Jane Allen: Right Guard Part 35

"I suppose I ought to feel dreadfully cut up over being accused of theft," she said, "but I can't. The whole business seems positively unreal. Jane, do you believe it was the ign.o.ble n.o.ble who overheard us talking that night?"

"No; I think it was either Maizie or Marian," returned Jane positively.

"Didn't you see them exchange glances? Then Maizie nodded. They had agreed to put the blame on Miss n.o.ble."

"I wonder if she had agreed to let them," remarked Norma. "I suppose she had. Otherwise, Marian wouldn't have dared use her name."

"_I_ wonder what Mrs. Weatherbee will do about it," emphasized Jane.

"There's more than weird unreality to it, Judy. You mustn't forget that Marian has accused you of taking her ring and Maizie's pin. She hasn't withdrawn that accusation. She won't withdraw it. I am very sure of that."

"Well, she needn't," retorted Judith. "We know how much it's worth. So does Mrs. Weatherbee. You heard what she said about spite work. She's very much displeased with Marian and Maizie. She'll probably send for us to-morrow night and them, too. Then she'll lay down the law and order the whole thing dropped. She must see herself how unjust it is. Your explanation about Edith's dress was enough to show that. Just because the pin and ring are missing is no sign that I should be accused of their disappearance. Besides, they've been posted as 'Lost.' That clears me, doesn't it?"

"It ought to, but it doesn't," replied Jane soberly. "Marian and Maizie will go on insinuating hateful things about you, even if they are ordered to drop the matter. Then there's Miss n.o.ble. She's on the outs with us and on Marian's side. Unless we can do something ourselves to make these girls drop the affair, they won't drop it."

"If Mrs. Weatherbee can't stop them, we certainly can't," Judith responded rather anxiously. "I guess, though, that she can. She's awfully determined, you know. I'm going to put my faith in her and not worry any more about it. I dare say if a thorough search were made of Marian's and Maizie's room the lost jewelry would be found," she predicted bitterly.

"That's precisely my opinion," nodded Jane. "If it comes to it I shall tell Mrs. Weatherbee so. I'd rather wait a little, though, to see how things pan out. This is Wednesday. I hope it will be settled and off our minds before Sat.u.r.day. We'd hate to go into the game with the least bit of shadow hanging over us."

"Oh, I guess it will be settled before then." Nevertheless Judith looked a trifle solemn. Despite her declaration that she did not intend to worry, Jane's prediction had taken uncomfortable hold on her.

"I think she ought to have settled it to-night," was Norma's blunt opinion. "It wouldn't surprise me if she really wrote to Edith Hammond.

Mrs. Weatherbee's peculiar. I know, because I've worked for her. She probably believes Jane, yet she's in doubt about something. I could tell that by the way she acted."

"You don't believe she suspects me of stealing those girls' jewelry, do you?" questioned Judith in quick alarm.

"I hardly think that," Norma said slowly. "I only know she's not quite in sympathy with you, Judy. If she had been she wouldn't have hesitated to settle things then and there."

Norma's surmise was more accurate than not. Marian Seaton's sneering a.s.sertion that alleged absent-mindedness on Judith's part cloaked a grave failing had not been entirely lost on the matron. She could not forget the missing sweater. Was it possible, she wondered, that there might be truth in Marian's accusation?

Privately she resolved to do three things before pa.s.sing final judgment.

She would write to Edith for corroboration of the gown story. She would make further inquiry, concerning Judith's absent-mindedness, of Dorothy Martin. She would have a private talk with Elsie n.o.ble. This last was solely to determine whether Marian had spoken the truth in regard to Elsie's having overheard the fateful conversation. She was as doubtful of Marian as she was of poor Judith.

Mrs. Weatherbee intended to delay making inquiry of either Dorothy or Elsie until she had received a reply to a special delivery letter which she had dispatched to Edith Allison, nee Edith Hammond.

In the interim Judith had gone from hopefulness to anxiety and from anxiety to nervousness. In consequence, she failed to play on Sat.u.r.day with her usual snap and vigor, and had not her teammates put forth an extra effort, her unintentional lagging would have lost them the game.

As it was they won it by only two points.

Completely disgusted with herself, Judith broke down in the dressing-room and sobbed miserably. A proceeding which made Christine, Barbara and Adrienne wonder what in the world had happened to upset cheery, light-hearted Judy.

Back in her room, Judith cried harder than ever.

"I'm all upset," she wailed, her head on Jane's comforting shoulder. "I don't see why Mrs. Weatherbee hasn't sent for us about that miserable business. It's got on my nerves."

"Never mind," soothed Jane. "If she doesn't let us know about it by Monday afternoon, I'll go to her myself. If I knew positively that Marian Seaton wrote the letter that nearly lost me my room, I'd tell Mrs. Weatherbee. It would only be giving her what she deserves."

Monday morning, however, brought Mrs. Weatherbee a letter from Edith Hammond, over which she smiled, then looked uncompromisingly severe. Her stern expression spelled trouble for someone.

Meanwhile, on the same morning, Jane also received a letter which made her catch her breath in sheer amazement. It was from Eleanor Lane and stated:

DEAR JANE:

"I've remembered at last. Now I know why your name seemed so familiar. Last fall a Miss Seaton was staying at the hotel with her mother. She dictated a letter to me, the carbon copy of which I am enclosing. She told me that she was having the letter typed for a joke and asked me to sign it 'Jane Allen.' I knew that wasn't her name, because I had heard a bell-boy page her several times and knew who she was. She said that you were her cousin and that she was only sending the letter for fun, that it wouldn't do you the least bit of harm.

"I didn't like her at all. She was very hateful and supercilious.

I thought at the time that the letter was a queer kind of joke, but I'd never been to college so I wasn't in a position to criticize it. Anyway, it wasn't my business, so I typed it and signed it as she requested. That's where I saw your name. I thought I would send you the letter and ask you if it was really a joke. I found it the other day in going over my files and it worried me. I realized that I had done a very foolish thing in signing it. I should have refused to do so.

"This is the second letter I've written since I last heard from you, so hurry up and write me soon. With much love,

"Ever your friend,

"ELEANOR."

The shadow of a smile flickered about Jane's lips as she unfolded the sheet of paper enclosed in Eleanor's letter and glanced it over. As by miracle the means of retaliation had been placed in her hands.

She decided that she would wait only to see what the day might bring forth. If by dinner time that evening Mrs. Weatherbee had made no sign, she would go to the matron after dinner with a recital that went back to the very beginning of her freshman year. She would tell everything.

Nothing should be omitted that would serve to show Marian Seaton to Mrs.

Weatherbee in her true colors.

If, on the other hand, Mrs. Weatherbee sent for Judith, Norma and herself that evening and exonerated Judith in the presence of her enemies, Jane determined that she would not, even in that event, withhold the story of Marian's long-continued persecution of herself and her friends. Undoubtedly Marian and Maizie would be asked to leave Madison Hall; perhaps college as well. Mrs. Weatherbee would be sufficiently shocked and incensed to carry the affair higher. Jane hoped that she would. She had reached a point where she had become merciless.

While Jane was darkly considering her course of action, Mrs. Weatherbee was finding Monday a most amazingly exciting day. The morning mail brought her Edith's letter. Directly afterward she hailed Dorothy Martin as the latter left the dining-room and marched Dorothy to her office for a private talk. When it ended, Dorothy had missed her first recitation.

Mrs. Weatherbee, however, had learned a number of things, hitherto unguessed by her.

Shortly after luncheon a meek-eyed, plainly dressed little woman was ushered into her office. In her mittened hands the stranger carried a package. Sight of it caused the matron to stare. Her wonder grew as the woman handed it to her.

"If you please, ma'am," blurted forth the stranger, red with embarra.s.sment, "I hope you won't feel hard towards me. I know I oughtta come to you before. My husband found this here package in a rubbish can.

He works for the town, collectin' rubbish. He found it jus' before Christmas and brung it home t' me.

"You c'n see for yourself how the name o' the party it was to go to had been all run together, so's you can't read it. The package got wet, I guess. But your name's plain enough up in the corner. I knowed I ought ta brung it here first thing, but I--I--opened it. I knowed I hadn't oughtta. Then I seen this pretty silk sack and I wanted it terrible.

"I says to myself as how I was goin' to keep it. It wasn't my fault if you throwed it into the rubbish can by mistake. My husband he said I hadda right to it, 'cause findin' was keepin'. So I kep' it, but it made me feel bad. I was brung up honest and I knowed it was the same as stealin'.

"But I wanted it terrible, jus' the same. I never see anything han'somer, an' it looked swell on me. I put it on jus' once for a minute. It didn't give me no pleasure, though. I felt jus' sneaky an'

mean. After that I put it away. Once in a while I took a look at it.

Then my little girl got a bad cold. She was awful sick. I forgot all about the sack. She pretty near died. I sat up with her nights for quite a while. When she got better I thought about the sack again, and knowed that G.o.d had come down hard on me for bein' a thief. So I jus' got ready an' brung it back. It ain't hurt a mite, an' I hope you won't make me no trouble, 'cause I've had enough."

Mrs. Weatherbee's feelings can be better imagined than described. The return of the missing sweater at the critical moment was sufficiently astounding, not to mention the pathetic little confession that accompanied its return. She felt nothing save intense sympathy for her humble caller.

When the latter took her leave a few moments later, she went away wiping her eyes. Far from making her any "trouble," Mrs. Weatherbee had treated her with the utmost gentleness. The stately, white-haired woman with the "proud face" had not only thanked her for returning the "sack," she had asked for her humble caller's address and expressed her intention of sending the little sick girl a cheer-up present.

Left alone, Mrs. Weatherbee sat smiling rather absently at the dainty blue and white bit of knitting which she had taken from its wrapper. She thought she understood very well how it had happened to stray into the rubbish can. She now recalled that the rubbish cans about Chesterford and at the edge of the campus were much the shape and size of the package boxes used by the postal service. Given a dark, rainy night and an absent-minded messenger, the result was now easy to antic.i.p.ate. Here was proof piled high of Judith Stearns' "fatal failing."

There was but one thing more to be done before winding-up summarily an affair that had been to her vexatious from the beginning. She had obtained plenty of evidence for the defense. Now she turned her attention to the prosecution. She had yet to hold a private word with Elsie n.o.ble. This she resolved to do directly the freshman in question had returned to the Hall from her afternoon cla.s.ses.

Elsie, on her part, had been looking forward to this very interview with a degree of sullen satisfaction. On the day following the scene in Mrs. Weatherbee's room, Marian had informed her cousin of all that had taken place. As a result, Elsie had flown into a tempestuous rage over having been dragged into the trouble by Marian.

"You've got to do as I say, Elsie. If you don't, you'll be sorry,"

Marian had coldly threatened. "Maiz and I will drop you. Besides, I'll tell Mrs. Weatherbee all about that register business. Then she'll believe you listened outside the dressing-room, no matter how much you may deny it."

"I'll do as I please," Elsie had furiously retorted, and flung herself out of Marian's room.