Elizabeth Hobart at Exeter Hall Part 12

"But you always play. I'd rather any day get up and strut over the stage, shrieking 'Is that a dagger that I see before me?' than sit down and keep my fingers on the right keys," said Mame Welch.

"It is certainly wonderful how Azzie can play," said Min. "Every one seems to enjoy it; but, do you know, just for myself, I like popular airs best?

Beethoven and Mozart may be fine, but I like the kind that the newsboys whistle and all the hurdy-gurdies play."

"Wouldn't Mozart turn in his grave if he heard her?" asked Mame. "Speak to her, Azzie. Reason with her. You are the only one who has artistic sense enough to be shocked. Tell her to keep quiet, like the others of us do, and pretend to revel in delight at Wagner."

"Will the Middlers be in it, too?" asked Elizabeth. Her heart failed at the thought.

"Yes," said Mary, seeing that Elizabeth was really concerned at the prospect of appearing in public. "Yes, they give the Middlers several parts. You see, their idea is to get the Middlers used to public speaking so that they will appear well when they are Seniors. All the experiences or lessons Middlers ever get are given them in order to fit them to be Seniors."

The lunch had been progressing during the chatter. A few drumsticks and several slices of cake remained to show what had been. Elizabeth and Mary, with true housewifely instinct, put away the remnants of the feast after their guests had finished.

"How economical you are becoming!" said Mame Welch. "If I become hungry to-morrow, I will visit while you are not here. If you miss anything, I think you may give Landis the credit of taking it."

Landis shrugged her shoulders. "To see how careful they are, one would think they never had much to eat before and don't expect much again. Now, I'd throw the whole lot of it into the sc.r.a.p-basket and let Jimmy Jordan carry it off with the refuse. You bring to my mind that woman we met the day we came back to Exeter. She was horrified because I didn't take what was left of our lunch and run about offering it to some people who did not have any with them. She went outside and shared hers with such a common-looking woman and two dirty, crying babies."

"And me, too," said Elizabeth, not a whit abashed that she had been one of the party which Landis saw fit to criticise.

"Oh, yes," was the reply, "But I suppose you were forced into it."

"I wasn't forced into it," Elizabeth replied. "Indeed, I was glad to go.

It was like a little picnic out there under the tree--"

"With two crying babies?"

"They did not cry after we went out. And the woman whom you laugh at was very agreeable. The wait did not seem at all long. It was rather like a pleasant party."

"Well, tastes differ," was the reply. "I am glad you enjoyed it. I'm sure I should not. Come, Min, don't you think we had better pick our steps back?"

"Walk as you please. The great Hokee Bokee Chief of the Night Hawks has taken the scalp of the pale-faced scout," shouted Mary Wilson, jumping to her feet and, seizing the false fronts, she waved them madly in the air while she executed a war-dance.

"Give them back to Azzie," said Mame. "Sometime early to-morrow morning you will find that the pale-faced scout is close on Azzie's trail."

Azzie took the trophies in her hand, examining them critically. "To-morrow I intend to go in and call upon her. I know she'll have a towel bound around her head."

The girls were about to depart when Mame Welch exclaimed, "There, I almost forgot! Anna Cresswell has been invited down to Gleasonton to visit at the Senator's. Mrs. Gleason is arranging quite a party of Exeter girls as soon as they can have a free Sat.u.r.day."

"Elizabeth and I were invited to-day," said Mary. "We were to let Mrs.

Gleason know what Sat.u.r.day we would have free."

"They have fine times there--so they tell me," Azzie said. "I've never been invited to see for myself."

"I do not know Mrs. Gleason personally," remarked Landis, "but we have the same set of friends. No doubt if I should tell her that I'm Robert Stoner's daughter, she'd out-do herself to be kind to me."

"Why," said Elizabeth guilelessly, "was she such a friend of your father's?"

Landis shrugged her shoulders. "My father was a man of some prominence,"

was the response. "But how is it that she invited you? Did you not tell me that you did not know her?"

"I don't. I have never so much as seen her."

"She's very philanthropic--always trying to help people who need it. I suppose she knew you were a new student, and perhaps hadn't a wide acquaintance here, so she invited you that you might not find life too dull."

"Perhaps," was the reply, with a smile of amus.e.m.e.nt. Elizabeth was learning a great deal, not less important that it lay outside of cla.s.ses and books.

The other girls had departed. Only Landis and Miss O'Day remained. Then the former with a whispered "good-night" went tip-toeing down the hall.

Miss O'Day lingered.

Much to Elizabeth's surprise she bent her head to kiss her. "It was very kind of you, Elizabeth, to ask me to come this evening. But the other girls did not like it. Come to see me. You and I will grow chummy over my tea-table. But you do not need to ask me again when you entertain. I will not feel hurt. If you persist in being good to me, they will drop you and you will find it very lonely."

"They may do as they see fit," she responded with determination. "I will entertain whom I wish. If they do not choose to come, then they have the alternative. Good-night! Don't worry about me, Miss O'Day. I'm learning to take care of myself." Then she put up her lips to be kissed again.

The following morning the preceptress did not appear at breakfast, as Azzie had predicted. The dinner hour, according to the custom for all holidays, had been postponed until two o'clock. Devotional exercises were held in the chapel at ten o'clock. Mrs. Schuyler's place on the rostrum was vacant.

"She's been in her room all morning," giggled Min to Landis on their way to their rooms.

"I hope Azzie will see the error of her ways before dinner time," Mary Wilson said. "I should not like to miss a Thanksgiving dinner."

As though Mary's words had power to call her, Azzie at that moment came down the corridor, swinging herself lazily along.

"This is the sixth time I've started for Mrs. Schuyler's room," she began at the sight of the girls. "But the moment I reach the door, my heart drops down into my shoes, and it's so heavy, I can't move my feet an inch."

"Taking scalps is not all the fun it's supposed to be, is it?" asked Mame Welch.

"The taking is all right. The taking _back_ is what hurts my feelings."

Azzie sighed deeply as she began to unwrap the paper about the false fronts. "I don't know whether I'll have the courage to lay them inside her door or not. I'd put it off until to-morrow if it wasn't for the Thanksgiving dinner. Well, there's luck in odd numbers."

"To me there would be something too subtle, too sly, in slipping them in at the door." The remark was from Landis.

As usual, Mary Wilson was the one quick to reply. "Then Azzie will not do it if there be but a suspicion of subtleness about it. Do you not know her well enough, Landis, to know when she is jesting and when she is not?"

"Oh, well, let us hope she was jesting then," was the reply.

The seventh venture had carried a charm for Azzie. Her heart did not go thumping to her heels again. She knocked at Mrs. Schuyler's door and then entered without waiting for permission.

"Good-morning, Mrs. Schuyler," she cried gayly. "I was sorry not to see you down to breakfast, though to be honest I did not expect you. Did you miss anything last evening after I was in? It was too good a chance--there they were lying right under my eyes. I'll leave them here," laying the budget on a table near her, "so you can come down to dinner."

Her manner was not that of one who merited or expected a rebuke. There was such a big-hearted friendliness in her voice that Mrs. Schuyler's heart responded. She smiled in spite of the feeling of vengeance she had been cherishing against her tormentor. Before she could regain her austerity of manner, Azzie had departed and was half way down the dormitory hall, on her way to the music-room for an hour's practice before dinner.

Thanksgiving was not a day of unalloyed happiness to Elizabeth. The afternoon's mail brought her letters and papers from Bitumen. Her father wrote the home news with the same gaiety which marked his conversation. He mentioned, as though it were a subject to be lightly treated, that there was some talk of the miners "going out." He thought their grievance might be adjusted without resorting to extreme measures--a week or so would tell. Then he took up the little matters of the house.

The letter was remarkably cheerful. Yet Elizabeth was disturbed in spirit.

She had never lived through a strike; but she had heard the miners' wives tell of the dreadful happenings. So far she thought only of the suffering of the miners' families, with no money, starving and freezing in their little shanties. She had never heard how the lives of the operators and men in the position of her father hung in the balance at such times.

After reading the letter again, she mechanically took up the newspaper.

The black headlines heralding the coming strike were before her. She read column after column hurriedly. The newspaper attached greater importance to the rumors than her father. They recounted the horrors of strikes past, and presaged them for strikes to come. No definite reasons had been given for the miners going out. The article hinted that only the grossest imposition of the operators had led them to consider a strike. The names of two men appeared frequently--Dennis O'Day and Ratowsky--who were opposed to each other. Strange to say, neither was a miner. Ratowsky could influence the men because he was foreign-born, a Pole, as the majority of them were. On the other hand, Dennis O'Day was a native American, a cla.s.s of which the foreign element is suspicious. Yet at his instigation the miners had arisen.

The article caused Elizabeth some uneasiness. She looked forward to the following day's paper, hoping it might contain a brighter outlook. But on the next day when she went to the reading room, she failed to find the papers. For many successive days the same thing occurred. Then at length, she gave up looking for them. It was not until a month later that she learned that they had disappeared at Dr. Morgan's suggestion, and the girls were aiding her in keeping the worrisome news from Elizabeth.