Molly Brown's Freshman Days Part 3

CHAPTER III.

THE PROFESSOR.

Molly beat and kicked on the door wildly. Then she called again and again but her voice came back to her in a ghostly echo through the dim aisles of the cloistered walk. She sat down on a bench and burst into tears.

How tired and hungry and homesick she was! How she wished she had never heard of college, cold, unfriendly place where people insulted old friends and they locked doors at six o'clock. The chill of the evening had fallen and the stars were beginning to show themselves in the square of blue over the Cloisters. Molly shivered and folded her arms. She had not worn her coat and her blue linen blouse was damp with dew.

"Can this be the only door into the Cloisters?" she thought after the first attack of homesick weeping had pa.s.sed.

She rose and began to search along the arcade which was now almost black. There were doors at intervals but all of them locked. She knocked on each one and waited patiently.

"Oh, heavens, let me get out of this place to-night," she prayed, lifting her eyes to the stars with an agonized expression. Suddenly, the high mullioned window under which she was standing, glowed with a light just struck. Then, someone opened a cas.e.m.e.nt and a man's voice called:

"Is anyone there? I thought I heard a cry."

"I am," said Molly, trying to stifle the sobs that would rise in her throat. "I've been locked in, or rather out."

"Why, you poor child," exclaimed the voice again. "Wait a moment and I'll open the door."

There were sounds of steps along the pa.s.sage; a heavy bolt was thrust back and a door held open while Molly rushed into the pa.s.sage like a frightened bird out of the dark.

"It's lucky I happened to be in my study this evening," said the man, leading the way toward a square of light in the dark corridor. "Of course the night watchman would have made his rounds at eight, but an hour's suspense out there in the cold and dark would have been very disagreeable. How in the world did it happen?"

By this time they had reached the study and Molly found herself in a cozy little room lined from ceiling to floor with books. On the desk was a tray of supper. The owner of the study was a studious looking young man with kindly, quizzical brown eyes under s.h.a.ggy eyebrows, a firm mouth and a cleft in his chin, which Molly had always heard was a mark of beauty in a woman.

"You must be a freshman?" he said looking at her with a shade of amus.e.m.e.nt in his eyes.

"I am," replied Molly, bravely trying to keep her voice from shaking. "I only arrived an hour or so ago. I--I didn't know they would lock----"

She broke down altogether and slipping into a big wicker chair sobbed bitterly. "Oh, I wish--I wish I'd stayed at home."

"Why, you poor little girl," exclaimed the man. "You have had a beastly time for your first day at college, but you'll come to like it better and better all the time. Come, dry your eyes and I'll start you on your way to your lodgings. Where are you stopping?"

"Queen's."

"Suppose you drink some hot soup before you go. It will warm you up," he added kindly, taking a cup of hot bouillon from the tray and placing it on the arm of her chair.

"But it's your supper," stammered Molly.

"Nonsense, there's plenty more. Do as I tell you," he ordered. "I'm a professor, you know, so you'll have to obey me or I'll scold."

Molly drank the soup without a word. It did comfort her considerably and presently she looked up at the professor and said:

"I'm all right now. I hope you'll excuse me for being so silly and weak.

You see I felt so far away and lonesome and it's an awful feeling to be locked out in the cold about a thousand miles from home. I never was before."

"I'm sure I should have felt the same in your place," answered the professor. "I should probably have imagined I saw the ghosts of monks dead and gone, who might have walked there if the Cloisters had been several hundreds of years older, and I would certainly have made the echoes ring with my calls for help. The Cloisters are all right for 'concentration' and 'meditation,' which I believe is what they are intended to be used for on a warm, sunny day; but they are cold comfort after sunset."

"Is this your study?" asked Molly, rising and looking about her with interest, as she started toward the door.

"I should say that this was my play room," he replied, smiling.

"Play room?"

"Yes, this is where I hide from work and begin to play." He glanced at a pile of ma.n.u.script on his desk.

"I reckon work is play and play is work to you," observed Molly, regarding the papers with much interest. She had never before seen a ma.n.u.script.

"If you knew what an heretical doc.u.ment that was, you would not make such rash statements," said the professor.

"I'm sure it's a learned treatise on some scientific subject," laughed Molly, who had entirely regained her composure now, and felt not the least bit afraid of this learned man, with the kind, brown eyes. He seemed quite old to her.

"If I tell you what it is, will you promise to keep it a secret?"

"I promise," she cried eagerly.

"It's the libretto of a light opera," he said solemnly, enjoying her amazement.

"Did you write it?" she asked breathlessly.

"Not the music, but the words and the lyrics. Now, I've told you my only secret," he said. "You must never give me away, or the bottom would fall out of the chair of English literature at Wellington College."

"I shall never, never tell," exclaimed Molly; "and thank you ever so much for your kindness to-night."

They clasped hands and the professor opened the door for her and stood back to let her pa.s.s.

Then he followed her down the pa.s.sage to another door, which he also opened, and in the dim light she still noticed that quizzical look in his eyes, which made her wonder whether he was laughing at her in particular, or at things in general.

"Can you find your way to Queen's Cottage?" he asked.

"Oh, yes," she a.s.sured him. "It's the last house on the left of the campus."

The next moment she found herself running along the deserted Quadrangle walk. Under the archway she flew, and straight across the campus--home.

It was not yet seven o'clock, and the Queen's Cottage girls were still at supper. A number of students had arrived during the afternoon and the table was full. There were several freshmen; Molly identified them by their silence and looks of unaccustomedness, and some older girls, who were chattering together like magpies.

"Where have you been?" demanded Nance Oldham, who had saved a seat for her roommate next to her own.

All conversation ceased, and every eye in the room was turned on blushing Molly.

"I--I've been locked up," she answered faintly.

"Locked up?" repeated several voices at once. "Where?"

"In the Cloisters. I didn't realize it was six o'clock, and some one locked the door."