SURPRISES
“We’ll be caught!”
“Run! Run!”
“It will do no good,” said Rose-Mary. “Miss Bylow knows we had the
burrs.”
This statement was true, and the girls in the upper hallway looked at
each other in consternation. Then one of them, quick of wit, leaned
over the railing.
“Oh, Miss Bylow,” she said. “Did that hit you? How provoking!”
“Very!” cried the teacher tartly. She was about to say more, when
somebody called her from a rear door. She hesitated, then walked away
to answer the summons.
“What an escape!” breathed Edna.
“The next time, think before you throw,” said Rose-Mary.
“Indeed, I will,” was the quick reply. And then, as the crowd passed
on, Edna continued: “But where in the world is Dorothy? I haven’t seen
her since she came along dragging that dirty youth into the sacred
precincts of Glen.”
“Hush!” ordered Wanda Volk, “that was the first boy I have seen since I
came here. Don’t scare him off the premises.”
“Don’t!” followed in the usual girlish chorus.
“But I was talking of Dorothy,” continued Edna.
“She was at the tea table,” Cologne remarked.
“But left before jelly,” added Adele Thomas.
“And Tavia ate her share,” Lena Berg declared.
“I suppose,” went on Rose-Mary, “Dorothy is about this moment trimming
the hair of her hero. Did you notice the cut?”
“Notice it!” shrieked Ned. “Why, it called to us--wouldn’t let us pass.
That cut is termed ‘Christy,’ after the man who discovered maps.”
The girls had congregated in the alcove of the upper hall. It was a
pleasant fall evening and some proposed a game of “hide and seek” out
of doors.
This old-fashioned game was always a favorite pastime with the Glenwood
girls, and as the grounds afforded ample opportunity for discoveries
and hiding places, “hide and seek” ever had the preference over other
games as an after-tea amusement.
Promptly as the word had been passed along, the girls raced to the
campus, and were soon engrossed in the sport.
But Dorothy and Tavia were not with their companions. Instead, they
were walking with the strange boy along the quiet path, that was
separated from the school grounds by a row of close cedars. Dorothy was
urging, and so was Tavia.
“But if you go away from here, and out into the woods again,” said
Dorothy, “you will run a greater risk. Why not stay around, and help
with the outside work, as Mrs. Pangborn had proposed, until we can hear
from Aunt Winnie. Then, if everything is all right, you could go back
to the--”
“I’ll never go back!” interrupted the boy. “I would starve first.”
“No need to starve,” said Tavia. “Surely, with Dorothy anxious to help
you, you ought to listen and be reasonable.”
“Yes, I know that,” assented the boy, “but if you had to run and sneak
the way I have been doing, for the past two weeks, you wouldn’t--feel
so gay, either.”
“I know how you must feel,” answered Tavia, “but you see, we are right.
The only thing for you to do is to go back and have it all cleared up.”
“Perhaps,” said Dorothy, “I could go with you.”
“Then I wouldn’t be afraid,” promptly answered the stranger. “I know
you would see that I had fair play.”
“Good idea,” exclaimed Tavia. “Dorothy could do a lot with the people
out there. And everyone knows Mrs. White.”
“In the meantime I will have to wait to see what Aunt Winnie says,”
remarked Dorothy.
“Then I’m to stay at the garden house to-night?” asked the boy.
“Yes, and in the morning put on the things I have brought down there
for you. You can help the gardener’s wife around the house, and come up
to the grounds to see us about ten o’clock. We will come out here where
we can talk quietly.”
It was quite dusk now, and the game of “hide and seek” was over. Tavia
and Dorothy walked down towards the garden house, then said good-night
to the stranger, and hurried back, to be in with the others.
“What a queer thing?” remarked Tavia, all excitement from the meeting.
“I thought so, too, when I was ‘held up’ in the woods,” replied
Dorothy. “But, after all, it was a very lucky meeting.”
“And I think Miette looks so much better--she was quite cheerful when
she came in,” went on Tavia.
“Yes, I found out that she never wrote the note in the classroom, and I
mean to tell Mrs. Pangborn so, first thing in the morning. Miette was
willing to go to her, herself, but I think it may be best for me to
speak to Mrs. Pangborn first.”
“What on earth would Glenwood girls do without you?” asked Tavia,
laughing. “You are a regular adjustment bureau.”
“Some one has to do it,” replied Dorothy simply.
“Why don’t you let them, then?” asked Tavia, just to tease her friend.
“A natural inclination to meddle,” remarked Dorothy, “keeps me going. I
suppose I really should not monopolize the interesting work.”
“Oh, you’re welcome. I don’t happen to know any one who objects.”
But the work with which Dorothy was at present engaged was not so
simple as she would have her friend believe.
In the first place, Miette’s troubles were not at all easy to handle.
The girl was naturally secretive, and with the obligation of keeping
her affairs entirely to herself (as she had explained to Dorothy those
were her orders from someone) it was a difficult matter to understand
just why she should “go to pieces” over the small happening of having
lost a note.
Now Dorothy had at least found out that the note was not written
contrary to school orders, so that would be one fact to Miette’s
credit, whatever else might remain to her discomfort in the actual loss
of the note.
Dorothy tried to think it out. She had a way of putting her brain to
work on important matters, and in this way she now went at the question
seriously.
To be alone she left her room and slipped down to the chapel, which was
deserted.
“I simply must think it out,” she told herself. “I must have some clear
explanation to offer Mrs. Pangborn.”
Then she went over it all, from beginning to end.
Miette had suddenly become almost hysterical over the announcement made
on initiation night. Then she tried to get back the note and found
Nita had handed it over to Miss Bylow. This added to her anxiety. She
declared she would have to leave Glenwood if the contents of the note
became known. Then Dorothy learned that the charge against Miette was a
mistake--that the note had been written before class time. But that was
as far as Dorothy’s investigation went. Miette hinted that her friend
was a working girl, but what could that matter? Dorothy had assured
Miette that many of her own friends belonged to the working class.
So Dorothy pondered. The chapel was silent, and an atmosphere of
devotion filled the pretty alcoved room.
“I will go directly to Mrs. Pangborn,” concluded Dorothy. “There is no
use of my trying to think it out further.”
But Dorothy had not reached the office when Miette came upon her in the
hall. She was excited and looking for Dorothy.
“Oh, do come to my room!” she begged. “I am in such trouble! I know
of no one to go to but you,” and she took Dorothy’s hand in her own
trembling palm, and drew her over to the room across the hall.
“I have had a letter,” began Miette, “from Marie--the girl the note
was written to. And now I must tell you--for I do not know what to do
myself.”
Miette looked into Dorothy’s eyes with a strange appealing expression.
“I will do all I can for you,” answered Dorothy, dropping into the
cushioned tete beside Miette.
“You know I lived with my aunt--that is, she was my father’s brother’s
wife, not my real aunt,” explained Miette, with careful discrimination.
“When I came to New York my uncle was at home, but he soon went away.
Then my aunt was not so kind, and I--had to go to work!”
Miette said this as if she had disclosed some awful secret.
“What harm was it to go to work?” Dorothy could not help inquiring
abruptly.
“Harm!” repeated Miette, “When my mother was not poor, and she
sent me to my uncle to be educated? They must have used my money,
and--and--Don’t you see?” asked Miette, vaguely.
“But why, then, did they send you to Glenwood?” asked Dorothy, still
puzzled.
“Perhaps to--get rid of me,” answered Miette. “That is what I wanted to
talk to you about. I have written two letters and received no answer.
Now, Marie, the girl who worked in the store with me, has written that
my aunt is no longer living in the brick house.”
“She may have moved--that would not have to mean that she has--gone
away.”
“Oh, but I am sure,” replied Miette, still agitated. “First my uncle
goes, now she is gone, and they have left me alone!”
Dorothy was too surprised to answer at once. Miette seemed very much
excited, but not altogether distressed.
“Suppose we go together to Mrs. Pangborn?” suggested Dorothy, “she will
know exactly what to do.”
“If you think so,” replied Miette. “You see, I had to be so careful
about keeping the working part secret, for my aunt--said she would put
me in an institution if I ever told that. She said it was a disgrace,
and that I had to go to the store because I was--stupid, and did not
learn all the American ways at once. Now, I do not believe her, for I
got along well here, and the girls here are surely--refined.”
Dorothy thought this a very strange story--too strange for her to draw
reasonable conclusions from.
“Mrs. Pangborn is always in her office at this hour,” she told Miette.
“Come at once. We will feel better to have her motherly advice.”