prey. At the same time the door of the preserve closet was thrown open, and Trude Middleton set the example by capturing a can of peaches. The girls fancied that they were robbing the pantry, and this gave zest to the performanceto a few of the more reckless ones, but the rest held back, and Winnie found it necessary to circulate the whisper that even this apparently high-handed proceeding was authorized by Madame, before the raid became general. A very heterogeneous repast, consisting of pickles, crackers, dried apples, canned fruit, prunes, dried beef, and lemonade hastily mixed in a great earthen bowl, was now participated in by the hilarious ghouls. One bowl of the lemonade was ruined, after the lemons and sugar were mingled, by a ludicrous mistake. Milly, mistaking it for water, filled the bowl from a jar of liquid bluing. The error was discovered when we began filling some empty jelly tumblers with the strange blue mixture, and, fortunately, no one was poisoned by drinking the ghoulish liquor.
Under cover of the confusion I managed to tell Adelaide of the captives in the cellar, and later in the evening, while the ghosts were engaged in a Virginia Reel in the long underground passage leading from the furnace room to the other end of the school building, met in solemn conclave to deliberate on their fate. Adelaide was for delivering the keys to Madame with a statement of the case. Cynthia argued strongly in favor of releasingthe young men, sending them home, and saying nothing about it. While we were in the midst of the argument, a far away cry was heard. It was from Polo, who had been left to guard the door of the root cellar. We rushed to the spot, only to find that the rusty staple had yielded to the efforts of two athletic boys, one of whom was heavy of weight as well as strong of muscle, and had been forced out of the wall, and our captives had escaped. Polo had followed them in their flight, and returned breathless to report that they had made a dash, not for the outside door, but straight up the great staircase to the studio and had then descended the turret staircase, showing clearly that they had made their entrance in the same way.
We talked the matter over for a long time. How could they have known of this staircase, and have timed their coming so as to follow the procession of sheeted ghosts as they left the studio for their march to the lower regions? The suspicion instantly suggested itself that some one of the ten had furnished the information, and this suspicion deepened to certainty as we considered the excellence of their disguise, the sheets draped exactly as ours had been, the pillow-case Capuchinhood fitted about the mask cut from cotton cloth. How, too, could they have entered, since Polo declared that she had locked the turret door when she came in that afternoon, and had left the key on a nail in the studio?
“Show me the nail,” Winnie commanded promptly, and Polo led her to the studio. The nail was there, but the key had gone. We descended the staircase and found the lower door locked.
As we were returning to the studio we heard the door open and Professor Waite mounted the stairs, as was his usual custom at this time. “Heigho!” he exclaimed, “what are you all doing in the studio at this time of night? Oh! I forgot; this is the evening of the lark. Has it been a jovial bird? Why do you all look so solemn? By the way, Polo, I found your key in the lock on the outside of the door. It was very careless of you to leave it there; you must not let such a thing happen again. Some thief might have entered the house. I met two young men running with all their might as I came across the park. They made something of a detour to avoid me—I thought at the time that they had a suspicious look. Ifyou are so thoughtless a second time I shall take the key from you.”
“I didn’t leave it there,” Polo protested. “I hung it on the nail, Miss Cynthia saw me. Didn’t you, Miss Cynthia?”
But Cynthia had gone, and as the quarter-bell struck we were all reminded that we must descend to our dancers to be present at the unmasking and close the frolic. We hurried unceremoniously away without replying to Professor Waite’s questions.
After we had dismissed our guests, we adjourned to the Amen Corner and we again discussed the affair. It was agreed that it was sufficiently serious to report to Madame, and to this there was only one dissenting voice—that of Cynthia’s. It was too late to disturb Madame that night, but we presented ourselves at her morning office hour and told her all the circumstances of the case.
She looked very grave, but did not blame us. “I am very sorry,” she said, “that some one of my pupils has abused my leniency in this way. It will of course make me hesitate to grant you such frolics in the future. The matter shall be thoroughly investigated and the offender severely punished. Again I must ask you to keep this affair strictlyamong yourselves. You have kept the secret of the robbery wonderfully; be equally discrete with this. We do not as yet know certainly that these young men were cadets, and I shall not make any complaint to the head master until we have ascertained the culprits. Mr. Mudge will call to-morrow. He writes me that he has found a clue to the robbery, and we will place this matter also in his hands. You have done right to bring it directly to me, and your action only confirms the confidence I have always reposed in the Amen Corner. Be assured that the truth will out at last. Meantime don’t talk this over too much, even among yourselves, for Tennyson never wrote truer lines than these:
I never whispered a private affairWithin the hearing of cat or mouse,No, not to myself in the closet alone,But I heard it shouted at once from the top of the house.Everything came to be known.”
I never whispered a private affairWithin the hearing of cat or mouse,No, not to myself in the closet alone,But I heard it shouted at once from the top of the house.Everything came to be known.”
I never whispered a private affairWithin the hearing of cat or mouse,No, not to myself in the closet alone,But I heard it shouted at once from the top of the house.Everything came to be known.”