Nan Sherwood at Rose Ranch Part 6

"What did she want to throw that water on me for?"

"But it didn't hurt you," Nan pointed out. "You are dressed for it!"

"Yes," snapped Rhoda, looking down at the jumper and overalls. "I look like a silly in these things."

"Well, you don't need to act like a silly," urged Nan, keeping pace with her, as Rhoda left the gymnasium. "You are making it awfully hard for yourself. The girls won't forgive you."

"Forgive me? Well, I like that!" scoffed Rhoda.

"Oh, yes. It was all in fun. We all have to go through some such performance--when we are greenhorns."

"Not for me!" exclaimed the Western girl with emphasis.

Nan was silent for a moment, guiding the new girl through the unfamiliar and only half-lighted pa.s.sages to the back stairway.

Then Nan asked:

"Does your knee hurt?"

"Of course it does."

"I have some lotion in my room. It is good for a sprain, or anything like that. I'll get it for you and you can rub it in well when you go to bed."

"If those girls come around to bother me again--"

"I'm afraid they won't," said Nan, sorrowfully.

"You're _afraid_ they won't?"

"Yes. They may let you very much alone. You won't have much fun here."

"Humph! I can flock by myself," said Rhoda, quite cheerfully.

"But you can have so much better times if you are friends with the other girls."

"I don't know about that. I don't like any of them--as far as I've gone. Except you. Out where I come from--at Rose Ranch--there are plenty of Mexican girls and Indian girls who are much more ladylike than this crowd. Why! these girls are savages."

"Oh, no, Rhoda! Not quite that," laughed Nan. "You don't understand. And I am afraid they won't understand you."

"Who wants 'em to?" responded Rhoda Hammond gruffly.

Nan Sherwood took the liniment into Rhoda's room, and when she returned, bringing back the overall suit to be returned to Henry, she found her chum, Bess Harley, in their room, slowly preparing for bed.

"Well! isn't that the greatest girl you ever saw?" exclaimed Bess.

"She will have a nice time here--not! And I should think you'd not have anything to do with her, Nan. The other girls won't like it.

We're just going to ignore her. A girl who can't take a joke!"

"I shan't have much to do with her until she comes to her senses,"

Nan admitted. "But I am sorry for her, just the same."

"You'll waste your 'sorry' on that one," laughed Bess.

"Perhaps. But don't you realize, honey, that we came near being just as foolish as Rhoda Hammond when we came here last fall?"

"Oh, nonsense!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Bess; but she blushed.

"Think," said Nan, with twinkling eyes. "Don't you remember that shoe-box lunch we brought with us and that the girls made so much sport of? Didn't you get vexed?"

"Oh! Well! Yes, a little," admitted Bess. "But, Nan! I never acted as foolishly as this Rhoda Hammond. Now, did I?"

"No, you did not, my dear," agreed her chum.

But she might honestly have claimed credit for this being a fact.

It had been Nan's better sense and her strong influence over her chum that had kept Bess Harley from acting quite as unwisely as Rhoda Hammond was now acting.

"I expect," was all Nan said, however, "that this poor Rhoda is going to have a very unhappy time of it here, unless she changes her att.i.tude."

"Well, she deserves to. She spoiled our fun and she hurt Minnie badly. I suppose she's had no sort of bringing-up, coming right from that wild country."

Nan chuckled. "I wonder! She thinks we lack proper up-bringing. She compares us unfavorably with the Mexican and Indian girls she has been used to out on the ranch from which she comes."

"Good-night!" gasped Bess indignantly, as she plunged into bed.

It did not take a seeress to foretell Rhoda Hammond's unpopularity during the opening days of this term at Lakeview Hall. It seemed that before breakfast the next morning the whole school was buzzing with the story of the doings of the girls of Corridor Four.

That a newcomer should set herself contrary to a custom that had always been honored at the Hall, was considered unpardonable. Even the older girls--seniors and juniors who thought themselves too dignified for such escapades--had merely a sarcastic smile for the new girl from the West. While the little girls--the "primes"--were frankly curious, and could scarcely keep their gaze off Rhoda at meals, or in the main hall at chapel.

The privilege of hazing had seldom been abused by the girls. Dr.

Prescott winked at the romps which never really hurt anybody. No girl with "ingrowing dignity," as Amelia Boggs called it, could hope to be happy with her fellows at Lakeview Hall.

"A proper amount of hazing is bound to reduce the size of the sawney's ego," Laura remarked. "This wild Western person has a swelled ego, if ever I saw one. But she shall be let alone, all right, if that is what she is so anxious for."

Nan was, as she said, sorry for Rhoda; but she could do nothing openly to help matters. She would not speak for the Western girl, for she felt that, in justice, Rhoda was in the wrong.

Unlike many of the other girls, however, Nan failed to find anything about Rhoda's character to dislike. Even Linda Riggs was not pleased with the girl from Rose Ranch. The latter girl threatened quite unconsciously to outshine the railroad magnate's daughter in point of dress.

Mrs. Cupp had something to say about that. It was said tartly enough, of course, and Rhoda had to take it before a good-sized party of other girls.

"Where did your mother think you were coming to, Miss Hammond?"

Mrs. Cupp demanded when she had looked over the contents of Rhoda's two trunks. "These clothes might be of use if you expected to attend the opera, or appear in society. How absurd to dress a young girl in such garments! Your mother--"

"Please, Mrs. Cupp, do not blame my mother if you think these things are not suitable for me to wear. She is not at--at fault for their selection. They were bought for me by a friend, mostly in Chicago."

"Humph! Your mother should have attended to your being properly dressed. This is a practical school, not a theatrical company, you have come to," snapped Mrs. Cupp, who was always very severe in matters of dress. "Your mother--"

"Don't criticize my mother, please," interrupted Rhoda again, and her voice was sharper. "My--my mother is blind; she could not pick out my clothes."

The statement sponged the smiles from the faces of all the girls within hearing. Unpopular as the Western girl was, the fact she had made public somehow made the other girls taste pity for her for the first time. Bess Harley fairly sobbed when she and Nan got to their room with the piles of their own garments, which Mrs. Cupp had allowed them to take from their trunks.

"It--it's _mean_ that she should have a blind mother," cried Bess angrily. "Why, it makes us sorry for her. And she doesn't deserve to be pitied."