“Darling Phœbe,” gushed Miss Simpson, “how do you do!”
“How do you do,” responded Phœbe, rising politely.
“It’s so _nice_ to see you again,” went on the Principal. “Oh, my dear,
we’ve missed you so much!”
“Thank you.”
Such straight looking out of those frank eyes, and such cool poise, was
most disconcerting. Miss Simpson, with a smile that was wholly muscular,
changed the subject by bending down to Phœbe’s book. “‘Kenilworth’?” she
cried in delighted surprise. “Do you enjoy it, Phœbe?”
“I love it,” answered Phœbe, with quiet sincerity. “Every day I read it
with Uncle John—Sir Walter Scott in twelve volumes.”
Miss Simpson turned to Grandma, waiting and smiling and nodding her
white head at the far end of the library table. “Dr. Blair must be such
a great help to Phœbe,” she declared.
“Oh, he is.” Phœbe did not wait for Grandma. “Uncle John is my tutor,
and I like having a tutor.”
Miss Simpson fell back a step, as at some new and disconcerting thought.
“Do you, dear?” she murmured, and sank, still staring at Phœbe, to a
convenient chair.
“I do,” returned Phœbe. “You know princesses always have governesses and
tutors. I’ve seen them in the movies.”
“The movies!” exclaimed Miss Simpson.
“But Phœbe doesn’t go to them,” said Grandma, quickly. “Dear Phœbe, you
know you don’t.”
Phœbe remembered what Sophie had said about keeping one’s chin up. She
raised hers now. “I used to,” she reminded. “So I know. And Uncle John
and I are reading Dickens’s ‘Child’s History of England’—it’s a
wonderful book. Oh, we’ve got a whole year’s work planned out.”
Miss Simpson sat back, swallowed, glanced right and left—then broke
forth in a smile that was meant to be warmly diplomatic. “I see,” she
cooed. “But I’ve come today, Phœbe, because—ah—er—I’m calling on all of
my pupils for the Fall term, and so——”
Up went Phœbe’s chin another inch. She returned the diplomatic smile.
“But, Miss Simpson,” she protested pleasantly, “I wouldn’t change my
tutor for anything. Uncle Bob says a tutor is ever so much more stylish
than a private school.”
Miss Simpson’s face set. She rose as if propelled upward by a spring.
“However,” she said icily, “a private school might be of great value to
you. It might help to eradicate the effect of your moving-picture
training, and teach you that nice little girls are never loquacious.”
Now she revolved toward Phœbe’s grandmother. “Where, I wonder, is dear
Genevieve?” she inquired.
“Grandma,” said Phœbe, “Genevieve didn’t seem to care a bit for this
wonderful ‘Kenilworth’, so she’s outside.”
“Good afternoon, Mrs. Blair.” Miss Simpson extended a long arm.
“But you’ll have a cup of tea, won’t you, Miss Simpson?”—Grandma was
following her guest, who was even now at the hall door. “The Judge will
be home, and he’ll be so glad to see you, and——” Miss Simpson was
already in the hall; Grandma went with her, closing the door upon the
straight-standing, angry little figure at the middle of the library
floor.
“Yes, have a cup of tea, Miss Simpson!” cried Phœbe, wrathful. “The
Judge’ll be home and he _won’t_ be glad to see you! You’ll take me back,
now that my mother’s dead! Well, you won’t! I’ll read the classics
first! Scott!”—she whirled “Kenilworth” to the sofa—“And History! And
anything!” Whereat she flung herself bodily atop the book and the sofa,
buried her face in a cushion and wept.
“Phœbe!” It was Sophie, come to hear the results of the Simpson visit.
“Whatever is the matter?”
Phœbe sat up. “Lots of things,” she declared. “This house—it never gets
any smaller. And everybody grown up. And, oh, think of having Uncle John
six days of the week at home and twice at church on Sunday!”
Sophie laughed. “Don’t blame y’,” she confided. “But I hope you said No
to her.” She jerked her head toward the hall.
“I did.” Phœbe got up. Rebellion flamed in her cheeks. “But, Sophie,
there’s one thing sure. Something’s got to happen: Public school or the
movies!”
“Land sakes!” gasped Sophie. “Don’t you know your folks’ll never let you
go to public school?”
“They won’t?” Phœbe went close to Sophie, and lowered her voice. “Then
it’s the movies,” she declared. “I’m not going to stand things any more.
I’m going to see some pictures and I’m going with you!”
“Phœbe Blair!”
“My mother took me. It isn’t wrong.”
“But the folks! If they ketch us——” Sophie threw up both hands.
“They won’t. They think I’m asleep at nine o’clock. We can go just
before that, and see a picture when it’s on for the second time. We can
steal down the back stairs—I’ll carry my shoes. Oh, Sophie, will you do
it? Say Yes! I haven’t seen a picture for months!”
“We-e-ell,”—Sophie was visibly weakening—“I might. Because I think
you’re kept in too close. And that ain’t good for any kid.”
“Oh, I want to see just one more five-reeler!” pleaded Phœbe.
“If I take y’ just once?” Sophie held up a finger.
Phœbe had won. She threw her arms about Sophie, almost smothering her.
“Darling Sophie! Oh, Sophie, you’re a girl, and you understand!—Oh,
Sophie, who’s the star I’ll see tonight?”
Sophie half turned away. She raised ecstatic eyes to the neighborhood of
Uncle John’s Map of Palestine. She sighed. “William S. Hart,” she half
whispered.
“William S. Hart,” repeated Phœbe. She echoed the sigh.
“Oh, he’s grand!” breathed Sophie.
Phœbe touched Sophie with an anxious hand. “What girl is playing with
him now?” she asked jealously.
“I don’t remember. But”—enviously—“she’s awful pretty.”
“Does he—like her?” went on Phœbe.
“Oh, he’s crazy about her!”
“Mm!” Phœbe considered the toe of a shoe. Now and again, in the case of
this particular star, she had dreamed dreams. She had looked forward to
a time when her hair would be up and her dresses longer; then, if her
plans worked out satisfactorily, might _she_ not be a moving-picture
actress, and play with her favorite hero?
“When he told her how he loved her,” mused Sophie, almost as if to
herself, “and asked her to be his bride——”
Phœbe came back to sad realities. “How did he ask her?” she wanted to
know.
“She was settin’,” recounted Sophie. “He come close, and looked at her.
She dropped her eyes; so he reached over and took her hand. Next, down
he went on one knee. ‘Dear little woman,’—that’s what it read in
print—‘let us ride into the sunset together!’” Sophie gestured,
indicating a possible sunset.
“But did she say Yes?” inquired Phœbe, impatiently.
“Well, not just at first. She kinda hung off——”
“Goodness!” exclaimed Phœbe, incredulous. She walked to and fro, head
down.
“But think of it! A gang of Indians come scootin’ up to the Ranch. And
he fought ’em all, and saved her. So she took him, and he kissed her——!”
Phœbe paused. It seemed to her then as if she were to be penned up
forever in this small town which she so hated; as if she would never
grow up, and be able to say what she would do; as if other girls—this
William S. Hart girl, for instance—simply had everything. In an excess
of resentment she went up to Uncle John’s favorite armchair—and kicked
it!