Nancy Of Paradise Cottage Part 13

"Miss Leland has changed us. Charlotte Spencer is going to be your roommate from now on--and--and I'm going in with--with Mildred."

"That's--a--a good idea," replied Nancy; sarcasm was a thousand miles from her mind, and she spoke really only for the sake of sounding as if all differences had been forgotten; but a more ill-chosen sentence could not have fallen from her lips.

"I suppose--you--you're glad to be rid of me," said Alma, her lips quivering. "Anyway, you'll have Charlotte, and she's ever so much more congenial with you than I am."

Nancy did not answer. If Alma had not made that last reference to Charlotte she would have had Nancy back in a moment, but there is a little devil who takes a delight in twisting people's tongues when they most need to be inspired with the right thing to say.

With her night-gown and dressing-gown over her arm, and her sponge-bag in her hand, Alma walked in silence to the door. There she paused, and like Lot's wife flung back at Nancy one piteous parting look, which, alas, met only the back of Nancy's down-bent head. The door closed.

Nancy sprang up, and crossed the room, running, while the spools from her overturned basket rolled off placidly under the bed. Then she paused; pride conquered the tenderness in her heart at that moment, bringing in its trail a sequence of unhappy days.

"No---it won't do to admit I'm wrong. I'm not, and I'll just let her find it out."

And having voiced this stern resolution, she flung herself down on the bed and, burying her face in the pillows, cried herself into a doze; while, separated from her by a thin part.i.tion of lath and plaster, Alma made up her new bed, and bedewed it with her doleful tears.

CHAPTER X

THE OGRE REAPPEARS

"Hope you haven't forgotten that you've bound yourself in an engagement with me for the theatre to-morrow, Nannie, old dear," called Charlotte from her customary location during leisure hours--namely the piano bench. "I've reserved seats for 'The Countess Betsey'--nice, light, loads of good Viennese tunes--nothing lofty about it. Miss Drinkwater had a cute little plan for us--wanted us to go to hear--or see--I don't know just what the right word is--some production of Euripides in the original. I said 'No'--very politely. Too politely perhaps--I had to repeat it three separate and distinct times. I explained to her that while I just adored Euripides, and loved nothing better than Greek as she is spoke, my const.i.tution craved something a bit gayer than 'Medea'--in the original. I hinted modestly that I'd been overworking a bit lately--and that my mighty brain needed something that it didn't have to chew eighty-five times before swallowing. Aren't you going to thank me?"

"Oh, I do--thanks _horribly_," laughed Nancy. "Can't you see us sitting through a merry little Greek play, trying to weep in the right places, and not to laugh when everyone but the villainess had been stabbed or poisoned or fed to the lions?"

"Gee--but couldn't we be lofty when we got back?" said Charlotte. "I'd say, 'How sublime were those lines in Act II, Scene 4, where, in a voice thrilling with sublime hate, the frenzied woman shrieks "Logos Nike anthropos Socrates!"' And you would glow with fervor, and say '_Zoue mou sas agapo_.' I tell you what, when it comes to dead languages----"

"It's too late, I hope, for you to get enthusiastic about the idea now," interrupted Nancy, firmly. "It wouldn't be a bit unlike you to get so carried away with it, that you'd suddenly change your mind about not going--and I'll tell you right now, that if you do I am emphatically _not_ with you. I don't like to improve my mind when I'm on a holiday--and Sat.u.r.days come only once a week."

"You should thirst for every opportunity to improve your understanding," reproved Charlotte, who could chatter away like a magpie, while her nimble fingers never lost a note, or stumbled in the rhythm of the lively dance tune she was playing.

"Don't forget _our_ little party, Alma," said Mildred Lloyd.

"Mademoiselle is going to chaperone us--I asked her yesterday. We're going in on the eleven-fifty-four, and the boys are going to meet us at Delmonico's at one."

Charlotte cast a sidelong glance at Nancy; she understood that Alma possessed all this information already, and that Mildred was making the announcement simply to excite the other girls' curiosity.

Since their quarrel Alma and Nancy, chiefly for the sake of outward appearances, had called an armistice. But while Nancy had not confided the first hint of the quarrel to Charlotte, poor Alma, who could never smother anything in her own heart, had unbosomed herself completely to Mildred. Needless to say, Mildred, who had disliked Nancy from the beginning, was not warmed toward her by any of the details in Alma's narrative that concerned herself. She knew that Alma had not told Nancy about their arrangements to go to the theatre, meeting two boys in town, of whom Frank Barrows was to be Alma's cavalier; and consequently, she surmised, quite correctly, that Nancy would be hurt when she spoke about the plan.

Alma shot a quick, uncertain look at her sister, and blushed; but Nancy only smiled, and asked, casually:

"What are you going to see?"

Alma's expression changed to one of relief.

"'Oh, Trixie!' Aren't we, Mildred?"

"Uh-huh. Everyone says it's a scream, and the music is perfect. I wanted to go to a regular play, but then I thought the boys would like a musical comedy better. By the way, Alma, I think I'll ask Miss Leland to let us go in on the ten-fourteen--I want to do some shopping.

It'll get us in at eleven, and we'll have two hours. I promised Madame Lepage that I'd come in to talk over a dress I want for the holidays--and then I've simply got to get a new hat."

The following morning, after the first study period, which closed the labors of the day at nine-thirty, Nancy heard a timid knock at the door. It was Alma, gloved and bonneted in her "Sunday-best," but with an agitated expression that was ill-suited to her festive appearance.

It was the first time that she had seen Nancy alone since the night of their quarrel.

"Oh, Charlotte's not here, is she?" she said, evidently much relieved.

"No, she walked up to the village to post a letter. We aren't going in until the eleven-fifty-four. Did you want to see her?"

"No, oh, no. You see, I--I----" Alma stammered, turning scarlet, and fidgeting nervously with the b.u.t.ton on her glove. "You see, I wondered if you could lend me--lend me just a little bit of money. I--I'll pay it right back. You see, I don't want Mildred--I mean this is a sort of Dutch treat----"

"Why, of course," laughed Nancy, touched and a little bit hurt by Alma's embarra.s.sment. Heretofore they had borrowed and lent to each other without the thought of explaining why they needed the money, and her sister's constraint marked with painful clearness her sense of the coldness between them. "How much do you want?"

"Could you lend me--ten dollars? Or seven would do. I won't use it all, of course, but--but it's better to have it."

Ten dollars was a good bit more than either of the girls had spent on any pleasure before the Porterbridges' dance; but Nancy said nothing, and going to her top bureau drawer, took out her pocketbook and gave Alma the bill without a second glance into the purse.

"Oh, _thank_ you--oh, Nancy!" Alma looked into her sister's face, and the tears came suddenly to her eyes.

"Goodness, you don't have to thank me like that," said Nancy, flushing.

"You know that it's no more my money than yours, dear----"

"You're--you're so good to me, Nancy---oh--I didn't mean----" and all at once Alma, who could restrain her sweet impulses no more easily than her weak ones, flung her arms around Nancy, and burst out crying. "Oh, darling Nancy, don't be angry with me any more. I can't bear it!"

"Alma, dearest---I'm _not_ angry--oh, I'm so glad--so glad!" cried Nancy, in tears, too; they clung together fiercely, every hard word forgotten in the joy of "making up."

"There, darling, you'll miss your train. There now, it's all just as it was. Oh, see, your hat's all over your eye"--they began to laugh tremulously. "You'd better put a little cold water on your face, sweetheart--and dust a little powder over it."

They hugged each other again, and, as Alma ran down the hall, Nancy stood at the door watching her, with brighter eyes than she had had for a week. But when Alma had disappeared below the landing of the stairs, she walked back into the room with a sober expression.

A quarter of an hour later she went again to the top bureau drawer to get out her gloves, and then thinking for the first time of the amount of money she had left herself, realized that she could have barely sufficient, if that, to defray her expenses of her own day in town.

Each of the girls had taken fifteen dollars to last them as pocket money up until Thanksgiving--a little she had already spent on shoe-laces, ribbons and so on, and she had given Alma ten. A glance into her purse showed her to her dismay that she had left herself exactly fifty-four cents. She knew, of course, that she could easily borrow from Charlotte, but this she was absolutely unwilling to do, first because she did not want to have to write to her mother for more money, and secondly because she did not want to do anything that she would not have Alma do. To borrow from Charlotte was one thing, but to have Alma follow her precedent was unwise; for in the first place, Alma would borrow from Mildred Lloyd or Kay Leonard, and in the second place, Alma might not know just where to set her limits. Nancy dropped the purse, and shut the drawer quietly. After all, she told herself, she had not deprived herself of so much pleasure that she should pity herself. It was a beautiful day, clear and sparkling, and she would enjoy herself just as much on a walk across country as at the "Countess Betsey." Nancy had the happy faculty of banishing any regrets for a pleasure which she could not reasonably take, and finding a subst.i.tute for it with perfect cheerfulness. The prospect of a free day, which she could spend as she liked, was as full of attraction for her as her original plan for the matinee had been, and when Charlotte strolled in upon her, she was whistling softly as she pulled on her scarlet tam-o'-shanter.

"Listen, Charlotte--don't kill me--but I'm afraid I've got to stay here after all. Do you mind awfully?" Naturally she could not give the reasons for her default on the theatre party; and because she had forgotten to think up a plausible excuse she flushed slightly.

"Oh, come now!" howled Charlotte in dismay. "You can't do anything like that. There's not an earthly reason why you should stay here, and you know it." Then quickly her singularly delicate tact warned her not to press Nancy. The very fact that her friend had not given a reason for breaking their engagement was enough for Charlotte to know that she should not ask for one. The two girls understood each other so well that they knew instinctively when to respect one another's silences.

"Well, if you can't, you can't, I suppose," she said quietly. "I'm awfully sorry; but we can go in next Sat.u.r.day. If you have anything to do, however, there's no point in my staying around out here. I'll go on in anyway. Do you want me to get anything for you?"

"Not a thing," replied Nancy, feeling an intense grat.i.tude toward Charlotte for not disputing her decision with her. "I'm glad you are going."

"Well, sit down and talk to me while I'm dressing. Alma's gone, hasn't she?"

"Yes. Oh, wear your brown hat, Charlotte--the one with the little feather on it."

"My dear, what does it matter--Drinkwater won't appreciate it."

"Doesn't matter. You'll be a thing of beauty whether she knows it or not, and that's reason enough for wearing it."

"Want me to bring out a pound of those scrumptious soft chocolates from Mailliards? Then we can have a regular festival on 'em to-night, if you're a good girl while I'm gone."