A Sweet Girl Graduate Part 28

"Allow me to lend them to you until next term. You can return me the money then, can you not?"

Polly's face became on the instant a show of shining eyes, gleaming white teeth and glowing cheeks.

"Of course I could pay you back, you-- darling," she said with enthusiasm. "Oh, what a relief this is to me; I'd have done anything in all the world to have my jacket back again."

"It's a bargain, then. Good night, Miss Singleton."

Maggie tossed the jacket on Polly's bed, touched her hand lightly with one of her own and left the room. She went quickly back to her own pretty sitting-room, locked her door, threw herself on her knees by her bureau and sobbed long and pa.s.sionately.

During the few days which now remained before the end of the term no one quite knew what was wrong with Miss Oliphant. She worked hard in preparation for her lectures and when seen in public was always very merry. But there was a certain hardness about her mirth which her best friends detected and which caused Nancy Banister a good deal of puzzled pain.

Priscilla was treated very kindly by Maggie; she still helped her willingly with her Greek and even invited her into her room once or twice. But all the little half-beginnings of confidence which, now and then, used to burst from Maggie's lips, the allusions to old times, the sentences which revealed deep thoughts and high aspirations, all these, which made the essence of true friendship, vanished out of her conversation.

Priscilla said to herself over and over that there was really no difference-- that Miss Oliphant was still as kind to her, as valued a friend as ever-- but in her heart she knew that this was not the case.

Maggie startled all her friends by making one request. Might they postpone the acting of The Princess until the middle of the following term?"

"I cannot do it justice now," she said. "I cannot throw my heart and soul into my part. If you act the play now you must allow me to withdraw."

The other girls, Constance Field in particular, were astonished. They even felt resentful. All arrangements had been made for this special play. Maggie was to be the Princess herself; no one could possibly take her place. It was most unreasonable of her to withdraw now.

But it was one of the facts well known at St. Benet's that, fascinating as Miss Oliphant was, she was also unreasonable. On certain occasions she could even be disobliging. In short, when Maggie "took the bit between her teeth," to employ an old metaphor, she could neither be led nor driven. After a great deal of heated discussion and indignant words, she had her will. The play was deferred till the following term, and one or two slight comedies, which had been acted before, were revived in a hurry to take its place.

CHAPTER XXII

A BLACK SATIN JACKET

VERY active preparations were being made in a certain rather humble little cottage in the country for the heroine's return. Three small girls were making themselves busy with holly and ivy, with badly cut paper flowers, with enormous texts coa.r.s.ely ill.u.s.trated, to render the home gay and festive in its greeting. A little worn old woman lay on a sofa and superintended these active measures.

"How soon will she be here now?" said Hattie the vigorous.

"Do stay still, Hattie, and don't fidget. Don't you see how tired Aunt Raby looks?" exclaimed Rose. "Prissie can't be here yet, and you are such a worry when you jump up and down like that, Hattie."

Rose's words were quite severe, and Hattie planted herself on the edge of a chair, folded her plump hands, managed to get a demure look into her laughing eyes and dimpled mouth and sat motionless for about half a minute. At the end of that time she tumbled on the floor with a loud crash and Aunt Raby sprang to her feet with some alarm.

"Good gracious, child! are you hurt? What's the matter?"

Hattie was sitting on the floor in convulsions of mirth.

"I'm not hurt," she exclaimed. "I slipped off the chair. I didn't mean to; I couldn't help it, really. I'm sorry I woke you, Aunt Raby."

"I wasn't asleep, child." Miss Peel walked across the room and vanished into the kitchen, from which very savory smells issued.

Hattie and Rose began to quarrel and argue, and Katie, who was more or less of a little peacemaker, suggested that they should draw up the blind and all three get into the window to watch for Prissie.

"I wonder how she will look?" said Rose when they were all comfortably established.

"I hope she won't talk in Latin," exclaimed Hattie.

"Oh, it is nice to think of seeing Prissie so soon," murmured Katie in an ecstasy.

"I wonder," began Rose in her practical voice, "how soon Prissie will begin to earn money. We want money even more than when she went away.

Aunt Raby isn't as well as she was then, and since the cows were sold----"

"Hush!" said Hattie. "You know we promised we wouldn't tell Prissie about the cows."

Just then a distant sound of wheels was heard. The little girls began to jump and shout; a moment later and Priscilla stood in the midst of her family. A great excitement followed her arrival. There were kisses and hugs and wild, rapturous words from the affectionate little sisters. Aunt Raby put her arms round Priscilla and gave her a solemn sort of kiss, and then the whole party adjourned into the supper-room.

The feast which was spread was so dainty and abundant that Katie asked in a puzzled sort of way if Aunt Raby considered Prissie like the Prodigal Son.

"What fancies you have, child!" said Aunt Raby. "The Prodigal Son, indeed! Thank Heaven, I've never had to do with that sort! As to Priscilla here, she's as steady as Old Time. Well, child, and are you getting up your learning very fast?"

"Pretty well, Aunt Raby."

"And you like your grand college and all those fine young-lady friends of yours?"

"I haven't any fine young-lady friends."

"H'm! I dare say they are like other girls; a little bit of learning and a great deal of dress, eh?"

Priscilla colored.

"There are all sorts of girls at St. Benet's," she said after a pause.

"Some are real students, earnest, devoted to their work."

"Have you earned any money yet, Prissie?" exclaimed Hattie. "For if you have, I do want-- look----" She thrust a small foot, encased in a broken shoe, prominently into view.

"Hattie, go to bed this minute!" exclaimed Aunt Raby. "Go up to your room all three of you little girls. No more words-- off at once, all of you. Prissie, you and I will go into the drawing-room, and I'll lie on the sofa while you tell me a little of your college life."

"Aunt Raby always lies on the sofa in the evenings now," burst from Hattie the irrepressible.

Miss Peel rushed after the plump little girl and pushed her out of the room.

"To bed, all of you!" she exclaimed. "To bed and to sleep! Now, Prissie, you are not to mind a word that child says. Come into the drawing-room and let us have a few words quietly. Oh, yes, I'll lie on the sofa, my dear, if you wish it. But Hattie is wrong; I don't do it every night. I suffer no pain either, Prissie. Many a woman of my age is racked with rheumatics."

The last words were said with a little gasp. The elder woman lay back on the sofa with a sigh of relief. She turned her face so that the light from the lamp should not reveal the deathly tired lines round it.

Aunt Raby was dressed in a rough homespun garment. Her feet were clad in unbleached cotton stockings, also made at home; her little, iron-gray curls lay flat at each side of her hollow cheeks. She wore list slippers, very coa.r.s.e and common in texture. Her whole appearance was the essence of the homely, the old-fashioned, even the ungainly.

Priscilla had seen elegance and beauty since she went away; she had entered into the life of the cultivated, the intellectually great. In spite of her deep affection for Aunt Raby, she came back to the ugliness and the sordid surroundings of home with a pang which she hated herself for feeling. She forgot Aunt Raby's sufferings for a moment in her uncouthness. She longed to shower riches, refinement, beauty upon her.

"How has your dress worn, Prissie?" said the elder woman after a pause. "My sakes, child, you have got your best brown cashmere on! A beautiful fine bit of cashmere it was, too. I bought it out of the money I got for the lambs' wool."

Aunt Raby stretched out her hand, and, taking up a fold of the cashmere, she rubbed it softly between her finger and thumb.

"It's as fine as velvet," she said, "and I put strong work into it, too. It isn't a bit worn, is it, Prissie?"

"No, Aunt Raby, except just round the tail. I got it very wet one day and the color went a trifle, but nothing to signify."