Mary-'Gusta Part 31

CHAPTER XI

The Misses Cabot's school was to open on the fifteenth of September and, on the morning of the fourteenth, Mary-'Gusta bade her guardians good-by on the platform of the South Harniss railway station. Shadrach had intended going to Boston with her, but she had firmly insisted on going alone.

"I must get used to being away from you both," she said, "and you must get used to having me go. It will be best for all of us to say good-by here. It won't be for VERY long; I'll be home at Christmas, you know."

The three weeks prior to the fateful fourteenth had been crowded with activities. Twice the girl and Captain Shadrach had journeyed to Boston, where in company with Mrs. Wyeth, whose services had been volunteered in a crisp but kindly note, they visited shops and selected and purchased--that is, the feminine members of the party selected and the Captain paid for--a suit and waists and hats and other things which it appeared were necessary for the wardrobe of a young lady at finishing school. Shadrach would have bought lavishly, but Mrs. Wyeth's common sense guided the selections and Mary-'Gusta was very particular as to price. Shadrach, at the beginning, made a few suggestions concerning colors and styles, but the suggestions were disregarded. The Captain's taste in colors was not limited; he fancied almost any hue, provided it was bright enough. His ward would have looked like an animated crazy quilt if he had had his way.

He grumbled a little as they journeyed back to South Harniss.

"She may be all right, that Wyeth woman," he said, "but she's too everlastin' sober-sided to suit me. Take that hat you and she bought; why, 'twas as plain, and hadn't no more fuss and feathers than a minister's wife's bonnet. You ain't an old maid; no, nor a Boston first-family widow, neither. Now, the hat I liked--the yellow and blue one--had some get-up-and-git. If you wore that out on Tremont Street folks would turn around and look at you."

Mary-'Gusta laughed and squeezed his hand. "You silly Uncle Shad," she said, "don't you know that is exactly what I don't want them to do?"

Shadrach turned his gaze in her direction. She was at the end of the car seat next to the window and against the light of the setting sun her face and head were silhouetted in dainty profile. The Captain sighed.

"Well," he said, philosophically, "I don't know's we need to argue. I cal'late they'll look some as 'tis."

Her parting instructions to her uncles were many and diversified. Zoeth must be sure and change to his heavy flannels on the first of October.

He must not forget rubbers when the ground was damp, and an umbrella when it rained. If he caught cold there was the medicine Doctor Harley had prescribed. He must not sit up after ten o'clock; he must not try to read the paper without first hunting for his spectacles. These were a few of his orders. Shadrach's list was even longer. It included going to church every other Sunday: keeping his Sunday shoes blacked: not forgetting to change his collar every morning: to get his hair cut at least once in six weeks: not to eat pie just before going to bed, "because you know if you do, you always have the nightmare and groan and moan and wake up everyone but yourself": not to say "Jumpin'" or "Creepin' Judas" any oftener than he could help: to be sure and not cut prices in the store just because a customer asked him to do so--and goodness knows how much more.

As for Isaiah Chase, his list was so lengthy and varied that the responsibility quite overwhelmed him.

"Gosh t'mighty!" exclaimed Isaiah, desperately. "I'll never be able to live up to all them sailin' orders and I know it. I've put some of 'em down on a piece of paper, but I ain't even got them straight, and as for the million or two others--whew! I'm to dust every day, and sweep every other day, and change the tablecloth, and see that the washin' goes when it ought to, and feed the horse the cat--no, no, feed the cat oats--Oh, consarn it! Feed the cat and the horse and the hens their reg'lar vittles at reg'lar times and--and--Oh, my soul! Yes, and let alone my own self and all that's laid onto me, I must keep an eye on Captain Shad and Zoeth and see that they do what's been laid onto THEM. I swan to man! I'm a hard-workin', painstakin' feller of my age, but I ain't as young as I used to be, and I'm human and not a walkin' steam-engyne.

I'll do the best I can, but--but first thing you know I'll be drove into heavin' up my job. THEN this craft'll be on its beam ends, I bet you!

They'll appreciate me then, when it's too late."

The farewells at the railway station were brief. They were very hard to say and neither the partners nor Mary-'Gusta could trust themselves to talk more than was necessary. The train drew up beside the platform; then it moved on. A hand waved from the car window; Shadrach and Zoeth waved in return. The rear car disappeared around the curve by Solomon Higgins' cranberry shanty.

Mr. Hamilton sighed heavily.

"She's gone, Shadrach," he said. "Mary-'Gusta's gone."

Shadrach echoed the sigh.

"Yes, she's gone," he agreed. "I feel as if the best part of you and me had gone along with her. Well, t'other parts have got to go back to the store and wait on customers, I presume likely. Heave ahead and let's do it. Ah, hum! I cal'late we'd ought to be thankful we've got work to do, Zoeth. It'll help take up our minds. There are goin' to be lonesome days for you and me, shipmate."

There were lonely days for Mary-'Gusta also, those of that first month at Mrs. Wyeth's and at the Misses Cabot's school. For the first time in her life she realized what it meant to be homesick. But in the letters which she wrote to her uncles not a trace of the homesickness was permitted to show and little by little its keenest pangs wore away. She, too, was thankful for work, for the study which kept her from thinking of other things.

The Misses Cabot--their Christian names were Priscilla and Hortense--she found to be middle-aged maiden ladies, eminently prim and proper, and the educational establishment over which they presided a sort of Protestant nunnery ruled according to the precepts of the Congregational Church and the New England aristocracy. Miss Priscilla was tall and thin and her favorite author was Emerson; she quoted Emerson extensively and was certain that real literature died when he did. Miss Hortense was younger, plumper, and more romantic. She quoted Longfellow and occasionally Oliver Wendell Holmes, although she admitted she considered the latter rather too frivolous at times. Both sisters were learned, dignified, and strict disciplinarians. Also, in the eyes of both a male person younger than forty-five was labeled "Danger--Keep Away." But one creature of the masculine gender taught in their school; he was white-haired Doctor Barnes, professor of the dead languages. It was the prevailing opinion among the scholars that Doctor Barnes, when at home, occupied an apartment in the Greek Antiquity section of the Art Museum, where he slept and ate surrounded by the statues and busts of his contemporaries.

As for the scholars themselves, there were about forty of them, girls--or young ladies: the Misses Cabot invariably referred to and addressed them as "young ladies"--from Boston and New York and Philadelphia, even from Chicago and as far south as Baltimore. Almost all were the daughters of well-to-do parents, almost all had their homes in cities. There were very few who, like Mary-'Gusta, had lived all their lives in the country. Some were pretty, some were not; some were giddy and giggly, some solemn and studious, some either according to mood; some were inclined to be sn.o.bbish, others simple and "everyday."

In short, the school was like almost any school of its kind.

Mary-'Gusta entered this school and, doing so, ceased to be Mary-'Gusta, becoming Miss Lathrop to her instructors and Mary to her intimates among the scholars. And at Mrs. Wyeth's she was Mary or Miss Lathrop or Miss Mary, according to the age, length of acquaintance, or station of the person addressing her. But she always thought of herself as Mary-'Gusta and her letters written to Uncle Shad or Uncle Zoeth were so signed.

She found, after the hard work of beginning, that she could keep abreast of her cla.s.s in studies without undue exertion. Also she found that, the sn.o.bs excepted, the girls at the Misses Cabot's school were inclined to be sociable and friendly. She made no bid for their friendship, being a self-respecting young person whose dislike of imitation was as strong as ever, but, perhaps because she did not bid or imitate but continued to be simply and sincerely herself, friends came to her. Most of these friends received monthly allowances far greater than hers, and most of them wore more expensive gowns and in greater variety, but she showed no envy nor offered apologies, and if she sometimes wished, being human, that her wardrobe was a trifle more extensive she kept that wish to herself.

Her liking for Mrs. Wyeth grew into a real affection. And the prim and practical matron grew more and more fond of her. The girl came to be considered, and almost to consider herself, one of the family. The "family" consisted of Mrs. Wyeth, Mary, Miss Pease, the other "paying guest," and Maggie, the maid, and Nora, the cook. Miss Pease was an elderly spinster without near relatives, possessed of an income and a love of travel which she gratified by occasional European trips. She and her closest friend, Mrs. Wyeth, disagreed on many subjects, but they united in the belief that Boston was a suburb of Paradise and that William Ellery Channing was the greatest of religious leaders. They at-tended the Arlington Street Unitarian Church, and Mary often accompanied them there for Sunday morning or afternoon service.

The conviction of the Misses Cabot that youthful manhood was dangerous and to be shunned like the plague Mary soon discovered was not shared by the majority of the young ladies. If Miss Priscilla and Miss Hortense had had their way Harvard University and the Inst.i.tute of Technology would have been moved forthwith to some remote spot like the North Pole or San Francisco. There were altogether too many "cousins" or "sons of old family friends" calling at the school to deliver messages from parents or guardians or the said friends. These messengers, young gentlemen with budding mustaches and full-blown raiment, were rigidly inspected and their visits carefully chaperoned: but letters came and were treasured and the cheerful inanity of their contents imparted, in strict secrecy, to bosom friends of the recipients.

Mary received no such letters. No cousins or family friends called to deliver messages to her. No photographs of young fellows in lettered sweaters were hidden among her belongings. Her friends in the school thought this state of affairs very odd and they sometimes asked pointed questions.

Miss Barbara Howe, whose home was in Brookline and whose father was the senior partner of an old and well-known firm of downtown merchants, was the leading questioner. She liked Mary and the latter liked her. Barbara was pretty and full of spirits and, although she was the only child, and a rather spoiled one, in a wealthy family, there was no sn.o.bbishness in her make-up.

"But I can't see," she declared, "what you have been doing all the time.

Where have you been keeping yourself? Don't you know ANYBODY?"

Mary smiled. "Oh, yes," she replied, "I know a good many people."

"You know what I mean. Don't you know any of the fellows at Harvard, or Tech, or Yale, or anywhere? I know dozens. And you must know some. You know Sam Keith; you said you did."

Mary admitted that she knew Sam slightly.

"Isn't he fun! Sam and I are great chums. Doesn't he dance divinely!"

"I don't know. I never saw him dance."

"Then you've missed something. Do you know his friend, the one on the football team--Crawford Smith, his name is--do you know him?"

Mary nodded. "I--I've met him," she said.

"You HAVE? Don't you think he is perfectly splendid?"

"I don't know. Is he?"

"Of course he is. Haven't you read about him in the papers? He made that long run for a touchdown in the Yale game. Oh, you should have seen it!

I couldn't speak for two days after that game. He was just as cool and calm. All the Yale men were trying to get him and he dodged--I never saw anyone so cool and who kept his head so well."

"I thought the papers spoke most of the way he kept his feet."

"Then you did read about it! Of course you did! I'm just dying to know him. All the girls are crazy about him. Where did you meet him? Tell me!"

Mary smiled. On the occasion of her only meeting with Crawford Smith that young fellow had been anything but cool.

"I met him in my uncle's store at South Harniss," she said. "It was three years ago."

"And you haven't seen him since? He is a great friend of Sam's. And Sam's people have a summer home at the Cape. Perhaps you'll meet him there again."

"Perhaps."

"Goodness! One would think you didn't want to."

"Why, I don't know that I do, particularly. Why should I?"

"Why should you! Mary Lathrop, I do think you are the queerest girl. You don't talk like a girl at all. Sometimes I think you are as old as--as Prissy." "Prissy" was the disrespectful nickname by which the young ladies referred, behind her back, to Miss Priscilla Cabot.