Hester's Counterpart Part 25

"Nothing, when one's hair curls naturally. But it can do a lot when one's hair is straight. Look at mine." Mame sighed dismally. "Did you ever see such locks? Every one as straight as a poker. I wish, just for once, I could look like other girls."

Josephine was standing in the hall, waiting when the little group of girls entered.

"Have you been in all the time?" asked Hester. "How could you? The river is fine and getting higher and higher each moment. You shouldn't miss such a sight as this."

"I have not missed it," was the reply, given while the speaker's eyes took a soulful upward glance. "I cannot enjoy nature with people laughing and talking about me. I must be alone and commune with it. I have stood here watching from the window. What a beautiful and yet a terrible scene it is. I feel uplifted."

"I wish I felt the same way--uplifted to the extent of two flights of stairs," said Hester. She had not meant to be funny, but the girls laughed. Josephine turned upon her a hurt, aggrieved look. But just for a moment, then she smiled and said gently, "Hester, you little water-sprite! How can you jest when nature is at war?"

Edna Bucher was another student who would not brave the elements. She stood at the hall window where the stairway makes a turn. She was dressed in very somber clothes, guiltless of curves or graces. She did not look with favor upon girls' trudging out in the storm. It had in it the element of tom-boyism upon which Miss Bucher looked with alarm.

"No, I did not go," she said meekly and apologetically. "I was brought up to think it wasn't ladylike to go out in all kinds of weather; ladies don't do it. It is just what you would expect of a man."

The hearers replied not a word. They did not so much as shrug their shoulders or glance at each other. But each girl resolved at that minute, if being hearty and hale and fearless were unladylike, from that moment they would be that very thing.

The weather soon had its effect upon the spirits of the girls. Gayety in the dormitories and parlors was reduced to the minimum. Pupils stood silent at windows, gazing out at the steady downpour. Where they did gather in groups of three or four, there was no laughing or bright talk.

Just a word now and then, and a low reply. At intervals, someone grew intolerant and expressed herself. "Will this rain never stop?" "I was hoping it would clear so that we might go into town."

Their hopes were doomed to disappointment. The rain never ceased for one instant during the night and all day Friday.

At lunch time Friday, the girls ran out on the campus to see what had become of their markers of the evening before. They were gone. The water had come over them and moved up in the campus until it touched the cannae-beds.

"The flowers will be ruined!" cried the girls. As though to prove the truth of the statement, a tongue of water curled itself softly about the plants, sucked deep into the roots, and when it went its way, the cannaes went with it, and only a hollow was left in the great bed, and this was quickly filled with water.

"It has risen three feet since last evening," said Hester, who had been standing silent, estimating the distance. There were exclamations of wonder, surprise, and fear. To many, three feet of a rise in water meant no more than a Greek syllable. They had not been reared near a river, and knew nothing of what might be expected in the way of floods.

"Three feet is nothing," said Hester with the air of one who knew all there was to know of such matters. "Why, a June flood is generally seven feet at home. We do not think much about it. And September floods--we do not always have them, but we wouldn't think of calling it a flood unless the river rose at least five feet. Three feet since yesterday!

That is really nothing at all. I hope it will go five feet higher before night."

It was all braggadocio on her part; but it had the desired effect. Erma screamed in terror; Emma's eyes grew big; Mame scolded her soundly for expressing such a wish. For a while she had a hornet's nest about her ears.

Early Friday afternoon, a change came. Before, the rain had come down steady and constant. Now it came in a stream, as though the floors from a great reservoir had given way and the water had fallen in one great body.

There was no going out in this. An umbrella was no protection whatever, for the rain came through as water through a sieve. After dinner, the girls stood in the windows which overlooked the river and watched the water as it crept up, so slowly the eye could not recognize its advance.

The trunks of the apple trees were hidden from view. The water was muddy and foaming. The current had increased until the velocity was ten times that of normal. There was a sullen roar, and tearing as though the banks were giving way. Some logs were running, but not many. The breast of the water was covered with drift. At intervals, large branches of trees went down. Once a great oak, roots, trunk and all, sailed close to the apple tree and almost tore it from the earth. A walk, a piece of fence, a chicken coop, or a dog-kennel went bobbing along their watery way. Some distance below, yet in sight of the school, was the county bridge. It had been built in the early history of the country. It was a big, clumsy-looking affair of wood with a shingled roof and board sides.

Now, entrances were cut off by a wide stream. It stood alone, like an isolated being; its weather-beaten sides, looking gray against the brown of the muddy water.

The sight of the river was growing awful, yet it attracted and held the girls. The study bell rang unheeded. Miss Burkham came from her room to call their attention to the study hours.

As the girls from the east wing crossed the main hall in order to reach their rooms, they saw Doctor Weldon in earnest conversation with Marshall, the office boy; Belva, the man-of-all work, and Herman who acted as night-watchman.

"I do not antic.i.p.ate a bit of trouble," she was saying. "But telegrams came into the city from Reno, thirty miles above, that there was a twenty-foot flood there and still rising. They've sent warning all down the river.

"I have heard that alarm sounded ever since I have been at the seminary.

It is always a twenty-foot flood and the word always comes from Reno.

Either those people have no idea of a foot measure or their imaginations have been over stimulated." She spoke slowly yet with conviction, as one who has been accustomed to having their slightest word obeyed. The three men had been at the seminary and in her service for ten years. They adored her and accepted her word as final.

"However, Herman, you keep a close watch. Do not let the water reach the drive without warning us. We will not run any risks. If you wish to have Belva and Marshall with you, well and good. I shall ask the matron to have a lunch prepared for you."

There was little possibility of danger. Should the water creep up from the river, even to the west side of the dormitory, a great wing extended to the east and avenues of escape would remain open.

The girls overheard Doctor Weldon's words. They were not alarmed. They understood the conditions perfectly. Should the water come near the west wing, a thing which had never yet occurred even in the famous flood of '48, there could be no immediate danger. They were excited with the prospect of the unusual happening. Since it had rained for five days against their express wishes, they would feel themselves aggrieved if no compensation, in the form of an unusual experience, was offered them.

The fact that it was Friday night, and that the week had been one which had been void of relaxation or amus.e.m.e.nt in any way, moved the preceptress to shorten the study hour and lengthen the time for recreation.

But the students would not get away from the weather and the flood.

Little groups of four and six came together and discussed floods, from the Noachean down to the one of '48. The girls had no personal knowledge of any high water, but they handed down the folk-lore as it had come to them.

Some were particularly fine in giving detail, and making weird, strange scenes so real that their hearers were deeply affected. Erma had this power in a great measure, and Hester, to some extent. By the time they had related several stories, the girls in Sixty-two were shivering with nervous fear.

"Oh, you silly little geese!" cried Erma. "Why, you are actually shivering over something which happened in my great-grandfather's time!"

"But you make it so real! You and Hester talk as if it happened but yesterday," said Mellie.

"Certainly, that is what we try to do," Erma laughed, and seizing Mellie by the hand, drew her up from the floor where she had been sitting.

"That is what will make us famous. I shall be a great actress and Hester a great writer."

Hester heard and blushed. She wondered how Erma knew of her day-dreams for she had mentioned them to no one.

"Come, peaches," cried Erma. "I'll take you back to your rooms. If I do not, you all will have nervous prostration, sitting here listening to such stories."

"I do not know when Erma is complimenting me," said Mellie as she followed. "Sometimes I am 'silly goose' and sometimes I am 'peaches.'

Now when am I which, and why?"

Erma laughed again. "Oh, you silly goose, don't you know you're peaches all the time with me?"

The girls departed. It was yet early, yet Helen and Hester prepared for bed. Each was deliberately slow. Their paths crossed and recrossed as they moved from one part of the room to the other, yet not a word was said until Hester reached to turn off the light. Then came the customary good-night.

CHAPTER XV

There was no danger of the river rising to such an extent that the building would be surrounded and communication cut off. Such a thing would be impossible! But Doctor Weldon had forgotten to reckon with the creek which flowed on the opposite side of town and joined the river at the east end. It had risen as rapidly as the river and had come over the banks and was creeping in upon them.

Hester awakened suddenly. It was early morning for the gray lights were shining in at the windows. The rain had ceased. The first thought which came to her was that of thankfulness. Now they could have a clear Sat.u.r.day and be out of doors without being drenched to the skin.

It was not raining but there was a peculiar gurgling sound of water.

Helen also heard it and sat up in bed.

"Do you hear that, Hester? What is it?"

"It is something outside, I'll see." As she spoke she had left her bed and hurried to the window. Her exclamation brought Helen to her. There was no need to ask for explanation. Beech Creek had backed in from a mile beyond, and was lapping against the stone foundation. The water was moving over the campus. Nowhere was it more than an inch deep; but on each side lay the greater depths of the river and the creek.

"Let us get dressed at once!" cried Hester.

"Yes, let us go downstairs," replied Helen. She was not so excited as Hester, yet she was more afraid. Hester knew the river and loved it. Now her excitement did not spring from fear, but from a kind of enjoyment.