Kathie's Soldiers Part 22

"And how kind it is in Mrs. Strong to take home this poor cousin!"

Kathie said. "I liked her manner of speaking of it so much. But I think--"

Kathie made a long pause.

"A remarkable thought it must be!" said her uncle, smiling.

Fred ran in to have his pencil sharpened, and also to announce that one of the cunning little guinea-pigs was dead. So Kathie's school discomfort pa.s.sed out of her mind.

But it met her on the threshold again. She was rather early at school, as Uncle Robert wished to drive about the village to do several errands.

Half a dozen girls were discussing tableaux. Kathie joined them with a face full of interest.

"O," she exclaimed, "I do love to hear about tableaux! Are you really going to have them?"

There was a coolness and silence in the small circle.

"It was a little matter of our own that we were discussing," said Belle Hadden, loftily.

Kathie turned. She had been in such a happy mood that she was ready for anything. And the two or three experiences in tableaux had left such a delightful memory that she was fain to try it again.

She went to her seat quietly. The voices floated dimly over to her.

"It is mean not to ask her!"

"Girls, I know Mrs. Wilder will notice it, and speak of it."

"You can all do as you like, but if you want Tom, d.i.c.k, and Harry, and everybody in them, I beg leave to be excused," said a rather sharp, haughty voice.

"But Kathie Alston isn't--"

"I would as soon have Mary Carson, or any one of that cla.s.s. They are all alike."

Mary Carson's father had made a fortune in buying and selling iron. She was as coa.r.s.e as Sarah Strong, without her ambition or good, tender heart.

Somehow Kathie rebelled at being placed in the same category. She took up her book and tried to study, but her heart was swelling with a sense of injustice. What had she done to these girls? She was not coa.r.s.e, or vulgar, or mean.

"Plebeian and patrician," some one said with a laugh, as they dispersed at Mrs. Wilder's entrance.

Kathie heard of the plan through the course of the day. Some of the larger girls had proposed that they should give a little entertainment for the benefit of the wife and children of a Captain Duncan who had been killed in one of the recent battles. Mrs. Duncan was staying at Brookside, quite prostrated by her misfortunes.

Thirteen of the school-girls had been asked. Mrs. Coleman, Mrs. Duncan's warmest friend, had offered her parlor and dining-room. Sue Coleman was hand and glove with Belle Hadden.

Now and then Kathie glanced over to Mary Carson. Vulgarity was written in every line of her broad, freckled face. Something beside plainness,--snub nose, wiry brown hair, and the irregular teeth, which looked as if they were never brushed,--an air of self-sufficiency, as if she considered herself as good as the best. She was continually talking of what they had at home, and made the most absurd blunders, which Mrs.

Wilder patiently corrected. The small satires of the other girls never pierced the armor of her complacency. "And they think me like her!"

Kathie mused, with a sad, sore heart. "I suppose because our fortune came so suddenly; and yet mamma always was a lady. However, I must bear it patiently."

Uncle Robert, seeing her so grave, fancied that it was on account of Mr.

Meredith; and he was so busy that for a few days they had no confidential talks.

It was very hard to feel so entirely alone. Even Emma Lauriston was at home sick with a sore throat.

CHAPTER X.

UNDER FIRE.

EMMA LAURISTON was absent from school three days, and then took her place, looking somewhat pale and languid; but several of the girls were rather impatient to see her.

"Have you heard bad news?" she asked of Kathie. "My cousin said your uncle had returned."

"Yes," in a grave tone, rather unlike the sunshiny Kathie.

"That was quite a romance about your friend Miss Darrell. Do they think Mr. Meredith will--never get well?"

"They are afraid."

The little bell sounded to call them to order, and then began the usual lessons. Kathie's were always perfect, and yet, oddly enough, it seemed to Emma that her whole heart was not in them.

She had fallen into the habit of watching Kathie very narrowly. The "something different from other girls" was still a puzzle to her; and when the doctor had said, a few days ago, "You just missed having a severe attack of diphtheria," it startled Emma a good deal. She knew several who had died of diphtheria; and if she were to die--

Of course she wanted to live. She was young, and full of hope; and there would be the fortune by and by,--one of those odd bequests of which she reaped little benefit now, as it was to go on acc.u.mulating until she was twenty-one; but then she would be able to do a great many delightful things with it. That was not all, however. There was something very terrible in the idea of death.

"O Miss Lauriston, we have ever so much to tell you and to talk about!"

exclaimed Sue Coleman. "We are going to have some tableaux for a charitable object, and we want you to stand in several of them. You will make such a lovely Sister of Charity in Consolation."

With that the ball was fairly opened. Emma was pleased and interested at once.

"You are all to come over to my house after school. Belle Hadden has planned everything. She is a host in herself."

Kathie had been walking up and down with two or three girls that she did not care much about, only they had joined her, and were, perhaps, better company than her lonely thoughts.

"You are going over to Mrs. Coleman's,--are you not?" asked Emma, in surprise. "Don't you like tableaux?"

"Very much, but--Good by"; and Kathie made a feint of kissing her hand.

"Girls, haven't you asked Kathie Alston?" exclaimed Emma, in the first lull, for the talk had been very energetic; "she would make up lovely in ever so many characters."

There was a silence, and the girls glanced at each other with determination in their faces.

"What is the matter? Has she offended you? I noticed something a little peculiar in school to-day."

"Kathie Alston is well enough--in her place."

Emma colored. "Her place is as good as any of ours, I suppose," she made answer, slowly.