Hester's Counterpart Part 20

"It is well to be satisfied," she said.

"It certainly is," replied Erma. "I am glad I am. There's not a father or mother better than mine and my friends are the best in the world. I wouldn't exchange them for millions."

She had come close to Hester, and encircling her with her arm, asked, "When are you coming back, peaches?"

"Monday morning. There comes my car now." She stooped to lift her suit-case which Marshall had brought down from her room and deposited at her feet. As she did so, the b.u.t.terfly end of her tie fluttered, displaying her quaint pin whose setting gleamed like a spark of fire.

Its scintillation caught Erma's eye. She was about to remark concerning it, but stopped herself in time. But Berenice, who never let anything escape her, also caught the sparkle of the stone. More than that, she saw the expression which pa.s.sed quickly over Erma's face, and she read it aright. She made no remark until Hester had boarded the car, had waved her good-byes and the car had disappeared down the bend of the road. Then turning, she slipped her arm into Erma's and Mellie's, and so walking between them, moved toward the building.

"Did you notice the pin Hester had on?" she asked suddenly.

Mellie was wise and did not answer. Erma, who was as transparent as a ray of light, grew confused and tried to cover it up by asking, "A pin?

Did she have a pin on? I suppose she did. Girls generally wear pins of some sort."

Berenice shrugged her shoulders. "Yes; she had a pin on, Erma Thomas, and you observed it as well as I did. You know as well as I do whose pin it is."

"You are very much mistaken. I know nothing at all about it. I have nothing to do with other people's jewelry."

"You have with this. At least you spent hours in helping to look for it.

It is that odd one which Helen Loraine wore and which so mysteriously disappeared."

"Any disappearance is a mystery. If I lose a collar b.u.t.ton, it is a mystery to me. If it was not, I would know where it was. The things we don't know are always mysterious. If we know, then they are as plain as day."

"It seems strange it should disappear for three months and then Hester Alden have it on, especially when Helen Loraine is away."

"That is the very time you should wear other people's jewelry and clothes. When I am home I always wear my mother's best silk stockings and rustling petticoats when I know she's down in the city shopping. Of course I always ask her--when she comes back--and she never refuses me permission. She always says the same thing: 'Well, since you have them on--'"

Erma's attempts to lead the conversation away from Hester and the pin was without results. Berenice clung to the subject with a tenacity which would have been admirable had the thing been worth while.

"I understand you, Erma. You think just as I do, but you are afraid to say so. I suspected from the first where the pin went; but of course I did not say so."

"Do you not think it a wise course to follow now--to say nothing?"

"It is very different now. Before, I was merely suspicious. One may not make statements in mere suspicion. Now I have proofs."

"Proofs? Because Hester Alden has the pin on and Helen is away?"

"Let us walk along the edge of the river," said Mellie. She, too, meant to change the conversation. "I love the river when it is icebound. I should like to cross if I thought it were safe. But I fancy we had better not. We have had several days of thaw and that always rots the ice, and rotten ice is far more dangerous than thin ice."

"I intend to speak my mind," said Berenice. "Mellie and you are very much afraid you will express yourselves. You think as I do about the matter, but you will not say so. I cannot see the difference between thinking a thing and saying it outright."

"The best thing to do is not to think it," said Erma. She laughed long and loud and merrily. "That is quite an idea. After this, I shall not think things. Perhaps my brain will never wear out. Doesn't the physiology say that every thought wears away some of the gray cellular tissue? Thank goodness, no one can blame me for destroying mine. I am sure I never thought any of mine away." As she spoke a new thought came to her. "No doubt, Helen found her pin weeks ago and you are having your tempest in a tea-pot all for nothing."

Berenice had not thought of that possibility. This was an argument, she was not equal to and was the means of causing her to say no more on the subject.

She knew from experience that she could not talk with some of the girls.

They had a sense of loyalty and honor which restrained them from discussing anyone who came under the name of friend.

Berenice was unfortunate in her disposition. She was not by nature honest or sincere, and she could not conceive of another's being so.

When Erma and Mellie had refused to listen to her suspicions, she attributed not to their high sense of honor, but rather that they were deceiving her and would discuss the question between themselves.

Every girl in the hall understood Berenice. They were careful of their words while in her presence and they never repeated a tale that she carried to them. Many a time had they taken her to task, but she never profited by the lessons. When the girls spoke to her plainly, she put the fault on them instead of upon herself. Gradually the girls let her go her own way, gave no credence to her words and kept a bridle on their tongues, when Berenice was within hearing.

Yet, a word dropped here and there, will spring up and bear seed even though every one about knows it to be but a poisonous weed. Berenice dropped these seeds in plenty. A word fell here and there, although the hearers repudiated it, it yet made an impression, before any one was conscious that it was so. No one could trace the source from which it sprung, but the impression was strong throughout the hall that Hester Alden had taken Helen's valuable pin and had hidden it away for months, then at the first opportunity when Helen was at Exeter, Hester had worn it home.

Hester, wholly unconscious that her action might be misjudged or that it should be judged at all, had left the pin at the cottage with Aunt Debby. She had put it away in her own tiny bedroom. A feeling of pride had restrained her from wearing it at school. The other girls wore pins which were not make-believes and Hester did not like the idea of the odd metal and cut gla.s.s.

"Aunt Debby told me it was just a cheap little pin," she said to herself as she placed it away. "I shall always keep it because it was my mother's, but I shall not wear it. I do not feel just right wearing something which pretends to be something else."

When Hester returned to school Monday morning, more than one pair of eyes looked eagerly for her coming. Erma and Mellie were hoping that she would come in with the pin boldly in evidence, and thus put to rout the rumors which had crept into the hall. Berenice, too, watched for Hester's coming with a wholly different motive.

"If Hester Alden comes in to cla.s.s and wears the pin when Helen is present, then of course nothing can be said. I shall believe it then that Helen found the pin and allowed Hester to wear it. But if Hester comes back without it, I shall draw my own conclusions, and I shall feel justified in doing so."

She did not dare to say this to Mellie, Erma, or the older girls. It was to Emma she spoke, and Emma being youngest of all, and new to school life, listened and believed.

Hester was expected on the eight o'clock car. It was not by chance that some of the girls lingered in the main hall at the time of her coming.

Marshall from the office window, saw the car coming in the distance and went down to the triangle to carry up Hester's baggage. The group of girls saw him and moved nearer to the door.

"The car is coming. Hester will be on it," said Berenice. Erma was in the little group. At the tone in Berenice's voice, Erma flushed. Like a flash there came to her a conception of the part she was playing in this. If she were Hester Alden's friend, she had no right to question her action and no right to wait at the door to find proof of her perfidy or her honesty. Erma raised her head proudly, "I think I shall not wait here. I shall see Hester later. The dear old honeysuckle that she is! I shall be glad to have her back. I missed her dreadfully these two days."

She turned her back on the group and was about to walk away when Mellie moved forward and slipped her hand in Erma's arm. "I shall go with you,"

she said. Others, grasping the situation more clearly than they had before, followed the example of Erma. So it was, that only Berenice and two of the younger girls waited at the doorway.

But a few moments they stood there, when the door opened and Marshall ushered Hester into the hall.

"I shall take this case directly to your room, Miss Alden," said Marshall.

"Thank you, Marshall," cried Hester. She was her gay, bright self after her visit with Aunt Debby. Her eyes were sparkling and her cheeks bright. She turned to the girls who stood waiting for her. Ignorant of the motive which had brought them here to meet her, she greeted them affectionately.

"It was lovely of you girls to come down here to meet me. I had a lovely time with Aunt Debby. Yet I am glad to get back to school."

While she had been speaking, she had drawn off her gloves and had thrown back her coat. The girls had given no response to her greeting, but stood with their eyes fixed upon her. The exclamation which Berenice gave sounded much like one of exultation; for Hester Alden was not wearing a pin.

Hester felt conditions about her. She gave the three girls a quick hurried glance as though to grasp the intangible something which she felt. Then she continued her way down the corridor. Berenice was not easily offended. Catching step with Hester, she walked with her.

"Did you lose your pin, Hester?" she asked. "You had such a pretty pin on when you left school Sat.u.r.day morning. I noticed at once that you didn't have it on now. Do you suppose you lost it?"

"No, I did not. I left it home purposely."

"Indeed. If I had such a pin I am sure I would wear it. There are only one or two girls in school who have diamonds. If I had a pin with a diamond in it, I am sure I'd be only too anxious to wear it."

"But that did not happen to be a diamond. It is a very cheap little pin which belonged to Aunt Debby--that is, it belonged to me, and I'd rather keep it than wear it."

Berenice gave her shoulders a shrug, lowered her eyelids until her eyes looked like little beads. She would prove to the girls that what she had said was true. Every one of Hester's friends had heard the report but had refused to discuss it. Erma laughed in derision at the mention of it. "Oh, you silly thing," she cried, "to come to me with such a story.

Don't I know Hester better than that."

And Mellie, Mame, Renee, and Sara stopped the tale-bearers in their story. Yet while they tried to be true, in the heart of each one was a doubt. Had they not seen the pin many times? Had it not disappeared weeks and weeks ago; and had they not seen Hester wear it home, and that when Helen was absent? Proof was brought before them and they tried to ignore it. They tried to strengthen themselves in their position by believing that Helen had found the pin and had neglected to tell them.

Hester's friends would have let the matter pa.s.s, giving her the benefit of a doubt, but there was in school a different set who were easily influenced and stood ready to believe anything that was told them. This set with Berenice as instigator, took it upon themselves to ostracize Hester.