Beatrice Leigh at College Part 3

Looks like a dig as well as a prig, n'est-ce-pas?"

Berta's eager dark face grew sober under the swathing folds of her pillow-case. "Maybe it isn't her fault," she said.

But Robbie Belle unaware of this precious drop of sympathy plodded through an essay on Intellect, wrote out a laborious a.n.a.lysis, and at the stroke of the nine-thirty gong crept reluctantly back to her room. The next morning she translated her Latin, committed a geometrical demonstration to a faithful memory, consumed a silent luncheon amid a dizzying cross-fire of psychological arguments, walked around the garden, through the pines and over the orchard hill for a scrupulously full hour of exercise, read her physiology notes, and composed one page of her weekly theme before dinner time. After dinner she stood in a corner of Parlor J and watched the dancing. Then she went to chapel with Miss Cutter, returned alone in haste to dress in the concealing sheet and pillow case. It was rather difficult to manage the drapery without aid, especially in the back and at the sides. The strange junior who had chosen Robbie's name from the cla.s.s list and undertaken to escort her to the party found awaiting her a rumpled young ghost with raiment that sagged and bagged quite distressingly in unexpected places. But the eyes that shone from between the crooked bands of white were joyous with excitement. In this disguise she was sure that no one would recognize her; and so of course they would not know that she was queer, and perhaps she would have fun at last.

And at first it really seemed as if she would. Imagine a big gymnasium with jack-o'-lanterns on the rafters and a blazing wood-fire in the wide fireplace, and five hundred figures in white circling and mingling among the shadows, and at least a thousand sticks of candy, and three big dish-pans full of peanuts, and gallons and gallons of red lemonade. When her escort proposed that they should go up-stairs to look in upon the seniors and soph.o.m.ores who were having a country dance, Robbie Belle moistened her lips and said, "If you please, don't wait for me. I enjoy it so much here." Then at the junior's formal, "Oh, certainly, Miss Sanders!" she remembered that often people did not understand her unless she used a bothersome number of words. So she added hastily, "I mean that you must go with your own friends and leave me here, because I am watching some girls I know, and I want to speak to them. Please don't trouble any more about me, thank you."

"I do know them," she a.s.sured herself as her escort disappeared, "and I do want to speak to them even if they don't know me. I think"--she hesitated and turned quite pale at the prospect of such daring, "I think I shall go and play with them. They will suppose I am one of them. n.o.body will know."

At this point the file of impudent ghosts, headed by Berta, who looked unusually tall and still angular under her flowing sheet, paraded past Robbie Belle's corner, their elbows flapping like wings. With a gasp for courage she took one step forward and found herself prancing along at the end of the line.

It was such fun! Robbie Belle had shot up to an annoying stature so comparatively early in life that her romping days seemed to have broken short off in the middle. She had never had enough of tag and hide-and-seek and coasting. She hated long skirts. Indeed that was one reason why she longed to join the enviable circle of freshmen around Berta: they wore golf skirts all day long, except when hockey called for the gymnasium costume or bicycling demanded its appropriate array. The reason why she liked Miss Abbott best of course was because her name was Roberta, too.

On this Hallowe'en, in joyous faith in her disguise, she forgot her height and breadth and the dignity imposed thereby. And anyhow Berta Abbott was just as tall, if not of such stately proportions. So Robbie Belle with exulting zest in the frolic raced up-stairs and down with the mischievous band of freshmen. They skipped saucily around members of the faculty, chased appreciative juniors, frightened the smallest forms into scuttling flight, and gave their great performance of "There was an old woman all skin and bones," in the middle of the upper hall, where the seniors were entertaining the soph.o.m.ores.

It was fun to howl. It was so long since Robbie Belle had grown up that she had almost forgotten the joy of using her lungs to their full capacity. With her spirits dancing in the afterglow of such vocal exercise, she marched after the others down to the hall below. There in the vestibule Berta halted her followers for final instructions.

"Now, girls, fall into line according to height. We are going to astonish----Why!" She fixed two amazed dark eyes upon the tallest, "who are you?"

Robbie Belle heard; she felt her heart shriveling within her; her shoulders seemed to shrink together; her head drooped. Then turning away slowly she moved toward the gymnasium apartment, a loose corner of her robe trailing at her abashed heels. But she did not escape swiftly enough to avoid catching the sound of hisses.

"Ha! an interloper!"

"Hist! ye false intruder!"

"Seize him! To the shambles!"

"To the guillotine! Ho, brothers! pursue!"

That made Robbie Belle flee so fast that she was able to take refuge behind Prexie himself while the vengeful furies withdrew to a respectful distance. That night when she was shaking her pillow back into its case Robbie noticed some damp spots amid its creases. A few minutes later she laid her head down on it and proceeded to create some more. There was only one comfort in the throng of scorching reflections: this was that it had not been Berta's voice that had called her an intruder. Perhaps Berta did not think she had done something so awfully wicked after all.

This faint hope infused more dreadful bitterness into the incident that happened in mathematics C on Monday. Anybody would have believed that Berta was offended past forgiveness. She sat next to Robbie. She was not very well prepared that morning, possibly in consequence of Sat.u.r.day's excitement. The instructor was more than usually curt and crisp with an unsmiling sternness that struck terror to palpitating freshman hearts. In the middle of the hour Berta became aware that a problem was traveling rapidly down the row toward her; and she had not been paying attention.

She had not even noticed the statement of it, for it had started at an apparently safe distance from her seat. Turning with a swift motion of the lips she asked Robbie Belle to tell her. And Robbie Belle--how she longed to tell it! It had almost leaped from her lips while conscience reasoned wildly against it as deceit. It would not be honest. And yet--and yet--the girls would think she was queer. They would say she was mean and priggish, for she might have told Berta as easily as not.

There! the third girl from Berta was trying to explain her own ignorance and failing brilliantly. Now the second was stammering through a transparent bluff. Berta had settled back, coolly resigned to fate. How she must suffer, after having stooped to ask for aid! Poor Robbie Belle!

Poor, lonely, disappointed Robbie Belle! For strange to say she flunked too and the question journeyed on triumphantly to the mathematical prodigy at the end of the row.

In the corridor outside Berta exerted her nimble self to overtake Miss Sanders, who was sidling away in a strikingly unprincesslike manner, her eyes shifting guiltily.

"So you didn't know the answer either? Wasn't that the biggest joke on me! And really, Miss Sanders, I beg your pardon for asking. It popped out before I could gather my wits. I am scared to death in that cla.s.s, though of course that is no excuse for sponging. I'm glad you didn't know it enough to tell me after all."

Robbie Belle lifted the lashes from her flushed cheeks. "I--I did know it," she said with a gulp.

"Oh!" said Berta, and stared, "how--how peculiar!"

Robbie Belle held back the tears till she had reached her room, seized her hat and s.n.a.t.c.hed her thickest veil. Then she fled to the loneliest walk among the pines. Her veil was a rarity that rendered her an object of curiosity to everybody she pa.s.sed on the way. But she hurried on, somewhat comforted by the conviction that no one could mark her reddened eyelids. In truth she had good need of comfort, for Berta Abbott herself had said that she was peculiar. And peculiar meant queer!

That evening Robbie sat down to study for the Latin test announced for the next day. Miss Cutter was studying, too, harder than ever. The green shade was pulled so fiercely forward that a fringe of hair stood up in a crown where the elastic had rumpled it. Her grammar, lexicon and text-book occupied most of the table, but Robbie did not complain. She could manage very well by laying her books, one on the open face of another, in her lap. For once she was grateful that an ENGAGED sign shielded them from interruptions, for Latin was her shakiest subject, especially the rules of indirect discourse. The instructor had warned the cla.s.s that this weak spot was to be the point of attack. If Robbie Belle should not succeed in drumming the rules into her head before the ideas in it began to spin around and around in their usual dizzy fashion when she waxed sleepy, she might just as well stay away from the recitation room. Or better perhaps, for in absence there was a possibility of both doubt and hope: hope on Robbie Belle's part that she might have been able to answer the questions if she had been there, on the teacher's part doubt concerning the exact extent of the pupil's knowledge.

At the end of the corridor just outside their door a narrow stairway led to the north tower rooms on the floor above. Beatrice Leigh and Lila Allan and a number of their liveliest friends lived up there on the fifth, with Berta Abbott at the foot of the stairs near Robbie's place of abode.

Just as Robbie's usually serene brow was puckering its hardest over the sequence of tenses, a door banged open in the tower and the stairs creaked under swift clatter of feet--a dozen at the very least.

Miss Cutter scowled beneath the green shade; Robbie Belle could tell that from the way the fringe of upright hair vibrated.

"Savages!" she muttered, "they'll tear the building to pieces. No wonder the newspapers report that the college girl's favorite mode of locomotion is sliding down the banisters."

"No," said Robbie Belle, "not that. They take hold of the railing and jump several steps at a time. I've seen them. Miss Leigh says she does it for exercise."

"And this also is exercise!" Miss Cutter clutched her ears as a tornado swept past their threshold.

Robbie bent to listen anxiously. "They're going to the ice-cooler," she said, "pretty soon they will go back again."

"Yes," said Miss Cutter as she rose and moved toward the door, "they will doubtless go back, and doubtless also they shall go in a different manner."

Then she went out and remonstrated briefly but to the point. Whereupon the culprits apologized with n.o.ble profusion and tiptoed their way to the stairs. This would have been an admirable proof of repentance if their heels had not persisted in coming down on the bare boards in very loud clicks at very short intervals. And every click was greeted by a reproving chorus of "Sh-sh-sh!"

The instant they reached the hall above, pandemonium broke loose. To judge from the sounds, they were playing blindman's buff with scampering of heavy shoes, sc.r.a.ping of chairs, banging against walls, flopping on mattresses. Even reluctant Robbie Belle looked upward in fear that the ceiling might fall. When a deputation of wild eyed soph.o.m.ores from an adjacent study arrived to protest against a continuation of the outrage, the shrinking corridor-warden had no loophole for escape from her duty.

Outwardly calm, inwardly quivering, she mounted the stairs to expostulate on behalf of the Students' a.s.sociation for Self-Government.

When the peace officer reached the foot of the flight, the noise sank abruptly into a silent scurrying--on unadulterated tiptoes this time.

When she appeared at the top, she beheld the tower hall deserted, every door shut and a suspiciously profound stillness reigning in the dimly lighted Paradise of fun. Ah! she drew a breath of relief from away down in her boots. Surely now she had performed her duty. n.o.body could expect her to find fault after the disturbance had ceased. Now the girls below would be at liberty to study in peace.

Barely had she completed her hurried descent before the strange silence above was shattered suddenly by the simultaneous banging of seven doors.

Seven full-lunged voices burst forth into a howling song, while twice as many feet thumped and tapped and pranced and pounded in the mazes of an extemporaneous jig.

Robbie Belle halted instantly, with a quick lift of her head. Her nostrils quivered. Her violet eyes snapped black. Her hands clenched.

Turning swiftly she mounted the stairs once more. But this time she was angry. The uproar was an insult to the authority of the Students'

a.s.sociation. She forgot for the minute all about shy Robbie Belle.

And the mischievous freshmen above--the flippant fun-loving irresponsible six-year-old freshmen--they waited ready to meet the warden with an impudent burst of revelry, and thus to dash her official dignity from its exasperating estate. When they saw Robbie Belle's face they simply stared. They listened in silence to the few rapid words that stung and burned and smarted. They watched her depart, her head still held at its angle of wrathful justice. Then they looked at one another.

They could not see how, when once safely in the haven of her room, she broke down utterly and lay trembling and sobbing in Miss Cutter's astonished arms. Now at last she had surely committed an unpardonable offense against the only girls for whom she cared in the whole collegeful--especially Berta. Now Berta would be certain she was queer.

Meanwhile in the tower, Berta drew a long breath and glanced around at her dismayed and sobered companions.

"The more I see of that girl," she said, "the better I like her. And we have been awfully silly--that's a fact. The next time I see her I shall tell her so too. Now suppose we go and do a little studying our own selves."

Somehow or other before Thanksgiving Day, Robbie Belle Sanders had ceased to be disappointed in college. With Berta for a dearest friend and Miss Cutter withdrawn to a more congenial neighborhood, she was finding it even more fun than she had expected.

CHAPTER III

A QUESTION OF ECONOMY

"I LOVE music myself," said Robbie Belle, lifting serene eyes from her porridge, "but to-day is Thanksgiving Day."